New Age guru and actress Shirley MacLaine is sparking fury around the world over her new book which claims, among other New Age absurdities, that the six million Jews slaughtered by Hitler were responsible for their own deaths because they were  “balancing their karma” for crimes committed in past lives.

The Daily Mail is reporting on the blowback being experienced by MacLaine and her new book, What If . . . A Lifetime of Questions, Speculations, Reasonable Guesses And A Few Things I Know For Sure. The most furious backlash is directed at her claims that the victims of the holocaust brought about their own deaths.

“What if most Holocaust victims were balancing their karma from ages before, when they were Roman soldiers putting Christians to death, the Crusaders who murdered millions in the name of Christianity, soldiers with Hannibal, or those who stormed across the Near East with Alexander?" she writes. "The energy of killing is endless and will be experienced by the killer and the killee.”

Even more outrageous were her comments about “her friend”, Professor Stephen Hawking, the renowned physicist who suffers from a rare early-onset case of the motor neuron disease known as Lou Gehrig’s or ALS. Hawking, who is the subject of the new hit movie, The Theory of Everything, is a theoretical physicist who is currently serving as Director of Research at the Centre for Theoretical Cosmology within the University of Cambridge in spite of his severe disabilities.

MacLaine posits that he may also have brought his fate upon himself. ”Did he ‘create’ the disease that has crippled him in order to learn to be dependent on caregivers and the kindness of strangers so that he could free his entire mind to the pursuit of knowledge?” she speculates. “What if he inadvertently chose to set an example of himself to show the rest of us that cosmic travel and universal understanding are available, regardless of one’s physical condition or circumstance?"

She continues: "If Jesus chose to die in a state of martyrdom, then Stephen Hawking could just as readily have chosen to live in a dual state of being: visibly physical weakness and unseen knowledge and power. What if all reality is an illusion?”

The remarks brought her condemnation from the disability community who consider her views to be what they are – utterly ridiculous, confused and completely wrong in addition to be patently offensive.

But this is only the tip of the iceburg where MacLaine is concerned. She’s as far out as it gets in the New Age, which is already about as far as the next galaxy compared to the rest of us. Perhaps best known for her belief in reincarnation, she claims to have lived in Atlantis in a previous life when she was the brother of a 35,000 year old warrior spirit known as Ramtha. (This is the same spirit who is being channeled by former Tacoma housewife-turned mystical teacher J. Z. Knight). In her previous books such as Out on a Limb, Dancing in the Light and Sage-ing While Age-ing she reveals her interest in Transcendental Meditation (what a surprise!) and her encounters with aliens. She claims to have seen numerous UFO’s over her New Mexico ranch.

Speaking of which, she sold the ranch for $18 million even though her psychics recommended she ask $30 million for the place. But MacLaine said she likes the number 9 – it means completion to her, And because 1 + 8 = 9, that was the perfect number. “It’s not about the money,” she claimed. “It’s about completion.” (I still can't figure out why she didn't just ask for $9 million - I guess my karma's out-of-whack.)

She bought the 7,450 acre ranch 20 years ago because it was near the so-called “New Age capital” of Santa Fe. The minute she stepped foot on the property she was struck by its “energy” and claims “the land itself insists on inner peace.”

The property contains a 9,000-square-foot main house, a caretaker's cottage, a horse barn, a yurt (portable nomad dwelling) a swimming pool, two ponds, various ranch buildings and (of courses) a labyrinth which is used to “help listen to your inner guidance.”

MacLaine is the sister of actor Warren Beatty, the mother of one child, a daughter named Sachi, and the godmother of the daughter of former Democratic Congressman Dennis Kucinich.

If you haven't already figured it out, I'm going to pass on this book.