Sigh. It’s taken me forever to get this written. Yes, I’ve been busy with schoolwork, etc. etc. etc. But mainly why it’s taken so long is because Eckankar is just so hard to explain! I don’t quite understand all of it myself—it’s a very mystical religion—but I’ll do my best:
Eckankar was founded in 1965 by a man named Paul Twitchell. (Some“Eckists” will claim he only “rediscovered” the original religion from the beginning of time... but I’m not buying it.) After a period of spiritual searching, and ultimately finding nothing that struck his fancy, Twitchell decided to create a religion of his own. (Go figure.)
Like I said before, the basic beliefs of Eckankar are sparse and open to interpretation. Though the religion has a few main tenets, it focuses more on every individual’s personal relationship with God, or “Eck” as they call it/him/her. According to www.eckankar.org, the basic beliefs are as follows:
* Soul is eternal.
* Soul exists because God loves It.
* Soul is on a journey of Self- and God-Realization.
* Spiritual unfoldment can be accelerated through conscious contact with the ECK, Divine Spirit.
* This contact can be made via the Spiritual Exercises of ECK and the guidance of the Living ECK Master.
* You can actively explore the spiritual worlds through Soul Travel, dreams, and other spiritual techniques.
* Spiritual experience and liberation in this lifetime are available to all.
There are a number of specific exercises to further “God-realization.” Most of these are essentially forms of mediation focusing around a single chant which signifies a certain “spiritual plane.” The holiest spiritual exercise is the “Hu song”—“Hu” being the sound associated with the highest, purest spiritual plane.
Whew. Confused yet? Anyway...
Armed with this information, Carmen and I set off to... erm... “Hu” the morning away.
The group met downtown in a small office space with a poster on the door that read: “Eckankar: Religion of the light and sound of God.”
As expected, there were only about seven people attending. All were seated in a circle of cheap plastic chairs in the center of the small office space. They welcomed us, asked us how we heard about their group... all the typical questions. They briefly explained the proceedings and began the service.
People closed their eyes, took deep breaths, and began to sing the simple—and supposedly divine—syllable. The held the tone for as long as they could, then took another breath and began again. To my surprise, I actually found the sound quite lovely.
The “hu-ing” went on for about twenty minutes, followed by a few minutes of silent mediation. Afterwards they talked about their personal experiences during the service: One man mentioned some character flaws he felt he needed to fix in himself, and he described a scene he pictured in his head of Sri Harold Klemp (the current “spiritual leader”of Eckankar) leading him through a shining doorway into greater enlightenment.
My overall impression of it? Well, it was a little too... shall we say... “woo-woo” for me—with all the “soul travel” and “dream states” and such. But I guess some people get into that sort of thing. I must admit I underestimated the religion in some ways. The actual meditation was very pleasant, and in general, the religion itself wasn’t as “cult-ish” as I had expected.
But the religion on the whole lacked some essential quality... at least for me. There were no ancient rituals, no deep sense of awe, no artistic wonder. The religion would be so much more complete if it included some kind of ages-old tradition. The service would have been so much more profound if it had been performed by monks cloistered in a grand, majestic temple. I just couldn’t quite get into it with the creeper-eyes of Sri Harold Klemp staring at me from his portrait on the dull gray walls of an office building in downtown Lincoln.
~Monica
