Here is a website that takes an interesting stance--how Yogananda changed his teachings, and how the book, Autobiography of a Yogi was, according to this author, edited after Yogananda's death.
This is important, friends. Autobiography of a Yogi was a book that in its way, made history by shaping people's hopes and expectations of what they would find in India or from anyone advertizing Hindu spirituality. The book was in people's hands, minds and backpacks.
Apparently, one would need to obtain successive editions of the book and see how it has changed.
when at a yoga house in India.
Quote
http://oaks.nvg.org/sr7.htmlYogananda Praising Fascism in the 30s
The average man cannot think clearly . . . He needs the master mind of a Dictator in order to think right and do right." - Yogananda. "Interview". East West Magazine, February 1934, p. 25.
"A master brain like that of Mussolini does more good than millions of social organizations of group intelligence." - Yogananda. "Interview, East-West, February 1934, p. 3.
"What the heart is full of, the mouth overflows with." On this page is some Yoganandic writing from the first half of the 1930s, when he was about 40 years old. He is quoted verbatim from his own magazine, and the immediate source of the sayings that follow is a thread on the SRF Walrus Discussion Board [NA]:
Hitler is to be admired for leaving the League of Nations because peace can never be attained by the victor and vanquished attitude, but on a basis of equality and brotherhood. Instead of preventing Hitler from having equal armament with other nations, the other nations should reduce the armaments to the level of Germany, then the millions of dollars that are thrown away on idle battleships could be used for national or international prosperity. America, France, and Great Britain should reduce their armaments first, and thereby destroy the desire of Japan, Russia, and Germany to become equally armed. An insulted, snubbed Germany, if it gets away from the uplifting guidance of Hitler, may join Russia and make her a more powerful enemy of France and so on. The Allies must reduce their own armaments first, and then they will find out that the example speaks louder than words.
[Swami Yogananda. "Christmas message to the Nations of the Earth". East-West Magazine, December, 1933, p. 25]
Some Interview
In East-West of February 1934, Volume 6, No. 4, there is an interview with Swami Yogananda.
Question: What message has Hindu philosophy to offer toward solving present-day problems of peace between nations and averting international disasters?
From the Gandhi way: The United States of the World
Answer: Mahatma Gandhi . . . has demonstrated the philosophy of non-violence and non-co-operation with evil systems and of resistance by a spiritual force.
[T]he nations of the earth must scrap the engines of war and try to settle their international disputes in the Gandhi way.
y love, Gandhi has made over 60 per cent of the people of India stop drinking. By his spinning wheel, philosophy of plain living and high thinking, and the doctrine of all for each and each for all, Gandhi is not only founding India's freedom on solid Spiritual laws, but is showing the nations how they can build an United States of the World . . .
. . .
Answer: We may stumble on the way, we may slip backward a little, but being endowed with Divine Intelligence, mentally we shall be moving constantly toward the goal of Truth and understanding. . . .
Individual national selfishness must be sacrificed for the greater patriotism of international common well-being. Then it will be found that real international upliftment includes the national upliftment.
Question: Individualism and socialism are conflicting philosophies in the modern world. Which is more likely to prevail in the future?
Answer: Individual perfection and social upliftment are interdependent. A master brain like that of Mussolini does more good than millions of social organizations of group intelligence. Yet, {p. 3] if many persons in a group should develop the brain power of a Mussolini, they would be greater than the individual Mussolini.
Socialism, consisting of evolved individuals, will prevail in the end, but as long as people are not highly evolved, individualism will keep coming to the surface. Individualism exists only for the ushering in of Spiritual socialism . . .
Question: Does the rise, in recent years, of dictatorships as forms of government indicate the failure and ultimate doom of Democracy?
Answer: A society of morons and unthinking people will never establish a real Democracy. The average man cannot think clearly, but is ruled by explosions of his emotions. He needs the master mind of a Dictator in order to think right and do right. [But in a] Democracy of universal wisdom and agreement, [the mass of people] will then be able to govern themselves spontaneously by the universal laws of Truth. Then Dictators will be unnecessary.
One real wise Dictator, like President Roosevelt, is much better than too many cooks of small Dictators and politicians, who spoil the broth. Much is discussed and nothing accomplished with many. A whole-hearted co-operation with . . . with active, wise President Roosevelt, will bring prosperity and international balance. Democracy will never fail; it is the growing life of nations, which will mature through the trials of republicanism, dictatorships, capitalism, and any other "isms" which are necessary for its growth.
Question: What effect would independence for India probably have on that nation's diplomatic and commercial relations with other countries?
Answer: Germany and England did a great deal of business with India, but India's non-violence war with England has caused a boycott of most European goods.
Unless England gives complete independence, or self-government, to India, India will boycott all European goods.
A free India will enrich the world . . . when she uses the hoarded gold of the idle princes to buy agricultural and scientific machinery.
[Swami Yogananda. "An Interview". East West Magazine, February 1934, Vol 6, p. 3 and 25. Emphasis added]
Some Discussion
The following citations and renderings are from the SRF Walrus, the string called "early East-West [srfwalrus.yuku.com/topic/1591], and initiated by one "Divine Gypsy". The Walrus is or was a pro-Yogananda discussion-board. It's policy usually did not allow criticism of the guru Yogananda. But what did appear on one Walrus string? Yogananda-critical, disillusioned postings due to thinking activity among former monastics, for one thing. The sayings stem from the Walrus, and relate to the Yogananda citations above.
In case the bulky SRF Walrus now has folded in and you are unable to retrieve the source on the Internet by use of the Internet Archive ◦WayBack Machine, be happy to know I took care to download plenty of Walrus material several years back, just as I have taken the trouble to ◦get a copy of Yogananda's praise of dictatorship in 1934.
Here are hints that show how cult members react to bad news about their leader - not all bad for socialists or dictatorship-minded Americans either, but too bad for some Jews, I figure. A sense of danger is there in some postings, mixed with "guru loyalty", of course.
"God help SRF if any mainstream Christian or Jewish organizations find out about this," says one of them.
"[The SRF senior minister] Anandamoy, he advised me to forget such controversies and focus on the techniques," says one. Another says, "Focusing on the techniques (which do work, I think we all agree) and ignoring the hard questions like some monastics have counseled is just a cop out [a backing-out]."
It was hard for one member to realize that this supposedly omniscient Guru made such staggeringly obvious blunders and egregious errors. "From Yogananda's glowing praise of Hitler, one would expect that the all-seeing Guru was simply unaware of the facts," he also says.
"Hitler was evil, I don't doubt that and to hear Yogananda compliment him is weird," says another.
"Guru lord, I bow to Thee," or "Guru image of Brahman...", comments another.
"What kind of omniscience did he have if he couldn't see ANY of this?" is asked.
"PY made huge errors of judgment on some things that he just wasn't knowledgeable about . . . he missed pretty obvious atrocities in 1933 and after," concludes another.
"Maybe his errors, and ours, have lessons for us . . . I won't believe everything blindly again," says one.
"PY is falling way short of the mark," says another.
"What kind of perfect master would create an imperfect organization, or allow an imperfect [SRF] president to lead it?" asks one.
"If you've taken kriya, you actually signed a contract, such that God is going to leave you in this ocean of suffering until you . . . get the nod of this master . . . your one and only gatekeeper.".
"I'm not taking everything he said as gospel anymore."
"Both the commies and the Nazis were dangerous and evil. Had Yogananda been able to see that, he would most certainly not have described Hitler's iron dictatorship as "uplifting guidance." Heaven forbid."
"The quote about Hitler is offensive enough, but Mussolini wasn't far behind Hitler in his brutality and evil . . . For crying out loud, what sort of !@#$%^&* would characterize Mussolini this way? He was a Mafia thug!"
"But hey, he made the trains run on time!"
"The facts of Yogananda's inexcusable praise of the three most brutal dictators of the twentieth century have NOT been taking PY out of context . . . How can we be sure he didn't get other things wrong?" asks one.
"Check out . . . the USA is currently displaying all 14 characteristics of a Nazi regime."
Some Noam Chomsky messages say some disturbing things about the regime of the States too: [Link]
- and there you have it
Well you get the drift - Things Yogananda instituted before he "went overboard (passed away)", were not democratic and fair at all. SRF's Kriya Pledge is totalitarian, giving all power to "God's humble servant", who require that you swear to love him unconditionally, no matter what, and the bond is to be in effect for many lives too!
But take heart. If kriya yoga is what you are after, in can be learnt without any ugly bonds in Satyananda's line. They do not indoctrine persons toward poverty either, to my knowing.
There are varying traditions and attitudes in ancient yoga too - in the kriya yoga tradition after Shyama Lahiri - and that is where Yogananda and his organisation are - you give the guru your wife too, as if she is your possession and not ally. In Buddhism, women have had a markedly better position than that.
The guru-disciple structure that is propagated by SRF, feeds the ongoing, much authoritarian deal - and the cultishness. Compare:
"We do not find fault with Paramahansa Yogananda's guidelines. Since we believe . . . his wisdom is flawless." Another opinion: "Well, I do find faults with Yogananda's guidelines, and have taken the trouble to show it too, and also that his so-called wisdom is not flawless. Don't cling to an obviously misleading faith, is the counsel." [Notarised SRF letter]
Adolf Hitler, a Christian
Just as we grant that not everything Yogananda said was good and fit, we should also grant that not everything Adolf Hitler said was all bad. A few years after writing his praises of dictatorship and so on, Yogananda sought to visit both Mussolini and Hitler on a tour, but it did not come to pass.
Adolf Hitler was a Christian theist that caused much evil in the name of God. Christianity was a role model to Hitler on how to advance his agenda. He often proclaimed how much he valued Christianity, how important Christianity was to his life, and even how much he was personally inspired by Jesus - his Lord and Savior.
Hitler regularly spoke and acted to promote and defend traditional Christian beliefs, values, and political policies. He kept saying that he believed in God and was convinced that he was doing God's work. He learned from the early history of Christianity as well as more recent Christian political movements. Hitler's theism, religiosity, and Christianity are strongly supported in his own words.
Nazi ideology was committed to supporting Christianity. Christians in Germany threw their support behind Hitler and the Nazi Party.
Hitler was convinced that religious faith was needed, quite like the conviction of conservative Christians today. One of the reasons why Hitler was so popular with conservative Christians in Germany was that he opposed abortion, homosexuality, pornography, and just about everything else conservative Christians complained were ruining modern Germany.
American concervative Christians might get less likely to do so much to transform their own Christianity into an American echo of Germany's extreme nationalistic Christianity if they saw these lines, says Austin Cline. [Note]
Adolf Hitler Quotations
Faith is harder to shake than knowledge. [Mein Kampf Vol. 1 Chapter 12]
The great masses of a nation are not composed of philosophers. [Mein Kampf, Vol. 1 Chapter 10]
The great masses of the people will more easily fall victim to a big lie than to a small one.
It is criminal lunacy to keep on drilling a born half-ape until people think they have made a lawyer out of him. [Mein Kampf Vol. 2 Chapter 2]
Those who are passionate themselves can arouse passion in others.
When I recall my teachers at school, I realise that half of them were abnormal . . . and quite a few ended their days as honest-to-God lunatics! [Remarks February 1942 recorded by Martin Bormann, published in Hitler's Table Talk (1953)]
Woman's world is her husband, her family, her children and her home. [Quoted in Lucy Komisar, The New Feminism]
How shall we fill people with blind faith in the correctness of a doctrine . . .? ... Here, too, we can learn by the example of the Catholic Church. [Mein Kampf Vol. 2 Chapter 5]
Scapegoating
Fascists blamed their countries' problems on scapegoats. Jews causes major problems, they claimed. [Merriam-Webster, Ebu "scapegoat", "fascism"] In psychology, scapegoating is tied in with neuroticism. Scapegoating with butchering innocents for the sins of guilty ones, is blatantly corrupt - and the cornerstone of Judaism and Christianity, by the way. Insanity is unreasonable, much as other severe mental diseases, and may be uncurable.
Take heed of your company, therefore. Buddha warns against being among fools, not unlike the proverb "Stay away from fools that you may not be among their number". Refrain from using the criteria to harm people.
Ak: Yogananda, Paramahansa. Man's Eternal Quest. Los Angeles: Self-Realization Fellowship, 1975.
Ap: Mieder, Wolfgang (main editor), Stewart A. Kingsbury, and Kelsie E. Harder: A Dictionary of American Proverbs. (Paperback) New York: Oxford University Press, 1996.
Ay: Yogananda, Paramahansa. Autobiography of a Yogi. 1st ed. New York: Theosophical, 1946. Online. [oaks.nvg.org/pv6bk12.html]
Clh: Dimmit, Cornelia and van Buitenen, J. A. B. trs: Classical Hindu Mythology. Temple University. Philadelphia, 1978.
Ebu: Encyclopaedia Britannica. Encyclopaedia Britannica 2006 Ultimate Reference Suite DVD. London: Encyclopaedia Britannica, 2006.
Op: Simpson, John, and Jennifer Speake. The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Proverbs. 3rd ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998.
Pa: Yogananda, Paramahansa. Autobiography of a Yogi. 11th ed. Los Angeles: Self-Realization Fellowship, 1971.
Say: Yogananda, Paramahansa. Sayings of Yogananda. Los Angeles: Self-Realization Fellowship, 1958.
NA: "early East West", a thread on the SRF Walrus's "Not in the mainstream". Started by "divine gypsy". Accessed 10 October 2005.
p203.ezboard.com/fsrfwalrusfrm39.showMessage?topicID=56.topic. New URL, Accessed 31 March 2008:
srfwalrus.yuku.com/reply/9883/t/early-East-West.html#reply-9883.
Austin Cline. Adolf Hitler Quotations: Adolf Hitler on Religion, God, and Christianity. About, Inc., 2008.
[atheism.about.com/od/adolfhitlernazigermany/tp/AdolfHitlerQuotesGodReligion.htm]