The Ultimate Frontier [Paperback]

We had been solidly middle class. I was a happy, well-adjusted child--but after we moved to Stelle my life changed completely. There were only about 100 people there, yet everything outside the community described in The Ultimate Frontier was referred to as "the outside world."

I know the author of this book as Richard Kieninger; Eklal Kueshana is his pen name. Richard convinced my father to invest all his savings (money intended for college) in some crazy scheme. The money wasn't supposed to be any good anyway after the United States collapsed during the mid-1970's. By the time we left Stelle we were broke, my parents were disheartened, and I was afraid of everything in "the outside world."

None of the prophecies in The Ultimate Frontier came true. The United States didn't collapse during the mid-1970's, Stelle didn't grow to become a city of 250,000, nor did World War III bring nuclear holocaust in November, 1999. You can buy this book if you want, but please don't believe Richard or the prophecies.

I have talked to quite a few of the children of Stelle, and their experiences are similar to mine. I think it is dangerous to believe people who pretend to know the future, especially if you have children. My parents recovered somewhat--my father refers to Richard Kieninger as "God's cure for naivite." But I think some of us who spent our formative years in Stelle were permanently marked.

The Ultimate Frontier describes a beautiful dream. It says that people with a special destiny will create a new nation on land that will rise out of the Pacific Ocean on May 5, 2000. It may be surprising that intelligent people could believe this, but some do. This dream appeals to their vanity, and they set their common sense aside.

The philosophy described in The Ultimate Frontier is beautiful, but I think there are safer, cheaper ways to learn about it.

First and foremost, THE ULTIMATE FRONTIER is the non-fiction autobiography of Richard Kieninger, who spent his early years in the Chicago area and who currently resides in an intentional community called Adelphi, which he founded just east of Dallas, Texas. Mr. Kieninger has always claimed access to special information provided by an organization called "The Brotherhoods," which early on gave him the titles "Harbinger of Aquarius," "The Judge of Israel," "The Builder of Lemuria" and "The Fountainhead of Christ." References to such self-aggrandizing titles are refreshingly absent from Chapter Three of the new Tenth Edition.

Gone too are Chapter Four references to a session with "The Council of Seven," a group of seven advanced beings who supposedly officiated at a ceremony during which Mr. Kieninger's pen name, Eklal Kueshana, was carved into his right thigh when he was twelve years old. Also at this ceremony, Mr. Kieninger's "Council of Seven" confirmed his possession of "the Key of David, by which your works are given authority."

As the young Richard Kieninger is introduced to the Lemurian Philosophy by various of his scientist-philosopher teachers, the reader learns that the author's "works" are to be the building of two precursor communities, one located eighty miles south of Chicago, Illinois called "Stelle" and the other located twenty miles east of Dallas, Texas called "Adelphi." We also learn that Mr. Kieninger is charged with the founding of a new nation, "The Nation of God," on a continent that will someday rise out of the Pacific Ocean.

All previous editions of THE ULTIMATE FRONTIER cited the date for the rising of this new continent as May 5, 2000, when a unique alignment of various celestial bodies would trigger "Doom's Day"-a massive seismic event that would lead to the shifting of the continents. A devastating nuclear Armageddon would already have occurred in November, 1999 and the wretched survivors of this earlier event were to have greeted May 5, 2000 as "a blessing." In all previous editions, Mr. Kieninger quoted the prophetic words of a certain Dr. White, "After Armageddon and Doom's Day, less than a tenth of the world's population will be alive to see the year A.D. 2001."

Readers of the new Tenth Edition of THE ULTIMATE FRONTIER may be forgiven if they wonder why the author simply deleted all references to these aforementioned dates, while he continues to maintain the Armageddon and Doomsday predictions in full force. No explanation is offered for the failed prophecies.

In all fairness, Mr. Kieninger's decision not to include specific dates is more a return to his roots than a fresh approach. As a 1950's student of the Lemurian Fellowship in Ramona, California, the author was introduced to Lemurian Philosophy through a series of twelve lessons that mention no specific dates for the prophesied Armageddon and Doomsday events. By eliminating such references in the new Tenth Edition, Mr. Kieninger may be honoring the spirit of the original Fellowship lesson material.

The cover of the new Tenth Edition includes a subtitle, "A Call to the Builders." Of course THE ULTIMATE FRONTIER has always been a call to action, and Mr. Kieninger has founded a number of non-profit organizations to facilitate the work of building his Stelle, Illinois and Adelphi, Texas communities as well as the building of a new city that is to be called "Philadelphia"--Lemuria Builders, The Stelle Group, Builders of the Nation, The Adelphi Organization, and The Philadelphia Fund. It should be noted that in 1986 The Stelle Group and its associated Stelle, Illinois community disavowed any affiliation with Mr. Kieninger because of his well-documented tendency to abuse his authority and seduce the young women of both communities--patterns of behavior that have carried over to at least 1997. Despite this recent history (not to mention Mr. Kieninger's April 14, 1998 conviction on federal bank fraud and mail fraud charges), The Adelphi Organization and its associated Adelphi, Texas community continue to support Mr. Kieninger's building projects. Current readers of THE ULTIMATE FRONTIER are encouraged to tithe 10% of their incomes to support expansion of the Adelphi community and to finance the building of the new city of Philadelphia on Cedros Island, just off the coast of Baja California.

The new Tenth Edition of THE ULTIMATE FRONTIER includes one new section of commentary in "Remarks by the Biographee." Mr. Kieninger writes, "Inasmuch as freedom to experience and to experiment are essential to attaining meaningful Egoic growth, Adelphi is the very opposite of a cult. It is important that no one turn his life over to a guru or be obedient to one." Longtime observers may wonder, then, why Mr. Kieninger retains final decision making authority, both in the Adelphi community and within the structure of The Adelphi Organization. Even more troubling are Mr. Kieninger's claims that he has sometimes found it necessary to use his "Key of David" powers to discipline disobedient members by removing the veil of protection from evil that Christ promises all sincere Christians. In his landmark book on modern cults, RELEASING THE BONDS--EMPOWERING PEOPLE TO THINK FOR THEMSELVES, Steve Hassan cites precisely such behaviors when he defines what makes any political, economic or religious organization a cult.

This update of THE ULTIMATE FRONTIER is indeed a welcome improvement over all previous editions. Learning to live in community has always been a worthwhile goal, and the author is to be commended for inspiring this sort of thing. It seems, however, that readers contemplating full and active involvement in Mr. Kieninger's current projects would be well-advised to consult with former participants before committing large sums of money and years of their lives to such endeavors.

As for Mr. Kieninger's claim that "The Brotherhoods" assigned him the task of developing an advanced culture in Adelphi that will someday lead to the establishment of a perfect civilization in a future "Nation of God," thousands of readers of THE ULTIMATE FRONTIER can attest that taking such claims too literally has in the past led to major disappointments. The small band of true believers who currently populate Mr. Kieninger's Adelphi community might do well to read Eric Hoffer's namesake classic, THE TRUE BELIEVER. Perhaps they too will someday decide to reduce their dependence on Mr. Kieninger's future talk and concentrate instead on the very legitimate, though somewhat less ambitious, goal of simply learning to live in community.

This book is filled with esoterica and new age ideas (before new age was "in") but you can get much more from other sources. In fact, much of Kieninger's information is gleaned from the Lemurian Fellowship, which existed in California in the 1950's.

Fortunately, I finally figured out what was going on, and left Stelle after about 3 years. I had no money to invest and I was told by the leaders that my ideas were too "radical."

This book is a utopic view of what a community can be, but has no basis in reality. Buyer beware!