Beelzebub

Beelzebub’s Tales to His Grandson

  • Introduction to The Web Edition
  • First Book
  • Second Book
  • Third Book
  • Gurdjieff Heritage Society

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Friendly Advice

[Written impromptu by the author on delivering this book, already prepared for publication, to the printer.]

ACCORDING TO the numerous deductions and conclusions made by me during experimental elucidations concerning the productivity of the perception by contemporary people of new impressions from what is heard and read, and also according to the thought of one of the sayings of popular wisdom I have just remembered, handed down to our days from very ancient times, which declares:

“Any prayer may be heard by the Higher Powers and a corresponding answer obtained only if it is uttered thrice:
Firstly – for the welfare or the peace of the souls of one’s parents.
Secondly – for the welfare of one’s neighbor.
And only thirdly – for oneself personally.”

I find it necessary on the first page of this book, quite ready for publication, to give the following advice:

“Read each of my written expositions thrice:
Firstly – at least as you have already become mechanized to read all your contemporary books and newspapers.
Secondly – as if you were reading aloud to another person.
And only thirdly – try and fathom the gist of my writings.”

Only then will you be able to count upon forming your own impartial judgment, proper to yourself alone, on my writings. And only then can my hope be actualized that according to your understanding you will obtain the specific benefit for yourself which I anticipate, and which I wish for you with all my being.

Filed Under: First Book

  • Introduction to The Web Edition
  • First Book
    • Friendly Advice
    • Chapter I – The Arousing of Thought
    • Chapter II – Introduction | Why Beelzebub Was in Our Solar System
    • Chapter III – The Cause of the Delay in the Falling of the Ship Karnak
    • Chapter IV – The Law of Falling
    • Chapter V – The System of Archangel Hariton
    • Chapter VI – Perpetual Motion
    • Chapter VII – Becoming Aware of Genuine Being-Duty
    • Chapter VIII – The Impudent Brat Hassein, Beelzebub’s Grandson, Dares to Call Men “Slugs”
    • Chapter IX – The Cause of the Genesis of the Moon
    • Chapter X – Why “Men” Are Not Men
    • Chapter XI – A Piquant Trait of the Peculiar Psyche of Contemporary Man
    • Chapter XII – The First “Growl”
    • Chapter XIII – Why in Man’s Reason Fantasy May Be Perceived as Reality
    • Chapter XIV – The Beginnings of Perspectives Promising Nothing Very Cheerful
    • Chapter XV – The First Descent of Beelzebub upon the Planet Earth
    • Chapter XVI – The Relative Understanding of Time
    • Chapter XVII – The Arch-absurd According to the Assertion of Beelzebub, Our Sun Neither Lights nor Heats
    • Chapter XVIII – The Arch-preposterous
    • Chapter XIX – Beelzebub’s Tales About His Second Descent on to the Planet Earth
    • Chapter XX – The Third Flight of Beelzebub to the Planet Earth
    • Chapter XXI – The First Visit of Beelzebub to India
    • Chapter XXII – Beelzebub for the First Time in Tibet
    • Chapter XXIII – The Fourth Personal Sojourn of Beelzebub on the Planet Earth
    • Chapter XXIV – Beelzebub’s Flight to the Planet Earth for the Fifth Time
    • Chapter XXV – The Very Saintly Ashiata Shiemash, Sent from Above to the Earth
    • Chapter XXVI – The Legominism Concerning the Deliberations of the Very Saintly Ashiata Shiemash Under the Title of “The Terror-of-the-Situation”
    • Chapter XXVII – The Organization for Man’s Existence Created by the Very Saintly Ashiata Shiemash
    • Chapter XXVIII – The Chief Culprit in the Destruction of All the Very Saintly Labors of Ashiata Shiemash
  • Second Book
    • Chapter XXIX – The Fruits of Former Civilizations and the Blossoms of the Contemporary
    • Chapter XXX – Art
    • Chapter XXXI – The Sixth and Last Sojourn of Beelzebub on the Planet Earth
    • Chapter XXXII – Hypnotism
    • Chapter XXXIII – Beelzebub as Professional Hypnotist
    • Chapter XXXIV – Russia
    • Chapter XXXVI – Just a Wee Bit More About the Germans
    • Chapter XXXV – A Change in the Appointed Course of the Falling of the Transspace Ship Karnak
    • Chapter XXXVII – France
    • Chapter XXXVIII – Religion
    • Chapter XXXIX – The Holy Planet “Purgatory”
  • Third Book
    • Chapter XL – Beelzebub Tells How People Learned and Again Forgot About the Fundamental Cosmic Law of Heptaparaparshinokh
    • Chapter XLI – The Bokharian Dervish Hadji-Asvatz-Troov
    • Chapter XLII – Beelzebub in America
    • Chapter XLIII – Beelzebub’s Survey of the Process of the Periodic Reciprocal Destruction of Men, or Beelzebub’s Opinion of War
    • Chapter XLIV – In the opinion of Beelzebub, Man’s Understanding of Justice Is for Him in the Objective Sense an Accursed Mirage
    • Chapter XLV – In the Opinion of Beelzebub, Man’s Extraction of Electricity from Nature and Its Destruction During Its Use, Is One of the Chief Causes of the Shortening of the Life of Man
    • Chapter XLVI – Beelzebub Explains to His Grandson the Significance of the Form and Sequence Which He Chose for Expounding the Information Concerning Man
    • Chapter XLVII – The Inevitable Result of Impartial Mentation
    • Chapter XLVIII – From the Author