[1] According to the author John G. Bennett, a student and aide of George Gurdjieff who first mentioned the concept, the word sarmoung uses the Armenian pronunciation of the Persian term sarman, which may mean either "he who preserves the doctrine of Zoroaster" or "bee".
A collection of legends, well known in Armenian and Syrian circles with the title of The Bees, was revised by Mar Salamon, a Nestorian Archimandrite in the thirteenth century.
[2][3] Describing the contents of an old letter written by a monk which he had obtained, Gurdjieff writes: "Our worthy Father Telvant has at last succeeded in learning the truth about the Sarmoung Brotherhood.
Gurdjieff's experiences on these journeys, and a sketchy account of his somewhat mysterious relationship with the Sarmoung Brotherhood, can be found in his autobiography Meetings with Remarkable Men.
[4] During his stay at the monastery, Gurdjieff recalls seeing a complex and ancient tree-like apparatus used to indicate bodily postures and train temple dancers.
The account hints that the central Asian activities of the Sarmoun are to be shut down and the organisation shifted to the west, and mentions an absent chief of the order, the Surkaur, who lives in a place called Aubshaur or "waterfall" (Another account of a visit to a remote monastery, published anonymously in The Times, links the Sarkar to Idries Shah[8]).
He also says they owe their allegiance to the "Studious King" (a literal translation of Idries Shah's name), and agrees with Major Martin that their teaching has been exported and adapted to the West.
In Studies in Comparative Religion (Winter 1974), it is said that according to the Armenian book Merkhavat, the Sarmoung Brotherhood, also referred to as the 'Inner Circle of Humanity', originated in ancient Babylon circa 2500 BC,[10] at around the time the Egyptians built the Great Pyramid of Giza.
In The Masters of Wisdom, J. G. Bennett states that the Sarman left Babylon before the arrival of the Alexander the Great (who reigned 336-323 BC), moved up the Tigris and made their headquarters in the abandoned capital of the Assyrian Kings, close to modern-day Mosul in northern Iraq.
[13] In The People of the Secret, Edward Campbell (writing as Ernest Scott), another associate of Idries Shah, describes studies in extrasensory perception being undertaken in the contemporary Sarmoun monastery in Afghanistan.
José M. Tirado presented a paper to the All & Everything Conference in Loutraki, Greece detailing the probable Buddhist influences on Gurdjieff's teachings, and linking "Sarmoun" to the Surmang monastery, in "Beelzebub's Buddhas".
Gurdjieff's claim to have found and entered 'the chief Sarmoung Monastery' is, in effect, a litmus test, distinguishing literal minds from those preferring allegory.