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A review by mayoroffailure
Bare-Faced Messiah: The True Story of L. Ron Hubbard by Russell Miller
4.0
L. Ron Hubbard is self absorbed, Narcissistic, insane, and a pathological liar. All of these things were unbeknownst to me before I read the book but it has now become abundantly clear.
I had been interested in Scientology ever since several Hollywood stars had come out as followers, not in the sense that I wanted to become a Scientologist, but rather that I was curious how in the world so many were convinced to tithe, tithe, tithe. One day I was browsing the internet and had come across an article that revealed this books existence. When I read the article I learned that it had been published in the eighties but blocked from publication in the US until now, a rather interesting fact. That peaked my interest and filled me with a curiosity to learn why the church would fight so hard to get a book blocked from publication, so I bought it.
The book itself is not so much an analyzation of the church and its founder but rather what the title suggests, its a story of L. Ron Hubbard from the start of his life to its finish. Russell Miller tells the story of LRH's life from an unbiased view and cites all of his sources with great care and detail, and as a result the book reads like a 60 Minutes segment.
I was most shocked at just how horrible of person LRH was, I had vaguely heard of him from his work in Science Fiction back in the pulp era but I didn't know anything specifically. What I came to learn was that LRH was a charlatan and insane narcissist of the highest order, a man who is so self absorbed that he needs to feel as though he is important. I think that his obsession with feeling important comes from the days of his spoiled childhood (Russell throws in some interesting family stories about this at the begging of the book) where LRH was the most beloved of all his fathers children. That need for importance drove Hubbard through his life until he finally ended up with a body of followers who worshiped him like Jesus, but that need would also be his downfall.
As he progressed through life he became ever more paranoid and insane, and I think that he had been lying so often and so much that he actually began to believe what he was telling people. This insanity led to the banishing of his own children, two divorces, a rash of suicides from his followers, federal investigation, and the banishment from several countries. When Hubbard set out to make his mark on the world he was often looking after the monetary gains of his choices, this becomes most evident in the chapter where Mr. Miller chronicles Hubbard's time as a Satanist under the tutelage of one of Alastair Crowley's students. Hubbard left the satanic cult because it was yielding him no money and elected to bring out his master money making plan, invent a religion.
Hubbard did just that and the rest is history, as his mental state declined he became ever more paranoid and violent until his eventual death in 1986. I learned a lot about Scientology and its estranged founder through my reading and believe that I have come away with my answer that I was looking for. It would seem that if anything, LRH was charismatic, and it was that charm that led people to the cult and kept them there, no matter what happened. I would recommend this book to anyone remotely interested in Scientology for its wealth of information on the cults history, and after all, protection begins with education.
I had been interested in Scientology ever since several Hollywood stars had come out as followers, not in the sense that I wanted to become a Scientologist, but rather that I was curious how in the world so many were convinced to tithe, tithe, tithe. One day I was browsing the internet and had come across an article that revealed this books existence. When I read the article I learned that it had been published in the eighties but blocked from publication in the US until now, a rather interesting fact. That peaked my interest and filled me with a curiosity to learn why the church would fight so hard to get a book blocked from publication, so I bought it.
The book itself is not so much an analyzation of the church and its founder but rather what the title suggests, its a story of L. Ron Hubbard from the start of his life to its finish. Russell Miller tells the story of LRH's life from an unbiased view and cites all of his sources with great care and detail, and as a result the book reads like a 60 Minutes segment.
I was most shocked at just how horrible of person LRH was, I had vaguely heard of him from his work in Science Fiction back in the pulp era but I didn't know anything specifically. What I came to learn was that LRH was a charlatan and insane narcissist of the highest order, a man who is so self absorbed that he needs to feel as though he is important. I think that his obsession with feeling important comes from the days of his spoiled childhood (Russell throws in some interesting family stories about this at the begging of the book) where LRH was the most beloved of all his fathers children. That need for importance drove Hubbard through his life until he finally ended up with a body of followers who worshiped him like Jesus, but that need would also be his downfall.
As he progressed through life he became ever more paranoid and insane, and I think that he had been lying so often and so much that he actually began to believe what he was telling people. This insanity led to the banishing of his own children, two divorces, a rash of suicides from his followers, federal investigation, and the banishment from several countries. When Hubbard set out to make his mark on the world he was often looking after the monetary gains of his choices, this becomes most evident in the chapter where Mr. Miller chronicles Hubbard's time as a Satanist under the tutelage of one of Alastair Crowley's students. Hubbard left the satanic cult because it was yielding him no money and elected to bring out his master money making plan, invent a religion.
Hubbard did just that and the rest is history, as his mental state declined he became ever more paranoid and violent until his eventual death in 1986. I learned a lot about Scientology and its estranged founder through my reading and believe that I have come away with my answer that I was looking for. It would seem that if anything, LRH was charismatic, and it was that charm that led people to the cult and kept them there, no matter what happened. I would recommend this book to anyone remotely interested in Scientology for its wealth of information on the cults history, and after all, protection begins with education.