At midnight on December 21, 1928, Sherifa and I founded The Assembly of Man. From that time forward, there were many lecture trips . . . and many workings with individual sādhakas. Sherifa was the head of the organization and I maintained the greater part of the lecture activity . . . oriented to the esoteric philosophy. In connection with this activity, we began the effort for the building of an ashram up in Tuttle Creek Canyon in the midst of the Sierra Nevada Mountains, and met during summer for vacation periods when the students were able to come . . .[1]
In 1930, some of Wolff’s fellow disciples in the Benares League had observed that he was “teaching work of another nature not connected with Super Yoga Science Teachings by Yogi Hari Rama” and they asked for “a written statement from Disciples that they and their staff are not actively engaged in teaching any other work than that taught by Yogi Hari Rama.”[2] Wolff could not comply, for as he remarks above, he and his wife had already inaugurated their own religious association; in fact, they had done so before Wolff began his work on behalf of the Benares League.[3]
The founding of such an organization was something that Wolff, and most particularly his wife (who was now using the name ‘Sheila’), had set out to accomplish after leaving the Temple of the People. And by 1930, this aspiration was coming to fruition. Sheila had organized a number of students of the Benares League into an “inner section” that was called “The Order of Avalokiteshvara,” which according to its governing documents, was “a special work given to Yogagñani by the Great Master.” Moreover, “no disciple of H. R. [Hari Rama] may know anything about it except by Initiation”; indeed, the work was not even to be discussed with other disciples “unless they hold the symbol of the Order as per [the] rules.”[4] As this last quote suggests, Sheila had quite a penchant for ritual, and the governing documents for the Order of Avalokiteshvara contain a set of rules that cover the handling of its documents, requirements for membership, the administration of Sunday services, offerings to the Order, and local organizational upkeep.
This document also designates Yogagñani as the “Ambassador General” of the Order and Sheila A. Merrell-Wolff as the head of the “Esoteric Section”; the Wolff home in San Fernando is called the “Permanent Headquarters Staff” and Mt. Whitney is the “Esoteric Headquarters.” Sheila goes on to justify the sacrosanctity of the leaders of this organization by spelling out their “guru line” as follows:
B [uddha] C [hrist]
\ /
M [orya]
/ \
K [oot] H [oomi] H [ilarion]
\ /
I [nayat] K [han]
/ \
H [ari] R [ama] H [ari] R [ama]
/ \
Y [ogagñani] S [heila][5]
Wolff (as Yogagñani) contributes to the cause by writing a short note on the “Meaning of Avalokiteshvara.” In brief, he states that “given in its simplest terms the definition of Avalokiteshvara is ‘The Great Master’” . . . but, “it is wholly wrong to think of the Great Master as an objective, individual Hierophant”; rather, “Avalokiteshvara is the Light of Consciousness which sustains the Universe,” and “to realize that I am Avalokiteshvara is the goal of all Yoga.”[6]
By 1931, the group has become an independent organization that is named—perhaps in deference to Yogi Hari Rama—the “Rama Sangha in America,” and it is comprised primarily of students from the Chicago chapter of the Benares League (of which Wolff was the head “disciple”) and a few other students from the Los Angeles area. In February of that year, the Chicago Center of the Rama Sangha in America began offering classes on Wolff’s book titled Yoga; Wolff and Sheila would also begin to give regular Sunday lectures in Los Angeles.[7] Over the years, a number of the Chicago students would relocate to the Los Angeles area to be more active in the group.
An integral feature of this enterprise was the establishment of a summer school designed “to provide favorable conditions for the deeper study of what we may call the Philosophy of Life.”[8] This school, which was originally called “The Arcane School,” would matriculate the “Sangha Jñana”—that is, students dedicated to “the study of that Philosophy known as the Wisdom Religion or Dharmavidya.”[9] The school was originally to be located on Mount Whitney at an altitude of about 7,500 feet, which afforded “a climate which is agreeable even when a general summer temperature is extreme at lower levels.”[10] The U. S. Forest Service would not allow Wolff to use a site on Mt. Whitney; they did, however, give him permission to “conduct a summer school” on five acres of land in Tuttle Canyon, just to the south.[11] On August 3, 1930, members of the Order of Avalokiteshvara laid on this site the foundation stone for a school building that was to be called the “Ajna Ashrama.” Invitations were sent the following year for applications to “The Mount Whitney Summer School and Camp,” opening on June 29 at a weekly rate of $10. It was also noted that August 9-16 would be “Convention Week of the Rama Sangha,” and that this week would feature special lectures and instruction.[12]
Sheila had been referring to Wolff as “Yogi” since his work for the Benares League as “Yogagñani” (which was likely another issue that rankled Wolff’s fellow disciples in the League), and many of the students in their association would follow suit when addressing Wolff. As for Sheila, she would come to be called “Mother” by their students, a reflection of her status as the “spiritual mother” of the group.[13] These appellations plainly suggest that the couple had achieved what they had set out to do since their break from the Temple of the People—that is, “to sprout a new religious branch and become spiritual parents to an ideological offspring of their own.”[14] This, in fact, is emphasized by Sheila in the initiation ceremony for the Order of Avalokiteshvara:
Know then, that even as a soul must have a father and mother before it can incarnate and perfect a physical body, so too must the Neophyte have a spiritual father and mother, e’er he can build and incarnate in an Immortal Body of Light.[15]
As is also made evident by her delineation of a “guru line,” Sheila is concerned with differentiating the association from the mutifarious religious fringe groups that have sprung up since the end of the war:
We sincerely hope that you have glimpsed something of the great opportunity that is yours through affiliation with this work. It is rapidly becoming a power in the UNITED STATES and never again will such an opportunity to unite yourself with a truly occult movement be yours. The country is filled to overflowing with pseudo-occult organizations, and this movement is partially designed to counter-balance this deadly danger.[16]
Their “truly occult” teaching was spread through booklets and correspondence courses as well as via public and private events, such as children’s and sacred services on Sundays and study groups on Thursdays.
The Wolff Archive does not clearly document when the group began to publicly be called the “Assembly of Man,” but this name does not appear in any newspaper advertisements for Wolff’s lectures prior to 1937.[17] There are archival documents dated 1937 that refer to the group as the “Assembly of Man”[18] and in a document simply dated “June 13,” it is noted that the “Rama Sangha is a chapter of THE ASSEMBLY OF MAN.”[19] Another document most likely produced in 1937 also notes that “Philo Theo Sophia”—which is a name used in advertisements for lectures by Wolff and his wife in Los Angeles area newspapers—is “the Los Angeles chapter of the Assembly of Man.”[20]
A booklet titled “For Those Who Have Gone Part Way And Are Still Seeking” published after 1936 sketches the core beliefs of The Assembly of Man, its purpose, and it activities.[21] In brief, the organization’s principal beliefs include the conviction that there is a means for humankind to realize their own true nature and that this realization is the only effective key whereby humanity may know “enduring happiness” and “adequate understanding” and thereby “have the power” to effectively to resolve its “metaphysical, religious, personal, social and national problems.” The purpose of the Assembly of Man was to provide the means for individuals to effect such a realization, and its activities are designed as such. These activities fall into two categories: “Open Court” activities are available to the general public; “Inner Section” activities are available only to those who have been accepted as members of the group. The former consist of “Sacred Sunday Services,” public classes, children’s education, correspondence courses, a retail book operation, and the summer school and camp at Tuttle Creek Canyon. Inner Section work is a graduated course consisting of graded instruction, group training and special individual training. The Doctrine of the Priesthood is a seven-year course “for those for whom the primary purpose of the Assembly of Man has become the central interest of life.” The Ajna Ashrama is described in this booklet as “a retreat, located near the Summer Camp” that is “devoted to more advanced work.”
The Wolff Archive includes educational papers produced by the members of the Assembly of Man that were intended for use in public coursework and for the various degrees of training in the Inner Section, including the first through seventh degrees of priesthood training; in addition, there are a number of papers for the children’s and youth sections. Other educational material in the Wolff Archive includes classwork notes and student reports. The Archive also includes convention programs and special convention messages from Hilarion as channeled by Sherifa (the name Wolff’s wife began to use after ‘Sheila’). And, of course, there are documents that relate to the intricate rituals Sherifa developed for initiation into the group, as well as for sacred services and study groups. The instructions were “secret” and initiates had to solemnly swear not to share documents with outsiders and to let even former members in on these gatherings.[22] Also included in the Archive are the “Rules and Duties of Officers” of the Inner Section, which is now called “The Order of Avalokiteshvara, The Assembly of Man.” These documents were distributed to disciples around the country, and during the following decades, lectures and study groups were organized in Chicago, Los Angeles, Milwaukee, Kenosha, Wis., Port Washington, Wis., Minneapolis, Des Moines, Louisville, Denver, Phoenix, Morenci, Ariz., Arroyo Grande, Calif., and Juneau, Alaska.
At the August 1938 convention of the Assembly of Man, the National Treasurer reported that the only work completed on the Ajana Ashrama was the leveling of a building site and the construction of foundation walls; it was also noted that the smaller stones created from blasting “huge rocks” would be used for the walls of the main structure. The building itself was laid out in the form of a balanced cross, which was meant to symbolize the principle of balance or equilibrium. Construction would pick up over the next decade, part of which is documented in a 1940 film that can be accessed on the Ashrama page under the Franklin Merrell-Wolff tab of this website. Working only a few weeks during the summer months, the group managed to complete the building’s stonework walls and to erect a large stone fireplace; two intersecting heavy-beamed gable roofs were also installed, as well as the window and door casings. But after 1950, before the windows and doors were installed, work ceased on the Ashrama because Sherifa, whom Wolff credited as being the main impetus behind the project, was no longer able to make the trip up to the building site.
There is very little Assembly of Man material in the Wolff Archive from the 1950s, although it appears that there was an attempt to reinvigorate the organization by renaming (or replacing it) with the “Holistic Assembly” during the first part of this decade. (This enterprise has its own page on this website, from which both some of its organizational and instructional material may be accessed.) The Assembly became inactive because Sherifa’s health was failing and she could no longer carry on the work. Wolff notes that at the time the couple “continued activity in our home in San Fernando, where I continued to lecture, and a certain number of people came out to attend the lectures”; but, he continues, “by 1956 Sherifa had deteriorated further so that these activities were discontinued . . .”[23]
In February 1960, Wolff held a memorial service for Sherifa, who had passed away a year earlier. He begins the observance by noting that neither he nor Sherifa had been actively engaged in the work of the Assembly for a number of years, and that as a result, there has been a “considerable decline.” Accordingly, the problem facing “the remnant of the Assembly” is its “reactivation”; in addition, he has come to the conclusion that he “would have to have some associate if I were to carry on in my part of this work.” This led him to search for a companion, which he reports he has found. Gertrude Adams is from Chicago and is a member of the Assembly of Man; she and Wolff have married, and he has given her the name “Lakshmi Devi,” which is one of the four aspects of the Divine Mother as represented by Sri Aurobindo.[24]
The next step, Wolff continues, is to “reactivate interest in the Assembly.” He notes that the “instructions that we have had are many years old, have been studied time after time . . . [and] it is evident that . . . the substance has . . . been taken out of them.” Accordingly, “something new [is] needed to give [an] impetus.” He suggests that this incentive might take the form of a manuscript that he has written (“although not all of it rewritten”). This manuscript is his book, The Philosophy of Consciousness Without an Object, which he states “has stimulated more questions and more interest than I expected and I am gratified.”[25]
In addition, Wolff plans to reactivate “the ashram complex, including the ashram proper: the means of getting to it; the making of it, if possible, a going activity again; and the reactivation of the ranch as a subsidiary to it.” The “ranch” Wolff is referring to is a nearly 430-acre property near Lone Pine, Calif. (and proximate to the Ashrama) that he and few other members of the Assembly had purchased in 1943; formerly known as the Hoar Ranch, Sherifa had immediately renamed it “The Assembly of Man Ranch.” The purchase of this property provided the group with easier access to the Ashrama, and the ranch was primarily used as a base for their summer activities. Wolff now planned to permanently settle on the ranch, where he and Gertrude would build a new dwelling that would also serve as the headquarters of the Assembly of Man. It was also “planned to make the ranch a place where members can retire, where they can live, say, upon their Social Security, and ultimately make that our prime center of activity.”[26]
Wolff and his new wife shortly thereafter relocated to the ranch, where they built a home largely of their own design. A few members of the Assembly would also come to build retirement homes on the property. Although work on the Ashrama was never restarted, Wolff, with Gertrude’s help, was successful at revitalizing the Assembly. The couple reinstated the tradition of holding an annual convention for the group (now as a weekend event), which Wolff continued until his death. Gertrude began publishing the Bulletin of the Assembly of Man, a periodical that reprinted articles written by Wolff and Sherifa, as well as a number of theosophical writers; it also contained new material written by Gertrude (and a few other authors) and featured quotes from sundry sources. The print run of the Bulletin consisted of thirty issues, from June 1960 to January 1967. After that it was renamed “The Seeker,” which had a run of only three issues, the last being printed in May 1968. Both publications are part of the Wolff Archive.
Wolff would also resume his own work—now in the form of audio-recorded lectures, and all part of the Wolff Archive. In the nineteen years that he was married to Gertrude, Wolff recorded some two-hundred-forty audio essays covering topics that include philosophy, psychology, religion, politics, and yoga—more material than he had produced at any time before. Wolff reports that Gertrude worked a great deal on the transcribing of the tapes, and that she planned to have them duplicated in cassette form, “and thus help to continue what had been started here.”[27] She would not, however, for in May 1978, Gertrude suffered a stroke and died.
It is difficult to say just when the Assembly of Man ceased functioning as an organization. Since Wolff continued the tradition of holding an annual Convention until his death in 1985, one might argue that it ended then. The date of Gertrude’s death is another possibility. Gertrude was nearly twenty-four years younger than Wolff, and her death had come suddenly and without warning. Wolff was devastated by the loss, and it effectively ended his philosophical work. He did continue to produce audio recordings, but they were more personally focused—centering on his grief over the loss of Gertrude and his own passing. And, although Wolff came to regard these recordings as having a collective significance, they clearly were not produced with an educational intent in mind.
A third possibility is “Summer 1968,” which is the date of the last issue of The Seeker. Gertrude had asked one of Wolff’s students to take over the publishing of this periodical, but when he could not, its production ceased.[28] And so, it would seem, did the functioning of the Assembly of Man as an educational center. Wolff, however, was still recording his audio essays at this time; accordingly, one might counter that some aspect of the work of the Assembly was still active. This is consistent with Wolff’s own view of the Assembly, which he saw as having two components—that instituted by Sherifa and that shaped by himself. Sherifa’s work was focused on the collective aspect—that is, the “sangha” in the sense of an association or assembly—and she sought to bring a group together through the use of ritual, classwork, and even secret societies. Wolff, on the other hand, was oriented toward philosophical work, which he characterized as an attempt to establish a way to Enlightenment or Fundamental Realization “from a Western base.”[29]
Perhaps the most appropriate date to mark the end of the Assembly of Man is with the release of the inaugural issue of The Seeker in May 1967. This issue notes that it is a continuation of the Bulletin of the Assembly of Man, but it also states that the Assembly’s name “has served its purpose.” Instead, Wolff offered a new designation for the group, the “Friends of the Wisdom Religion,” and it was the teachings of this “ancient” tradition that would be the focus of The Seeker.[30] It may have been the case that Wolff and Gertrude realized that they could not continue the services, coursework and other collective activities formerly offered by the Assembly, and this name change was reflective of this circumstance.
It was not easy to give up the Assembly of Man, however, as evidenced by the 1972 invitation to the August convention, which is titled “Convention of the Assembly of Man and Friends of the Ancient Wisdom Religion.” Whatever the name, it is also clear that Wolff wanted to see the work of the Assembly continued. In December 1978, he put it this way:
But what about the work here in the Assembly? Remember that a few years ago I offered a new designation, alternative to that of the Assembly of Man, namely, the Friends of the Wisdom Religion. This I want to see continued.[31]
He then suggests that the work of the group should continue along the two lines delineated above—that of Sherifa and that of himself. After suggesting the names of some individuals that might respectively continue these lines, he concludes: “for the future beyond, I can only hope that it will be a fulfilling of that which Sherifa and I started in Chicago on the twenty-first day of December at midnight in 1928.”[32]
[1] Franklin Merrell-Wolff, “Autobiographical Material: A Recollection of My Early Life and Influences” (Lone Pine, Calif: July 6, 1978), audio recording, 1.
[2] The Disciple (December 1, 1930).
[3] It does not appear that Wolff’s work on behalf of the Benares League was prolonged. Indeed, there are only a few newspaper advertisements from early 1929 that announce lectures by Yogagñani as “presented by the Benares League of America” and by the end of that year, there is no mention of this organization in his publicity.
[4] Sheila Merrell-Wolff, “Rules of the Order of Avalokiteshvara” (Wolff Archive: Organizations & Group Work, no date), 24.
[5] Ibid., 23.
[6] Yogagñani, “Meaning of Avalokiteshvara” (Wolff Archive: Organizations & Group Work, no date), 1.
[7] “The Rama Sangha Study Class: Chicago Center” (Wolff Archive: Organizations & Group Work, 1931).
[8] Yogagñani, “The Arcane School (Sanga Jñana)” (Wolff Archive: Organizations & Group Work, no date). Wolff also makes it clear that this “specific study will be that of determining what the Wisdom Religion is without the imposition of acceptance of it.”
[9] Ibid.
[10] Ibid.
[11] United States Forest Service, “Special Use Permit” (Wolff Archive: Organizations & Group Work, Jul 1, 1930).
[12] Sheila A. Merrell-Wolff, “Programs for Convention Week of the Rama Sangha: 1931 & 1932” (Wolff Archive: Organizations & Group Work, August 9, 1931 & August 7, 1932). This was a tradition borrowed from the Temple of the People, which still holds an annual “Convention” during the month of August.
[13] Sherifa Merrell-Wolff et al, “Convention Messages” (Wolff Archive: Organizations & Group Work, 1937-1948).
[14] Dave Vliegenthart, The Secular Religion of Franklin Merrell-Wolff: An Intellectual History of Contemporary Anti-Intellectualism In America (Leiden/Boston: Brill, 2018), 112. As Vliegenthart also notes, some students took the Assembly as the culmination of the Temple’s work (112, note 185); see, as Vliegenthart notes, Lakshmi Devi, “Halcyon Revisited,” Bulletin of the Assembly of Man 1, no. 1 (June 1960), 5.
[15] Sheila Merrell-Wolff, “Rules of the Order of Avalokiteshvara,” 26.
[16] Ibid., 82 (emphasis added).
[17] A June 1936 newspaper advertisement announces a lecture by “Dr. F. Merrell-Wolff (Yogagñani)” presented by the “Rama Sangha of Des Moines.” The Des Moines Register (June 28, 1936), 42. An advertisement in January 11, 1936 Los Angeles Times (p. 24) announces a lecture presented by “Philo Theo Sophia.” A two-week course on “Consciousness Transformation” is listed in November 1937 “for those who have gone part way and are still seeking,” which is the name of a booklet produced by the Assembly of Man (see note 19). The Des Moines Register (November 6 & 7, 1937), 6 & 36. The “Assembly of Man” announces classes “On Consciousness” in the same newspaper on October 30, 1938 (p. 39). Other examples can be found in Los Angeles newspaper advertisements through 1946.
[18] The earliest dated reference is in “Convention Message by the National Treasurer, 1938” in Sherifa Merrell-Wolff et al, “Convention Messages,” 7.
[19] Sheila A. Merrell-Wolff, “Are You Teaching Hindu Philosophy?” (Wolf Archive: Organizations & Group Work, no date).
[20] Assembly of Man, “Sunday Service Program” (Wolff Archive: Organizations & Group Work, no date), 4. This program lists a special course on “The Secret of the Golden Flower,” which was written by Sherifa in 1936; accordingly, this document might be dated “ca.1937.” The history and meaning of the name ‘Assembly of Man’ is also unclear. One might speculate that the name was meant to reflect the “earthly” reflection of the “Assembly of the Great White Brotherhood,” from which a message was transmitted for the 1937 convention. See Sherifa Merrell-Wolff et al, “Convention Messages,” 3.
[21] Assembly of Man, For Those Who Have Gone Part Way And Are Still Seeking (Wolff Archive: Organizations & Group Work, ca. 1937). Note: the date for this booklet is based on the fact that 1937 newspaper advertisements used this title (see note 15).
[22] “Do you pledge yourself not to speak the name of this Order nor of the services of initiation nor concerning any of its forms or instructions . . . to anyone who is not a known Initiate of the Order.” Sheila Merrell-Wolff, “Rules of the Order of Avalokiteshvara,” 29.
[23] Merrell-Wolff, “Autobiographical Material: A Recollection of My Early Life and Influences,” 1.
[24] Merrell-Wolff, “Memorial Service for Sherifa” (Lone Pine, Calif: February 20, 1960), audio recording, 1.
[25] Ibid.
[26] Ibid., 2.
[27] Wolff references the meaning of “Lakshmi Devi” in his audio-recorded “Memorial Service for Gertrude” (Lone Pine, Calif.: June 4, 1978), 3.
[28] Gertrude Wolff, “Memo to Bruce Raden & Cie” (Wolff Archive: Correspondence, no date). In this memo, Gertrude “bequeaths the responsibility of formulating publishing and distributing [The Seeker],” albeit with an attached list of rules and suggestions to be heeded.
[29] Franklin Merrell-Wolff, “Convention 1974: Preliminary Words on the Purpose of My Work” (Lone Pine, Calif.: August 11, 1974), audio recording, 2.
[30] The Seeker 1, no. 1 (May 1967), 1
[31] Franklin Merrell-Wolff, “Where Do We Go from This Point?” (Lone Pine, Calif.: December 12, 1978), audio recording, 2.
[32] Ibid.
