Source Text
Foreword IN his introduction to Meetings with Remarkable Men, Gurdjieff puts into the mouth of an elderly, intelligent Persian a long tirade against all forms of modern Western literature, which he says contain nothing substantial for the perfecting of humanity. “It is all exterior,” the Persian says … “An Asiatic, having lost to a lesser degree the ability to feel, that is to say, standing closer to nature, half-consciously feels and instinctively senses the [Western] writer’s complete lack of any knowledge of reality and of any genuine understanding of the subject he is writing about.”
Jean Vaysse was born at Le Mans in France in 1917. Following his father and grandfather in the medical profession, he became one of the best surgeons in Paris, well-known for his care and ingenuity, a pioneer in the development of open heart surgery and transplantations. He was a polished speaker and lecturer. With dark, searching eyes and a somewhat hard, pitiless face, even a brief acquaintanceship with him left an impression of great intensity. His patients trusted him. He was deeply sensible of their anxiety and spent hours discussing their health and talking with them about Far Eastern art and his collection of antiques. In his spare time he was an abstract painter, as well as a student of metaphysics. As he himself says about Gurdjieff’s ideas, which he met through a student friend before any of the books were published, “whoever approaches them for the first time without prejudice feels touched to the core by a truth which he cannot deny and called upon to put in question all the values his life has been based on until then.”
Vaysse’s book is based on Gurdjieff’s own books and Ouspensky’s In Search of the Miraculous but it must not be dismissed as a mere paraphrase of Ouspensky. In Search was written and meticulously revised by Ouspensky over a period of at least ten years in order to give as honest and objective an account of the teaching as possible. Probably his achievement will never be equaled. In any case it was intended to preserve the teaching in as pure and impersonal a form as possible.
But we are going too fast. Learning the new language, as Jean Vaysse says, is the first payment that has to be made in approaching our work toward awakening. Vaysse adds the word “presence” to the new words that are needed.
that I am here now in this immediate space in contact with a life-force which supports, enlightens and unifies my presence.
From this point of view, the knowledge we are searching for is much more than what can be written in books or told in words. It is an immersion in experience.
Faith of consciousness is freedom Faith of feeling is weakness Faith of body is stupidity.
Introduction
THE ideas we shall deal with here represent only one aspect of the teaching transmitted during his life by G. I. Gurdjieff. They acquire their real sense only as one of the elements of a greater whole upon which—for every man who recognizes its necessity—the work of inner transformation is based.
Questions
AI Summary
Toward Awakening by Jean Vaysse and Lord John Pentland presents key insights from the Gurdjieff tradition. The 10 passages above capture the essential teachings.
Core Themes:
- [To be expanded]
Key Passages: Highlights 1, 3, and 10 are particularly representative.
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