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1. The Founder of the Sect and his Finances

The Founder of the Sect, Ronald ("Ron") Lafayette ("L.") Hubbard

The Scientology sect takes every available opportunity to promote Hubbard's biography. Supposedly he could ride a horse before he could walk. The rest of his childhood was said to be full of adventure as well, something like a children's book author would picture an adventurous childhood. Nothing about it has been proved.

The first verifiable fact appears to be that Hubbard was enrolled in a University at Washington. His official star biography asserts that he partook of the first lectures on atomic and molecular theory, and was therefore one of the first students of atomic physics in the USA. The only way this could have been true in his case would be if the atomic research in the USA was being conducted outside the universities. [There is no record of it at the university.]

Be that as it may, let us suppose that this information is correct. "All About Radiation" is the name of a small book first published in 1957, copyrighted by Hubbard. It is still being sold today, despite a content which includes easily recognizable nonsense. On the inside cover the one-time student suddenly becomes "<one of America's first atomic physicists,>" then "<one of America's most renowned atomic physicists>": brazen deceit in both cases.

As far as can be seen, there is only one indication that Hubbard may have ended his university studies with a regular degree: the Frankfurt College for Applied Philosophy states in a 6 page Hubbard biography: "At age 21 he ended his upper level studies with 'ones'." We will ask the Frankfurt College about their source.

Hubbard later decorated himself with the title of Doctor of Philosophy as awarded by the University of Sequoia, which is described as a college for healing without medicine, which probably consists of a post office box and awards doctor's titles by mail. The presumption has been made that Sequoia, so to speak, was one of Hubbard's own shops. In any case, Hubbard relinquished the title in 1966 in a spectacular newspaper advertisement in the London TIMES. The sect continues to use it on suitable occasions.

CFAP [College for Applied Philosophy] - Frankfurt is using special information here, apparently without a Hubbard copyright: according to this the University of Los Angeles had awarded him a Doctorate of Philosophy in 1953.

Hubbard took part in the second World War - at least it is claimed he did - as a commander of corvettes. This statement is extremely dubious, especially when one reads descriptions of his first voyages on the Sea Org flagship. The captain was prohibited from using radar. Instead,

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the E-meter was applied in critical situations, which resulted in a dock being rammed. The captain called it, "The strangest voyage of my life."

Various, partially contradicting descriptions have been given of Hubbard's war years.

Part of the text of an advertisement, "Dianetics, the Development of a Science" read:

"Crippled and blinded by war injuries, he continued his studies and research into philosophy after the end of the war, and assisted by his own discoveries, he won his health back to such an extent that in 1949 he was again classified as completely fit for duty."

A different biographical presentation is found in another Hubbard book:

"Despite being wounded in the second World War, he worked in a hospital during the last years of the war and conducted detailed studies to bring Dianetics out of the gunpowder and war stage up to a level of synthesis."

Amazingly, not a word is said here about being crippled and blinded.

So the information provided by a spokesman for the Secretary of the Navy is hardly surprising: according to him, an inspection of Mr. Hubbard's service records yielded no indication at all that he was wounded while in the Navy.

Other Scientology texts state that he was twice declared dead and had spent a year (1945) in a Navy hospital.

And finally, according to the Veteran's Administration, Hubbard was receiving $160/month in compensation for physical damages which had occurred during the second World War and which had rendered him 40% disabled. The list is, however, not very typical of wartime injuries: duodenal ulcer, bursitis (right shoulder), arthritis, conjunctivitis.

Did a clever advertising manager fabricate disability out of arthritis and blindness from conjunctivitis? Everything indicates that was the case, and so the miraculous cure from paralysis and blindness is now understandable: conjunctivitis and arthritis can be cured by conventional means without Dianetics.

Also worthy of mention from the Frankfurt CFAP biography:

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"Crippled, paralyzed and blind, he was transferred to Oak Knoll Hospital in 1944. Through his extensive training in the area of human understanding which he had received in his youth from Commander Thomson . . . his father's friend and personal student of Sigmund Freud, he developed techniques which enabled him to master his injuries and regain his abilities . . . in 1947 he was completely recovered and was released from the Army hospital once again completely fit for duty."

There is really only one thing which is verifiable in Hubbard's adventure/ biography: he earned his livelihood as a writer. For his western stories he used the ingenious pseudonym of Winchester Remington Colt, the name of the three most well-known instruments of death. Most of his work, however, consists of science fiction stories, that is, fairy tales of the future tinged with science. For those he used pseudonyms including Rene Lafayette and Kurt von Rachen. From the number of them, his productivity seems to have been very impressive. However, Hubbard appeared not to have been completely satisfied with his financial recompensation. In 1949, he made the following momentous proclamation before his author colleagues:

"<It would be crazy to write even one word for only a penny a word. If somebody really wanted to make a million dollars, the best way would be to start his own religion.>"

Then Hubbard wrote "Dianetics - The Modern Science of Mental Health", thereby setting the foundation for his "Copyright" religion. In the early 1950's, Hubbard apparently had a monstrous burst of productivity, because it was during this time frame that the major portion of his books and texts on the subjects of Dianetics and Scientology were written. Variants of these same texts, in essence, are being constantly re-compiled and are still being presented in the Scientology magazines as though they are actually brand new even though they are, in truth, 25 years old. For Hubbard, anyway, this burst of productivity has proved to be rewarding: it is said that 20 million copies of his books have been sold. The real source of money was not discovered until later: a vast number of courses of instruction. Apparently the Americans were not satisfactorily grateful for his grand achievement. He went to England and bought the former castle, located in East Grinstead, of the Maharaja of Jaipur, Saint Hill Manor.

Foreign Scientologists inundated the area, predominantly US Americans, whose dollar at that time enabled them to more cheaply live in Europe.

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After the English government decided to ban foreign Scientologists from the country, Hubbard left England at full steam. For years he lived on ships with the Sea Org at his service, the notorious Sea Organization. Evidently no outsiders see him any more, even though he is said to have since gone ashore in Clearwater, Florida.

Hubbard sentenced:

There was a little kink in Hubbard's biography on February 14, 1978: on this day the 13th Criminal Court of Paris sentenced him to 4 years of prison and a 30,000 franc fine. Hubbard himself took note (perhaps) of the situation from afar: he did not appear in court. [Judgment in English here]

Hubbard was not the only one accused. Charges and summons were made on a Dutchman, Henry Willem Laarhuis, the Frenchwoman Jaqueline Valantin and the Casablanca-born Frenchman Georges Andreu. Andreu was the only one who appeared in court as summoned.

The judgment revealed astounding findings about the Scientology Organization, and an astounding will of the judge to involve himself with this material instead of, or perhaps because of, the absence of the chief accused: the court had its work cut out for itself.

The court had the ledgers of the sect reviewed by accounting experts. They determined, among other things, that 10% of the gross income was being transferred to the "mother church" in England. To England! These payments will be mentioned again in connection with Hubbard's finances: the charter of the German Scientology association states that 10% are to be transferred as donation to the mother church in California. Why the detour through England?

The court further determined that - whatever legal form may have been in use at the time - Scientology was being set up as a well-directed and profitable business undertaking. Charitable status/tax exemption was out of the question even if the balance did not show a profit: that was immediately being ploughed back into real estate and other property.

The court confirmed a finding which had already been arrived at many years before in US Federal court:

90% of the income came from the sale of courses.

Nothing about that is criminal. Why the deceit?

The court painstakingly tallied up everything that was being promised: business success, advancement of professional career, health, etc.

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On the contrary, for the money paid, the participant would receive nothing except "hope for utopian events." If that is too short, the judgment is in the original and a translation is available. Here is a quote from the judgment:

"The French group of Scientology is a commercial enterprise which hides behind a false, misleading facade, a company which sells services; this group misleads people with deceptive maneuvers into believing things which do not reflect reality."

As a result, the court issued a warrant for the arrest of Hubbard and his colleagues. So far as is known, the judgment is not yet legally binding. But if it becomes legally binding and if the French administration requests extradition, Hubbard will probably be better off moving his headquarters back to sea.

Hubbard's Finances

For the Scientologists worldwide this is a delicate subject. It is not without reason that Hubbard has styled himself a selfless idealist. Tax issues are constantly lingering in the background. The assumption is also in the background that Scientology is solely a for-profit company for Hubbard.

It has been and is asserted that Hubbard receives 10% of the gross income of his sect. The Scientology sect attacks this assertion angrily, with no regard for legal fees in their defense. The courage for such legal processes could only arise from the threat of having to pay taxes and from a misperception of the facts which had been caused by intended disinformation.

Also, Hubbard owns the copyright for all written products of the Scientology sect, down to the last little invitation card.

COPYRIGHT: that means an internationally recognized license fee of 8-10% of the final sales prices. If 200,000 copies of the "Dianetics" best seller are sold in one year, (a completely realistic number), then 800,000 DM of the sales alone belong to Hubbard. Sure enough, the Scientology sect sells several dozen different Hubbard books: also sound tapes, E-meters and last but not least, courses.

However, Hubbard does not just receive 10% of book sales, but 10% of the entire gross income of all sect organizations.

The sect disputes this and has already complained numerous times on account of this statement. Former Scientologist Kaufman (»Übermenschen unter uns«/"Supermen Among Us") has reported that anybody who wants to found a Scientology branch must transfer 10% of the gross income to Hubbard via the Scientology headquarters.

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Nothing has changed since then. From the incorporation papers of the College for Applied Philosophy, Hamburg:

"Paragraph 8

The costs of the association will by born the contributions of the course participants, member contributions as well as by donations, 10% of the gross income is to be paid as license fees to L. Ron Hubbard."

The fact that this is not an individual case is shown by the incorporation papers of another Scientology branch: Dianetics Munich Scientology College for Applied Philosophy:

"Paragraph 9

The costs of the association will by born the contributions of the course participants and members, as well as by donations, 10% of the gross income is to be paid as license fees to L. Ron Hubbard."

Later these paragraphs were changed, and since then the Scientology organization of Dianetics Munich pays

"10% license fees as administration costs to the mother church"

and the Dianetic College of Frankfurt, and similarly Scientology Heilbronn pay

"10% to the mother church, Church of Scientology of California"

The German revenue offices would be interested in whether Hubbard and and the "mother church" were not one and the same, because that would doubtlessly have an unfavorable bearing upon charity status/tax exemption.

The answer has been available since July 19, 1969. At that time the US Federal court in case 226-61 passed a decision on sect founder Hubbard's request for return of tax money. From the decision of the US federal revenue court:

"<On March 29, 1967, the complainant (the "mother church" - ed.) introduced a compensation system (known as an "installment plan") in which Hubbard, instead of a wage, was paid 10% of the gross income of the complainant (the "mother church" - ed.) Other Scientology communities, licensees and organization also pay a portion of their gross

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income, usually 10%. In addition, Hubbard receives royalties for his numerous Scientology books as well as honoraria for lectures and other coincidentally occurring income.

"During the years in question these other percentages, honoraria and commissions, as far as is indicated by the paperwork, were quite obviously accessible to Hubbard for the purpose of his own personal use. One of these kind of regulations closes the end of the existence of a chain of concessions for private profit and throws doubt on the other page upon the correctness of the payments by the complainant (the "mother church" - ed.) to Hubbard and to the members of his family. The fact that Hubbard was the receiver of income of the complainant in the form of royalties and commissions gives a related reason for the presumption of personal profit.>"

The decision further mentions "veiled and unjustified division of income" and "unexplained totals" and payments to Hubbard's family: free automobile, rent-free apartment, furthermore the "mother church" paid rent to Hubbard's wife and loans to his son and his daughter Kay received a stipend: "<In the paperwork, any evidence is lacking that Miss Hubbard performed work for the complainant.>"

The judgment continues:

< "From these facts the conclusion can be drawn that the Hubbard family possesses the right of disposal over the income of the corporation for their personal use.>"

Despite the absolutely unequivocal statement of one of the highest courts of the USA, the Scientology sect continues, in numerous proceedings, to fight the assertion that Hubbard receives this 10%.

An example of that was a proceeding against the Heinrich Bauer publishers, who had distributed this assertion in an article with the title, "The Rotten Business of False Christians."

The publishers had the chief bookkeeper of the English sect headquarters called before the court. He confirmed that Hubbard was also receiving money from this organization, designated as wages. For about 30,000 DM per year. This bookkeeper made another noteworthy statement:

"In Denmark there is a commercial business which manages his books. This company also makes a profit . . . Hubbard has a normal writer's contract with this company."

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And, after many lapses of memory: "Royalties are paid for all items which are sold to the public." The record bears a date of May 5, 1977. Head bookkeeper Derek Field further stated: all of these approximately 60 organizations paid 10% of their income to the mother church.

Now back again to the Federal Republic [of Germany] and a special tip for the revenue office: Inez Lochridge also appeared before the same court as a witness, the director of the Scientology "financial entity." Her most important statement was:

"To be sure 10% of the net income of the association was paid to the mother church."

This ends the chain of evidence, because any reference to these payments are missing from the charter of the sect center. In the future the revenue offices will know: there is no relying upon the wording of the charter.

Finally the business auditor of the German sect center was heard on this court date. He corrected Ines Lockridge, who had mentioned net figures:

"10% of the gross income is paid . . . to the mother church."

One thing must be made perfectly clear here: 10% of the gross income - that is of the total income - is a huge percentage. By no means does that have anything to do with royalties or profit, because profit is only taken out of income. 10% of the profit would be a hefty amount. But 10% of the gross sales: probably no capitalist has ever dreamt that words and books alone would serve as capital.

Scientific Hocus-Pocus

Trip up the Time Track

The belief in past lives in not important for the Scientology sect, but the demonstration of the existence of past lives is. Because that is what lays the track for Hubbard's train of thought: the Thetan is of a past life, the "engrams" are surviving remnants out of past lives and their removal is what brings the sect the bulk of its money.

The evidence which Hubbard offers is childish. However, his adherents appear to believe his demonstrations. We will have to dispute them. For the Scientologists, the most important proof is the book, "Have you lived this life before?"

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(A German translation does not exist.) The sub-title of this book is "A scientific report." In the introduction, there is a section called "the conditions of the experiment":

"<Toward the end of 1958 a group of Scientologists assembled in London to learn the most advanced methods of psychotherapy ever to have been successful.>"

One can see here, by the way, that Scientology was still being presented as a method of psychotherapy. The rift with the psychologists did not occur until later.

The heading "the conditions of the experiment" is also misleading, as is just about everything in Scientology: in science, a description of the conditions is given so that the experiment can be repeated again. Proof is assured only under the same conditions in the experiment is repeated.

At least Hubbard was still making an effort to pretend to be scientific. Later he doesn't bother about that anymore. The "conditions of the experiment" includes a description of the E-meter, which will be mentioned again later:

<"The electrometer is the oldest known instrument of psychotherapy. It was discovered about 100 years ago and named "the Wheatstone Bridge." It was and is the most important instrument of the researcher of the spirit. Its most modern version is a transistor model. Older versions can be found in any therapeutic practice, also described as "skin galvanometer" or "lie detector."

The E-meter, as it is called in the language of psychotherapy, detects areas of spiritual travail and stress. This is just as useful to the police as to the therapist, because it shows everything which unsettles the person. The E-meter then localizes the disturbance in time and character. Some people with bad consciences have a justifiable fear of the E-meter, because when it is used by an expert, it covers each and every thing the person has done or been.">

We are going to come back to this miracle machine. This is only to ascertain that not one word is mentioned in the required statement for the repetition of the presumed experiment. Temperature, humidity, barometric pressure, etc.

The experiments described in this book are not able to be repeated and therefore have no conclusiveness whatsoever!

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42 "cases" are described.

Case 1 Jessie Gray: "<Through Questions and interpreting the E-meter reactions>", Scientologist Jessie Gray discovered something in a "preclear" which happened 651 years before. He talks about an ape and the naked body of a handsome, white-haired man. A shore, a ship, signs in the sand and two helmeted soldiers took a prisoner. Nothing which makes a story colorful was missing.

Case 2 is a coolie in China in the 19th century: "<at least half-way enough to eat and walls within which to sleep, that was our idea of prosperity.>". Then it gets somewhat more precise: 1874, in May.

Case 3 on March 19, 56 B.C. concerns a slain Roman legionnaire. For 45 minutes he could not understand why he was alive, but his body was dead. For three hours he lingered in the vicinity of the dead body, felt the heat of the sun upon the dead body and felt how the soldier pulled out his sword. Later he decided to use the body of the brother of the woman who had poisoned him.

Case 4 happened "<nine galactic periods ago.>" I was of the masculine gender, born of space parents. Apparently I had two or three mothers who died or were killed ... At the age of 16 I killed my father.

Case 5 had the misfortune of having the needle read the strongest at a point in time 78 billion years ago. He found himself in a fantastic space factory in which golden animals - mostly elephants and zebras - were suspended concentrically by their necks.

Case 6 began 1,600 years ago on a planet of perfection. He was an engineer and had to make a machine with energy which would serve the welfare of the citizens. A machine was a kind of god which gave orders.

Case 8 the event was localized with the E-meter and it turned out that it happened 3,225 years ago. "I was in North Africa, stationed near the coast. I was the leader of the Roman army in this sector", etc. A very colorful story followed that. Comment: Rome was first founded about 2,600 years ago. Rome, therefore, could not have had an army 600 years before then in Africa. The Punic Wars took place about 2,240 years ago. The E-meter was off by a good thousand years.

Case 9 had a collision with a giant meteor in space.

Case 10 happened 55,000,000,000,000,000,000 years ago, pinpointed exactly with the needle on the E-meter. At the time he had repaired the atomic engine of a space ship, and other things.

Case 11 went back 6,254 years. He was, at the time, about 35 years old, a carpenter, married for 12 years and had three children. Although he was always broke, he found himself a mistress, and then he was really broke. His mistress demanded much

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money from him and threatened to tell his wife. The carpenter turned into a criminal and killed. But the person who gave him his contract - supposedly a political group - cheated him out of his money . . etc. etc.

Case 12 began in 1790 and ended in 1840. He was the son of a French aristocrat and was smuggled to England at the age of 3. Both parents died in France, he later travelled back, rode on a warship to see, tended cannon and died in a work accident.

Case 13 also had troubles with work: 468 million years ago he lost the body of a robot. Exactly 469,476,600 years ago he was on Mars, with a body, of course. There he had caused great devastation, and destroyed a bridge and buildings. (Followed once again my a wild outer space story.)

Case 15 happened 1 million, 15 thousand and 550 years ago. On another planet. He was a spaceship pilot and had a breakdown.

Case 16 occurred 1,500 years ago. At first he saw 4 arms that rose up out of the ground. Vesuvius served as a background for this drama: the "preclear" survived the destruction of Pompei.

These are what serve as proof for the Scientology sect that everybody has lived a previous life. Today this book is included as one of the standard works offered by Scientology.

In connection with this, perhaps it should once again be mentioned that sect founder Hubbard, before the founding of the sect, was a science fiction author; that means he wrote fairy tales based on science.

Here is how the statement "nine galactic periods ago" was explained in case 4: scientists presume that our universe has come about as a result of the so-called "big bang." That is supposed to have been a big explosion in which the earth and sun and all components of the universe were all flung away from each other, and that will continue until the force of of the pull has been exceeded, then everything will collapse back together again, and there will be another explosion, compared to which the sun will only be a pilot light.

However, the Thetan, the spiritual being which in Hubbard's view is found in us, survives all this unharmed. Unharmed, but not unchanged. Hubbard also wrote a book about what the Thetans were doing in times like this. The title: "A History of Man."

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For the history of mankind, Hubbard needed only 78 pages. The first sentence reads:

"This is a cold-blooded and factual account of your last sixty trillion years."

That figure as a number is: 60,000,000,000,000 years.

As a comparison, our universe is said to have originated about 5,000,000,000/5 billion years ago.

Comment of the translator: the original was "sixty trillion." That is US English. In British English that can also be "billions". We have used the US version.

In the meantime Hubbard believed to have gotten an even more essential, remote period of time in check. Compare this to the chapter about the E-meter. Hubbard described in the beginning how he had sounded out the "whole track", even past the 60 trillion years, with his volunteers. He was not at a loss for words to explain why it was exactly 60 trillion and not 20 or 120.

In the beginning he had used various types of devices, for instance an electroencephalograph and a police lie detector. However, these instruments proved not to be suitable for his purposes because of their limitations. Volney Mathison then applied his electronic expertise to this problem and invented the electropsychometer.

The nonsensical assertion that an E-meter is more effective than a lie detector will be gone into later. The point here is that he did not invent the E-meter; it was a certain Volney Mathison. We have already cited a quote in a different place in which he even admits that this device was already over 100 years old.

None of this would be of any interest if Hubbard had not received a patent for the E-meter from the British Patent Office (Patent Nr. 943012). However a patent is only received for one's own workmanship and for something which must be new. The patent, in turn, serves as justification for the profiteering price (compare capital price): the model designated as the "work horse" costs about 1,500 DM, a model more pleasing to the eye about 2,500 DM [Deutsch Marks].

Back to the "History of Man": in it Hubbard used theories, as he does elsewhere, which roughly correspond to existing schools of thought. What comes out of Hubbard's work, however, is a real eye-opener. For instance he writes about a genetic line in which is contained all the experience which has taken place in the course of evolution. A completely acceptable opinion, known today as DNA.

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Hubbard, however, rephrases this into his Scientology gobbledygook so that an outsider can hardly understand it. His explanation of pre-natal impressions also corresponds to existing opinions. However his conclusions are peculiar. And all of this is only the beginning:

Hubbard had even discovered a "preclear" (somebody who is not clear) in an atom:

"There seems to be a "hole in space" immediately ahead of the Atom. Just after this hole is a condition of motion, with the preclear in the centre, with rings of motion travelling around him."

Hubbard described how the "Thetan" had changed in the course of time. For example:

"The Weeper

"After leaving the sea, the GE spent a half a million years on the beach. It had already known about air as a plankton, had known about the beach as seaweed and dying clam."

He also knew what the "Thetan", also called a "preclear", does when it is not sitting in a body:

"BETWEEN-LIVES: At death the theta being leaves the body and goes to the between-lives area. Here he "reports in", is given a strong forgetter implant and is then shot down to a body just before it is born. At least that is the way the old invader in the Earth area was operating.

The implant is very interesting. The preclear is seated before a wheel which contains numbers of pictures. As the wheel turns, these pictures go away from him. He is moved aside to the right, the left the back. A mirror arrangement shows him still sitting there before the pictures. A force screen hits him through the pictures. The pictures dim out. The whole effect is to give him the impression that he has no past life, that he is no longer the same identity, that his memory has been erased."

So that is the secret of the Thetans. Because their memory has been erased, they no longer know of earlier existences or of their unrealized abilities. These abilities are blocked through negative impressions

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from earlier existences. Hubbard revealed the secret of Thetans with the aid of an E-meter, and with the help of the same E-meter he maintains that he is able to remove engrams, which he discovered. The result: the OT, the "Operating Thetan", and that is truly a superhuman.

There are OTs of various stages, from I to VIII, and only Hubbard has ascended to the highest step. Perhaps that is because it does not cost him anything. That OTs do not get sick is a given. It makes the question of why nobody ever gets to see Hubbard more interesting. According to the latest reports he is paraplegic. That would be a sour note, surely: a crippled OT, strapped to his wheelchair and not in the position to set his own body in motion.

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