I’ve used both of my recovery experiences to show that, not only are different forms of faith appropriate to different people, sometimes this is true for the same person at different times in their lives. In my experience faith (or if you prefer, confidence and optimism) works. In my initial recovery I had faith in a higher power and I was happy to call that God. In my later recovery I developed faith in the Dharma. I found no inconsistency between the 12 steps and the Three Fold Way of meditation, morality and wisdom.

Coming from a recovery background into Buddhism has been quite an interesting experience. In recovery we value personal experience and pretty much ignore speculation.  Who cares what peoples opinions are, what matters is surely what works? Within some Buddhist circles personal experience is almost frowned upon as ego centred and speculation is commonplace.

Dharma, ironically is what works. By definition it is whatever brings one to awakening. It is relative to the particular individual and circumstances and cannot be turned into dogma. In traditional terms paramarthasatya =absolute truth and samvritisatya = relative truth = Dharma. There isn’t anything that can be said that is absolute truth and all Dharma is relative to human experience. In the absence of greed hatred and delusion we discover the interconnectness of all living beings. An awakened mind is then characterised by wisdom and compassion in response to human reality. But we see that for ourselves thru the practice of meditation, morality and wisdom. It’s not a set of beliefs to be taken on blindly.

For me, the Four Noble Truths are fundamental to Buddhism. The truth that human being are suffering, that the cause of suffering is craving, that there is a way leading to liberation from suffering, that way is the Three Fold Way. Within these ‘Truths’ is the idea that all experiences occur in dependence on conditions. Nothing is born of itself and nothing is ever completely obliterated. All of phenomenal existence is in a constant flow of change. From this many other important ideas are developed including that everything is impermanent; insubstantial; and ultimately unsatisfying. I won’t go thru all of these here because there are plenty of books to help you with that.

I spent 6 years preparing for Ordination into the Western Buddhist Order. During that time I spent six to eight weeks every year on retreat. Studied the variety of approaches outlined by Sangharakshita systematically and reflected deeply on the various talks he gave. What has become increasingly clear to me is that clarity of commitment is more important than trying to prove that this Buddhist group is better than that one or the other way around. ‘The way is easy save for picking and choosing’ The Taoist, Lao Tsu once said. It is on that basis that I became a Western Buddhist. Not perfect, but I believed I could practice Dharma within this context.

In general I found the FWBO retreats I attended inspiring. They provided me with a great opportunity to meditate, reflect and enjoy the company of other Buddhist. I lived in Buddhist communities in London and then Spain and worked in Team Based Right Livelihoods (TBRL). These are something like cooperatives, which allowed me to work with other Buddhists and practice the principles in all of my affairs.

The main TBRL I worked for was The Karuna Trust. I was a fundraiser and a member of their management team for four years. The money we raised went to a charity in India called Bahajan Hitay, which means for the welfare of the many, and was used to provide education and sometimes hostel accommodation for ex Untouchables. (The criteria allow for children who are in need who are not necessarily ex untouchables.)

It was while I worked for Karuna that I was Ordained and given the name Jayanatha. I was sent on a four month retreat in a valley in Spain called Guhyaloka, meaning the hidden valley. My Preceptor, the man who ordained me, told me that Jaya means victory and Natha means protector. So Jayanatha could be seen as victorious protector. However he emphasised protector of victory. To me this resonated with my attraction to the earth touching mudra (posture). This is the legendary moment after the Buddha’s Enlightenment when the Buddha called the earth to witness, to confirm that his experience was real.

A significant personal moment in those six years.

After yet another set back, during which I felt furiously angry at what I saw as class prejudice, I had an experience during a form of visualisation practice. At the point where we were to bring our mother to our left shoulder I found my daughter Nicky. Thinking this was wrong I forced that to change and what came to my shoulder was a corpse. I had the very strong feeling “She is dead.” I released her and Nicky came back to my shoulder. In a sort of waking dream I watched my mother’s body being placed into a coffin and pushed into a cremation fire. It felt like so much of my anger came from the feeling of needing a world in which she had a chance. The slightest sign of class prejudice and lack of sympathy with my cause and I would, metaphorically draw my sword ready to fight against the powerlessness. The raging desire to ensure that no human being should live and die like that, expressed itself in a contradiction. As if I was saying ’I want to live in a world in a which it could be easier to love and I’ll fight any bastard who stands in my way.’ It was never going to work. I had to let go and begin to accept others, some of whom are, in my opinion, politically naive and sometimes ignorant of social injustice, and I have to open my heart to them. I don’t have to pretend that they are what they are not, but it has to be all right for me that they are part of the sangha to which I go for refuge.

Ordination was about being witnessed, recognised, whatever word you prefer. It has to be done by someone who one respects enough for it to be meaningful and it was certainly one of the most significant moments in my life second only to the day when John W and the others, persuaded me to stay alive. Without them, without AA, I would not be writing this now. We can’t do these things alone. Just as my sobriety depends on constant contact with others who take not drinking seriously, and enjoy sobriety, so too is my ability to live the spiritual life dependent on conditions.

When I voice criticism about the FWBO, it’s because it matters enough to me. I want the FWBO to come of age. To learn from it’s mistakes and spread the Dharma.

Not long after Ordination I began to find out in more detail how Sangharakshita had behaved during a period of approximately 18 years ending in the mid 80s. It appears that he believed that same sex relationships were better for the spiritual life and that changing from hetero to homosexual sex was ‘as easy as changing from tea to coffee’. Up until Ordination I had been told that it was the days of free love, Bhante’s gay and so what? It was more than that. Copies of the book Greek Love were distributed to men’s communities and young men were encouraged to believe that there was value in having sex with their mentors. I have been told by one of those men that he knew of at least 35, otherwise straight young guys who had sex with Sangharakshita. This often took place in a retreat centre while the young men were on retreat.

I have never seen anyone copying that behaviour in the last 18 years but I can say for sure that there are still some Order Members who fail to openly acknowledge that Sangharakshita was naïve and irresponsible in this behaviour. Sexuality is much more complicated than he had concluded and it has been a source of pain and confusion as a result. I wish to forgive him for his inability to acknowledge that he was unskilful and to continue to answer questions about FWBO history as honestly as I can. There are still those who would prefer to believe denials and rationalisations. In my opinion, this is not a real foundation for us, as an Order to teach Dharma. The collusion has to stop.

For some reason Sangharakshita got hung up on the superiority of classical music and art. I’m not concerned here to argue whether there is any justification for this value system but I have wondered if he actually cared about how off putting this was to many of those who are searching for Dharma. I remember having a huge reaction when I heard a talk by one of his closest friends, during which he made aggressive statements about the ludicrous comparison of ‘an African Witch Doctors mask’ and a painting by some famous classical artist.  I remember a black woman weeping in the foyer surrounded by sympathisers, including me. We had to stop him from giving talks at the centre after that. That woman is now an OM so make no mistake there is an openness and commitment to individuals regardless of class, race, gender or sexual orientation. We just need to remain vigilant and make changes in our attitudes when they get in the way of another’s spiritual aspiration.

I found this institutionalised snobbishness really weird but Sangharakshita said so many other things, which were such good interpretations of Dharma that I was not, inclined to leave. For example, this is his critique of many formal religions:

“Religious life, instead of being a voyage of spiritual self discovery, thus becomes the uncritical acceptance of creeds and dogmas which serve the selfish interests of some particular class or community. Independent thought and unbiased investigation are discouraged and if possible, suppressed by force, while blind faith (the blinder the better) is heaped with superlatives and extolled as the one infallible means of obtaining salvation.” (from “The Essential Sangharakshita”, p151)

Comments that Sangharakshita makes, which appear to contradict that, should be seen in the light of an attempt to redress the balance of OMs drifting into loose, individualistic lifestyles which are not going to help them or us collectively. Personally, I think he has been seen too much as one single authority within the Order and I applaud those who have studied with other teachers, questioned and criticised. He is human and is therefore not a safe refuge (I’m sure he would agree with this).  Those Order Members who appear to worship Sangharakshita are a minority, in my opinion, unfortunately they are a powerful minority and that should not be the case within a spiritual community.

I believe we could do well to learn from the huge success of AA and study the 12 traditions. They are brilliant and courageous, for example the decision to refuse legacies in case problems of power, prestige and property affect our primary purpose. We might not decide to follow this exactly but even to understand why the tradition exists would help us. I’ve met far too many Buddhists who are attached to their own status and position to the extent of losing sight of the insignificance of these things. Grandiosity and being on the receiving end of other peoples projections is a hindrance. It can lead to the development of a guru like persona that stops seeing it’s own shadow.

I learned to distinguish between Sangharakshita’s interpretation of Dharma and his personal opinions about other matters. In terms of Dharma there was beauty and inspiration, the attempt to find a middle way between monastic life and being a Sunday school type of Buddhist, really suited me. I also believed that we need to develop a 21st century Western approach. In terms of women, sex and social relations I have absolutely no intention of defending his attitudes or behaviour.

I am a member of the Western Buddhist Order. I am not a devotee and I am concerned to ensure that Western Buddhism develops on the basis of principles and not personalities. I would encourage other recovered alcoholics to use the resources available to enjoy good retreats, study and reflect on Dharma. In my experience I have been able to go so much deeper thru Buddhist practice than I could ever have done simply thru rational thinking.

When you meet a Buddhist you will soon know if they are dogmatists. There is something about communicating with people who are open minded that feels tangibly different. As though you are two people searching together thru dialogue. This, in my opinion is going for refuge, the pursuit of the honest truth about human experience, with others, inspired by the ideals and ideas, ancient and new within Buddhist tradition. If the Buddhist you meet has fixed views and cannot engage in dialogue find someone else to search with.

As I said at the beginning I have no intention of telling anyone exactly how Buddhism fits into the 12 steps of recovery. Nor do I have any intention of telling you what you will find if you practice meditation, morality and wisdom. The Dharma is my source of inspiration and faith and I am aware that a man or woman could be seen as something special while in truth they are simply singing this great song well. Beware of the cult of the singer and listen to the song of the Dharma.

In the Sutta of Golden Light, a highly advanced spiritual practitioner suddenly comes up against something he doesn’t understand. The details aren’t important but in this case it was ‘Why did the Buddha die so young.’ In this state of not knowing the Sutta described his house expanding and becoming bedecked with jewels and riches, then it fills with Gods and Buddhist saints. The house represents consciousness, which expands when we know we don’t know and are therefore searching. The windows and doors of the house are the senses and the riches are the beauty of awe and wonder which attracts other seekers of truth. They come to hear the answer when the Buddha of abundant treasure rises up in the imagination and says ‘The Buddha is not his body.’

Maintaining an awareness of not knowing while also maintaining the will to know is, in my experience, the middle way between clinging to secure dogma on the one hand and apathy on the other. Time and time again I see wisdom and compassion expressed spontaneously by one receptive human being responding to another human beings suffering. If you turned any of those acts of wisdom into dogma and tried to repeat them it simply wouldn’t work. Wisdom and compassion may be conveyed to some extent in the form of words and actions but they are more than that and we all know it. If love can be defined as the unselfish concern of one human being for another I would go so far as to say that it is the transcendence of the delusion of fixed self.

The story of the Buddha is a story written 100s of years after his death. It is almost certainly a mixture of folk tale, legend and history. Consequently we are worshipping our own ideal. A human being who woke up to the simple truth of human existence, that there is no separate discrete self and, therefore, if you love the self, you cannot hate another. Experience is whole, it is not divided.

All of Buddhism is methodology. The ideas and practices are there to free the mind from greed, hatred and delusion. Enlightenment, is a state of being, it’s not a set of beliefs.

I say all this from a feeling of gratitude to John W and those other men and women who responded to me 36 years ago at an AA meeting in Lombard Street, in the City of London. Without their loving intervention I would have died like my mother, ‘Scotch Pat, the friendly local drunk. Murdered by person or persons unknown.’

May all beings be well and happy.

Jayanatha

Jayanatha76@yahoo.co.uk