Witness to Death and Resurrection, is Joseph Azize’s comprehensive biography of John G. Bennett. I recently finished reading it and highly recommend it. A string of pearls consisting of Bennett’s “visions” takes us through not only Bennett’s life, but his growing spiritual development.
Ben Bennett’s book, I Teach How to Cook, (not What to Cook) shows us Bennett the man. Not sparing us his dad’s faults, his book points to how one can work on oneself to transform.
My book, Real People, portrays J.G. Bennett as I saw him, a highly developed teacher of the Work in his own right.
A Witness from Afar
Having never met, Azize examines Bennett from a scholarly distance. Yet, as a student of the Work through his own teachers who were contemporaries of Bennett, Azize can appreciate Bennett’s ability to understand Gurdjieff’s teaching and make it his own.
In Witness to Death and Resurrection, Bennett’s foibles in life and propensity to seek teachers after Gurdjieff’s death are looked at closely. Azize’s inclination to label Bennett as naïve, (perhaps based on Gurdjieff telling Elizabeth that Bennett was “naif, like little boy.”) May, in my opinion, be too literal an understanding of what Gurdjieff intended to convey in that private conversation.
Not hiding his opinions, Joseph is good at building his case for his opinions. Some of his conclusions about Bennett I took with a large grain of salt. Yet, time and again, this book unearthed gems of interest about Bennett I did not know. This helped me to better understand how he grew into the extraordinarily developed human being I knew.
Death and Resurrection
All told, Joseph Azize has magnificently brought to light J.G. Bennett’s own contribution to the Work. He shows Bennett to be firmly rooted in the rich soil of G.I. Gurdjieff. His quest nurtured through research, intellect, and his willingness to respond to what is being asked of him. Azize shows Bennett’s tireless quest to learn from other teachers as his response to Gurdjieff’s admonishment to find understanding through experience.
Thoroughly researched and annotated, I encourage you to read, “John G. Bennett, Witness to Death and Resurrection,” by Joseph Azize.