Is Abraham Hicks True? Did you eat the whole thing? What about Jerry and Esther? Did you eat the whole thing? I did not so long ago, just as you may have.
by David Stone
Is Abraham-Hicks a Scam? A Closer Look
Do you believe Esther and Jerry Hicks’s published claims about Abraham? Agreeing on the “teachings” is easy enough or at least what they used to be.
Related: Pam Grout’s Law of Attraction Proofs
But a vocal group of skeptics and critics have for years called the whole show an Abraham Hicks scam, a fraud that Esther and Jerry Hicks kept running until Jerry’s death and beyond.
Is Abraham Hicks True? The 100 “Nonphysical Teachers…”
Esther and Jerry Hicks insisted that a hundred or so “nonphysical teachers,” speaking in collaboration, arise in Esther Hicks’ head, delivering “blocks of thought” which she translates as teachings of eternal wisdom.
At best, this can’t explain why she stood barefoot on stage in ritual garb, going into apparent trances and talking with an eerie accent.
In the beginning, the story goes, entities dumped words into Esther’s cranium, and she spit them out.
Over the years, the accent evaporated, evolving into normal speech, another mystery, but older recordings are still available.
The truth about Esther Hicks and Abraham is probably more obvious than obscure, with a quarter of a century to look back on for contradictions and inconsistencies.
There’s jumbled information, a mania for selling workshops, cruises, books and associated products. This souped-up marking apparatus went beyond what skeptics thought possible in 2011.
That year, they openly tooled up Jerry Hicks’s fatal cancer to goose ticket sales, DVDs and webcasts.
Jerry Hicks Cancer Scam: Update
In the spring of 2011, Abraham-Hicks followers were surprised by an emailed announcement that Jerry Hicks was undergoing chemotherapy.
(While he was alive and fighting, they never admitted that he battled leukemia.)
The admission proved a critical part of Esther Hicks’s preaching was false because she said, as Abraham, that – if you wanted – you could whisk away ill health in a day simply by changing your vibration. Before he died, Jerry went through so much therapy there is no question that he wanted to survive.
I’ve written several articles and participated in more forums than I can count where the primary topic is Esther Hicks and Abraham. If there’s a point of view I haven’t heard or debated, I’d be surprised.
I’ve criticized flaws in Abraham’s teachings and especially in Esther’s evolving, sometimes mean-spirited style, which lacks, not just empathy, but ordinary kindness.
Nothing else I’ve written on any subject draws as much attention. Or hostility.
Esther, Jerry Hicks and the Abraham Hicks Scam: Facade Crumbles
Is Abraham Hicks true?
I once wrote an article, Is Esther Hicks Faking?
Then, I wrote that she wasn’t.
Anyone reviewing the twenty-five year public history of Esther Hicks on stage, speaking the same message, evolved and honed, would have a hard time concluding that it was a gimmick. A performer with skills greater than Laurence Olivier might not be able to pull it off. Even stars in long running plays and televisions shows give it up sooner.
Is Esther Hicks Faking?
Since, I changed my mind.
But holes breached the overall fabric of Esther Hicks’s Abraham “truths” when challenged by the World Trade Center disaster.
Despite the obvious craziness of it, Esther/Abraham insisted that all deaths on September 11th were voluntary. In other words, each was a suicide. ”No exceptions!” she declared.
Now, more than in the past, marketing and sales messages saturate every step. And there have been enough contradictions and false claims that some of the “teachings” must be bogus. They couldn’t be both true and false, could they?
Either that or the “eternal beings” – Abraham – were not very bright.
Starting in mid-2009, the presentations began to unravel and the spirit grew coarser.
In-depth studies, like those reported in the blog, Kyra Speaks, poke holes in the story that couldn’t be glossed over.
Is Abraham Hicks True? What About The Others?
Maybe you’ve heard of Seth or even Theo. Maybe Chief Joseph crossed your path.
All of these have human counterparts who claim they are conduits from another spiritual or nonphysical world, much like Esther is with Abraham.
Esther and Jerry were neither first nor original.
The success Esther and Jerry had promoting Abraham, as well as a lack of media scrutiny, spawned newcomers claiming to channel whatever and dispense readymade wisdom.
Success begets imitators.
Even when new channels are not involved, self-appointed teachers and the law of attraction life coaches abound. There are even people who claim that they too channel the same Abraham Esther does.
Could there be a shortage of nonphysical entities, forcing them to share?
Teachings of Abraham Hicks
Abraham, it is said, takes over the mind of Esther Hicks in meditation and delivers “blocks of thought.”
Why did this create an accent, a la Theo? That’s not explained, and Abraham tells audiences that there are no words in the spirit world.
Questions hang or are dismissed.
Here are some basics:
- The central teaching from Abraham is that the “Law of Attraction” is the most powerful force in the universe. Thought empowers vibrations that attract their equivalent. Thoughts force the universe to deliver the essence of what is being thought about. The more emotionally powerful the thought, even if ill-defined, the more complete and quick the delivery.
- Because most of us are unaware of the power inherent in our thoughts and emotions, we create realities by default. That is, the universe has no choice but to deliver, no matter how unintentional or careless our “thought vibrations.” A fear of something, for example, has the ability to bring that fear into your life. As Esther and Jerry Hicks write in Ask and It Is Given, “You get what you think about, whether you want it or not.”
- Acknowledging the confusing complexities most people must sort through, Abraham suggests a number of implementing practices. In brief, they encourage “reaching for the next best thought,” giving students step ladders to find their way up incrementally.
- Abraham teaches positive thinking and maintains faith in results. Manifestations of desires must arise in complex lives where other desires and conflicts compete. Sorting out is a learning process. A lack of faith delays delivering the goodies.
- “Life is supposed to be fun,” a motto derived from the teachings and embraced by Jerry and Esther Hicks and their followers. If you don’t get results from the law of attraction, relax, take a breath, and find the impulse that feels right. Be easy with it. Pick up your oars and float easily downstream.
- Finally, daily meditation is critical. Meditation was the first thing Theo recommended to Esther and Jerry, and it was through meditation that Abraham entered their lives.
Truths
The teachings coming from Esther Hicks and Abraham began simply, grew tangled and, finally, full of contradictions and bad advice.
But it’s easy to see how this happens more visibly as the “teachings” meet reality and must be justified.
The challenge of turning teachings into demonstrable results is hard enough, but the bizarre nature of some — all deaths are suicides, for one — makes it impossible.
Abraham Hicks’s followers dismiss skeptics as failures. They misunderstand the teachings or practice them effectively.
Esther and Jerry seldom allowed interviews, and after making fools of themselves with a British journalist, they stopped.
Dissenters and doubters are evicted from workshops, and the tightly controlled official Abraham Hicks Forum – now taken down – deleted threads as “off-topic.”
Look for yourself. Read the core books.
The most important is Ask and It Is Given, but I find it one of the weirdest and least coherent books ever published.
Avoid anything having to do with The Vortex, the books, the guided meditations, etc. That’s all rehashed garbage heaped on the market with nothing new to say.
Once you get your basic information, anything else is just details and sales.
David Stone
Find all my books on my Amazon Author Page
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Hi David,I was completely sold on Esther/Abraham until a few days after Jerry's admission of illness. I hadn't heard about the spider bite or cancelled workshops, but in my search after that news I found both your site and Kyra Speaks.I felt like I got kicked in the stomach, and it's taken a while for me to grieve the loss, believe it or not!Anyway – I appreciate your site (& Kyra's) for the rational and systematic explanation of the scam.I was wondering if you happened to see one of the A-H blogs, where Esther (?) talked about Abraham writing a meditation or something for Jerry… The first part sounded like it was for wellness, but the majority *really* seemed more like relaxing into the vortex, i.e. path of least resistance, just go ahead and croak, Jerry. I'm absolutely kicking myself for not taking a screencap, because I think it has disappeared! I've searched the various AH blogs, and cannot find it again! Wondered if you or one of your readers saw it, and if it's still somewhere online.Thanks, Juli
Hi, and yes, Juli, I retain all that stuff. Here is the full email blast:Dear Friends,We so much appreciate all the inquiries and love that you have been sending our way and we wanted to give you a quick update.We’re going to fly to Del Mar on Monday for the next phase of our rebalancing act in getting Jerry back on his feet and feeling frisky. Every day we’re experiencing the relief that we can only receive from Abraham as they remind us about the power of the Vortex. We are enjoying the comfort when we are able to ignore the temporary what-is.Abraham recorded a wonderful segment for Jerry last night guiding him toward complete comfort and ease, and that is exactly what he is focusing on now. We’ll continue our city-to-city workshop schedule as posted, which means that we'll be enjoying the company of our friends in San Francisco on Saturday, July 9th. If you'd like to join the generally frisky Frisco workshop group, you can call the office before 4 p.m. CDT on Friday (830-755-2299). The last San Francisco workshop was filled to capacity, so a phone reservation would ensure that we won't run out of chairs.If you won't be physically with us in San Francisco on Saturday, you can join Jerry in the virtual audience with the LIVE broadcast, which will begin promptly at 9:00 a.m. PDT. We are so happy to have the ability to offer this LIVE broadcast option to our friends around the world. Click here to register for the Frisco LIVE broadcast.We love you all and appreciate not just your understanding (and we know you do) but your unwavering certainty in well-being.Our love, Jerry & Esther While I agree with your assessment (and they seem to have been preparing followers on their Daily Quotes with a flood of death material), I was more startled by however update on Jerry's condition leads to a sales pitch. Can't imagine anything more cynical.There was another after this, and although signed by Esther and Jerry, it was clearly written my neither. Probably by their PR people, either because what Esther had been writing was sounding so weird or because she was just too out of it to write the standard, chipper notes.In this one, the writer claimed that Jerry was wondering how many countries the LIVE broadcasts had reached. They produced a map (Esther isn't tech enough to do that), and of course, pivoted to another sales pitch. Just as a related note, I should tell you and whoever follows on this blog that most of material on this subject is on Squidoo. You can hit the links from the right column. I mention it because Esther and Mark (her factotum in charge in Texas) have found them and regularly send anonymous readers in to make distracting comments and try to deflect others from reading through. It's part of a longstanding practice Jerry had to send proxies out to unsettle critics. I don't think he's up to it at the moment; so, it's probably Mark fulfilling Esther's commands. It's all pretty lame, but I thought it was worth mentioning.
Thanks for your response, David!Wow, funny how my memory turned that one sentence about Jerry's special recording into what I thought was a whole paragraph…I actually had Squidoo bookmarked already. 🙂 Had no idea that some of the \”denser\” posters were sent to be disruptive! LOL It explains a lot, though.Funny, it didn't even occur to me that the sales pitch was odd, only because I don't think I've ever received something from AH that *wasn't* one. But in thinking about it, you're right that it's cynical – disgusting, too.I wonder if \”they\” will send out a notice when Jerry finally passes. I mean, it would be weird to find out he died \”a month ago,\” or even \”a week ago.\”Here's a partial quote from today's LOA daily quote:\”When you make your transition into the Non-physical, you re-emerge into Pure Positive Energy, and you leave all resistance behind. Everyone who makes their transition reaps the glory of Pure Positive Energy.\”I was particularly devastated at having to give up this idea after learning the whole freaking show is a scam. That one idea, that consciousness survives and thrives, REALLY comforted me. Although, the idea that all death is suicide really f*cked me up when my Father died, because it meant that on some level he *left me on purpose!!* (He had cancer.) I'm still reeling from that. I even got in the hotseat once and asked \”Abraham\” something about it. I have blocked out my question and the answer, but maybe one day I'll play the recording and refresh my memory.So yeah, in finally discussing the topic of your post, I ate the WHOLE THING.And in eating/digesting and really internalizing the messages I can see NOW, in retrospect, how harmful it all really was.Ironically, when I first saw Esther live, I walked in on my own two feet. Soon I discovered an annoying progressive nerve process in my legs. Must not have done a good enough job of being in the vortex, because as progressive diseases will do, it progressed. My increasing lack of mobility first had me on a cane, later with braces on both legs, and now I use a walker with a seat. But the wheelchair is fast approaching and I'm SO THANKFUL THAT IT ISN'T MY FAULT!!!Wow. It really was cult-like!! It's really too bad that it took Jerry's cancer for me to question things, and even sadder that some folks are still deluded.I'd like to think it's only because they really don't know about Jerry being a total shuckster, and that Esther and Jerry were doing the LOA show for YEARS before they came up with Abraham. And that Abraham just happens to be a nearly word-for-word imitation of Seth, etc.Because once you know, there's no going back!So, after all this rambling, I want to again thank you for your sites. It's been a painful break-up with the cult, but it's SO much better knowing that at least there is a community of former Abers that understands.Juli
Hi there,It will be interesting to see what happens with it all. I never bought the weird ? germanic /transylvanian accent which Esther burbled in and then became more American as time went on- how dopey do people need to be to believe in channelling.Having said that, it doesn't matter in so far as, eat the chicken and spit out the bones. There is a wealth of useful ideas and notions in their ideas- who ever thought it was from outer space or divine anyway ? ? It all comes form within our own mind, of course we may be inspired by anyone or genetic meory or a flower of the faith we grew up for better or worse.I have found much of the Abe material useful with clarity of goal setting, focussing on what I do want and not just materially- most of us spend too much time bitching about what is wrong or bad istead of trying to improve and using our energy in a constructive manner.As for folk who refused medical help based on the teachings or notions of 2 wealthy pensioners say driving a bus all over the US, I would say that as harsh as it may be, that is Darwin's Natural selction theory in action ie survival of those with a rational thought system working in their own head…or not! But that doesn't excuse the efect of anyone enjoying a messianic adulation and not taking the time to dispell that to any accolites. It would apear that as time has passed, Esther was beginning to come across as believing that she was more divine than anyone in the audience.There is little doubt that there is a mind-body link associated with health and health issues, how accurate the metaphysical meaning or causation is, I don't know but I don't entirely discount it.Certainly a better attitude or postive approach to life has to be better for everyone, as is taking self-responsibility- but as we are human, we shouldn't feel like cr*p about it if we \”attract\” an illness as the Hicks' would suggest. And therein lies the issue which numerous folk have mentioned in blogs- implying that Esther/Abe weren't understanding, of their \”human- ness\”. no-one knowingly or willingly directly brings illness in, but some folk don't help themselves , especially if they have esteem issues eg. obesity, not following a diabetic resolving diet etc ( my aunt got her act together and is no longer on diabetes meds so it can be done in some instances)or stay in abusive relationships, or in a job that they hate- common sense tells us that it is not good for our health.Just because their notions may not have worked for every \”follower\”, that doesn't mean that there was a flaw with their ideas, it could be the way in which folk carried it out. I personally ignore what doesn't sit well with me or what I think it ridiculous.Does it matter that Abe never existed? Not to me, never thought so anyway.Do I think that Esther was channeling? NOIs she especially charismatic? NOPoor ol'Jerry has looked on the way out for ages, but he is pretty old anyway.Is Esther in any way infallible or divine? NO NO NODo some of her ideas have a useful place in the lives of many people? Yes.Are all of her ideas going to work, are all of her ideas in line with how I see things? NOBut… I have the brains to decide and discriminate, use what works, discard the rest, and not fill a void in my life with the need to become anyone's disciple. I am responsible for the choices that I make.Not everyone has that capacity,and I do feel for those folk who for whatever reason, have felt hoodwinked or ripped off. A lot of lessons should be learned.Hopefully, folk will get over themselves and not lock onto antiblogging going over the same ground and admit ok, I was a bit silly, I was taken in by those whom it suited to have a following but ok people, ITS DONE, I will get a grip and I can all get on with having a life now!Best wishes to all.
I get the skepticism with these concepts. I was raised in a Christian religion, and was led to believe that I was powerless over my life. This is ultimately a much more destructive belief than the alternative, which simply says, we can control what happens to us.
As I got older, I understood that much of Christianity exists as a metaphor, examples of how to and not to behave, as a source of moral guidance. Much of the original teachings of Christianity (Roman Catholic, etc.) are invalid today, or are seen as metaphors, but many people firmly believe them as true historical events. We know this is not true and that the church has always manipulated belief for its own gain, financial gain of those in the area, etc.
What’s wrong with telling people they can make their shitty conditions better? They can. Even you, as someone who clings to negativity, can overcome your barriers to resistance.
Good luck, and I hope you feel better.
The remarkable thing is, after a decade, I still get the same poor reasoning and flakey personalization of issues from Abers. It’s like you’re all such narcissists that objective thinking and analysis is out of your reach. I keep reading some prattle, usually not very well-informed, about Christianity when it hasn’t been mentioned at all, as if this rationalization proves some point.
Here’s a tip: It doesn’t.
And I’d love to have a nickel for every Abraham-Hicks Bozo who tells me how much better off I’d be if I weren’t so negative and just accepted Esther’s preaching. Give it a rest. You don’t know anything about me, but you’re so insecure in your beliefs, you make a play for superiority. This is an old, old tactic, and the New Age has gone far past where you are now.
But thanks for trying.
Esther Hicks was my personal coach for 2 years and she admits she made the vortex up.
That came after their trademark claim for “law of attraction” got shot down because they never came anywhere near inventing it. But the clunky “vortex” is all theirs. And there were a few others like “high flying disks” and the “emotional guidance scale,” but they stand up there, conference after conference, and claim it was all verbatim Abraham. Estherham is more like it.