Complication of The Plot
Gurdjieff went to great lengths to add layer upon layer of complexity to the book making it some of the most difficult and challenging reading one can take up. At times dry, long winded, or seemingly ridiculous, Gurdjieff also added a huge list of complicated words which appear frequently throughout the text. Many times the definition of those words is given later on in the text, and thereby further understanding of the book is further complicated.
The first chapter, entitled "The Arousing of Thought", was edited or rewritten by Gurdjieff thirty times. Gurdjieff also expounded one of the book's most controversial ideas in an early chapter entitled "The Arch-absurd: According to the assertion of Beelzebub, our Sun neither lights or heats".
One of Gurdjieff's chief criticisms of modern society, expressed quite clearly even to the casual reader in this particular volume, is the inexactitude of modern language. What follows is the first sentence of Beelzebub's Tales to His Grandson:
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- "AMONG other convictions formed in my common presence during my responsible, peculiarly composed life, there is one such also—an indubitable conviction—that always and everywhere on the earth, among people of every degree of development of understanding and of every form of manifestation of the factors which engender in their individuality all kinds of ideals, there is acquired the tendency, when beginning anything new, unfailingly to pronounce aloud or, if not aloud, at least mentally, that definite utterance understandable to every even quite illiterate person, which in different epochs has been formulated variously and in our day is formulated in the following words: "In the name of the Father and of the Son and in the name of the Holy Ghost, Amen.
The reason for complicating so far the plot of this book is to increase the effort and the attention required from the reader to understand this book. This is because of Gurdjieff's conviction that knowledge which comes without any effort from the student is completely useless for that student. He believed that true knowledge comes from personal experiences and individual confrontations actualized by one's own intentions.
The complexity and the length of this book limited the readers to only those who are interested in Gurdjieff's ideas. Thereby it also significantly limited criticism towards it.
Read more about this topic: Beelzebub's Tales To His Grandson
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