Spiritual Masters on Parade: Tathagata...

[m1thr0s]

I was doing a little internet research on the third eye and ran into this cat. I'm sure i don't quite understand why an enlightened being would be posting his message through a Tripod website...but then again...the job doesn't pay what it used to...

http://www.members.tripod.com/tathagata2000/2261def0.jpg


Weblink (http://www.members.tripod.com/tathagata2000/)

I keep meaning to start a tracking system for looking at these cats as they emerge so we can at least bookmark them and talk about them a little. Almost all of them have something of value...some more...some less than others.

maybe a forum would be best, but for now...this one has a few points of interest going on I think.

m1thr0s

[Naomi]

He's a fucking politician gone on a quest for enlightenment and like any typical politician he manages to weasel his way into the top brackets of spirituality just like that. His words are rehashed Buddhist shit what else can I say? Sure some of it sounds fine but it's just rehashed common knowledge.

Thie shit about an enlightened being coming around only once every 3000 years was also pretty bogus. But yeah he's like saying a spiritual messiah won't be coming around like people expect but then he's like "I am the man with the third eye who has come to save the world!" or something.

I don't know I just kind of gloss over at this type...

I have no opinion one way or another - they do good for some people and for others they waste valuable time. .Time that could be spent on real studies. Same goes for all of the "legitimate" bullshitters amongst the Buddhists and Brahmans...Christianity isn't the beginning nor end of lies parading as supreme truth...

I mean we all have our own lives and no one can really judge someone accurately from a website, but that doesn't mean I approve of some of the statements he is making nor can I really understand why he would make such harmful statements except out of stupidity. It's the whole "Don't question what I say because I am a spiritual master" thing that made Christianity such a homicidal influence. Except "God" is replaced with "I'm Enlightened"

[Naomi]

I have to say it seems like these guys are catering to the idiot side of the equation - and I wonder if that's the purpose behind this schism in advanced masters and fake ones - if people listen to the real ones more then we advance as a race to the next level - if they listen to the newbie version we get another 50 years of idiocy or whatever, and so one, as the readiness of the entire species is tested again and again. And if we get signs of life maybe we recieve an injection of older souls into the population.l

Or maybe it's all random volunteer work....hell


I think that guy is misguided and deluded. He got caught on the part where you're supposed to realize oneness with everything at some point rather than identifying yourself as some kind of messiah. I think that he failed at some point in realization but what's a failure to me may be a great accomplishment for his karma.

I mean look at his story - he doesn't even seem to recognize that he had all of those horrible life experiences just to push him into that secluded enviroment and achieve the introspective power that launched his journey into the first stages of supreme truth. He just sounds like he's feeling sorry for himself. He doesn't recognize his oppressive country and government as part of the absolute itself working to mend the friction in consciousness in this part of space-time. He just externalizes it.

He gets the love part right - all of the fluffy ones do. But they stop short there for some reason. Perhaps it's because love is the supreme state of man but to go beyond that one most become of a mind that is not centered in man.

[m1thr0s]

I usually start out trying to give these folks a chance, at least at the beginning, but inevitably run into logistical complications that are nearly impossible to reconcile. Sometimes it's just little things they say. Tathanaga seems to be playing the "there can be only one" card by his assertion that the enlightened man - the one who tells the truth - only comes along in this world once every 3000 years!

What's the point of saying that? That's a little like a mathematician trying to assert that "the one who groks geometry" only comes along once every 3000 years as well. It's just such a ridiculous and unfounded thing to say...how am I supposed to overlook it? If your car breaks down you don't feel compelled to take it to the only person on earth who understands your car...as a matter of fact you'd usually rather take it to somebody who doesn't much give a crap either way but will do a good job quickly at a fair price and call it good. Why then when it comes to spiritual matters is this some sort of special selling point?

This one seems to have a sort of Zen approach to things and some of that stuff I like but it's hardly a unique sort of doctrine and you sure as hell don't have to go back 3000 years to find evidence of its last pronouncement in this world.

m1thr0s

[Anibis]

I like the camp value of it all, personally... I notice he specially thanks 'Paul S'. Is this the same Paul S who was a moderator on OF? I hope he does do some good in the world, but as the other Tatagatha said "Be a lamp unto yourself"...

Al that being said, the word Ta-Ta-Ga-Ta has been surfacing in my mind alot over the last few months as a sort of chant or song...

-Anibis-

Those who know don't say. Those who say, don't know.

[m1thr0s]

so then you look upon all this enlightenment business as some sort of theatrical performance? It seems to me that if is this was the case then the *truthful* one should just say so and we could all view it in this light.

moreover, I think that some number of these individuals do at least believe themselves chosen in some way to lead others out of darkness into some kind of light. Others are probably just business opportunists who regard the whole realm of spirituality as a financial opportunity.

I don't think they all can be such opportunists though...many of them seem to really believe their own stuff...I think maybe Naomi has an important point regarding the ways in which people get kind of tricked by their own spiritual awakenings. I have a hard time believing it's all a deliberate con, so if it is not then they have managed to convince themselves of things that do not actually mean what they have taken them to mean.

Wiki has a reasonable breakdown on the term Tathagata (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tathagata)

m1thr0s

[Anibis]

I'm not sure that Truth is very well served by words. I would be more inclined to think that the Truthful ones would *DO so* rather than just *say so*, and that perhaps would carry... As for performances, I am inclined to think that pretty much everything we percieve within the house of our languages is a performance of a sort, but I do certainly believe that there are stronger, and weaker performances... And there is also that space which precedes the performance... Nalyd mentioned something about the bluff as a sort of ontological 'leap' that jumpstarts true manifestations... I tend to agree with this, although understand that I am not saying that the universe is a bluff, or is or that the illusion is 'untrue', necessarily. It's like we generate holographic world of meaning in which to dwell, and that's great, although there is also a common space which is not holographic. I see thought and art as somewhat creative rather than reflective. To perform the role of Tathagata, well, and truely, this fellow may well be creating precisely such a legitimate space. He will have to negotiate with other Tatagatha's and how he manages to do so will be the ultimate judge of his truth; his ability to exit his 'holograph', and guide other to doing so as well, and meet them in this common space before returning to their respective homes. I think that's what I look for in an enlightened person (And what I seek to practice myself). It's easier to say than to do, and we all know that. There is 'the true', but it doesn't strike me as a set of conditions to which our minds identify, catalogue, and finally possess, but rather a maximum context in which an elightened person who has plugged the gaps in their psyche (Through meditation, or whatnot) can interact and percieve directly... I suspect many more people can do this than we think. I believe most people are intuitive enmeshed in 'the continuum' or the Tao, and they only start to bungle it up when they look for it by specific names, seeking to own it... Recognizing that we are performing is a help, but also that we are amongst others who's performances condition and apply inertia to ours is also a help. I distrust all exclusive truth claims, but I recognize folk who are genuinely helpful. And maybe this one really is... I am thinking that organized religion as we see it to day should be made illegal, but I also know that that would probably make things worse. Somehow we need to find a way to achieve true satisfaction for our hunger to be deluded and deformed... a kind of final satiety from which we can then, quite naturally move on.

-A-

It would be great, though if we were indeed amongst as many spiritual masters and guides as we seem to be... we might actually have a chance then... Seems the truely legitimate masters of the world need only start working together... networking, as it were...

[Anibis]

He looks alot like Mao, though, eh?
-A-

[m1thr0s]

well that's a lot of words running about in circles in my view. I don't think there can be any good excuse for leaning upon half-truths as a means of somehow secretly igniting whole ones. We can do this on a personal level but when you start drawing others into it it becomes a deliberate deception...there is no art in this...it is purely criminal intention. It is the intent to deceive for personal gain plain and simple. Once you start justifying this there would seem to be no end to it. I may be a little old fashioned in this respect but a lie is just a lie in my view and should be treated as such. But the curious issue here is that I don't think many of these individuals are entirely aware of their own falsehoods...and that's a curious situation.

I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt. Something has happened to them and they have interpreted this to mean something it doesn't actually mean. They then go immediately about the business of getting others to believe in their own unique interpretation. They are not leading anybody to *truth*...they are rather leading them to acquiescence...

m1

[Anibis]

But a performance is not a lie... a drama of initiation is not just an unnecessary fabrication, but is a bridge, right? It brings you from one state to another through smodulating emotions and perceptions in a specific way. I think that 'Tatagatha' even means something like builders of the forge or something... As for words going around in circles, well... I guess as long as we are enmeshed in languages, the best way to point outside of it is to engage paradox in as earnest and challenging a manner as possible... Ourobouros. The truth is still the truth, and each of us can find it, and all of us need each other. I also share your distaste for scam artists, but I suppose since I make my living decieving peoples perceptions (who know that's what I'm doing, and enjoy it completely), I have a certain respect for the actual weaving of certain parts of the Samsara in such a way that it leads more people into a position to actually eject themselves from it to a certain degree...

It's funny. As an occultist I see the spiritual as a domain that should not be for sale. Even those who charge for small services like tarot readings strike me as having sullied the magick they weild to a certain extent. The trickster, then seems like an honest way to make a living, since people go in to see a performance willing to suspend their disbelief, and enjoy themselves in the process. I have no problem at all getting paid to do tricks, but I have a problem with taking money to give spiritual advice. Making a living as a guru, at least for me, sounds like it would be a little *wrong*... To me I think that we can weave our illusions, and even share the products of those illusions with others who ask, but to force them on others, well... that would be "evil", as they say... As for now, I am still waiting to see what I can learn... The world seems to be so much on the brink of *I-don't-know-what*, and I think that my time is not quite yet...
-A-

[m1thr0s]

But a performance is not a lie...a performance which is understood as a performance is not a lie, no and *magickal theatre* has been around forever. But this guy isn't talking about any such thing...he is calling himself the exact same thing the Buddha did...he is saying he is the Tathagata...that he comes from the Absolute itself and has some very important information to impart accordingly. I think this whole business of reducing it to a *performance*, or attempting to weigh it on its performance value is seriously wrong-headed. I don't give a crap about his performance at all...I am only concerned with his words...the things he chooses to say and also not say. To approach it at the performance level is really just a way of reducing the whole thing to superficiality out of hand. I'm not sure we have any actual right to do that. I'd rather try to understand what he has to say (or thinks he has to say) and then try to sort out why on earth that would make him something I should regard as a bona fide Tathagata...

m1

[Naomi]

But it would be like Russell Crowe trying to play that he's really kickass because he plays kickass roles when irl he's just a pussy liberal...

I agree that magick shouldn't be sold - this has always been a strong instinct of mine which is why I don't do tarot readings for a living. The only way I could do it would be to accept donations and people are just not that magnanimous.

Another point you bring me to is the idea of lieing to someone in order to get them over something. Well you can do that. This guy probably has no intention of doing so, he really believes in his truth.

Tricksters are awesome. But this guy appears to be just another dumbshit.

I hate Paul S he gave me warnings way back when.

[Anibis]

'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt. Something has happened to them and they have interpreted this to mean something it doesn't actually mean. They then go immediately about the business of getting others to believe in their own unique interpretation. They are not leading anybody to *truth*...they are rather leading them to acquiescence...


I am interested in your thoughts on your own work in this light... I can see that you really respect the experience these people have had, although you recognize that they have made an error in interpreting it. How does your own work in imparting tools and paradigms differ from theirs? How does mine, or anyone's here, since I definitely read that we are saying here that there is a more Truthful approach and a less truthful approach. How do we avoid ourselves falling into the traps that these other spiritual masters seem to fall into? And specifically, how do you aim to avoid it, m1thr0s, since your body of work is the most prominent one in this space, at any rate? I am interested in your thoughts on this genuinely, and I think we can all agree that your work demonstrates an intruiging level of mastery, and so would potentially run these same risks we are discussing. You say that delusion can be avoided. How?

I am just very interested in how you would solve these specific problems...

-A-

[m1thr0s]

well i am sorry Paul S has even entered into this conversation...that certainly diminishes the odds in my view that this person can be anything even remotely close to what he is claiming. But we really don't know it is the same Paul S anyway...

i don't really know if he is a *dumbshit* or not. There are certain qualities to his approach reminiscent of Lao Tsu although that does rather look like his particular gimmick...

m1

[Anibis]

Looking back at the thread, I'd say that maybe I am less concerned with this guy, who is another goofy guru who says he is the be all and end all, and more concerned with the abstract questions this whole thing raises, for my own work, and for others... Maybe it sounds like I've giving him more credit than he's worth, but I'm really not... he's obviously not 'got it' in the way that I respect... I'd personally rather know a little more about what it actually means to 'get it', and I think that's what we are all talking about here, and the true value of examining a guy like this. My responses have been only nominally about him, though and mostly about my general personal reflections... Ie, tricksterism and such...
-A-
But maybe he does get it, and he's just saying so directly. Either way, I'd treat him the same were we to have tea together... As another.

[m1thr0s]

well...those are all interesting questions Anibis but for one thing I do not feel like it is important for me to assume the role of the *Absolute* in order to get a certain amount of vital information across regarding the mechanics of the Body of Light...and the StarBody in particular. In other words I try to let that work speak for itself as much as possible...even though I could claim everything this cat is claiming. I've been through all the same experiences and more...I even went through a very distinct "third eye" period where I had the same protrusion on my own forehead...seriously...this really did happen. But in my case I realized immediately that it was of no real importance that anyone did or did not recognize the force of these personal experiences and have instead committed myself to attempting to resolve some of the key technical issues surrounding the Body of Light itself. It is my belief that this body of work is much more important than any following I might personally accrue.

So in a sense I have abandoned any attempt at assuming or educating anything having to do with any so-called *Absolute*...and I think that this is where a lot of these cats go wrong...If they are so godamm enlightened they should logically be able to resolve a few things mere mortals have not been able to resolve.

m1

[Naomi]

I disagree with this being a case of tricksterism Anibis, and I assure you I have a firm grasp of those concepts.

I think he is overestimating the importance of his experience, and this is a common pitfall - getting a messiah complex instead of continuing on to the correct natural step. It is known. We see it all the time. It's not a trickster, it's a disease...Tricksters don't naturally assume the mantle of supreme absolute even though they ARE in fact a glimmer of that supreme absolute. Far and beyond that actually.

It's not my right to even comprehend the totality of the scheme of things and that's where this guy totally loses his train of thought - I think he has lost his godamned mind along with the rest of humanity who still hasn't even found theres. He had it but he let it slip due to ignorance.

[m1thr0s]

Yes, I do believe "unconscious ignorance" is once again the real cuprit here. I mean, this guy has a few things going on that make it difficult for him to carry on as usual...he's got a freaking mountain sticking out of his forehead for instance and that's bound to garner a lot of attention at the mall etc... By his own admission he grew up as an abandoned kid with no one there to support him so surely becoming adopted by the Absolute must have seemed like a fairy tale come true...but it's not what it seems...he has interpreted it incorrectly in my view - assuming he is not an outright fraud, which in this case I rather doubt.

m1

[Naomi]

Well I don't want to be mean to people but when they encroach on my domain of actually dispelling myths and superstition and fucking messiahs then yeah it pisses me off....

But it's true that you can't judge people based on some stupid website. He may in fact bring a lot of good to some people...not me obviously....I just want to smack him upside the head...

[m1thr0s]

I have a hard time buying into this idea of him bringing real good to people...it just doesn't mean anything and you have to ask...at what cost? I think it's just another form of dismissal...just another way to shuffle it along, business as usual. There's a lot of justifications for doing this...we can't do anything about his trip...he's gonna blow his damn horn anyway he likes and there's nothing we can really do about it. But I do think it's being unnecessarily optimistic to say he'll be doing people some good anyway. The guy who drives the bus for me is doing some real good too but he doesn't get shit for gratitude or recognition. Is he somehow less an emanation of the Absolute in some way?

So I think the truth is that it creates a lot more hardship than it resolves. It makes the work of the real Tathagata(s) in this world just that much more likely to fail and more difficult to accomplish. It confuses things when people claim great truth to reside where it basically does not.

m1

[Anibis]

I disagree with this being a case of tricksterism Anibis, and I assure you I have a firm grasp of those concepts.

I think he is overestimating the importance of his experience, and this is a common pitfall - getting a messiah complex instead of continuing on to the correct natural step. It is known. We see it all the time. It's not a trickster, it's a disease...Tricksters don't naturally assume the mantle of supreme absolute even though they ARE in fact a glimmer of that supreme absolute. Far and beyond that actually.

It's not my right to even comprehend the totality of the scheme of things and that's where this guy totally loses his train of thought - I think he has lost his godamned mind along with the rest of humanity who still hasn't even found theres. He had it but he let it slip due to ignorance.

I don't think he's a trickster either. I don't think anyone disagrees here. The thing is that I am a trickster, so this whole thread started me on a train of thought regarding truth and illusion that was more of a personal tangent than a reflection of my feelings towards this guy, which are of vague amusement. Like I said, it's camp, and that's about it. I really wasn't defending him, though... what do I care about this guy... he's just an object lesson on the nature of claims to enlightenment....

-A-

[Anibis]

I got onto the Trickster thing, because m1thr0s addressed my discussion of performance... I guess I took him to be talking about performance itself as inherently a lie, which I disagree with, and hence I cited the Trickster as an example of how this was not the case, and yet, looking back at the thread, his comments may have been focused more on 'Tatagatha' than mine really were. I was riffing...
-A

[Naomi]

I have a hard time buying into this idea of him bringing real good to people...it just doesn't mean anything and you have to ask...at what cost? I think it's just another form of dismissal...just another way to shuffle it along, business as usual. There's a lot of justifications for doing this...we can't do anything about his trip...he's gonna blow his damn horn anyway he likes and there's nothing we can really do about it. But I do think it's being unnecessarily optimistic to say he'll be doing people some good anyway. The guy who drives the bus for me is doing some real good too but he doesn't get shit for gratitude or recognition. Is he somehow less an emanation of the Absolute in some way?

So I think the truth is that it creates a lot more hardship than it resolves. It makes the work of the real Tathagata(s) in this world just that much more likely to fail and more difficult to accomplish. It confuses things when people claim great truth to reside where it basically does not.

m1

Yeah, it's an ego trip....the kind you don't come back from. Do you see this guy ever finding his way out of the hole he has dug for his mind? I don't. He's messing with parameters of supreme truth in falsehood, and ensuring his doom in the process. It's important, I think, to be very careful of this messiah complex. There's always a bigger dinosaur. If you look at it one way,ensuring your confidence in yourself as supreme absolute is fine - if you realize we are all emanations and attaining supreme brahman or para atman is not something you can come back from - alive - not in the way you were before. Even the higher routings of mind willreshape your consciousness so you ar enever quite the same.

This fucker wouldn't HAVE problems "getting sick because of healing people" as it says on his website if he had indeed attained to the supreme ultimate parabrahman or supreme abode. He has a long way to go and it's a fucking pity he won't go much further and will drag others down into the sea of samsara with him.

Anyways you can't let cretins drag you down, that's for sure.

Ah I love being a Satanist.

[Anibis]

And he looks like Mao.
-A-

[Naomi]

No, he doesn't...I was getting to that...Mao has a hairline that recedes further, fatter smoother cheeks and a mole on his chin. He doesn't even look Han.

Taken from the website:

"Someone who wants Enlightenment, must first know how the one who is, or was already Enlightened could attain the Enlightenment. If they are fortunate enough to meet an Enlightened Being, it will make for the best circumstance. But if not, they must not practice until they find the exact way to the Enlightenment. If they meet those who aren't Enlightened and follow their teaching, it may put them into serious dangers."

This is the same old Roman Catholic bullshit repackaged as part of the 'mystical orient' shit that caters to dumb white people and stupid rich yuppies. This is how you make a fortune peddling lies...it all starts like this. I bet Osho started the exact same way.

The supreme absolute reality doesn't need petty little men who call themselves enlightened masters to resolve disturbances in its own system...it can do whatever it likes. It allows Maya to do whatever she likes. This guy is a test of Maya or an example of Maya eating herself alive... it's my job to point out what an dildo he's being.

People from the outside have no real need to roll in their own shit. They already know what's up with this world and why we shouldn't talk so much about spiritual mastery and shit like that. It's tired, it's boring, it's old, it's nothing worth looking at. We've moved on, This guy is just another fallout reaction to Siddhartha's teachings. The inevitable chaos and decay that results from being so blatant about heavy issues. Jesus failed the same way.

[Anibis]

Yeah, we pretty much agree... The whole 'no-one comes to the Father but through me' line. Although I tend to find people who spend too much time trashing other peoples illusions to be equally suspect in their own way... It's a delicate balance, I guess...
-A-

[Anibis]

Andy Jones has a similar '3rd eye', but his is off to the side. He's a trickster. A good one, too.
-A-

[Naomi]

Sure I agree, but this guy is an asshole. I'll probably never meet him nor will I met any of his followers, so I don't have to worry about being delicate about it. There's a lot of people who have even worse assumptions near to me whom I don't even bother mentioning - it is important that when a figure is put into a position of spiritual authority they are called on their bullshit though...

Do you think I didn't scrutinize m1thr0s thoroughly as well? Everyone gets the same treatment. Outrageousness though is always appreciated...this guy just isn't funny enough for me to tolerate that...in fact he's unforgiveably unfunny...

I don't know who Andy Jones is....

[Anibis]

I don't know who Andy Jones is....

He's just a commedian... but he has a lump on his head.
-A-

[m1thr0s]

As far as *authenticity* goes, I take my lead from the arts and sciences a whole lot sooner than from politics and religion, either of which is generally devoid of any commitment to self-responsibility to begin with and rely chiefly upon its antithesis anyway.

But people don't necessarily really want what they are historically accustomed to. The problem is that most people are sort of stuck somewhere in the middle these days. When it comes to matters of spirituality, part of them feels like they still need a cosmic parental figure of some kind while the other part knows that there really is no such thing as Santa Claus other than what grown-ups have created in lieu of a more nebulous *spirit* of compassion and giving. The same rule applies to *god* even though the stakes may seem a little higher.

I think we are seeing a half-hearted paradigm shift over to forms of spirituality that do not belabor *absolutes* as much but the shift is miserably slow. It is amusing to hear this guy talking about the power within while still insisting that people need to line up like a bunch of sheep behind himself...this contradiction is built into the fabric of culture itself, since people are at this precarious crossroads where they want to have it both ways but can't be sure which way will finally win out over the other. It is true that even Xst makes this fundamental mistake and it is probably more due to what people can handle than what actually works or doesn't work.

The job of the Tathagata is to make the choice that must be made without regard to emotional attachments...to walk ahead of the herd in the manner one should walk and not be catering to personal inhibitions, so I have to reject this person's claims since he is clearly playing to the herd at the level of its own internal contradictions.

edit: I should probably qualify that we really don't know that Xst himself ever played this card...it was played on his behalf many years after the fact from all we really know...it would have been more consistent of him not to have played it at all.

m1thr0s

[Naomi]

so I take it you've done this before....

[m1thr0s]

moi? It is my *impression* that I do this shit all the time as a matter of fact...bad habit, weird hobby, who knows...

That's entirely subjective obviously...nobody can say yay or nay to that since they have no freaking clue either way, but I have seen glimpses of things that cause me to think this may be true in my case. I think I may be some kind of specialist...a *red line* specialist of some kind...

I specialize in worlds about to blow their asses to kingdom come...

In any case...even at the fantasy level...no harm done thinking this way...I'm not terribly attached to it anyway. It's just some sort of kinky motivational carrot, cuz it causes me to think *professionally*...how to do things even better than the last time etc...

m1thr0s

[Naomi]

Oh you think so? I don't really know what my specialty is...

[m1thr0s]

"we're not allowed to know"...Mothman Prophecies...

m1

[Naomi]

You know those little electronic toys at the store that have the little plastic tag in them that you pull out to activate the "try me" feature?

It feels like that.