Since no one else seems to be willing to deal with this, I will. : Thanks - sounds intriguing. I wish someone had taken candid-camera footage for the rest of us to enjoy.
---In fairfieldlife@yahoogroups.com, <turquoiseb@...> wrote: --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com mailto:FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, wrote: > > On the topic of religious rituals - and to take this thread even further away from Mani - were there ever any group ceremonies (puja) performed at the various HQs where Maharishi established himself in Switzerland and Holland? > > And did those attending training courses as TM teachers ever have communal puja chanting or anything else suggesting a cult? Maybe the sacrifice of a maiden on a stone slab? > > Or did it never deviate from individual and group TM/Sidhi practice and SCI lectures? Since no one else seems to be willing to deal with this, I will. :-) The answer, of course, is "Is the Pope Catholic?" *Of course* there were mass pujas and "celebrations" performed to the various Hindu gods and goddesses in these locations. The general public probably never knew much about them, not being allowed on the premises, but they definitely took place, and undoubtedly do to this day. Many people suspected, because the people on the courses rarely came into town and when they did, they were as spaced out as zombies. In St. Moritz, on my last long TM course, the townspeople referred to the folks up in the hotel on top of the mountain, possibly taking a cue from the Beatles, as the "fools on the hill." :-) To deal with other of your recent questions, there was always a "public teaching" and a "private" or "real" teaching w.r.t. the TMO and Maharishi. For the public (and for those TMers who never ventured any further into the org) it was "20 minutes twice a day and no belief or lifestyle changes." But for those who went on to become TM teachers, it was very, very different. Much of the teaching centered around oft- repeated stories extolling the benefits of and necessity of devotion to one's "master." MMY would tell the story of Trotakacharya over and over, as if that exemplified what a spiritual seeker's life and relationship to one's teacher "should" be like, and in practice he pretty much demanded to be treated as if he were the "master" in question. Refuse to do something he had "commanded" you to do (for example, Deepak Chopra, preferring to have a life and a medical practice not directly linked to the TMO) and you were "outa there" faster than shit through a goose. Those held up as "role models" were the ones with near- absolute and unquestioning devotion to and obeisance to Maharishi. As for the name itself, the question is not so much "How is it pronounced?" but "Was the name deserved?" Even according to Maharishi's version, people started calling him that, and he allowed them to. Bottom line, however, is that the "title" was neither conferred on him by any legitimate lineage, or deserved. Heck, he wasn't even a "yogi." If you were one of those lucky TMers who avoided the TM organization and just meditated, you probably missed a lot of the drama that people on this forum talk about, and that the cult apologists -- many of whom never became teachers themselves and never did more than "dip their toe" in the TMO as it really was -- try to excuse. For anyone who became a TM teacher, it was *very much* about lifestyle changes, and obeisance to one's "master." And there was simply *no question* that Maharishi both allowed this to happen, and encouraged it.
