Going Clear: Scientology, Hollywood, and the Prison of Belief

by Lawrence Wright

and trim, with brown hair and sharp features, Miscavige announced to the assembled Scientologists that for the past six years of exile, Hubbard had been investigating new, higher OT levels. “He has now moved on to the next level,” Miscavige said. “It’s beyond anything any of us has imagined. This level is, in fact, done in an exterior state. Meaning that it is done completely exterior from the body.” Someone in the audience whistled in amazement. “At this level of OT, the body is nothing more than an impediment, an encumbrance to any further gain as an OT.” The audience began to stir as the realization began to sink in. “Thus—,” Miscavige said, then paused and adjusted the microphone. “Thus, at two thousand hours, Friday, the twenty-fourth of January, A.D. 36 [that is, thirty-six years after the publication of Dianetics], L. Ron Hubbard discarded the body he had used in this lifetime for seventy-four years, ten months, and eleven days.” Miscavige turned to a large photograph of Admiral Hubbard with the waves behind him and began to applaud. “Hip, hip, hooray!” he cried, as the audience echoed him. “Hip, hip, hooray!”