Guru

[Vidyasankar Sundaresan]

I have been avoiding getting into this debate for some time now, but I
couldn't resist this, to make a few points.

On Mon, 28 Oct 1996, Natha Bhaktyananda wrote:

> Ramakrishnan has written:
>
....
>
> Say there is a person who considers H.H abhinava Vidya tiirtha, the
> previous
> pontiff of Sringeri as his guru, say, since he was transformed by his
> books,
> lectures etc. Now he can't go around saying that he belongs to the
> "abhinava
> vidyaa tiirtha lineage".
> ------------------------------
>
>         Dear Ramakrishnan,
>
> I think that, in spite of your Indian name, you have a very Westernized
> concept of "guru"; traditionally, the guru is not one whom *you*
> consider as such, but one who *accepts* you as disciple and coaches you.


What you say is true, but isn't that what Ramakrishnan was also hinting
at? I may consider some one person to be my guru, but unless that person
accepts me as a disciple, I have no right to claim to be from his
"lineage".

Specifically, in the context of Indians who have family associations with
this or the other matha, they all consider themselves to be "sishyas" of
the mathadhipati in charge. But that does not give them the right to set
themselves up as teachers, claiming to derive authority from him.
Similarly, if it is correct that Ramana Maharishi did not formally
initiate a disciple, his followers have the right to say that they regard
Ramana as their guru, but talk of an associated lineage will raise
suspicions. Especially in the modern world, where the number of gurus
abound, and more than a few of these "gurus" are charlatans. I am not
saying that any specific follower of Ramana is so, but I am suggesting
that they should be aware that they are under public scrutiny, and must be
careful of what they say and do.

There have always been fierce disputes about succession of gurus in most
institutions. There have been very few institutions where the guru selects
his successor with great care. Maybe Ramana Maharishi wanted to avoid all
such complications and therefore did not designate a specific disciple as
a successor. Cases like the one which Ken mentions are not uncommon
nowadays. A successor is appointed in haste, and later on a dispute arises
between teacher and student, and the two fight their battles in public.
Something is definitely going wrong in such situations, but it is not
limited to those who consider Ramana Maharishi to be their guru. In other
words, there is nothing intrinsically problematic with Ramana Maharishi's
teaching that makes "false gurus" out of his followers. Such instances
abound elsewhere also, among advaitin gurus, visishtadvaitin gurus,
dvaitin gurus, yoga teachers, tantriks and others.


Regards,

S. Vidyasankar

>From  Tue Oct 29 19:53:49 1996
Message-Id: <TUE.29.OCT.1996.195349.1100.>
Date: Tue, 29 Oct 1996 19:53:49 +1100
Reply-To: cjreilly at ozemail.com.au
To: "Advaita (non-duality) with reverence" <ADVAITA-L at TAMU.EDU>
From: Cameron Reilly <cjreilly at OZEMAIL.COM.AU>
Subject: Re: Pedagogic
Comments: To: "Advaita (non-duality) with reverence" <ADVAITA-L at TAMU.EDU>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
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Natha Bhaktyananda wrote:
>
> Cameron has written:
>
> When asked why he still performed bhajan daily, Maharaj apparently
> replied: "Why not?"
>
> It was a spontaneous functioning which gave him pleasure and was partly
> tradition and habit. Maharaj saw no difference between performing
> bhajan, smoking a cigarette and going for a walk. But he denied that he
> performed bhajan in order to "achieve" anything.
> ---------------------------
>
> IMHO it is not as simple as that; one could also answer to that
> question: "Why yes?" If it was *only* a matter of pleasure, tickling the
> armpits would have been even better (I can think about 500 other things
> in that direction now, some of them quite "unorthodox" :-). And if it
> was tradition, then why not also perform some agnihoma, ashvamedha,
> puja, and a host of other Indian customs? There must be some *pedagogic*
> in it. As about the story with the "cigarette smoking", it can be easily
> extended to alcohol drinking, coffee, pot, horseriding, domestic
> violence, holy war and God knows what more, but it still seems that the
> great Masters have always had quite a clear limit to what was ok -- so
> there must be *some* difference!

Natha,

You appear to suffer from the common delusion that sentient beings have
some sort of 'free will' or volition.

I can assure you that this is not the case. They act according to
genetic and environmental factors. In Maharaj's case, there never *was*
an entity to choose to do bhajan, to tickle himself, or whatever, before
or after his 'enlightenment'. The same can be said of all sentient
beings.

And this also applies to the second part of your message.

Cheers.

Cameron.