Customer Reviews

Cosmic Suicide: The Tragedy and Transcendence of Heaven's Gate

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Suicide cults! Apple sauce! Sexless androgenoids! Sure there are satanic cults, drug cults, Ufo cults, Christ cults, Hip hop cults, beenie-baby cults, Ebay cults, and even tupperware cults, but none come close to the inspired zaniness of Doe's Heaven's Gate cult.

I've been an observer of cults for most of my adult life and I must admit that I've got a soft-spot in me for all of them. Many books are written in the aftermaths of these cults and most are a boring lethargic read. Victims families are trotted out for the dog & pony show and stoic lawmen denounce the "crimes". NOT IN THIS BOOK!

Here, Forrest Jackson and Rodney Perkins become entrenched in the genesis of the Heaven's Gate cult as well as interpreting the parallels with other cults and pull back the veil on our own cult dominated society, exposing our fetishes for some cults and our poison hatred of others. Not only is this book a fun read because of the scalpel-altered DOE and his suicide-prone squad of comet pilots, but this book takes it's subject matter seriously, and never in a Bugliosi tone of superiority. The closest equivalent that I can think of to this book in terms of cult research is MESSENGERS OF DECEPTION by Dr. Jacques Vallee.

COSMIC SUICIDE is one of the best books written about the Heaven's Gate cult, hands down and it's written from the desk of someone who did the leg work and circumvented all the idiot editorializing that this book would have been subjected to had it been published by a major publishing house. To put it simply... if cults are your thing... especially the Heaven's Gate cult.... then BUY THIS BOOK!

This is one of those rare gems that is both informative, and interesting. It covers a lot more ground then just the history of the heavens gate cult. There are Ideas on why our society is causing a rise in such splinter groups. Most books about cults tend to be either biased, or boring; this is neither. First rate journalism, unpretentius writing, concise and to the point style, make this an enjoyable must read for any one who desires to be socialy aware.

The reasoning and worldview of religious minorities are often difficult, impossible even, to understand for an outsider. What he or she sees as completely bizarre and incomprehensible is for the believer quite normal and natural. Not rarely is there a major clash when the two worldviews meet, and history is thus filled with conflicts between dominating religious beliefs and exotic and strange groups.

The "UFO-cult" known as Heaven's Gate is one of the most notorious new religious movements in modern times, with the media going into a genuine frenzy after their well-known mass suicide in San Diego in 1997 where close to forty members lost their lives. They were convinced that an extraterrestrial spacecraft was hidden behind the comet Hale-Bopp, an idea planted in them by their leader Marshall Applewhite. However, the fact that such (in)famous UFO people as radio host Art Bell and author/abductee Whitley Strieber were positive to this idea was definitely not an obstacle in the strengthening of the beliefs of the soon-to-be victims. The pictures of the alleged spacecraft were proven to be hoaxes, and mainstream science declared the comet to be just that: a very ordinary comet. Still, that did nothing to quench the suicidal ideas.

Perkins' and Jackson's book is a thin little thing with a little more than 100 pages. However, the small scale doesn't mean the quality is low. It was originally published in 1997, the same year the tragedy took place, and is filled to the brim with interesting facts about Heaven's Gate, its history, and worldview. A worldview that, when it comes down to it, wasn't really that different from other, more established religions. Using a comparative approach the authors show how different parts of the ideas can be found in other religions and/or in earlier eras. The language is easy to understand, so you don't have to be a scholar of religion to benefit from the reading. The text is furthermore filled with miscellaneous little stories and details that many other essays and studies about the group have left out or ignored. These stories and details might not provide a better comprehensive picture of the group, but they sure make the reading more fascinating.

Still, the fact that the book was published in 1997 makes the section about the internet, quite understandably, feel somewhat outdated, and I must say that the conclusion that Applewhite founded the movement as a result of his homosexuality and the negative response from the Christian church is very weak indeed. But it's nonetheless a book worth reading, primarily due to the understanding it offers. Alternative religious movements are often hard to grasp, but by reading this book one will gain a somewhat thorough understanding of why the members did what they did, how they viewed their bodies more as "containers" than bodies, and how they as a result of this regarded their actions not as suicides per se. They simply moved on to a different level. The greatest insight offered by the book, however, is that readers will learn about other "normal" people, who chose to do something radically different and incomprehensible while at the same time being able to rationalize it completely, at least according to their view of the world.

I happened across Forrest Jackson's blurb about how inexpensive his book is if bought through him. Correct this was.
Not only is this book fabulous, but Mr. Jackson was a pleasure to deal with by email. He was ultra-quick in responses, polite and even asked if I might like him to inscribe it, or would I prefere to have no handwritting on or in the book. Very considerate.
Thank you, Mr. Jackson. I give this book and you a very high review.

If you buy it direct from the publisher, you can buy it for $12 which is $70 cheaper than what was being offered from maket place sellers via Amazon.com when I was looking to get hold of a copy. Information below:

Cosmic Suicide is available for $12 ppd. from The Pentaradial Press, P. O. Box 600318, Dallas, TX 75360.

E-mail: forrestjackson@hotmail.com.

Forest was great in getting it to me really fast - I haven't yet read it.

This book expored all that was evident in the the tragedy of Heaven's Gate and i found it to be very descriptive in that it explored the subject to a rather deep extent. I enjoyed it and found it quite interesting.

I am doing a term paper on cults for a sociology class. I picked this topic because I have always found cults, their members, and their leaders particularly interesting. I bought this book to help me in my research, but didn't read far before knowing it wasn't going to be what I had hoped.

The book is not very maturely written, with a little too much tongue-in-cheek wit for its own good. Aware of its own stability among the seemingly lost sanity of the cult, the writers become presumptuous- even boring.

The biggest problem I had with the book is that it is more of a review of cults and sects in general... while it is certainly helpful to offer insight through comparison to other cults/sects, the comparisons in this book overtook it. For every piece of Heaven's Gate information, there were five facts about cults in general-- information that is certainly good to know, but should be in a book titled, "Cults," not a book claiming to be about a specific incident.

The book handles the history of the leaders, but gives little insight into their emotional stances or those of the members. After reading the book, I am slightly more knowledgable about cults in general, fairly well-versed in tidbits about other cults, somewhat aware of what happened in Heaven's Gate, and accutely aware of where the cult's leader went to school and the general idea of hysteria over armaggedon.

Read this book for a little more info on Heaven's Gate. Don't read it expecting insight on the specifics of the cult itself.

Cosmic Suicide remains available from the publisher for only $12.00 (postpaid in the U.S., too!)

Send a check or money order (or carefully concealed cash, if you're brave) to:

Forrest Jackson
POBOX 600318
Dallas, TX 75360

Personal inscriptions available upon request.

This book expored all that was evident in the the tragedy of Heaven's Gate and i found it to be very descriptive in that it explored the subject to a rather deep extent. I enjoyed it and found it quite interesting.

I was excited to read this book since material on the Heavens Gate group is woefully lacking. The book had much information, some of it somewhat obscure about the group and I found the history of the group from start to finish to be reported in an interesting, entertaining matter. There was something I had a problem with though.The Authors had a very judgmental attitude towards members of the group. Several times, they called them insane,disturbed and used other unflattering terms to describe them. I'm not a believer in Heaven Gates theology by any means, but I would have much rather seen a straightforward reporting of events than the Authors making so much of a value judgement and constantly asserting so much of their own commentary based on their personal opinions.They seemed to have the same sort of Attitude towards any sort of religion .There are many books of essays in which different writers assert their views on various groups and I felt that it would have been better suited for such an anthology.
It is no way takes away from the quality of the book . I just found that to be a bit irritating.
This is the best book out there on Heavens Gate that I've come across and I would recommend it to anyone who wants to learn more.