Guru as Prophet poster: belleislesound length: 58:23 date added: February 8, 2020 event date: December 23, 1973 language: English views: 1570; views this month: 30; views this week: 15
A talk by Avatar Adi Da titled "Guru as Prophet", given on December 23, 1973. The full talk is available on the double CD, Money, Food, and Sex / Guru as Prophet. A written version of this talk is available in the book, My "Bright" Word.
In this talk, Adi Da distinguishes between the Spiritual function and the "prophet" function of the True Guru. As prophet, the Guru offends, criticizes, and undermines the usual ego-based life by confounding the search and the need for consolation and fascination. This process works to bring about a crisis of understanding in anyone not yet involved in the real Spiritual process.
Adi Da explains that teachings about ordinary life or even about Spiritual life tend to console the seeker in some way, exploiting the search for self-fulfillment. But contact with the True Guru frustrates the seeker instead, and draws the individual into the feeling of dilemma that is at the root of his or her search. This serves the crisis that must precede the real Spiritual process whereby the True Guru's Spiritual Function may be discovered.
Later in the Discourse, Avatar Adi Da returns to the primary theme of the Guru-devotee relationship. When the ego-frustrating process is engaged as Satsang, or relationship to the Guru, then present Realization of the Divine can be Awakened by Grace, and the real Spiritual process can begin.
ADI DA: To the extent that I appear in public at all—for example, by writing books, or even simply by the existence of the gathering of My devotees in this world—My visible Role can only be that of Prophet. I do not serve people's random needs to be fulfilled, to be consoled, to be fascinated. Every individual who is moved to Realize Real God, Truth, and Reality in My Avataric Divine Company must approach Me as My formally practicing devotee—and, in every such case, the usual egoic process will (and must) be Offended, Criticized, and Undermined by Me.
As the Avataric Incarnation of the Very Divine Person, I must be Paradoxical, I must be Free—in order to Serve the Divine Liberation of My devotees. The qualities of My Avataric Divine Activity cannot be predetermined. I do not consistently assume the qualities of any particular archetype—the holy man, the Yogi, the Sage. I must be Free to Appear as I will. I am always Acting to Undo the egoic life of My devotees—even if only by Merely Being Who I Am.
poster: CDBaby length: 10:01 date added: April 6, 2024 event date: March 11, 1973 language: English views: 47; views this month: 47; views this week: 16
Conversion To The Guru poster: DawnHorsePress length: 05:45 date added: November 7, 2016 event date: June 28, 1973 language: English listens: 3328; listens this month: 15; listens this week: 2
On this CD, Avatar Adi Da Samraj masterfully explores the relationship between experience, understanding, and Truth: Experience cannot ever lead to Truth -- but, in the context of the devotional relationship to Avatar Adi Da, experience can serve the crisis of understanding that makes a person available to His Transmission of Truth.
The CD includes Avatar Adi Da's lively recountings of two genuine conversion stories -- one from a modern Christian minister and the other His amusing free-rendering of the story of Ribhu and his disciple Nidhaga (from the Ribhu Gita, an epitome of traditional Non-dualist teachings).
poster: DawnHorsePress length: 05:03 date added: June 23, 2012 event date: December 23, 1973 language: English listens: 5052; listens this month: 11; listens this week: 3
An excerpt from "Guru As Prophet", a humorous and penetrating Discourse from the very earliest years of Avatar Adi Da’s Teaching-Work. Adi Da speaks of the Guru's role as prophet in the world, which is to create "an aggravation, a criticism, an undermining of the usual life". He speaks of how the Guru in the function of prophet is always working to produce a condition in which people's illusions may be undone.
poster: DawnHorsePress length: 04:34 date added: June 23, 2012 event date: January 18, 1973 language: English listens: 5707; listens this month: 20; listens this week: 7
An excerpt from "Money, Food, and Sex", a humorous and penetrating Discourse from the very earliest years of Avatar Adi Da’s Teaching-Work. Adi Da criticizes the typical conception of Spirituality as having nothing to do with the realities of day-to-day life and says that taking responsibility for money, food, and sex creates the foundation practice of genuine spiritual practice.
By tendency, people are bound to the natural cycle of ups and downs. Neither bodily pleasures nor spiritual pursuits result in True Freedom from this constant phasing. One path merely accentuates the descending (or bodily) experiences and the other, the ascending (or subtle) experiences.
In this Discourse, Avatar Adi Da reveals with absolute clarity how the relationship with the Guru gives freedom from this trap—because the Guru is the Manifestation of the Condition that is Prior to this mechanical cycling, not part of it.
Watching this DVD will transport viewers to a special moment in Adidam history. July 29, 1973, was the day Avatar Adi Da left Los Angeles for a Yajna (sacred journey) through India and Nepal. He returned as “Bubba Free John”, His first spontaneously revealed Teaching-Name. Thus, this was the last Discourse He gave as “Franklin Jones” (Avatar Adi Da’s birth name).
Moved by Love poster: frank marrero length: 04:56 date added: February 5, 2009 event date: May 1973 language: English views: 2658; views this month: 4; views this week: 0
Franklin Jones (Adi Da Samraj) talking to early devotees about the natural process of distraction. The occasion was a Prasad Day in May, 1973, in the backyard of a devotee's residence in Los Angeles.
In this talk, Avatar Adi Da addresses the fundamental principle of existence by which we should submit ourselves: service, love, and sacrifice at the Feet of a True Guru.
The occasion of the talk was a Prasad Day on July 15, 1973. This talk, originally recorded on reel-to-reel film, was given by Adi Da in Los Angeles, California — beginning at the Ashram center on Melrose Avenue and then moving to the backyard of a devotee’s house — only a year after His formal Teaching-Work began.
Adi Da talks about fear and the self-contraction. "Wherever there is an 'other', fear arises."
What Do You Do With Emotions? poster: TheBeezone length: 04:31 date added: November 17, 2013 event date: 1973 language: English views: 2100; views this month: 4; views this week: 2
In this 1973 talk, Adi Da Samraj responds to a question from a student about the tendency to either suppress, rise above, or indulge emotional states. He makes clear that "doing something else" - namely, the sadhana - is a different (and inherently right) alternative to all these other choices, in every moment.
[Contains Italian subtitles. If the CC icon ("Subtitles/closed captions") has a red line under it, the subtitles should appear. If you don't see them, just press the CC icon to turn them on.]
By tendency, people are bound to the natural cycle of ups and downs. Neither bodily pleasures nor spiritual pursuits result in True Freedom from this constant phasing. One path merely accentuates the descending (or bodily) experiences and the other, the ascending (or subtle) experiences.
In this Discourse, Avatar Adi Da reveals with absolute clarity how the relationship with the Guru gives freedom from this trap—because the Guru is the Manifestation of the Condition that is Prior to this mechanical cycling, not part of it.
Watching this DVD will transport viewers to a special moment in Adidam history. July 29, 1973, was the day Avatar Adi Da left Los Angeles for a Yajna (sacred journey) through India and Nepal. He returned as “Bubba Free John”, His first spontaneously revealed Teaching-Name. Thus, this was the last Discourse He gave as “Franklin Jones” (Avatar Adi Da’s birth name).
[Contains Spanish subtitles. If the CC icon ("Subtitles/closed captions") has a red line under it, the subtitles should appear. If you don't see them, just press the CC icon to turn them on.]
"Dios no está ni adentro ni afuera" ("God is neither within nor without") is an archival talk from July 15, 1973. This is one of the earliest video recordings of Avatar Adi Da speaking. Here He talks about the Free State of the fully Realized being, which is neither inward nor outward.
ADI DA: "God is neither within nor without. This is the principle of Satsang [the relationship with the Guru]: the Divine already present, the Divine lived with, the Divine as your Condition."
[Contains Spanish subtitles. If the CC icon ("Subtitles/closed captions") has a red line under it, the subtitles should appear. If you don't see them, just press the CC icon to turn them on.]
"El Gurú es la estabilidad constanteen medio de los altibajos de la vida” ("The Guru is Constant Stability Amidst the Highs and Lows of Life") is an excerpt from the DVD, The Relationship To The Guru Is The Constant In Life.
Watching this DVD will transport viewers to a special moment in Adidam history. July 29, 1973, was the day Avatar Adi Da left Los Angeles for a Yajna (sacred journey) through India and Nepal. He returned as “Bubba Free John”, His first spontaneously revealed Teaching-Name. Thus, this was the last Discourse He gave as “Franklin Jones” (Avatar Adi Da’s birth name).
[Contains Spanish subtitles. If the CC icon ("Subtitles/closed captions") has a red line under it, the subtitles should appear. If you don't see them, just press the CC icon to turn them on.]
In this rare historical footage from 1973, Adi Da speaks about the relationship with the Guru in Satsang (the Company of the Awakened One) as the Way of Truth, and Reality Itself.
ADI DA: "During My 'Sadhana Years', whenever My Guru asked Me to do something, I would do that. The rest of the time, I would sit there and be absorbed in Him. And there was nothing else I could do. The Guru is sufficient — and the devotee of the Guru is one who knows that."
[Contains Spanish subtitles. If the CC icon ("Subtitles/closed captions") has a red line under it, the subtitles should appear. If you don't see them, just press the CC icon to turn them on.]
Video excerpt from an early discourse by Adi Da Samraj on July 29, 1973.
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