Gurdjieff and the Esoteric Teaching of Buddha and Jesus

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This present work restores to the original message of Siddhārtha Gautama and Jesus of Nazareth their true nature as operational and transmutative disciplines, liberating them from the doctrinal layers and reductionisms accumulated over millennia. In the Ganges valley of the 6th century BCE, the Buddha's word was not an abstract metaphysical system, but rather a clinical pedagogy and an art of inner transformation founded upon the observation of psychophysical mechanisms. The Dhamma constituted an invitation to direct experience aimed at diagnosing and eradicating the suffering tied to psychological sleep. The investigation highlights how Buddhism's historical trajectory underwent a regression: with monastic codification and the Abhidharma, the living practice of deconditioning gave way to a hyper-intellectualized anatomy of the mind. The most severe distortion concerns Anattā ("Non-Self"): through philological analysis and the contribution of perennialist scholars, the text demonstrates that the formula did not deny spiritual individuality, but served as a practice of stripping away attachments so as not to identify with the five aggregates of the temporary personality. The work establishes a parallel between Gautama’s path and the Fourth Way of Georges I. Gurdjieff, drawing a distinction between mechanical "Personality" and "Essence." Subsequent scholasticism confused the diagnosis of mechanical man with ultimate reality, generating metaphysical dead ends such as Nāgārjuna’s Madhyamaka dialectic and Emptiness. By integrating traditional cosmologies with quantum physics, the text demonstrates the necessity of a non-reducible Primary Principle. This critique extends to Advaita Vedānta, Theosophy, and modern commercial Mindfulness, which has been reduced to mere psychophysical well-being, devoid of the true inner alchemy oriented toward the destruction of the false personality and the formation of a real, unique, and permanent self. In parallel, the volume undertakes an operation of "cultural archaeology" to dismantle the misunderstandings that have distorted Jesus' message, transforming it into a State religion and a system of social control. Through the criteria of modern historiography and critical philosophy, the author demonstrates the historical concreteness of the Nazarene, deeply rooted in the prophetic and eschatological horizon of Second Temple Judaism. The central core lies in the dramatic metamorphosis undergone by his teaching: the transition from the original texts to the Latin of Roman law shackled inner experience within a framework of penal casuistry. Metanoia (a paradigm shift of the mind) was translated into the moral punishment of paenitentia; hamartia (existential misalignment) became sin-as-crime; pneuma was dematerialized; and pistis was reduced to dogmatic adherence. The work deconstructs traditional spatial and temporal categories: the "Kingdom of God" is reclaimed as an inner state of consciousness "within you," Hell is downsized to Gehenna as a metaphor for existential waste, and "eternal life" reveals its value as the qualitative fullness of the Eternal Present. Redrawn as Bar Enasha (Son of Man), Jesus embodies authentic humanity, dismantling the Hellenistic myth of the parthenos. Finally, the subversive power of Agape is reassessed as an unconditional posture of consciousness, contrasted against the legalism of the rule and pyramidal power institutions, thereby returning to contemporary human beings an existential teaching of extraordinary liberating power.