--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "authfriend" <jst...@...> wrote: > > --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "Marek Reavis" <reavismarek@> wrote: > > > > Like you, I've only read the few chapters of Coplin's > > dissertation that appear in a google search. I'd like > > to read the rest, too. > > > > And these titles, like referring to Guru Dev as "His > > Divinity", all seem to be purely honorific. I hadn't > > heard about the use of maharishi as a "pathfinder" > > title, but I agree that it's appropriate should that > > be so. > > The flip side may be that, as I suggested, it would > indicate he wasn't claiming either an "official" > spiritual rank or to be the successor in a *lineage* > per se. I'd bet such subtleties would be fairly obvious > to Indians familiar with the spiritual-title game. >
I seem to recall that in MMY's explanation for why MIU had an "M" in it, that he referred to a "rishi" as someone who was enlightened, and a "maharishi" as someone who could teach others to be enlightened, and that therefore, the name was to refer to the goal of the school (and maybe as an hommage to all [other?] maharishis throughout the ages). Lawson
