Since Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes are well known in our dark society, their divorce has focused the spotlight on Scientology because of their religious issues. Scientology is a very small religion with some very strange beliefs! While I was doing research on their beliefs, I ran across some strange terms unique to them. Three are: thetan, Xenu and Dianetics.
While Christianity speaks of man and his body, soul and spirit (1 Thess.5:23), Scientology speaks of mind, body and thetan! At least some in Scientology believe a human to be an immortal alien, i.e. extraterrestrial, spiritual being, termed a thetan, that is trapped on Earth in a physical body. A different source gave definitions to their terms:
Thetan — an invisible part of a human being, similar to the concept of a soul or spirit in other religions, that exists whether or not it is currently operating a human body. Scientologists believe Thetans are trillions of years old, having been reborn repeatedly in various earthly bodies. They are responsible for the existence of the material world, which they willed into being, according to Dianetics.
Xenu – according to Hubbard, the dictator of a Galactic Confederacy who brought billions of people to Earth and massacred them with hydrogen bombs 75 trillion years ago. The slaughter, known as “Incident II,” sets up a major conflict in Scientology, as the thetans of the victims devolved into “body thetans” that torment modern humans. Releasing their grip is part of the goal of Scientology. The story of Xenu, which the church tried to keep secret until it leaked via an Internet newsgroup in 1994, is revealed in Operating Thetan level three, or OT III. Some Scientology officials now deny the existence of the Xenu story.
If you know the Scriptures, you have to admit those are some very strange beliefs and poles apart from the Biblical message of Christianity. Their religious myths distort or omit sin, the Lord Jesus Christ and his redeeming blood, Judgment Day, the lake of fire or Paradise for the overcomers, etc. as mentioned in the Bible! Hence, Scientology is beyond outside the ballpark, so to speak! But without the light from Scripture and it being the criterion of where all teachings are found (2 Tim. 3:16,17), any person can drift into any kind of wild belief system. For Scientology it doesn’t stop with the above. Their view of salvation is also strangely different and DANGEROUS. The following is from the Scientology website:
Scientology holds in common with many of the world’s oldest religions that Man was put here to work out his own salvation by attaining an understanding of himself and the universe and that only in this way can he understand God the Creator and his relationship to the Allness of All. ( http://www.scientology.org/faq/scientology-beliefs-and-practices/what-are-the-religious-tenets-of-scientology.html )
Again, not a single word was mentioned about a submissive faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and turning away from sins, yet they have a salvation teaching! Scientology uses Biblical terms, like Mormons, but they mean something altogether different than Christians, who possess eternal life through faith in Jesus Christ and have true salvation.
