The Teaching Demonstration Adi Da Never Gave
Excerpts from post by Jim Butler (former devotee) to Ken Wilber Forum
...In my eyes, there are a couple of fundamental problems with Adi Da's claims about his spiritual greatness....
No one disputes that Adi Da basically embraces "money, food and sex" in his life. He has, now and in the past, had multiple sexual relationships with female devotees, and lives comfortably on the financial contributions of his devotees (which are considerable; around one-fourth of net income is tithed). Devotees, however, interpret these actions in ways that I do not readily accept.
Adi Da and devotees assert that the "teaching years" (prior to 1986), when he engaged many of the above-mentioned "enjoyments" at peak intensity, were actually about Adi Da exploring and reflecting to devotees "every conventional" avenue of seeking, both for worldly and spiritual fulfillment (or release). The "sacred history" of Adidam thus includes a number of episodes such as "Garbage and the Goddess", wherein wild partying and kundalini transmission from then-Bubba combined in a miasma of ecstacy, followed by the chance to examine the limitations of such experiencing, high and low. In more austere times, devotees were urged to follow a strict diet, and engage a number of physical, moral, and spiritual disciplines, while Adi Da engaged at least some of them as a more traditional-appearing "acharya"-type. This broad range of activity is said by Adidam historians (within the fold) to encompass the range of ways in which humans have sought happiness and God.
But prominent among paths of historic seeking for God is the path of "karma yoga", where that term is interpreted along the lines of charitable action toward those in need. Yet among all the diverse goings-on in Adidam's history, one finds no mention of the "Mother Teresa" period or any such thing. This I find telling, and it suggests to me that Adi Da conducted himself as he did for reasons other than enlightening his devotees. You can't tell me that at least some of those who have come to him over the years carried with them the "baggage" of the less-than-radical archetype of serving one's neighbor. This is a key thread in Judeo-Christian material, one Adi Da could have addressed far more than in a few talks ....
Along these lines, it's common for Adi Da and devotees to say that Adi Da is profoundly protean -- that he is "the Man of Understanding" whose actions are perpetually in flux, unpredictable, and prone to switch among opposites. But just as Adi Da has given rather short shrift (in his teaching and example) to humanitarian service, he has been really quite consistent in other ways.
To wit: he has nearly ALWAYS embraced, and never renounced, his enjoyments of "money, food and sex". There has never, in my knowledge, been an "experiment" with making tithing optional. And Adi Da has nearly always had at least a few women in his "imtimate sphere", and with very rare exceptions, they have been gorgeous. Contrast this with Drukpa Kunley, the Tibetan tantric yogi whom Daists frequently point to as an example of a realizer who shared Adi Da's predeliction for quantity of sexual partners, but was not so picky about conventional issues of quality. (This "wildness" is more the kind of walk I'd expect from the "non-dual" and "anything-for-devotees" talk.)
Really, Adi Da has always been pretty consistent in his playing the role of the alpha-male. I know that this point will elicit a certain "God is not a gentleman" type response from some...But the possible fact that I get my buttons pressed by the "offensive" actions of a supposed Realizer is not sufficient grounds for saying that (a) he is truly Realized, or (b) these points about Adi Da's "internal consistency" aren't valid.
Possibly more compelling is the argument that Adi Da has done a less-than-complete job of exploring the avenues of "spiritual seeking", and thus has actually failed to walk an important area of his own talk (final revelation; no-difference; life lived for sake of devotees). Further, the areas he has emphasized (consistent personal enjoyment of biological imperatives) and deemphasized (charitable service to others) may explain why.
Namely: although Franklin Jones/Adi Da is person with an immense scope of understanding and spiritual power, he is by no means the "World-Teacher". Rather, he is a soul who came into this life with profoundly exaggerated karmas and has exaggerated them even more,... He is a guy whose residual subtle ego has become inflated and corrupted by his having allowed himself to be seduced by the trappings of the Western Guru number.....
JCB