[As a fan of Dante’s Inferno from The Divine Comedy, when I discovered that Dante may have had knowledge of the Enneagram when he wrote The Divine Comedy, it all made sense. It made sense that I’m deeply drawn to the meaning and the different artistic expressions of Inferno. And it made sense that I have developed an affection for the Enneagram and taken up the torch as an Enneagram Educator.]

REVIEW

Before we dive in the modern Enneagram, I want to take a moment to do a quick review of the classical Enneagram for those who may have not read the previous entry—I highly encourage that you stop right here and the entry about The Classical Enneagram first.

The history of the Enneagram is richer than some might realize. The development of the Enneagram began with Pythagoras; however, it was Ramon Llull who introduced the earliest visual representation of the nine-pointed diagram that we associate with the Enneagram. However, the Enneagram didn’t begin as a personality typology. In fact, the earliest contributors to the Enneagram were not attempting to make a personality typology… they were attempting to connect the spiritual to the mathematical.

Ramon Llull’s work with the Enneagram is where the Enneagram began to lose its mathematical roots and transition to wholly spiritual self-assessment. Llull introduced the nine-pointed diagram, “He created a diagram of nine sets of aspects in concentric circles, one of which maps to the Vices of the Enneagram.” (Integrative Enneagram Systems, “A Short and Comprehensive History of the Enneagram’s Origins”)

Although Llull introduced the nine-pointed diagram, Athanasius Kirchner’s cover of Magnum opus Arithmologia (1655) is accredited to being the first illustration that closely matches the Enneagram diagram today.

Because a 600-year gap of undocumented use of the Enneagram symbol in its modern form, George Gurdjieff is noted as the definite start of the 20^th century Enneagram. George Gurdjieff (1866-1949) and P.D. Ouspensky (1878-1947) is where the transition between the Classical Enneagram and the Modern Enneagram begins.

ÓSCAR ICHAZO (1931-2020)

Óscar Ichazo is known as the father of The Enneagram of Personality. After inheriting his grandfather’s library from his uncle Julio, Ichazo started to read the work of Ouspensky.

In 1949, I started reading the work of Ouspensky, and in 1950 in Buenos Aires, I was invited to a closed study group… where I participated in long discussions about the work of Gurdjieff and Ouspensky. Here is where I first pointed out to this group that all the ideas proposed by Gurdjieff and Ouspensky could be traced to certain forms of Gnosticism and to specific doctrines of the Stoics, the Epicurians, and the Manichaeans. I also pointed out that we could not find any instructions in their books on how to apply the Chaldean Seal (enneagram) and that there were only vague references to music, the days of the week, etc.”

— Óscar Ichazo, “Setting the Record Straight,” Enneagram Monthly, Issue 21, November 1996.

Shortly after participating in that study group in Buenos Aires, in 1968, Ichazo began lecturing on protoanalysis(personality insights overlaid on the Enneagram symbol) under the supervision of the Chilean Psychological Association.

He taught a system he called Protoanalysis, which connected the nine points to Vices (Passions), Virtues, and ego-fixations. Central to his work was the idea that each person’s innate ‘Essence’ is obscured by an ‘Ego’ fixation developed in childhood. Ichazo provided the essential spiritual and psychological “skeleton” of the nine types, creating a powerful framework for self-realization.

— Integrative Enneagram Systems, “A Short and Comprehensive History of the Enneagram’s Origins”

Within his lectures, Ichazo taught a system of 108 Enneagrams—what he called Enneagons. Although he taught on 108, the Enneagram movement in America is based only on the first few:

1. Fixations — Underlying mental preoccupation for each.

2. Passions — The emotional energy in support of the fixation.

3. Virtues — What’s lacking when the passion gets in the way.

4. Holy Ideas — True remedy for the fixation.

5. Traps — The trap you fall into in seeking to overcome the fixation.

CLAUDIO NARANJO (1932-2019)

Óscar Ichazo is the father of the modern Enneagram, but Claudio Naranjo is the refiner of the Modern Enneagram (Naranjo often referred to himself as the mother of the Enneagram). Naranjo was a Chilean psychiatrist who was regarded as a pioneer of the Human Potential Movement and an innovator of the Enneagram of Personality, also known as EnneaTypes.

Naranjo took the foundation of the 27 subtype keys developed by Ichazo and made them into the 27 Subtype Character profiles that we use today.

The rich personality descriptions we use today were then developed by the Chilean psychiatrist Claudio Naranjo. After studying with Ichazo, Naranjo took this psychological ‘skeleton’ and began a monumental synthesis. He integrated Ichazo’s framework with his own extensive background in Gestalt therapy, psychoanalysis, and academic psychology to create the detailed portraits of the nine personality types. Building on the 27 subtype keys originally mapped by Ichazo, Naranjo was the one who developed them into the rich psychological 27 Subtype Character profiles we use today.

— Integrative Enneagram Systems, “A Short and Comprehensive History of the Enneagram’s Origins”

On July 1, 1970, Naranjo took fifty-four Americans (many of whom were from the Esalen Institute) to Arica, Chile to study with Ichazo. It was this group of Americans who made the Enneagram public and are the reason we know about today.

DON RISO AND RUSS HUDSON

In the late 1990s, Don Riso and Russ Hudson further developed Ichazo’s and Naranjo’s work surrounding the Enneagram to give us the Enneagram that we use today.

As you can see, the Enneagram isn’t new—despite popular belief. At its origin, in c. 570 BC, it began as a way to bridge the spiritual with the mathematical. Through time it evolved from having mathematical roots to having religious roots, and then to what we know it as today and having personality/psychology roots.

And although many individuals have contributed to the making of the Enneagram, Óscar Ichazo, Claudio Naranjo, Don Riso, and Russ Hudson are arguably the most notable contributors of the Modern Enneagram. Never the less, without the work of Ichazo and Naranjo, we wouldn’t have a solid framework to understand it in modern times. And without the work of Don Riso and Russ Hudson, it may have never escalated into modern popularity.

The thing that I find the most interesting about the beginning of Enneagram history is that there was no intent to make a personality indicator—most of the early contributors were solely connect the spiritual to the mathematical. It wasn’t until Ramond Llull introduced the nine-pointed diagram (c. 1232–1316) that the Enneagram starts to emerge as defined system.

PYTHAGORUS (570–490 BC)

Although Beatrice Chestnut recognizes connections between the Enneagram and Homer’s Odyssey, Pythagorus is likely the best origin of the Enneagram’s formation. It was Pythagorus who created the math that led to the creation of the nine-pointed star which later became the symbol for the Enneagram.

Pythagorus believed that all truth is mathematical. And, unbeknownst to him, he believed in the Law of Three. The Law of Three is the belief that things come into being through a triadic pattern.

EVAGRIUS PONTICUS (345–399 BC)

Evagrius had a deep fascination with Pythagorus’s number theory—early Christians thought there were correlations between Biblical numbers and Pythagorus’s number theory.

I have divided this discourse on prayer into one hundred and fifty-three texts. In this way I send you an evangelical feast, so that you may delight in a symbolical number that combines triangular and hexagonal figure. The triangle indicates spiritual knowledge of the Trinity, the hexagon indicates the ordered creation of the world in six days…

— Evagrius Ponticus, Introduction to Chapter on Prayer

It was Ponticus who developed the Eight Patterns of Evil Thought, which are now known as the vices and virtues. Here’s a list of Ponticus’s Eight Patterns of Evil Thoughts [which were later] paired with each Enneagram type:

1. Gluttony and Abstinence (Type Seven).

2. Fornication and Chasity (Type Eight).

3. Avarice and Freedom from possessions (Type Five).

4. Sadness and Patience (Type Four).

5. Anger and Patience (Type One).

6. Acedia and Perseverance (Type Nine).

7. Vainglory and Freedom from vainglory (Type Three).

8. Pride and Humility (Type Two).

ST. GREGORY (590)

St. Gregory later revised Ponticus’s Eight Patterns to form the Seven Deadly Sins.

1. Lust (Type Eight).

2. Gluttony (Type Seven).

3. Sadness (Type Nine). (Later replaced with Sloth.)

4. Avarice (Type Five).

5. Anger (Type One).

6. Envy (Type Four)

7. Pride (Type Two).

RAMON LLULL (1232–1316)

Ramon Llull gives us the earliest visual representation of a nine-pointed diagram that can be found in history. Llull also developed the Nine Vices, which are now represented as Passions in the Enneagram.

1. Anger – ire (Type One).

2. Envy (Type Four).

3. Pride (Type Two).

4. Lust (Type Eight).

5. Avarice (Type Five).

6. Gluttony (Type Seven).

7. Sloth – acedia, accidie (Type Nine).

8. Lying – deceit (Type Three).

9. Inconstancy – faithlessness, lack of loyalty (Type Six).

DANTE ALIGHIERI (1265–1321)

It is believed that since both Dante and Llull were alive during the same time, Dante was aware of Llull’s work with the Seven Deadly Sins. And it’s from this awareness that Dante was inspired to write his famous Divine Comedy (1308–1320). The Divine Comedy is an allegorical representation of the soul’s journey towards God. And in this work, the Seven Deadly Sins can be found—each person must spend more time on one of the terraces (deadly sins) before moving on.

ATHANASIUS KIRCHNER (1602–1680)

The cover of Kirchner’s Magnum opus Arithmologia (1655) includes an illustration that looks very similar to the symbol for the modern Enneagram.

GEORGE GURDJIEFF (1866–1949)

Everything preceding George Gurdjieff holds loose relation to the Enneagram—it’s more theory than concrete evidence of the Enneagram’s history—Gurdjieff is where Enneagram history concretely begins.

Why does Enneagram concretely begin with Gurdjieff?

George Gurdjieff is credited with being the definite start of the Enneagram’s history because the exact symbol that is used for the Enneagram today made its first appearance through Gurdjieff and his students.

It was also Gurdjieff who gave the Enneagram more religious roots when he introduced the model as a spiritual symbol in the 1930s. Gurdjieff is directly attributed with developing the Enneagram diagram and the Centers of Intelligence (triads).

P.D. OUSPENSKY (1878–1947)

P.D. Ouspensky was a distinguished Russian student of Gurdjieff, and he wrote In Search of Miraculous: Fragments of an Unknown Teaching (a book about Gurdjieff’s beliefs). In his book, Ouspensky outlines Gurdjieff’s teachings into four core beliefs: waking up, three-brained beings, chief features, and the Enneagram symbol.

Arguably, had Ouspensky not written this book about Gurdjieff’s beliefs, then we may not know about the Enneagram. So, while Gurdjieff is the start of the modern Enneagram, thanks is due to Ouspenksy for making Gurdjieff’s work publicly known.

ST. IGNATIUS (1491–1556)

The last contribution toward the Classical Enneagram comes from St. Ignatius.

By teaching us to awaken our soul to the Spirit’s movement in our head, heart, and gut, St. Ignatius inspired the creation of the Harmony Triads (the Harmony Triads show how each Enneagram type relates to the world) of the Enneagram.

Now, that you have learned about the history of the Classical Enneagram, you might have also gained a better sense of understanding of why I—along with Suzanne Stabile and many others—believe that the “trendy” Enneagram is doing more harm than good. I can almost guarantee that by the time you finish learning the history of the Modern Enneagram you will join us in this believe… you will see the value of the Enneagram beyond what you see on Instagram and other social media.

And that value is something that is truly transformational.

Primary Source: Tyler Zach, The Real History of the Enneagram online course.