How Harold Klemp Became What He Is

 

 

 21/4/1432 Eckankar is a Comparative Religion   

 

    Eckankar is what one would call a set of dogmas for those who want to align themselves with almost any spiritual path in history.  It believes in reincarnation, mystical powers, divination, spiritual linage invocation, Atlantis, lucid dreaming, the omnipresence of Gurus (This is not in body, but in their actual souls.), a seemingly endless variety of rituals, psychology & psychiatry without secular connotation, a mythical history of Tibet, unusual ways of talking, initiations, implicit biblical view points, cause and effect that isn't part of Karma, et cetera.  It is the view of Tibet before the Chinese invasion as the spiritual center of the world that puts the importance of Rebazar Tarzs behind only the three historical Eck Masters.  Peddar Zaskq or Paul Twichell in actuality was foremost.  The current president of the Eckankar corporation is always considered the most important spiritual master for the initiate of Eckankar.  He is given credit for all projections and entities encountered in trance or dream states.  Such is the importance to Eckist of their living spiritual masters.  Even their highest have doubts from time to time in many of these things, but this is counteracted by continued self referral and making sure one believes in what the historical and mythical Eck Masters tell them. 

 

 

 

    From 1967 till 1970 Harold Klemp made the transition over to Eckankar from Lutheran Church.  During this time he would still attend a church.  Unlike most, he made a point of submitting his resignation from Christianity.  Even after that point he was filled with fear, guilt, and doubts about his involvement with Eckankar.  The announcement of heresy to those who probably made it known they don't like hearing of and will not consider such matters, made things worse.  Harold Klemp could not work out the issues of being pressured back towards church, so it was left to working with troubled dreams.  Those many prayers for his guidance resulted in many dreams about churches and church meetings.  It wasn't till he had found something in a number of these dreams to help him deal with having a Christian past in a Christian society that he could have normal relations with Christians again.  Many of these lessons were from finding different interpretations of Bible passages.  In Eckankar it is believed all guidance needed for life can be found in dreams.  Whether explicitly claimed or not; they do not have to be all one's own dreams.  This point is clear in Soul Travelers of the Far Country.  Many won't have access to understand or even recollect enough of your dreams.  When you do, you have to find the balance of religion in society and in yourself that is better for you.  Aligning his ideas of living master with the ideas of his inner life is how Harold Klemp finally calmed his heart.  When treated properly, even the most mundane dreams can become as an important part of life as our more physical experiences.

 

 

 

    The past existed.  We have an interpretation of what we think we know of.  Some believe the organization of our memories is not just in our minds.  They call it the Causal Plane.  In Eckankar, it is not the standard idea for it.  That would be a like the Aramaic concept of the Atzilut or Archetypal Realm.  Instead of divine ideas being the cause of all causes, this idea is about accessing the past in psychological experiences.  Harold Klemp's account of Lemuria with its clear discrepancy in page 75 and what page 90 said he hired Paul Twichell to come up with, offer proof of something very important.  The many past life claims, I heard of, find all their information in knowledge and conclusions about this life.  This could be landscapes of Southern California, particularly Laguna Beach, resulting in ideas of a lost continent of Lemuria; ideas expressed in past generations resulting in future ideas; or a reading of a translation of the Infancy Gospel of Thomas leading to a professional reading with connections to a current person; et cetera.  Eckankar teaches that this Realm of The Past can be viewed in three ways:  Akashic readings make claims about the measures of one's good, evil, et cetera; Soul readings are said to be a detailed account of a soul's history; And the ECK-Vidya are detailed accounts of what could happen in the future.  These readings, can be learned by all Eckist, but claims about others are only allowed to be from the President of Eckankar Corporation.  The exception was when Darwin Gross Man allowed Harold Klemp as vice president this privilege too.  The goal of these practices is to minimize repetition of life's lessons.

 

 

 

    Harold Klemp had long dreamt of stave churches.  In 1979, Harold Klemp finally visited an old stave church in person.  There he reconciled his dreams of old churches with his new life in Eckankar.  He first noticed how the inner temples were pristine and precise, not degraded by the processes of the living.  He found the used nature of currently used churches full of modern technology stifling enough, but a place in a harsh climate no longer used for spirituality, was much more so.  These dreams were now interpreted as past lives, regardless of any relation of the main character to him.  He thought of division within 

Christianity and assumed how anti-Catholic sediment must have been a main subject of Martin Luther.  He thought how scripture that is no longer accessable in its original must be outdated.  Even what isn't outdated, can't hold any weight without spiritual involvement.  Can it?  Can we just follow traditions without even looking for their meaning and experience?  What are our motivations when we claim to perform a spiritual practice?

    Visiting an old farm house nearby, brought more forgotten dreams and memories.  He had come to a realization.  All these recalled events made him what he is and there was something that each of these offered to teach that was not available elsewhere in his experience.  To know of personal experiences in an inner and outer sense, we can't leave them unbalanced.  We have to become comfortable with them inside and out.

 

 

 

    Like many, Harold dreams of himself doing things he can't or won't do in his outer life.  Sometimes this means picturing yourself as having a different body to make it possible.  The difference with the view of such dreams in Eckankar is that such dreams can be counted as important as our physical achievements.    This is true whether expressing vulgarity, making a scene in the place of faith abandoned, or having a spiritual master declare your graduation of your studies with him.  The psychedelic experiences of Eckist are regarded as greater than the metaphysical realizations of saintly characters. This is for the control one can have both during and in bringing them about.  The level of realization of an inner kingdom is also often kept secret.  The keys are paying close attention to detail and teaching about it.  Those are said to be of the best ways to advance spiritually.  The difference between the one pushing a spiritual path and that of the Eckanakar missionary work becomes very unclear.  One needs to make a careful read of books like Soul Travelers Of The Far Country to discern the types of experiences and make an accurate judgement of the issues brought up. 

 

 

 

    In 1970, Paul Twichell said that Harold Klemp would be the leader of Eckankar Corporation after the next and that every living Eck Master chooses his own successor.  The later was well known, but the former may not have physically happened.  The result was a decade of progressive dreams.  Peddar Zaskq and Dap Ren (Paul Twitchell and Darwin Gross) were main characters of these visions, as well as inner masters, such as Rebazar.  These experiences were about receiving leadership, responsibility, and being initiated into further mysteries.  Harold admits that many have had similar experiences as these inner initiations and thereby claimed positions of spiritual authority as a result.  What he considers more important is the outer positions of authority.  As opposed to the Islamic concepts of starting out God Conscious and being in authority to teach of what you know of spiritual knowledge by the time you learn a single verse of God's Word, The Eckist hold that few of their own ever develop these states.  It was still in the future when he would attain these positions.  He was one of several who Darwin Gross selected to try for his successor as President of Eckankar.  In 1980, it looked like he was about to hand over the Rod of Eck Power, but the time was not as yet.  This brought further doubt in Harold about his role in Eckankar and the nature of Paul Twitchell as a prophet.  He thought not being not declared the top spiritual person in the world, car trouble, and his brother's cancer were punishments by God for his failures.  His wife tried to reassure him, but it didn't work like that.  He tried very hard to hold on to his seventh intitiation in 1980 and his eighth in 1981.  He kept seeing himself have his ninth in different ways.  He saw himself get it from the Nine Silent Ones months before his eight initiation in the physical world.  He couldn't wait to get it for real and it was tearing him up inside.  Distraction was the only consistent way to be at peace with this.

 

 

 

    Harold had been paying attention to the higher initiates in Eckankar after they left following the 1980 International Seminar.  They thought Darwin Gross was a false master and that a lack of harder lives for renouncing him was proof.  A pledge of allegiance was not to be confined by personal expectations confined by time.  They didn't know Darwin Gross's spiritual status.  Neither did Harold, but he trusted the claim to Living Eck Master.  Focusing on posting Eckankar advertisements was how he separated himself from the new apostates.  That left a potential of as many as 1,200 people a year who had now thought of Eckankar.  Harold's life of dreams and visions sped up, but he kept his progress secret.

 

 

 

        Harold Klemp was thinking about different types of leaders.  He focused on what the Mahantas (Way Showers [Eckankar's top spokesman) were.  They were not to act as just intercessors between man and God.   The Mahantas were supposed to take people beyond emotional support and trust.  The mahanta of the time is even said to be the greatest medium for God's power.  Is it really necessary for one who realizes God's presence through light and sound to call on anyone to mediate these for them?  For people to always feel like the leading human spiritual master is present, it can be the only way.  Dead spiritual giants have left their teachings, but not their presence.  That is why knowing a living master is thought necessary.

    Having taught lower and higher initiate (Chela) classes or seminars was not enough to organize his thoughts on them.  It wasn't enough to control emotions, such as anger.  Harold needed to write to advance spiritually.  Darwin Gross, the president of Eckankar told him, "Do it as if you were the Living Eck Master (world's leading spiritual authority)."  Shouldn't we all share as if we were the main person to convey the information?  He wrote to those who would know nothing of the Eckankar (Light & Sound of God) path.    He wrote to show how one could advance in Eckankar.  The views of both the Eckist and those who had not accepted their living spiritual master needed to be established.    Harold wrote of how different groups focused on different levels of the spiritual hierarchy.  This is explained in terms of theSpiritual Planes.  They are said to be places where time and space are dislocated.  Major faith groups are said to have spiritual ideas that do not transcend mental projections or the Fourth Heaven.  They say the less popular traditional paths confined to feelings of the Second Heaven.  How are almost all these alleged higher visions shared by Eckist are more than mere psychedelics?  Realm six through eleven are  attributed as being sheerly metaphysical, but some descriptions relate how this may not be the case.  The Eckist (Eckankar members) are commanded to pay attention to whatever realms make themselves evident.  Their is not much to say to the Eckist what the difference between metaphysical and psychedelic is.  It is said the psychedelics experienced are manifestations of the metaphysical, though. What metaphysical entities do the Eckist ignore or not work with?  Only those interpreted as not confirming Eckankar doctrine are universally ignored and disobeyed.  This awareness was a chief part of their training.  For those on the way to being The Mahanta, The Living Eck Master, some training was not to be spoke of though.  Not only did access to the private reports of Eckankar members refine his thinking, but their responses to his work did as well. 

  This lead to a July 22, 1981 experience of a Ninth Initiation on the Agam Lok (Unapproachable Sphere: 10th Plane in current Eckankar Cosmology). The fact of even being in such a real was regarded as an immense privilege.  "Very few initiates ever go farther into the God Worlds than the Eighth Plane."  There he was met with the Terror of God where one is met with the intense electrocution he faced in his first trip their in 1970.  Dap Ren spoke to him before, after, and during the experience of what Paul Twitchell in Tiger's Fang called the Agam Purusha (Unapproachable Manifestation).  This time he didn't jump in to a freezing body of water to cool of the burning he felt.  Was he unique in this? Such a terrifying experience is thought to be passed by many on the way to greater spiritual mastery.  Certainly all who Eckist call Mahantas went through this extremely painful, both in spirit and body, possession by such a being of the Agam Lok.  He was now able to withstand being such a medium.  Harold Klemp was hence forth to be known as a dweller of that realm, a Maulani.

 

 

 

    Harold now had a family of his own and a busy schedule.  He was no longer able to spend as much of his free time to performing what he called spiritual exercises; Chanting Hu or some secret word was chief amoungst these.  He knew he couldn't stay in bed and write dreams in the middle of the night, either.  Family needs were considered separate to spiritual life, but still had to be a main part of the balance of life.  Despite the fact that he was advancing in Eckankar as one of the lesser leaders and teachers, doubt still crept in.  Even though Harold's interpretation of Paul Twitchell's 1970 prophesy and many dreams & visions placed Harold as Eckankar's next leader, he saw no outer confirmation of being next in line.  There were people nicknamed minimasters who wrote or shared about experiences that led them to believe the were to be the world's spiritual leader.  Focusing on Sugmad (God) in whatever circumstance is the way for a soul to save itself.  Supreme illumination was not to be a result of one occasion.  

    On September 16, 1981 the outer confirmation came.  They went into the dark room and told him of his new role and how his wife had to approve of it.  Darwin Gross claims Harold  was to be the outer spokesman, while he was to remain President and inner master.  Darwin, even after founding Ancient Teachings Of The Masters, held that Mahanta or way-shower was his rightful role until he died in March 8, 2008.  As long as the Eckankar corporation kept Darwin Gross as their member, they held this as true.  Till Eckankar banned Darwin, Harold Klemp and Darwin Gross were to remain personal contacts.  Harold's wife approved and they and their wives discussed it over dinner.  At that dinner table in Mama's restaurant in the Stanford Shopping Mall, Harold's wife was made a seventh initiate.  That meeting led Harold and his wife to think he would soon be master of Eckankar's.  Harold needed a fuller spiritual name, first.  He was known as Z since 1970.   Harold knew he was to serve as a leader of higher intitiates in seminars, but knowing how close a greater role was gave him great joy like when his friend of decades joined Eckankar in August that year.  In the dark room of the Eck Office, on October 9, 1980 Darwin declared it as Wah Z or the Secret Doctrine.  Now he needed to have 5,000 photos printed before October 22nd.  How could Eckankar members who made it their have enough photos to help in visualizing their new leader in spiritual exercises without that.  Everything was kept secret, for effect, I'm sure.  The photos made Harold notice how aged he was getting.  Harold then realized something about himself.  Despite what illness and stress working in the Eckankar camera department did to his physical form, it had little bearing on what his spiritual role was.  After all, how can we judge a person's spiritual state on their body alone?  Midnight of October 22, 1981 was when Harold claimed to receive the Rod Of Eck Power like he was prepared for eleven years ago, that day.  The next day, Friday the 23rd Darwin Gross lead some Higher Initiates in chanting Hu and declared Harold as Eckankar's new chief spokesman.  Having been presented to the crowd as a Living Eckmaster by the President of Eckankar, Harold made his first talk in that Seminar on Saturday the 24th of October, 1981.  A blue spiritual light was seen descending upon him by himself and atleast one initiate and Harold started what he thinks was a new direction for Eckankar.  Like in Al Qoor'aan 3.144, people's allegiance was to be towards Eck or God; no matter what happens to the Living Spiritual Master (Eck Master).  Despite a feeling of repeated persecution, Harold Klemp has continued in what he considers a new way of spiritual teaching.

 

 

 

    Since his possession of 1970, Harold has had permission of the Eckankar corporation to help people in their dreams and visions.  Like all images of historical or mythic Eck Masters, Harold Klemp has an appearance that can be mistaken for someone encountered in most peoples live.  Since Paul Twitchell was said to give him permission to be a guide in dreams, the vague descriptions that can apply to him have been interpreted as being Z or Harold Klemp in the dream state.  Like other dreams people have much or all of such encounters are forgotten.  However, for the second intiate in Eckankar under Harold Klemp as President, they claim to remember atleast one.  Much of why people forget dreams and visions is beliefs that say they shouldn't.  Likewise what dreams we have are influenced by what we believe.  Since atleast 1973, people had such experiences that were later interpreted as being Z or Wah Z; Whether that be a sick person in bed, a child saying what sounded like Wah Z, or dreams of changes in Eckankar leadership.  In 1980, when Darwin Gross started testing atleast sixty other candidates for the next Eckankar leader, the public knowledge of it made such recollections more common.  While people had started to adjust to the ascent of a new leader, many still had too much focus on Darwin Gross's personality.  The same sort of fanaticism of focusing more on the teacher than the teachings, happened when Paul Twitchell died in 1971.  Many found that difficult, too.  Like believers in Al Qoor'an 2.285, the Eckist is not supposed to discriminate between God's Messengers.  The most recent one chosen by God to deliver his messages has the current law, is all.  This time they had advanced warning.  Three Eck Masters were said to have stepped aside while still alive.  Yet Rebazar Tarzs, Fubbi Quantz, and Yaubl Sacabi remained unattached to their leadership role.  Darwin Gross is said to have done differently when he decided to share leadership of the corporation he took from being worth about $85,000 to any where from 25-50 million dollars.  This difference of sharing the role of Living Eck Master was part of what led to Darwin being banished from Eckankar starting on August 7th, 1983.  The other two reasons are a failed lawsuit that cost the Eckankar Corporation a million and Darwin Gross using $2,510,00 of Eckankar funds to start a satellite organization without board approval. 

    Like Moses and Aaron, can no two prophets share leadership of their people?  If you believe Darwin Gross is a prophet, then you say they can.  If you believe Harold Klemp is the 973rd, then the answer is not this time.

 

 

 

    In Eckankar, all who don't have the right consciousness are viewed to be on their way towards that.  Along the path many qualities stand in the way.  Amoung them are "venom, spite, abasement, ... greed, gluttony, and every negative trait that stands between us and Sugmad (God)."  To the member of Eckankar the strongest drives in the human being; shyness and fear are not to be worked with, but done away with.  No life is without difficulty in getting rid of the qualities that stand in the way of our spiritual development.  Nothing in life happens without a reason, though.  Whether desire to meet a spiritual master leads to meeting one eventually or that which is not part of known choices we made; It is was predestined as something we need to go through.  We are like in Al Qoor'aan 2.286, not burdened beyond our capacity.  We all make mistakes, but are to move past them.  Some experiences give us something, some take something away, and others are to avoid a matter.  These trails are opportunities for more spiritual freedom.  To the member of Eckankar, the proof of this is in access to spiritual worlds.  The Eckist (Eckankar Initiate) is said to have come further than those who aren't in Eckankar and the Mahanta, the Living Eck Master is said to have more freedom than any other of his time.  These 973 Spiritual Leaders are said to be able to have visions at will and have control over them.  They are said to control the destiny of the Chela or initiate of Eckankar in the way of Divine Judgement.  The Eckist is not to seek truth in non Eckankar scriptures, for it is said not to be in their.  Neither are members of Eckankar to wait for proof amounting to faith to accept these grandiose claims of Paul Twitchell, Darwin Gross (before August of 1983), and Harold Klemp.  They are however meant to seek the knowledge of visions for themselves.  There they are said to find the support and realization of what Paulji, Darji, and Harji taught.  Regardless of the interpretation of some of the claims of experience, they can't all be discounted.