New Age Cults and Religions

by Texe Marrs

  The Academy for Future Science is closely connected with certain UFO societies and groups. J. J. Hurtag, for example, is well-known among UFO authorities and is considered an expert on the subject. It is his claim that in 1973 a spirit-being named Enoch enveloped him with a great wall of light, and both he and Enoch sped upwards into the heavens. There they met up with another being of great majesty called Metatron, the Creator of Light in the universe.

  Finally, Hurtag says, he was taken directly into the throne room, near the pyramid of the living light, before a great Throne. There he saw the “Ancient of Days” face-to-face. According to Hurtag, the Ancient of Days has glowing white hair and a face of overwhelming love and joy. Seeing the great one, Hurtag proclaimed “Thou art worthy O Lord YHWH to receive glory and honor and power, for Thou has created all things and for Thy pleasure the aeons were created.”

  While in the heavenly realms, Hurtag was supposedly told by his guides, Enoch and Metatron, that man is not to eat the food of “the false powers of the earth, nor encourage my seed to marry with the fallen spiritual races of the earth, nor join in false worship with those who serve the fallen mind energies of the earth.”

  It is apparent that Hurtag’s book, The Keys of Enoch, is in reality a massively clever conglomeration of occultic doctrines which he has picked up over the years through intense study. For example, when Hurtag mentions the externalization of the Hierarchy, this is simply a throwback to the teachings of Alice Bailey of the Lucis Trust, who published a prominent New Age occultic book, The Externalization of the Hierarchy, in the 1940s. Hurtag also borrows freely and unabashedly from the Bible. For example, he says that while he was before the Throne he saw a burning scroll rolled as a cylinder and out of this burning scroll a light was projected into his “Third Eye.” Such phraseology reminds us of the biblical accounts of Ezekiel and other prophets, though Hurtag’s imaginative account is greatly embellished with New Age and occultic symbology and terminology.

  Hurtag says that he composed a scroll on parchment from the divine scroll of light that was coded into the “Third Eye” region on his forehead. This scroll is said to be the 64 keys of Enoch as explained in The Book of Knowledge: The Keys of Enoch. They are a prophetic message showing how the seven seals of the book of Revelation of the Bible will come to be broken, or unsealed, and how the last days will transpire. The version of prophetic events soon to come that we find in Hurtag’s scrolls certainly is at great variance from what a Christian reads in Bible prophecy.

  The Brotherhood of Light

  In common with other New Age groups, Hurtag’s New Age bible maintains that there is a group called the Brotherhood of Light, spirit beings from the heavenly realm, who are available to share their wisdom with the Brotherhood of Man. The beings who compose the Brotherhood of Light are said to work directly for the Eternal One, YHWH. Although Jesus Christ is an indistinct part of the teachings of Hurtag and The Academy for Future Science, His role is greatly de-emphasized. He most certainly is not credited by this cult group as the creator of the universe as depicted truthfully in the Holy Bible.

  Hurtag’s teachings are that, through a process of visualization and consciousness imaging, an individual will achieve a higher understanding. The masters who are the Brotherhood of Light will transmit into the mind of the person through the Third Eye region of his forehead and into his brain direct knowledge, or gnosis. Thus, the person will be able to understand the holy doctrines of YHWH.

  Through continued contact with the Brotherhood of Light, eventually, The Academy of Future Science proclaims, an individual can become a Christed individual, a higher evolved entity. Those chosen as higher evolved beings receive the promise of “New Life” in the myriad other universes. They are transformed into beings of pure light and thereafter live an existence of pure bliss.

  Meanwhile, here on earth the dark forces (no doubt including biblical Christians) will be overcome. “Advanced powers” will soon oversee and direct dramatic changes upon our planet, “intervening to control man’s wanderlust for a cosmic holocaust.”

  In other words, Hurtag maintains that the Brotherhood of Light will, in the last days, come forth to save the planet earth from extinction through nuclear catastrophe.

  The Third Eye of Agni

  New Agers and Hindus alike call the site where the invisible Third Eye is located the Agni Point, or Agni Center. In Hindu mythology, the Lord Agni was the fire god, represented by lightning. The New Age occultic teaching is that the Agni Center is the Third Eye in which cosmic fire and light enter to bring a form of higher consciousness and inner transformation to initiates. We should recall that Jesus Christ described Lucifer in this manner: “I beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven” (Luke 10:18).

  In some occultic teachings, the initiate is taught that a cosmic string of fire, or lightning, comes down from the spiritual realm and enters the initiate’s forehead exactly where a mark is placed between the eyes. This is the Third Eye region. It is thought to be the chakra (Hindu) or energy point in the body which, when developed, enables the individual to develop god-like abilities, powers, and knowledge.

  Programmed by 6-6-6

  In The Keys of Enoch, we find similar occultic construction. However, not only do we discover in The Keys of Enoch the Hindu occultic doctrine of the Third Eye, but Hurtag’s The Keys of Enoch suggests to us that man is initiated in his Third Eye by light messages from the Brotherhood of Light.

  Those light messages are said to come in a numerical electrical sequence. Astonishingly, we are further told that this numerical electronic sequence is the number 666! It is through the number 666 that the heavenly beings supposedly communicate with men, sending and receiving spiritual information. This is done, says The Keys of Enoch, through use of “specific light and sound harmonics... by means of a pyramidal focus created... over the Third Eye.”

  By using this heavenly sequence of 666, it is explained, the individual’s thoughts are elevated as if they were a “seed crystal.” Blessed by the 666 force, the individual thereafter communicates directly with the “councils of light in the heavens,” which is yet another synonym given in The Keys of Enoch for the Brotherhood of Light.

  The New Age bible that is The Keys of Enoch reveals to us also that every man has a Third Eye and it is through the individual’s Third Eye that the Father in heaven oversees creation with His own “Eye of Horus.” When we realize that the Eye of Horus is the all-seeing eye of Horus, the son of Osiris, the Egyptian Father God, we understand clearly the connection of these teachings with the ancient philosophy of occultism.

  In effect, The Academy for Future Science and its false bible, The Keys of Enoch, instruct initiates to communicate with demonic powers through a light-link. Here is the procedure of how this is supposed to be done:

  The Eye of Horus is the eye of the lords, serving the Living Father of Creation which is placed upon the Third Eye region of the elect. Therefore, this alignment of the divine eyes permits you to acquire wisdom and to work within the complete network of the divine hierarchy

  Contrast with Christianity

  The “divine hierarchy” which members of The Academy for Future Science connect with is certainly not the divine hierarchy of Jesus, the true God of the Bible. Those who become involved with this New Age religious group and are held spellbound by the pseudo-scientific language of its 618 page “bible” will be taken on a journey far from the truth. Contrasts with the real Bible are many. For example, The Keys of Enoch teaches that the Antichrist is not a man, though Revelation 13 clearly shows him to be a man. The Antichrist, suggests Hurtag, is the collective spirit of all of those who stick to the “contaminated,” man-made doctrines of Biblical Christianity.

  Hurtag says that his New Age scriptures are superior to the Bible but that even more highly advanced revelations are forthcoming. He insists that in the coming era the Bible will be augmented and supplemented with certain “sacred scriptures” revealed to man by interplanetary messengers. This
receiving of new sacred scriptures will occur when the New Age race is ready to move upward to a higher evolutionary plane. Then the lower beings who refuse the New Age doctrines must return to the primeval earth and begin the reincarnation process all over again, as the Kingdom of God—a New Age Utopia—is built here on earth.

  Thus, The Academy for Future Science teaches a doctrine of the “elect:” “The elect are the people of The Plan.”

  Chapter 3: ADELPHI

  Adelphi leader Richard Kieninger claims that strange members of an invisible spirit world who make up the elite group called the Brotherhood have initiated him into a higher knowledge and spiritual state. Kieninger claims that Adelphi was established to carry out “the Great Plan of these disembodied spirits of the Brotherhood.”

  Adelphi, in Garland, Texas, a suburb of Dallas, has gone through some trying times recently. It seems that another organization which Kieninger established, the Stelle Group, dismissed Kieninger from its leadership claiming that he had bilked the organization out of a significant sum of money and that he was also guilty of sexual misconduct.

  Specifically, it was charged that Kieninger had failed to come through on his grandiose scheme for a utopia on earth. It is Kieninger’s plan to buy an island, which he claims exists in the Pacific Ocean, and rename it “Philadelphia.” Philadelphia, according to Kieninger, is slated by the Brotherhood to be a heavenly city on earth. The directors of the Stelle Group, however, contend that such an island does not exist at all, that actually it was merely a figment of Richard Kieninger’s fertile and untrustworthy imagination, designed to delude members and relieve them of spare cash.

  None the worse off, Kieninger in 1988-89 decided to emphasize Adelphi, which, after extended litigation and legal maneuverings, appears now to be totally a separate entity under the direction of Kieninger and associates.

  The Great Plan of the Brotherhood

  According to its own publications, which include the Adelphi Quarterly newsletter, it is Adelphi’s purpose to help disciples realign themselves with “The Great Plan of the Brotherhood.” To that end, Adelphi conducts public seminars to teach participants what the Brotherhood wants humanity to do in achieving spiritual goals.

  Adelphi teaches that the cosmic universe consists of seven planes of existence made up of matter and energy. These range from the physical plane to the plane of pure spirit and love, which is the seventh and ultimate plane. Another teaching is the spiritual evolution of man. According to the Brotherhood, man proceeds throughout twelve levels of development before he fully realizes his true purpose and divinity.

  The central and most desirable goal of those who believe in Adelphi is to be initiated into the Brotherhood. If Richard Kieninger’s example is an indication (see section on The Stelle Group), initiation occurs at a mystical ceremony in which, evidently, the individual literally receives a mark somewhere on the body in a form of bloodletting.

  Yet another key feature of Adelphi’s teachings is the Theosophist doctrine of the ancient continents of Atlantis and Lemuria. In fact, Adelphi seems to claim to be the New Lemuria, an embryo of a great society soon to take hold and bloom on planet earth in which men will be able to exercise fully their psychic powers and become god-like. As part of this teaching on Lemurian and Atlantis history, initiates are also instructed on the spiritual role and meaning of the Egyptian religions, and the building of the Great Pyramid.

  Belief in the Ten Lemurian Laws

  Like practically every other New Age group, Adelphi also is a believer in the Law of Karma, which Adelphi instructors call the “Natural Law of Cause and Effect.” Finally, Adelphi teaches that the coming great society of “Philadelphia” will incorporate what is called the Ten Lemurian Laws, which are held to be akin to the Bill of Rights in the U.S. Constitution. According to founder Richard Kieninger, everyone on earth is insane to a certain degree because of the sickness of society and its failure to recognize the true spiritual laws of the universe. Thus, Kieninger has stated, “In reaching Initiation, you are essentially going sane.” As a person works the Ten Lemurian Laws and achieves increasingly higher levels of initiation, Adelphi teaches that the person progressively achieves sanity and eventually may become an ascended master, one of the elite of the Brotherhood.

  Chapter 4: ALETHEIA

  Aletheia sells itself as a “dynamic health training center.” Its founder is a man named Jack Schwartz who operates the Aletheia Center and the Aletheia Institute of Massage in Ashland, Oregon. The center provides a wide range of New Age and holistic health learning experiences and studies. For example, in its most recent Course schedule we find such short Courses as Understanding the Human Energy Centers (Chakras and Glands); Introduction to Biofeedback; Kinesiology; Mythology for Self-Discovery; Breathing For Self-Regulation and Expansion of Consciousness; Advanced Human Energy Systems (Auras); Transcending Into Knowingness; Exploring The Paraconscious; Energy and Motion With Light, Color, and Sound; and Health Imagery and Breathing.

  Schwartz promotes the “Aletheia experience” as a potential way to achieve not only individual peace of mind but world peace and love. Through Aletheia even the survival of the human race on the planet might be assured. How does the Aletheia program claim to achieve such astounding goals? In its publications we are told that man can achieve peace of mind, universal love, self-understanding, financial prosperity, health, and enduring relationships through a “transmutation of the mind” and by linking up with “the unlimited power of universal intelligence.” Thus again we find revealed the impersonal force which the New Age calls “God.”

  It is apparent from their logo, which is an adaptation of the oriental yin/yang, that Aletheia is simply another Eastern mystical holistic health system. In fact, Aletheia offers multiple ways to achieve the oriental transformation so familiar to New Age believers. Chief among them is the belief in the hazy form of God which Aletheia calls “Universal Intelligence.” Tap into this Universal Intelligence and you will find the greatest source of wisdom and wealth in the universe, touts Aletheia: “Successful people tune in this infinite intelligence and receive the answers and wisdom they need to achieve their success.”

  The teachings of Aletheia are eclectic, representing a virtual hodgepodge of New Age faddism, spiritual experiences, holistic health speculation, and psuedo-scientific trappings. Recently, even the Catholic Church’s teachings on Mary received the attention of founder Jack Schwartz and his wife, Lois. On May 25-June 7, 1990 they personally conducted a tour to Medjugorje, Yugoslavia, the site where many claim that Mary, the Mother of Jesus, appeared to children.

  They called this tour “a spiritual adventure to Medjugorje, Assisi, and the Omeramergau Passion Play.” The European tour no doubt included Assisi, Italy as well as Medjugorje, Yugoslavia, because it was at Assisi that St. Francis, patron of nature in the Catholic Church, first formulated his now popular religious teachings advocating the worship of nature. In their brochure, Jack and Lois Schwartz advertise Assisi as “An enchantment of nature.”

  Chapter 5: ANANDA

  What are we to make of an organization that goes by the Hindu name of Ananda—billing itself as the Ananda World Brotherhood Village—yet sends out promotional material with pictures of Christianity’s Jesus Christ? The simple conclusion is that Ananda is a group promoting the synthesis of all the world’s religions. While emphasizing Hinduism, the organization unabashedly promotes Pope John Paul II, the worldwide head of the Catholic Church, and declares that all religions basically are the same regardless of their outward form, dogmas, or rituals. Sri Kriyananda, the head of Ananda, has stated, “Direct experience of truth, like the experiments of science, is the true essence of all religions.” According to Kriyananda, “The quest for inner experience will become the religion of the New Age.”

  To promote its own vision of the New Age, Ananda’s disciples are busy in their headquarters at Nevada City, California, building two new impressive shrines, or temples, which they believe will contribute to world pe
ace and the unity of all religions and spiritualities. These are the brainchild of leader Sri Kriyananda, an American whose real name before he converted to Hinduism was J. Donald Walters. Swami, or Sri, Kriyananda is the founder and spiritual director of Ananda.

  Kriyananda claims to have received in meditation a vision that he was to build a “Golden Lotus Shrine of All Religions.” At the time, as Donald Walters, he was serving the Hindu guru Paramhansa Yogananda in India. Walters promptly wrote to Nehru, the prime minister of the government of India, and requested permission to build this Golden Lotus Shrine of All Religions near New Delhi, India. Nehru quickly approved the project; however, Walters could not get it off the ground because of a lack of funding and, by his own admission, a lack of spiritual maturity on his part. Today, Kriyananda (or Walters) proclaims that the time is right and that his retreat facility at Ananda is “the expanding light needed to transform mankind and bring all of humanity into a relationship with the Divine Essence.”

  Ground has also been broken for a second temple to be called the “Chapel of Divine Inspiration.” Ananda explains that the Chapel of Divine Inspiration will enable the organization to conduct special conferences with the leaders of all the world’s religions and thereby establish universally recognized teachings. The stated goal is “Towards oneness in God for all mankind.”