In early 2020, I had been considering attending the All & Everything conference, since it was to be held in Salem, Massachusetts, not far from where I live. But then circumstances caused the in-person conference to be cancelled and instead, the conference would be held online. This was less interesting to me, so I did not attend.

Still, I had an interest in what was to be presented at the conference. And in researching what papers were to be submitted to the conference, I came across a paper by Jan Jarvis and later a rebuttal to her paper by Rafael Lefort Jr.

The papers were particularly interesting to me in that they presented Gurdjieff’s ideas on death and immortality, the rebuttal more accurately than the original paper, in my opinion.

The Jarvis 2020 paper is titled Role of Abstract Ideals in the Creation of the Kesdjan.

The Lefort Jr rebuttal is titled Esoteric Christianity vs. Secular Humanism in Esoteric Clothing: A Rebuttal to ‘Role of Abstract Ideals in the Creation of the Kesdjan’.

The original paper was presented at a conference in 2020 and recently, the Q&A for the conference was published. It is evident however from the Q&A that her assertions were hardly challenged at all.

If you’re interested in the topics of death and immortality as presented by Gurdjieff, I recommend reading the rebuttal—it touches on all of the points of the original paper and is more thoroughly researched on the topics presented. To date, I have seen no counter paper to refute the Lefort Jr rebuttal.