Concerning Passionate Journeys and Spiritual Autobiographies

[sparrowhawk]

The following is a quote from "Passionate Journey: The Spiritual Autobiography of Satomi Myodo."

" When I think of certain famous persons over whom everyone makes a fuss, such as the founders of certain religions (i.e. the New Religions), I am appalled. When, in their practice of austerities, some abnormal phenomena arise in body or mind, they get carried away. They settle down in this condition and get the idea into their heads that ' This the Supreme Way of Heaven-and-Earth!' There are even cases of people who affect, 'In all the universe, I alone am to be revered!' Isn't it really a matter of regret and chagrin that a human being can claim to be the spiritual leader of all existence?"

Sounds all too familiar doesn't it? Kabir Helminski, one of the leading exponents of Sufism in America states in his book "The Knowing Heart" that it is possible to acheive something like "a hothouse enlightenment". That is certain people may develop extraordinary spiritual capabilities, but you wouldn't leave such a person alone with your children to babysit them.
Such "hothouse enlightenment" does not insure that such a one's moral an ethical development is commesurate with their spiritual advancement. It would seem fair to suggest then that Adi Da has been sitting in his private hothouses in Fiji, Hawaii and Northern California for the last 30 plus years. Even Ken Wilbur has criticized Da for not daring to emerge from seclusion and entering into public discussion with other spiritual leaders. If Da is the once and for all completing adept of Mankind what does he stand to lose?

Is it not then indeed " a matter of regret and chagrin" that this man claims to be "the spiritual leader of all existence"? What a ridiculous an absurd idea. Would it have even occured to someone like Ramakrishna or Nityananda to make such a claim? More likely they would have burst out laughing at such a conceit. Who would dare to put a glass cealing on humanity's spiritual potential? Why would anyone want to say, " Higher than this one cannot go," ? In fact Rudi, Da's first teacher, warned explicitly of belonging to any organization that made such a claim.

Cheers to One an All~

[...oneLove]

I had never heard the term "hothouse enlightenment" before, so I did a google and found this; excerpted from "The Knowing Heart, A Sufi Path of Transformation" by Kabir Helminski, The Completed Human Being: The Drop that Contains the Ocean

[friend]

... that frank and his followers like to state that they are following tradition in these claims they are making. Actually it turns out hardly any traditions back them up even partially, even Hindu ones. Take the idea of the Ishta, for instance. Frank is one who has stretched that idea to ridiculous lengths. Here's a note from Wikipedia on cults...

[...oneLove]

You know Frank has convinced himself that when it comes to God "it takes one to know one". And since he's the "one" who knows (and the only one...how could there possibly be another?) we must turn to him to "find" or "recognize" God? What a joke! A joke to those of us who recognize the nature of his game. To all others (whether they realize it or not) it's an insult to their birthright.

…oneLove
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"In the whole universe, in all states of being, in all forms is He. All Names are His names. All shapes His shapes, all qualities and all modes of existence are truly His."...Sri Ananadamayi Ma

[richlip]

You guys keep missing the big picture. You have to take the teaching of Da as a whole and not focus on the parts you hate, don't like or agree with.
Why does Adi Da keep abusing his own community while at the same time calling for greater numbers? He is constantly criticizing it as a mummery and at the same time wanting it to be bigger. Then whenever it looks like the community is starting to grow, he finds a way to undermine it through another teaching lesson!
Taking that approach, you can see all the contradictions: from I am the Avatar to there is no exclusive God. When this is done, the ordinary mind is confounded so that direct revelation can come through. It's the koan tradition tasken to another level, a larger scale. He relates to the community as a single person and he is constantly working to awaken that person. If that person awakens, then the Guru function is no longer necessary.
Mankind is the Avatar, the Heart of All.

[JayaHanuman]

Maybe you should go tell him that then?
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Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram

[...oneLove]

[friend]

... unfortunately it just isn't true. At least it's not true if you are basing anything on frank's actual teaching. It's inventive but just wishful thinking on your part. We've all been through something like it.

Yours is just another valiant attempt to make it all OK somehow, to try and find some way to explain how an apparently brilliant and powerful teaching can devolve into such idiotic human idol worshipping nonsense involving all sorts of abuse, financial rip offs and cultic manipulation.

Everybody has their own way of trying to rationalize it at first. Ken Wilber's wriggling in his seat all the time about it, but he never puts his life on the line for frank. I tried to rationalize it by assuming frank's so-called death event and divine emergence in 1986 was actually a stroke, after which his teachings and books took a distinct dive into the demented zone and he started to outwardly demand all this blatant idol worshipping stuff. But no, it was pointed out that this and a bunch of other nasty stuff had been there all along, even from the very beginning.

His devotees do it through rationalizing his abuses away, calling it crazy wisdom for example, and seeing blowjobs and rapes as divine service and so on, just like Sai Baba's devotees try to rationalize away his pedophilia. Otherwise, devotee's just can't reconcile the two extremes of supposed divinity with the obviously subhuman self-interest, exploitation and abuse. So they have to twist their minds by rationalizing things to make it OK, so they can ignore it and not confront their idol and hang on to their outward divinity.

In a similar way, that's what you are doing. You are trying to make it all OK too. If you are anything like I was you want to rationalize it all because you think that if part of it is wrong, then you are afraid all of it will be invalidated, even the part you find so valuable and have to admit you found nowhere else other than with frank.

Well, you needn't worry. You don't have to rationalize. You can ditch frank and all his nonsense and keep what is valuable because, first of all, no one can take that away from you and secondly it's all out there in the great tradition. And besides, it is the heritage of every human being. Treat frank like a professor who bought it all alive for you. That's what he should have been anyway and could have been that if all his self glorifying ideas didn't go to his head. Then you wouldn't be afraid you owe him the rest of your life for that gift. Just a hearty thanks will do.

There's no doubt what frank taught was both true and original. The problem was that what was true was not original, and what was original wasn't true. All the true stuff he swiped from some one else. He didn't know it before or develop it himself. That's just another rationalization. His teaching reeks of Ramana, Aurobindo and Krishanmurti and a whole lot more, and all that is still out there for you to rediscover. Frank's original stuff, however, the stuff about being the only seventh stage nonsense is the stuff that is not true. Throw him and it in the garbage as he suggested a long time ago.

Do it now. It takes a bit of a struggle, with our own brains and logic as much as anything, but it can be done.

The way I see it now is that he had a number of great insights but fell into all the traps that are inherent, but unexpected in the spiritual path. I've fallen into many of them myself. He might have missed the lesson on those traps because he was too impatient. He wanted so much to be the teacher, even before Scientology. He didn't want to stay with his guru long enough, perhaps. He only spent a week with Muktananda over all he was in such a rush. Maybe if he had stayed longer, he would have learned a few more things and matured. Who knows. Some say Mukta himself was somewhat corrupt and was never OK'd by Nityananda anyway.

One thing I'm pretty sure of and that is that trying to make all his idol worship nonsense, his abuses and exploitation acceptable by revising frank's teaching on your own, like you and Zensun and Black Sheep and others try to do, makes no sense.

For one thing you are defending something that doesn't exist. What you are saying is obviously just plain not his teaching at all. You are making it up to rationalize the terrible contradiction that would be there if you didn't. Secondly, the guy is right there now to confirm what you are saying or not. Why not check it out with him instead of revising or reinterpreting his teaching for him without his endorsement? Surely, you know he would deny it flat out and tell you to get on your knees.

Back in the beginning, frank was much more brilliant, though a bit devious and up to something even then as reports go, but still he had this somewhat more honest assessment of gurus (both from different lessons in the cosmos tapes on beezone).

[Broken Yogi]

Richlip is right. Why can't anyone see how obvious it is?

But I think he is ignoring the true avatar of our time: George W. Bush. Look. The guy says he's a unifer, then he divides the whole country. Then he says Saddam has WMD's, tens of thousands are killed, and no WMDs are to be found. He declares victory, then fights on to defeat for three more years. He says Saddam is aligned with Al Qaeda, that they had something to do with 9/11, then it turns out to be false. He launches a war with the most powerful army in the world, then refuses to even make plans for an occupation. He claims to be for freedom and human rights, but tortures prisoners of war in secret prisons, and refuses to let the Red Cross examine them. I could go on and one. Isn't it obvious that George Bush is the great Avatar of our time, confounding out minds, our expectations, our conventions (I mean the Geneva Conventions), our very sense of reality and common sense?

This is how humanity is to be enlightened in our lifetime. Why can't Adi Da admit that he is just playing second fiddle to the true Awakener of us all?

[marshall matt dharma]

Yes, the word is getting out about this Avatar and his "upwising"
impact on our fellow folks out there:

http://www.rense.com/general73/swam.htm

[marshall matt dharma]

Here's the relevant passage:

"Yes, the up-wising has begun, and intergalactic observers are saying that we have none other than George W. Bush to thank. How is that, you may ask? Well, I am reminded of a story my guru Harry Cohen Baba used to tell. A well-known minister died and arrived at the Pearly Gates at the same time as a cab-driver from New York. The cabbie was ushered in, but the clergyman was left waiting outside. After waiting and waiting and waiting, he finally called over the attending angel. "Excuse me, but I'm a renowned minister. How come you let that cab-driver in, and I'm left waiting out here?" "Well," the angel said, "when you preached, everyone slept. But when he drove, everyone prayed."

For millennia, spiritual teachers have been calling on us to go for the highest common denominator, but we've always seemed to end up with the lowest common dominator instead. And now, George W. Bush has done what preachers, teachers and other far-sighted visionaries have failed to do up until now: His policies have been so alarming, that he has awakened a slumbering body politic that slept through all previous alarms. Where others have failed, he has people all across the world praying, "God help us!" And instead of waiting for an intervention from above -- after all, we cannot expect to be fed intervenously forever -- people are beginning to help themselves, and even more importantly, help each other."

[richlip]

You are right BY, george seems to be serving that function for all the hard-core Christians. So it's all spiralling out of coooontrooool!!!
It's all you do-gooder new age freaks that are holding everything back.
Get with the program. [/img]

[richlip]

Friend, friend, friend, I say unto thee thrice so you will see that I value your effort, its irrelevance notwithstanding. I understand your intentions and they are good. Now what was that saying about the road to hell? lmao
Just because I see the big picture does not mean I can't see your little picture which you paint so very well.
Your universe is changed by your perception of it and yours is a rather limited one. I prefer mine, even though I understand that my view is ultimately also limited. The fact of the matter is that the Truth is beyond point of view but I offer mine as a counterpoint in the wish that perhaps someone will see the ridiculousness of taking any point of view!

[friend]

Hinduism no barrier to job as priest in Church of England

The Times reports that a priest with the Church of England who converted to Hinduism has been allowed to continue to officiate as a cleric.

[JayaHanuman]

Yeah, so maybe it is all kind of like a grand koan, of a horrible joke gone totally horribly amazingly wrong over years? Maybe Frank really decided that he was going to fix his followers so they would no longer be able to do what they wanted to do - much in the same way that you would "fix" a dog?? Maybe this strategy of "especial exploitation" did actually work for a while, two or three years to bankroll the projects, until the followers, or at least a few decided that maybe they were in a precarious position with re: to Frank? And maybe at some point, both parties found themselves mutually checkmated such that neither was able to move very freely in any new direction at all?? This sort of situation would generate a lot of animosity on the parts of both Frank and his followers, both of whom might ultimately end up looking like total fools when his claims to being the One and Only FLO ever to live in the 7th Stage slowly started coming apart in the minds of all caught in that particular belief web. It does get more difficult to defend that particular red-herring in public when trying to draw in new cultured and legitimate influential recruits, just as Frank himself might get tired of having to haul this crap around over his neck like a dead albatross into old age!!! Ultimately this might even be the reason for the implosion of the teachings, if he is supposed to be creating a new tradition, because ultimately, while all those great ideals about the "global need" for such a thing look nice in the gift-wrappings and dressings, we could just as easily end up with some sort of twisted state-sponsored cult of the universal avatar as an imperial religious dogma that we are forced to submit to (not there yet however in 2006). And then, of course, would come the destruction of the actual records, of Frank's great teaching and all the contradictions around that, while the new state-sponsored self-appointed clergy goes about the systematic destruction of all that's unpalatable and creates a new conformist dogma that cleans up any loose ends, forcing any remaining living witnesses to FJ's teaching on earth underground because of their threat to the legitimacy of the state religion!!! Wow! Wouldn't that undermine Jonathon Condit's claims to "We have all his original writings preserved in a vault. Everything is handwritten out on yellow pads for the preservation of the teaching to posteri-ty!"

Can you Hear It??? Can you Hear the Sound of One Wide-Open Hand Clapping? Can you? Can you Hear It??? Hmmm?? I Certainly Can!!!

Come on... who's fooling who? Are we supposed to believe that Frank's an avatar? Or instead that his devotees have compromised their lives to believe in this wishy-washy crap?

Who is really being buffaloed in this greater picture here? And by whom:? By Frank's "Wife"?
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Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram Ram