"Mary": He would do whatever he wanted with his women. He lined a bunch of us up and took off all our clothes and cut all our pubic hair. He owned them. I mean we were owned. ...I got herpes from Da Free John. As far as I am concerned, I am one of the lucky ones...I got out alive, and I got out with my sanity intact.

Jackie Estes (a former member of Frank's inner circle of wives): I don't think I had a will to speak of, because of the indoctrination and the alcohol and what was being done. I was twenty years old and I believe anyone is subject to mind control at a certain aspect of their lives.

Beverly O'Mahoney: He would instruct women to defecate in bed with their husbands during the sex act. I saw some of his wives urinate on him.

Response of a long-time Devotee: He can’t help Himself. He feels compelled to Work with this emotional-sexual matter in whatever way it is presented to Him. And in doing so He will violate every social nicety we have constructed to protect our emotional-sexual inner life from being tampered with. He will deal with people right up front in whatever manner He is spontaneously moved to do so. He may ask you to have sex on the floor with everyone watching and video-cameras rolling. I know people for whom that was the first contact they ever had with Him. I know people who were given the most loving and sweetest hugs that broke through all their emotional armor. It can appear to be madness, and it can appear to be the most insightful “therapy” ever devised. And yes, beware putting yourself before Him, because He has no real control over Himself.
read entire text of response

JCB: Responding to a post of yours, in response to mine about how "Da seems to be rather selective in his choice of Gopis":

Pilgrim said: You seem to be really stuck on this one.

JCB: Actually no, it was just germane to the sex thread. The only thing I'm stuck on here (other than samsara generally) is pervasive patterns in Da's "walk" that suggest non-establishment in nonduality. Sex is just one such arena of his conduct.

Pilgrim said: First of all, it's not true: He has slept with women who do not fit the "babe" ideal.

JCB: Perhaps occasionally, but that is not at all the general trend, as more devotees than not have admitted to me. A look at the women whom he chose for kanyadom confirms the pattern. True, he has stuck with them as he's aged, but then again he's aged too since his wilder Bubba days (and has "auditioned" potential kanyas recently, whether sexually, I don't know).

I never said he was a sybarite, only that he hasn't expunged all traces of duality and desire, evidently not by a long shot.

Pilgrim said: Second, I know very few women in the community who would not jump at the chance to be in His bed. In the early days, it had to be nearly 100%. So it's voluntary.

JCB: I never said it was not voluntary, did I, Pilgrim? I said that Adi Da showed a definite preference. More on "voluntary" below.

Pilgrim said: I'm quite sure that it was voluntary for the woman who posted in this thread who claimed to have been in the "little room" with Him. Obviously she should have said NO. If she didn't have the guts to do this and slept with Him against her better judgement, then she blew it. She should grow up and accept responsibility for her own actions and stop whining about it here.

JCB: I don't know any more about this particular case than you do (and unlike you, am not sure it was voluntary ... or that it was not), so I won't comment on it.

However, the matter of subtle coercion is there and a guru must be very skillful about sex. Let me throw out a couple of hypothetical scenarios for you to consider.

(A) Just for the sake of choosing an obvious charlatan who almost certainly knew he was full of shit, let's take Zen Master Rama, a.k.a. Freddie Lenz. This guy convinced disciples that he is enlightened and that sleeping with him is a great blessing. Let's assume that he also knew full well that he was not enlightened. The sex is consensual, but based on untruths (yes, this happens as often as you can say "one night stand", but enlightenment is being claimed here!). So: was Freddie completely "without sin" in this behavior?

(B) X other guru does the same, but unlike Freddie is convinced he is enlightened, but actually is not. Is this one's behavior stainless as well?

So, in each case, the sex is consensual ... but it is also transpiring in a less than "relatively truthful" way. I'd say, without hesitation, that in neither case above is the guru's behavior stainless (though case A, starring Freddie, is obviously worse).

You have to understand, Pilgrim, that a lot of people on this forum put Da in either category A or B. So it takes a little more than to say sex is consensual, if that's the issue at hand (which in fact it is not, from the POV of my "non-dual walk" argument, but it's worth stating). I myself generally incline to put Da in category B; I see him mostly as sincere, albeit deluded in certain ways. Anyway, I hope I've made the point that it's not quite enough for Dasters to say that the sex is consensual. And it's putting the cart before the horse to say he's doing it for devotees' sake ... that may be, but if the person you're talking to doesn't buy that Da is fully non-dually-realized, this doesn't have any weight as an argument, as he's still prone to ego/desire.

None of this is to say that a truly free Avadhootish guru wouldn't step on lots of toes, maybe do some sexing down, and have some people upset about it later. For reasons I've stated elsewhere, though, I do not put The Adept Formerly Known As Bubba in such a category.

Pilgrim said: Not too long ago the Kanya who had to be considered by most people to be the most attractive, became attracted to a man from Australia. The way I heard it, Adi Da blessed their relationship and she is now in a relationship with this man. Adi Da loves her deeply, as He does all His devotees. That story doesn't fit some of the image some have tried to conjure up on this forum.

JCB: Sure. Nor does it contradict anything I myself have said. I don't disagree that a large amount of what people say on the forum about Da is off the mark, unfair, and tasteless. (Some of the satire is probably funnier to me than you, of course, but that's natural.)

Pilgrim said: So how far do you want to take this one? Adi Da considers the non-humans in His zoo to be among His devotees. Should He consider them as potential partners?

JCB: Oh, come on, Pilgrim. But see below, re categories, if you're really serious here.

Pilgrim said: Should He do men? There are some gay men in the community who would most likely be very willing. If He "doesn't do Johnson's" as He has been quoted as saying, does this mean the level of indifference is not sufficient for one claiming to be enlightened?

JCB: I've thought about this too and I think it comes down to that fact that homosexual sex can be argued to be in a different "category" than heterosexual sex, so that if engaged, you'd look for non-duality in that arena. But no praise or blame for avoiding gay sex. IOW, if Da or anyone claiming to be enlightened were doing men, I'd expect to see them not just choosing the buff, well-hung bubble-butts. :-)

If you're not going to play in a certain arena, fine; if you are, then you gotta walk the walk of non-difference as others have before. I think that's a pretty reasonable way to look at it, one informed both by personal experience and (bubble) butt-loads of tradition.

Pilgrim said: (caveat: I wouldn't be the least bit bothered if He did sleep with men, just to make myself perfectly clear here. I don't consider it to be "unnatural".)

JCB: Me neither. I like gays and lesbians. It take guts to go against an often very bigoted societal grain.

Pilgrim said: Are you willing to extend your criticism to others such as Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche? To Neem Karoli Baba?

JCB: Of course, if the shoes fits. No sacred cows here.

Pilgrim said: I cannot say whether the latter chose among the "unattractive", but he certainly did sleep with his devotees unless some of the stories I've heard are complete fabrications.

JCB: Sure, it seems pretty clear that he did have sex with some devotees, unless that entire "Krishna Play" chapter in Miracle of Love was a troll by Ram Dass.

Pilgrim said: And he wasn't very kind to one woman who turned him down either.

JCB: Maybe. I wasn't there. That does sound like questionable behavior on his part, if true, and of course perceptions can vary. But is there a pattern? Not that I see; he could also be very kind to complete assholes, so I think that on balance, he was showing a pretty good net walk of not preferring conditional comforts. Unlike Da.

Pilgrim said: Should we consider this to be abuse? Does this take him down a peg or two in your eyes should you believe it to have occurred?

JCB: It would, if it were a pattern. Of course, a single act of really bad magnitude would also take him down a notch, like if he'd raped the woman. But he didn't, did he. Not that I am aware that Da has. Remember, we're not talking abuse here, but preference for attractive strange.

Pilgrim said: I think you idealize some of the other realizers you speak of, however. I've heard stories about Neem Karoli Baba's sexual play with female devotee's that could be called just as abusive as those I've heard about Adi Da.

JCB: I'm talking about patterns here, patterns of preference for hot specimens of femaleness, as opposed to possible "abuse" (and addressed NKB above). I'm intentionally staying away from the "he said, she said" realm of crazy-wise instruction (though yes, there does seem to be a lot of misery emanating from many a former Daster). Certain "abuses" -- certain ones -- could fall into the realm of teaching. Consistently, much more often than not, preferring to go first class is not something that falls into "teaching" unless ones really wants to stretch one's rationalizing to the breaking point. Which I am sure many, many devotees do.

Pilgrim said: Ammachi shocked a couple of friends of mine who left Adi Da for her and then became very disturbed by some of the things she was doing that they considered dishonest. They had the guts to bring these things up to her and were slammed very hard--pretty much kicked out.

JCB: Anecdote vs. pattern, again. And again, if the shoe fits.

Pilgrim said: I'm not saying Ammachi and Neem Karoli Baba are (and were) not great realizers. I really don't know enough about them to draw any conclusions, and I've learned to be careful before thinking my take was the one correct one.

JCB: Entirely agreed.

Pilgrim said: I think wrapping your mind around Adi Da is pretty much impossible.

JCB: This is where we diverge, and frankly I think that this is verging on cultism, Pilgrim. One may not be able to wrap one's mind around Da's realization or siddhi, but one can certainly engage in discriminative exercises as I am, comparing patterns of his walk to others.

Pilgrim said: I couldn't even begin to improve upon what Pilgrim #2 wrote in response along these lines, so I guess I'll leave it at that. Thanks again for a most interesting thread.

JCB: What Pilgrim #2 wrote was superb, and worthy of discussion. Even in the wake of my response, where I got somewhat caught up in Da's siddhi in the wake of a dream about him, I still made couple of critical points that could be further refined. For example, Pilgrim #2 basically said that the universe was mad, and Da's behavior reflected that. I disagreed, citing chaos as a hallmark of samsara, vs. harmonious compassion as one realization. Glenn posted on that issue as well. I think it's an excellent topic, one of the core dharmic issues where I and others diverge with Adidam.

Pilgrim said: Jim, it seems to me that you idealize gurus you have not been associated with intimately and compare Adi Da, who you do know (to what degree, I'm not sure you've ever said; just how close did you get to these abuses you seem so sure of), to these idealizations as if this is a fair comparison.

JCB: I addressed the issue of idealization above. This cuts both ways, you know. The only highly-regarded guru I know of who has preferred the comfortable road anywhere near as consistently as Adi Da is Narayan Maharaj, and I would have absolutely no problem knocking him down a notch or two in my schema is he did turn out to be consistently all palaces and Rolls-Royces.

Pilgrim said: As I've told you in the past, I looked into many of these accusations as deeply as I was able to while I was outside the community.

JCB: I understand and appreciate this, but as you must have realized, the "abuses" are not really what I am talking about here, Pilgrim.