TODAY'S CONSIDERATIONS
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To clarify, the suggestion to seek facts and truth vs. religious and spiritual concepts does not involve even the slightest hint of an anti-religion / anti-spirituality bias. Maharaj tried both religion and spirituality at varying times early on as key ingredients in his version of the Ultimate Medicine. But he would eventually abandon the use of both. Why?
He abandoned them both because they proved to be ineffective, long-term, and because he came to understand that any version of the Ultimate Medicine which was to have any efficacy at all called for the use of psychology-based pointers because the Ultimate Sickness, he came to see, is a mental sickness.
Note the sequence of the awarenesses which came and which led him to the shifts he made:
I. Maharaj made clear that the sole job of the non-dual teacher is to free his protégés of the learned ignorance which is trapping them in misery and suffering.
II. He came to see, via his own experiences, that the elimination of learned ignorance and entrapment in misery and suffering had nothing to do with learning more and more dogma or with endlessly engaging in spiritual exercises.
III. Therefore, his ending the use of both had nothing to do with being anti-religion or anti-spirituality but instead had everything to do with setting aside versions of the Ultimate Medicine which he saw were ineffective in order to use a version which could work.
IV. When Maharaj advised seekers to forget both religion and spirituality, it had nothing to do with being "anti-" any specific institution or organization but had everything to do with finding a more effective version of the Ultimate Medicine which could free seekers from the key symptoms of the Ultimate (Mental) Sickness, namely, "ignorance, stupidity, and insanity."
V. He also realized that the two predominant sources of those mental symptoms of "ignorance, stupidity, and insanity" were the very things he had tried to use to eliminate those symptoms.
VI. Most significantly, he realized that such an approach made no sense at all.
He may as well have been trying to treat persons with tuberculosis by moving them into the ward of a hospital where scores of TB patients were isolated and instructing his listeners to spend the entire day every day bending over and placing their noses near the mouths of the sickest TB patients and inhaling their diseased breath.
One cannot be rendered free of "ignorance, stupidity, and insanity" by taking in more "ignorance, stupidity, and insanity" from the persons who are already spreading more "ignorance, stupidity, and insanity" than any others.
Yet even then, keeping one's distance from those spreading more "ignorance, stupidity, and insanity" than any others does not imply that those persons or their venues are to be hated.
In my youth, I spent many months each year with Grandmother, and some days I would play with the children of one of her nearest neighbors, a fellow named Josh. When I arrived one summer at the end of May, one of the first things Grandmother said was "This summer, you must stay away from Josh's house and his children. He has TB now and I don't want you to get sick."
In the city where I lived with my parents, Mr. Kerley across the street had recently bought the first TV in our neighborhood and he would let us watch one thirty-minute program a week. With that experience fresh in the consciousness, it was easy for me to misunderstand Grandmother, so I said, "I watch thirty minutes of TV every week. Is that going to make me sick?" She smiled and replied, "I said 'TB,' meaning tuberculosis, not 'TV'."
(It would be years later before I came to understand that TV in some cases can make parts of a population very sick, such as when a station transmits and passes along the symptoms of the Ultimate Sickness to its viewers.)
But to continue with the point that Maharaj's later warning to his visitors - that they should ignore both dogma and spirituality because neither addresses the symptoms of the Ultimate Sickness - was not evidence of any anti-religion or anti-spirituality prejudice.
If Maharaj's experiences had shown him clearly that no place was spreading more ignorance, stupidity, and insanity than the farsan snack shops in Bombay (Mumbai), then he would have advised seekers to stay away from farsan snack shops. If a seeker wanted to go inside and try one of the salty snacks, he may have said, "Rock and roll. Visit that place if you like, but do not stay there. Move beyond."
It so happened, however, that he came to understand not that the most ignorance, stupidity, and insanity was being spread in farsan snack shops but that, in fact, the most ignorance, stupidity, and insanity was being spread in religious and spiritual venues. And that is the sole reason he advised seekers to seek elsewhere rather than in religious and spiritual venues.
And, yes, he eventually admitted that one such venue where ineffective religious and spiritual pointers had been shared was in a loft in an upper floor near Grant Road at Khetwadi 10th Lane in Bombay.
Thus he said: "Stop reading the talks in I AM THAT. Listen to my later talks." Were there some pointers in that collection of transcripts of earlier talks which provided a glimpse into his later mind-and-psychology-focused message? Yes, but they were buried beneath far too many dogma-and-spirituality-based diversions for most readers to find.
That is why he would later advise, “Give up spirituality” and “follow your normal inclinations" and "forget spirituality." Focusing eventually on the psychological roots of the Sickness, he advised, “There is no such thing as a mind” and “I have no mind.” He advised seekers to go to the “no-mind” state, to reach a state of “zero concepts.” Why?
Because the Ultimate Sickness is not about having too little religion; it is not about having a “spiritual malady” or a “sick spirit.” Humankind’s main problem, he came to see, is a mental problem marked by what he called an excess of “ignorance and stupidity and insanity.”
Religion does not cure ignorance and magical thinking. It contributes to them. Spirituality does not cure ignorance and magical thinking. It can contribute to them. Nor can either eliminate the insanity of distorted thinking, delusions, personality disorders, neuroses or psychoses.
No, the problem with humans is not rooted in widespread agnosticism and atheism. Neither agnosticism nor atheism is widespread, evidenced by the fact that 97% of all persons claim an affiliation with one religion or another; additionally, the problem with humans is not rooted in their ignoring things spiritual. Millions upon millions are presently reporting, and reporting proudly, that they “are spiritual” or that they "are spiritual creatures presently having a human experience.”
No, it should be clear that the problem with humanity has nothing to do with too little religion or too little spirituality because both are plentiful - and have been for thousands of years - yet the problems of humanity continued - and continues - alongside an abundance of "religious" and "spiritual" beliefs.
Obviously, therefore, neither religion nor spirituality nor any mythical procedure offers a solution or the answer or a cure or any effective treatment for what ails humankind, namely, the preponderance of ignorance-and-stupidity-and-insanity-filled minds.
So Maharaj was not “anti-religion” and was not “anti-spirituality.” That is not the case here, either. It’s just that he came to see that both are irrelevant for those who are trapped in (and would be free of) . . .
personality and personality disorders and mind-based neuroses and psychoses
and
misery and suffering
which are all rooted in
the “ignorance and insanity” of the Ultimate Sickness.
Thus, rather than becoming “anti-religion” or “anti-spirituality,” Maharaj became doggedly “anti-ignorance” and tenaciously "anti-stupidity" and staunchly “pro-sanity.”
And that is the invitation offered here as well, specifically, to become doggedly “anti-ignorance” and tenaciously "anti-stupidity" and staunchly “pro-sanity.”
To be continued.
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