On Apr 10, 2009, at 10:07 AM, TurquoiseB wrote:
Real TM Teachers, "recertified" or not, are also
encourage to participate by taking the test. So are
TM critics. It's an equal opportunity test. :-)
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THE WANNABEE TM TEACHER TEST
When answering the following questions, assume that
the person you are speaking to is a 16-year-old girl,
an intelligent one who is interested in learning TM
in her school as part of the DLF initiative but who
has done a little Web surfing and is asking you to
clear up a few questions so that she can in turn
clear them up with her parents so that they will
sign the permission slip she needs to partake in
the DLF "Quiet Time" program. She is looking to you
for honest answers.
1. My parents are quite conservative Christians.
They are concerned that I might be getting involved
in a different religion. Is TM based in religion?
Yes. But it's not incompatible with other
religions, just take our word for it, at
least until your check clears.
2. How many mantras are there? I've read on the Web
that there are only a few and that they are given
out on the basis of age. Does that mean that all
of the kids in my class (who are all the same age
I am) are going to get the same mantra?
Yes. We believe in safety in numbers
and all that good stuff. And if you
don't, just stuff it, OK?
3. Where do the mantras come from? I have read on the
Web that in India they are considered either the
names of, the nicknames of, or invocations of sev-
eral of the Hindu deities (gods and goddesses). Is
this correct?
Yes. But what you (or they) don't
know won't hurt you, so just chill, OK?
4. What's up with this 'puja' thing? Again, on the Web
I've read the translation of it, and it is *filled*
with the names of Hindu deities. And, according to
these Websites, at the end I am going to be asked
to kneel. Does that mean that I am bowing to these
deiites?
You may be asked, but you don't have to.
To hell with the rest of your question.
5. I looked at the tm.org website, and there is no
mention there of 'Rajas,' the people who (as I under-
stand it) run the TM organization. On other Websites,
and in fact on old versions of the tm.org website I
found on the Internet Wayback Machine, there are LOTS
of mentions of them, plus photos of them dressed up
in long robes and gold crowns. What's up with this?
Who are these people? And why does it look as if the
tm.org Website has been "cleaned up" to remove all
mention of them? For example, here is a photo of
one of them, the 'Raja' in charge of America:
http://tinyurl.com/dhb89n
Oh, ha ha hoo tee hee ha hahahahahaha
hahahahahahahahahahahaha...HA!
That's a scream! Those are just loonies
from the local sanitorium, on Halloween!
We let them come over here once a year
so they can get a little fresh air.
Sorry if they scared you.
6. For that matter, if all of these 'Rajas' really DO
run the TM organization, why aren't there any women
among them? I'm a girl. Does that mean that I'm some
kind of second-class citizen in the TM organization?
Yes.
7. Similar to the deletion of any mention of the 'Rajas'
on tm.org, there seems to have been a deletion of any
mention of 'pundits,' even though one can still
find videos of them on the Web like this one:
http://globalcountryofworldpeace.org/maharishi_vedic_pandits12.html
This is an official TM Website, right? So why have all
mentions of these 'pundits' been removed from the main
site? And what's up with their funny clothes and all
sitting in neat little rows chanting Indian religious
scriptures like that? Is this what you have in mind
for us during "Quiet Time?"
For one thing, it's pandits, not to be
confused with pandas, which at least
are cute, even though I've heard they're
not very friendly, which brings us back
to the pundits, or maybe the rajas. Now
I'm confused!
8. Did Maharishi *really* call Britain a "scorpion
nation" and forbid the teaching of TM there? Did he
*really* say "Damn Democracy?" Did he *really* say that
most of the capital cities of the world should be torn
down and rebuilt from the ground up based on "rules" he
found in ancient Indian scriptures? These things have
all been said on the Websites I've visited, and they
sound too outlandish to be true. What's the real story?
The real story is, he said them but was delirious
at the time. It's also the end of the story.
9. Another thing that seems to be missing from the
tm.org Website recently is any mention of "enlighten-
ment." That used to be ALL OVER that Website. One site
I found said that Maharishi used to promise enlighten-
ment as a result of practicing the TM technique for as
little as 5-8 years. If this is true, surely you can
point me to some of the people who have been practicing
TM for that period of time or longer, so that I can ask
them what 'enlightenment' is like and whether I want
it, right? What are their names so I can contact them?
10. The tm.org Website used to talk about the TM-siddhis
program, and how one can take a course to learn how to
levitate. Now there is no mention of it. If I were inter-
ested in such a course, is it still being given, and if
so, is the cost of it covered by the Lynch Foundation the
way that my initial TM instruction would be? If not, how
much is that course going to cost me?
Nothing, since you'll never get approved anyway,
at least not without some serious frontal-lobe
surgery. Don't thank me, it was nothing.
Sal
