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Gurdjieff, A Very Great Enigma: Three Lectures

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During the Summer of 1963, Mr. J. G. Bennett delivered three lectures on Gurdjieff at Denison House. Mr. Bennett was the one person, perhaps, who could speak with authority upon the controversial and little-known figure of the Master, Gurdjieff.

The first lecture acquainted his audience with the incredible enviroment of Gurdjieff's boyhood. Such compelling names of places and peoples threaded their way through Mr. Bennett's lecture. He spoke of the Greeks of Caesaria and Alexandropol. The early invasions of the Turks, Armenians and Assyrians came to his mind, as the Sack of Kars in April of 1877.

The second lecture was devoted to the sources of Gurdjieff's ideas. The reader will be intrigued with his associations with the Armenian Secret Societies; of Sufism and the Dervish Brotherhoods; and of the Sufi Recluses of Persia and Turkestan. In this lecture, we find Gurdjieff known as the Wonder Worker, who was evidently influenced by Russian Occultism and Zoastrian teachings.

The third lecture, which dealt with Gurdjieff's teachings and methods, revealed a man with the basic human problems such assail every man. It, also, allowed the audience to see the practicality of the man through the plans he made and their execution. There remains an unanswered question: "How did Gurdjieff intend his work to continue?"
--- from book's back cover