Part One of an Essay
from the Ruchira Avatara Gita (The Way Of The
Divine Heart-Master) The Divine
World-Teacher, RUCHIRA AVATAR ADI
DA SAMRAJ
Guru cultism is a tendency that has
always been present in the religious and Spiritual
traditions of mankind. Anciently, and in the present time,
both true Spiritual Masters and ordinary Wisdom-Teachers
have been "cultified', and (thereby) made the merely
fascinating Object of a self-contained popular movement that
worships the Spiritual Master as a Parent-like Savior, while
embracing very little of the significant Wisdom-Teaching of
the Spiritual Master The error of conventional cultism is
precisely this
childish, and (otherwise)
adolescent, and (altogether) ego--based orientation to
fascination with Spiritual Masters, Wisdom-Teachers,
God-Ideas, myths, sacred lore, inherited beliefs,
traditional propaganda, and psycho-physical (or merely
body-mind-based) mysticism. And the cultic tendency in
religion and Spirituality is the essence of what is wrong
with conventional religion and Spirituality. The "problem" is not that there Is
no Real God,* or that there are no true Wisdom Teachings, or
that there are no true Spiritual Masters, or that there
should be no devotion to any true Spiritual Masters. The
"problem" with conventional religion and Spirituality is the
same as the 'problem" of all ordinary life. The problem is
the childish, and (otherwise) rather adolescent, egoism that
is the basis of all forms of ordinary existence. Yet un-Enlightened (or, otherwise,
not yet Most Perfectly Enlightened) people are
ego-possessed. Therefore, egoity is the "disease" that all
the true Spiritual Masters of religion come here to cure.
Unfortunately, those who are merely fascinated by Spiritual
Masters are, typically, those who make (or, at least,
transform) the institutions of the religion and the
Spirituality of their Spiritual Masters. And true
practitioners of religion and Spirituality are very hard to
find, or develop. Therefore, religious and Spiritual
institutions tend to develop along lines that serve,
accommodate, and represent the common egoity, and this is
why the esoteric true Teachings of true Spiritual Masters
tend to be bypassed, and even suppressed, in the drive to
develop the exoteric cult of any particular Spiritual
Master The relationship to Me . . . is not
an exoteric cultic matter. It is a profound esoteric
discipline, necessarily associated with real and serious and
mature (ego-surrendering, ego-forgetting, ego-transcending,
and Divine-Guru- Oriented) practice of the "radical" Way (or
root-Process) of Realizing Real God (Which IS Reality and
Truth). Therefore, I am critical of the ego-based (or
self-saving, and self- guruing) practices of childish, and
(otherwise) adolescent, and (altogether) merely exoteric
cultism. The common religious or Spiritual
cult is based on the tendency to resist the disciplines of
real (and really counter-egoic) practice, and to opt for
mere fascination with extraordinary (or even imaginary)
phenomena (which are, invariably, not understood in Truth
and in Reality). Apart from the often petty demand for the
observation of conventional roles (generally, relative to
social morality, or merely social religion), the cult of
religious and Spiritual fascination tends to become
righteously associated with no practice that is, with the
even official expectation that there be no real (or truly
right, and full) practice of religious and Spiritual
disciplines (especially of religious, Spiritual, and
meditative disciplines of an esoteric kind). Just so, the
cult of religious and Spiritual fascination tends to he
equally righteous about maintaining fascinated faith (or
indiscriminate, and even aggressive, belief) in the merely
Parent-like 'Divine" Status of one or another historical
individual, God-Idea, religious or Spiritual doctrine,
inherited tradition, or force of cosmic Nature. Religious and Spiritual cultism is,
thus, a kind of infantile collective madness. (And such
madness is equally shared by secular cultists, in every area
of popular culture, including politics, the sciences, the
arts, the communications media, and even all the agencies
and institutions of conventional 'officialdom" relative to
human knowledge, belief, and behavior). Religious and
Spiritual cults (and, likewise, all secular cults) breed
"pharisaism" (or the petty righteousness of conventional
thinking). Religious and Spiritual cults breed
"Substitution" myths (or the belief that personal
ego-transcendence is both generally and ultimately,
impossible, hut also unnecessary, because of what "God", or
some "Master", or even some "priest" has already done).
Indeed, religious and Spiritual cults (and likewise, all
secular cults) breed even every kind of intolerance, and the
chronic aggressive search for exclusive social dominance and
secular power. Religious and Spiritual cults are,
characteristically, populated by those who are, generally,
neither inclined toward nor prepared for the real right
practice of religious and Spiritual discipline, but who are
(and always seek to be) glamorized and consoled by mere
association with the "holy" things and beliefs of the cult
itself. This error of religious and
Spiritual cultism, and of ego-based culture in general, must
be examined very seriously such that the error is truly
rooted out, from within the cult and the culture itself (and
not merely, and with equally cultic cultural righteousness,
criticized from without). Cultism of every kind (both sacred
and secular) must be understood to be a kind of ritualized
infantilism bound to egocentric behavior, and to the embrace
of "insiders" only, and to intolerance relative to all
"outsiders' The cultic tendency, both sacred and secular,
causes (and has always caused) great social, cultural, and
political trouble, as can even now be seen in the
development of worldwide conflicts based on the exclusive
(or collectively egocentric) orientation of the many grossly
competitive religious traditions, political idealism's, and
national identities. All cults, whether sacred or
secular, thrive on indulgence in the psychology (and the
emotional rituals) of hope, rather than on actual
demonstration of counter-egoic and really ego-transcending
action. Therefore, when all egos meet, they strive and
compete for the ultimate fulfillment of searches and
desires, rather than cooperate with, Reality, or Real God,
and in a culturally valued and rewarded mood of fearless
tolerance and sane equanimity. Clearly, this cultic tendency in
religion and Spirituality, and the egoic (anti cultic)
tendency in life in general, must become the constant
subject of fundamental human understandingand all of mankind
roust constantly be put to "school", to unlearn the method
of egocentrism, non-cooperation, intolerance, and disease.