Skeptical Material on New Thought/Religious Science

[ExMinister]

I just read a great book by Martin Gardner on Mary Baker Eddy, one of the leaders in the New Thought movement around the turn of the century. Much like the less than positive information we've discovered about Mother Teresa since her death, the same was true for Ms. Eddy.

Do any of you know of any similar books or articles that have been written on any of the other major New Thought movements or leaders/founders such as Emmet Fox, Joel Goldsmith, or Charles and Myrtle Fillmore? Others include Thomas Troward, Ralph Waldo Trine, or any of the founders of religious science, divine science, etc.

I haven't been able to find any in my online researching, and I had just stumbled accidentally on Gardner's book while looking for other of his books at the library.

[Bikewer]

Interestingly, Mark Twain wrote a book excoriating Ms. Eddy as well, and he was a contemporary!

I recall reading through a psychiatric text once; they listed Ms. Eddy as a "textbook" example of a paranoid schizophrenic.

[ExMinister]

Yes, Gardner has a whole chapter called "The Rage of Mark Twain." Here is part of Twain said about Eddy: "Grasping, sordid, penurious, famishing for everything she sees - money, power, glory - vain, untruthful, jealous, despotic, arrogant, insolent, pitiliess where thinkers and hypnotists are concerned, illiterate, shallow, incapable of reasoning outside of commercial lines, immeasurably selfish." I can't find the quote but one of my favorites was where he essentially said the one thing he gave her credit for was being a shrewd businesswoman who never missed an opportunity to bilk money from her followers. Sounds like a few other modern spiritual nutter types we know.

She was convinced throughout her life that she was the victim of what she called "malicious animal magnetism," and obsessed with fear that her enemies (and there were many, in her mind, especially her competitors) were sending this malicious mental energy to destroy her. She blamed even the smallest things going wrong on this and had people working in prayer shifts in her home throughout the night to protect her. She apparently lied on more than occasion in her claims of healing - for example, she claimed to have miraculously recovered from an incurable spinal illness in which a certain doctor had given her only 3 days to live. Said doctor finally came forward to do a sworn affidavit saying he felt obligated for the sake of posterity to say that it wasn't true and he had never said she had 3 days to live, nor at any time believed her to be close to death.. She was evidently also addicted to morphine.

Very revealing book! The Healing Revelations of Mary Baker Eddy by Martin Gardner, for anyone interested. I hope there are others like it!

[RSLancastr]

"Grasping, sordid, penurious, famishing for everything she sees - money, power, glory - vain, untruthful, jealous, despotic, arrogant, insolent, pitiliess where thinkers and hypnotists are concerned, illiterate, shallow, incapable of reasoning outside of commercial lines, immeasurably selfish."Wait, Mark Twain wrote a book about Sylvia Browne? :eek:

[SRW]

Mark Twain wrote a book called Christian Science, exposing Eddy and her church. It's a good read I would recommend it.

[ExMinister]

Wait, Mark Twain wrote a book about Sylvia Browne? :eek:

:D And "...who never missed an opportunity to bilk money from her followers"! Let's see - $850 a reading, $1000 for a salon, $25 for a measly photo after a lecture, fees (at least in the old days when they were open to the public) to attend trance sessions, online Sylvia Browne jewelry and gifts, monthly study group membership fees, fees for the study group books, fees to become a minister, fees (money sent back to SB) to operate your church, fees to learn hypnosis....

[ExMinister]

Mark Twain wrote a book called Christian Science, exposing Eddy and her church. It's a good read I would recommend it.


I'll look for that one, thanks. I bet it's entertaining. He wasn't one to mince words about his low opinion of Eddy.

I'm ordering Gardner's Fads & Fallacies so perhaps there will be more in that.

[SRW]

I'll look for that one, thanks. I bet it's entertaining. He wasn't one to mince words about his low opinion of Eddy.

I'm ordering Gardner's Fads & Fallacies so perhaps there will be more in that.

It might be hard to find, it is out of copyright so you can find it here.

http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/3187

[CFLarsen]

Jeffrey Shallit's article on Christian Science and Mary Baker Eddy. (http://skepticreport.com/medicalquackery/christianscience.htm)

[ExMinister]

Jeffrey Shallit's article on Christian Science and Mary Baker Eddy. (http://skepticreport.com/medicalquackery/christianscience.htm)

Thanks!

[CFLarsen]

You're welcome.

[sillyhead]

Much like the less than positive information we've discovered about Mother Teresa since her death


Is there a link or two about this anywhere? Yes, I've been living under a rock for the past few years. :)

[ExMinister]

Is there a link or two about this anywhere? Yes, I've been living under a rock for the past few years. :)


I haven't mastered the science of linking to previous threads yet but if you do a quick search of the forum for Mother Teresa, you will find a few. A book that has been highly recommended to me, which I have recently ordered (haven't read yet), is The Missionary Position: Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice by C. Hitchens.

http://www.amazon.com/Missionary-Position-Mother-Teresa-Practice/dp/185984054X

[Worm]

Also this (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=119537) thread in History, Literature and the Arts section