We have perhaps been too harsh on the Dalai Lama, so we can acknowledge his initiative here (with a new book), he is a man to reckon with, but at the same time we should note that he is no longer (and never really was) a spiritual teacher. Ditto for the whole of Tibetan Buddhism which is useful to study, and then move on. You will be left in the lurch by this Tibetan world, where you have no place. Just as well, find the real buddhism, if it exists, and don’t confuse the Dalai Lama’s PR with real spiritual effort.
You have a long road if you wish to follow a buddhist path to enlightenment. The Dalai lama will lead you astray there.
I should laugh at his ‘interfaith’ gestures with sufism, and wonder how he would reckon a sufi gangster like EJ Gold.
Let us note the quite different perspective of Rajneesh here, who was critical of almost all religion. Nota bene.
Anyway, the Dalai lama’s effort deserves some examination and we can follow his news lines here.
In any case, the legacy of buddhism is a dark one, in its last phases in the nineteenth century association with rising fascism. I don’t think buddhists, or the Dalai lama can live that down, not that anyone can make anything stick.
If we can get past the beautiful effort of the new atheists to unwittingly prolong these religions, we can get past Xtianity and buddhism and move to a new age of new religions.
What’s the Dalai Lama’s secret? He’s got over two million Twitter followers, people buy his books in droves, his speeches sell out stadiums. In a highly cynical age, he’s held the public’s attention for over two decades with some pretty elementary ideas: the essence of human nature is to be happy, human beings are happiest when they help others attain happiness, all major religions nurture the most basic ingredient of happiness, namely compassion, but you don’t have to be religious to be compassionate, you just have to live up to the basic goodness of your human nature.
Like Socrates saying “I know that I know nothing”, it’s not just the simplicity of the message that attracts people, it’s the remarkable journey of the man who is articulating it. The story of his escape from Tibet into India, his successful establishment of a government in exile, his continual advocacy for peaceful negotiations with his Chinese occupiers even while the culture and lives of his people are crushed day after day — these things are well known, and more than enough to command admiration and attention.
But what is astounding about the Dalai Lama is how much more he is than the spiritual, symbolic and political (although he’s stepping down from that role) leader of the Tibetan people. For those of us who believe religion is a source of inspiration and a bridge of cooperation, at a time when people presenting religion as a bomb of destruction are ruling the airwaves, the Dalai Lama is our single most powerful example. It is this part of his mission — Dalai Lama as interfaith leader, which is also the subject of his most recent book, “Towards a True Kinship of Faiths: How the World’s Religions Can Come Together” — that has brought him to Chicago for a set of presentations sponsored by the Theosophical Society.
In relation to previous post, we get luck at Huffpost/religion with this from Stephen Schwarz. I reviewed his book at Amazon, and was too fair, perhaps, embedding a swipe at the ‘sufi mafia’ in the review.
Sufis must have been on the look out for a rightwinger here, and got this near neo-con to do their bidding.
His article is not without interest, and are critiques of sufism here have been unbalanced: we have reported sufism as we found it, a truly dreadful mafia-ridden quagmire, we thought, and tried to sound a warning. But obviously the Moslem world of sufism is beyond us.
Give this writer his hearing, mistrust what he says (on principle, his facts here may actually be reasonable enough), and be wary of sufism in general. It is a reactionary phenomenon at this point, and you changes of realization are close to zero. Face reality, and move on (you probably have to study everything anyway). Remember as a rule of thumb that Islam had nothing like yoga or the path to enlightenment and, in trying to make up for the lack, invented the false and confusing ‘sufi’ path.
I can only speak for myself: a total waste of time, and much worse than that. But as to what sufism represents in Islamic countries, I admit, is unclear from our perspective.
Keep in mind that this neo-con Schwartz is no democrat, and his place at Huffpost just shows that rag is pretty useless on religion.
Devotees of Sufism, the spiritual interpretation of Islam, face problems wherever they are found. In the West, many self-styled Sufis have never become Muslim, know little of the religious background of the Sufi way, and give Sufism a reputation as simply another flavor of New-Age, “weekend” mysticism. In Muslim lands, especially in the Arab core countries, classic Sufi authors may be praised while living Sufi teachers are derided as un-Islamic charlatans. And in some places, Sufis are imprisoned and murdered. Read the rest of this entry »
The Forgotten Liberalism Within Islam
If you examine the eonic effect and its take on modernity you will, as you move beyond its ‘eurocentric’ focus, see just what this author makes clear: the near global synchrony (or at most a generation or so delay) of the enlightenment effect.
Not least in the reaction are figures like Gurdjieff and the sufis, with their crypto-reactionary views (and their black magic against liberal students interested in sufism, liberal sufis beware).
Today, in most minds, the words “liberalism” and “Islam” can come together only to form an oxymoron. However, this was not the case a century ago. The Islamic world was still much less open and democratic then the West, but most intellectuals and statesmen of that world were self-declared liberals.
One of the vanguards of this forgotten trend was an intellectual group in the late Ottoman Empire — which then covered almost the whole Muslim Middle East — called Young Ottomans. (Not to be confused with the later Young Turks, who were more secular and nationalist.) The Young Ottomans were both pious Muslims and committed liberals, who believed that the only cure to Muslim societies was to import the liberal democracy of the West and re-articulate it in Islamic terms.
The most prominent Young Ottoman was Namık Kemal, who saw liberty as the secret of the West’s ascendance, but also believed that Islam had the same ideal in its core. “Being created free by Allah, man is naturally obliged to benefit from this divine gift,” he wrote in his journal Hürriyet (“Freedom”) in 1868. “[Thus] state authority should be realized in the way which will least limit the freedom of the individual.”
Thanks to such idealistic calls, and also the pragmatic need to keep the multi-religious empire intact, the Ottoman State, the very seat of the Muslim Caliphate, realized very important reforms in the 19th and early 20th centuries. The powers of the sultan were limited by law, while citizen’s rights were guaranteed. Non-Muslim peoples of the empire, who used to be “protected” but unequal according to classical Islamic law, gained the status of equal citizenship. The Ottomans accepted a liberal constitution in 1876, and then elected a parliament, which welcomed many Greek, Armenian or Jewish deputies, along with Turkish, Arab or Albanian ones.
In the same era, the Arab intelligentsia was also living what Arab historian Albert Hourani called “the liberal age.” One of the prominent reformists, the Egyptian scholar Muhammad Abduh, who traveled in Europe, famously said that in Paris he saw “Islam without Muslims,” and on his return to Egypt he saw “Muslims without Islam.” He felt, in other words, that all the good things Muslim societies should have were in the West but not in Islamdom. He and his followers were only proud that Islam did not share Europe’s virulent anti-Semitism, which then was rampant in countries such as France.
Most of these late 19th or early 20th century Muslim liberals — who are commonly known as “Islamic modernists” — looked back at the formative centuries of Islam, and discovered some liberal themes buried under the weight of stagnant traditions. First of all, they found tolerant references in the Quran — verses declaring, “there is no compulsion in religion.” Besides, they noticed that some of the troubling hadiths (sayings attributed to Prophet Muhammad) might not be authentic, and could be representing only the misogyny and the bigotry of some medieval men. They, therefore, wanted to re-read the Quran in the light of the modern age.
Quite notably, this was the dominant intellectual trend in the Muslim world a century ago. Yet, again quite notably, it failed. Instead, the authoritarian ideology called “Islamism” gradually dominated the scene, to establish reactionary political parties, tyrannical regimes and even some terrorist offshoots.
But why? Why Islamic modernism failed and gave floor to radical Islamism?
My short answer to that big question, which I explore more deeply in my book, is the change in political context: At the end of the first quarter of the 20th century, the Ottoman Empire fell, giving rise to more than a dozen nation-states, almost all of which were colonized by European powers. Colonization inevitably led to anti-colonization, and replaced liberalism with a reactionary collectivism. The question, “How can we be like the West?” got replaced by “How can we resist the West?”
For worse, the post-colonial regimes in most Muslim nations turned out to be secular dictatorships, which oppressed the Islamic pious, only to push them further toward Islamism. In Iran, for example, the “modernist” Reza Shah, banned the veiling all women, ordered his police to patrol the streets to tear the chadors off, and executed the ayatollahs who protested his measures. As a response, the first modern Islamist terrorist movement, the Fadayan-e Islam (Devotees of Islam), was born, and it began assassinating the Shah’s men. Secular violence had created its Islamic mirror image.
Unfortunately, these two extremes — secular authoritarianism versus Islamic authoritarianism — created a vicious cycle in the modern Middle East, whose latest byproducts even hit the West.
Fortunately, though, we might be at the dawn of a new era, in which the vicious cycle can be broken. The Arab Spring, at least in Tunis and Egypt, offers an important ground, whereas my country, Turkey of the new century, which defeated its own secular authoritarianism without falling prey to Islamic authoritarianism, offers an important example. If we are lucky, more democracies can soon emerge in the Middle East, and Islamic liberalism, which is actually not that much of an oxymoron, can be reborn.
Mustafa
Akyol is a Turkish journalist, and the author of the just-released ‘Islam without Extremes: A Muslim Case for Liberty.’
Gurdjieff, Gold, and the rightist attack on America:
Many people have taken offense at the challenges to Gurdjieff (and Gold) here, but they have been misled by the surface bluff of these people.
As better insight might come from studying what the Republican right has wrought in the last forty years: the fruition, among other things, of the Gurdjieff-style attacks from the New Age on modernity, democracy, and economic leftism (liberal, socialist, etc…)
The last generation, and especially the last ten years, have shown something that is connected to the occult world of ‘devils’ like Gurdjieff (as Sillykitty early noted), and, being wary of conspiracy theories, it is important to suspect the real links here. The two are not the same, but the connection, suspected by many writers on the ‘conspiracy theory’ circuit can be deduced from the real hidden program of Gurdjieff.
That’s why the superficial attractiveness (to some) of figures like Gold is misleading. He is part of the sufistic/ right wing haute bourgeoisie attack on the left, its ideals, and politics. We are seeing the application of Gurdjieff-style tactics in the ‘shock doctrine’ operations outlined by Naomi Klein.
That said, I am sure the right (witness the cruder horrors of the MKUltra legacy) would love to find out about Gurdjieff style occult hypnosis tactics. These are provided by the said occultists, but the methods so far have not reached public/covert knowledge levels.
Comment from SillyKitty, a poem by Theodore Roethke
Welcome back to SK, once a frequent commenter here and at Darwiniana during the heroic phase of exposing Gurdjieffianity and EJ Gold. SK was a victim of Gold’s black magical ops, and testified to that here.
sillykitty
69.108.75.29 2011/07/19 at 2:12 am
The Waking
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
I feel my fate in what I cannot fear.
I learn by going where I have to go.
We think by feeling. What is there to know?
I hear my being dance from ear to ear.
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
Of those so close beside me, which are you?
God bless the Ground! I shall walk softly there,
And learn by going where I have to go.
Light takes the Tree; but who can tell us how?
The lowly worm climbs up a winding stair;
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
Great Nature has another thing to do
To you and me, so take the lively air,
And, lovely, learn by going where to go.
This shaking keeps me steady. I should know.
What falls away is always. And is near.
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
I learn by going where I have to go.
The Waking
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
I feel my fate in what I cannot fear.
I learn by going where I have to go.
We think by feeling. What is there to know?
I hear my being dance from ear to ear.
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
Of those so close beside me, which are you?
God bless the Ground! I shall walk softly there,
And learn by going where I have to go.
Light takes the Tree; but who can tell us how?
The lowly worm climbs up a winding stair;
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
Great Nature has another thing to do
To you and me, so take the lively air,
And, lovely, learn by going where to go.
This shaking keeps me steady. I should know.
What falls away is always. And is near.
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
I learn by going where I have to go.
sillykitty
1
Hits have doubled in the past week, ca. 800 visits per day, 2000 page views per day, perhaps temporarily, we will see. I am not always sure what post triggers these jumps (in the otherwise very steady traffic in the archives). Great, thanks for the attention. It could be the Levenda post on Blavatsky. I wish I could scan more of that book, but the author might protest.
I think that this blod, despite its ragged character, is a swell success. I may change the theme to the type visible at my other blogs, e.g. http://redfortyeight.com
And it might be useful to make that site into a blog for religious issues. A lot of people would like to comment here but are repelled by the Gurdjieff critique. A regular site for New Age issues would be useful (and to cross link), especially mixed with leftist questions:
The last and first men theme is a good post-Nietszechean New Age topic.
Remarkable comment with alarming signature on EJ Gold:
Suicide#9
suicide@suicide.com
71.22.104.185 2011/07/17 at 10:37 am
EJ Gold is a dangerous criminal who hides behind the cultural (literary)heritage of his father, his own deceptive spiritual work, the scores of idiots who follow him, and his “connections” with the world of celebrities. I am convinced that his soul is destined to suffer in one of the worst hells, but it would still be nice to see him arrested and put behind bars. Unfortunately it is impossible to prove occult interfences and abuses to a standard court of law. He has hurt enough people though that there is a counter-influence operating against him that will hopefully overpower him before he gets to leave his body.
EJ Gold is a dangerous criminal who hides behind the cultural (literary)heritage of his father, his own deceptive spiritual work, the scores of idiots who follow him, and his “connections” with the world of celebrities. I am convinced that his soul is destined to suffer in one of the worst hells, but it would still be nice to see him arrested and put behind bars. Unfortunately it is impossible to prove occult interfences and abuses to a standard court of law. He has hurt enough people though that there is a counter-influence operating against him that will hopefully overpower him before he gets to leave his body.
Suicide#9
Sillykitty parts ways
1 #
This comment expresses what few discover about Gold, who is a clever con man and front, but not in the usual sense. His front is for something dreadful.
He is a self-confessed fascist, supporter of genocide, shadowy occultist, applier of black magic, and a man who exploits former ‘students’ who have briefly passed through his school, that short stay the ‘signed and seaaled’ permission to be exploited off the premises for the remainder of their lives. Note how the ‘current’ crop of dupes stays in the ‘school’ very briefly, and is soon gone, replaced. Dealing with these ‘former’ members is the real point of this occult exploitation.
My strong memore seared into my mind is of the way ‘baraka’ went to those who ‘surrendered’ to nazi total obedience games, and I recall one ‘student’ (Jewish!!), running a spin off group of ‘work’ types with nazi arm bands. Gold sets up but always publicly denounces such things.
It is good to simple refuse allegiance, keep your distance, and void out any ‘work’ connections: they will enslave you.
I once often tried to ‘be fair’ and take a less harsh stance, after all Gold has some seemingly good qualities on the surface. Various sufis have warned me that, while that is true, the harsher judgment is fairer in the end, because of the damage he does to the potential of those he works with. He never produces development in anyone, but always sets people up, and then tries to either ‘iinvultuate’ or ‘feed’ off of them.
The point here is that these are deliberate ‘demonic’ tactics, the ‘work’, in the legacy of G’s Beelzebub. Wish they had never heard of you.
This critique of Marx should not let us forget that we are trying to expose religious exploitation on this blog, and public ignorance of the occult is one aspect of that.
The exploitations of Gurdjieffianity can, or potentially are (it never become a religion), truly dreadful, as Crowley style manipulation lurks behind the pious front of the ‘work’.
And Gurdjieff’s ambigous term ‘work’ was the orignal case of ‘union bashing’ as he indirectly calls for the renewal of labor exploitation under various guises. And his reactionary attacks on modernity and its freedoms as obvious signs of the religious exploiter gearing up.
Just for the ‘heck’, etc, I scanned this passage about Blavatsky from Peter Levenda’s Unholy Alliance (‘A History of Nazi Involvement with the Occult’).
you may or may not wish to pursue that text, which I can’t endorse. This obsessive aspect of our initial blog series here came to a halt for a while, but I thought I would reinvoke the issues (without comment for the moment) on the way to still another attempt at evaluation. Lavenda’s book (he wrangled a foreward from Norman Mailer) is hard to evaluate, and I don’t take this kind of material straight.
In any case, the effect of Blavatsky’s work is often misunderstood: Lavenda makes it clear that her thinking was taken all too seriously in the German occult revival that accompanied the genesis of the nazis.
Thinking caps, on!
Madame Blavatsky was born in what
is now Ukraine. She would be forty-four years old before creating the
Society for which she is best remembered, but her most important
achievements still lay ahead of her.
In 1877-two years after starting the Theosophical Society-she
would publish Isis Unveiled, an energetic blend of Eastern religion
and mysticism, European mythology and Egyptian occultism, whose
rambunctious style would pave the way for her even more ambitious
The Secret Doctrine in 1888. Some authors have written that the popu-
larity of Blavatsky’s writings in the late nineteenth century was evi-
dence of an antipositivist reaction among the middle classes to the
effect that science was having on religious belief. 5 In other words, sci-
ence was going so far toward “proving” the errors of faith that the
average person-suddenly up the existential creek without a paddle or
a prayer book-embraced the quasi-scientific approach toward reli-
gion represented in The Secret Doctrine.
Darwin had published The Origin of Species in 1859 and this was
followed by The Descent of Man in 1871; both books offered evolution
as the means by which humans were created, as opposed to the Biblical
account found in Genesis. The effect of the theory of evolution on
religion was as great then as it is now; the controversy over Darwinism
caused many people to question the existence of God, the possibility
of redemption, life after death, etc. People were startled to discover
that Biblical myths were at odds with scientific theories, and thus
began to doubt everything they ever believed. They found themselves
spiritually-and, perhaps, morally-adrift.
Blavatsky provided a much-appreciated antidote to Darwin even as
she was brazenly appropriating (and reversing) his theory of evolution.
As bizarre as her theories appear today, they were actually quite bril-
liant for her time, for they enabled intelligent and educated men and
women to maintain deep spiritual beliefs while simultaneously ac-
knowledging the inroads made by scientific research into areas pre-
viously considered beyond the domain of mere human knowledge.
Blavatsky outlined a map of evolution that went far beyond Darwin
to include vanished races from time immemorial through the present
imperfect race of humans, and continuing on for races far into the
future. Based on an idiosyncratic selection of various Asian scrip-
tures-including a few she made up herself-The Secret Doctrine’s
message would later be picked up by the German occultists, who wel-
comed the pseudoscientific prose of its author as the answer to a
dream. The smug and condescending attitude of scientists and their
devotees toward the “unscientific” had proved contagious among
many in the newly created middle class, and mystics began to find
themselves in the ridiculous position of having to satisfy the require-
ments of science in what are patently unscientific (we may say “nonsci-
entific”) pursuits. Modernism in general was seen as being largely an
urban, sophisticated, intellectual (hence “Jewish”) phenomenon, and
this included science, technology, the Industrial Revolution, and capi-
talism. The only wholesome lifestyle was that of the peasant on his
“land,” and the naive beliefs of the people of the land, the paganus or
pagans-with their sympathetic magic and worship of ancient gods in
the form of such superstitious practices as fertility rites, the lighting of
bonfires on particular days sacred to the old calendar, and the whole
host of cultural traditions that can be discovered by consulting Fra-
~ier’s The Golden Bough-were set up in opposition to “science,” with
tts suspect lack of human warmth and its cold indifference to the
‘gods’.
Science in its hubris was treading dangerously close to the territory
claimetl by religion (the origin of life, the creation of the universe,
even the existence of God), and in order to get there it would have to
dance a jig all over the occult “sciences.” Science still smarted from
the religious furors caused by Galileo and Copernicus; so rather than
mount an all-out attack on God, it was a lot safer to conduct a rear-
guard action and go after the ghosts.
But then along came Blavatsky, who took new scientific attitudes as
they were popularly understood and gave them a mystical twist. Taking
her cue from Darwin, she popularized the notion of a spiritual struggle
between various “races,” and of the inherent superiority of the
“Aryan” race, hypothetically the latest in the line of spiritual evolu-
tion. Blavatsky would borrow heavily from carefully chosen scientific
authors in fields as diverse as archaeology and astronomy to bolster her
arguments for the existence of Atlantis, extraterrestrial (or superterres-
trial) life-forms, the creation of animals by humans (as opposed to the
Darwinian line of succession), ete.
It should be remembered that Blavatsky’s works-notably Isis Un-
veiled and The Secret Doctrine-appear to be the result of prodigious
scholarship and were extremely convincing in their day. The rationale
behind many later Nazi projects can be traced back-through the
writings of von List, von Sebottendorff, and von Liebenfels-to ideas
first popularized by Blavatsky. A caste system of races, the importance
of ancient alphabets (notably the runes), the superiority of the Aryans
(a white race with its origins in the Himalayas), an “initiated” version
- of astrology and astronomy, the cosmic truths coded within pagan
myths … all of these and more can be found both in Blavatsky and
in the Nazi Party itself, specifically in the ideology of its Dark Crea-
ture, the 55. It was, after all, Blavatsky who pointed out the supreme
occult significance of the swastika.” And it was a follower of Blavatsky
who was instrumental in introducing the Protocols of the Elders of Zion
to a Western European community eager for a scapegoat.”
This is not to imply that Theosophy is inherently “fascist,” or that
Madame Blavatsky is somehow responsible for the horrors of Ausch-
witz. Although Blavatsky herself did not become ouertly involved in
political campaigning or intriguing, many of her followers and self-
appointed devotees could not help but use their newfound faith as a
springboard into the political arena. In this context it is interesting
to note that Blavatsky’s successor as president of the Theosophical
Society-Annie Besant (1847-1933)-became an important figure in
Indian politics during World War I and was the first woman elected
to serve as president of the Indian National Congress. She served as
mediator between various warring factions, and made the Theosophi-
cal Society (a magnet for intellectuals and Brahmin-class English-edu-
cated Indians at Theosophical Society headquarters in Adyar, outside
of Madras) prominent in the Indian Nationalist Movement.” (Later,
the Nazis would attempt to exploit the Indian Nationalist movement
for their own ends, since India then was still under British control,
making the Indian Nationalists and the National Socialists seem like
natural allies.)?
The fascinating mixture of armchair archaeology, paleo astronomy,
comparative religion, Asian scriptural sources, and European mythol-
ogy that can be found in Blavatsky’s writings was enough to cause a
kind of explosion of consciousness among many women and men of
her generation, including the scientists who would one day direct en-
tire departments within the 55. Blavatsky’s “creative” method of
scholarship inspired admirers and imitators throughout the world,
who considered the theories put forward in such books as The Secret
Doctrine to be literally true, and who used her writings as the basis for
further “research.”
In a way, this was understandable. In ancient times, alchemists were
the only chemists; as the centuries went by and science developed a
philosophy and methodology of its own, the alchemists and chemists
split off from each other and went their separate ways. So it was with
the rest of academia. In the nineteenth century-bereft of a unified
vision of humanity and cosmos, cosmos and God-it was no longer
easy to be an expert in every field of science and philosophy; by the
twentieth century, it would become impossible. The writings of peo-
ple like Blavatsky and her spiritual descendants represent the last gasp
of the “Renaissance Man” before science, medicine, the Industrial
Revolution, and mechanized warfare made specialization a necessity
and the medieval image of the all-powerful and all-knowing Magician
a bitter-sweet memory.
Comments on the ‘rape’ claim: scroll below to find the original post. In the early phases of this blog I was extremely wrathful on the Gurdjieff phenomenon, even as SK (sillykitty) brought his/her charges of ‘spiritual rape’ against EJ Gold.
The claim was from Orage originally!
Hassan said,
11.07.11 at 8:17 am · Edit
Hi
Gurdjieff tried to rape somebody? This is new to me. Can you tell me more?
Thanks,
Hassan
nemo said,
11.07.11 at 12:16 pm · Edit
Check the standard biographies.
Hassan said,
12.07.11 at 8:05 am · Edit
Hi nemo
OK. Guess I’ll have to buy some books then. I guess “The Harmonious Circle” is one of the books in which this “attempted rape” is mentioned?
Wellwell.
Paul said,
12.07.11 at 3:23 pm · Edit
Not sure I’d swallow all these claims of ‘rape’…
I don’t remember James Moore mentioning it in his biography of G.
Nemo has a profound and understandable dislike of Gurdjieff.
Some intelligent and sensitive people like Peter Brook and half his theatre group (to give one example) have devoted themselves to the Paris based group…I knew one woman who knew g in Paris during the war – and she was not a gullible fool….
However, there are obviously disaster groups out there – I have seen one. Candidates for a mental asylum – as G commented on visiting some groups in america!!!
nemo said,
14.07.11 at 12:37 pm · Edit
I will have to find the reference, where where… The issue came up here in the early phase of this blog: try the search box (and I will too).
I think that the incident was partly seen in the mind of various beholders and was an instance of aggressive provocation, more than rape.
So it is not clear.
A lot of ink has been spilled on Ouspensky’s break with Gurdjieff, in fact, whole books have been written, with a lot of backdated kitbitzing about how Ouspensky was some kind of betrayer of the cause, or that he should have persisted in the great teaching to the end, etc, etc…
The reality would seem a bit different. Consider this from James Webb’s The Harmonious Circle, p.384,
Orage’s explanation of the split is therefore of great interest. He always maintained that it was Gurdjieff’s near rape of Mrs. Y in1923-24 that finally decided Ouspensky. The date tallies and the scandal was of such proportions that the explanation is very plausible. If Orage were right this would explain Ouspensky’s obsession with Gurdjieff’s ‘integrity’ in his conversation with Boris Mouravieff after Gurdjieff’s crash, and why–out of loyalty to his teacher as a ‘member of the same family’ he refused to tell Mouravieff why he had decided to work alone.
Ouspensky suffered a great disappointment, and saw that the whole game was going to suffer failure and collapse, and he was right, although the immense proliferation of Gurdjieffianity he did not foresee.
The ‘work’ was a failed enterprise by 1924, and it is no use blaming Ouspensky.
Interesting…given that the Buddha never taught “mindfulness” meditation or “vipassana” meditation (it was invented by Mahasi Sayadaw):
The Jhanas are sometimes considered a dangerous practice because they are not an Insight Practice. The primary factor of the first Jhana is Piti and Piti is mentioned as a corruption of insight in the commentaries (see, for example, the Visuddhimagga). This has been taken to mean that Piti is bad, when all that is meant is that Piti should not be mistaken for a non-mundane state. Theravadan Buddhism in the West has primarily come down from the Mahasi Sayadaw tradition in Burma and this tradition is a “dry insight” (non-Jhanic) tradition. Thus the Jhanas are seldom mentioned, let alone taught, in Western Theravadan Buddhist teaching.
Almost any book on early Buddhist meditation will tell you that the Buddha taught two types of meditation: samatha and vipassana. Samatha, which means tranquillity, is said to be a method fostering strong states of mental absorption, called jhana. Vipassana — literally “clear-seeing,” but more often translated as insight meditation — is said to be a method using a modicum of tranquillity to foster moment-to-moment mindfulness of the inconstancy of events as they are directly experienced in the present. This mindfulness creates a sense of dispassion toward all events, thus leading the mind to release from suffering. These two methods are quite separate, we’re told, and of the two, vipassana is the distinctive Buddhist contribution to meditative science. Other systems of practice pre-dating the Buddha also taught samatha, but the Buddha was the first to discover and teach vipassana. Although some Buddhist meditators may practice samatha meditation before turning to vipassana, samatha practice is not really necessary for the pursuit of Awakening. As a meditative tool, the vipassana method is sufficient for attaining the goal. Or so we’re told.
But if you look directly at the Pali discourses — the earliest extant sources for our knowledge of the Buddha’s teachings — you’ll find that although they do use the word samatha to mean tranquillity, and vipassana to mean clear-seeing, they otherwise confirm none of the received wisdom about these terms. Only rarely do they make use of the word vipassana — a sharp contrast to their frequent use of the word jhana. When they depict the Buddha telling his disciples to go meditate, they never quote him as saying “go do vipassana,” but always “go do jhana.” And they never equate the word vipassana with any mindfulness techniques.