Post by Reefs on Aug 20, 2019 21:53:51 GMT -5
Somehow I couldn't find Papaji on the Spiritual Teachers main site. His students Gangaji and Cohen are listed though. I'm not quite understanding that logic. He should definitely be listed.
From Wikipedia:
From Wikipedia:
Sri H. W. L. Poonja (born Hariwansh Lal Poonja; 13 October 1910 (or later) in Punjab, British India – 6 September 1997 in Lucknow, India), known as "Poonjaji" or "Papaji" was an Indian sage and jivanmukta (liberated being) who taught Self-enquiry as advocated by Ramana Maharshi.
His teaching emphasises that words can only point to ultimate truth, but never are ultimate truth, and that intellectual understanding without directly realising the truth through one's own investigation is not enough. Like Sri Ramana he stressed that teaching through silence was more important than teaching through words.
At the age of eight he experienced an unusual state of consciousness. He was persuaded by his mother that he could regain this experience by devotion to the Hindu god Krishna, and so he gave himself over to this and began to have visions of Krishna. He became obsessed with a longing to have the experience of seeing Krishna all the time. He continuously repeated Krishna's name (japa) and traveled throughout India asking sages if they could deliver the ability to produce the darshan of Krishna at will.
After all his attempts had failed he returned to his family in Lyallpur. A sadhu appeared at the door soon after and Poonja asked him the question he had asked swamis throughout the country: "Can you show me God? If not, do you know of anyone who can?" The sadhu told him that there was a person, Ramana Maharshi, who could show him God and explained how to find Ramana Maharshi at Tiruvannamalai in southern India. At the earliest opportunity, Poonjaji travelled to Tiruvannamalai to meet the sage Ramana Maharshi at Ramanashramam at Arunachala. This happened in 1944 when Poonja was thirty-one. However, rather than giving another vision of God, Ramana pointed him in the direction of his own self: “I cannot show you God or enable you to see God because God is not an object that can be seen. God is the subject. He is the seer. Don't concern yourself with objects that can be seen. Find out who the seer is.”
He found that he could no longer bring his mind to think of God, do japa or any other spiritual practice. He asked Ramana for help and was told that this was not a problem, that all his practice had carried him to this moment and it could be left behind now because it had served its purpose.
Poonjaji later settled in Lucknow where he received visitors from all around the world. Some well-known students are Mooji, Gangaji, Arjuna Ardagh, Catherine Ingram, Ganga Mira, Isaac Shapiro, Madhukarji, Sam Harris, Dolano, and Andrew Cohen, who later distanced himself from Poonja. David Godman moved to Lucknow in 1992, and stayed with him till 1997, and soon became his biographer, in the following years edited and published a number of books on him. Poonjaji died on 6 September 1997.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H._W._L._Poonja
His teaching emphasises that words can only point to ultimate truth, but never are ultimate truth, and that intellectual understanding without directly realising the truth through one's own investigation is not enough. Like Sri Ramana he stressed that teaching through silence was more important than teaching through words.
At the age of eight he experienced an unusual state of consciousness. He was persuaded by his mother that he could regain this experience by devotion to the Hindu god Krishna, and so he gave himself over to this and began to have visions of Krishna. He became obsessed with a longing to have the experience of seeing Krishna all the time. He continuously repeated Krishna's name (japa) and traveled throughout India asking sages if they could deliver the ability to produce the darshan of Krishna at will.
After all his attempts had failed he returned to his family in Lyallpur. A sadhu appeared at the door soon after and Poonja asked him the question he had asked swamis throughout the country: "Can you show me God? If not, do you know of anyone who can?" The sadhu told him that there was a person, Ramana Maharshi, who could show him God and explained how to find Ramana Maharshi at Tiruvannamalai in southern India. At the earliest opportunity, Poonjaji travelled to Tiruvannamalai to meet the sage Ramana Maharshi at Ramanashramam at Arunachala. This happened in 1944 when Poonja was thirty-one. However, rather than giving another vision of God, Ramana pointed him in the direction of his own self: “I cannot show you God or enable you to see God because God is not an object that can be seen. God is the subject. He is the seer. Don't concern yourself with objects that can be seen. Find out who the seer is.”
He found that he could no longer bring his mind to think of God, do japa or any other spiritual practice. He asked Ramana for help and was told that this was not a problem, that all his practice had carried him to this moment and it could be left behind now because it had served its purpose.
Poonjaji later settled in Lucknow where he received visitors from all around the world. Some well-known students are Mooji, Gangaji, Arjuna Ardagh, Catherine Ingram, Ganga Mira, Isaac Shapiro, Madhukarji, Sam Harris, Dolano, and Andrew Cohen, who later distanced himself from Poonja. David Godman moved to Lucknow in 1992, and stayed with him till 1997, and soon became his biographer, in the following years edited and published a number of books on him. Poonjaji died on 6 September 1997.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H._W._L._Poonja