only Bordel for Truth

Henri Tracol asked about Krishnamurti, and Mr. Gurdjieff talked about Mrs. Besant, Mme. Blavatsky, and so on. He said he had met Blavatsky.

He went on to talk about India: how many people go there looking for truth, but India is only "bordel for truth."

September 24, 1949 in Paris

Fourth Way related literature published 2013

A. R. Orage, Lawrence Morris, Sherman Manchester - Orage's Commentary on Gurdjieff's Beelzebub's Tales to His Grandson: New York Talks 1926-1930

B. B. Grant and L. S. Morris - The Force of Gurdjieff. A.R. Orage's group talks Vol.1

John O. Cosgrave - The Academy for Souls

H. K. Grumbein - A New Theory Of Music: An Introduction

Keith Buzzell - A New Conception of God, Further Reflections on Gurdjieff's Whim

Red Hawl - Self Observation: The Awakening of Conscience: An Owner's Manual 

Robin Bloor - To Fathom the Gist: Volume 1 - Approaches to the Writings of G. I. Gurdjieff

Robin Bloor - The Searchable Index to G. I. Gurdjieff's Beelzebub's Tales to His Grandson

Mitzi DeWhitt - The Reality of Being decoded "Getting to the Heart of the Matter"

Stephen A. Grant - In Search of Being: The Fourth Way to Consciousness 

Alan Wrightson - Master Disaster: The Inner Lives Of Gurdjieff, Meher Baba, Idries Shah and Omar Ali-Shah

the melting pot of Essence

At death the essence of beings is thrown into the melting pot (Peer Gynt and the Button Moulder) from which new beings emerge, but not with the same essence. They recur like the leaves of a tree, with the same tendencies for growth, in the same way, with perhaps minor variations - fulfilling a cosmic purpose.

A.R. Orage

everybody acts in the interests of good

One may say that evil does not exist for subjective man at all, that there exist only different conceptions of good. Nobody ever does anything deliberately in the interests of evil, for the sake of evil. Everybody acts in the interests of good, as he understands it. But everybody understands it in a different way. Consequently men drown, slay, and kill one another in the interests of good. The reason is again just the same, men's ignorance and the deep sleep in which they live.

This is so obvious that it even seems strange that people have never thought of it before. However, the fact remains that they fail to understand this and everyone considers his good as the only good and all the rest as evil. It is naive and useless to hope that men will ever understand this and that they will evolve a general and
identical idea of good.

 In Search Of The Miraculous (Chapter Eight)

Mathematik is useless

Finally he saw me, and when I told him all I was doing, he said: "Physical efforts are unnecessary.' I told him about the paper to the Royal Society. His comment was:

"Mathematik is useless. You cannot learn laws of World Creation and World Existence by Mathematik. You must only look for Being. When you have Being, you will know all those things, without the need of Mathematik."

J.G. Bennett - Witness p.247

New Editions 2013

Russell A. Smith - Gurdjieff. Cosmic Secrets

Charles T. Tart - Mind Science

deeper science of Being

In Gurdjieff the ancient teachings of Lao-Tse, Jesus and St. Augustine all have fresh import and find valid scientific support. The implications of this deeper science of Being no longer slumber in secret archives of the temples of the East. Sought by him they are made clearer to us in writing by one himself a seer.

Frank Lloyd Wright

Arnold Keyserling visiting Gurdjieff 1949

I had never heard of Gurdjieff and the statement of my friend, that she knows a Russian master, filled me with suspicion. Nevertheless I accompanied her one evening in the Salle Pleyel where he taught these techniques of movement. I always remember how strange it touched me when Gurdjieff entered the hall. It was like a purple light. Here I encountered the first old man who was as I had always wished it to be: an example of complete presence and dedication or empathy.

During the meal Gurdjieff told stories which were like Zen stories. All of us listened without saying anything. For me Gurdjieff was a man of unbelievable beauty. All the people supped, so to say, with their eyes on him. He told me I should come to every meal now; if I was not a pupil of his, I would be a good companion with whom he wanted to eat and drink. This naturally put me in complete enthusiasm. For the first time I experienced outwardly the mood of reality which Ramana Maharashi had brought to me inwardly.

One day Gurdjieff told me that his books would appear in many countries and that I was ready to publish them in German if he paid the cost. In that year and the following year I began an adventure. I translated Ouspensky's, In Search of the Miraculous, and published this and Gurdjieff's All and Everything. Both books had no echo whatsoever in the public. (Few copies were sold.)

http://www.lawsofwisdom.com/chapter5.html

only one interest

He said, "Every thinking man - and by man I also mean woman - must be occupied only by this interest - to develop a soul."

Gurdjieff and the Women of the Rope p.22

super-human effort

He also said that any efforts of less than "super-human" strength were of no value anyway, once more pointing out that, in a sense, man's only hope was to fight to attain the "impossible". The only thing worth doing being something that "could not be done".

Fritz Peters - My Journey with a Mystic p.237

culture depends on developed individual man

‘I agree,’ said Orage, ‘but, according to Gurdjieff, the inner development of individual man does not depend on culture, though culture may provide a background. On the contrary, culture depends on developed individual man, or rather a group of men working together. The flowerings and blossomings of culture which occur from time to time in history, apparently for no reason—the building of the Gothic cathedrals, the Renaissance, Shakespeare’s plays - are examples of the results of a group of men working consciously.

Nott - Teachings of Gurdjieff p.30

Paris Demonstrations December 1923

 Demonstrations de L´Institut Gurdjieff

Theatre des Champs Elysees

no System is comparable to it in power

No system of gnostic soteriological philosophy that has been published to the modern world is comparable to it in power and intellectual articulation.

Philip Mairet on Gurdjieffs Ideas

John Carswell on Gurdjieff

What he possessed and in abnormal measure were energy, self-confidence and control over his passions.

He had the power of controlled fury which commands instant obedience.

John Carswell - Lives and Letters p.185

words are too weak to describe him

The secret of that personality that so strongly affected us all is hard to define; words to describe him are too weak, or incomplete or too passive.

He was quiet, but the quiet was a smouldering fire that might suddenly flare up with a scorching flame that made us shrink away in startled silence. He was gentle, but when he wished us to learn a lesson that could not be taught by soft and comfortable methods, he was ruthless in his demands and scathing in his condemnation of our failures. He had studied much, and had learned at first hand about such things as the religious basis of the dances of the dervishes.

He was scornful of wordy analysis of philosophical ideas, and his own ideas were always expressed clearly, even crudely, with the earthiness of his peasant stoc ,and seemed to come out of his personal experience and contemplation. Verbosity he always condemned, and in the early days particularly that of Ouspensky, who was an effortless, brilliant but wordy talker.

Anna Butkowsky Hewitt - With Gurdjieff in St.Petersburg and Paris p.142

The Seers School

A school called “The Seers", this school has existed since time immemorial in large artificial caves in Kafirstan, on the heights of Kidjera(Kijera/Kidgera). 

from a introduction to the Gurdjieff Movements in 1923

will be better than an angel

In answer to a remark from someone Gurdjieff began to speak about ‘silly angels’ and said that if a man works on himself and purges himself of undesirable elements he will be better than an angel, a being with more understanding and experience.

C.S. Nott - Teachings of Gurdjieff p.107

Sarmoung Enneagram in the Gurdjieff Movie

Gurdjieffs Stop Exercise 1923

Gurdjieffs uniqueness

The more I saw of Gurdjieff the more convinced I became of his uniqueness. He had qualities which I had never seen in anybody else; profound knowledge, immense vitality and complete immunity from fear.

Gurdjieff once said: 'I have very good leather to sell to those who want to make shoes out of it'.

Dr. Kenneth Walker - Venture with Ideas

necessary to hide one's light

He stated that, contrary to the principles expressed in the "Sermon on the Mount", as it was frequently interpreted, it was necessary to "hide one's light" from the ignorant and the uninitiated as they would only, quite automatically, attempt to destroy any such "light" or 'knowledge"; however, it was equally important not to hide that same knowledge or "light" from oneself and from others who were working seriously and honestly towards the same goals of self-development and proper growth.

Fritz Peters - Gurdjieff Remembered (Chapter X)

What happened to Alexander Petrov after 1918?

...Gurdjieff’s group in Moscow. Among them was Alexander Nikanorovich Petrov, one of the chief pupils there. Physically, he was like a healthy young bull, and, as I came to learn, he had a very intelligent mind and was highly gifted in mathematics and engineering.

He was one of Mr. Gurdjieff’s favourite pupils, with whom he worked much on selfconcentration and self-observation.

...the others went to Maikop, where Petrov became director of a state school. Mr Gurdjieff asked him to come to Tiflis when we went there, but he did not come. And when the Bolsheviks again conquered the whole northern Caucasus, he returned to Moscow. Soon, even correspondence with him became impossible.

all quotes are from Hartmann´s - Our Life with Mr. Gurdjieff,

please comment if you have any information on Petrov´s life after returning to Moscow about 1918

egg and chicken

Gabo, an old Russian pupil, one day told him that he was eating too much fat, it was not good for him. With a quizzical look Gurdjieff asked, "Since when has egg told something to chicken?"

C.S. Nott - Further Teachings of Gurdjieff p.80

how close people live to the truth

Crumbs of truth are scattered everywhere; and those who know and understand can see and marvel how close people live to the truth, yet how blind they are and powerless to penetrate it.

Views from the Real World p.55

dances are a kind of language

Observe how people dance. Each nationality has its own way of dancing. You can always tell the nationality by the way a man dances. In the East, where traditions are much stronger, you can even tell which tribe or village people come from by the way they dance. In this way dances become like a kind of language by which people - unconsciously, of course - tell us about themselves. It is the same with everything. Each nation has a limited repertoire of movements which come from the impressions of childhood.

from a Gurdjieff Talk in London 1922 
(The Study of Psychology)

I worked harder than any man on earth

I hate you because all my life - that is half a century - I have labored and suffered for you, day and night, to discover why you are unhappy, and whether it was possible to make a man, who was quite indifferent to me, happy. I have worked so hard that I can freely say harder than any man on earth. The result of it all is that all who have ever known me will either hate me or call me a speculator or an enthusiastic psychopathic visionary or what-not.

Gurdjieff - Ecstacy of Revelation

finding a teacher

To a man who is searching with all his being, with all his inner self, comes the unfailing conviction that to find out how to know in order to do is possible only by finding a guide with experience and knowledge, who will take on his spiritual guidance and become his teacher. And it is here that a man's flair is more important than anywhere else. He chooses a guide for himself. It is of course an indispensable condition that he choose as a guide a man who knows, or else all meaning of choice is lost. Who can tell where a guide who does not know may lead a man? Every seeker dreams of a guide who knows, dreams about him but seldom asks himself objectively and sincerely—is he worthy of being guided? Is he ready to follow the way?

Views from the Real World p.57

a genuine representative of science

Look out, you scum, or I'll crush you like cockroaches. Don't you see who's coming? Not just anybody, but a genuine representative of science who has assimilated all the knowledge offered today by the highest seats of learning!

Beelzebubs Tales to his Grandson - 
The sixth and last sojourn of Beelzebub on the planet Earth (Chapter 31)

the Real never ceases to be

Orage´s gravestone

You grieve for those who should not be grieved for.

The wise grieve neither for the living nor the dead.

Never at any time was I not, nor thou,
nor these princes of men.

Nor shall we cease to be hereafter.

The unreal has no being.

The real never ceases to be.

Old Hampstead Churchyard. On the stone is the enneagram carved by his friend Eric Gill, with Krishna's words to Arjuna.

X - the unknown quantity

Small parties of three, four and sometimes even a dozen, would go to a nearby cafe and sit for an hour or more, reconstructing what Gurdjieff had been saying. This led to a strange observation that was verified many times by all of us. One person would have a clear and exact recollection of what Gurdjieff had said on some topic. Another would flatly contradict the account, saying that something quite different had been said. Sometimes several people would insist that Gurdjieff had spoken exclusively and privately to them, giving them a deeply important message. Other people who had been sitting a yard away would not have heard a word.

After some time we concluded that Gurdjieff had a peculiar kind of Maya that enabled him to appear differently to different people at the same time. He was, indeed, as Madame Ouspensky had put it, X—the unknown quantity. To convey some impression of his infinite variety forty people, men and women, who saw most of him at the various periods of his life would have to write forty different books. Unfortunately most of those who could have written of him have died, leaving little or no record of their experience.

J.G. Bennett - Witness p.246

chief obstacle to the spread of G's method

I am reluctant to describe any of Gurdjieff 's spiritual exercises, as I am sure that they should never be undertaken without supervision by some experienced guide. Herein indeed lies the chief obstacle to the spread of Gurdjieff 's method. His pupils are generally agreed that at least seven years of intensive training are needed to form a group leader. The majority of those who attempt this training fall by the way or become so acutely aware of their own defects that they refuse to take responsibility for others. In consequence, those who have at different times accepted the task of guiding others have been overworked and overstrained. Dependence upon highly trained and rarely equipped teachers is a serious defect for which it is difficult to see a remedy.

J.G. Bennett - Witness p.246

What are you trying to do?

At one meeting a man who had just started coming to meetings said,  “Mr. Gurdjieff, what are you trying to do?”

What I try do?” Mr. Gurdjieff replied, “I try show people when it rains the streets are wet.”

That struck me so strongly that I have never forgotten it.

Edwin Wolfe - Episodes with Gurdjieff p.12

the worst collection of paintings in the World

"You know, Miss Keep not have any sympathy for my paintings. Last time she come here, I ask her what she think of my paintings, and she tell me: 'Mr. Gurdjieff, you have everything here, except art'. Miss Keep not appreciate what I do."

"...they tell I have worst collection of paintings in Paris—perhaps in all world. I already unique to most people who know me, but in my collection of bad art people see that I am still more unique ... in another way, unique."

Fritz Peters - Gurdjieff Remembered (Chapter 18)

even God made a mistake

Elizabeth Constant Gordon

Gurdjieff once was telling Elizabeth Gordon, that he had made a mistake. He went on to say that even God made a mistake, one big mistake. Miss Gordon replied that she thought God had done everything necessary to forestall the effect of the Merciless Heropass - "Time, that wears away every living thing". Gurdjieff said, "Yes, everything but one thing; he made an umbrella when he should have made an enema, and now he is idiot and like everyone else sits in galoshes." This seemingly senseless expression puzzled me; only after a long time did I begin to perceive a great truth in the parable.

C.S. Nott - Further Teachings of Gurdjieff p.229

 (Miss Gordon was a close Gurdjieff pupil from 1922 until her death in Paris 1945)

above the World

Alexander de Salzmann

One day he told me why he never smiled. He said that once Mr. Gurdjieff had picked him up and put him above the world where he could see everything as it really is. Then he fell back down to crawl in the earth's dust again. From then on, he was unable to laugh. He yearned for that larger view until the end of his days.

Louise March - The Gurdjieff Years p.33

the Highlands of Pamir

Alfons Paquet met Alexander de Salzmann in Istanbul 1921, Salzmann invited him to the Institute:

We met in the late evening and visited the Institute. It was named the Institute for the Harmonic Development of Man. Nothing less!...
I was introduced to the head of the school, a Caucasian, who had traveled for years to the mountain regions of Inner Asia, where he visited monasteries and studied the cults, dances and sciences of the monks. This man claimed that India wasn´t the "home of wonders", but instead he talked of the highlands of Pamir...
The fields of study of this Institute include lectures on asian religious myth, on rythym, on the law of octaves, on the science of numbers and what else is related to the Kabbalah and the magical crafts. They teach here a interpretation of the strange stone monuments, the dolmen...
Enthusiasm and boast, which accompany certain esoteric schools in the countries of the West, are far from them...

Alfons Paquet´s "Delphische Wanderung" was published in 1922.  Five pages of this book are dedicated to the visit of Gurdjieffs Institute in Istanbul, which Paquet visited only on one night in 1921.

the Enneagram is a Universal Symbol

"Speaking in general it must be understood that the enneagram is a universal symbol. All knowledge can be included in the enneagram and with the help of the enneagram it can be interpreted."

"The knowledge of the enneagram has for a very long time been preserved in secret and if it now is, so to speak, made available to all, it is only in an incomplete and theoretical form of which nobody could make any practical use without instruction from a man who knows."

G.I. Gurdjieff

Fourth Way Enneagram Literature:

P.D. Ouspensky - In Search of the Miraculous

J.G. Bennett - Enneagram Studies

Anthony Blake - The Intelligent Enneagram

Steffan Soule - Accomplish the Impossible

Russell A. Smith - Gurdjieff: Cosmic Secrets

Sophia Wellbeloved - Gurdjieff: The Key Concepts

Dr. H.J. Sharp - Sacred Geometry and the Enneagram

Richard J. Defouw - The Enneagram in the Writings of Gurdjieff

William Patrick Patterson - Taking With the Left Hand: Enneagram Craze

how to educate our children

Would you be kind enough to give me some advice how to give a good education to the children who are entrusted to us, such as we are? 

Gurdjieff: You ask Mme de Salzmann to give you two chapters of a book I have written (Meetings with Remarkable Men), "My Father" and "My First Tutor." I have explained there briefly what you ask me. These two chapters will give you some good instruction.

Paris Meeting, 28 October 1943

why Gurdjieff became a writer in 1924

Since I had not, when in full strength and health, succeeded in introducing in practice into the life of people the beneficial truths elucidated for them by me, then I must at least, at any cost, succeed in doing this in theory, before my death.

Life is real only then, when "I AM"(Prologue)

you cannot imagine how extraordinary he was

Suddenly he began to talk about what he called the "week of miracles." It was a week that he and other members of the Russian group had spent with Gurdjieff in Finland. "I was in another room," said Ouspensky. "I heard Gurdjieff's voice speaking inside me. He told me something, something very important." Ouspensky's eyes became glazed. He seemed to go into a trance. The zoubrovka perhaps—or the memory of Gurdjieff. Hoping to restart this intriguing conversation I piped up in my prissy English voice, "He must have been a very strange man, that Mr. Gurdjieff." Ouspensky gazed at me as if I had said something ridiculous. "Strange! He was extraordinary! You cannot possibly imagine how extraordinary Gurdjieff was." His eyes glazed again...

Robert de Ropp - Warrior´s Way p.102

your life is finished

May 30th 1937, Paris. Wright: "Damn, I'm sleepy. I can't take it. Still, I don't want to hurt the old man's feelings." (Began to read and G. returned and sat down. Wright stopped reading.) "You know, Mr. G., this is interesting and it's a pity it's not well written. You know you talk English very well, too bad you can't dictate. Now if I had time you could dictate to me and I could write this for you in good English." (Read a few pages, stopped again.) "Now I must go and take my little daughter home. She's sleepy and so is her father." G: "Yes, for her sake, stop. She is young. You, of course, are old man now and life finish. But she only begin." Wright (turning red): "My life is NOT finished. I could right now make six more like her...." (Olgivanna with tears in her eyes led the child to the door.)

source: http://www.gurdjieff.org/rope.htm

Another account of this meeting can be found in C.S. Notts "Further Teachings of Gurdjieff". Lloyd Wright referring to Gurdjieff as "the old man", was born in 1867, Gurdjieff was born 1866. This was the first time Gurdjieff und Lloyd Wright met.

Fourth Way Literature 2012

english Fourth Way related books, published in 2012:

Solita Solano/ Kathryn Hulme - Gurdjieff and the Women of the Rope
Kathryn C. Hulme - Undiscovered Country: A Spiritual Adventure
Louise March Göpfert - The Gurdieff Years: 1929-1949
Keith A. Buzzell - Reflections on Gurdjieff's Whim
Georgette Leblanc - The Courage Machine: A New Life in a New World
Christian Wertenbaker - Man in the Cosmos: G. I. Gurdjieff and Modern Science 

Jacob Needleman - An Unknown World: Notes on the Meaning of the Earth
Paul B. Taylor - Real Worlds of G.I.Gurdjieff. Chapters in the Life of a Master
Bob Hunter - Meetings with Beryl Pogson - A Guide to the Fourth Way
Michael S. Pittman - Classical Spirituality in Contemporary America: The Confluence and Contribution of G.I. Gurdjieff and Sufism
Ashala Gabriel - Remembering: Being with my Teacher
David Hall - Beelzebub And The Beast - Comparative Study of G.I. Gurdjieff & Aleister Crowley
Mohammad Tamdgidi - Gurdjieff and Hypnosis: A Hermeneutic Study
Theodore J. Nottingham - Written In Our Hearts: The Practice of Spiritual Transformation
Patty de Llosa - Taming your inner tyrant
Herb Cohen - Journey to Feel like a Man: Olympic Fencer, Gurdjieff Work, Tai Chi Teacher
Edward F. Sylvia - Swedenborg & Gurdjieff: The Missing Links
Philip Riley - God Was All Dry: Alienation, Violence, and an Experience in The Fourth Way

Prince Oldenburgsky and Beelzebub

If this episode has a base in historicel fact, the person Beelzebub/Gurdjieff met in Egypt would have been Prince Alexander Petrovich Oldenburgsky (1844-1932).

In Tales, Beelzebubs function in relation to the Temperance committee is the curing of alcoholics, something for which Gurdjieff had proved adept.

Paul B. Taylor - G.I.Gurdjieff. A New Life p. 35

 (Beelzebubs Tales to his Grandson - Beelzebub in Russia,Chapter 34)

studying ancient magic in Baku

I often went to Baku because there was a society there, composed mostly of Persians who were studying ancient magic, of which I had been an associate member for a long time.

Meetings with Remarkable Men p.255 (dated around 1900)

all life is hidden in design

Whenever somenone questioned why Gurdjieff described himself to visitors as a rug merchant, he replied: "Why dealer in rugs? Answer simple. I sell knowledge. All is in rugs around you, all. Read! All life is hidden in design."

The rugs on his floors and walls were texts, stories to be read. Rug or carpet designs, like folk stories, transmit traditional cultural lore from one generation to another. Gurdjieff had always insisted that story, myth, art and dance reduplicate objective language, and that symbols veil truths.

Paul B. Taylor - Gurdjieff. A New Life p.218

Prince Bebutov and the Seekers of Truth

D.I. Bebutov

Prince Bebutov, born 1859 of Armenian descent, was a politician and a leading member of the russian Kadet Party.

He was the founder of the Astreya Lodge, whose house on Rozhdestvensky Boulevard in Moscow, replete with symbols hidden in its ornamented fasade, was familiar to Gurdjieff. Gurdjieffs cousin Merkurov equated members of Bebutovs circle with the "Seekers of Truth". Bebutov practised magic and spiritualistic seances.

Gurdjieff travelled to Istanbul with Bebutov in 1908. There he apparently met with Turkish Masons who had overthrown the Turkish Sultan. Among the European guests of the Turkish revolutionaries was a German, Rudolf von Sebottendorf.

Bebutov was a high ranked mason.("Great East of Russia", "Order of free masons", "Polar Star") He was also one of three founders of a lodge called "The Truth" in Odessa.  Bebutov wrote a book titled "The Russian Masonry of the 20th Century".

Bebutov´s House in Moscow, where the Seekers of Truth were meeting

Masonic Symbols on Bebutov´s house

my teaching is my own

Tibet is an example where, ten years ago, all government was in the hands of the monks. But they couldn’t put my ideas into practice, because my teaching was not known to them. My teaching is my own. It combines all the evidence of ancient truth that I collected in my travels with all the knowledge that I have acquired through my own personal work.

Our Life with Mr.Gurdjieff p.182

desires and nondesires

And so, only he who consciously assists the process of this inner struggle, and consciously assists the "nondesires" to prevail over the "desires," behaves in accordance with the Being of our Common Father Creator Himself, whereas he who consciously assists the contrary only increases His sorrow.

Beelzebubs Tales to his Grandson(Chapter 27)

a King in exile

Gurdjieff...even now, nearly thirty years after his death, the name has for me a certain magic. He was, without doubt, the most extraordinary human being I have ever met.

...

The life of Gurdjieff represented a special aspect of the Warrior's Way. More than any other man I have met, he lived by self-imposed rules and pursued intentional aims. In the fullest sense of the word he was inner-directed and lived strategically, knowing what he was doing and why he was doing it. He cared nothing for the artificial laws that confine weaker people to narrow patterns of behavior. He made his own laws and played the game by his own rules. Because these laws and rules were very different from those that ordinarily govern human behavior he seemed like an enigma to some and like a madman to others. My impression that Gurdjieff was a king in exile, that he had been displaced not only in space but also in time...

...

Jesus evidently had plenty of Hvareno. Gurdjieff had it too. It gave him the quality of a king in exile. His kingdom was neither in our time or our place, but he could, had he wished to, have used his Hvareno to draw great numbers of people to him. He could have had a following of thousands.

Robert de Ropp - Warrior´s Way

know thyself

Man who all 'good' or man who all 'bad' is not whole man, is one-sided. Third thing is conscience; possibility to acquire conscience is already in man when born; this possibility given - free - by Nature. But is only possibility. Real conscience can only be acquired by work, by learning to understand self first. Even your religion - western religion - have this phrase "Know thyself". This phrase most important in all religions. When begin know self already begin have possibility become genuine man. So first thing must learn is know self by this exercise, self-observation. If not do this, then will be like acorn that not become tree—fertilizer. Fertilizer which go back in ground and become possibility for future man.

Fritz Peters - Boyhood with Gurdjieff Chapter 9

sayings on Jesus Christ

In any other man I should have been sceptical of most of his tales; but certainly Georgiy Ivanovich was out of the common theosophical ruck. If he really wanted to go anywhere, were it even to his mysterious monasteries in Tibet - in one of which, he said, echoing an Indian tradition, Jesus had studied! (Bechhofer Roberts - A Journey through Georgia)

Q: Was Christ a teacher with a school preparation, or was he an accidental genius? Gurdjieff: Without knowledge he could not have been what he was, nor could he have done what he did. It is known that where he was there was knowledge.
(Views from the Real World p.85)

But while for some people religion serves as guidance, for others it is only a policeman. Christ, too, was a magician, a man of Knowledge. He was not God, or rather He was God, but on a certain level. (Views from the Real World p.211)

Christ and all the others spoke of the death which can take place in life, the death of the tyrant from whom our slavery comes, that death which is a necessary condition of the first and principal liberation of man. (Views from the Real World p.238)

He said that Jesus knew his own nonentityness and should he return, he would be very angry that people thought he had said he was God. 
(Gurdjieff and the Women of the Rope p.179)

Let us suppose Jesus Christ to be man number eight. (ISOM Chapter 16)

The Last Supper was a magical ceremony similar to 'blood-brotherhood' for establishing a connection between 'astral bodies.' But who is there who knows about this in existing religions and who understands what it means? All this has been long forgotten and everything has been given quite a different meaning. The words have remained but their meaning has long been lost. (ISOM Chapter 5)

There is nothing new in the idea of sleep. People have been told almost since the creation of the world that they are asleep and that they must awaken. How many times is this said in the Gospels, for instance? 'Awake,' 'watch,' 'sleep not.' Christ's disciples even slept when he was praying in the Garden of Gethsemane for the last time. (ISOM Chapter 8)

see also the detailed description in Beelzebubs Tales (Chapter on Religion)

my bible is quite another thing

What you learn from bible you wish believe, but your bible is one thing and my bible is quite another. Nobody now believe in Christian thing, not with inner world, especially young ones. Nobody but English old maid and your American Lesbians. In General, man over there not believe. Your bible is hodgepodge.

Gurdjieff and the Women of the Rope p.156

perhaps will understand better

Nott: What about people who have never met you, or will never meet you? How will they be able to understand Beelzebub's Tales?

Gurdjieff: Perhaps will understand better than many always around me. You, by the way, you see much of me and become identified with me. I not wish people identified with me, I wish them identified with my ideas. Many who never will meet me, simple people, will understand my book. Time come perhaps when they read Beelzebub's Tales in Churches.

C.S. Nott - Further Teachings of Gurdjieff p.77

discovery of Gurdjieffs true nature

Julia O. Ostrowska

It might seem surprising that this member of the Polish high aristocracy, who associated with those close to the Tsar, became the wife of a man so remote from the manners of the court. Mr. Gurdjieff had won the heart of this young woman, though she little suspected what she was to find out about him later.

One day she confided to us, with a certain smile, how moved she was to discover her husband’s true nature, and to realize that he was totally devoted to work of a spiritual order and dedicated to the good of his fellow man. In his quiet strength she had until then appreciated him above all as an affectionate companion, a benevolent protector, and the hoped-for father of their children.

She saw him in a new light when she realized that her husband was revered by those around him as an exceptional teacher and as an authentic master of wisdom, with the power to help his pupils discover their true spiritual potential. She then took a discreet place beside him, careful not to hinder in any way the work he had to accomplish.

Gurdjieff a Master in Life p.227

Western Section in Tiflis 1919

Alexander de Salzmann´s cover design for the prospectus of the Institute for the Harmonious Developement of Man.

At the bottom in Russian language : Western Section!

This bottom part is removed in the later versions in english, french and german.

I wish for Immortality

Olgivanna Lazovic

She told me about their life in the Caucasus with Gurdjieff. In Tiflis he had asked her if she had a wish, a real wish. She said, ‘I wish for immortality’. He said, ‘What you do now?’ ‘I look after my house and servants,’ she replied. ‘You work yourself? Cook, look after baby?’ ‘No, my servants do that for me.’ ‘You do nothing, and you wish for immortality!’ he said. ‘But this does not come by wishing but by special kind of work. You must work, make effort, for immortality. Now, I will show you how to work. First, tell servants to go and begin by doing everything yourself’

‘He did show me,’ she added. ‘He showed me how to do ordinary housework, not as a servant would do it, but to work and at the same time use his method.’

Like all the women who really worked with Gurdjieff, she was remarkable and unusual; she possessed an inner something, she had individuality, and she could turn her hand to anything.

C.S. Nott - Teachings of Gurdjieff p.84

a Guide to the eternal Mysteries of the Universe

He was still surrounded by this strange entourage of philosophers, doctors, poets, and dancers. He was not exploiting them; on the contrary, several of them were living on his diminishing means. And by them all he was esteemed, almost worshipped, as a guide to the eternal mysteries of the universe. His admirers were by no means fools; some of them were distinguished men, and these especially insisted that Georgiy Ivanovich, as they called him in Russian fashion, had taught them more about their particular art than they had ever learned before. He had peculiar notions about music; others about the ballet; more still about medicine and philosophy; all of which, he said, were based upon secret mathematical mysteries in which he had been instructed in the remote hills of Central Asia!

C. E. Bechhofer Roberts - A Journey Through Georgia