Date Posted:14:13 Author: ketch - 29 Jul 2001 Subject: Re: What Vow of Poverty? In reply to:
Eponymous - 28 Jul 2001
's message, "Re: What Vow of Poverty?" on 14:11
On the questions of desirelessness and nonattachment you are quite correct that while we live in this world we will have some desires, good and bad. Yoga teaches us that it is possible to control the mind in meditation and reach a state where no thoughts emerge. When there are no thoughts (temporarily) there are also no desires. This is considered essential if the higher states are to be achieved. It is also taught that a highly advanced person can live in the world without desires or attachments. Whether or not the psychologists agree does not alter the fact that the yogi's believe it to be possible.
You say "But monks who take similar vows should live in similar conditions. Daya Mata apparently lives in conditions far more luxurious than those of her brothers and sisters."
Why should monastics who take similar vows live in similar conditions? Whose rules are these? SRF does not have to follow the rules of the Discalsed Carmelites (or whatever). It has to follow the rules laid down by Yogananda. Where did Yogananda state that monastics must live in similar conditions? I dispute that this rule applies to SRF, or for that matter to the vast majority of spiritual organisations whose Pope's and Archbishops often live in conditions far above those of the average renunciant.
