--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Vaj <vajradh...@...> wrote: > > Having only listened to the FF enlightened over the phone or via > email I thought it would be interesting if there was someone who > would infiltrate the Wednesday Night Satsang, a weekly gathering > of the "enlightened" you refer to. So I had a friend with deep > personal experience with actual enlightenment and a certain amount > of realization themselves go to the satsang and observe, gauge and > report back on their findings based on their own considerable > experience. > > Their conclusion? Some were able to "be in the present", that is > some of them had gained some basic awareness. That's all. Otherwise > they were superficially compassionate but seemingly nice people, > but largely ego-bound. The ability to be 'in the present' was then > combined with language popular among Neoadvaita teachers and of > course, self-fulfilling prophecies of what MMY talked about. The > person was little impressed. There was a lot of "one upmanship", > "my enlightenment trumps your enlightenment" going on. Much > unsolicited advice from well-meaning "enlightened". Negative > emotions were really no different from the rank and file. > Vindictiveness was sometimes present.
Vaj, I'm not going to get sucked into the game of analyzing a group of people I've never met and judging their claimed enlightenment. But I will provide another story to show that this "What some people consider enlightenment may not be what other people consider enlightenment" thang is NOT limited to the TM movement. On another forum, someone who had once studied with the Rama guy talked about his experiences studying for a short time with one of Rama's former students, who is now marketing himself as "fully enlightened." What he described was someone who had mastered the same "emanating golden light" minor siddhi that Rama had, and who could "broadcast" enough (in his opinion) minor shakti to give people sitting in the same room with him a buzz. But how did this person run his organization, and present himself and his "teachings" to the public? *Exactly* the same way that Rama did. That is: * He requires absolute obedience from all of his "accepted" students, and throws them out if they ever fail to do what he tells them to do. * He has a sizeable "security team" to protect him from perceived threats and personal attacks. ( This is a "teacher" so minor that his follow- ing consists of a few dozen students and that no one has ever heard of. Who is going to be "threat- ening" him or wishing him harm? At least Rama had actually received a real death threat once. :-) * *Just like his mentor*, this guy suggests that all of his students be celibate, but with the exception that all of the women students are expected to sleep with him if he wants them to. And yet, a few dozen people have actually accepted this guy as "enlightened," for no other reason than that he can produce a little flashy golden light and they feel a buzz when they meditate with him. I'm presenting this as an example of how "standards" vary greatly when it comes to "judging enlightenment" and whether someone has realized it. I think that we see these different "standards" on this forum. Some, like yourself, have fairly high standards based on what you have been taught and what you have chosen to believe. Others have fairly low standards, and tend to believe that someone is enlightened if they merely claim it. Again, what this all comes back to for me is the situation created by an organization that refuses to ever "certify" enlightenment, and allows it to remain a kind of hazily-defined, ever-changing myth, and never names anyone who has realized the mythic state. Yes, there are problems related to "certification," but in my opinion there are far more problems that arise when an organization refuses to point to concrete *examples* of enlightenment. What tends to happen is that seekers within these traditions, having never seen anyone be acknowledged as having realized enlightenment, tend to project their hope that enlightenment really exists onto anyone who has a good story to tell.
