Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
The picture is not mine. Had it been mine, I would have hesitated
to put it there . . . The picture only appears to be mine; it is not.
No picture of me is possible really. The moment one knows
oneself, one knows something that cannot be depicted, described,
framed. I exist as an emptiness that cannot be pictured, that
cannot be photographed. That is why I could put the picture
there.
Thousands upon thousands of photographs of the bhagwan must
exist. His moist eyes are sometimes soulful in such pictures, pungent
with a stagy wisdom, but most often they look predatory, steeped in
a goatish lechery. In many he appears surrounded by women
writhing about in a frenzy, his large, brutal hands pressing their
energy centres - often conveniently located near breasts and groins.
I met his first true disciple, the first sannyasi he initiated. She was
a somewhat pushy, arrogant woman. On July 1, 1970, she shed the
name her parents had given her and became Ma Yoga Laxmi,
embarking on an ambitious career of manipulating human foibles.
The bhagwan seemed to have other interests in Ma Yoga Laxmi
back then. He certainly did not cater to feminists in the fold when
he said, 'Always remember that Laxmi never does anything on her
own. She is a perfect vehicle. That is why she is chosen for this
work . . . Whatever is said, she does.'
The classic Indian wife on one level, or a brainwashed automaton
on another, Laxmi could have been either, from my impressions of
the woman. With the bhagwan's unswerving confidence in
grooming her for her role as
éminence grise
, Ma Laxmi assumed
greater and greater power and authority while those of her god and
guru waned, his diabetes and asthma in the 1980s gradually forcing
him into a seclusion that his believers naturally viewed as a classic
retreat into silence. Many great spiritual leaders dissolve into the
great Oneness this way in their later years. From their seclusion
they teach on inner levels only, working from within the very hearts
and souls of their devotees. Apparently.
But back in 1976, the Bhagwan seemed nowhere near retreating
- nowhere near acquiring the world's largest collection of Rolls-
Royces either. He had, as photos revealed, aged drastically in two
