What is deeply needed beneath the surface is a change of attitude away from "the gilded guru" bluffs. Consider:

Don't take my word for anything. . . . find out for yourselves. Don't get hung up on words . . . please remember. - Yogananda, in Dietz 1998

On the letter

They say they don't find fault with Yogananda's guidelines, but by their activities they show something different: they even forged his signature after his death, as if he did not know how to write it: they changed Paramhansa into Paramahansa. What else? You may not want to know it all.

So the SRF letter shows a belief, but facts are different from it. For example, where do beginners find Yogananda's hailing of Benito Mussolini and Yogananda's yes to dictatorship [Link]? Does his fellowship flaunt them or tuck them away in a basement closet out of shame?

The SRF letter from spring 1979 was to a top kriya initiate (kriya yogi) who left the fellowship after getting that goody-goody letter. As for the SRF management's "cannot change his words or the injunctions he gave in order to adjust them" - they have actually done it and very much so too. Documentation of many and tough changes abounds. A former SRF vice president sums up some: [◦Kriyananda sums it up] He warns against false play and dirty doings, but not a dictatorship-ardent guru. In these waters there are yes-guru-followers - some undermine Yogananda a lot by cult swerving, thinks Kriyananda, the former SRF vice president.

One can sympathise with endeavours to appear all right, but there is at times a need to discern between fool's gold and real gold . . .

Sects mar to rule

One had better detect cultish streaks to avoid getting trapped. One decent clue is "The Boss Is Always Right (and we, the other leaders, and so on)".

Further

Authoritarian, old goals made clear

The Americanised guru Paramahansa Yogananda (1893-1952) set up the Self-Realization Fellowship in Boston in 1920 - by backdating only, it seems -, and in 1925 got a headquarters in Los Angeles. Some of his many-faceted teachings are quoted below. For one thing, Yogananda says dogmatism makes his heart break, "And is not God suffering also? [Dr 257]" Regardless of that, the fellowship he started, canonises him as someone with flawless wisdom and guidelines they do not find faults with. Such goofy clowning is one mark of a cult, among others.

The fact is that Yogananda says many marring things, for example he speaks for Mussolini and dictatorship in his own magazine East West.

The call for humility serves top-dogs in what is really a top-down structure, which is a common hallmark of a cult or sect, and also a monastic structure (definitions vary). Dogmatic faith in Yogananda's guidelines is not regarded as something offensive by this servile crew, or as an outcome of servile stupidity (doubt-avoidance) and authoritarian goals. And that is part of the problem.

Against the "idyl stand" in the letter, face the facts: About one third of the SRF monastics left the premises between 2000 and 2005 (Parsons 2012:170). - To that: During the high tide of good feelings and shared joy in a bay (cult) one may have a nice time and enjoy a bit of shallow diving. But during ebb tide one notices that the bay (cult) does not rest on rock. There is just a nasty sand bottom. And a detrimental current for those who venture a bit out from the beach. Be warned of undercurrents.

Beware of Monky Business: Yogananda Quotations

I was never born, I never died–" - Yogananda in East West Vol. 17, No. 1, 1945.

All the same he was eager to get his autobiography published. It happened next year (1946).

There is no material universe; its warp and woof is . . . illusion. - Yogananda, in Autobiography of a Yogi, Ch. 30.

If that be so, you find no Yogananda (1893-1952), no Self-Realization Fellowship (SRF), no yoga, no SRF kriya pledge, no SRF books, no way of living, etc. in the universe. Yogananda adherents do not see it; hence many thank for being led astray by the no-fruit teachings opposed to such teachings as:

Don't turn the words of fine teachings
into something that bears no fruit,
like pretty flowers –
colourful but without fragrance.

- from The Tibetan Dhammapada, 18.6 (See Sparham 1986)

What Yogananda said about the next generation is as unfit as his world prophesies of two more world wars before 2000 CE - words so unheeded by guru disciples.

The next generation will not give us a thought. - Yogananda (1893-1952) [Ak 344].

- Ah, but it did! Whose fault might that be?

When a true guru performs an action, it is like writing on water. Then no marks remain. - Yogananda [cf. Say 14].

Many Yogananda marks remain. Alarmingly so? Hm!

Our best friends are those who criticise us the most . . . who never condone our faults. - Yogananda

Rebuke me a million times . . . scold med now! - Yogananda [Pa 432]

Silently heal yourself of the desire to criticize. - Yogananda. "Creating Your Happiness". East West, Vol. 4-12, October 1932.]

From this, the "best friends" of the guru could have another yardstick to behave on top of: Don't desire to criticise him, but do it because help is wanted and asked for.

And how close some of this seems to "Nag, nag, nag!" and "Yak yak yak"! Good friends seem hard to find where the harder they criticise, the better they get -

We do not find fault with Yogananda's guidelines. Since we believe that . . . his wisdom is flawless. - Self-Realization Fellowship, as notarised.

Compare, if you will, "Those who flatter thy faults are thy worst enemies," by Yogananda [Dr 254]

It is good to laugh . . . employ that power. - Yogananda [see Ak 353]

Some joke books offer relief, if not help.

A cult of quack teaching and servile dogmatism has failed

The quasi-dogma that Yogananda's altered guildelines are infallible are not canonised in the cult yet. Geoffrey Falk, tells of humiliating SRF experiences in a chapter of his book Stripping the Gurus.

How to get free from "blind dogmatism"? How to deal with it?

1. Stay out of the cult in the first place.
2. If sniffing at SRF regardless of sound reasons to the contrary, abstain from submitting to Yogananda and gradually turn into a freak. It is possible to learn kriya yoga in the line of Satyananda, for example: [Link]
3. If you have entered SRF already and feel you are sinking in the mud, try to clarify how to get the best of Yogananda without being all too harmed for a life-time. Try gentle moves at first. The article Fair Yogananda Teachings is part of a collection of articles that offers help along such lines. However, reactions from guru friends and devotees against "traitors and quitters" (Yogananda's expression) may not be wholly holy-looking, warm and inclusive - just be aware of it: [Link]

Ways of Discourse

- and something mysterious to begin with

The essays and other information in this archive (our 4th archive) contains material that started as postmodern discourse. By now most of the discourse is post-postmodern, or naturalistic. Terms abound, and some seem strange at first encounter. Perhaps the book Naturalistic Enquiry may serve as an introduction; perhaps an introduction is not needed at all. [Cf. Nai]

For Yogananda also said the world is unreal [cf. Ak 488]. Give it a second's thought, and compromise, a litte, adding: "His world, maybe." and consider how some conform to crazy teachings and others to things that are plainly irksome.

Farm animals and cult members are wanting more natural scenery and more rustic freedom. All may get too little of a say, once caught and handled to serve others, also against some basic human rights (check the UN charter).

Against overgrown claims of infallibility of Yogananda, consider that he and SRF ceremonically teaches his own guru, swami Yukteswar, was an "incarnation of divine wisdom", and that Yukteswar also said about Lahiri Mahasaya (also called Baba), "reverently vibrant": "Greater he was, as man and yogi, than any other teacher whose life came within the range of my investigations." [Ay ch 12]

Step by step the big ones "get greater" we are taught, but not really infallible in everything. Satyananda:

Even such a great being and avatar can succumb to error; they are also not beyond reprimand. It is so". [Ycm, ch 3].

What is more, an episode in Yogananda's autobiography of a Yoga, shows that the guru behind Yogananda, called Babaji, once broke his word for a trifle. That means his word was of trifle worth too, on Yogananda's word, that is. [Story with comments]

The SRF guru says blind dogmatism breaks his heart, advocates rational inquiry and constructive doubt by some of his utterances, but hardly follows up all the way. [More]

Drivel and Sage Words

There are figurative terms (metaphors and more) and allegories in this section. A figurative expression says something and refers to something else at the same time. A carefully masked term often:

• Helps some harshly involved readers to maintain peace.
• Amplifies the range of usefulness; the seed may fit in in lots of places.
• Seems to help the good points to get a welcome and survive.
• Helps youngster through the fun value or entertainment fitness of good figuresof speech.

Apart from that, beware of old cattle or other farm animals completely assisting owners that profit from them, or even make a living on their backs, so to speak. Similarly, in a broken-in cult crew few give a damn, not unlike docile farm animals. [More here]

Points

Treating humans like fish is hardly quite enough. Be alerted in this vein and refrain.

There is wisdom in bringing messages when prizes are in sight, or when they help us to fulfil some of our own missions in life.

The carrier pigeon is full of purpose and direction, but does it criticise the owner to be looked on as friendly?

Only those who are fallen need rebukes, largely for the reason of avoiding or eliminating mishaps.

Good friends, if criticising severely, seem to show a lack of compassion, much like deer hunters.

Each of us may be pressed to ascertain and judge this and that, in renovating our homes too.

Is the constantly nagging wife the best friend there is around?

To really scold in all the ways a guru treasures may seem better than religious crankness, but how sure are you?

Don't let your best friend's help deteriorate into a cock-fight, though.

No one should diminish his or her essential worth while trying to please for boons.

Judicious study can help many beginners.

That old and cultured liberals stand up for well-proved issues in favour of long life, should favour young ones.

Nice outfit can be good for contacts. Let it be the right contacts.

Observe how the starkly embarrassed ones smile.

Adhere to "No great triumphs without rewards".

To get out of the humble-brambles (SRF) can be unpleasant, very unpleasant, and not everyone who succumbed to Yogananda and SRF in the first place, makes "a dash for freedom." Far from it. Some are scared. There are guru-given reasons for it.