History of the Enneagram

One of the earliest recorded attempts to account for the differences in moods and behaviour was that of Hippocrates who, over 2,500 years ago, wrote of choleric, phlegmatic, melancholic, and sanguine characters.

Since then, in an effort to categorise, various authoritative figures - Freud, Jung, Meyers-Briggs are just a few - have attempted to classify people, trying to understand what makes up the human race. There are similarities and differences in the labels that have been placed on people, but they all tend to concentrate on psychological problems.

There is, however, one personality classification that is reputed to predate even Hippocrates, and that is the Enneagram.

A great deal of speculation (and imagination) exists regarding the origins of the Enneagram, but there is little solid evidence. Various writers proclaim that it was in use 4,000 or even 5,000 years ago. This, of course, makes it seem to be ancient wisdom that has fairly recently been rediscovered, but there is no real evidence that it did so exist. Other writers place it back to the 12th century, or the 15th century, when it was used by the Sufis who knew it as the Face of God - but there has been little real evidence. Certainly around this time the significance of the zero was discovered, and the Law of Three and the Law of Seven could not have been part of the Enneagram before this. Decimals as we know them did not exist until the latter part of the 16th century, after Simon Stevinus, a mathematician, physicist, and engineer from Bruge, Belgium had devised, and in 1585 published, a system. The present decimal notation, based on that of Stevinus, was first used by Henry Briggs, the computer of logarithms, in 1617.

It is, of course, possible that the Enneagram as a symbol did originate long before the significance of the zero was discovered and used - if so one wonders what was its use. If it was used milennia ago, a symbol of ancient times, from a civilization that no longer exists, then one wonders why it was created and what was its purpose. In view of the fact that we know nothing, we can speculate and who can say us nay? We have licence to dream and wonder and, in the light of present opinion regarding ancient wisdom, it is pleasant to dream. That is only speculation about the origins of the Enneagram. What does the symbol mean and how was it used?

Sufism and the Enneagram

Hard evidence for the use of the Enneagram, except as a typology, is difficult to find except as small snippets of information here and there. In an above paragraph it was mentioned that the Sufis knew the Enneagram as the Face of God. According to Dr Laleh Bakhtiar, who has a Doctorate in Educational Psychology, Masters Degrees in philosophy, with a concentration in religious studies, and counselling psychology, Sufism refined and practised the Enneagram since the 7th century. She has been a student of Sufism and Islamic tradition for over 30 years, and she is a Sufi of the same Naqshbandi Sufi Order that Gurdjieff met in Central Asia and Turkey. Among her published works is God's Will Be Done - a 3 volume work on the Sufi Enneagram. From what can be gathered, the Enneagram did exist before the 7th century but it was named, by the Naqshbandi Sufi Order, 'The Sign of the Presence of God'. It is used in spiritual practice and moral healing in the Islamic tradition. It is a circle of renewal. The 3 volumes by Dr Bakhtiar are for those who are seriously interested in the meaning of the Enneagram, and who are looking for means of healing the soul outside of the ordinary channels in the modern world.

Gurdjieff and the Enneagram

The esoteric teacher George Ivanovitch Gurdjieff (?1866-1949) was the first to make use of the Enneagram in the West for the purposes of psychological work in a definite and systematic teaching. Little is known about how he obtained its secrets. P. D. Ouspensky records its appearance in Gurdjieff's teachings in Moscow in 1916. It was Gurdjieff's claim that the Enneagram was a complete system of knowledge of cosmological and human laws, such that anyone who drew the diagram would have a lifetime of study. It, like the Emerald Tablet of Hermes Trismegistus, the Qabbala, and the Philosopher's Stone, contains a complete sketch of the laws of the Macrocosmos that are mirrored in the Microcosmos - the human personality.

Gurdjieff stated that in certain parts of Asia the Enneagram is used for divination - for interpreting the pattern of future events. He also said that it was a key symbolic device of the Samoun Brotherhood, a mystic order that existed in Central Asia for thousands of years. Members of the Brotherhood can both recognise one another by the use of the Enneagram, and find out by question and answer which is the most advanced, and therefore who should take the role of teacher.

In spite of these statements, Gurdjieff seems to have not taught much about how to use the Enneagram. However, John Godolphin Bennett, a pupil of Gurdjieff and co-editor of Gurdjieff's Beelzebub's Tales to His Grandson, spent many years working on understanding the Enneagram. In his books he utilises the Enneagram in explaining many of the things we tend to take for granted.

The Modern Enneagram Movement

The modern Enneagram movement really began in 1956 when Oscar Ichazo, a Chilean psychologist, formulated the Arica Protoanalytical theory. This was based on Ichazo's discovery of a new logic (Trialectics) arising from his research, investigation, and experience of metaphysics, theology, esoteric tantra, and mystical psychology. Ichazo is the founder of the Arica Institute.

A psychologist named Claudio Naranjo studied with Ichazo and left to begin teaching a fragment of Ichazo's theory. These were the Ego Fixations, which became known as Personality Types, from which the Enneagram movement developed.

Since the 1980s many others have researched and taught their findings. Helen Palmer, Don Richard Riso, Kathy Hurley and Ted Dobson, Margaret Frings Keyes, and Richard Rohr are just a few.

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