[Buddha-l] Eckhart Tolle

[Richard P. Hayes]

On Tue, 2006-01-10 at 09:34 -0500, Vaj wrote:

> It seems the people who talk most about enlightenment are the ones  
> who are trying to "sell" you something--either literally or  
> figuratively. 

That's why I find Bikram so refreshing. He charges people for the joy of
watching themselves risking cardiac arrest by doing strenuous exercise
in an overheated room, threatens to sue yoga teachers who come too close
to using his sequence of poses, tries to patent his yoga routines and
tells people "If you want enlightenment or meditation, go somewhere
else.

> These newer, new age Advaitins are selling the most ephemeral package  
> of all and if you don't "get it" you gotta come back for another  
> seminar or buy another tape.

Henry Miller once observed that heroin addiction is the perfect metaphor
for capitalism. People are enticed to buy what they don't need or want,
and then it ruins their health. There is not much in the world of
unrestricted free trade that does not meet that description. And that
includes religion and self-help psychology and formal education.

> What is bizarre to me is the rapidity with which these people claim
> their own enlightenment. 

You really do have a prapanca about that, don't you? Why does it stick
in your craw so much that people, such as Siddhartha Gotama, claim to be
enlightenened? If they are mistaken, they are simply mistaken, and no
one is the worse for it.

It could be that what sticks in your craw (as it sticks in mine) is the
very fact that there is no means of knowing whether or not someone is
mistaken when they claim to be enlightened. It is a perfectly vacuous
claim, unfalsifiable and unverifiable.

> Of course then you can tell others about it. Start your own satsang.
> Share your new- found non-dual awareness. And they do.

Yes. And what is the harm in that? A few suckers lose a few shekels. Is
it any worse than all the people telling others how to lose weight, make
money, have whiter teeth, make better impressions on potential
employers, and face terminal cancer with comfort and joy? 

> This quote very nicely encapsulates a common dynamic in this entire  
> Pseudo-Advaita movement.

I see we have now shifted the topic away from Eckhart Tolle, who, as far
as I can see, is not at all like the pseudo-advaitins whose work causes
you such unbearable suffering.

-- 
Richard