A Tribute to Maharishi Mahesh Yogi
by Edward Tarabilda
Maharishi is a disciple of the now deceased, former Shankaracharya of
North India, Swami Brahmananda Saraswati. This great swami was a Surya
Yogin, and one of the characteristics of a Surya Yogin is that he
teaches in a manner which causes different disciples to draw different
conclusions about the nature of his teaching.
Maharishi came to the west during the sixties and immediately gained
public attention largely because the Beatles started attending his
meditation courses. His immediate challenge was to address the need of
the people living a fast paced existence but with little knowledge of
how to cope with the stress of this life-style -- people that were more
interested in a good night's sleep rather than enlightenment. He also
had to face misunderstandings about the nature of meditation, its
practice and its relationship to daily existence.
He sought to meet these challenges by teaching a simple, natural,
effortless form of meditation suitable for busy householders. He called
it Transcendental Meditation (TM) and its practice quickly spread
throughout the U.S. and the world. He called the theoretical aspect of
his teaching "The Science of Creative Intelligence" and founded two
universities, one in Fairfield, Iowa and one in Lucerne, Switzerland, to
promote this knowledge as well as its applied, meditative aspect.
His first setback occurred when he instituted an advanced meditation
program which included the practice and performance of "siddhis",
techniques which he claimed would bring supernormal abilities including
physical levitation. In fact, for a period of four or five years, the
erroneous impression was left with the public that his students were
actually levitating. This bizarre publicity and the strange ideas which
accompanied it turned off many people. The credibility of Maharishi's
movement, which had been established through its emphasis on scientific
research and educational reform, was largely lost; the popularity of
"TM" began to wane.
There was also the factor of the high costs of learning "TM" and all the
advanced techniques which followed it. Many complained that such a
policy violated the age-old idea that spiritual techniques should be
given out at no or, at least, a low cost. The movement representatives
countered by saying that all the money was being used to subsidize
individuals throughout the world who could not otherwise afford to learn
"TM".
In the late seventies, Maharishi began to speak of a one percent
phenomena: getting one percent of the world's population to practice
"TM" as a means of solving world problems. He then decided that this was
not feasible and instead, asked the growing number of " TM Siddhas"
throughout the world to do their "program" ("TM" plus the "Siddhis")
together in large groups as a means of accomplishing the same effect.
This was carried out in a number of places throughout the world
including Washington, D.C. Scientific research was conducted on these
gatherings to determine their effects on local, national and global
problems. The results seemed to indicate that such group processes did,
in fact, bring positive changes, although some challenged these results
arguing that the researchers were hardly free from bias. However, most
deep thinking individuals had no reason to doubt the creative genius of
the Yogi who had thought of and promoted this strategy in the first place.
In recent years I have been forced to distance myself both from
Maharishi’s unique approach to spiritual development and from many of
his uses of the applied Vedic disciplines. This is despite the fact that
Maharishi was my first teacher in the realm of meditation and eastern
studies. This has been necessary for a number of reasons:
To bring out the richness of my own cognitions and to demonstrate how
they differ from Maharishi’s.
To distinguish my teaching from an exclusively eastern approach to
spiritual development.
To warn people of the potential abuses of Vedic Science as presently
practiced.
To provide people with a more multi-dimensional approach to spirituality
when they are sufficiently mature to benefit from it.
At the same time I have come to realize that Maharishi has provided an
invaluable service to humanity in bringing forms of knowledge that
provide the world with fresh alternatives to solving the severe present
day problems and crises that now face us.
He has done this in virtually every major field of living and in regards
to every system of knowledge. He has helped promote alternative
approaches to healthcare and stress-management that allow for greater
self-sufficiency. He has reminded us of the need to pay attention to how
we locate and build our homes. He has sought to restore the
meaningfulness of ritual and celebration in our daily lives. He has
restored ancient forms of Vedic music for relieving stress and promoting
wholeness. He has provided us with innovative approaches to education,
government and defense. He has even enlivened once again the meaning and
use of the term natural law. Possibly his greatest contribution has been
in restoring viable forms of meditation to the religious and spiritual
life and making meditation a household word throughout the world.
He has even been the inspiration for the establishment of a political
party (The Natural Law Party) that is now interjecting greatly needed
new ideas into the political process for solving our local, regional,
national and global problems.
What separates Maharishi from every other spiritual teacher of the past
is his recognition of the importance and creation of spiritual group
dynamics and organizations to achieve fundamental changes in world
consciousness. Thus, he has affected world consciousness in ways that we
may never fully appreciate.
You can observe the practical workings of these group dynamics of
consciousness in Maharishi’s two major communities in the United States:
Fairfield, Iowa and Blowing Rock, North Carolina. The residents of both
of these communities demonstrate qualities of creativity, intelligence
and achievement found rarely in communities of similar demographics.
I have come to realize that despite the profundity of my own teaching, I
am handicapped in impacting world problems without the types of
organizational structures Maharishi has been so successful in
instituting. It took great foresight on his part to see exactly what
type of response would be needed to combat the threat of materialism.
And it was a stroke of enlightened genius to create institutions that
could effectively do battle with these forces.
So those people who think that I do not support Maharishi’s programs are
quite mistaken. However, those people who fail to see how one can be
both a supporter and a critic of a sage, teaching or institution lack a
certain subtlety of awareness and flexibility of insight. Sri Aurobindo
was a harsh critic of many of the Vedic teachings, but he was also its
overall champion. The same can be said for Rudolph Steiner and his
approach to the various Christian doctrines of his time. Paul Brunton
also had the unique ability to both appreciate the Veda and yet condemn
many of its applications to present day society. I trust Maharishi would
not want it any other way.
Based upon the empirically verified results of these group programs,
Maharishi announced the end of all wars and the full sunshine of the Age
of Enlightenment. Shortly thereafter the Gulf War broke out! After
apologizing to his disciples for this false or premature prediction,
Maharishi suggested that his programs had not fully achieved what he had
hoped for and that what was also needed was a radical physical
transformation of the planet through Sthapatya Veda, the ancient science
of geomancy.
By this time Maharishi had already begun to bring out his particular
version of Vedic Science and had sought to integrate it with western
knowledge, both spiritual and mundane. Initially "Maharishi Ayurveda"
was introduced, then "Maharishi Jyotish", Maharishi Gandarva Veda and
finally, Maharishi Sthapatya Veda." In my judgment, Maharishi's efforts
in this arena have been a mixed blessing. On the one hand, I am happy
with his attempts to restore, on a massive scale, the various aspects of
the Veda and tailor them for modern society; on the other hand, he has
allowed his prestigious name to be attached to Vedic disciplines, many
of which have become so eroded over time as to no longer have real
efficacy. By allowing his name to be placed in association with these
various disciplines, Maharishi leaves the impression that he has
restored these disciplines to their pristine form. Nothing could be
further from the truth.
A Note on Edward Tarabilda:
The late Edward F. Tarabilda's was a spiritual teacher in the tradition
of knowledge known as Gyana Yoga. The Art of Multi-Dimensional Living is
a profound elaboration of this path which grew out of his inner
cognitions. Edward was a colleague of Dr Vasant Lad and Dr David
Frawley. Edward Tarabilda, of Fairfield, IA, was an early adopter of TM,
author and critic, philosopher, spiritual guide, ex- M.U.M faculty,
ex-M.U.M. Vice-President, passed away on January 10th, 1999 at
Fairfield, IA while playing tennis at MUM.
.On 12/26/2013 7:09 AM, Richard J. Williams wrote:
> A message from Edward Tarabilda:
>
> "Despite these drawbacks in his recent teaching and his failure to
> fully honor The Art of Multi-Dimensional Living®, by promoting only
> one generic form of meditation, Maharishi still deserves our praise
> and thanks. No one has done more to enhance human evolution in the
> twentieth century than Maharishi. He has been a virtual dynamo from
> the moment he came out of the Himalayas, and has offered a seemingly
> never ending series of innovative programs to help mankind solve its
> pressing problems. I, myself, have gained much from Maharishi and hold
> him in high esteem, even though I am also, at times, his harshest critic.
>
> One of my criticisms has been Maharishi's tendency to promote a
> dangerous form of elitism among his followers. There is a difference
> between one-pointed attention to the task at hand and an elitism which
> tends to dismiss the contributions of others as insignificant. The
> streak of eastern fundamentalism which is so predominant in Swami
> Brahmananda Saraswati's other disciple, Swami Prakashananda, also
> exists in Maharishi's teaching and organization, although to a lesser
> degree. These authoritarian tendencies exist in most eastern teachings
> and are one of the reasons why they are no longer the most suitable
> for modern western people. However, none of what I have just said
> should keep us from admiring the accomplishments of these group, nor
> from supporting them where appropriate.
>
> In Maharishi's defense, we must realize that the urgency of his task
> (helping prevent the world from self-destructing) required unusual
> methods and sacrifices, which sometimes appear to ignore or violate
> the principles of The Art of Multi-Dimensional Living® He has always
> suggested that a time would come when the spiritual needs of each
> individual would become a rightly restored priority. It is apparent
> that in saying this, he was referring to the advent of The Art of
> Multi-Dimensional Living.
>
> "The only way you will know if a teacher is enlightened, is if he is
> able to enlighten you!" - Edward Tarabilda
>
> A Note on Edward Tarabilda:
>
> The late Edward F. Tarabilda's was a spiritual teacher in the
> tradition of knowledge known as Gyana Yoga. The Art of
> Multi-Dimensional Living is a profound elaboration of this path which
> grew out of his inner cognitions. Edward was a colleague of Dr Vasant
> Lad and Dr David Frawley. Edward Tarabilda, of Fairfield, IA, was an
> early adopter of TM, author and critic, philosopher, spiritual guide,
> ex- M.U.M faculty, ex-M.U.M. Vice-President, passed away on January
> 10th, 1999 at Fairfield, IA while playing tennis at MUM.
>
> Read more:
>
> 'Ayurveda Revolutionized: Integrating'
> by Edward Tarabilda
> Lotus Press, 1997
>
> 'The Art of Multi-dimensional Living'
> by Edward Tarabilda
> http://shell.forethought.net/~risaacs/
> <http://shell.forethought.net/%7Erisaacs/>
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