Differing Responses to the ‘Shadow Side’ of a Spiritual Teacher, by Frank

Frank reflects on a recurring pattern of responses to scandals involving the founders of spiritual movements, the ‘gurus’.

A recent post on SN pointed out that the recently surfacing scandals around the Osho movement, taking in Osho himself, are in fact part of a larger story of widespread revelations in recent times about the shadow sides of many “new religious movements”/”cults” .

The subsequent reactions of the contributors on SN has followed clear patterns that are also to be found in the reactions of the participants of all the other groups/religons/cults mentioned.

Fundamentally, there is a polarisation:
On one side, partcipants take on board the reports and attempt to re-assess their lives and position vis-a-vis the implications of the new information.
At the other end of the spectrum we find the hard core who flatly deny everything, cry conspiracy/persecution and proclaim their devotion to the leader all the more.

Take, for example, the case of Sai Baba where there are high ranking disciples who have publicly proclaimed that even if Sai Baba was a paedophile (and the evidence is really overwhelming) it would not change their faith as he was God incarnate and that would justify everything.

Followers of Trungpa and other more subtle philosophies claim that the master`s motives remain unknowable to our inadequate minds, therefore the fact that he was beating, intimidating, coercing and sexually molesting his disciples whilst out of his head on huge amounts of cocaine and booze is in fact an occurrence that is beyond our capacity or place to judge.

Clearly, the reactions of some Osho sannyasins are very similar.

What is fascinating is that these situations seem to turn ostensibly free-thinking, liberal individuals into extreme supporters of/apologists for paedophilia, sexual abuse, coercion, widespread deception and authoritarianism etc. Surely not places, one would suppose, that they had set out on their spiritual search to reach?

This entry was posted in News. Bookmark the permalink.

104 Responses to Differing Responses to the ‘Shadow Side’ of a Spiritual Teacher, by Frank

  1. Lokesh says:

    In regards to “the hardcore who flatly deny everything, cry conspiracy/persecution and proclaim their devotion to the leader all the more.”
    There are multiple reasons for this. Getting involved with a guru can be and often is a huge emotional and psychological investment. Years pass and it turns out the guru is not all he/she is cracked up to be. The dividends are negligible. It can be difficult to reset after such a big investment…attachment can become very pronounced.

    For some, particularly the lazy and naive and the pig-headed, it is easier to bury their head in the sand and pretend they are headed for enlightenment/salvation at the end of the tunnel etc. Those who tell them it is time to wake up to the deteriorating situation are then viewed as the enemy etc. It is not rocket science.

    I have experienced this first-hand in my own life. Someone I was once very close to and first went to Poona One at the same time as me is a Catholic sannyasin. Everything in his life is still centred around Osho. His imagined relationship with Osho has not served them well. His life has remained full of hardship and yet he is devoted to Osho, no question about it.

    I ran into him a few years back and treated him to a five-star lunch, something he was not accustomed to. I tried telling him that it was time to wake up to what he was involved in, a spiritual fantasy. Maybe I should have kept my big mouth shut. He accused me of trying to tear his life apart. Nothing could have been further from the truth. I wanted to help him. I wished him to realize that the path we once embarked on together had turned into something stunted…a dead end…an existential cul-de-sac. He would not hear anything that contradicted anything that said Osho was not the master of masters. It was actually quite shocking for me to witness this. His self-induced brainwashing was complete. He was stuck in a psychological paradigm that had been created back in the seventies. I mean stuck like a wilted flower encased in reinforced concrete.

    I haven’t seen that person in years. It is slightly sad for me. We went through so much together, good times and bad times. Today he lives in denial of the fact. He has been reborn in Osholandia, where it is all about doing Osho’s work, singing Osho songs while living on the poverty line, where daily life is an endless struggle and most of his energy goes into keeping up with paying bills and how to go about getting the medical attention he desperately needs for a litany of physical complaints and calamities.

    I am certain the person in question will die with the idea of somehow hooking up with Osho again. The dewdrop merging with the ocean and so forth. I’ve had to accept his position and can only wish him the best of luck. To me, his life appears like an exercise in wasted potential, that comes down to singing nursery rhymes like ‘Yes, Bhagawan, yes.’ A part of me asks ‘Who am I to judge?’ Another, bigger part says, “What a fucking mess!”

    • swamishanti says:

      Lokesh states: “Years pass and it turns out the guru is not all he/she is cracked up to be. The dividends are negligible. It can be difficult to reset after such a big investment…attachment can become very pronounced.”

      That could be difficult and this must be his own situation, having not got enough out of his relationship with Osho, not actually ever having a real connection with Osho, having becoming disenchanted, yet rather than leaving what he views as the “cult”, he prefers to hold on to it and preaches to others how great it is to see through it all – and stand on his own two feet.

      However, he is unable to stand on his own two feet and needs to hold onto Osho’s coat-tails and walk behind him, like Frank, imagining that he is superior to the ‘Catholic sannyasins’ – a term used to describe anyone still into Osho, who is unwelcome on the site, which is “unwelcome to all sannyasins”.

      Thus the lack of interest for present-day sannyasins, and deterioration of this site since Parmartha died.

      MOD:
      Well, you seem interested enough, Shanti, having not only continued commenting here for years but also demanding that you be given special licence to post without prior moderation.

      • Lokesh says:

        Swami Shanti cuts through to the heart of the matter with razor-sharp clarity, no doubt a result of living in Osho’s grace. Only thing I did not get is hanging onto the coat-tails of a man whom I never saw wearing a coat. Perhaps just a metaphor that an enlightened wretch like me fails to understand. We can’t all live on the peak of the holy mountain, where a beacon of consciousness like Shanti surely abides. His blessings….

      • satyadeva says:

        My feeling, Shanti, is that you are addicted to coming here to express how dreadful the site is as it helps to reinforce your own ‘faith’, which at deeper levels might not have as strong a foundation in the reality of where you’re actually at as you’d like to believe. In which case, you’re not really that much different from any ‘believer’ in mainstream religions. I look forward to your outraged response.

        • swamishanti says:

          I’m not much of a believer in faith, although I know that faith can lead to authentic experiences, although this happens to a tiny minority of mainstream believers of religions and gets mixed in with lots of mythology. And I have noted and seen some of the damage done by some mainstream religions. And mainstream anti-cult groups, which sometime work together with mainstream Christian belief systems.

          • satyadeva says:

            Look deeper, Shanti. Isn’t it insecurity that impels you to come here to this little site, in order to admonish the ‘traitors’, ‘the enemy’, a tactic so often used by politicians and ideologues of all persuasions in order to shore up their own ‘faith’, make themselves feel better?

          • Klaus says:

            Authentic experiences increase faith.
            With more faith diligence in practice (for instance in Vipassana practice or other) increases, leading to more authentic experiences…
            That’s right, too. If I am not erring.

    • Nityaprem says:

      I think for a lot of older sannyasins the groupthink of Osho’s movement is difficult to break through, because it is tied to your own happiness by Osho’s directive for his sannyasins to be joyful and celebrate life. You want to feel happy, so you stay a sannyasin.

      In the end you need to realise it is not Osho who tells you to celebrate and be happy, but this is what comes from deep inside. The reason why we are continually searching for happiness is because it is a root of what makes us human. You can reclaim your happiness, your celebration, it is not linked to sannyas.

      • Lokesh says:

        Np says, “I think for a lot of older sannyasins the groupthink of Osho’s movement is difficult to break through.£

        I think it all depends on who you know. Of the hundreds of sannyasins I know I would say only 5% fit into such a bracket. Most old-school sannyasins just get on with their lives and leave the past behind. Once in a while, when speaking about the good auld days, it usually finishes with “It was so long ago.” There is no denying that.

        • Nityaprem says:

          Perhaps that is so. For me ‘The Children of the Cult’ was what finally made me drop Osho — he did a lot of weird stuff but this I could not abide. And once the relationship of trust goes, you start noticing all the other oddities around the movement.

          It was a long time ago, that’s true.

          • frank says:

            NP, it seems that there`s no choice but to use your own intelligence.

            I mean, if it suddenly came out that ET had been spending all his money on hardcore porn vids and buggering rentboys senseless in his appartment for the last couple of decades, would you have to decide that living in the present is a bad idea?

            • Lokesh says:

              Ultimately, the whole Osho story was indeed a device for our awakening, although I doubt that he intended it as such.
              Many of us have to wake up to the fact that we need a Big Brother in our lives, who will show us the way, bring salvation and deliver us unto the light. Just like that.
              Unfortunately, as far as I understand it, no such figure exists. We have to do the journey ourselves with no saviour to help us, other than to perhaps point the way. Friends can help.

              Prince summed it up pretty well…
              “Cause in this life
              Things are much harder than in the afterworld
              In this life
              You’re on your own.”

              He wasn’t joking.

            • Nityaprem says:

              The point is, Osho’s books were edited and manipulated to make his message more attractive, and were in the first place spoken by someone who was a debater and seemed to have been into manipulating his followers. Can you still trust that message as an authentic spiritual vision? I think not.

              I’m not really interested in having some kind of Elder Brother as a guide, I’m just interested in the actual wisdom.

              SHANTI:
              The audios and videos of the discourses can be compared with the books. There is very little manipulation and editing in the majority of the text.

              • satyadeva says:

                NP, I only edited one book, ‘The Mustard Seed’, in ’74/5, and I assure you that during that time the official policy, coming direct from ‘Bhagwan’, was to be absolutely faithful to the words he spoke, to neither omit nor change anything. I began working on the first discourse or two for a week or two, thinking I had to put it into ‘good English’, with correct grammar, structure, sentences etc. which was quite a task, before being advised to keep exactly to what Bhagwan had said.

                I don’t know how long that mode lasted, maybe a few years in Pune One, or perhaps during the whole of those years.

              • Lokesh says:

                NP says, “I’m not really interested in having some kind of Elder Brother as a guide, I’m just interested in the actual wisdom.”

              • frank says:

                NP, not really sure what you mean by “an authentic spiritual vision” – sounds a bit neat and tidy, like a Buddhist haircut.

                William Blake said, “Wisdom is sold in the desolate marketplace where none come to buy”, meaning, I suppose, in places where we wouldn`t expect it, or wouldn`t want to go.

                I don`t think you have to wait for perfection to arrive before you can make a move. That sounds pretty self-defeating in philosophy or real life. Personally, I would say wisdom is found mostly on a take-it-where-you-find-it basis.

                My Dad wasn`t much of a spiritual guru but I do remember him telling us this story when I was a kid:

                A guy he knew told him he was driving very late at night when he broke down in an out-of-the-way place, just outside a big mental hospital. It was very dark and raining. One of his wheels had come clean off on a sharp bend (this was the 1930s) and although he managed to retrieve the wheels, the screws had flown off and were lost. He didn`t have a spare. Whilst wondering what the hell to do and how he would get home, he suddenly heard a sinister cackling laughter behind and above him. He turned round, and on the wall of the mental hospital was a very odd-looking guy, swinging his legs manically and watching him closely with beady eyes.

                Naturally, my dad`s friend was very unnerved. Now, not only was he stuck miles from home in the dark and damp, but was being mocked by a maniac who looked as if he was literally in the process of escaping from a lunatic asylum and could even be dangerous, who knows? He felt depair and fear. But then, to his surprise, the lunatic appeared to calm down and said, in a surprisingly sober tone: ”Why don`t you take one screw off each of the other wheels, use them to attach the lost wheel and like that you will have three screws on each of the wheels and that should get you home?”

                The driver could hardly believe it, and thinking to himself “My God, why didn`t I think of that?” he thanked the crazy guy profusely and got down to following his instructions, eventually fixing the wheel and driving off.

                As he drove off into the pitch-black wet night, all he could hear was the sound of the driving rain and the cackling laughter of the madman behind him.

                • satyadeva says:

                  Great story, Frank, but was the madman’s advice “wisdom” or just practical common sense? (And the guy might have been a car mechanic before being incarcerated). Sometimes there’s not much, if any, difference between the two.

                  The story itself could be said to be a wise teaching in that before getting the tip the driver had been consumed by his sense of helplessness and despair, and fear of the stranger, unable to think straight, demonstrating the dysfunction of that sort of emotional state when there was a simple solution readily available which even a ‘madman’ was able to perceive, perhaps because he wasn’t personally involved in the situation, therefore not prone to creating suffering through it.

                  I imagine soldiers are taught how to deal with such conditions, to not allow themselves to be taken over by fear, to stay calm under even intense pressure and assess difficult situations realistically. Perhaps helped by some deep breathing…And being fit and knowing they can take care of themselves would help as well.

                  As for the rest of us, remembering this sort of story could also be a handy self-help resource, not least in reminding us not to jump to conclusions, to be open to being surprised when things look bad or even desperate.

                • frank says:

                  SD, I guess it is “presence of mind” in the vernacular.
                  What that actually is or whether it is possible to train for it is hard to say.

          • swamishanti says:

            That seems wise to me, NP. Rather than hanging onto a guru you no longer trust like Lokesh, Frank & Dominic.

          • satchit says:

            “For me ‘The Children of the Cult’ was what finally made me drop Osho.”

            Don’t worry, this too will pass, lol.

  2. veet says:

    Frank is in such a hurry to rise above the gullible idiots that as usual he makes crude analyses, putting potatoes and artichokes together and drawing conclusions, without any qualitative scruples, between a baby and dirty water.

    In this case he seems to judge morally a Hindu and a Buddhist, with the same value parameters, without taking into account the difference between a butterfly collector and a serial killer.

  3. satchit says:

    Maybe I am not up-to-date.
    Is it true that Osho was a paedophile?
    What other crimes is he accused of?

    MOD:
    Where have you been, Satchit?! The only sex scandal where Osho is involved is re his activities with adult women. See facebook for the details and the debate. The under-age sex is another matter entirely, invoving adult sannyasins, not Osho.

    • satchit says:

      Oh, SD, then there were no crimes, only sexual meeting with adults and consent?

      Maybe you can tell me then why this fuss about ‘Shadow Side’?

      • satyadeva says:

        You should read the stories at facebook from the people concerned, Satchit.

        • satchit says:

          I am not on facebook, SD, but I know Erin’s story.

          The only thing I can say is if I have sex problems with someone, then I do it once (the sex), but never again.

          All other things are childish and complaining and blaming the other 45 years later makes it even more childish.

          • satyadeva says:

            Ok, Satchit, but you fail to take into account the unique dynamics and implications of still relatively young disciples being chosen by their beloved Master (in whom they’ve invested huge trust and devotion) for intimate relations, only to find the encounter deeply disappointing, a sense of having been disrespected, uncared for, ‘used’.

            • satchit says:

              Certainly, SD, one must have felt good and special being chosen by beloved Master.

              If the encounter was deeply disappointing, it is always possible to listen to the inner voice and say thank you, no more.

              Price would have been one no more belonged to the special ones.

              • frank says:

                Yeah. In an ideal world, it was the women`s choices.
                One said the swallowing was unpleasant and she recoiled so she wasn`t asked again. That was probably the best way to get out of it under the circumstances.

                His trip of using his power to swear them to secrecy, his controlling others to play this game, making them complicit and his using them like an average John uses hookers all sounds pretty messed up.

                Not to mention, a million miles away from the tantra sweet talk he was giving to his public audience.

                If that was enlightenment, who would want it? Obviously very few, which is why there was such a huge effort to keep it secret.

                • swamishanti says:

                  “The huge effort to make it secret….”

                  Telling the World Press.
                  On multiple occasions. When asked about his sex life. And saying it was perfectly compatible with his enlightenment. Indeed, a huge effort to make it secret!

                  And incredibly naive to believe these women weren’t enjoying this at the time. If the stories are even true.
                  Otherwise why were they following him back to India? No intelligence?

                • satyadeva says:

                  Naive of you not to understand the women’s psychology at the time, Shanti (see my post to Satchit, 9.11pm).

                  And clutching at straws to suggest they’re telling lies.

                  An obvious conclusion is simply that you’re threatened by anything that might undermine the image of Osho that happens to suit you. And therefore of course the last thing you’re prepared to do is to examine your own motives for such a stance. Denial is a symptom of a lack of intelligence, and its source is to keep one feeling secure in one’s own beliefs and values.

                  No use turning that on to me and saying that’s what I’m doing, I actually wish these stories weren’t true, but one has to be able to face the evidence as best one can rather than believe in convenient fantasies. If one respects the truth.

                  One can still appreciate Osho for all his wonderful work, his extraordinary being, his enlightenment – but without illusions about what else he was. Including illusions about the nature of enlightenment.

                • Klaus says:

                  If memory serves me well, Osho said about sex to us: “At least, let it be normal.”

                  To me, that is a hint towards love, respect, mutual enjoyment, agreement…

                  Hmmm.

                • frank says:

                  Thing is, Shanti, in that interview with the press at the Ranch where he said he had `made love to so many women`, the interviewer then asked him where this took place and he said “On a train, or anywhere”. (Check the video for youself if you can find it). Fact is, he hadn`t been on a train for decades, he was playing it both ways, not telling the truth at all, but obfuscating.

                  We sannyasins listening to that, as I was, saw he was playing with the press. At no point did that constitute a clear statement about his sex life and the fact he was having women brought secretly to his room in the middle of the night.

                • swamishanti says:

                  And it was on multiple occasions that he talked about it in 1985. And he previously answered when asked that he had a girlfriend in Pune One, Vivek, who was the reincarnation of his teen girlfriend. That was his business. It was clear he believed any women were enjoying it at least and enjoyment was Osho’s thing, not putting stones in his shoes or denying himself or others pleasure.

                  He is not around to defend himself against any accusations.

                  It’s also the case with many of these accusations in this topic which appear to be have been pulled from Frank hanging around on anti-cult forums such as women who agreed to have sex with John De Ruiter, for example, and then later decided to sue him. This case is being called “abuse”.

                  I do not know all of the details of the particular case, actually I have no interest, but there will be much more of the real picture in that and other cases than what is painted in the anti-cult forums.

                  The phenomenon of women complaining years after having consensual sex with a man, not just being forcibly raped, is a new phenomenon and men and some women in the public domain and celebrities are also being targeted.

                • frank says:

                  “I do not know all of the details of the particular case, actually I have no interest.”
                  Says Shanti who is writing a post claiming the innocence of John De Ruiter who is up on sexual abuse charges.

                  You are one confused individual, bro`.

              • satyadeva says:

                “Price would have been one no more belonged to the special ones.”

                Far more than that, Satchit, it created an emotional wound at the hands of the man in whom the women had invested so much love, emotion and expectation by the very fact of their having surrendered to him by taking sannyas and choosing to live in his commune.

                I haven’t read their stories but I can well understand that they might have been traumatised by the experience but unable to deal with it effectively at the time (blaming themselves, perhaps?) given the extent of their investment in Osho and the commune.

                • satchit says:

                  I can understand these women too, SD.

                  Good that you use this word “investment”.
                  It was an investment and it did not pay out.
                  They wanted something and they did not get it.

                  It’s a simple thing if you look closer.
                  Certainly the ego doesn’t like it.

                • satyadeva says:

                  I think it’s rather more complex than that, Satchit.

                • Klaus says:

                  Life is hard.
                  With investments, sometimes you win, sometimes you lose.
                  Who cares?

                  “I am not nice. I am not your uncle.”

                  Sometimes, even uncles aren’t nice. At all.

                  No illusions. In the end. Shattering. Of illusions: that may be the gain. In the pain.

                  The lack of empathy I find…disappointing.

            • veet says:

              Satyadeva, have you ever flirted with a woman even though she initially rejected your flirting?
              It is not automatic that if a woman says no to you, you will like her less afterwards, hoping that she will change her mind. Things can change for both.

              From the first “no” you received before ending up in bed with her, is it correct to define it as your attempt to overcome her resistance?
              Isn’t this a healthy constant in relationships between the sexes?
              The man proposes, the woman disposes.

              There are exceptions:
              At the bunga bunga parties* there was a line of very young girls pushing to participate in what were officially called “elegant dinners”, organized by rich men, in power in politics, economics, media…it seems that in that case there was no resistance to overcome, no one got hurt.

              Afterwards, the girls only asked for a little privacy when they were harassed by the tabloid press for details on the sodomy, the exact opposite of what happens today with the ‘Me Too’ movement.

              *In Italy, eg during Berlusconi’s time as pm.

  4. Klaus says:

    In ‘Life of Brian’ there is the ‘eternal joke on cultish behaiour’ scene of ‘the lost sandal’:

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=deDlab6vFgg

    Oh, man. Hammer on the Rocks.

  5. Lokesh says:

    Were Sannyas based on a military organization, surely Swami Shanti would be awarded a medal of honour or even a Victoria Cross for his selfless service to the rank-and-file.

    For years Shanti has tried to tell the uninitiated that Osho’s Rolls Royce collection was all a device for our awakening. He was, of course, right. A true hammer on the rock. His compassion is on par with Osho’s, who spent hours studying RR catalogues, ordering special leather upholstery, bells and whistles for his limos, and it was all for us. When it came to his followers Osho’s love knew no bounds. No expense was spared. The RR device cost somewhere in the region of ten million dollars, but who cares with money for nothing and chicks for free? What was important was our awakening and getting rid of the people who lacked faith and did not want to wake from the sleep of ignorance. Jai Bhagwan!

    Having said that, I am surprised that Shanti does not seem to fully grasp why it was that the master of masters appointed fascist bitches to run parts of his empire. This was, of course, a device to give his disciples a taste of fascism. In other words, another device for our awakening. What true seeker is worth their mala if they haven’t had a good taste of unsavoury fascism? A veritable prerequisite on the winding path leading to enlightenment.

    • veet says:

      “The forces of history are the psychological motives that act in individual men and in human communities; and the science of history is nothing but an “applied psychology”. This makes what Wundt calls the principle of the heterogenesis of ends operative in history: according to which the ends that history achieves are not those that individuals or communities propose, but rather the result of the combination, relationship and contrast of wills and objective conditions”. (Nicola Abbagnano)

      The difficulty of the debate on SN, which is also a paradox, has always been the presence of former sannyasins who accuse Osho of having abused the trust of his disciples but who at the same time are eager to demonstrate that they are just stupid, gullible people, and who in doing so show off the same posture of an abuser at work, which is exactly that of not finding in the dignity of others the limit not to be exceeded.

      And if there were heterogony of good ends even in bad Masters/Teachers?
      And what about the heterogony of bad ends of Masters animated by the best intentions?
      Who is the true Master, the one who cares that the ends are consistent with his teaching or the one who invites us to use tools that allow us to enjoy the journey?
      Who abuses the trust of the disciples more, the one who promises happiness after death or the one who invites us to live before?
      The list would be long, but there is the gym that calls me.

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heterogony_of_ends

      • frank says:

        It`s a fascinating viewpoint, but then again, is there a heterogony for a master who uses his end for bad ends any more than there is a heterogenesis of a master who uses his end for good ends?
        Or what of a master who doesn`t mind where he sticks his end as long as he can get his end away?

        It is an ontological paradox, as Willy Wonka, the famous 19th century philosopher has proposed:
        Is he using his tool to enjoy the journey or is he a tool of Existence using his tool to enjoy his journey, or is he just a tool?

        I would say more, but I have to go and put the ontological frighteners on a few gullible people in order to serve the sangha.

        Love.

      • satyadeva says:

        Does any of the above serve to enlighten the debate around the issue of Osho’s apparently poor treatment of a number of his young female disciples? Or the sexual abuse of young girls at certain Osho communes? The “And if..?” and “What about…?” in particular seem more like smokescreens to me.

        And if one comes to the conclusion that some people in a community are stupid, gullible, then why is it wrong to state this in a forum directly relevant to these people? Because such a view offends the sensibilities of others who are involved in the same group? You’re on very shaky ground there, Veet, I haven’t noticed you holding back on condemning others through any sense of reverence for their sensibilities.

        Talking of shaky ground, your insistence that you have a right to insist that this site should bow to your specific demands, your persistent complaints of an unfair balance of power here, illustrate the inappropriately ‘entitled’ space you come from, neglecting the very basic fact that such an online forum for exchanging views is, by necessity, not run on democratic lines, it’s in that sense an autocracy, where you can choose either to accept the conditions or not participate.

        To say, as you did the other day, that you can somehow ‘rebel’ and ignore such inevitable constraints is just adolescent-type posturing, impotent whining, a load of hot air.

        • veet says:

          Satyadeva, I too would like you to shed light on the debate on events 50 years ago, when you were a 27 year-old boy and I a 10 year-old child. Your Lieutenant Colombo syndrome does not infect me, and I am not Perry Mason, Osho only knows how to defend himself.

          • satyadeva says:

            I suggest a sexual encounter with Osho would be deeply etched into a woman’s psyche, wouldn’t you, Veet?

            And if quite a few are telling a similar story than I’d say the balance of probabilities would seem to indicate that’s what happened. Wouldn’t you?

            • veet says:

              If so, SD, I don’t see much consequence for you, you can always use BL as a backup umbrella.

              Almost everyone here has one, there are also photos that are proudly brought out to demonstrate their devotion to a true master, one who corresponds to the moral expectations of the disciple.

              In my case the mystery continues, Osho is still the centre of it, pointing to the moon, this time with a wet finger, someone suggests that it is probably not jam. Maybe.

          • satyadeva says:

            What exactly do you want to know, Veet? There’s actually no “debate on events” to “shed light on” from that time, so your post is pointless.

            • frank says:

              Talking gibbering nonsense is one way of avoiding unwanted reality.
              It used to be called `madness`.
              For many, now it is now simply called `being online.`

              • veet says:

                “Talking gibbering nonsense is one way of avoiding unwanted reality.” (frank the assertive).

                Finally someone who is going to say the right thing online, that doesn’t sound gibberish.

                Wait, frank, I’ll make the popcorn, the last time you tried it the gibberish online stopped suddenly, a few seconds, before a loud laugh.

                Just a word of advice, don’t forget that the worst of you comes out with the lyrics of the Bronx, in that field it seems that at least some SN cheerleaders give you smiles with yellowed dentures and take off their diapers invitingly.

            • veet says:

              “What exactly do you want to know, Veet? There’s actually no “debate on events” to “shed light on” from that time, so your post is pointless”. Satyadeva two

              “Does any of the above serve to enlighten the debate around the issue of Osho’s apparently poor treatment of a number of his young female disciples?” Satyadeva one

              It would be interesting to hear the point of view of someone who has been at Osho’s feet, to understand, for example, who was the seducer and who was the seduced, the lover and the beloved.

              Or if you had noticed that the “vibration” in Osho was more of the “power type” than of the “love type”, more in the seriousness of domination than in the playfulness of someone who is not a slave to sexual impulses, with an urgent need to ejaculate…it doesn’t seem so pointless to me compared to the feelings of someone who at a certain point began to have doubts and fears and felt in his power, whose nature suddenly appeared unloving.

              Feelings of guilt for having betrayed God? Nostalgia for paradise? Responsibility for finding yourself alone, like a God?

              Can an authentic iconoclast allow people to go around telling how virtuous he was in his private life?

              Who are the true types of devotional disciples, those who judge the “sins” of the Masters or those who learn something from them too?

              • satyadeva says:

                I never noticed anything other than loving energy from Osho, Veet, including when he was critical or even showing traces of anger. But that was a different time to the Oregon period.

                As for the four questions at the end of your post, they seem to me to be attempts to rationalise the hard to accept fact that Osho seems to have mistreated a number of women in intimate circumstances, behaving with supreme selfishness and lack of care.

                Where’s the ‘enlightenment’ in that? The sort of behaviour that we hear about others privileged by wealth and fame indulging in, eg an instance I recall of Frank Sinatra having perfunctory sex with a fan and then getting rid of her as fast as he could afterwards. And John Lennon having sex in a toilet with someone at a party. No doubt multiplied many thousands of times by many thousands of others, whether wealthy, famous or completely ‘unknown’ – just ‘normal’ loveless lust.

                But there again, Osho used to say he was “just an ordinary man” – and we used to sing a devotional song to that very effect.

                • swamishanti says:

                  Osho talks about ordinariness and enlightened sannyasins in this video here and in an interview with Vishrant from 1985. Looks crystal clear, and happy as usual:
                  https://youtu.be/4-87Xu-Pmz0?si=6LvwkvuKJ085bMHn

                  One of the great things about the Ranch and Pune Two phases was that the Buddhafield had grown much more powerful than it was in Pune One, there were more enlightened sannyasins wandering around, keeping it quiet to themselves, as well as Osho”s enlightened presence, and some people had dropped out because they couldn’t handle the Rolls Royces, which was also great.

                • Lokesh says:

                  One enlightened sannyasin that one rarely hears about is Swami Burgerman. Pictured below. I keep this photo on my puja table and stare into Burgerman’s eyes.

                • frank says:

                  I got enlightened on the Ranch, too. I kept quiet about it as I didn`t want to arouse other people`s jealousy. Still do.
                  I don`t want to attract the evil eye from folks who are less fortunate and blessed than myself. For example, unlucky guys who have spent their lives shovelling horseshit for the army, or wasters who think that they are big disciples cos they watch Youtube gurus.

                  Unfortunately, it`s difficult because those types of people pick up the enlightened vibes, even on the net, and are still so riven with jealousy and envy that they can`t keep it in, and are so apoplectic that they struggle to put together a sentence that actually makes sense.

                  Out of compassion, I still keep schtum and don`t let on.

                  Such are the trials of being an enlightened Bodhissatva.

                • Klaus says:

                  Congrats, Frank, for having attained to FULL enlightenment in that auspicious place.
                  It’s pure appreciative joy from my side: that’s what we all take/took the effort for.

                  Of the partially enlightened there are many.

                  Wahooooo – the werewolves of London:

                  https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=N1PFz56XWQI

                  Cheeers!

                • veet says:

                  Satyadeva, I am not a rock star but when I was young it was also true for me that the place where to have sex was not an insurmountable limit.

                  I think that if I used a woman for my pleasure it is because perhaps there was reciprocity.

                  As for Osho, but it is also true for you, the last thing that inspires me is sex, but who am I to force him and you to abstain from doing it, being quite sure that women will feel mistreated afterwards, feeling a sense of disgust and disappointment?

                • satyadeva says:

                  I don’t really get where you’re coming from here, Veet, but unlike us and everyone else we know, Osho had a sort of ‘harem’ around him due to his extraordinary status where he was no doubt able to have anyone he wanted, the women concerned almost certainly expecting something outstandingly special from the master of love and meditation, the man who ‘knew everything’, an expert on tantric sex, and to whom they were already ‘surrendered’ in love and devotion, hence very vulnerable.

                  My God, what a let-down it must have been, no wonder they were disappointed, the seeds of eventual total, angry disillusion were well and truly sown!

                • satchit says:

                  “As for the four questions at the end of your post, they seem to me to be attempts to rationalise the hard to accept fact that Osho seems to have mistreated a number of women in intimate circumstances, behaving with supreme selfishness and lack of care.”

                  So, SD, you think he has lost his enlightenment and
                  “loving energy”?

                • satyadeva says:

                  In such circumstances, yes. Which doesn’t mean he was therefore unenlightened forever after.

                  The only possible mitigating factor might possibly be that he felt he needed to indulge in sex and behave in an ‘unenlightened’ way in order to help himself remain in the physical body for longer, ie deliberately creating karma in order to remain with his people for longer. (So that’s my Xmas present to Veet and Shanti, lol!).

                  On the other hand, he might just have been around those circumstances a bored, curious, middle-aged Indian who couldn’t believe his luck, and just couldn’t resist the western temptations surrounding him.

                • satchit says:

                  Interesting theory, SD.

                  Blow jobs for staying in the body.
                  Could also be the reason behind the laughing gas.

                  Certainly it would be better not to talk about it. Because otherwise the females would maybe be even more hurt.

                • Klaus says:

                  SD,

                  Yupp, my thoughts too: born in India, poor country, caste system, patriarchal, little education for the masses, nationalism etc.

                  Encountering Western stuff and mentality…

                  Looking at India today they are up imitating all that Western style.

                  Where’s balance?

                • Lokesh says:

                  Satchit speculates that Osho might have been doing nitrous oxide to keep him in the body. Obviously his speculation is not based in experience. Laughing gas takes the user away from the body. Perhaps when the user comes down off the gas they might well feel more in the body because that shit can bring you in contact with Iva Brainhemmoricth, the mother of all headaches. The gas gets sold in balloons on the streets of Ibiza during the summer months to numpty tourists who don’t know any better.

                  The popularity of recreational use of nitrous oxide is unsurprising. It’s legal in many parts of the world, it’s cheap and it reliably produces a short-lasting euphoria as well as heightened senses and a slight feeling of disconnect from the body and is often used as a drug at concerts, nightclubs and festivals. Strictly for the dummies in the long term. I must admit the first time you try it can be fun.

      • veet says:

        @MOD
        veet says:
        2 December, 2024 at 5:07 pm

        2th paragraph: i’m nor sure about the “who”, i mean with it “the former sannyasins” and not “Osho”:

        “the presence of former sannyasins who accuse Osho of having abused the trust of his disciples but WHICH ARE THE SAME THOSE who at the same time are eager to demonstrate that they are just stupid, gullible people…”

        • veet says:

          “I don’t really get where you’re coming from here, Veet, but unlike us and everyone else we know, Osho had a sort of ‘harem’ around him due to his extraordinary status where he was no doubt able to have anyone he wanted….” (Satyadeva)

          Satyadeva, I’m saying that sex can be transformed, if we realize that it bores us or that it pushes us to do things in the wrong places, but where is it written that it MUST be transformed?

          It’s certainly not written in the university textbooks where my urologist trained, who advises me against Tantra, because holding back ejaculation is not good for the prostate.

          I’m saying that the objects of sexual desire create either great passion or great repulsion, it’s difficult to remain neutral observers of images told by these alleged victims of Osho’s lust.

          I could instinctively say “what that girl said is disgusting”, but I must add that every time a partner of mine swallowed my sperm it was libidinally gratifying.

          • satyadeva says:

            Well, Veet, perhaps you need to ask yourself what sort of world your would-be revolutionary idealism envisions creating: a world where sex is just sex, good for fun and temporary, fundamentally selfish gratification (and even better as a means of making money through exploiting it through advertising and other channels) ie our current world; or a world where sex is transformed into and primarily serves love (difficult, of course, in these corrupt times when, as BL said, “we’re all sexually loaded”).

            But actually, we don’t necessarily have to bring ‘the world’ into this, it’s basically a matter of what we as individuals want to aspire towards. Examples are useful, inspirational. While also being the opposite when famous, revered proponents of tantra, for example, turn out to be less than the real deal.

            • satyadeva says:

              One might well view sex as ‘the elephant in the room’ where much revolutionary idealism is concerned, even that which professes spirituality to be its driving motivation. Veet says it doesn’t HAVE to be transformed, but it’s arguable that no profound socio-political transformation is going to be complete or have true foundations unless this key area is addressed. I mean we’re talking about the single strongest drive in the human organism apart from basic survival needs.

    • veet says:

      Lokesh leaves out of the hedonistic picture described, that one of more or less a collector of cars and women, the work of a lifetime, meeting people from all corners of the world on a daily basis, as long as his health allowed and did not falter too much.

      The intensity of that work is underlined by Paritosh (Sam) in ‘Life of Osho’, present at the last series of talks held by the Master of Masters.

  6. Lokesh says:

    Veet enquires, “Who is the true Master?”

    I don’t know the answer to that. Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj apparently did. Then again, would you trust a guru who chain-smoked and got jiggy with the local hookers in Mumbai’s red-light district? Yeah, why not, then read on, because according to the Beedie Wallah, “The innermost light, shining peacefully and timelessly in the heart, is the real Guru. All others merely show the way.”

  7. Klaus says:

    Well, imo it is a good thing that our assholes are taken care of in manifold ways; even based on very old and profound spiritual texts.

    Only one sample here (no ad, no personal interest, no Osho mentioned):
    https://www.oztantra.com/

    No questions will remain without answers:
    “Give me your ass. And relax.”

    Sorry. Not sorry. We’re starting from the base.

  8. Nityaprem says:

    Good morning, I seem to have missed a few articles!

    I think what it comes down to is you must be mentally deficient in some way to be a spiritual leader. People are going to put you on a pedestal, you’re going to be inventing and playing that role until you die. Seems a very non-free way to live…

    There’s nothing against spiritual teachers having sex, the problem comes when they do it in a damaging way, or take advantage of the power imbalance with disciples. Like Osho being a long way from a considerate lover. Take Adyashanti as a counter-example, he is married but doesn’t sleep around, as far as I know.

    I have been enjoying ‘The Very Best of Bob Dylan’ this morning. It’s funny, I know all these songs, but I always thought they were sung by other people, it’s amazing how often his songs were covered. Like ‘All Along the Watchtower’, great Jimi Hendrix song — except that Bob Dylan performed it first and wrote it! Anyway, really enjoying the original Dylan versions.

  9. Nityaprem says:

    What’s the latest status on the site? Is it still expected to close down in a few days?

  10. deva sugit says:

    So many claims of Enlightenment, so little time left for SN. Which is why I have decided, as a parting gift to the world of SN and its inhabitants, to out myself.

    As an Enlightened one, I know who else is the real deal and who is full of (sh)it. And for a small donation, I will answer your queries about yourself and others. Of course I will require an NDA so that you don’t go blabbing and lessen my earnings, which I like to call my Enlightenment Entitlement.

    To show that this is not a scam where you donate endlessly only to hear that no one else is Enlightened, I state here and now, at no cost, that I am not the only Enlightened one in human history.

    Pricing is as follows:
    Self – $100
    Others – $50
    Package deal (yourself and 4 others) – $250

    My Blessings,
    SDS

    • deva sugit says:

      I have received many private replies, positive, negative and threats on my life. It’s all good.

      To those wanting questions answered, you will get them as soon as the cheques clear.
      To those attacking me with words, I hope you feel better after the catharsis, free of charge.
      To those challenging me to a duel, you will be notified of the time and place when I will prove that you are not enlightened or at least less enlightened than I am.

      I have been asked if I can help in any way besides recognition of enlightenment. Yes, I can. For example, in ancient India (Poona in the 1970s), a few of us were having a beer in the Blue Diamond courtyard and one Ma was having difficulty speaking. I sensed a blockage in her throat chakra and told her I could help. She agreed and after sucking my cock and vomiting, she thanked me. She would go on to become a prostitute/tantrika.

      My Blessings,

      SDS

  11. Nityaprem says:

    Good morning, friends,

    OshoNews has published my review of Sarito Carroll’s book ‘In the Shadow of Enlightenment’, you can find it here…

    https://www.oshonews.com/2024/12/06/in-the-shadow-of-enlightenment/

    I hope it will get a few more people to buy the book, and spend some time thinking about the then-kids and their troubles. Either way it’s a stonking good read, a combination of a trip down memory lane and a serious consideration of the neo-sannyas cult.

    I am sitting here with my first coffee of the day, enjoying my read of the news and my favourite websites. It’s stormy weather outside, loud gusts of wind through the trees in the darkness….

    • frank says:

      And the `unnamed older man` was a guy that Osho made reference to approvingly on several occasions as being a great hit with the ladies.

      Also, remember Osho`s story about two lovers who lived on opposite sides of a lake and when they met, they did, and when they didn`t, they didn`t? This was presented as the ideal sannyasin-style unattached love. This story was directly about the `unnamed older man` and his longtime gf, who was a part of Osho`s close entourage.

      Weird scenes inside the goldmine.
      Who was fooling who?
      Someone somewhere probably knows.

      • Nityaprem says:

        Frank said, “This was presented as the ideal sannyasin-style unattached love.”

        But that’s exactly what the teen girls were not into — they dreamed of love and loyalty and of being lifted up alongside their older lovers who “chose them.” Hopes that were cruelly dashed again and again, creating the symptoms of abuse.

        I’m beginning to wonder to what extent Osho truly knew what is natural for human beings. It’s interesting to see that a lot of sannyasin couples that I have known have stayed together long-term after returning home from the communes.

        • frank says:

          NP, you were writing: “I’m beginning to wonder to what extent Osho truly knew what is natural for human beings”.

          I realise that some people see him as a bit of a classic neurodivergent.

          Here`s something I came across:

          “Osho seems non-neurotypcal one would say. He seems more like a high-functioning Asperger`s case.

          Key recognisable and typical traits that support this thesis:
          He liked to be alone to an unusual degree.
          Avoided all situations where he wasn`t in control of proceedings from early on
          Super-sensitive to sensory stimuli, smell, sound, noise.
          A lot of collecting obsessions from an early age. Pebbles, books, watches, cars, people.
          A lot of unclear health difficulties he had as a youngster with parents trying to get a diagnosis from all and sundry of doctors. No clear results.
          Good verbal skills; rich vocabulary.
          Ability to absorb and retain large amounts of information, especially about topics of special interest.
          Self-motivated, independent learner. Great mind collecting masses on favourite subjects. Couldn`t form attachments (rationalised as enlightenment). Decided after death of someone close, when young, to avoid all attachment.
          Little empathy (passed off as detachment).
          Sexually and emotionally distant as described by those who had sex with him.
          Super-finicky about cleanlinesss and order – note his library, surrounds, personal hygiene – everything had to be in right place all the time.
          Had difficulty reading people (see Sheela and a bunch of other obviously strange people around him he outwardly supported).
          Valium and downers worked for him from an early age.
          If opposed, ramped up the battle to the point of self-destruction.
          Ended up stranded in a fantasy world, unable to take basic responsibility. “Being attacked by black magicians”, “Talking with Buddha in his jacuzzi”, `Destroyed by women and jealousy`, `crucified`, `poisoned`.
          He just couldn`t relate it all to his own habits and actions.”

          MOD:
          Frank, Is the article you came across quoted right down to the end of your post ie are the closing quote marks in the right place?

          • swamishanti says:

            That’s how an ex-disciple like yourself, put off by collections of cars, will see him.

            And then you can hang on to him and complain about Rollers and “devices”.

            “Little empathy” – not the case. Unconditionally loving Buddha.

            • frank says:

              Also related to NPs wondering:
              And what about Sharna, the headmaster of Ko Hsuan, now disappeared, who multiple people allege raped kids as young as 8 for over a decade with impunity? During this time he was lovers with Maneesha, who wrote, as Osho`s “chronicler”, in her book, ‘Bhagwan, Buddha For The Future’, that he was “extraordinary with kids” and closing one chapter with “Sharna was a delightful and nourishing person to be with, and years after having parted as lovers, we continue to be the very best of good friends”. (Source ‘Sannyas Wiki’)

              Again, who was fooling who?
              Are they still?

            • Klaus says:

              IMV, enlightenment is not of the mind, maybe not even of the brain.

              So, the enlightenmend may be total. That is what we (all) admire and benefit of. I guess.

              IMPV, his brain deteriorated due to various conditions, which we know of. That is how some sayings came into life.

              There.

              ” “No reason to get excited”, said the joker to the thief.”
              Life is still a joke. And there is/was lots to learn and experience.

              OM.

          • satchit says:

            And what?

            Einstein had Asperger’s.
            Bob Dylan and Elon Musk too. Frank too? :-)

  12. Nityaprem says:

    Good morning, dear friends,

    So yesterday I asked on Facebook, from the Sannyasrich community of therapists, have there been any who have come forward to talk to the FB group where the then-kids hang out? And it turns out there hasn’t been any effort to help them. More to the point, on getting in touch with normal non-sannyas therapy centres, it appears that sannyasin therapists are generally not held in high esteem, because many still seem to be operating from knowledge from the 70s and 80s and haven’t followed the latest developments in Trauma Informed methods and the neurobiology research supporting it.

    The things I am hearing make me grateful that I never went to a therapy group in the ashram. I did once do Japanese Archery in the meditation resort in the 90s, but that is as close as I came.

    • satchit says:

      I think too that you can be grateful, NP.

      Looking back to the 70s and 80s, I think much abuse did happen in the therapy groups with these so-called therapists.

      • satchit says:

        The other part of the story is:

        By thinking, mind creates reality.

        If I call something “a trauma” then sooner or later I will find a trauma-therapist who calls it also a trauma.

        It is just a question of supply and demand.

    • swamishanti says:

      NP, perhaps you could use a non-sannyasin therapist to help to move on from Osho. After all, you wrote that “you cannot trust what he says, if he is proven to be a hypocrite and a manipulator as well as a hypnotist and a powerful psychic. What he says proves highly dangerous because he mixes in spiritual truth with his own opinions. “

    • frank says:

      NP,
      Therapy follows fashion. For example, up until 1975, the whole psychoanalytic/therapeutic world was unanimous that homosexuality was a disease, a physical/mental existential illness. These days, spreading such ideas could get you into some serious trouble.
      Plus, therapy is, and has been from the start, riddled with competitive sub-cults and rival orthodoxies who slag each other off.

      Trauma-informed therapy is probably useful for some people, but I very much doubt that its tenets are as scientific and unquestionably proven by psychobiology/neuroscience, whatever that would mean, as they like to make out. They have a product to sell, after all.

      Reichian theories (they also believed and promulgated the gay disease theory) informed Sannyas therapy a lot. The idea was that if you could have good orgasmic sex you would, due to the psycho-biological release, be free of all neurosis, was key. Such a theory helped a few uptight folks to get their rocks off at the time, but, as an all-embracing theory, it does seem to have a few plot-holes and it`s not hard to see how this theory can lead to coercive behaviour

      I find it helpful that some intelligent writers have pointed out that ‘psychotherapy’, going back to the original Greek, means “care of the soul”. That broadens it out nicely.

      Push comes to shove, you are going to have to do it yourself.
      Like art, you can spend your life wondering at the creations of others, submitting to their tutelage maybe, but in the end you have to paint your own picture, sing your own song, write your own poem etc., even if it doesn`t look like the greatest masterpiece ever.

  13. Lokesh says:

    Good, well thought out post, Frank. I do not agree with it entirely.

    I have done my share of therapy and I am glad that I did. It left me with some useful tools. I see that people who did not run the therapy gamut are often lacking in certain psychological dimensions, repressing emotions, projecting onto others and so forth.

    Yes, ultimately we have to create our vision, but help and guidance from others can speed up and hone the process.
    I think the therapy process has been surpassed by plant medicine healing, which also comes with guides…good and bad ones. Discretion is the name of the game. Currently reading ‘Seeding Consciousness’. Highly recommended.

    Of course, as Frank says, this might also be another fashion or fad, but it certainly is a fascinating one with many new dimensions to explore and discover.

    • frank says:

      By fashion I don`t really mean “just a fad” although that exists too, but rather that therapeutic ideas go with the movements/ideas current in society in various ways.

      The therapy-historical roots of the abuse issue are when Freud decided that his female patients’ accounts of sexual abuse were not actual accounts of real events but rather fantasies on the part of the patients. At first he believed his patients` accounts , then he changed his mind and his theories. Why did he do this? Because it was just too much to wrap his head around the fact that sexual abuse was so endemic in the society in which he lived.

      Not to mention the fact that if he continued to accept the level of abuse and report such, he might find himself as a kind of whistle-blower for abuse amongst his wealthy clients. Dangerous and bad for business! He instead invented a disease, ‘Hysteria’, that afflicted only women. This “illness” was not removed from the DSM “Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders” until 1980.

      So trauma and abuse weren`t really such a thing in the 70s and 80s therapy-wise.
      A better understanding of how dangerous and deleterious this kind of trauma is for the person subjected to it is a relatively recent development.

      Maybe the Sannyas therapists you are talking about, NP, haven`t been keeping up and are stuck in a past-its-sell-by-date paradigm. Or like Freud, they prefer to downplay the importance and keep their jobs and kudos intact.

    • Klaus says:

      The smoke makes therapy look way nicer as a process. Than it may actually feel when going through it.
      Just as O made it look lovelier than maybe it was.

      Current trauma therapy takes you near the trauma so you know it’s there. And then it makes you observe your reaction/s. However, it – the therapy therpist/setting – will not let you drown in it or be overwhelmed by it. You are kept ‘on the circumference/s – so ‘resilience’ in your own psyche increases (maybe same as ‘awareness’ is getting stronger). Doing it doesn’t sap your energy/pull you (as far) down as before on your own.

      Thus, one does therapy as it is available and affordable according to ‘the method’ or system chosen.

      Like when one is hungry enough one may eat.

      ‘Catfood Sandwiches’ – story told live by David Lindley:

      https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=n9Td_q1H3eU&t=1107s&pp=2AHTCJACAQ%3D%3D

      Wuuufffff.

Leave a Reply