The Book of est
Encyclopedia
The Book of est is a fiction
al book about Werner Erhard
's Erhard Seminars Training
(est), first published in 1976 by Holt, Rinehart and Winston. The book was written by est graduate Luke Rhinehart. Rhinehart is the pen name
of writer George Cockroft. The book was endorsed by Erhard, and includes a foreword by him. Its contents attempts to replicate the experience of the est training, and the reader takes the place of a participant in the course. The end of the book includes a comparison by the author between Erhard's methodologies to Zen
, The Teachings of Don Juan
by Carlos Castaneda
, and to Rhinehart's own views from The Dice Man
.
Reception of the book was negative, with critical reviews in Library Journal
, Kirkus Reviews
, and The New York Times Book Review
. An article about Erhard and est in the religious journal Quarerly Review placed the book among "the most accessible sources about est". Professor Walter A. Effross of the American University Washington College of Law cites The Book of est in an article in the Buffalo Law Review analyzing the control of new age
movements over their intellectual property
.
(born John Paul Rosenberg), a California-based former salesman, training manager and executive in the encyclopedia business, created the Erhard Seminars Training
(est) course in 1971. est was a form of Large Group Awareness Training
, and was part of the Human Potential Movement
. est was a four-day, 60-hour self-help program given to groups of 250 people at a time. The program was very intensive: each day would contain 15–20 hours of instruction. During the training, est personnel utilized jargon to convey key concepts, and participants had to agree to certain rules which remained in effect for the duration of the course. Participants were taught that they were responsible for their life outcomes, and were promised a dramatic change in their self-perception.
By 1977 over 100,000 people completed the est training, including public figures and mental health professionals. est was controversial: critics characterized the training methods as brainwashing, and suggested that the program had fascistic
and narcissistic
tendencies. Proponents asserted that it had a profoundly positive impact on people's lives. In 1985, Werner Erhard and Associates
repackaged the course as "The Forum", a seminar focused on "goal-oriented breakthroughs". By 1988, approximately one million people had taken some form of the trainings. In 1991 a group of his associates formed the company Landmark Education
, purchasing The Forum's course "technology" from Erhard.
in 1983 by Hugendubel
. In November 2008, Luke Rhinehart, in association with Joe Vitale and Mark J. Ryan, re-released The Book of est as an E-book
.
. Erhard writes in the foreword that Rhinehart's book "brilliantly ... communicates clearly to the reader both a sense of being in the training room and the spirit of what takes place there." Erhard's foreword notes: "although this book dramatizes the highlights of the training and attempts to give you the vicarious experience of being at a training, this is a book, and the est experience cannot result from reading any book".
With Erhard's endorsement, Rhinehart attempts to replicate the "transformation" experience from est. The book imparts the message that the participant's life "doesn't work", and that after two weekends the individual will come to understand how to "win". The book presents a fictional dramatization of the est training. Punctuation style usage including exclamation points and boldface type bring the reader's attention to key items in the text.
Rhinehart describes the est training as a form of participatory theatre
, writing: "Seeing the trainer as a master actor ... permits us to evaluate his acts and words more intelligently than if we misinterpret him as being a scholar or scientist giving a lecture." In an analysis of how to approach the est training, Rhinehart comments that "It might best be described, if it can be described at all, as theater—as living theater, participatory theater, encounter theater. Once we begin to see est in these terms, much that fails to fit the scheme of therapy or religion or science begins to make sense."
In Rhinehart's fictional account of the training, the est course leader begins with the instruction: "Let me make one thing clear. I don't want any of you to believe a thing I'm saying. Get that. Don't believe me. Just listen." The est trainer explains that the course techniques are used because "Werner has found that they work." When one of the est participants asks why the instructor says certain statements during the course, the instructor responds: "I'm saying them because Werner has found that the trainer's saying them works."
Participants in est are told that they cannot take notes during the course, and at the end of the seminar the instructor declines to go over a review of the training. In order to participate in the course, trainees must adhere to agreements which include: they may not exit the course facility except during specified break time, they cannot sit next to someone they knew before coming to the course, and they cannot take unprescribed medications or alcohol for the week prior to the training.
Individuals are given a chance to receive a full refund and leave the course after the instructor goes over the course agreements. A second chance to leave the course and receive a refund is offered on the third day of the course. At the end of the training, the seminar participants are strongly encouraged to bring guests to sign up for the course – participants are instructed that "bringing guests is a manifestation of a person's willingness to participate in life."
The concluding portion of the book includes a comparison of Werner Erhard's methodologies to Zen
, The Teachings of Don Juan
by Carlos Castaneda
, and to Rhinehart's views from The Dice Man
. Drawing a parallel to the "controlled folly" described in Castaneda's A Separate Reality
, Rhinehart argues that in almost all cases, enlightenment is linked to humor: "One can rarely have an enlightenment experience except under the impact of nonsense ... Every time we laugh we are in a way experiencing a mini enlightenment, a tiny letting go of some attachment to some bit of belief or sense. Full enlightenment, in these terms, is accepting what is, which leads to experiencing fully whatever one is experiencing."
Rhinehart comments that those who have taken part in the est training feel the need for a sense of community: "Most graduates indicate that the value of the seminar series depends not so much on is ostensible data content or on the processes introduced, but on the sharing on an intimate basis with others." He notes that some of the graduates of the est training "treat him [Erhard] with the love and awe normally associated with that of disciples for spiritual teachers". He likens Erhard's relationship to his staff members to the way in which a guru
interacts with disciple
s: "[It is] the essentially eastern phenomenon of a powerful being (usually a guru or a spiritual teacher) attracting other powerful beings who nevertheless choose to channel their power through their leader." Rhinehart argues that est "may be seen as in many ways the culmination to date of the 'Easternization of America', a process that first became notable in the late fifties and early sixties".
, "Questions of effectiveness or possible harm are hardly considered." Charney characterizes the problem of the book and its subject matter as a "kind of with-it diffuseness which disallows any intelligent understanding on principle". In a review of the book for The New York Times Book Review
, Zane Berzins was critical of the work, commenting: "There isn't much to be said for the book except that it exudes a kind of repellent fascination." A review of the book in Kirkus Reviews
was negative; the review characterizes it as, "Not a book, really. A verbatim transcription of one of Werner Erhard's weekend sessions in $250 doublethink." Kirkus Reviews criticizes the author for not engaging in any judgmental analysis of the est training methodology. The review concludes, "at least the reader finally has an opportunity to see what an estian seminar is, with vomit bags, circuitous logic, pathetic interplay between overbearing trainer and angst-ridden trainee, and all."
In an article about Erhard and est for the religious journal Quarterly Review, Florida International University
assistant religious studies professor Robert R. Hann places the book among "the most accessible sources about est". Hann comments that since the book has been "reviewed by Erhard and carries his statement of support for the author", it "can therefore be presumed to be, if not 'canonical,' then at least not significantly at odds with the perspective of est itself."
Professor Walter A. Effross of the American University Washington College of Law cites The Book of est along with Adelaide Bry's est: 60 Hours That Transform Your Life, in an article in the Buffalo Law Review analyzing the control of new age
movements over their intellectual property. Effross notes that the copyright page of The Book of est gives a notice that: "material based in part on unpublished lectures created and copyrighted by Werner Erhard and used by the author with his permission. No material created and copyrighted by Werner Erhard may be used or disseminated in any medium or language without his prior written authorization." Effross comments on the potential loss of control over his material that Erhard may have invited due to endorsing these books about his methodology: "...because it enabled commentators to make 'fair use' of the disclosed information, it was not helpful for ... Werner Erhard, the founder of est, to endorse a first-person account of an est training, even one which provided only simulations of est's 'processes,' or guided meditations. (However, the publicity [Erhard's organization] achieved from such exposure during crucial periods of ... expansion may have been seen as justifying the intellectual property risk.)"
Fiction
Fiction is the form of any narrative or informative work that deals, in part or in whole, with information or events that are not factual, but rather, imaginary—that is, invented by the author. Although fiction describes a major branch of literary work, it may also refer to theatrical,...
al book about Werner Erhard
Werner Erhard
Werner Hans Erhard is an author of transformational models and applications for individuals, groups, and organizations...
's Erhard Seminars Training
Erhard Seminars Training
Erhard Seminars Training, an organization founded by Werner H. Erhard, offered a two-weekend course known officially as "The est Standard Training"...
(est), first published in 1976 by Holt, Rinehart and Winston. The book was written by est graduate Luke Rhinehart. Rhinehart is the pen name
Pen name
A pen name, nom de plume, or literary double, is a pseudonym adopted by an author. A pen name may be used to make the author's name more distinctive, to disguise his or her gender, to distance an author from some or all of his or her works, to protect the author from retribution for his or her...
of writer George Cockroft. The book was endorsed by Erhard, and includes a foreword by him. Its contents attempts to replicate the experience of the est training, and the reader takes the place of a participant in the course. The end of the book includes a comparison by the author between Erhard's methodologies to Zen
Zen
Zen is a school of Mahāyāna Buddhism founded by the Buddhist monk Bodhidharma. The word Zen is from the Japanese pronunciation of the Chinese word Chán , which in turn is derived from the Sanskrit word dhyāna, which can be approximately translated as "meditation" or "meditative state."Zen...
, The Teachings of Don Juan
The Teachings of Don Juan
The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge was published by the University of California Press in 1968 as a work of anthropology. It was written by Carlos Castaneda and submitted as his master’s thesis in the school of anthropology...
by Carlos Castaneda
Carlos Castaneda
Carlos Castaneda was a Peruvian-born American anthropologist and author....
, and to Rhinehart's own views from The Dice Man
The Dice Man
The Dice Man is a novel published in 1971 by George Cockcroft under the pen name Luke Rhinehart and tells the story of a psychiatrist who begins making life decisions based on the casting of dice. Cockcroft wrote the book based on his own experiences of using dice to make decisions while studying...
.
Reception of the book was negative, with critical reviews in Library Journal
Library Journal
Library Journal is a trade publication for librarians. It was founded in 1876 by Melvil Dewey . It reports news about the library world, emphasizing public libraries, and offers feature articles about aspects of professional practice...
, Kirkus Reviews
Kirkus Reviews
Kirkus Reviews is an American book review magazine founded in 1933 by Virginia Kirkus . Kirkus serves the book and literary trade sector, including libraries, publishers, literary and film agents, film and TV producers and booksellers. Kirkus Reviews is published on the first and 15th of each month...
, and The New York Times Book Review
The New York Times Book Review
The New York Times Book Review is a weekly paper-magazine supplement to The New York Times in which current non-fiction and fiction books are reviewed. It is one of the most influential and widely read book review publications in the industry. The offices are located near Times Square in New York...
. An article about Erhard and est in the religious journal Quarerly Review placed the book among "the most accessible sources about est". Professor Walter A. Effross of the American University Washington College of Law cites The Book of est in an article in the Buffalo Law Review analyzing the control of new age
New Age
The New Age movement is a Western spiritual movement that developed in the second half of the 20th century. Its central precepts have been described as "drawing on both Eastern and Western spiritual and metaphysical traditions and then infusing them with influences from self-help and motivational...
movements over their intellectual property
Intellectual property
Intellectual property is a term referring to a number of distinct types of creations of the mind for which a set of exclusive rights are recognized—and the corresponding fields of law...
.
Background
Werner ErhardWerner Erhard
Werner Hans Erhard is an author of transformational models and applications for individuals, groups, and organizations...
(born John Paul Rosenberg), a California-based former salesman, training manager and executive in the encyclopedia business, created the Erhard Seminars Training
Erhard Seminars Training
Erhard Seminars Training, an organization founded by Werner H. Erhard, offered a two-weekend course known officially as "The est Standard Training"...
(est) course in 1971. est was a form of Large Group Awareness Training
Large Group Awareness Training
Large-group awareness training refers to activities usually offered by groups linked with the human potential movement which claim to increase self-awareness and bring about desirable transformations in individuals' personal lives...
, and was part of the Human Potential Movement
Human Potential Movement
The Human Potential Movement arose out of the social and intellectual milieu of the 1960s and formed around the concept of cultivating extraordinary potential that its advocates believed to lie largely untapped in all people...
. est was a four-day, 60-hour self-help program given to groups of 250 people at a time. The program was very intensive: each day would contain 15–20 hours of instruction. During the training, est personnel utilized jargon to convey key concepts, and participants had to agree to certain rules which remained in effect for the duration of the course. Participants were taught that they were responsible for their life outcomes, and were promised a dramatic change in their self-perception.
By 1977 over 100,000 people completed the est training, including public figures and mental health professionals. est was controversial: critics characterized the training methods as brainwashing, and suggested that the program had fascistic
Fascism
Fascism is a radical authoritarian nationalist political ideology. Fascists seek to rejuvenate their nation based on commitment to the national community as an organic entity, in which individuals are bound together in national identity by suprapersonal connections of ancestry, culture, and blood...
and narcissistic
Narcissism
Narcissism is a term with a wide range of meanings, depending on whether it is used to describe a central concept of psychoanalytic theory, a mental illness, a social or cultural problem, or simply a personality trait...
tendencies. Proponents asserted that it had a profoundly positive impact on people's lives. In 1985, Werner Erhard and Associates
Werner Erhard and Associates
Werner Erhard and Associates, also known as WE&A or as WEA, operated as a commercial entity from February 1981 until early 1991. It replaced Erhard Seminars Training, Inc. as the vehicle for marketing, selling and imparting the content of the est training, and offered what some people refer to as...
repackaged the course as "The Forum", a seminar focused on "goal-oriented breakthroughs". By 1988, approximately one million people had taken some form of the trainings. In 1991 a group of his associates formed the company Landmark Education
Landmark Education
Landmark Education LLC is a personal training and development company which offers educational programs in approximately 115 locations in more than 20 countries worldwide....
, purchasing The Forum's course "technology" from Erhard.
Publication
The book was first published in 1976 in a hardcover format by Holt, Rinehart and Winston, and a paperback edition was released later in the same year. It was published in GermanGerman language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
in 1983 by Hugendubel
Hugendubel
Hugendubel is, along with Thalia, one of two major book retailers in Germany. It was founded in 1893 by Heinrich Karl Gustav Hugendubel in Munich.- History :...
. In November 2008, Luke Rhinehart, in association with Joe Vitale and Mark J. Ryan, re-released The Book of est as an E-book
E-book
An electronic book is a book-length publication in digital form, consisting of text, images, or both, and produced on, published through, and readable on computers or other electronic devices. Sometimes the equivalent of a conventional printed book, e-books can also be born digital...
.
Contents
The Book of est includes a one-page foreword by Werner ErhardWerner Erhard
Werner Hans Erhard is an author of transformational models and applications for individuals, groups, and organizations...
. Erhard writes in the foreword that Rhinehart's book "brilliantly ... communicates clearly to the reader both a sense of being in the training room and the spirit of what takes place there." Erhard's foreword notes: "although this book dramatizes the highlights of the training and attempts to give you the vicarious experience of being at a training, this is a book, and the est experience cannot result from reading any book".
With Erhard's endorsement, Rhinehart attempts to replicate the "transformation" experience from est. The book imparts the message that the participant's life "doesn't work", and that after two weekends the individual will come to understand how to "win". The book presents a fictional dramatization of the est training. Punctuation style usage including exclamation points and boldface type bring the reader's attention to key items in the text.
Rhinehart describes the est training as a form of participatory theatre
Participatory theatre
Participatory theatre is a form of theatre in which the audience interacts with the performers or the presenters. Classroom exercises often include elements of participatory theatre....
, writing: "Seeing the trainer as a master actor ... permits us to evaluate his acts and words more intelligently than if we misinterpret him as being a scholar or scientist giving a lecture." In an analysis of how to approach the est training, Rhinehart comments that "It might best be described, if it can be described at all, as theater—as living theater, participatory theater, encounter theater. Once we begin to see est in these terms, much that fails to fit the scheme of therapy or religion or science begins to make sense."
In Rhinehart's fictional account of the training, the est course leader begins with the instruction: "Let me make one thing clear. I don't want any of you to believe a thing I'm saying. Get that. Don't believe me. Just listen." The est trainer explains that the course techniques are used because "Werner has found that they work." When one of the est participants asks why the instructor says certain statements during the course, the instructor responds: "I'm saying them because Werner has found that the trainer's saying them works."
Participants in est are told that they cannot take notes during the course, and at the end of the seminar the instructor declines to go over a review of the training. In order to participate in the course, trainees must adhere to agreements which include: they may not exit the course facility except during specified break time, they cannot sit next to someone they knew before coming to the course, and they cannot take unprescribed medications or alcohol for the week prior to the training.
Individuals are given a chance to receive a full refund and leave the course after the instructor goes over the course agreements. A second chance to leave the course and receive a refund is offered on the third day of the course. At the end of the training, the seminar participants are strongly encouraged to bring guests to sign up for the course – participants are instructed that "bringing guests is a manifestation of a person's willingness to participate in life."
The concluding portion of the book includes a comparison of Werner Erhard's methodologies to Zen
Zen
Zen is a school of Mahāyāna Buddhism founded by the Buddhist monk Bodhidharma. The word Zen is from the Japanese pronunciation of the Chinese word Chán , which in turn is derived from the Sanskrit word dhyāna, which can be approximately translated as "meditation" or "meditative state."Zen...
, The Teachings of Don Juan
The Teachings of Don Juan
The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge was published by the University of California Press in 1968 as a work of anthropology. It was written by Carlos Castaneda and submitted as his master’s thesis in the school of anthropology...
by Carlos Castaneda
Carlos Castaneda
Carlos Castaneda was a Peruvian-born American anthropologist and author....
, and to Rhinehart's views from The Dice Man
The Dice Man
The Dice Man is a novel published in 1971 by George Cockcroft under the pen name Luke Rhinehart and tells the story of a psychiatrist who begins making life decisions based on the casting of dice. Cockcroft wrote the book based on his own experiences of using dice to make decisions while studying...
. Drawing a parallel to the "controlled folly" described in Castaneda's A Separate Reality
A Separate Reality
is an allegedly non-fictional book written by anthropologist/author Carlos Castaneda in 1971 concerning the events that took place during an apprenticeship he claimed to have served with a self-proclaimed Yaqui Indian Sorcerer, Don Juan Matus, between 1968 and 1971...
, Rhinehart argues that in almost all cases, enlightenment is linked to humor: "One can rarely have an enlightenment experience except under the impact of nonsense ... Every time we laugh we are in a way experiencing a mini enlightenment, a tiny letting go of some attachment to some bit of belief or sense. Full enlightenment, in these terms, is accepting what is, which leads to experiencing fully whatever one is experiencing."
Rhinehart comments that those who have taken part in the est training feel the need for a sense of community: "Most graduates indicate that the value of the seminar series depends not so much on is ostensible data content or on the processes introduced, but on the sharing on an intimate basis with others." He notes that some of the graduates of the est training "treat him [Erhard] with the love and awe normally associated with that of disciples for spiritual teachers". He likens Erhard's relationship to his staff members to the way in which a guru
Guru
A guru is one who is regarded as having great knowledge, wisdom, and authority in a certain area, and who uses it to guide others . Other forms of manifestation of this principle can include parents, school teachers, non-human objects and even one's own intellectual discipline, if the...
interacts with disciple
Apprenticeship
Apprenticeship is a system of training a new generation of practitioners of a skill. Apprentices or protégés build their careers from apprenticeships...
s: "[It is] the essentially eastern phenomenon of a powerful being (usually a guru or a spiritual teacher) attracting other powerful beings who nevertheless choose to channel their power through their leader." Rhinehart argues that est "may be seen as in many ways the culmination to date of the 'Easternization of America', a process that first became notable in the late fifties and early sixties".
Critical reception
James Charney notes in his review of the book for Library JournalLibrary Journal
Library Journal is a trade publication for librarians. It was founded in 1876 by Melvil Dewey . It reports news about the library world, emphasizing public libraries, and offers feature articles about aspects of professional practice...
, "Questions of effectiveness or possible harm are hardly considered." Charney characterizes the problem of the book and its subject matter as a "kind of with-it diffuseness which disallows any intelligent understanding on principle". In a review of the book for The New York Times Book Review
The New York Times Book Review
The New York Times Book Review is a weekly paper-magazine supplement to The New York Times in which current non-fiction and fiction books are reviewed. It is one of the most influential and widely read book review publications in the industry. The offices are located near Times Square in New York...
, Zane Berzins was critical of the work, commenting: "There isn't much to be said for the book except that it exudes a kind of repellent fascination." A review of the book in Kirkus Reviews
Kirkus Reviews
Kirkus Reviews is an American book review magazine founded in 1933 by Virginia Kirkus . Kirkus serves the book and literary trade sector, including libraries, publishers, literary and film agents, film and TV producers and booksellers. Kirkus Reviews is published on the first and 15th of each month...
was negative; the review characterizes it as, "Not a book, really. A verbatim transcription of one of Werner Erhard's weekend sessions in $250 doublethink." Kirkus Reviews criticizes the author for not engaging in any judgmental analysis of the est training methodology. The review concludes, "at least the reader finally has an opportunity to see what an estian seminar is, with vomit bags, circuitous logic, pathetic interplay between overbearing trainer and angst-ridden trainee, and all."
In an article about Erhard and est for the religious journal Quarterly Review, Florida International University
Florida International University
Florida International University is an American public research university in metropolitan Miami, Florida, in the United States, with its main campus in University Park...
assistant religious studies professor Robert R. Hann places the book among "the most accessible sources about est". Hann comments that since the book has been "reviewed by Erhard and carries his statement of support for the author", it "can therefore be presumed to be, if not 'canonical,' then at least not significantly at odds with the perspective of est itself."
Professor Walter A. Effross of the American University Washington College of Law cites The Book of est along with Adelaide Bry's est: 60 Hours That Transform Your Life, in an article in the Buffalo Law Review analyzing the control of new age
New Age
The New Age movement is a Western spiritual movement that developed in the second half of the 20th century. Its central precepts have been described as "drawing on both Eastern and Western spiritual and metaphysical traditions and then infusing them with influences from self-help and motivational...
movements over their intellectual property. Effross notes that the copyright page of The Book of est gives a notice that: "material based in part on unpublished lectures created and copyrighted by Werner Erhard and used by the author with his permission. No material created and copyrighted by Werner Erhard may be used or disseminated in any medium or language without his prior written authorization." Effross comments on the potential loss of control over his material that Erhard may have invited due to endorsing these books about his methodology: "...because it enabled commentators to make 'fair use' of the disclosed information, it was not helpful for ... Werner Erhard, the founder of est, to endorse a first-person account of an est training, even one which provided only simulations of est's 'processes,' or guided meditations. (However, the publicity [Erhard's organization] achieved from such exposure during crucial periods of ... expansion may have been seen as justifying the intellectual property risk.)"
See also
- Getting It: The psychology of estGetting It: The psychology of estGetting It: The Psychology of est is a non-fiction book by American psychologist Sheridan Fenwick, first published in 1976, analyzing Werner Erhard's Erhard Seminars Training or est. It is based on Fenwick's own experience of attending a four-day session of the est training, an intensive 60-hour...
- Human Potential MovementHuman Potential MovementThe Human Potential Movement arose out of the social and intellectual milieu of the 1960s and formed around the concept of cultivating extraordinary potential that its advocates believed to lie largely untapped in all people...
- Large Group Awareness TrainingLarge Group Awareness TrainingLarge-group awareness training refers to activities usually offered by groups linked with the human potential movement which claim to increase self-awareness and bring about desirable transformations in individuals' personal lives...
- New ageNew AgeThe New Age movement is a Western spiritual movement that developed in the second half of the 20th century. Its central precepts have been described as "drawing on both Eastern and Western spiritual and metaphysical traditions and then infusing them with influences from self-help and motivational...
- Outrageous BetrayalOutrageous BetrayalOutrageous Betrayal: The Dark Journey of Werner Erhard from est to Exile was written by freelance journalist Steven Pressman and first published in 1993 by St. Martin's Press...
External links
- Werner Erhard: Books and Articles, as cited on official Werner ErhardWerner ErhardWerner Hans Erhard is an author of transformational models and applications for individuals, groups, and organizations...
homepage