CONCLUSIONSMany Buddhist movements in the West, including those described here, were founded during the second half of the twentieth century by charismatic leaders, assisted by an initially small group of devoted followers. It is typical that as a movement expands this group evolves into an inner circle, "a charismatic aristocracy," that stands between the growing membership and the leader. Increased numbers of the students mean that over time certain members of the inner circle also become meditation teachers and candidates for succession to the leadership. The founder, as in the current examples, may nominate a successor who, in adopting the mantle of charismatic authority, becomes remote from the other members of the inner circle who were once his peers. This happened to
Richard Baker and to
Osel Tendzin.
Once separated from former peers by being raised above them, a new leader can easily lose the sense of how his power depends on others, for as Weber describes it "the effectiveness of charisma lies in the faith of the ruled." The high-handedness that Richard Baker and Osel Tendzin displayed toward their critics suggests that they misunderstood the source of their own power. As Lindholm points out, "Charisma is, above all,
a relationship, a mutual mingling of the inner selves of leader and follower." But, according to his own admission, Baker became blinded to the needs of others by his "self-importance" and lack of "empathy." Osel Tendzin became so deluded as to believe that he possessed supernatural protection that could prevent HIV from conquering "his bory or the extended social body that trusted him." It may be that as Buddhist organizations mature and move away from charismatic leadership toward rationalized and democratically structured models of authority--what Gordon Melton has described as
board leadership--there will be fewer events like those that occured at Zen Center and Vajradhatu during the 1980s. Melton has proposed that corporate structures, imposed for tax purposes within new religious movements in the United States, have "given new religious groups an additional stability that no single leader could bequeath." The routinization of charisma into more bureaucratic forms of organization is also mirrored in the management of spiritual hierarchies. For example, resident students at the Zen Center must now hava a practice advisor, a senior practitioner whom they have a hand in selecting. Moreover, students can change practice advisors if they wish to do so. Par of Vajradhatu's transformation into Shambala has involved less focus on devotion to the guru in favor of training workshops, with input from a range of teachers and facilitators.
Nevertheless, in most Buddhist organizations the teacher/student relationship continues to be a central factor, and without careful management there is always a danger of manipulation of the student by the teacher, or that the teacher will succumb to sexually flirtatious students. Devotion to the teacher is encouraged in Buddhism, but devotion readily entails idealization. Such idealization often leads a student to experience strong emotional attachment, with feelings that parallel those associated in Western culture with romantic love and its stress on self-abandonment and glorification of the other.
Mark Epstein, a Buddhist and a psychiatrist, identifies these feelings as stemming from the nature of the spiritual exercise in which the practitioner is engaged:
The pressure to cast off attachment to one's own ego generates a confusion between the compassion that is supposed to grow out of egolessness, the so-called bodhicitta, with its more primitive over-identification with the glorified other [the teacher]. Meditators with this misunderstanding are vulnerable to a kind of eroticized attachment to teachers, gurus or other intimates, towards whom they direct their desires to be released into "into abandon." More often than not they also remain masochistically entwined with the figures to whom they are trying to surrender.
Certain characteristics that are inherent in the conduct of the relationship, such as privacy and confidentiality, make it additionally prone to romantic and erotic overtones. For example, in order to discuss the progress of meditation practice with their (usually) male teacher, both male and female students are likely to refer to their closest personal relationships and to unearth their deepest feelings. This is a form of intimacy in which the student is exposed in a way that does not apply to the teacher. Such a confessional relationship is also at risk of falling prey to the processes of psychological transference familiar in psychotherapy, whereby the student may project his or her erotic desires onto the teachers.
People who join Buddhist groups are often seeking communitarian alternatives to what they perceive as egocentric, competitive values that prevail in capitalist market economies. However, competitiveness re-emerges within the group as people try to outdo one another in achieving reputations for spiritual attainment or in currying favor with those whose reputations are already established. Butler describes how senior students at the Zen Center "strove to outdo each other for approval of their insight." She quotes a senior monk as saying that when it came to confronting Baker about his behavior, he felt alone, because "you don't feel like the person you are competing with will support you." New students, too, are unlikely to be critical. Their familiar, commonsense understandings are often in a state of suspension as they try to establish their places within the new milieu by learning unfamiliar ways of thinking and behaving. There is no doubt that despite the rhetoric around the notion of community (Sangha), which is ubiquitous within Buddhist groups, people can feel isolated. This isolation is exaggerated when anxiety about being ostracized causes meditation students to refrain from challenging the behavior of others, particularly members of a charismatic aristocracy. To do so can feel like betraying the idealized notions of Sangha and spiritual friendship that attracted the person to the group in the first place.
Finally, there is the question of whether Buddhist movements that are afflicted with scandals can regain their reputations. The examples suggest that this is indeed possible, if disappointed members have a medium for venting their feelings and listening to one another. At the Zen Center, the formation of affinity groups and the opportunities for counseling constituted such a medium. At Vajradhatu, the creation of a temporary newsletter, entitled
Sangha, provided an important outlet for disaffected members. In both examples, board leadership steered a course toward more accessible and open institutional forms, based on rationalized forms of organization. Charismatic authority remains, contained in the relationship between students and their meditation teachers. However, with the advent of more teachers and mentors, it is less concentrated and more readily distinguishable from matters of institutional leadership and governance.
Topic: Thich Nhat Hahn urges parliaments, corporations, schools and families to adopt 5 (Read 17711 times)