The glamour of the TB system and its subtle permissiveness for its elite is what gives Ole N his derivative legitimacy.

Once Ole is retired, others will continue to sprout on the lineage tree.

Its the elitism built right into Vajrayana has to be examined, because its the tree Ole grafted himself onto and gets his sap from.

It appears that the fifty stanzas of guru devotion are important in the in many sects of Vajrayana, at least the Kagyu and Geluk. It would be interesting to learn whether this text is used in Diamond Way.

[www.google.com]


That quotation is from the Introduction of Geshe Ngawang Dhargyey's short commentary on the Fifty Verses: the 50 stanzas of guru devotion.

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Guru devotion involves both thought and action. The most important thing is to develop the total conviction that your guru is a buddha—this is a prerequisite for receiving any insight.

So you cant make progress unless you have total conviction that your guru is a buddha. Right away you're stuck.

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Likewise, if you can train yourself to see only good qualities and never any faults in your guru, this positive outlook will come to pervade, amplify and reflect your own state of mind. As we all have buddha nature within us—the clear, uncontaminated state of pure mind established without any true independent existence—seeing our guru as a buddha gives us the possibility of activating and realizing our own buddha nature. Seeing only our guru’s faults merely reinforces our own shortcomings and negative attitudes; seeing only his perfection enables us to attain the perfection of buddhahood ourselves.

Note that the options are presented as binary, just option A or option B, with nothing else. Either you see 'only good qualities in your guru' or you see 'only our guru's faults'.

This is the black and white thought pattern of early childhood. It excludes the possiblity that one single person can exhibit a range, a spectrum of behaviors.

Two there is a trap.

*If you see only good qualities in your guru you improve yourself and are promised support for practice.

* If you see only bad qualities in the guru this reinforces your shortcomings. (note that anyone who dares venture worries or criticism of a small behavior will be written off as seeing only bad qualities in the guru--there is no room for loyal dissent in this kind of relationship. )

So anyone observing actual bad behavior in a guru is automatically on the spot, even if he or she never utters a peep. They're set up to feel shame ridden about themselves, by observing actual bad behavior (or borderline creepy behavior) in a guru.

This is a child's state of mind. Or that of a serf. Daddy guru can only be good. There is no other option. Even his bad behavior isnt actual bad behavior; its a mere appearance of bad behavior done to make him seem more human and approachable so more will come to the Dharma.

Commentary on the 50 verses of devotion

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THE FIFTY VERSES OF GURU DEVOTIONLama Nga -chu-pa

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The root text was composed by Ashvagosha in the first century BCE, translated into English by Sharpa Tulku,Khamlung Tulku, Alexander Berzin and Jonathan Landaw, and published by the Library of Tibetan Works andArchives in 1975. Gen Rinpoche Geshe Ngawang Dhargyey gave this commentary at the LTWA in DharamsalaJuly–August 1976. It was translated by Losang Gyaltsen and edited by Nicholas Ribush from his notes of the class.
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The guru to be avoided

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(7)A disciple with sense should not accept as a guru someone who lacks compassion o ris prone to anger, vicious, arrogant, possessive, undisciplined or boastful of his knowledge.This verse explains the kind of guru we should not cultivate; it mentions some disqualifications. Anintelligent disciple should not cultivate such a guru.

(Corboy)But...this text and commmentary do not imagine that a guru might have the right qualifications yet later in his career be corrupted by his role - the great lack in the Tibetan/Varayana tradition is that unlike modern social psychology there is no recognition based on history that power and adulation corrupt character. What if a student's guru starts out humble but later turns into a bad apple after years of adulation? Or has hidden his behavior and presents only a humble wise demeanor to the world? Remember, the tantrics feel entitled to conceal information when it suits them.

Later, the commentator has this dialogue.

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Question: How can we know if the guru has these qualities and qualifications?

Gen Rinpoche: Actually, if the guru is really an authentic teacher, most of the qualifications would beknown because of his reputation* as a learned lama and great practitioner, but you yourself canunderstand after you have examined him properly. As I mentioned before, you should cultivate a guru about whom you can confidently think, “If I take this teacher as my guru my faith won’t degenerate later.” When your faith in him is resolute you can cultivate that teacher as your guru

*Corboy: Reputation can be misleading. Two, we have testimony from legions of people who did start out with confident faith and were tragically disillusioned. Once again this neglects the sad possiblity that a guru might start out well but later be corrupted by the role.



What is interesting is the text speaks of the possiblity of despising your guru. It makes one wonder how often gurus misbehaved that a text had to be written in which the possibility of negative feels towards a guru would be discussed in such detail.

Consequences of disrespecting your guru.

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you are foolish enough to despise your guru, you will contract contagious diseasesand those caused by harmful spirits and will die (a horrible death) caused by demons,plagues or poison.The invisible consequence is rebirth in hell. Here, the visible consequences are enumerated. If youbelittle your guru you will suffer from infectious diseases and die from harm inflicted by othersentient beings, such as snake bite or tiger attack.

Corboy: In India and Tibet, people got sick all the time and still to this day get sick all the time. In the days when cooking had to be done in open fires and pots, kitchens and firepits were potential hazards.

So if anyone got sick and was known to be on bad terms with his drunken guru, the illness or death could be conveniently blamed on disciple's own impiety. The drunken guru, with better food, an entourage, and well housed, was less exposed to pathogens than disciples. If a disciple who honoured the drunkeng guru died young, he or she would be given a good funeral and be cited as a good example, while the misfortune of the dead skeptic would be told in all the villages. Confirmation bias.

In those parts of the world there was no shortage of accident or misfortune, and plenty of disease factors. People were scared. Life was unmanageble, so go to Magic Daddy.

Dirty water, unclean food, dung, wolves, tigers were aprowl. Tents, houses and buildings were porous. No shortage of rats, mice, snakes, lice fleas, flies and mosquitoes. Rabies was enzootic in the animal population. So was bubonic plag and anthrax. Cholera, typhoid and waterborne microbes. Smallpox and plague. Farm accidents. Malnutrition.

In Turtle Feet, in modern Dharamsala, Nikoli Grozni describes the level of filth. Even today many travellers to Nepal, Tibet and India are advised to get a huge range of immunizations and carry medicines with them plus observe sanitary precautions.


You must even avoid anyone who "belittles the guru"

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It is also very clear in many sutras that you shouldn’t cultivate friendship with those who havebelittled their guru; you shouldn’t even drink water with them. If you do associate with them, yoursacred words of honor will degenerate and, no matter how hard you try, you won’t be able toachieve any powerful attainments.

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The Kalachakra Root Tantra clearly states that no matter how many offerings you make to theThree Jewels in a million eons or how much charity to sentient beings you practice over the sameperiod, you still can’t actualize enlightenment in a single lifetime, but if you cultivate pure gurudevotion without transgression you can actualize enlightenment in a single lifetime of thisdegenerate age

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As Geshe Potowa said, “Disciples who regard Vajradhara as better than their own guru have nopossibility of gaining powerful attainments.”

This makes it clear that if, while practicing any meditation deity and doing the visualization, you regard the meditation deity and your guru as separate—the deity as very high and your guru as very low, separate—because of that great mistake, you won’t be able to actualize any powerfulattainments, even if you meditate for a hundred years.

On the other hand, if you meditate on the inseparability of the meditation deity and your guru, it’s impossible that you won’t actualize anypowerful attainments.

**Corboy note. Once you are in these inseparability practices, you become unable to see in any adult way, whether your vajra guru is doing something against the precepts.)

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If you can do what he asks, if youcan act in accordance with his words, you should accept, but if it’s too hard, then explain yourdifficulty politely. Don’t ignore what he’s asking, but tell him intelligently why you can’t do it.If your guru tells you to do something that you feel goes against your three types of morality,you can avoid doing it, but explain intelligently and unemotionally why.

*Corboy. Note the emphasis on 'explain intelligently and unemotionally why."

THe worse and more shocking a guru's behavior, the harder it is to respond "unemotionally". Showing the slightest bit of human, appropriate emotional depth will immediately invalidate your testimony. And again, the worse and more shocking and disillusining the gurus behavior, the harder it is to respond 'intelligently and unemotionally."

"Its the elitism built right into Vajrayana has to be examined, because its the tree Ole grafted himself onto and gets his sap from."

Great, Corboy, that´s it and that´s why I, Grainne and Misstyk always brought in some fundamental thoughts about TB or Vajrayana to make understandable on which system Nydahl´s system is grounding.

To make my story better understandable I would like to tell you, that no one accept Nydahl could have tied me to TB. Due to my lifestyle which was similar to his, my love for freedom, free thinking and philosophy, my intellectuall skills and my open mind he was the only one who could teach me independend of the fact he was not really my type. I flied above the different gestures of TB and was sure, just a Yogi is worth to be my teacher, never a monk. Did I had any attraction to christian monasteries? No.

So I read the stories of the 84 Indian Mahasiddhas -four of them were women - with great passion and was charmed by the colourful world of their lifes, their enlightened experiences, ways of thinking and powerful influence. And I believed in the myth of TB, that they really had got teachings by Buddha in a esoteric manner. So in Nydahl´s eyes I was a student of Sahara because I went into a deep selfless meditation in front of a picture, which showed him and his Dakini, "Riding on the Storm". How suggestible I was! But do you want to know the truth? I like it. I like to switch between an open mind and intellectuall thinking, its my favourite. And so Nydahl was able to catch me, to control me and my energies in a Tantric masters style for a while.

But one thing he could not know: I am not intended for anyone´s use.

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grainne uaile

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suenam
what motivates you to draw an line around Tibetan Buddhism to single it out from these other forms of mind control which you yourself are referencing?

I was merely pointing out that it doesn't take a person with low self-esteem to be hurt in these religions. All you need is a master manipulator, as gurus are. I don't believe that mind control should be used by anyone, but we are talking about lamas and gurus here, especially Ol'. I merely mentioned how the masses are controlled by experts at mind control. It isn't just vulnerable disciples who are controlled, all people are vulnerable. I didn't especially single out Tibetan Buddhism, as I also have brought up gurus in Hinduism.

I understand what you are saying here, but I don’t see why you are singling out gurus when the book you quoted was about political manipulation in a non-religious setting. If it is so widespread as this, and I agree that both manipulation and abuse of inequality are far more widespread, then it seems that goes far deeper than just vajrayana, and is so widespread that it transcends boundaries based upon religion, nationality, culture, etc.. In fact what you seem to be highlighting could be better described in terms of gender relations and the prevalence of patriarchy found not only in India and Tibet but also throughout the globe, and that is why I interpret Nydahl's behaviour more in terms of male chauvanism, dominant egoism, and arrogance also found in (male) politicians and leaders in all walks of life.

"I merely mentioned how the masses are controlled by experts at mind control." This matches your view that the world is composed of helpless victims and evil oppressors. I wonder which category you place yourself in here? And what about all of us contributing on this thread or reading it, and all the people you know, do they fit into the category of the "controlled masses" or "experts at mind control"?

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grainne uaile
Maybe you would like to tell us how Tibetan Buddhism has helped you. Are you more loving, compassionate, and peaceful as a result of these teachings?

It's hard to self-report on this, and my practice is not the same as that of DWB, in fact I wouldn't really call myself a vajrayana practitioner at all, and as I said before, I view Nydahl's teachings as a corruption. What I have found is that my perspective on life is broader and that I have developed patience and a degree of contentment. If you are interested in seeing another side to Tibetan Buddhism then take a look at this book written by a woman, about a much admired Tibetan female practitioner from the 11th Century, [www.wisdom-books.com]

Not everyone in the world uses mind control, so I don't consider everyone a victim. I only meant that masses of people can be and are controlled by the use of mind control, and these people do not have low self-esteem which was implied that people had if they were a victim of mind control. I am tired of going around and around with you. I think Corboy has done an excellent job here.

IMO it shakes down into whether whether one takes interconnectedness seriously and consders Ole important, but also as a visible symptom of a diseased system he grafted himself into (Vajrayana).

Or if one refuses to question the benevolence of Vajrayana and prefers to consider Ole and other identified misbehaving lamas as the the problem.

A clumsy medical analogy.

Two ways to regard persons with smallpox lesions.

In one instance -- recognition that the lesions are just a visible manifestation of a contagious disease that not only systemically attacks the victims entire body; it also threatens the community and requires a public health/education response

Option two-- treat small pox patients case by case, seeing only the visible lesions as the problem, ignoring the deeper chain of cause and effect. In this instance one lacks any way to create a response that protects the rest of the community.
--

Approach one)Smallpox is a highly contagious systemic viral disease, and skin blisters are one of its manifestions. One cannot treat smallpox by putting medicated ointment on the blisters. One also has to support the patient with intensive care, anti viral medication and recognize this is a contagious disease and that public health measures are needed, such as quarantine and immunizing the general public so that the virus cannot infect any new victims.

In this approach, both patient centered and based on germ theory and public health principles, one recognizes that the single person with smallpox lesions is not just one sad case. This person represents a staggering public health emergency. The community is threatened with an epidemic, an epidemic may already be in our midst. We have to abandon our illusions of safety. We have to contact the CDC and WHO and the local officials, at once. We are going to lose sleep and face media shit storms. We may see people die.

But facing all this is the only way to do a proper, modern response to that single case of smallpox.


Approach #2)One can buy serenity by telling oneself that smallpox is just a bad case of pus pimples, treatable with soothing ointment on the visible lesions--while ignoring that a dangerous contagious viral disease has entered the community.

In this instance, by identifying and treating it as one case of bad pimples at a time, case by case, one fails to look at the entire picture and see this in full dimension as a potential epidemic requiring not just treatment of visible cases, but protecting the entire community who have been potentially exposed.

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grainne uaile
Not everyone in the world uses mind control, so I don't consider everyone a victim. I only meant that masses of people can be and are controlled by the use of mind control, and these people do not have low self-esteem which was implied that people had if they were a victim of mind control. I am tired of going around and around with you. I think Corboy has done an excellent job here.

Due to the fact that only one of the many contributors to this thread have reported anything remotely similar to what you are talking about, there only seem to be 2 possibilities.
- Either Nydahl only targets specific people and even then his mind-control doesn't seem to have worked very well as it has resulted in the whole thing being reported online, causing law suits and a lot of grief for Nydahl. This hardly seems a basis on which to build the sort of theory you are proposing.
-Or you believe that his mind-control is so universal and complete that the single poster on here who has reported it is in fact the only one to have seen through this and that the rest of us are still duped (apart from Corboy who actually had no involvement with DWB). If that is the case then it is hardly surprising we are going round in circles.

The general consensus on here seems to be that Nydahl's views on women, Islam, and even his understanding of Buddhist doctrine are quite unsophisticated. If you wish to make him out to be an expert and an arch-manipulator then I wish you luck with that. It would seem to reflect more on your own level of understanding than on any actual reality.

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suenam
if the issue of mind control is so widespread as to include advertising and politics in liberal western democracies, then what motivates you to draw an line around Tibetan Buddhism to single it out from these other forms of mind control

Most importantly, what does this have to do with Nydahl?

Corboy explained approx 60 pages ago how the ngondro devotional exercises set followers up to become thralls of the guru. And karam-mudra told us of her own experience, whereby Ole (and his Karmapa) tried to take advantage of her when she was in an altered state of consciousness. Mind control seems to be an important component of some aspects of TB, and one of Ole's methods for abusing his students. These points have been part of the discussion all along; why suddenly begin objecting now?

The fact that TB is, in its highest, most clandestine practices, a sex cult grafted onto Buddhism from Hinduism has everything to do with Nydahl. A letter from Shamar was posted earlier, in which he said it was clear that it was the sexual aspect of Vajrayana that attracted Nydahl in the first place. Without it, he may not have paid it any mind.

This isn't letting him off the hook. Any guru who uses his students for sexual gratification is guilty of breach of fiduciary trust and ethics. There's a whole wide world of women outside the sangha for any teacher to choose from for sexual thrills. But it's helpful to analyze the structure of TB in order to gain an understanding of why problems are so rampant. The cause of these ethical problems is multi-factorial, and the tantric nature of the religion is one of the factors.

Grainne Uaile didn't say all the monasteries use children for sex, don't put words in her mouth. Many of the monasteries do sexually abuse boy novices, though. This is a scandal just beginning to break, now that young tulkus are beginning to speak out about it. (See the thread on that topic, for more info.) The elder Kalu Rinpoche had a Tibetan teen "consort", who died (of a heart attack, he claimed) while in his "care". We don't know if girls are still--in the 21st Century--used as consorts, but we do know that the tantric texts specify the use of young girls and teens. Even if the rituals are performed mainly through visualization, visualizing 9-year olds and 12-year olds in sexual situations raises pedophelic appetites.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Scholar Stephen Batchelor on relative morality in Buddhism:
"The Two Truths Doctrine is the single greatest disaster to hit Buddhism. It arose from the Indianization of Buddhism, which introduced the dual concepts of a) the illusory world of Maya, and b) Divine Truth. This opened the door to a double standard, which caused not only a philosophical problem, but practical, behavioral problems."
--lecture at Upaya Zen Center, December 2011

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Misstyk
The fact that TB is, in its highest, most clandestine practices, a sex cult grafted onto Buddhism from Hinduism has everything to do with Nydahl.

And the fact that Tantrism has impacted every major Indian religion, and spread throughout East and Southeast Asia would seem to make such generalizations verge on thinly veiled racism.

They also seem to detract from us focusing on the activity of one horny Danish guy who has built up a personality cult on the basis of a misunderstanding of them.

I'm not "objecting now" as you put it. I am trying to stay focused on the topic.

As you said yourself, Nydahl did try to take advantage karam-mudra, but this seems a rather flimsy basis for the argument that a huge part of Asia is practising a religion based upon a sex-cult, nor the fact that they seem to have exactly the same issues of abuse that are also found in the rest of the world.

edit: I have seen nothing first hand to suggest that the majority of the women who want to sleep with Nydahl are acting any differently to any woman trying to sleep with a high ranking politician or famous pop star. If anyone has witnessed anything more sinister than that then I am very happy to read about it and consider the evidence (rather than indulge in speculative consipracy theories).



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/29/2013 11:07AM by suenam.

It's not racism to say that tantrism was incorporated into Buddhism, and eventually travelled to Tibet. That's a historical fact. Scholars write about this (See "Indian Esoteric Buddhism", by Ronald Davidson, for one. But there are many books available on this.) Davidson discusses how the phenomenon of the personality cult was one of many elements (including sex and power) that were adopted by Buddhism and became popular with monks. Personality cults are part of the package in tantric Buddhism, though not all gurus choose to go that route. There's personal choice involved, no argument there. Nydahl obviously has chosen to take that to an extreme, but he's not the only one in the TB tradition to do so.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/29/2013 11:28AM by Misstyk.