David Godman interview - Buddha and the Gas Pump (excerpt on Maurice Frydman)
David: Maurice Frydman is one of the most extraordinary people I have ever come across and virtually nothing is known about him. Because of his connection with Ramana Maharshi, Krishnamurti, Gandhi, Nisargadatta, the Dalai Lama, I kind of view him in my own mind as the Forrest Gump of 20th century spirituality. He was in all the right places in all the right times to get the maximum benefit from interactions with some of the greats of Indian spirituality, and at the end of his career he was just about the only person that Nisargadatta certified as a jnani.
So in between all these trips to India’s major gurus, he was a Gandhian; he worked for the uplift of the poor in India; he worked with Tibetan refugees; he edited extraordinary books. I am That is probably one of the all-time spiritual classics. This man for me is, how shall we say, a shining beacon of how devotees could and should be with their teachers. He was just an absolutely extraordinary man. Oh, and he went out of his way to cover his tracks, to hide what he had actually accomplished in his life.
So I have enjoyed the detective work of looking in obscure places and digging out stuff that he personally tried to hide, not because it was embarrassing, but because he didn’t like to take credit for what he had done. So I see this as an opportunity to wave the Maurice flag and say, ‘Look, this is one of the greatest devotees, sadhaks, seekers from the west who has been to India in the last 100 years and I think more people should know about him.’
BE A SUPPORTER OF BUDDHA at the GAS PUMP
"What is Vedanta?" by Randall Friend
Vedanta is a "non-dual" tradition of Hinduism. It is similar in many ways to other non-dual traditions such as Zen or Dzogchen Buddhism, Taoism, Christian Mysticism (Gnosticism) and Sufism of Islam. The Advaita is a "section" or branch of the Vedanta which says that there is a singularity of reality, a "Unity" or an essence that underlies everything that appears to be.
Advaita means no-dos. This is not a path, nor a practice. The Advaita is a direct description of reality as it is.
Vedanta means the end of the Vedas, the end of all knowledge, unlearning, non-knowing. Through research on the nature of reality, called "knowledge of Being," the seeker comes to the realization of the non-dual nature of Reality.
BE A SUPPORTER OF MR. FRIEND’S BLOG
"A Rendering” by Mooji
These words are rendered from the transcript of a dialogue with Mooji that occurred in the spring of 2011.
There are clearly some people whose intellect can readily grasp Advaita Vedanta teachings, and even though the grasping is merely at an intellectual level, behind that there will already have been a subconscious search for something deeper. When this search first opens up through the intellect so that there is a looking for oneself as a separate, private, autonomous entity, and then nothing is found, that seeing or discovery can be the first taste liberating at some level, it's not enough, it's not quite there.
VISIT MOOJI ON LINE