Thetan
Encyclopedia
In Scientology
, the concept of thetan is similar to the concept of spirit
or soul
found in other belief systems
. The term is derived from the Greek letter theta
, which in Scientology
represents "the source of life, or life itself." In Scientology it is believed that it is the Thetan, not the Central Nervous System
, which commands the body through communication points.
Thetans have been described in the Church of Scientology
in a number of ways.
, who adopted the Greek letter
theta
(Θ) to represent "the source of life and life itself". Hubbard first spoke of "theta-beings" in a lecture series of March 1952. He attributed the coining of the word to his wife Mary Sue
. As an essential point of Scientology doctrine, a person's identity and self-awareness come entirely from a thetan. It is redundant to refer to "a person's thetan," because the person does not exist independently.
Hubbard once defined a thetan as: "... having no mass, no wave-length, no energy, no measurable qualities and no time or location in space except by consideration or postulate. The spirit is not a thing. It is the creator of things." Oddly, in a lecture series later published as a book ("The Phoenix Lectures"), he pointed to a study that implied a thetan manifests a small but measurable amount of mass:
Although Hubbard did not name the doctor concerned, there was indeed such an attempt, by a Dr. Duncan MacDougall, to measure the weight of dying patients to determine the weight of the soul. MacDougall's experiments took place about fifty years before Hubbard's lectures, not fifteen or twenty. They are generally not regarded as having any sort of scientific validity.
According to Hubbard's son Ronald DeWolf
(born L. Ron Hubbard, Jr.), his father stated that thetans are immortal and perpetual, having willed themselves into existence at some point several trillion years ago. After they originated, thetans generated "points to view" or "dimension points", causing space to come into existence. They agreed that other thetans' dimension points existed, thus bringing into existence the entire universe. All matter, energy, space, and time exists solely because thetans agree that it exists.
In the primordial past, according to Scientologist teachings, thetans brought the material universe into being largely for their own pleasure.." The universe is thought to have no independent reality, but to derive its apparent reality from the fact that most thetans agree it exists. Scientologists believe that thetans fell from grace when they began to identify with their creation, rather than their original state of spiritual purity. Eventually, they lost their memory of their true nature, along with the associated spiritual and creative powers. As a result, thetans came to think of themselves as nothing but embodied beings.
Thetans are believed to be reborn time and time again in new bodies through a process called "assumption" which is analogous to reincarnation
. Dell deChant and Danny Jorgensen
liken Scientology to Hinduism
, in that both ascribe a causal relationship between the experiences of earlier incarnations and one's present life. With each rebirth, the effects of the "MEST" universe (MEST here stands for matter, energy, space, and time) on the thetan are believed to become stronger.
Jon Atack, whose book A Piece of Blue Sky
details how he reached Operating Thetan
level V before leaving Scientology, describes Hubbard's doctrines about thetans: "Thetans are all-knowing beings, and became bored because there were no surprises. Hubbard asserted that the single most important desire in all beings is to have a "game
". To have a "game" it was necessary to "not know" certain things, so certain perceptions were negated ("not-is-ed")." Since thetans knew everything, this required them to abandon or suppress perceptions and knowledge. Over time, the loss of perception accumulated and certain thetans began to cause harm to others. MEST (physical) beings also sought to "trap" thetans in order to control them. Thetans came to learn contrition, punishing themselves for their own "harmful" acts.
According to Hubbard, an essential part of the thetans' game was the "conquest" of matter, energy, space, and time by the life force, theta. This has produced multiple universes which have ended and begun in succession, each new one being more solid and entrapping than the last. The thetans have by now become so enmeshed in the physical universe that many have identified themselves totally with it, forgetting their quadrillions of years of existence and their original godly powers.
Nonetheless, according to Scientology, thetan powers are said to remain potent and restorable. One of the Church of Scientology's stated goals is "the rehabilitation of the human spirit", by which it means the restoration of the thetan's original abilities. Hubbard claims that thetans are able to change reality through "postulates" — decisions made by the individual about the nature of the reality around them. Some thetans are said to have (mis)used this ability to "implant" others with hypnotic suggestions, forcing other thetans to "cluster" around bodies (hence body thetan
s). This sort of directed control is referred to as "other-determinism". Scientology seeks to undo it and return the thetan to "self-determinism", where he can control himself and his environment. The eventual goal is to achieve "pan-determinism", where he acts for the good of all.
, when a person dies — or, in Scientology terms, when a thetan abandons its physical body — they go to a "landing station" on the planet Venus
, where the thetan is re-implanted
and told lies about its past life and its next life. The Venusians take the thetan, "capsule" it, and send it back to Earth to be dumped into the ocean off the coast of California. Says Hubbard, "If you can get out of that, and through that, and wander around through the cities and find some girl who looks like she is going to get married or have a baby or something like that, you're all set. And if you can find the maternity ward to a hospital or something, you're OK. And you just eventually just pick up a baby." This is the basic belief of reincarnation in Scientology.
The Church defines "Operating Thetan" as "knowing and willing cause over life
, thought
, and matter
, energy
, space
and time
(MEST
)."
The Church of Scientology states as a point of doctrine that an individual exists with or without a body.
involving Xenu
, as well as other similar alien occurrences on the whole track.
Further still by the time the subject reaches the level of OT VII, it is revealed to him that his physical body is not just covered with Body Thetans, but is literally composed of them.
Scientology
Scientology is a body of beliefs and related practices created by science fiction and fantasy author L. Ron Hubbard , starting in 1952, as a successor to his earlier self-help system, Dianetics...
, the concept of thetan is similar to the concept of spirit
Spirit
The English word spirit has many differing meanings and connotations, most of them relating to a non-corporeal substance contrasted with the material body.The spirit of a living thing usually refers to or explains its consciousness.The notions of a person's "spirit" and "soul" often also overlap,...
or soul
Soul
A soul in certain spiritual, philosophical, and psychological traditions is the incorporeal essence of a person or living thing or object. Many philosophical and spiritual systems teach that humans have souls, and others teach that all living things and even inanimate objects have souls. The...
found in other belief systems
Religion
Religion is a collection of cultural systems, belief systems, and worldviews that establishes symbols that relate humanity to spirituality and, sometimes, to moral values. Many religions have narratives, symbols, traditions and sacred histories that are intended to give meaning to life or to...
. The term is derived from the Greek letter theta
Theta
Theta is the eighth letter of the Greek alphabet, derived from the Phoenician letter Teth...
, which in Scientology
Scientology beliefs and practices
Scientology is defined as a set of beliefs written by founder L. Ron Hubbard. Scientology describes itself as the study and handling of the spirit in relationship to itself, others, and all of life...
represents "the source of life, or life itself." In Scientology it is believed that it is the Thetan, not the Central Nervous System
Central nervous system
The central nervous system is the part of the nervous system that integrates the information that it receives from, and coordinates the activity of, all parts of the bodies of bilaterian animals—that is, all multicellular animals except sponges and radially symmetric animals such as jellyfish...
, which commands the body through communication points.
Thetans have been described in the Church of Scientology
Church of Scientology
The Church of Scientology is an organization devoted to the practice and the promotion of the Scientology belief system. The Church of Scientology International is the Church of Scientology's parent organization, and is responsible for the overall ecclesiastical management, dissemination and...
in a number of ways.
- A "thetan is an immortal spiritual being; the human soul."
- "The being who is the individual and who handles and lives in the body."
- "A thetan is not a thing, a thetan is the creator of things."
- A thetan is "the person himself — not his body or his name, the physical universe, his mind, or anything else; that which is aware of being aware; the identity which is the individual. The thetan is most familiar to one and all as you."
Thetan in Scientology doctrine
The term and concept were introduced by sci-fi writer and Scientology founder L. Ron HubbardL. Ron Hubbard
Lafayette Ronald Hubbard , better known as L. Ron Hubbard , was an American pulp fiction author and religious leader who founded the Church of Scientology...
, who adopted the Greek letter
Greek alphabet
The Greek alphabet is the script that has been used to write the Greek language since at least 730 BC . The alphabet in its classical and modern form consists of 24 letters ordered in sequence from alpha to omega...
theta
Theta
Theta is the eighth letter of the Greek alphabet, derived from the Phoenician letter Teth...
(Θ) to represent "the source of life and life itself". Hubbard first spoke of "theta-beings" in a lecture series of March 1952. He attributed the coining of the word to his wife Mary Sue
Mary Sue Hubbard
Mary Sue Hubbard was the third wife of L. Ron Hubbard, from 1952 to his death in 1986, and was a leading figure in Scientology for much of her life...
. As an essential point of Scientology doctrine, a person's identity and self-awareness come entirely from a thetan. It is redundant to refer to "a person's thetan," because the person does not exist independently.
Hubbard once defined a thetan as: "... having no mass, no wave-length, no energy, no measurable qualities and no time or location in space except by consideration or postulate. The spirit is not a thing. It is the creator of things." Oddly, in a lecture series later published as a book ("The Phoenix Lectures"), he pointed to a study that implied a thetan manifests a small but measurable amount of mass:
- "From some experiments conducted about fifteen or twenty years ago — a thetan weighed about 1.5 ounces ! Who made these experiments? Well, a doctor made these experiments. He weighed people before and after death, retaining any mass. He weighed the person, bed and all, and he found that the weight dropped at the moment of death about 1.5 ounces and some of them 2 ounces [60 grams]. (Those were super thetans.)"
Although Hubbard did not name the doctor concerned, there was indeed such an attempt, by a Dr. Duncan MacDougall, to measure the weight of dying patients to determine the weight of the soul. MacDougall's experiments took place about fifty years before Hubbard's lectures, not fifteen or twenty. They are generally not regarded as having any sort of scientific validity.
According to Hubbard's son Ronald DeWolf
Ronald DeWolf
Ronald Edward DeWolf , born Lafayette Ronald Hubbard, Jr., also known as "Nibs" Hubbard, was the eldest child of Scientology founder L...
(born L. Ron Hubbard, Jr.), his father stated that thetans are immortal and perpetual, having willed themselves into existence at some point several trillion years ago. After they originated, thetans generated "points to view" or "dimension points", causing space to come into existence. They agreed that other thetans' dimension points existed, thus bringing into existence the entire universe. All matter, energy, space, and time exists solely because thetans agree that it exists.
In the primordial past, according to Scientologist teachings, thetans brought the material universe into being largely for their own pleasure.." The universe is thought to have no independent reality, but to derive its apparent reality from the fact that most thetans agree it exists. Scientologists believe that thetans fell from grace when they began to identify with their creation, rather than their original state of spiritual purity. Eventually, they lost their memory of their true nature, along with the associated spiritual and creative powers. As a result, thetans came to think of themselves as nothing but embodied beings.
Thetans are believed to be reborn time and time again in new bodies through a process called "assumption" which is analogous to reincarnation
Reincarnation
Reincarnation best describes the concept where the soul or spirit, after the death of the body, is believed to return to live in a new human body, or, in some traditions, either as a human being, animal or plant...
. Dell deChant and Danny Jorgensen
Danny Jorgensen
Danny Lynn Jorgensen is an American professor at the Department of Religious Studies of the University of South Florida, for which he also served as chair from 1999 to 2006....
liken Scientology to Hinduism
Hinduism
Hinduism is the predominant and indigenous religious tradition of the Indian Subcontinent. Hinduism is known to its followers as , amongst many other expressions...
, in that both ascribe a causal relationship between the experiences of earlier incarnations and one's present life. With each rebirth, the effects of the "MEST" universe (MEST here stands for matter, energy, space, and time) on the thetan are believed to become stronger.
Jon Atack, whose book A Piece of Blue Sky
A Piece of Blue Sky
A Piece of Blue Sky: Scientology, Dianetics and L. Ron Hubbard Exposed, published in 1990, is an examination from a critical perspective by former British Scientologist Jon Atack of the history of L. Ron Hubbard and the development of Dianetics and the Church of Scientology...
details how he reached Operating Thetan
Operating Thetan
In Scientology, the state of Operating Thetan is a spiritual state above Clear. L. Ron Hubbard, the founder of Scientology, defined it as "knowing and willing cause over life, thought, matter, energy, space and time ". According to religious scholar J...
level V before leaving Scientology, describes Hubbard's doctrines about thetans: "Thetans are all-knowing beings, and became bored because there were no surprises. Hubbard asserted that the single most important desire in all beings is to have a "game
Game (Scientology)
In the Church of Scientology, L. Ron Hubbard's concept of "game" is defined in the Official Scientology and Dianetics glossary as:game: a contest of person against person or team against team. A game consists of freedoms, barriers and purposes, and there is a necessity in a game to have an opponent...
". To have a "game" it was necessary to "not know" certain things, so certain perceptions were negated ("not-is-ed")." Since thetans knew everything, this required them to abandon or suppress perceptions and knowledge. Over time, the loss of perception accumulated and certain thetans began to cause harm to others. MEST (physical) beings also sought to "trap" thetans in order to control them. Thetans came to learn contrition, punishing themselves for their own "harmful" acts.
According to Hubbard, an essential part of the thetans' game was the "conquest" of matter, energy, space, and time by the life force, theta. This has produced multiple universes which have ended and begun in succession, each new one being more solid and entrapping than the last. The thetans have by now become so enmeshed in the physical universe that many have identified themselves totally with it, forgetting their quadrillions of years of existence and their original godly powers.
Nonetheless, according to Scientology, thetan powers are said to remain potent and restorable. One of the Church of Scientology's stated goals is "the rehabilitation of the human spirit", by which it means the restoration of the thetan's original abilities. Hubbard claims that thetans are able to change reality through "postulates" — decisions made by the individual about the nature of the reality around them. Some thetans are said to have (mis)used this ability to "implant" others with hypnotic suggestions, forcing other thetans to "cluster" around bodies (hence body thetan
Body thetan
In Scientology, a thetan is the term corresponding to one's "spirit", and a Body Thetan is another thetan who is 'stuck' in, on or near a human "meat body" because of activities of an ancient Space opera figure named Xenu of the Galactic Confederacy. All human bodies were said by L...
s). This sort of directed control is referred to as "other-determinism". Scientology seeks to undo it and return the thetan to "self-determinism", where he can control himself and his environment. The eventual goal is to achieve "pan-determinism", where he acts for the good of all.
Thetans and death
According to ScientologyScientology
Scientology is a body of beliefs and related practices created by science fiction and fantasy author L. Ron Hubbard , starting in 1952, as a successor to his earlier self-help system, Dianetics...
, when a person dies — or, in Scientology terms, when a thetan abandons its physical body — they go to a "landing station" on the planet Venus
Venus
Venus is the second planet from the Sun, orbiting it every 224.7 Earth days. The planet is named after Venus, the Roman goddess of love and beauty. After the Moon, it is the brightest natural object in the night sky, reaching an apparent magnitude of −4.6, bright enough to cast shadows...
, where the thetan is re-implanted
Implant (Scientology)
In Scientology, an implant is similar to an engram, in that it is believed to condition the mind in a certain way. The difference is that an implant is done deliberately and with evil intent. It is similar to Thought insertion...
and told lies about its past life and its next life. The Venusians take the thetan, "capsule" it, and send it back to Earth to be dumped into the ocean off the coast of California. Says Hubbard, "If you can get out of that, and through that, and wander around through the cities and find some girl who looks like she is going to get married or have a baby or something like that, you're all set. And if you can find the maternity ward to a hospital or something, you're OK. And you just eventually just pick up a baby." This is the basic belief of reincarnation in Scientology.
Operating Thetan
According to Scientology doctrine, a thetan exists whether operating a human body or not. Scientology advertises itself as being able to "rehabilitate" the thetan of a practitioner to a state where the individual can operate with or without a "meat body". The term "operating thetan" would then apply as it does when an individual is operating a body. The Operating Thetan (OT) levels are the upper level courses in Scientology.The Church defines "Operating Thetan" as "knowing and willing cause over life
Life
Life is a characteristic that distinguishes objects that have signaling and self-sustaining processes from those that do not, either because such functions have ceased , or else because they lack such functions and are classified as inanimate...
, thought
Thought
"Thought" generally refers to any mental or intellectual activity involving an individual's subjective consciousness. It can refer either to the act of thinking or the resulting ideas or arrangements of ideas. Similar concepts include cognition, sentience, consciousness, and imagination...
, and matter
Matter
Matter is a general term for the substance of which all physical objects consist. Typically, matter includes atoms and other particles which have mass. A common way of defining matter is as anything that has mass and occupies volume...
, energy
Energy
In physics, energy is an indirectly observed quantity. It is often understood as the ability a physical system has to do work on other physical systems...
, space
Space
Space is the boundless, three-dimensional extent in which objects and events occur and have relative position and direction. Physical space is often conceived in three linear dimensions, although modern physicists usually consider it, with time, to be part of a boundless four-dimensional continuum...
and time
Time
Time is a part of the measuring system used to sequence events, to compare the durations of events and the intervals between them, and to quantify rates of change such as the motions of objects....
(MEST
MEST (Scientology)
MEST is an acronym used in Scientology and coined by author L. Ron Hubbard. Hubbard used the first letters of the words matter, energy, space and time, the component parts of the physical universe. The term MEST is frequently used in writings and lectures by Scientology founder L...
)."
The Church of Scientology states as a point of doctrine that an individual exists with or without a body.
Cleared Theta Clear
Even beyond the Operating Thetan levels comes the "Cleared Theta Clear", a godlike state which Hubbard describes this way:"A thetan who is completely rehabilitated and can do everything a thetan should do, such as move MEST and control others from a distance, or create his own universe; a person who is able to create his own universe or, living in the MEST universe is able to create illusions perceivable by others at will, to handle MEST universe objects without mechanical means and to have and feel no need of bodies or even the MEST universe to keep himself and his friends interested in existence".
Body thetan
A Body Thetan is an alien thetan who is "stuck" in, on or near a human body, and all human bodies are said to be covered in these misplaced thetans, or clusters of them. This information is not divulged until a Scientologist reaches the third Operating Thetan level (or OT III). Most Body Thetans were said by Hubbard to be a result of a prehistoric "Incident"Incident (Scientology)
L. Ron Hubbard used the term Incident in a specific context for auditing in Scientology and Dianetics: the description of space opera events in our Universe's distant past, involving alien interventions in our past lives...
involving Xenu
Xenu
Xenu ,also spelled Xemu, was, according to the founder of Scientology L. Ron Hubbard, the dictator of the "Galactic Confederacy" who, 75 million years ago, brought billions of his people to Earth in a DC-8-like spacecraft, stacked them around volcanoes and killed them using hydrogen bombs...
, as well as other similar alien occurrences on the whole track.
Further still by the time the subject reaches the level of OT VII, it is revealed to him that his physical body is not just covered with Body Thetans, but is literally composed of them.
External links
- What is Scientology: “The Parts of Man” a description of the thetan
- ScientologyToday: What is a thetan?
- FreeZone NOTS