Rick Archer contributed:
"Repetition aloud of His name is better than praise. Better still is its
faint murmur. But the best is repetition within the mind -- and that is
meditation.... Better than such broken thought is its steady and continuous
flow like the flow of oil or of a perennial stream."
- Ramana Maharshi
Bronte writes:
Thank you, Rick Archer and Ramana Maharishi, for providing a beautiful
example of Indian spiritual brainwashing. Whose name are you guys repeating day
in and day out, surrendering to it so fully that it becomes your very stream of
consciousness? Not the name of the Infinite, boys, because THAT has no name!
Rick, you've told us in this forum that you do mantras given you by Amma, and
I know from my research that her mantras entails names and homage of various
gods. There are, for example, "the Saraswati mantras." So it is not the
Infinite with which you are uniting your mind, but with individuals called
devas, individuals whom the Indian scriptures clearly show are self-serving,
desire-driven, imperfect beings. I am presuming Ramana M. promotes the use of
similar mantras.
"Repetition aloud of His name is better than praise." says RM -- whose name,
Rick? God is not a He. God transcends nomenclature. If you are uniting your
consciousness to a He, She or a name, you are selling yourself out to
possession by an entity, not to oneness with the Primordial Formless Mind. What
you attain through such measures is not Brahman but Shakti. Shakti bequeathed
by the worshipped god, who is pleased and appeased by your devotions. In
offering her your mind, your stream of consciousness, your will, your
personhood, you offer yourself up to be devoured over time, encouraged on with
chocolates and endorphines, until all that is left of you will be a
bliss-filled shell, a numbed-out zombified personhood, incapable of feeling or
doing anything that makes existence truly worth living.
A person who follows such practices is not on the path of Brahman but of
possession. Possession is the reason behind gurus promoting worship of the gods
and mantra meditation. Possessed by the gods themselves, having surrendered
their will, desires and independent thinking to these beings, Shakti-filled
yogis move to the next rung of the ladder, drawing in the next generation of
innocent victims.
Those who didn't reach "enlightenment" through mantra meditation but other
Eastern means, such as the Eastern version of kundulini meditation, nonetheless
are brainwashed by their gurus to believe that the gods are benign and that all
is perfect in the universe. So they never challenge the system or lift a finger
to promote Brahman-inspired cosmic individuality. Therefore the gods are
pleased with these guys, although they don't possess them. Such "yogis" have
willingly surrendered their minds, leaving their outer shell behind in the
world. Hence they are no threat to the system that promotes the gods feasting
on the minds and energy of physically incarnate beings.
It is because my friends do mantra meditation and blindly walk the way of the
primrose path that I am so concerned for them, and the reason I heartily
challenge the Eastern religion regimen. I don't want to lose these beautiful
people to their trusting path of spiritual suicide. To me, the philosophy
they've swallowed is not unlike the radical Moslem teaching that tells young
men to commit physical suicide because when they do they will be rewarded with
a heaven beyond their wildest dreams.
To experience the supreme and eternal bliss of "Brahman," trusting Westerners
follow the instructions of gurus, unquestioningly taking their word for where
there lives are headed. Just as their Moslem counterparts unquestioningly
accept their teaching about the dozens of virgins that await them in heaven
after their acts as suicide assasins. They believe this bilge because their
religion tells them it's so. My friends believe the Indian promises because
THEIR religion tells them it's so. But both stories are lies designed to
exploit, IMHO. Heaven is neither 20 virgins nor detached impersonal bliss. What
it is exactly we must together work to figure out. Through spiritual practices
that do not pay toll to self-serving entities, that focus on the Infinite
exclusively.
We can do this, because we are made of the Infinite, and it is the nature of
That to wake up in this world and know itself. But we have to ditch the gods,
the mantras and the gurus. We have to put on our big-boy pants and climb the
mountain for ourselves, trusting in our experience, our wits, and our common
sense. And giving ear and support to one another.
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