XBK Chat (unofficial archive)

jim brady · Joined: 13 Jul 2005 Posts: 19

A word of thanks firstly to those who set up this much needed site and also to the many inspiring contributors.

Came into RY back in 1983. Why did I join? Probably for some of the same reasons as you all did. The philosophy appeared to be quite unusual, original and convincing, initially. There were no fees involved and the elders were not swanning around in Ferraris, lording it over the hoi polloi. The social aspect was welcoming, people were very friendly and decent, and the ideals within the movement appeared to be the highest possible, with God apparently behind it all. And with not much else out there in an at times depressing and empty world, RY offered self-preservation in this life and beyond. I felt special and very lucky.

In the beginning I found the philosophy re cycle, karma, God etc quite ingenious with unlimited potential, totally unlike any of the vacuous nonsense I’d heard before. I was enthralled by it and it appeared water-tight, and I was greatly encouraged by the fact that the teacher giving me the class seemed quite open to discussing anything and everything. The whole skeleton of the cycle seemed eminently plausible with just the finer details to be ironed out. But as the years went by and the intermittent murli attendances were chalked up I gradually realised that the gaps were not going to be filled in. We were going to have to make do with our own fanciful speculation. The seniors were either inaccessible, disinterested in discussing certain issues, or too busy disseminating information on the vaguer stuff. The deity himself apparently, couldn’t be bothered addressing any of the issues or commenting about any of the anomalies. Disappointment and frustration set in and since I wasn’t getting mind-altering experiences in meditation I began to drift further and further away.

Here are the main issues that bothered me right from the start which I perhaps foolishly let go:

1. The ridiculously short cycle, the history of which obviously cannot be stuffed into so small a box. Unless the Minoans were silver-aged, and the Atlanteans, and when one considers the size of the Assyrians kings’ list, and the dynasties of the Pharaohs, and the Chinese pre-Taoist kingdoms, and the history of Israel from Abraham to Jesus, including wars with Syria, Babylon and Rome, the fall of the first and second temples, the captivity in Babylon until the emancipation by Cyrus, the reign of Saul and Solomon and all the kings after Jeroboam, the disappearance of the ten tribes, the long prophetic period, the early Talmudic period leading up to Jesus………….you just can’t fit it all into less than 500 years from the end of the Silver age. It would appear to me that Brahma who came from a very poor village had little education and had little knowledge of ancient history, had just conjured up the figure himself, it simply tied in with some of his Hindu beliefs. I’ve never come across any scientific writings (apart from a small section of musings by Velikovsky) that would allow for such a short cycle. I’ve always thought that a 10,000 year cycle would sound reasonable, but a 5,000 year one was just plain daft and simply not credible. It contradicts almost everything that we know, historical, archaeological and cultural evidence. I was always puzzled as to why the deity never spoke on the issue, and was never questioned on an issue that is so fundamental. It’s almost as ridiculous as saying that the cycle is a few hundred years old. Out of thousands of murlis (most of them repeating the same old points in the same old boring fashion) with not one word on the issue. I can’t be the only one who has been troubled by such silence. I was always told from the start that the scientists will gradually come round to cyclic time, that all the evidence is moving in the BK direction, it’s only a matter of time, alas not so. To quote a guest on this site: I was always busy - from the beginning - in researching all the science in it. I always thought it was a matter of time before I would hit on some plausible theories ... they never came.

2. I remember sitting in front of Gulzar/Shiva having being told that if I wanted to ask any questions in English they would have to be translated into Hindi so that “God could understand!!!!!!!!”........yeah, right! Periodically this one used to really bug me.

3. Throughout approx. 10 years in the institution I never really got to find out much about this inscrutable God person. What exactly does he do apart from a bit of lecturing/teaching? Too many simple questions were never answered about the being. Does he meet souls each time they die? What does he do for people of all the other religions or the non-religious? Is he responsible for miracles?. Is he little more than a warm fuzzy feeling that we sometimes get in life? Does he communicate with souls in the soul world? Does he tell each non-bk at the end of the cycle that they happen to not belong to the elite and they can now say bye bye to heaven? If he loves us all what does he do for us all, how does he show that love? This Shiva might give some kind of introduction but the introduction for me was, and is, minimal. For 2,500 years he says he does nothing but as regards the other half I’m no wiser. What involvement does he have in other religions, does he intervene in people’s lives, does he put ideas into people’s heads, does he answer prayer, does he know everything, does he know what I’m thinking, why is he so revered, what has he ever done for mankind, according to the BK’s he never even made the world. It’s tricky trying to think about someone all day long when you don’t know much about them. I think if most BK’s were honest they would say that their best meditation experiences occurred when they visualised idyllic scenes/interactions i.e. the experiences were of their own making and not due to any mystical interaction with a deity. Similar experiences can probably be got elsewhere in other faiths or practices.

Also the logistics of meditation are never explained fully by the BKWSU. Souls cannot think or act outside the body, yet Shiva who is identical in form apparently can. In order to become pure it is necessary to visualise God as a form of light and a point of energy. Somehow this is meant to bring magical and cleansing results, whereas other forms of contemplation of God as practiced by other faiths e.g. sincere prayer, are deemed to be quite ineffective and worthless. Apparently the moody deity only responds when you call him by his correct name, he is strangely peeved and hard of hearing when someone gets his name wrong or is confused as to his real identity. Also the obscure wavelength of communication with Shiva is strangely only one way. Even when the mind is made still and peaceful rarely do you hear of BK’s honestly describing God contacting them. I remember myself sitting in front of “God”, locking into the experience and waiting to be hit by a thunderbolt of love/peace/ecstasy/whatever, I couldn’t have been more focussed or more soul-conscious, but nothing happened, what an anti-climax! On all the occasions I practised meditation I almost always felt that it was me creating my own experience, there was no outside force trying to get through to me.

4. Was always troubled by the lack of evidence of a Golden Age. Everything associated with it appears to have conveniently disappeared, everything totally destroyed, palaces and vemans vaporised! And again at the end of the Iron Age all evidence is wiped clean again, how? And with such destruction going on twice every cycle, how does anyone survive to propagate the species. I never got any answers on this kind of stuff. Is the ocean of knowledge more pond-like in nature? I once was told that everywhere on the planet from A to Y gets pulverised at the end of the Iron Age. Those living in Z then migrate to somewhere from A to Y (the animals probably following two by two). Then Z gets pulverised. As usual no more detail is provided to explain this convenient and childish stop-gap.

5. Those souls who suffer dreadful pain and deprivation in the early days of the Copper Age (lepers, for example) well, who are they? They couldn’t be new souls, and they couldn’t be BK’s since BK’s only start getting a hard time at the end of the Iron age, so who are they? One of the seniors I spoke to on the issue hinted that they fell into another category, but then clammed up completely and said that she didn’t want to elaborate.

Next here’s a bunch of secondary issues, they never bothered me as much:

1. The dreadfully boring sakar murlis. Time after time I went to class with pen and paper, ending up with just a blank sheet. It’s puzzling how a Supreme Being can only come up with rather banal prose. I never went to class with any sense of excited anticipation as to what was God going to talk about today. It was just the same old rambling rhetoric, a hotchpotch of praise and threat, insights into Hindu trivia, and the 7 day course hammered and re-hashed again and again. I was told that the same murlis are recycled every 3 years (I’m not too sure about this). All the old writings are not available for BK consumption. This would mean that over 90% of God’s words between 1936 and 1969 are deemed by some authority to be not worth examining. My guess is that the sakars were the thoughts and ramblings of Brahma and/or a bodiless guide, and after a while he ran out of things to say and resorted to just repeating himself. I always thought they were ungodlike, needlessly repetitive, poorly structured and guilt laden. I don’t know much about Brahma’s life story but the naivety of his letter to King George of England telling him about the end of the world, the length of the cycle and the coming of God really beggars belief.

2. The waffly, rambling avyakt murlis - I couldn’t get much from them. And why are they so different from the sakars when they are meant to be spoken by the same person? And why the change of voice? Is it that the Avyakts are simply the ruminations of Gulzar or some other bodiless guide channelled through her, different from Brahma’s “guide”? An old xbk who wishes to remain anonymous described them once to me as follows: The Avyakts are classic carrot-and-stick operations. First you are praised to the sky, then you are undercut completely. You are the light of the world – but on second thought, there are three kinds of light, and the kind you happen to be is so filthy and rotten, that you are a light in name only. But there is still a chance for you – if you are perfect from now on and come to class every day – maybe. Meanwhile shut up and do what the Dadi tells you. To those who are the real lights of the world, love, remembrance and namaste, yours truly, God. Some of the Murlis do contain tantalizing hints of deeper information – but the promise is never fulfilled – and the Dadis will never follow up on the hints, and if you push them they’ll tell you you’re not pure enough to understand.

3. I could never understand why God only appeared or appears a few times a year, the visits over time, as far as I know, are becoming less and less frequent. With very little time left you’d think he’d be coming more regularly. Is he too busy to visit Madhuban? If the visits have simply diminished in frequency due to Gulzar’s health then it merely bolsters the case that Bapdada is only Gulzar

4. I’ve seen it stated in many murlis that:”there is no need to remember Brahma and no need to keep pictures of him”. Yet every centre seemed to make him overly prominent.

5. All the so-called trivia: flags on the moon and space probes finding their way back to earth; carnivores, insects, mosquitoes and venus fly traps in the GA……. Dinosaurs….reproduction by humans in the GA….reproduction by animals in the GA………..decay of animal carcasses in the GA…….the mechanics of Dharamraj…..purpose of sex organs in GA………karma for animals….whether trees have souls……….advance parties……..animals surviving destruction……..extinct species getting re-introduced………the planet speedily recovering from radiation poisoning….. aliens……ghosts………in-between body states…..the death experience……..profound differences between races - no clarification on any of this stuff, not even a brief comment.

6. Could never understand or get information and insight into the soul world (never mind the subtle regions)…..a world of peace and quiet…..does any thought exist there…..does any action occur there…..is it just a state of nothingness……never heard anything but the briefest of explanations. Again another filler-in. An ex bk describes it as follows: the soul world is perhaps an expedient solution to the problem of where do souls come from before they enter the cycle. Just a fix to make the whole cycle/tree philosophy work and from a reason/purpose point of view utterly useless.

7. 1976 controversy and the ‘Shankar party’, brushed under the carpet, nothing published by the institution on the matter, the plebs are again forced to speculate.

8. The trivialization of other faiths: Christianity, Buddhism, Islam etc. They have no place in heaven, they’ve had their day and are destined to just fizzle out at the end.

9. The BK philosophy is unpublished and generally speaking unchallenged as a result. If time is so short then what are they so afraid of? Is it that the 5,000 year cycle would be ridiculed by the scientific community? And why the sneaky covert approach, disguising it as some innocuous relaxation course? Why the subterfuge and the elaborate smokescreen? Why not make the whole philosophy transparent and let the media have a good look at it all? What have they got to lose?

10. The BK practice of not eating onions, garlic and eggs. Very wishy-washy reasons given for this. It would appear to be something just borrowed from an ancient custom of the Brahmin caste.

11. The unwillingness to answer questions and encourage a questioning mind and the fanciful speculation and dishonest manoeuvrings that dominate. To quote Atma on the dinosaur issue:

ex-london · Joined: 18 Jul 2005 Posts: 131

Atma · Joined: 26 Feb 2004 Posts: 98

ex-london wrote:

Atma · Joined: 26 Feb 2004 Posts: 98

Wah wah Jim ! What a post!

You have shared in spades - comprehensively - based on experience and observation. You wrote from the heart and from the head, and I commend you for that. You have given much food for thought and I will return to 'nibble' on some of the points you raised.

For now, let me go off on a (slight) tangent and raise a related issue. By now, nearly 70 years from the begining of the movement, the "Anomalies and Inconsistencies" have grown to significant proportions. They have increased in number and importance. So much so, that they can no longer be ignored - especially when taken together. There is an elephant in the room. The Emperor has no clothes.

We XBKs are cognizant of these issues. Indeed, they played a part in many of us becoming XBKs. What I am wondering about is this: Those who have invested (their beings) heavily in the BK world view, those who are still involved and commited - do you think that these anomalies penetrate their shield in any way? Do these things make even a slight dent in their awareness and certainty? And, as time goes by and the fallacies loom larger, will they gradually come to accept that there is something fundamentally wrong in the scheme that they so eagerly and whole heartedly embraced for so long?

If they come to those crossroads, can you see a complete psychological meltdown happening? Would their psyches and sense of identity be totally devastated ? Would deep depression, pent up anger and suicide follow? Will they feel a deep sense of shame and betrayal? Could they ever recover? Could they ever heal? If not - weird as it sounds - are they not better off living in delusion and denial? Seriously.

Once again "Kudos!"

gyaniwasi · Joined: 22 Feb 2004 Posts: 167

Atma wrote:

onepoint · Joined: 05 Aug 2005 Posts: 5

Fascinating posts...

It would be ambitious even to attempt a coherent and comprehensive answer to these many questions. But i have copied these posts so that i can type my responses to them offline. If something suitable comes up, will respond.

i came late to this party (the BKs) but i have spent over a decade here. i was an atheist before. It took me about 2 months to get a hang of the basics of the course but since then, its been good going.

i find a lot depends on our perspective. And we deepen our perspectives by pondering about the information presented to us. i have always had difficulty in just accepting something at face value. Yet, i have also welcomed and appreciated alternate viewpoints.

Everything can seem right from some perspective. And everything can seem wrong from another. We don't have to necessarily agree or disagree to different viewpoints. Understanding them however, is quite an enriching exercise.

i personally enjoy the Sakar murlis for the depth they yield. And i also commonly hear the complaint that they are boring, repetitive and no value addition. The Avyakt murlis are simple and topical. Quite a tonic. ( BTW: i loved that perspective about how the Avyakt murli goes about... and brandishes a stick after dangling all the carrots... Very Happy

) But the Sakar murlis are where i get insights into different aspects of life.

So are the others all wrong, and i am just brilliant in deciphering the truth that is so unexplainably well hidden? Oh not at all. Each viewpoint is right in some sense...and what has been highlighted in this topic is practical experience by not one but many.

All i can offer at this moment is my experience that it all matters on our perspective. And that people have different experiences even though the situation is the same.

Thanks for bringing up these thoughts. i don't think there can be "answers". But i hope to attempt some responses one day.

Enjoy your journey...

Best Wishes,
*
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Wonder what that point is all about...

gyaniwasi · Joined: 22 Feb 2004 Posts: 167

While you're considering this topic from the point of view of perspectives buddy, consider also the internal and external logical consistency of what you arrive at: what is logically consistent within gyan should also be logically consistent with what is outside its boundaries in terms of progressive human knowledge and our experience of living in both worlds.

God bless.

Fraternally,
Gy
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"Those were the days my friend ...."

onepoint · Joined: 05 Aug 2005 Posts: 5

Certainly Gy.

Given that each theory should be falsifiable, the entire content of gyan is subject to question. At the same time, the entire content of what is considered progressive knowledge is also falsifiable.

As long as a theory (whether its considered a fact by someone or not) seems to hold water while maintaining its basic assumptions, it is fair game. The basic assumptions should also seem to be reasonable in some context. (This is subjective, but i guess that's how assumptions are made).

Ultimately human knowledge (my understanding fully included Very Happy

) is limited. Experiences have their value but are subjective too and could be based on one's own mind games...

So i tend to form perspectives that get refined or rejected with further study in course of time.

Somehow, someday...i feel i'll finally get there. (That summit, like any other, will probably also mark the beginning of descent, but will handle that if and when it comes... Smile

)

regards,
*
_________________
Wonder what that point is all about...

Mr Green · Joined: 08 Sep 2005 Posts: 41

as an xbk, reading these things is extremely refreshing, to know I am not insane, or a failed shudra entering into a special hell that is reserved only for those fools that divorce the father etc

zhukov · Joined: 10 Apr 2004 Posts: 86

Oh no! You're one of those malcontent shudras too Shocked

LOL

uddhava · Joined: 20 Jan 2005 Posts: 142 Location: Paramdham

ex-london · Joined: 18 Jul 2005 Posts: 131

ex-london · Joined: 18 Jul 2005 Posts: 131

double_light · Posted: Tue Oct 04, 2005 4:01 am Post subject:

ex-london wrote:

zhukov · Joined: 10 Apr 2004 Posts: 86