Franklin Jones became a devotee of Swami Muktananda in 1968. In the summer of 1969 Muktananda, in a formal letter, gave his disciple the name "Dhyananda", as a sign that Franklin had "sought and found peace in meditation" and had become "a promising student of Shree Gurudev Ashram". Muktananda acknowledged in this letter that the kundalini energy had become activated in Franklin, and "The Inner Self which is the secret of Vedanta, the basis of religion, the realization of which is the ultimate object of human life, is awakened in you."

Four years later, in the summer of 1973 Franklin went to India with four questions in hand -- one of the questions was a request for formal recognition by Muktananda of Franklin's realization of the Maha Siddha:

Will you formally confirm and acknowledge Dhyananda as a full disciple of Muktananda, that the path of the Siddhas has fulfilled itself in Dhyananda and that he is teaching truly, freely, and independently in the Siddha of Truth, the Maha Siddha, and in the manner of the Siddhas. Even as Nityananda did this for Muktananda, will Muktananda do so for Dhyananda?

What follows is a transcript of a tape recording of that meeting, which was published in The Dawn Horse magazine, vol 2, number 2, in 1975. This "Special Issue" of The Dawn Horse has five images of Franklin and five images of Muktananda on the cover, and bears the legend "Bubba Free John and Swami Muktananda: A Confrontation of Dharmas."

An extensive critique of Swami Muktananda's approach to spirituality accompanies the dialogue between Franklin (Bubba Free John) and the Swami. Some of those commentaries are excerpted here, in red.

THE DAWN HORSE: An interview was arranged between Bubba and Swami Muktananda. It was to be conducted relative to a series of four questions Bubba had written for the Swami on the previous day... By means of the confrontation implied in these questions, Bubba expected to communicate to the Swami the argument for the point of view of his own realization as distinct from the point of view of yoga. It was a classic confrontation, for which there are examples in the history of traditional spirituality.

The last of the questions Bubba prepared for Baba Muktananda was in the form of a request for acknowledgment. It is traditional for a disciple to approach his Guru for testing and acknowledgment of his realization. This is a natural extension of the teaching process. In the past Bubba had approached the Swami for such acknowledgment, and it had been given.

On this occasion Bubba approached Muktananda in the same manner, as if for the same purpose. But it was with clear knowledge that such acknowledgment could not, and therefore would not be given, if the Swami confirmed his commitment to the yogic point of view he had expressed in the past.

Bubba's questions were designed to point out the irreconcilable differences between the way of Understanding and the yogic vision. Thus, in the absence of any acquiescence on Muktananda's part, they were also intended to reveal the impossibility of any acknowledgment. As a result, the confrontation between the two men became not the ground for the acknowledgment of Bubba Free John by Swami Muktananda, but for the dissolution of their relationship on the grounds of the special realization each represents to the world...

[In his response to the questions] Muktananda reconfirmed his experiential viewpoint without meeting the real issues contained within the questions. His responses, though clever and meaningful in their own terms, seem not to comprehend the radical intuition of his former disciple. To a reader not versed in the intricacies of Vedanta or alert to the limitation the yogi represents, it may, in fact, appear as if the Swami has "won" in a debate.

The final dialogue between Bubba Free John and Swami Muktananda is printed below verbatim, with occasional commentary by the editors. There is no editing of the actual transcript, and only those portions of the tape are omitted which deal with subjects unrelated to the four questions.

BUBBA: Is it not true that that which is perceived through the agency of visions, lights, bindu, and nadi by the yogis is intuited without visualization or audition by the Jnanis as the absolute, pure and perfect Consciousness that is Reality, and is not this Consciousness the same perfect, Self-luminous Reality of which all things are the modification, and is not this Consciousness the same that the yogis call Maha-Shakti?

MUKTANANDA: I am in the habit of talking candidly, and you shouldn't think that I am trying to hurt your feelings. If you wish to know the secrets of the scriptures, then your attitude must be appropriate. What is true in the world? In a certain sense, everything is true. This chair is true, those books are true. Laughter is true, and so are ideas. The state of waking is true and the state of sleep is true, but supreme Truth is realized only when there is nothing but Truth. That is a mark of knowledge. The mystery of the Vedanta is very deep. Do you accept the duality between the seer and the seen?

BUBBA: In a conventional sense, the seer is just that, and in a conventional sense, the seen is just that. They are both just modifications of one Reality.

MUKTANANDA: Are the seer and the seen two different forms of one Reality, or are they the same Reality?

BUBBA: Conventionally speaking, they are two different forms of the one Reality.

MUKTANANDA: No, they are the same. I will explain it to you. It is one thing to read from books, and another thing to realize. I am the seer and you are the seen; also you are the seer and I am the seen. And both are one. The two are not different.

BUBBA: Yes, from the conventional sense they are two. From the point of view of Truth they are one.

MUKTANANDA: The conventional point of view is the very ordinary point of view. There are two kinds of Vedantists. One talks on the basis of what he has read, and the other talks from direct experience.

THE DAWN HORSE: The first question was addressed to an essential Muktananda dogma: the vision of the "blue pearl" bindu is itself the Truth and only one who has had this vision has realized the Truth. ...As he began to speak Swami Muktananda quickly conveyed the real quality of his response. Instead of addressing Bubba's actual question he raised an ancient point of academic debate about the duality of the seer and the seen. The point is a paradox, in that it can be argued in a valid way from several points of view. It also has only the most abstract, superficial relationship to Bubba's question.

...Swami Muktananda used the occasion as an opportunity to imply that Bubba's understanding of this point was imperfect, and to demean him by innuendo. ...The Swami never directly addressed the actual content of Bubba's first question. This was itself something of an indication that Baba's position was, as Bubba suspected it might be, "simply contrary."

Muktananda's answers to Bubba's second and third questions dealt more directly with what was asked.

BUBBA: Is it not true that just as the yogis think of the sahasrar as the primary seat of Reality, the jnanis speak of the Heart on the right side of the chest, and is it not so that the perfect realization is not limited to either such region but includes both? As is stated in the Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 8, Verse 12, "Mind, including ego, thoughts and desires must fall in the Heart while the life-force or Brahman Shakti is released to the sahasrar."

The relationship between the true Heart on the right and the sahasrar is called Amrita Nadi, and one in whom all of this has come alive by grace knows Reality or God through or in the form of Amrita Nadi, the internal form whose feet are in the Heart of Self-nature and whose head is in the Perfect Light or sahasrar above, which is both the internal reflection of the Heart or true Self, and the source of all forms. Is this not so?

MUKTANANDA: In our experience a yogi cannot be different from a jnani or a bhakta. Yoga, knowledge, and devotion are all different means. They are not the experience themselves. In yoga it is dhyan, meditation that is important. For the jnani it is knowledge that is important. This can be clear from a simple example. If you are feeling pain inside, whether you are a yogi, or a jnani, or a bhakta, the pain won't differ.

Even a jnani, if he were to reach beyond his intellect, would see exactly what a yogi sees. He would see the same visions, the same lights. If you were to merge your intellect temporarily into some place, you wouldn't be able to have any experiences. For instance in the state of deep sleep you do not have any experience because the intellect is merged into a center for awhile. But if you were to go beyond the intellect and have the experience of the inner Truth, you would be bound to see these visions and lights whether you are a yogi or a jnani or a bhakta.

I'll quote from Shankaracharya, and he says that the supreme Truth is beyond the red light and the black light and the white light and it dwells in the blue light.

If you were to explore the inner realms fully, you are bound to have these experiences. To be able to merge the intellect for awhile is very ordinary. Whether you are a yogi or a jnani or a bhakta you are bound to see objects with your eyes, but the supreme Realization is had within the blue pearl, and that is what matters.

The Gita says that whatever you attain through Knowledge is the same as what you attain through Yoga.

Those who assert either the sahasrar or the heart on the right side are being partial. Both of them are seats of the same Truth. The same person who dwells in the heart dwells in the sahasrar. The same person dwells in both seats. You may say that the mind should be merged in the heart, but you don't remember what the Lord has said about the nature of the mind. You don't seem to had studied the Gita with that refined "Understanding."

In the tenth chapter He says that the mind is My own Form. The mind is form only to a kindergarten student of Vedanta, but one who thoroughly understand Vedanta realizes the mind is not only mind, the mind is nothing but the Lord. If the mind were not the supreme Reality, then Arjuna would not have complained to the Lord, "Lord, I can climb a ladder into the skies and I can walk on the ocean, but I cannot control the mind."

The mind is nothing in itself, it is not an entity in itself. The mind is Divine Consciousness. The hand is nothing in itself. It is the body which has become the hand. Likewise Universal Consciousness becomes the mind in order to manage the outer world, and once it withdraws from the outer world it is the same Consciousness. The Divine Consciousness is neither in the sahasrar nor in the heart, but it is all-pervasive. Sushumna, the central nerve, extends from the muladhara at the base of the spine through the heart to the sahasrar. It is the same Amrita Nadi.

BUBBA: Amrita Nadi is an extension of sushumna that comes down into the Heart, not the same thing as comes up the spine. The extension of the sahasrar comes down the front of the body in a coil.

BUBBA: If this is so, is it not also clear that the Divine Process awakened by God through the power of Grace may develop in the intuitive way of the jnanis or Buddhas, just as well as the experiential way of the yogis, and is not the intuition of the Light as Consciousness at least equal to the vision of Consciousness as Light, and, therefore, is it not so that Dhyanananda's way of Understanding or radical Self-knowing in which God, Guru, and Self are intuited as Conscious Reality is valid equally with the yogic way of experiencing in which God, Guru, and Self are perceived through the agency of yogic representations?

MUKTANANDA: When you have full realization of the sahasrar, it is there that ultimate Truth stands in front of the seeker. The Divinity dwelling in the sahasrar is the Supreme Divinity. For this reason all the scriptures have said that in the sahasrar Siva and Shakti have become one. It is for this reason the sahasrar has been given supreme importance. It is the place of highest effulgence, and it is the place where the yogis' inner skies are situated. It is in these inner skies that the yogis experience subtle smells and subtle sounds and subtle sense.

BUBBA: Isn't it at this point that the jnanis disagree? They say that the sahasrar is the reflection of the Heart, that the Heart is the primary Source.

MUKTANANDA: There are two kinds of jnanis. One has experienced the highest Reality in the sahasrar. The other is a mere scholar who has read books. In this regard no one has surpassed Patanjali. Likewise, Shankara agrees that the sahasrar is supreme. Now the question arises as to whether the knowledge of the jnanis is mere derivative knowledge, or whether it is direct, ordained knowledge. Those who have only derivative knowledge can say that the heart is the seat of Reality, but Shakaracharya would not say that.

BUBBA: Ramana Maharshi is one who says that it is.

MUKTANANDA: That doesn't matter. Who was the Guru for Ramana Maharshi and what scriptures did he study? In that case, one might say that the armpit is the seat of Reality. He might have been a great saint, just as Sai Baba of Shirdi was a great saint, but Sai Baba formulated no doctrine.

This doesn't mean I am complaining about Maharshi. In fact, I had a good relationship with him. When he attained his salvation I was meditating in Bombay and saw his spirit and followed it for quite some distance. It's not that I'm trying to make light of him, but have you met any of his followers and had any discussions with them? It is not for me to comment on somebody else. If Ramana Maharshi said that it is the heart, I say that it is the sahasrar, and for a person like you, it is not appropriate to get caught in a conflict.

If you were a little more intelligent you would try to find out which are the authorities in support of the sahasrar and which are the authorities in support of the heart. There was an element of true greatness and realization in Ramana Maharshi, but he didn't (inaudible).

It is as with Krishnamurti. He says the Guru is unnecessary, but then he says, "Read my books." We do not need to judge any other saint as high or low, all we need to ascertain is our true Nature or supreme Reality. Sai Baba was a great saint and he accepted the personal Lord and he accepted the Guru.

I don't like to comment on someone else. I would rather confine myself to the scriptures and to what my Guru has said and what my experience has been. The sages have said that a one-eyed saint is rare, but that is mistaken, because to make the blue pearl appear as the Real is the need.

So whatever you need, you can get here.

The most important thing is be certain of yourself. According to the scriptures, a yogi can be recognized even in a battlefield, while a jnani can only be recognized at the moment of death. I warned everyone here fifteen days before Baba's [Swami Nityananda's] final departure. One must be genuine in his worship of the Guru, and if you try to cheat the Guru, then you only cheat yourself.

Now, I have a question for you. What are you going to do for us when we come to Los Angeles? Can we have meetings at your Ashram? What about living places for five or six persons? Can you arrange that?

THE DAWN HORSE: By the end of the interview it was clear to Bubba that he had fulfilled his duty to represent himself intelligibly to Muktananda, and that the karmas inherent in their relationship had been dissolved.

The Swami had taken a stand directly opposite to the point of view expressed in Bubba's questions. Many of his responses were merely derogatory, not dealing squarely with the full implications of the questions. The irreconcilability of their positions was obvious.

...When it was over, Bubba did not salute Swami Muktananda by bowing as had been his custom. He simply stood up. Within an hour he had left the Ashram. The karmas and obligations of the Guru-disciple relationship had been dissolved between them, and all communication between them had come to a natural end.

Bubba has been accused of going to Muktananda for a "diploma" on this occasion. In fact the fourth question was never addressed to the Swami:

"If all of this is so, will you formally confirm and acknowledge Dhyananda as a full disciple of Muktananda, that the path of the Siddhas has fulfilled itself in Dhyananda and that he is teaching truly, freely, and independently in the Siddha of Truth, the Maha Siddha, and in the manner of the Siddhas. Even as Nityananda did this for Muktananda, will Muktananda do so for Dhyananda?"

Swami Muktananda's responses to the first three questions indicated that he could not confirm and acknowledge Bubba's realization because he did not acknowledge the realization of the Heart at all. One the basis of that disagreement, Bubba decided that all he had come to accomplish had been done. He knew that his former Guru had heard his point of view and thus would be able to comprehend something of the reasons and necessity for the break between them. This comprehension and the subsequent clear separation were the purification and clarification of their relationship that Bubba had come to find.