O my own, you have come to me!” My guru uttered the words again and again in Bengali, his voice tremulous with joy. “How many years I have waited for you!
This emotional first meeting between Paramhansa Yogananda and his master, Sri Yukteswar, in a marketplace in Benares, has captured the imagination of millions of readers of his seminal work, Autobiography of a Yogi. But there is nothing new about it. Discipleship transcends cultures, faiths and eras of history in its simplicity of concept:finding the teacher who can take you to God.
Some resist the idea of being a follower of anyone as though it were demeaning or represented some kind of loss of personal identity. And there is no doubt that the guru-disciple relationship has been abused in certain shameful cases by fakes and impostors. The principle though is a great and, for the serious student, essential one. As the Tibetan adept, Djwal Khul put it in a telepathic communication with Alice Bailey: All are disciples from the humblest aspirant up to and beyond The Christ Himself.
An aspiring artist given the choice of learning from a most accomplished and articulate art historian, who had never actually painted a great work, or from the unpredictable, difficult genius, Rembrandt, would surely choose the latter. In fact most of us, artistic or not, would relish such tutelage. Why? Because he had demonstrated so masterfully that which he teaches.
The same is true of a master of spirituality, as was understood in Tibet and other eastern mystical traditions. The lama or guru was not selected for their eloquence or communication skill, so much as for the fact that they had demonstrated in their life the lesson they were teaching. It was not just an idea for them, it had to be real to be transmitted to a student.
So, when the warrior-prince, Arjuna, was riding to battle in his chariot, it was to his charioteer, the avatar Sri Krishna, that he turned for answers. The wisdom he received from his master is the basis of one of the greatest bibles of ancient times, The Bhagavad Gita.
When Moses took his lonely steps up Mount Sinai where he received ‘The Ten Commandments’ from his Lord, it was his chief disciple Joshua who accompanied him. Faith, obedience and commitment led Joshua to become Moses’ successor, proving the old axiom revealed in the I-Ching and elsewhere, that you cannot be a leader until you have first learned to follow.
When Ananda agreed to look after the ageing Lord Buddha, he showed why he goes down in history as a leading disciple. But another was undoubtedly Guru Padmasambhava, who introduced Buddhism into Tibet in the 8th century AD, over 1200 years later. You do not have to physically meet your guru in order to become their disciple – the connection is made through your dedication to their work and your practice of their teachings.
My own teacher, the master of yoga Dr. George King, explained the secret of the teacher-pupil relationship as follows: If you study diligently under a teacher who is any good at all, and you really study diligently – whether you come into physical contact with that individual or not – you begin to absorb some of his higher knowledge which he may not have imparted to you by word of mouth. A karmic link is created between master and student through which far more is conveyed than words. A disciple can start to take on some of the higher attributes of their teacher through their dedication.
The apostle, St. Paul, is a very good example of this. He did not physically meet the Master Jesus – in fact he had been a ruthless persecutor of Christians. Yet, on the road to Damascus, he heard his master’s appeal and – crucially – changed completely. The hard-line disciplinarian transformed into a selfless exponent of love for all, impressed upon his consciousness by Jesus himself. He was, as much as some of the twelve, a true proponent of his master’s cause.
Tragically, our history has been soured by male domination of most aspects of life, and spiritual traditions are no exception. It is believed that the avatars of history who have incarnated upon Earth, have had both male and female within them, but generally have had to adopt male bodies because of the backwardness of humanity. Dr. King considered the Master Jesus to have been almost as much female as he was male.
All the more remarkable then are the women who overcame the obstacles in their way. One fine example was Yeshe Tsogyal who, though not an avatar, was both the chief disciple of Guru Padmasambhava and a prominent spiritual teacher in her own right. She had a number of male and female disciples and is often described as the mother of Tibetan Buddhism.
The finest example of this in modern times, I believe, was Dr. George King. He was the channel for, among others, his own master, Aetherius, whose instructions he followed to the letter for over 43 years. He clearly demonstrated throughout his mission that to be a great master you must also be a great disciple!
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Richard Lawrence is a spiritual teacher and disciple of Dr. George King. He is an international best-selling author of several books including Contacts With The Gods From Space and Realize Your Inner Potential, which he co-authored with Dr. King. His most recent book was Dr. King’s biography published last year, The King Who Came To Earth, co-authored with Brian Keneipp. He is Executive Secretary of The Aetherius Society for Europe and features regularly in print and on the radio.
