A sincere seeker must listen to what the Inner Voice says (while also being sure not to be talking to oneself...) and subject oneself to true teachers. But what happens when the two contradict each other?
One obstacle is that I discovered Jeff, and recognized his attainments, due to the Inner Director showing me to him. But, now it is telling me something different, that the time has come to go your own way.
This does raise an issue. If I still recognize Jeff's arahantship, it means that arahants may be wrong about some things. But, this is not a question that I will claim an answer to.
The areas where my Inner Director disagrees with Jeff Brooks.
1. Understanding of the Four Noble Ones.
Jeff's model of these is strongly correlated to advanced contemplatives.
Jeff's stages
I have ponder these stages for years. I have read Buddhist teachers speculating that the 4 stages of noble beings represent attainment of the 4 jhanas. I do not see this.I. Streamwinner represents one who has attained many of the charisms, so this would be 3rd to 4th jhana.II. Once-returner suggests one who has attained the immaterial domains via OOBE on a consistent basis.III. Nonreturner represents one who has so mastered the OOBE that no craving remains for the material domains.IV. Arahant (enlightenment) is one who has fully negotiated the 4 immaterial domains, and has thus completely lost the sense of self, so that there is no craving for identity. This one will see that the entire universe is one's body, and all beings are just cells in one's organism, which is infinite.
Alexander's
response
How sure are you of this? As it goes against what my Inner Director has taught me about these stages. I, II, and III I have understood as all pre-contemplative attainments - that while rare they are possible for all those who are sincere and earnest on the spiritual path; while III and IV are attainments of contemplatives proper.If you are certain I will not dispute it, though it would imply entry into the stream is almost impossible. It also nullifies the experiences of most human beings. It means if one is a non-contemplative, a life of accumulating virtue or wisdom has no value. It means all those throughout history who pursued a life in the spirit but had no knowledge of meditation had experiences of no value.
Jeff's response
Considering most mystics are marginalized by the devout, and the devout are often the cause of why the contemplative component of religion is most often lost, then it seems reasonable to me to consider seriously that mere devotion only leads to belief delusion, and otherwise no genuine spiritual attainment.
If one
day I come to a different understanding, I will correct myself, though I have
had my current understanding now for many years.
Let's put revealed knowledge (intuition) to one side, and reason through this for a moment.
1. Is the physical world an emanation of a benevolent, transcendent Reality?
2. Though the spiritual path may be elusive and hard to find, such a Reality would not damn all of humanity.
3. Most people do not discover the contemplative life.
4. Throughout most of human history, the ability to find true teachers and spiritual knowledge was extremely difficult. Any progress toward liberation would be precious.
5. The two lowest Noble Ones are far from freedom; they are just commitments they will not drop lower than a human birth and their number of rebirths is finite.
Let's put revealed knowledge (intuition) to one side, and reason through this for a moment.
1. Is the physical world an emanation of a benevolent, transcendent Reality?
2. Though the spiritual path may be elusive and hard to find, such a Reality would not damn all of humanity.
3. Most people do not discover the contemplative life.
4. Throughout most of human history, the ability to find true teachers and spiritual knowledge was extremely difficult. Any progress toward liberation would be precious.
5. The two lowest Noble Ones are far from freedom; they are just commitments they will not drop lower than a human birth and their number of rebirths is finite.
For more on this you may want to examine the post on discerning attainment and the purpose of the Gurdjieff work.
It is my theory that I may have more insight on this than Jeff does. Since he began having out-of-body experiences at the age of six, while I followed a very mundane path, I had a more immediate knowledge of the states of being a streamwinner and a once-returner. This, I think, may explain the different understandings.
2. Role of the Pre-Contemplative Life.
One of the things I have found from reading mystics over the years - let us take John Climacus, Teresa of Avila, or Evelyn Underhill as our example - is that they begin on the level of ordinary life and spend a significant amount of time describing the transition process from a material world focus to an immaterial world focus.
There are many terms for this shift throughout culture and civilization; purification, metanoia, conversion, pratyahara, withdrawal, the "new birth."
The completion of this transformation then makes the practice of the contemplative life possible. One's values have shifted, the dysfunctions of the mind and emotions have been addressed, and quiet peacefulness arises. In some traditions this transformation is all that is required for an immaterial life rebirth.
Let us take Teresa of Avila's Inner Castle as an example. In the Inner Castle, mansions 1-3 represent the purgative life (the process we are describing here), 4-5 the illuminative life (the early stages of contemplation), and 6-7 the unitive life (liberation).
A nonreturner (one who does not return again to a human birth) would be one who has passed through the steps of purgation, and has arrived approximately at the fourth mansion. They may not necessarily be an arahant, but they will not be returning again to a human birth.
Jeff's focus is strongly on the contemplative life proper. While he does examine the spiritual crisis, he does not seem to think that good people who have changed their focus are on the path to freedom if they lack spiritual attainments.
My theory here is again based on a difference of experience. Jeff's experience of effectively "the end" (the out-of-body experience) from a young age likely molded his view on the pre-contemplative life, which he more-or-less skipped over. I also suspect Jeff's experience of marginalization from the orthodox Buddhist community may also inform his perspective on pre-contemplative fates.