This is a scholarly examination of how Dianetics, a self-help fad, became a religion. Although the author has received much attention from the mainstream press, readers of Janet Reitman's Inside Scientology might be disappointed. Urban does not delve into the controversies or scandals surrounding the church. His mission is to examine how we decide what is and is not a religion.

It's a very readable, well-done book and his conclusions are extremely interesting and insightful. However, the book is aimed at other scholars, not the curious public. ( )

Somewhat misleading. The Church of Scientology, by Professor of Religious Studies Hugh Urban, promises to report on what it means to be a religion. To some extent, it does that – but the amount of text devoted to the philosophy of religion is small compared to the discussion of the history of Scientology, and Urban makes no comparison between Scientology and other religious movements. Still, I had only very general knowledge of the history of Scientology so that part was instructive; I still have very little knowledge of the actual dogma of Scientology because (and as Urban points out) most of that material is “secret” and Scientology has been litigious to the extreme against people who reveal it.


It sees fairly clear that Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard adopted “the religion angle” (his words) to get tax-exempt status for Scientology. Urban notes the details of that would make a full fledged book in themselves; in the 1950s Scientology was essentially a multinational corporation with numerous branches and spin-offs. When the IRS initially refused tax-exempt status, one entity was overlooked – the California Church of Scientology. Scientology responded by essentially transferring all assets to the CSC. The IRS eventually withdrew tax-exempt status from the CSC as well, and Scientology responded with a whole series of lawsuits, plus an undercover program to infiltrate the IRS and FBI and gather personally damaging information about high officials in both. After a series of raids on Scientology offices by the IRS and FBI, and burglaries and document theft at IRS and FBI offices by Scientology, there was a closed door meeting between the IRS and Scientology officials (L. Ron Hubbard had passed to a higher plane of existence by then, in an RV in hiding in California), and in 1993 the tax-exempt status was restored. Urban does make the interesting point that regardless of what you think of Scientology, the way tax-exempt status works puts the IRS in the position of deciding what is and is not a religion in the US. Some scholars have then argued – again, regardless of what they might think about Scientology – that this gives the IRS the power to “establish” a religion – which is a violation of the Establishment Clause.


Urban’s discussion of Scientology’s “secret” documents is also instructive. One progresses through Scientology ranks by taking various courses, at considerable expense – it’s in the medium six figures to get to the highest level. If the courses necessary to get to these levels were freely disseminated Scientology would lose a lot of revenue. The Church of Scientology has gone to considerable lengths to prevent that; when secret Scientology documents were made public as evidence in court cases, Scientologists would show up in hundreds, pack the court offices to the extent no one else could get in, check out every document copy, and return them just before closing. The Internet has, unfortunately for Scientology, been more difficult to deal with; despite lawsuits against Google and Wikipedia “secret” documents have turn up repeatedly. Scientology has sought copyright and trade secret protection (Urban seems not to understand the difference – to be fair neither do a lot of Scientology critics) and there have been raids on various private residences to confiscate computers holding Scientology documents. Urban again makes the interesting point; regardless of what you might think of Scientology, do religions have the right to keep secrets – essentially the same protection that (say) the Coca-Cola company has for its formula?


Talmudic scholars have commented that it’s best to take the most difficult cases first – then everything else is easy. Scientology certainly makes for some difficult cases. Good for an introduction to Scientology, and evoking a lot of interesting ideas. Some general illustrations; well footnoted and with a good bibliography. ( )

A fascinating and scholarly approach to the Church of Scientology and its decades-long struggle to be classed as a tax-exempt religion in America. Urban limits his study to this alone, because as he says, the history of Scientology is far too complex and multi-faceted to be covered in one monograph alone. As well as this, Urban uses Scientology to chart the transformation of religion in post-war American society, in which Scientology figured greatly as an example of the transforming spiritual makeup of society, and how the church embodied the ethos of secrecy that characterised the Cold War. He also debates, using the church's battle with the IRS and now online against Anonymous, how religion is defined and by whom; all of which have important consequences not only for the church but also for anyone interested in the sociology and history of religion.

Urban's book is decidedly scholarly, so it lacks much of the shocking revelations the characterise many publications concerning the church yet his scholarly tone does hide many interesting exposés: the Snow White project (the infiltration of the IRS), Hubbard's plans to market himself as a Messiah, and the consistent harassment of any investigator about the church.

Therefore, this book is an excellent edition to the corpus of material on the study of Scientology and one that while somewhat critical, attempts to be balanced (as balanced as possible about an extremely controversial subject), but would probably not serve as a gateway introduction. ( )

What is religion? Can religion be copywrited? Does religion have a moral and ethical responsibility to br moral and ethical? Does wearing a collar and a cross constitute a church? In a nearly 300-page book on church, can one expect t least one mention of Christ?

Urban asks most of these questions, but he fails to answer any of them. Partially these stems from his desire that the reader comes to their own answers, and partially because he fears reprisals from Scientology. And, this fear, of itself, speaks quite loudly that Scientology is not an entity easily fitting into a religious rubric. ( )