This was the second of Muktananda’s world tours. Some westerners who had become disciples had purchased and begun refurbishing a large hall with a kitchen and some staff quarters in either Emeryville or West Oakland. It was sometime in either ‘74 or ‘75 because I had taken my exclaustration, and was living on the Oakland Berkeley border with my fellow SAT member Hal Slate. It was also close to the end of those first early SAT groups, but all the group members were still in active communication. One day either Hal or I got a call that someone had arranged a private darshan with Muktananda to be held late one afternoon before his public event at the ashram.
There were only 20 or so people in the room. I recognized Helen Palmer. As soon as Baba Muktananda entered and took his seat, he gestured towards Helen who got up, bowed and then exited into a private meditation room. She later told me that she was there because Muktananda was the best “hit” in town. Following a few remarks by Jain, Muktananda gestured towards me and Jain asked me to come forward. I’d tried to find an appropriate gift. We were told that he liked hats. I had an old white Panama Hat from college that I’d trimmed with an orange ribbon and the end of a peacock feather. I’d wrapped it in plain white paper. I had already decided that I would skip the whole foot kissing ritual so I sat before him in a kneeling position. I said hello and handed him my gift. After Jain or another assistant unwrapped it, he laughed uproariously, took off his hat and put on the Panama. Then he handed me his orange skull cap and said in English, “hat for a hat!” Then Jain translated a few questions about who I was, what I did, something about a Prince that I missed entirely, but others in the group were impressed. I returned to my seat.
Then Muktananda pointed to someone behind me and asked who he was. The young man said he was from Franklin Jones (Da Free John)’s group and had come to extend their greetings to Baba. The conversation was suddenly doused with cold water. The drift of the questions that I could follow went something like, well, I do hope he’s well, but where is he? Oh he’s very busy but he sends as a token of his respect this box of cheap crummy chocolate balls that came from the ashram’s kitchen. I had tried to be respectful within what I felt were my limits. Da Free John’s people didn’t swear or make foul gestures, but they were definitely confrontational. I got the impression that someone on the staff would be asked how the group made it onto the list of invited guests.
An hour in I had a sense of heightened awareness, so when Jain invited questions from other guests, I was not prepared for my response to one woman’s question. She said she was epileptic. Was there anything she could do to prevent seizures? Muktananda became rather oddly professional, and said that he’d been a doctor before becoming a sadhu. His recommendation was to drink cow urine, preferably still warm. Now that I live in India and have some experience of village Ayurveda medicine, I realize that cow piss is a bit like aspirin. It is applied widely with little discrimination. But in that moment I was facing total culture shock. Here I was in a guru’s ashram wearing his orange skull cap, getting carried away with lots of high energy, watching him dress down a fallen-away follower’s disciples, and listening to medical advice about the benefits of cow piss.
At that point Jain said that the time had come to get ready for the chanting, talk and darshan in the public hall, and afterwards, please stay for dinner. I’m sure Hal and I stayed. Chanting the Guru Gita was very long although harmonious. Even though the poem is in praise of the eternal guru, it was obvious that the followers identified Muktananda as that guru. I thought that singing the praises of the guru in the presence of a human guru was a bit over the top, but I was also doing my best to dispel my preconceived ideas and prejudices.
The next day I had a meeting at the Jesuit School. After meditation I walked down Telegraph Avenue towards the campus. There was a bank just past Ashby and I stopped to get 20 bucks from the ATM. I made my way back to the sidewalk, turned left and stopped on the corner of Russell waiting for the light. Before the signal turned green, my entire world was transformed. The experience is extremely difficult, if not impossible to describe. It lit up. I’d been plugged in. First were colors I had never imagined. If I said I was floating in a whirlwind of electric particles, that wouldn’t do it justice. I knew exactly where I was and what I was doing but the world was buzzing. It was somewhat akin to the few drug experiences I had had, but far more vibrant and I was really present, not just an observer. It was extremely expansive, but the center held. I cannot say how long it lasted. It disappeared just as quickly as it had arrived. Part of me was stunned, but it was not the kind of experience that required that I put on my analytical hat and ponder it for a month. It just was. When I noticed that the light had changed to green although I had no idea of how long I’d been standing there, I looked at my watch and realized that I was going to be late for lunch at the Jesuit School if I lingered. The universe returned to what it had been a few minutes, seconds or nanoseconds before, and I continued to walk north though I do remember being extremely careful of crossing traffic.
Later that afternoon I realized that I had received shaktipat, what yogis describe as the awakening of the dormant divine energy. I also realized why there is really very little written about these experiences other than they happen. It was a wild experience. Maybe I could blame it on the orange skull cap.
I would have been a fool not to follow up on my experience at least to see if it led anywhere. I returned to the Oakland ashram, but did not become a regular by any stretch of the imagination. I didn’t really like the Hindu trappings. I should be more clear: I didn’t particularly dislike them either but I wasn't falling in love. The singing started to feel like uninspired Catholic guitar masses of the 70’s. The people around Muktananda, I felt, were there to feel some kind of spiritual high or bliss, but it was extremely self-centered. I had conversations with several of the western sadhu and again, but was not inspired. I could not shake off their guru worship.
The staff announced a retreat, a long period of meditation at a center in the Santa Cruz Mountains. It was to last a week which I could not manage, but I wanted to experience a longer concentrated meditation period so I asked Muktananda personally at darshan if I could attend only the weekend. He quickly assented. I arrived late on Friday afternoon after the long rush hour drive from San Francisco. I signed in and was directed to the shared cabin I’d been assigned. I set off into the woods. On the path I passed Muktananda with his perpetual entourage of VIP’s. Naranjo was among them. They were headed up to the main meditation pavilion. I bowed towards them and Muktananda nodded back. I continued to struggle along the rather densely overgrown path towards my bunk when suddenly I heard a very loud cracking sound. It sounded like a giant with enormous hands snapping his fingers right over my head or very close to my ear. Then again. I found my cabin, threw down my sleeping bag, and made my way to the meditation hall. I wouldn’t return to bed for 36 hours.
An elaborate Krishna shrine had been set up in the middle of the room. Men would circumambulate for an hour and then the women would take up the dance. It was not like the ecstatic airport Hari Krishna chanters but that was the song. It was not quiet. There were as I recall live musicians as well as spontaneous twirling and jumping. The chanting was modulated with slow and faster sections. When I did circumambulate, I was extremely restrained, but didn’t feel out of place or forced into a fake religious fervor. We sat in what zen monks would consider a very loose meditation posture, men on one side of the room and women on the other. A guy in front of me was bouncing off the floor with what I was told were some kind of kriyas or loosening of the kundalini energy. Once Muktananda came into the room and led the procession of men in the chanting. Otherwise he sat on the side in his elevated chair. There must have been a few breaks when Muktananda talked or answered questions. I remember the guy in front of me thanking Muktananda for his experience. Food was available during certain periods, but I don’t recall any formal meal breaks. And oh, it didn’t stop, but went on day and night. The drive back to San Francisco was about 4 hours on a very dangerous highway so I made sure that I had a few hours sleep before leaving, but other than that I was in the meditation hall.
Once was enough. Despite these intense meditation experiences, I began to feel more and more disconnected from Muktananda. I continued to visit the Oakland ashram from time to time when he was there which was less and less frequent. He had engagements in New York and southern California. There were now a huge number of people gathering around him. It had a cultish feel. There was also an extraordinary amount of money flowing into the organization.
One time we were told through the SAT grapevine that Hoffman would visit. Knowing that Hoffman only went to make a public display of himself as Muktananda’s equal, or to find some way to denigrate Muktananda, I was not going to miss it. After Hoffman’s private meeting, and I wasn’t present so I don’t know about the encounter, I was standing at the edge of the dining hall with others when Hoffman appeared. Suddenly he disappeared, and then, after a few minutes he came into the room sheepishly carrying a plate of food or a bowl of soup, complaining loudly that Muktananda’s guards wouldn’t let him into the private quarters. “I know he’s very lonely. So I just wanted to share some soup with him and keep him company, but they wouldn’t let me in.”
I am now going to try to describe an experience that I have never written about or even talked about other than on one or two occasions and then privately. I think that I’ve been afraid of either being called a madman or a failed sannyasin, neither of which is personally appealing. I can’t say with certainty what actually did happen, other than it happened. I might have been deluded or hallucinating, or carried away by some religious fervor, or perhaps it really did occur as I am going to describe. But I am going to demand a complete level of honesty from Muktananda so I can’t avoid telling the story.
I forget the circumstances of my invitation. I was not a regular member of Naranjo’s inner circle, but either late one afternoon or early evening, I went to Kathy and Claudio’s house in North Berkeley above the Arlington circle. When I arrived there were only a few people. I actually only specifically remember my friend Danny Ross being there. Cheryl Dembe, who later became Sundari might have also been present as well as Luc Brebion. But other than that I would have to pick and choose out of a list of the usual suspects. If there’d been a very close friend with whom I might have shared and even asked questions about what was going to happen, I would have remembered.
One of the first things that I remember very clearly was a Scientology E Meter casually set up on the breakfast table. I had only heard rumors of Nanranjo’s experimentation with Auditing and to see the device, which is nothing more than a galvanic skin response lie detector, there it was.
There was certainly the usual friendly chit chat. As it was beginning to get dark, Speeth and several others arrived. They came in through the front door. She was carrying a plain square cardboard box, slightly smaller than a bank box. In it were copies of a thin book, talks by Muktananda* that she and Donovan Bess had edited and published. She said that they were hot off the press and the reason she was late is that she’s been at the airport saying goodbye to Muktananda before he and his entourage flew back to India, and she had wanted to share the new publication with him before he left. She gave us each a copy. We were all now sitting on the floor near the breakfast nook near some casual seating. I still had a clear view of the front door. The group was politely enthusiastic about Speeth and Bess’s work, thumbing through, reading bits and pieces here and there, smiling, laughing.
Then I looked up and noticed a very bright light that seemed to be coming through the front door. It was a long oval shape and fit the door frame. It continued to increase in intensity, the edges becoming more white while the inside seemed reddish or orange. Suddenly the actual shape of Muktananda’s body became clear. It was dressed as we had always seen him in darshan, but the clothing was diaphanous and brightly lit. His distinct facial features were clearly visible. He was walking at a very deliberate pace though the legs may not have been really moving at all. He had the appearance and movement of a real human body although it was not solid. I could still make out the door and the walls through him. It was eerily real.
I do not know if I was the only person who saw this. There was no discussion, no questions, or expressions of shock and awe. The only thing that did happen was that someone in the group began to sing Om Namah Shivaya very softly. The figure began at the edge of the circle opposite me. It stood behind each person. I cannot remember if they were gestures, but the person became very quiet. The figure moved in a clockwise fashion until I could sense it standing behind me. That was the last thing I recall until we began to gather our things together to return home.
I am surprised that after an extraordinary experience, and I presume that others had some experience, we just went back to our normal lives. I have hesitated to speak about it openly for almost 50 years. There are many possible reactions to a clear, even violent breaking of normal perception. One is silence. Almost all modern writers talking about their drug experiences have expressed frustration. Most writings by the mystics are rarely clear or self-explanatory. When you can’t say anything, nothing may be the best option. I have not used any language designed for extraordinary mystical experiences, Muktananda was not projecting an astral body. I am not calling it an apparition. I wonder if close disciples or devotees simply have these kinds of encounters and accept them as the “new normal,” but what I experienced was not ordinary by any stretch of the imagination.
What I can say honestly is that a revered Indian guru who was on an scheduled international flight from San Francisco to Mumbai appeared in an ordinary Berkeley house in the early evening. He was a real person or appeared extremely life-like although his body was diaphanous and bright. He was alive, not dead or resurrected as in the Jesus narrative, but afterwards I could see the story of Thomas’s meeting Jesus differently. And if the story of Thomas putting his hands in Jesus’s open wounds actually happened, I could also understand that the conversations recorded in the 20th Chapter of John took a few years to emerge.
Things fall apart
The number of followers around Muktananda became overwhelming. Darshan was a circus. I can’t recall one talk that I thought memorable. No one seemed interested in psychological investigation. I stopped going. Siddha Yoga is a practice of energy transfer and a connection between the guru and his or her student. That wasn’t happening.
What was also clear that in a larger group, there were those who were close devotees, or considered themselves close, those aspiring or even jealous. There was also an enormous amount of money now available. This is ripe terrain for abuse, distrust, even warfare. I don’t think that it ever reached the outrageous heights of Rajneeshpuram in Oregon, but cults are cults. The disintegration in trust was the beginning of the leaking of salacious details about Muktananda’s sexual life.
Hoffman had been wrong, or perhaps very right. Muktananda was not lacking in company, and he may have been very lonely. I am not going to delve into his motivations, but soon there were many credible rumors that the guards who had blocked Hoffman from the private apartments invited many younger women, some even underaged, to join Muktananda. He was not a celibate sadhu.
I have read through many of the accounts from insiders and malcontents and disenchanted followers. Muktananda at some point gave up the celibate life, but he couldn’t just trade satguru for the role of a conventional married man. I think that Krishna Murti’s long involvement with an older married woman might be a good example, one that I can understand and even sympathize with. What I think I can say with some understanding of the cultural divide between traditional Indian culture and westernized ones, especially New Age California: Muktananda could not prey on younger Indian women--the taboos are too strong--but with so many younger American women with liberated attitudes available, the doors opened. From most reports, it was not about nurturing human relationships. It was sex.
People try to defend him. I will only point to one of Muktananda’s most ardent supporters, Claudio Naranjo’s explanation: “I think Muktananda’s case is very complex. My own interpretation of him is that he was playing the role of a saint according to Western ideals, or to cultural ideals in general. I think he was a saint in the real sense, which has nothing to do with that. For instance, it's the popular idea that a saint has no sexual life, and he was playing the role of a Brahmacharya, which I think was part of a cultural mission he was on, to be an educator on a large scale. It was fitting that he did that role, and my own evaluation of him is that he was clean, because he was not a lecher.”
Claudio, let me be clear--your analysis is wrong, He was a lecher. His behavior was unethical and exploitative. If he were a Catholic priest he would be defrocked, or even in jail. He does not get a pass for trying to play the role of a Brahmacharya in some large cultural shift.
Baba-Ji, you lied to us. You were not who you claimed to be.
I’m not quite sure where I can begin to separate the man from the yogic powers, or even if I have to. But I do know where to place my allegiance and when to withdraw it.
Honesty is such a lonely word
Everyone is so untrue
Honesty is hardly ever heard
And mostly what I need from you
--Billy Joel
*The publication date of “Swami Muktananda,” edited by Kathleen Speeth & Donovan Bess is 1974 so my mental calculation is slightly off.
