Kostos Vaxevanis, the Greek journalist was accused in Court last week, (on spurious charges), of publishing the names of 2,000 very rich Greeks with Swiss Bank accounts who were avoiding tax. He said about being a journalist that his job was “to tell the truth”, my job is simply to tell the news and tell it straight”.
In 1986 as the communes dissolved and Osho was being turned out of country after country I started a “rag” called sannyasnews. Okay maybe my motives were mixed, but much was about providing UK sannyasins with updates about Osho’s wherebouts, etc, street wise ads about how people were making a living in the wake of commune dissolution and stuff which the official Osho journalists seemed unable or unwilling to provide. I used to run a disco on the Archway Road, and sold it there. It went like hot cakes. Within a few months with the help of a few friends, there were subscribers, advertisers and the whole bit, from around the UK, but also around the world. In the end it became the magazine Here and Now.
However in the eighties I kept getting messages from people like Hasya and Amrito saying that my sort of journalism was “yellow journalism” whatever that meant. In the end I got a message from Amrito saying I was “risking” my sannyas. By the latter I figure he meant that I was at risk of some kind of excommunication. Devageet told friends of mine that “Parmartha was now beyond the pale”. However my own feeling at the time and now was that they felt some kind of destruction of monopoly of the “news” which was free of their kind of censorship. Over the years the official parties mellowed towards me, and I heard in the nineties that they still considered that “I loved Osho”. In 2000 I re-visited the Resort and unlike some other rebels found myself unbanned. To my horror however Dhanyam the Editor of Viha Connection who has in my view worked unstintingly as a servant of sannyas since 1986, with his honest Californian mag was actually banned from Resort entrance a few years ago…
Both then and now I considered the Orwellian saying crucial. Orwell said
“Journalism is printing what someone else does not want to be printed, everything else is public relations”.
Here in present time at Sannyasnews we try and keep what we see as healthy journalism within sannyas alive – in keeping with the Orwellian tradition. That includes the early Greek spirit of mutual criticism bound up within the bounds of rationality. That’s what our blog is all about. Many good and not so good articles appear on other Osho and sannyas sites, but many strings seem insipid and heavily censored or debarred. I dont fear to remind the reader of Orwell again, that often in the end they seem to fall into what is just “public relations”.
It is no surprise to me that Kostas Vaxevanis reminded the Greek Court last week, at his trial, of Orwell’s words, and in the spirit of the inheritors of Socrates the public galleries broke into wild applause. Well done to them.
Parmartha
Matter of the fact is Sannyasnews is unparallelled in the world of Osho. All other websites simply hide behind Osho’s words. Their attitude radiates humble arrogance: “Everything is fine with us, problems lie in the world”.
Few great devotees in those sites will still try to quote Osho’s words about one world, one govt., that elections are no good, democracy has failed, because what we need is meritocracy!
Sannyas has not developed the healthy mechanism of self-healing, which is fundamental to growth, therefore Sannyas is dying like that field of roses covered with air-conditioned roof, but no sunlight!
Basically, what I get is that journalism for a writer is mostly an expression of the self & for a reader, it is getting to know the diversity of facts, whether it is in the sannyas world or even otherwise.
Parmartha, there is always a chance that Hasya & Amrito could be colour blind…:)
Kavita,
Rose coloured glasses? Aren’t you doctor Kavita these days? Another Phd? Cheers.
No, dear, these days I am patient. Cheers, anyway
Kavita,
I like it. Looking at the diversity and being as honest as possible. Truth claims are not to be dismissed.
Well, Roman, surely “Truth claims are not to be dismissed.” & to each, her/his own truth.
Kavita,
And as you know, Alok John has a point, pointing out that there may be more than personal truth claims.
Roman, good to know that from you, ya but in Parmartha’s context it’s more like ‘the pot calling the kettle black’.
By Parmartha’s context I mean in reference to the accusation of ‘yellow jornalism’.
Good, well thought-out post. Reading it, I experience a sense of relief that I don’t have to be concerned about being excommunicated etc. I excommunicated myself from all that mumbo-jumbo years ago.
In many ways the sannyas scene has on many levels turned into the antithesis of what it once was, especially on the level of freedom. Sannyasins are now bound by the thought of being banned etc. What a joke…a very poor one.
That’s the thing about letting others have control over your life…they can manipulate you if there is something you cherish, which they have the power to take away from you. Now that I think about it, even back in Poona One days, that sort of thing was well established. Give me the road less travelled eight days a week.
There’s a ringing in my ear and I think its the call of the wild. Then again, maybe it’s simply tinnitus, caused by listening to loud music for 45 years.
Two Israeli soldiers are having a break and reading the day’s papers. One is reading Haaretz and the other is reading an Arabic newspaper.
A: “Why are you reading Arabic news yo?”
B: “Because according to them we are the richest and strongest people in the world, and we are controlling everything.”
* * *
We are in luck because the mainstream media is losing credibility by the minute and the people are looking for alternative sources for their information. But don’t rejoice too much because what is also eroding is trust in all the institutions which unfortunately are holding the society together.
The only reason the Greeks now want to know is because their backs are against the wall. In general people don’t want to know the truth. Compartmentalisation should never be underestimated as a tool or weapon, either by the individual or an organisation.
Vartan
‘Compartmentalisation should never be underestimated as a tool or weapon, either by the individual or an organisation.’
Excellent. Is it yours, Vartan?
Lokesh says:
‘Compartmentalisation should never be underestimated as a tool or weapon, either by the individual or an organisation.’
Excellent. Is it yours, Vartan?
Probably. I’ve been doing research into trauma-induced compartmentalisation and a couple of years back I had to make the hard decision and allow a friend whose daughter was murdered to stay partitioned and functional in order to deal with the rest of his family. Since then I have been seeing it everywhere. It’s an amazing function for coping and control.
Vartan
Never heard of this until now, Vartan. Could you explain more about compartmentalisation, please?
Satyadeva says:
Never heard of this until now, Vartan. Could you explain more about compartmentalisation, please?
It would be just as easy if you googled it…In its simplest form it’s like having a wife and a girlfriend and a boyfriend at the same time.
Vartan
(But less fun)
Call that “easy”?!
More like a recipe for utter disaster….
Hopefully, the trust in those institutions will crash, and people start trusting in themselves. Celebrating instead of making institutional war against Man and soon the society will recover healthier.
“Celebrating”? – More like chaos, confusion and social and economic breakdown, you mean!
Great, of course, if you fancy a spot of virtual civil war, riots, crime and anarchy on the streets…
And how soon do you imagine “soon” would be – 5, 10, 20, 30 years?
Preetam, I don’t think you have a clue about the forces that would be unleashed in your preferred scenario.
Bullshit force, the best example was New York last week during this little flood and storm…People were cooking and helping each other on the streets. Humanity stays together, even those institutions are crashed.
Where are those institutions, if before the same people forced folk into war or leaving their land by pressure? Then have nothing to eat, no clean water, just for their best? Simply by the same interest of money and power as they stand behind UNO.
Sure, Preetam, except New York last week was suffering a natural disaster, not the irreversible collapse of its whole political and socio-economic framework.
You really seem to have no clue, as I said, about the forces that would be unleashed in ‘your’ scenario:
Panic, mental breakdown, food shortages – even famine, leading to death and disease, violence, killing, widespread crime and disorder…
Still, there you’d be, I suppose, “celebrating”..!
Good Luck.
A really little trust into Humanity, quite negative and little fear of letting go the old repressive.
You’re a fool, Preetam, if you imagine the transformation you yearn for will emerge from the utter chaos you seem to be inviting, without severe pain and suffering, on a massive scale.
Where is the suffering on a massive scale caused, by war because of lower interest, or because of a meteorite? If it is a meteorite the pain will be inescapable, and I will be one of the first who is dying. But if it is of War…then your institutions and the monsters behind are due, not humanity as a whole.
It doesn’t even have to be war, Preetam. Isn’t virtual civil war bad enough?
The point I’m making is that before you start imagining how wonderful it’s all going to be when the big, bad, evil ones and their institutions and governments collapse, you need to take a good look at the price everyone will inevitably have to pay.
My sense is that you’re so blinded by anatagonism to the ‘old order’ and your own idealism that you tend to be unable to see the implications of the breakdown you’re longing for.
And I’m not necessarily defending the status quo at all, I’m just saying things as I see them unfolding, given a certain ‘worst-case’ scenario.
I expect we both think the other is wildly exaggerating, possessed by naive idealism (you, according to me) and an utterly pessimistic lack of faith in humanity (me, according to you)!
Who shall give the angular dimension in your opinion for the future? The present measure of authorities is as ugly as “Cologne Cathedral”.
Preetam, strange that you use this example: the locals helping each other out in a time of great need. Often I hear that. Yet most of the time, people put themselves in that dire situation, by making stupid and uneducated and possibly selfish decisions which lead to avoidable disasters. In the above case, the locals many years ago filled in the land (used to be wetlands) and put in home, stores and roads, the natural ability for the land to absorb flood waters was taken away. Similar things have occurred throughout the world and here in the States, in New Orleans and Louisiana in particular, we suffered the same fate from Hurricane Katrina back in 2005…
So now, humans screw things up, then years later suffer serious consequences, join hands to help each other out, and then go on to repeat the same stupid mistakes they made years earlier, and thereby repeating the process in the future…Haiti, Brazil, Borneo, Indonesia… you name it, just maddening, yet you give kudos to idiots acting like idiots…
No wonder we need clowns like Osho and Meher Baba, etc. to “rescue” us from self-made calamities. Yet you obviously can’t see beyond your nose, so what good is Osho to you then?
Preetam, let us forget about the big world around.
Trust in Sannyas institutions is on its nadir, sannyasins are trusting themselves. Has this addeed the celebration in the winds?
As far as I know, the people who were sannyasins for decades, they have really stood up on their feet, almost like rape victims who limp back to normalcy.
But celebration..?
It is there when you join the weekend group,”How to Tie the Shoes Meditatively”.
Guess, many like it to celebrate – but, perhaps don’t see the deeper sense of celebrating.
Which is what, Preetam, please?
Sure, celebrating…being celebrate and not full of fear of some disaster. The harm always comes from the same direction, because that’s why we can avert what is ill-prepared.
Ok, I can go with that, Preetam.
Where I differ with you is re what we’ve discussed earlier today.
Do we differ? Because I am neither into recreating society by chaos. But there is lots of stuff that needs a better measurement by less regressive people, people of celebration with respect for the individual instead of individuals forced to surrender to institutions.
May I ask, please, Preetam, a personal question?
What was/is your relationship with your family like, especially with your father?
And how about your school – what was that like?
Both good. Why?
Ok! I asked in order to see if the roots of your anti-authority/institutions/government stance might possibly be in an unhappy past. But apparently, they’re not!
Satyadeva,
How about a maternal superego? Sheela fitted the role perfectly. In the eyes of many she could do no wrong, which means a lot of wrong. Don’t we love to idealize? Regards.
Preetam,
You’ve pointed out that things at home and school were good. Bloody hell! I was looking forward to something spicy. Childhood molestations and abuse. The journey out of the shit to seeing the light.
Anyway, here’s a tale which is true. I know of a Meher Baba disciple who spent time in the slammer for bludgeoning his father to death with a hammer. He saw his mother being abused once too often. Actually, he ended up in a psychiatric hospital. The judge took pity on him. A mate of mine, now dead, used to visit him and give him Baba books to read. It was an horrific crime and can’t be condoned. He was still young. He’s since become a poet and writer. Amazing the people who go to these Babas. They take on a lot. The prudes, perverts and tyrants. We’ve seen them all.
Talking about childhood molestations, Pete Townsend went through that but he ain’t no ‘chester’ or ‘jimmy.’ He suffered from a white-knight syndrome and tried to help in that area, financially and in other ways. The Press gets things right sometimes, but they can have a field day with a celebrity. He’s faced his demons and writes well.
His ‘master’ played a big part in the healing.
Yes, I was reading about that recently, he says that he looked up and paid for access to online child porn sites to prove that banks were helping to ‘serve’ such sites, not for personal gratification.
Also, he says he closed them very quickly and has a leter from the police stating they didn’t find anything incriminating on his computer.
All of which, he says, didn’t prevent him being snubbed by people in public, eg in restaurants, who, of course, believed all they’d read in the papers.
Cool Cat Satyadeva. Exactly.
What? You mean newspapers don’t always print the truth? I’m shocked.
One day, I’ll have to tell you the story of the Pakistani guy who I once met. We sat in a prison yard and he explained to me why and how he managed to decapitate his beautiful wife with a meat cleaver, naked in a snow-covered street.
Satyadeva says:
“Yes, I was reading about that recently, he says that he looked up and paid for access to online child porn sites to prove that banks were helping to ‘serve’ such sites, not for personal gratification….”
I’d be the first to say that you can never blame the victim on how they respond…but in this case, I am not having it. If one is going to conduct research in this subject, one shouldn’t do it in private (especially somebody of his wealth and standing). He should have got a capable team together for any eventuality.
Unfortunately, historically, it is the abused who turn around and become abusers.
One of the biggest lessons I’ve learned in sannyas is how many more ppl (percentage wise) have been abused as children than I ever considered. It has been pointed out to me that an organisation such as ours probably attracts victims of childhood abuse, to which I would partly agree, but I also feel that the problem is much bigger than generally accepted. There are a lot of abused kids in the Heavy Metal scene, I came across some of that, in the mid-’90s. I don’t want to ponder on this subject.
Vartan
Roman, so then you would call England’s and America’s response to Adolf Hitler’s atrocities “a horrific crime and can’t be condoned”?
The thing here is that this chap was very young and his mind was very vulnerable and influenced by extreme violent actions he witnessed being committed against his mother by his father. The kid snapped, and it’s excusable and perhaps justifiable in my opinion, otherwise the violence being committed by his dad could have escalated to the point where his mother would have been killed. Use your head when making judgements about people.
Baba,
It is an interesting point. When I heard the ‘story’ I had similiar thoughts to you.
Those words I used were conveyed to me by parties concerned. Some people believe that harming anyone damages their ‘soul’.
Obviously I feel Hitler should have been stopped. I do think the bombing of Dresden was a crime.
It is said with pride, we are capable to create our own spiritual awakening?
Question is, why only one freak out of millions is able to do this, and still no one is sure whether this one in million is really an awakened or just chewing Indian Tobac!
Obama has won an election in democratic America.
“Masses” have chosen their leader.
In the coming weeks, we will read the commentary by the wise and meditator journalists of Osho’s home garden.
They will try their best through one or two quotations of Osho to put the whole election process down:
“How blind masses can decide, what is right, what is wrong? Masses can be brainwashed easily by electronic adevertisement. We need a world where people are meditators. We need to build a world where meritocracy rules.”
Sometimes I wonder, how great ideas become crap when they are repeated by the craps!
Shantam,
Two quotes to get things into perspective. The first was written by Hegel in 1820:
‘The History of China has shown no development, so that we cannot concern ourselves with it any further… China and India, as it were, lie outside the course of world history.’
One can see how stupid Hegel looks with the benefit of hindsight.
And now the second quote, by Raymond Aaron, 1969:
‘Europeans would like to escape from their history, a ‘great’ history, written in letters of blood. But others, by hundreds of millions, are taking it up for the first time, or coming back to it.’
Obviously, it may be Western civilization which goes to the dustbin of history with countries like India and China ruling the world. Where Osho figures here is your guess? A whole myth, narrative could be created over hundreds of years. He did leave an imperialistic power in not the most pleasant circumstances.
Obama’s foreign policies will ensure that the United States will be held in contempt by a significant part of the world. Strange, because Obama regards Malcolm X as an important figure in his life. Malcolm did obtain some wisdom and died a good guy after he left the Muslim Brotherhood, who were responsible for his assassination. One can pay a heavy price for leaving a cult.
Anything could happen…
Future leaders of China may have huge pics from the ranch of Osho, flanked by the Peace Force with uzis, in their offices.
People who speak against the Oshoist government will have to stand up and apologise publicly.
“Death is a Fiction” will be emblazoned above the entrances to the many military bases where the soldiers meditate on the statement every day.
The unconscious masses will be controlled by a self-selecting Inner Circle, who greet each other by saluting with both hands and shouting “Yahoo” and repeating the traditional greeting:
“The lie of the awakened man is truer than the truth of the unawakened man.”
Americans will be persecuted as the Jews once were for killing the Messiah.
But gasoteric gnoshtics will survive underground for centuries, living quietly in the moment, surviving within the matrix, secretly sowing the seeds of sweet sedition….
Frank,
You are risking your sannyas. Heard that one before.
Pentheus: You say you saw the god
What form did he assume?
Dionysus: Whatever form he wished.
The choice was his, not mine.
‘The Bacchae’
Jim Morrison, ‘I’m a changeling.’ Hard to pin him down, many have tried.
Here’s to the laughing gas man.
All people want to escape from their history.. stop being so picky.. it’s a human problem not a euro, american or asian thing.
‘All people want to escape from their history’. According to Baba. Then again, many would beg to differ.
James Joyce: ‘History is a nightmare we can’t escape from.’
As this thread is about Journalism in Sannyas, I wonder if there is any role in sannyas for ‘a journal’? Any smart person can google around and get the picture pretty quick. I have a nagging feeling that we are not using the medium in its appropriate capacity.
Vartan
More like bumblism in sannyas.
Wy this fuss about Love? Why paying money through the nose for some cookie jar called “Path of Love”?
Any smart person can google around and get the “Videos” pretty quick. I have a nagging feeling that we are not using the medium in its appropriate capacity to learn the art of love.
Shantam
Shantam, that nagging feeling you’re experiencing…Could it be that odd sensation that you’ve totally lost the plot and everyone else knows it but you? Could be that you’ve been googling around too much…looking for cut-price Path of Love videos…sounds awful. Get well soon and then maybe you can have a crack at love itself, instead of wandering the winding path to nowhere all on your San Antonio. Very sad.
Getting back to the thread, Parmartha points out how he started a ‘rag’ called sannyasnews. The ‘rag’ actually provided a few of us, who weren’t even in the UK, with sustenance. ‘Here and Now’ also kept us abreast with what was happening. At the time of these publications sannyasins were starved for news. Every now and then there would be an article in a newspaper on Osho, pointing out that he was refused an extended visa or denied entry somewhere. It was because of ‘sannyasnews’ and ‘Here and Now’ that sannyasins were kept informed and created networks.
After Osho left Oregon, my partner worked in an esoteric bookshop and a few sannyasins would visit. She had copies of sannyasnews. She also decided to get a meditation space happening and we soon had around twenty souls turning up regularly. There also were the times when she got journalists to review Maneesha’s books and other publications which gave a different slant from media sensationalism. As for media sensationalism, I remember the evening we had kundalini happening at a hired space with pink walls and a journalist turned up unannounced. There were a few of us about to start the meditation and he left. The next day a broadsheet newspaper, not a tabloid, had an article about the rebirth of the ‘orange movement’. Apparently there we hundreds of us, in the newly painted pink building, about to participate in perverse activities. This type of thing wasn’t uncommon.
I think people often forget how dangerous Osho was perceived by the establismnent in those days. Back then we had rabbis, members of various christian denominations monitoring the activities of ‘the Rajneesh people’. There were meetings with other journalists which come to mind. One ex-sannyasin journalist I knew wrote a critical book about the ranch when things were falling apart. When I contacted him a few years later he decided to write a long piece for a broadsheet newspaper which was very balanced and fair. He told me that at the time, his piece was very difficult to write because he wanted to be as honest as possible. I respect his integrity. A few weeks after Osho died, a journalist phoned me from a tabloid newspaper saying he wanted to write an article on the ‘sect’. I spent a morning with the guy and showed him a few short videos. The journalist was moved. There was no sensational article in the tabloid newspaper.
Finally, I find what happened to Dhanyam sad. My partner and I were impressed with his qualities when we met him in Poona Two. He wouldn’t remember us. There have always been schisms within organizations but I want to thank Parmartha and others for ignoring the threat of excommunication and getting ‘sannyasnews’ and ‘Here and Now’ happening back then. I don’t think one can doubt the integrity of their intentions. Their work prompted others to get things moving and not to rely on external authority.
In general, I don’t really see it that governments saw Osho as being dangerous. A nuisance, yes. Somehow sannyasins are more responsible for the dangerous thing…spiritual terrorist and all that jive. Even the dumbest journalist who interviewed Osho would have had a real job actually viewing Osho as being in some way dangerous, because it’s bollocks. Dangerous is Osama Bin Laden, not the gentle vegetarian.
The “dangerous” thing probably needs a bit of historical perspective, as Roman might say.
Back in the day, there was Paki-bashing and hippie-bashing and hippies with a picture of a Paki round their neck were taking the bloody piss, mate.
Oy! Wot you lookin’ at?
The ranch (run by darkies) started only about 15 years after racial de-segregation in schools in the US.
These days, kids (anyone below 40) see old clips of David Bowie on ‘Top of the Pops’ and imagine the 70s was full of gay transvestites poncing around the streets kissing each other and camping it up in their glitter suits.
The reality for most gays who actually got out a bit was a solid dose of queer bashing…
What I mean to say is that people who were “different” were simply attacked and victimised much more openly then (70s/80s) than now.
Whether the attackers thought of gays, Pakis and hippies as “dangerous” is open to debate.
From a psychological point of view, the “straights” were “threatened” by all the “weirdos”, but I`m not sure that’s exactly the same thing.
But the “dangerous” moniker was the language of right wing journalism…
“This country has gone to the dogs because of blacks, poofs, cults and lefties” type of thing…
(when everyone was supposed to be white, hetero, christian and patriotic).
Skinheads, squaddies, politicians, the Old Bill…
Now, they`re dangerous!(man)
Maybe Osho threatened the status quo in the US, but don’t forget the perspective that no one likes a bunch of people moving onto their patch and calling them “idiots”!
Also, in Crete, Osho put on the whole Socrates-versus-the-State thing, implying a philosophical debate, with him as the martyr.
Yet, the reality was he slagged off the local church and took the piss out of the congregation (“3 old women”) in public and told the sannyasins in discourse to have sex as loudly as possible in their rooms as a reaction to complaints about so many unmarried people moving into rooms over town.
This was excellent stuff on the basis of “kick out the jams, mutherfucker” philosophy, for sure, but translating that as him destroying the 2000 year-old civilisation in a few days was a bit exaggerated, altho` an excellent piece of provocative theatre.
If he`d done the same thing in an English resort…
A Paki guru inciting a bunch of young religious nutters to bang their brains out in all the local b and b’s in Blackpool, say…
You can bet there would have been a bit of aggro there, too.
Funny enough, was just talking to a friend who told me that one time Osho was giving an interview to a Washington Post journalist, who just so happened to be black. Osho told him that black people were 2000 years behind the rest of humanity. Apparently, the bloke threw a fit. Personally, I don’t agree, but I do find the story a lot funnier than Shantam’s short story, which only succeeded in making me scratch my head in puzzlement.
He may be right, the Zulus still do their war dances and carry spears whenever they protest, even about the most insignificant things. Women aren’t allowed to join in either.
And the Rwandan genocide? Hmm, sounds like the good ole days of the Roman Empire to me…That covers about 2,000 years, no?
The history of Rwanda and its colonization is an interesting one.
Osho also said that living in an apartheid state like South Africa made it impossible for Blacks to live a meditative life. They need to rise up and overthrow their oppressors. I’m not sure whether Osho read Franz Fanon. What would Osho have said about Israel today if someone had asked the question? An Apartheid State. Hard to be spiritual under occupation.
Easy for old men in India to play the role and pander to Western yuppies who find their ‘true source’. The beatific smiles of naive nincoompops around corrupt old farts. Just brand names, part of global capitalism.
Osho also pointed out that indigeneous cultures had a spirituality which had respect for the planet and didn’t turn it into a wasteland littered with garbage. Meanwhile the ‘true’ meditators drink their Evian and go off in their four-wheel drives to meditation retreats or trendy resorts.
A Paki guru inciting a bunch of young religious nutters to bang their brains out in all the local b and b’s in Blackpool, say…
You can bet there would have been a bit of aggro there, too.
Mmm,love it! Sure would have sold a few more copies of The Sun and the like…My Gawd, the Daily Mail would have self-combustulated!
Bin Laden was an American ‘creation’, if you look at his past. No need for a Politics 101 lecture, anyone can go online and do a bit of research. I’m not a great fan of Christopher Hitchens, who felt he had the only interpretation of Orwell and lied about his visit to Poona, but he’s right in saying Laden was nowhere near the threat of right-wing Christian nutters in the States. To Hitchens’s credit he held debates with these characters who claimed we needed God to defeat the bin Ladens.
Another great, supposed, threat to the US was Saddam Hussein. Any fool knows he was once supported by the Yanks for despicable reasons. Wolwitz always knew there were no weapons of mass destruction but being a Straussian, the brilliant scholar of Plato’s texts, he had no qualms in lying for the benefit of the ignorant masses. I knew Jews who literally thought Hussein was going to nuke Israel, the world’s fifth most powerful nuclear nation. In other words, the war in Iraq was a war against the American people who would remain obedient and compliant.
Plato’s noble lies work well and the White House has an inordinate number of Straussians working behind the scenes. Many were trained from Chicago University by characters like Alan Bloom, who was highly promiscuous, slept with male students and died of AIDS. Bloom condemned the left counter-culture for its promiscuity and literally had black shirt disciples running around Chicago uni. intimidating young radicals. A ruling class has a ruling culture. Noble lies are essential for the masses.
The United States has made great use of Hussein and Bin Laden. We know their deaths have eliminated Evil and Americans can feel safe. Meanwhile, the tragedy in Afghanistan continues.
Osho had ideas and ridiculed cultural hegemony and he attracted a lot of intelligent people. Bin Laden and Hussein were illiterate. It has also been documented that deals were done with countries denying Osho entry. It isn’t as straightforward as some people make out. A four hour documentary, narrated by Charleton Heston of all people, highlights how corrupt America was during the Cold War, the C.I.A having its own private army. Nothing has changed. A little bit of incense, some New Age music and bourgeois love will solve it all.
Bunch of horse shit, Roman. You must get your news from the Martian Daily Chronicle…
“Bin Laden was an American creation”…Good laugh for today.
Baba,
Nice to get some feedback. This could go on for a few weeks as we pull out our reference books and press articles. Here’s a start:
In 2004 BBC article entitled ‘Al-Qaeda’s Origins and Links’ we have the following:
‘During the anti-Soviet jihad, Bin Laden and his fighters received American and Saudi funding. Analysts believe Bin Laden himself had security training from the CIA.
In a 2006 in-depth piece on Osama Bin Laden, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation published that ‘Bin Laden apparently received training from the CIA, which was backing the Afghan holy warriors – the Mujahideen – who were tying down Soviet forces in Afghanistan.’
Robin Cook, Foreign Secretary in the UK 1997-2000, believed the CIA had provided ‘arms to the Arab Mujahideen, including Osama Bin Laden:
‘Bin Laden was, though, a product of a monumental miscalculation by Western Security Agencies. Throughout the 80s he was armed by the CIA and funded by the Saudis to wage jihad against the Russian occupation of Afganistan.’
Take care we may not have much time to spare.
And if you believe that, you’ll have to believe the latest news…that Sheela was an enlightened being during those Ranch years…Came from a reliable, anti-American, British source. Propaganda-free, of course.
Baba,
I believe you pointed out the impersonality of nature? And we are left in a world where perspectives will be contested? Obviously you are not a relativist and you feel some perspectives are better than others. Some might say superior and based on power (Nietzsche). There will always be different viewpoints, rhetoric, propaganda, spin, sophistry and butt kissing for prestige. Some will say there is more than that? What do you think?
I noticed that I did not include US writers on bin Laden. Chomsky has written extensively on the topic, as have other left of centre writers in the States. I don’t have to guess, you don’t like Chomsky. Interesting world sannyas. The ideological backgrounds that shape us. Such a diverse group and we were thought to be a united cult. Imagine you and I being in Buddha Hall next to each other. A community that has nothing in common except?
A Short Story -
Just the other day, a jailer was showing to his children his work premises: the central Jail.
He mentioned something like, “I just don´t work here. I have deep emotional bond with this prison. It is in this prison, my father, your grandfather, has spent 15 years of his life”.
Child enquired, “Was Opa a criminal?”
Jailer replied, “No. He was the most dangerous man since Jesus Christ!”
I’m glad it was a short story.
Let us face the fact, most of the people were allured into sannyas during Pune One of Hippie phase because Osho was promising Enlightenment at discount price, almost like Lidl!
Fuck, drink or smoke, just brush your teeth, meditate an hour, wear orange, change the name…and Awakening will be oLala!
Those who could not get their daily need awakening during Osho´s lifetime found Punja ji quite an experience. Even Osho´s discount price articles were looking expensive. No need to go anywhere, everything you need is already there…Just look inside…and you find hairs in your Nose!
Mama Mia!!
PS: Sorry, Generation first senior citizens. I don´t want to undermine your great search….
Shantam, your view of such matters is cynical. Scots tend to be cynical also, but unlike you they have a lot more wit.
PS: Is this your brother?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/11/08/canada-military-video_n_2093167.html?ncid=edlinkusaolp00000003
You are right, Shantam.
We really have to face the facts.
Here’s one of my favourite Black Robe therapists doing the Poona One mantra…
The video cannot be shown at the moment. Please try again later.
Here`s an old documentary clip from Poona One that you might find educational, if you weren`t there…
Yep, it brings it all back, the great search and all….
The video cannot be shown at the moment. Please try again later.
Fortunate we are, to have in our very midst such a devoted and accurate chronicler of those times…
Sincere thanks, Friar Frank…
Watch, Absorb and Inwardly Digest, Friar Shantam….
Lokesh, my views are cynical. Can you show me óne post where views are devotional yet rationally sane?
About Scots I have really no idea. Never had a Scottish girlfriend. Basically, I did not come across a single sannyasin who was from Scotland. During 1990s was the Scottish economy worse than Greece?
I’m not a racist but you know the Greeks.
I’m not a racist but you know the Jews.
I’m not a racist but you know the Arabs.
There’s always a BUT!
Scotland is doing quite well during these tough economic times. Oil-rich. I go there once a year for a week. Great people and beautiful country, but more than a week and I bein to feel claustrophobic. Natonalism will not be the last refuge that this particular scoundrel turns to.
When I was pulled towards Osho, during that time, it was mentioned quite often, “Master like Osho is born after 2500 years”.
Was this because of the fact that Osho´s oratory skills were superb?
How many words master has left behind is the criteria for His greatness?
Shantam,
Some sannyasins have said on this site that Osho was an energy phenomenon. There have also been non-sannyasins highly critical of Osho, who have claimed this. Father Bede Griffiths, a Benedictine monk and scholar of Hinduism and Buddhism had an ashram in Southern India where he held his meditation retreats. I know people who claim he was a wise person. Griffiths was highly critical of Osho from the outset, stating that what was happening around Osho had nothing to do with spirituality. There was tremendous psychic energy but there was no discrimination between good or evil. Morality didn’t figure. That’s one way of looking at it.
So we have the energy phenomenon approach, but we also have all the discourses. Many are very brilliant and you can take your pick. I found the ones in Oregon repetitive and I wasn’t interested in simplistic interpretations of Christianity. Others disagree with me.
I also think things changed in Poona Two and Osho spoke brilliantly. So there are Osho’s words and he’s left some sort of legacy. The different schisms within the ‘church’ can fight over that. I thinks his books are important. I have lent Osho books on Buddhism to a Theravadan monk who told me they hold up with the best interpretations. Osho books will stand the test of time and perhaps he was more than what Griffiths and others claim?
Well, the approaches of Father Griffiths and Osho so radically differed that it’s not surprising one criticised the other. Just a matter of what suits some people doesn’t suit others, surely? Clearly, Osho’s ‘client group’ isn’t Father Griffiths’!
Doesn’t every teacher aim at that segment of humanity that can benefit from their teachings – and, in Osho’s (and others’) case, their energy?
Strikes me that Father Griffiths didn’t really ‘get’ that, but I’d bet my boots Osho certainly did. Griffiths also couldn’t have grasped the huge need for psycho-somatic healing and a general loosening-up of the psyche, that were absolutely required ‘back in the day’ and which Osho heavily promoted (as it were).
Why can’t such people as Griffiths actually perceive these things, if they’re such great teachers? It seems they must be blinded by their own beliefs and values. A ‘mere scholar’, however “wise”, is breathing different air to a man (or woman) of Being…
Still, I guess more than enough ‘dodgy nonsense’ – abuse even – went on, to satisfy the critical zeal of anyone inclined to decry the whole Osho set-up.
Satyadeva,
I’m finding myself agreeing with you of late. What is going on?
But just a minute, here’s a way out. You can’t force me to accept Barry Long, no matter what. I will not be converted. You can’t make me believe. Not even room 101 will change my mind. I don’t care if he is God. I don’t like him.
Interesting, perhaps, Roman. You know what they say about such strong antipathy – that it might mask a hidden attraction? Or even something you’re afraid of…or resisting (like ‘grim death’!)…
Looking forward to your utter denial of anything of the sort….
SD,
Are you being ironic, because I was.
I actually have a long-term relationship with Death – whom I call DR.D – He/She/It, hard to tell, due to the hooded cloak that is always worn, drops around every Friday night for drinks. I get Him/Her/It to tie up the sycthe out the front along with the bicyles, because it scares the cats. We sit around, sometimes He/She/It has a cat on the lap, we might talk about football, ballet or even what is going on with sannyasnews.
PS: He/She/It sends love.
But you yourself have misunderstood my little piece of word-play, Roman. I wrote “(like ‘grim death’)” to describe your possible ‘resistance’!
And no, I wasn’t being ironic, just suggesting a possibility in a fairly light-hearted way.
SD,
You maybe right. We have to laugh. There’s irony in not getting irony.
Father Bede Griffiths was another interesting neurobiology case.
His big satori came when he had a stroke.
He said the stroke whacked him out of his mind, and he was blasted with love by it and then he understood Jesus on the cross etc…
That’s all I know about him, apart from the fact he was terribly, terribly posh.
When all’s said and done, I think I’d feel lost without a bit of “dodgy nonsense”. It’s what humans do best, isn’t it?
Give me Father Ted and Father Jack any day.
Frank,
Hard to disagree with you.
Here’s one for the Father:
‘The greatest pleasures are born of conquered repugnancies’.
Marquis de Sade.
Utube has Bede talking about the blissful stoke. Seems a nice, gentle soul. More importantly, mentioning posh, the Catholic Church made a big mistake in getting rid of the Latin Mass. No one understood a word but the masses thought the incense and words were magically sacred.
I thought Osho erred by not giving discourses in Hindi when he was in Oregon. I know this sounds like postmodernism, which Alok John hates, but the tactic would have worked. He would have converted the whole nation. Something for everyone from the KKK to Wicca.
Roman, it is a myth that no one understood a word of the Latin Mass. Any adult who attended church regularly would have understood it. Every Sunday there were readings from the Old and New Testaments in the local language. Every Sunday there was a homily in the local language. Several times a year the meaning of the Mass would have been covered, one way or another. A really good book that gives insight into what Catholic England was really like is ‘The Stripping of the Altars”, by Eamonn Duffy
Alok John,
Thank you. The book sounds interesting. By the way, did most medieval peasants of Europe ( a lot of people) speak Latin? How high were literacy rates?
And didn’t Descartes write his ‘Meditations’ in Latin for philosophical specialists? He wrote works in French but I believe there were many different dialects in France? They tried to clear all that up during the French Revoultion, when France emerges as a Nation. People become citiens of a nation, not subjects of a king. We have a uniform metric system introduced. Weights and measures are made the same throughout the country and French becomes the official language.
I am sure few peasants knew Latin in medieval Europe and literacy rates were low. An important part of a priest’s work was to teach (we would say brainwash) the religion to children, and you cannot do that unless you know the local language. Children would have learnt about the Mass in order to be confirmed. Of course, they could not follow every word of Latin but they knew roughly what it was about. As to all the dialects in France, presumably the Church just did what it could. I am sure most people in medieval Europe knew that “corpus Christi” meant “the body of Christ.” Probably everyone knew a few Latin phrases.
PS: The book was the Sheldon Press edition.
And have you read
“The Stripping of the Altar Boys”,
by Father Pete O’File?
That gives a pretty good idea of what Catholicism is like,too!
Frank – we all were given copies by our local priest Father Horny O’Malley…or was it Horatio Hornblower? I forget which….
Alok…then they got what they deserved; if they didn’t understand that Catholic blab then one can say those followers were just frightened children who knew no better…But you say they did, so it makes them more of accomplices than innocents…so fuck ‘em.
With a name like Father Griffiths I am hardly surprised that he was not exactly an ardent Osho supporter. Maybe a Celtic fan.
Lokesh,
As I pointed out to Baba, he was a British-born Indian Benedictine monk who became Swami Dayananda, a noted yogi.
He spent his life in Southern India where his ashrams existed, so he wasn’t a Celtic fan.
He had a thing for dark-skinned girls…explains his ashram…Now who the fuck in Catholic-land sets up an ashram?
Life IS no discrimination between good and evil…good and evil is the creation of humans…Nature has no distinction…Sso then what is there to say about this whole game that’s going on..? Do we take our opinion over Nature’s way or do we look to Nature for guidance? That’s what i liked about the old man…used any means necessary to get the point across.
This Benedictine monk sounds like a hypocrite…just being a Catholic monk says volumes to his hypocrisy…just following Catholic doctrine is enough to disqualify anyone from making judgements about anything, not just about anyone. They wouldn’t know Nature if she sat on their faces.
Baba,
Griffiths was a British-born Indian Benedictine monk who became Swami Dayananada, a noted yogi. I’m neither here nor there about him.
Your views on Nature and morality have been contested for thousands of years and not by second-raters. In Plato’s ‘Gorgias Callicles’ says what you say and Socrates disagrees, pointing out there is moral order in the universe. In Plato’s ‘Republic’ we have the same game. Thrasymachus echoes your sentiments and then points out that justice is whatever serves those in power. Socrates again talks about a cosmological order.
There’e a whole history of this: Machiavelli, de Sade, Nietzsche etc. There are also those who take the Platonic route. Osho has played with both these angles in his texts. For every statement you make about Osho I can find an alternative. We have discourses on Pythagoras and at the other spectrum, Nietzsche. We have Zen and Vedanta. it just goes on.
Babasvetlana says:
” Life IS no discrimination between good and evil…good and evil is the creation of humans…Nature has no distinction….”
Absolutely correct. Concepts like “Justice” and “Compassion” only exist in the human realm. Accept it or not, part of Osho’s work was to place “the human” back in the centre of the universe. Only humans can be humane.
Vartan
Vartan,
Some humans are capable of compassion. What about other animals? Can they show empathy towards each other? One could accuse you of SPECIESISM. The revised edition of Singer’s ‘Animal Liberation’ isn’t a bad read. Ramana claimed certain animals around him were enlightened: the visiting elephant, the peacock and a cow. They were very developed souls, according to Ramana.
Absolute statements can often be contested.
The great Sufi mystics and poets have written about other realms and referred to angels and the transcendent. It is too easy to use Osho’s name to make a dogmatic statement. We’ve all been through that one. The usual bullshit that ‘Osho said this’. Sounds like a Christan know-nothing.
There are lots of early Osho esoteric discourses where he talks about experiences which seem ridiculous to science and inexplicable from just the human realm. In ‘Mojud – The Man with the Inexplicable Life’, Osho takes an old Sufi candle flame and shows us realms which secular humanists – you are sounding like one – are not capable of imagining. Here we meet the strange, enigmatic figure called Khidr. To Sufis, Khidr, who goes back to Moses, visits those who are ready. Ibn ‘Arabi, one of the great mystics of all time, explores this Theophanic world of spirits and angels. Osho knew his work inside out. I’ve rubbished trendy gnosticism but Alok John is right when he pointed out that Osho’s work involves a mystery school which is more than New Age mumbo jumbo.
Speaking about the human, your reference to Vivek’s mental illness and drug addiction show a very limited understanding of her relationship with Osho. You even claim she should not have been a sannyasin in a post and reference her with Kurt Cobain. You completely overlook the mysteriousness of her intimacy with the Master. I found your comments to be very narrow-minded.
Finally, I remember when Osho was barely alive and I has dinner with a very old Indian sannyasin who was a dream therapist. He knew his Freud, Jung and a bit more. There was a mysterious quality about him and I was humbled to eat at his large estate and learn. My partner, who writes down her dreams, told him a dream she had about Osho’s impending death. He’d been collecting this type of material. I won’t go on because it becomes a bit overwhelming and a presence enters the room. I think some get the drift. There are more things in heaven and earth than your philosophy, the human and the stupid little word games we all play.
‘Love’s returning to you’.
Roman says:
“There are more things in heaven and earth than your philosophy, the human and the stupid little word games we all play….”
Thanks for your post. If these other realms exist, they are not available to me, so I cannot say. I don’t feel I am misjudging Vivek. I understand that she loved Him, but obviously it wasn’t enough. I was recently telling a friend ‘the Vivek story’ and I said that she left her body a month early to get the new place ready for Him. We can spin it any way we want. They might be only words but it is all we have.
My best friend’s best friend’s sister 43, killed herself a month ago. People exit because of lack of relationship and not because of subtlety of relationship.
Vartan
Vartan,
More die of heartbreak.
Thanks for your sincere reply.
I saw an old copy of “No Water No Moon” in the now defunct Catholic Central Library, Euston, London.
Alok, that is fantastic news. Fabulous even. Keep us updated on any more of fascinating discoveries.
‘Well, one can see truth in a grain of sand’.
It refers to what Roman wrote at 9:32.
I have a couple of copies in my studio – one of the old boy’s best.
I read that book whilst I had some shit job in the theatre. Whilst everyone was watching the play I was out the back reading and laughing hysterically at certain points. It was a big help. This brings back a lot of memories.
Alok John,
I checked the book out and it looks fascinating. What about Vartan’s post about the big battle between the Amazons and the ‘boys’, ten thousand years ago, which the males won? Is that correct? I know about all the goddess figurines, but the big clash? Isn’t that contested by historians? Gunter Grass sent it all up in a novel.
“What about Vartan’s post about the big battle between the Amazons and the ‘boys’ ten thousand years ago,which the males won. Is that correct?”
I do not know.
Alok John,
Well, the ‘experts’ can fight over that. Osho’s discourses on the family are interesting, particularly in ‘The Tantric Vision’.
Thanks.
Roman says:
“I checked the book out and it looks fascinating. What about Vartan’s post about the big battle between the Amazons and the ‘boys’ ten thousand years ago, which the males won. Is that correct?”
I never said there was a battle, what I said was that there was a war against women that lasted 3000 years. Priorities change over a long period of time, in small increments. When studying history over vast periods what has to be understood is that more often than not humans can live for thousands of years with nothing ever happening. There are tribes in S. America that are still living in the Stone Age. If our civilisation disappeared, will those tribes ever get to the moon? Probably not.
Many see the current global unrest as some of kind of rebellion or revolution, where I see a new Renaissance and when one studies the last Renaissance, we can see that that was when all the societal pyramidal structures were put into place. The current globalisation effort is part of a new Renaissance, which will impose those pyramidal societal structures over the whole planet. Whether one agrees or not is irrelevant to me. What is primary is that with this new Renaissance one of the major subjects that will be addressed (and which was not addressed in the last Renaissance) is the subject of women’s rights and their position in the world.
Vartan
Vartan,
Thanks for your clarification. As for going to the Moon, that was a waste of time. Exploring Consciousness isn’t. I’m not just referring to human consciousness here. Your renaissance/pyramids idea will have to contend with the Battle of the Three Monotheisms and their apocalyptic visions. Good luck with this shadow.
Where in the Bible is that? Can’t find “Roman 9:32″, please help.
Babasvetlana says:
“Where in the Bible is that? Can’t find “Roman 9:32″, please help”.
He is referring to what Roman said above. 9:32 is the time he said it.
This forum’s software is like using a bullock-cart to get to the moon. Hehe.
Vartan
This proves my point that most sannyasins can’t take a joke, or get one, Vartan.
“Most sannyasins can’t take a joke, or get one”?
My God, sir, you’ve just committed sacrilege!
But, er, hang on a mo…Is Vartan the collective name for approximately, er, let’s say, 250,000 sannyasins?!
Just shows, you can never go by appearances….
Alokjohn,
Was it one of the old Sheldon Press editions?
It is a beautiful book. If one could trace the readers we would have some interesting narratives which could be published and titled, ‘Reading No Water, No Moon.’
I very rarely read anything by Osho. Attending well over a thousand live discourses probably was enough for me on a verbal level. I’ve met a few wise guys but nobody who could be compared to Osho on an energetic level. For me, there was no question of morality surrounding Osho’s energy. It was up to the individual how they used that power. A bit like psychic electricity. If you stand in a puddle and take a hold of a live wire chances are you’ll be electrocuted. There are always a few dummies around, but you can’t blame the power company if people misuse what is supplied.
Lokesh,
Nice to hear you say there is ‘no question of morality surrounding Osho’s energy.’ You then say ‘it was up to the individual how they used that power’. So you’ve used the words morality and power. Are they the same thing? Could you please explain this to me a little better as I’m always willing to learn.
Sometimes I’ve thought you are a bit like the good benedictine monk, Griffiths, who became Swami Dayananda but I was wrong. It is probably my bad reading but I thought you sounded very moral, like Griffiths, when you criticized Osho in the past. Not that he shouldn’t be subjected to scrutiny.
Reminds me of the central scrutinizer. I wonder if anyone on SN knows who invented the Central Scrutinizer. I’ll give you a clue…It wasn’t Mary Whitehouse.
I reckon if you do put the life of Osho under scrutiny you would have to be absolutely gormless not to come away criticising some of his actions. Of course, that may involve catholic sannyasins in the non-judgement doublespeak quandary. ‘It’s bad to judge’ being highly ironic, seeing as how it is a major judgement in itself.
I usually don’t judge anyone unless it is needed to assess them for one reason or another. I had to assess my relationship with Osho at a certain point in my life and to be quite frank I have to say he was sometimes not what he appeared to be. As I see it, Osho misled people in relation to what he said and what he actually did. I find taking any of it seriously almost impossible. It’s so long ago. Life goes on. Like the rest of us, Osho did his dance and just like him we will one day disappear from this world. The least we can do is enjoy the show, all the time bearing in mind it is all just a play of lights, shadows and mirrors.
Can’t blame the power company..?
I wouldn’t be too sure about that, these days…
Have you had an accident that was not your fault?
If so, you could be entitled to compensation.
Have you suffered from…
shaktipat-induced brain damage?
Therapy-related broken bones?
Tantra-related stds?
Fallen into a badly signposted cosmic void?
Run over by an uninsured guru without a licence?
Suffered loss of earnings?
Loss of ego?
Then call the claims hotline now….
‘Fallen into a badly signposted cosmic void? Yes, many times. Fortunately always managed to claw my way up and out.
Lokesh,
An old sannyasin who donated his jeep to the ashram and then stole it became a close friend of mine. He also heard many discourses and your words echo his. Osho became part of him and he didn’t need anything else except a few beers.
Roman says:
“Griffiths was highly critical of Osho from the outset, stating that what was happening around Osho had nothing to do with spirituality. There was tremendous psychic energy but there was no discrimination between good or evil. Morality didn’t figure. That’s one way of looking at it.”
Morality is for the poor in the pocket or the poor in the mind. Compassion is where it’s at. Spirituality is what one may wish (or not) to bring to the act. Whenever I took my spirituality with me, I met many spiritual people around Osho.
Vartan
Vartan,
I can’t get back to you right now. I’m having an enema. People who run this place insist on things at certain times. You might wonder how I can be on my laptop responding to you whilst having an enema. Well, it takes talent.
You in hospital, Roman?
Alok John,
I did have a hard time for a few months. A couple of ops. Short stays in hospital. Older cars need maintenance. No probs. Thank you for the concern.
“Master like Osho is born after 2500 years”. That might be true, but if you think about it it actually means just that.
It will again sound cynical, but let it be. Alok has seen an old copy of “No Water, No Moon” in the now defunct Catholic Central Library, Euston, London.
Lokesh is encourging the chap, “Alok, that is fantastic news. Fabulous even. Keep us updated on any more of fascinating discoveries”.
I can weep over this. How a live and kicking movement has disappered as Indus Valley civilisation just in 22 years time. Now to find some footprints of those years give a satisfaction to the archaeologists!
(The Indus Valley is one of the world’s earliest urban civilizations, along with its contemporaries, Mesopotamia and Ancient Egypt. At its peak, the Indus Civilization may have had a population of well over five million. Inhabitants of the ancient Indus river valley developed new techniques in handicraft (carnelian products, seal carving) and metallurgy (copper, bronze, lead and tin). The civilization is noted for its cities built of brick, roadside drainage system, and multi-storied houses).
Shantam, have you no shame? How can you knock Alok’s fascinating discovery, while on an archaeological dig in the Catholic Central Library, Euston, London? This is a genuine effort to spread Osho’s vision by unearthing ancient texts printed back in the analogical period of the late Twentieth Century. Alok’s work deserves recognition.
Lokesh, okay you are having fun. I do not mind.
But it is like this:
The Catholic Church was vehemently against Osho. Yet some Catholic liked No Water No Moon so much that he thought there should be a copy in a Catholic library.
Are you a Sherlock Holmes fan by any chance, Alok? I ask because you’ve obviously been employing Sherlock’s deduction technique to move deeper into the ‘No Water, No Moon’ mystery. Reading your comments creates an atmosphere of entering the world of Catholicism’s sacred secrets. It’s so exciting I simply can’t wait for the next episode, hoping all the time it might be something bearing the headline, ‘From Sex to Superconsciousness discovered under the counter of the Oxfam shop in Kentish Town’.
Well, actually, I was strolling up Kentish Town Road just the other day and…No, I just can’t go on, it’s too…you know…
Guess I’ll have to do dynamic in the morning….
Alokjohn,
A good point. Liberation theologians in South America were tortured and murdered by regimes controlled by tinpot dictators installed by the United States Government. Liberation theology inspired the peasants through action. A different type of Jesus here. The type Osho spoke about in the ‘Come Follow Me’ discourses.
We don’t know who put the book in the library. A radical liberation theologist was Michel de Certeau, who inspired atheists and people of all faiths. A courageous man who wrote, ‘The Practice of Everyday Life’.
“I will live through my books.”
Is this quotation from Osho?
No Shantam, that is, in fact, a quotation from ‘Revelations of a Bookworm’.
“Buy me another Rolls, Sheela”. Isn’t that another quotation?
There are some these days who refer to a new renaissance and pyramid structures falling into line. It seems more like we are Awaiting the Apocalypse.
The following poem was dedicated to Osho by a Sufi poet and translator of Persian mystical texts. Apparently, Osho’s discourses on Hakim Sanai are unsurpassed. I don’t know. I listened and was touched.
The Time Needed
Years are needed before the Sun
working on a Yemeni rock
can make a bloodstone ruby.
Months must pass before cotton seed
can provide a seamless shroud.
Days go by before a handful of wool
becomes a halter rope.
Decades it takes a child
to change into a poet.
And civilizations fall and are ploughed under
to grow a garden on the ruins,
a true mystic.
Hakim Sanai
Roman, every moment, someone, somewhere, is waiting for some oncoming apocalypse, ever since humans stood upright. Now we have a “New World Order” and instantaneous communication, so it’s really a perceptual thing, along with a huge population as compared to several hundred years ago. I don’t see anything to get excited about.
Baba,
I’m not excited. I’ve forgotten what excited feels like. Can you tell me? Can you help me?
Baba,
I actually do get excited. That’s when the young Irish nurse comes to change my nappies, then I get really excited. Then damn and then damn, I’ve forgotten what I was excited about. By the way, who are you? Are you excited, people tell me it is good, but I can’t remember.
Babasvetlana says:
“This proves my point that most sannyasins can’t take a joke, or get one, Vartan.”
You’ve got my attention now though!
Vartan
I would just like to say how much I’ve enjoyed reading this entire post… I’m a child of the Ranch who spent the majority of his life ignoring the past and trying to be as normal a person as I thought normal was. It’s only with in the last few years that I’ve finally woken up to the reality of the world… and since then I’ve been on a quest to fill my brain with as much knowledge about economics, agriculture/food industry, health, politricks and history as possible. Oddly enough it’s lead me on a path back to my own child hood, filling me questions about my parents and the Ranch which until now I’ve never bothered to ask.
I’m not trying to interrupt the topic at hand… I’m just simply saying hello, and that I’ve enjoyed what I’ve read. You all are a witty bunch!
Thank you, and carry on~
Sambodhi,
Nice to get feedback. It would be interesting to hear about your experiences at the ranch as a kid. I was in my thirties back then.
Don’t be put off when the crazy stuff happens on this site.
You got Sambodhi and I got Sambodh.
We like to use our minds before we eventually drop them – maybe …
Namaste