Customer Reviews

The Mother of God

5 star:		(18)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

The world of eastern spirituality in the USA is a small world and, if you're a member, you really owe it to yourself to read this book. Whether you buy it new, used, or even interlibrary loan it, I humbly urge you to do so.

First of all it is very, very well written. It is also painfully self-revealing, almost agonizingly so. I'd like to point out that although this book deals with an aspect of eastern civilization, we have a tradition in western civilization, too, a tradition of written history and biography, going back thousands of years (e.g. Plutarch), a tradition that says we tell the truth--no matter where that truth leads--the unvarnished, unexaggerated truth. And the fine lady who wrote this book about her son has, by doing so, placed herself squarely in that tradition. If I ever met her, I would offer her a bouquet of flowers. There is absolutely no self-aggrandizement to be found here anywhere. It is a really fine piece of work.

I read the book in less than two days, I found it so interesting. It recounts the story of how her son, well known guru andrew cohen, was "enlightened" through eastern "holy man" h.w.l. poonja. (I'd heard about this by word of mouth years ago).

However, what I hadn't heard was that upon her son's return to america, like so many westerners who play guru, he became a power-mad tyrant, bully, and monster.

(The book this most reminded me of was "Mildred Pierce" by James M. Cain, another story about a woman whose child grew up to be a selfish monster).

As someone else pointed out, no one in this story looks good. To give you a taste of the goofiness at large here--poonja claimed that several other westerners were enlightened through him, INCLUDING THE WOMAN WHO WROTE THIS BOOK. Yes! He told her she, too, was enlightened and proceeded to try to convince her of it. Having some grain of sanity lodged firmly in her psyche (like the pearl inside the oyster), she rejected this madness but did, however, become her son's "disciple." That is, until his gargantuan ego, disgusting self-centeredness and cruelty finally forced her return to reality. (Actually, and ironically, it was her meeting with U.G. Krishnamurti who triggered a mass defection from the power-mad cohen of which she was a part). This is really a trip down the rabbit hole. Residing in andrew-cohen world is like having tea with the mad hatter. Don't miss it!

Surely, Cohen is the only guru at large with the questionable honor of having had his own mother write an expose' of him!

p.s. We have something important to learn from eastern spirituality, we just haven't figured out how to do it yet. Don't give up, we'll get there somehow.

This is a very interesting book. Even though I was not with Andrew Cohen's community at the time that Luna Tarlo was involved, I can tell you from my experience with the community later, that events, like those written about in this book, still take place and worse. One does not know about them until one gets more deeply into the community life and a bit higher up in the hierarchy. Luna has shown a bit of this but little does she even know the extent of the travesty ... how badly he treats people, especially women. All with the barbaric notion that fear, cruelty, withholding, intimidation, punishment, "crazy wisdom" can uproot your "ego" and lead you towards enlightenment. Like Luna illustrates, what it does do is make you more self-preoccupied, fearful, awash in self-doubt, even suicidal. Andrew Cohen is a man who speaks about the "Unknown" yet who is convinced that "he knows." That he has experienced the mystical, there is no doubt, but beware. I can only liken him to the judgmental, punishing God of the Old Testament. In fact, his method of bringing people to "enlightenment" is an outdated paradigm (rarely worked), really no different than the fundamentalist religious methods. His methodology is as barbaric to many of us as psychotherapy is to him. So little true joy and much fear and intimidation - as Luna states - in this nazi-like community. Under Andrew Cohen's "seemingly true" curiosity and interest in others, he is always only trying to prove that he is right - look at his magazine that the cult publishes called "What is Enlightenment?" from this perspective and you will be amazed at this underlying current. I've been on the inside. Andrew has very little respect and feels far superior to many of the people he interviews; many cult members spend endless time working on these self-aggrandizing pieces of Andrew's. The cult members don't have a clue. I know. I was one of them. Beneath all the preoccupation with Andrew being Luna's son etc., I think the most inportant thing to pay attention to in this book is how Andrew and the community behave. Even though the melodramatic, emotional and self-conscious tenor in this book can be very hard to take at times, this is actually the kind of self-preoccupation that goes on in this cult community -"how did Andrew look at me? What did he say to me? am I OK? Did I say the right things? What did this higher-up student say to me?" As sickening as the content of this book is, it's important to know this before you get involved. There are humble people out here in the world living truly in the light. Find them. You don't need this kind of experience to become enlightened.

This is a truly courageous book! This book is far from a vengeful diatribe, but a sincere portrait of a woman caught up in the whirlwind of her son's sudden guru-dom. Andrew Cohen's teachings are a kind of radical eastern fundamentalism, that rejects(to the point of ridicule) the Personal/ego/suffering for absolute surrender to the Impersonal. As a result, any attempt of Luna to relate to Andrew as a mother to a son is swiftly quashed by Andrew. It becomes apparent that Andrew's own sense of security as a guru is dependent on his mother's willingness to see him as Master and not son. When she falters, he becomes possessed with a rage and impatience. Such outbursts(which were not exclusive to Luna alone) were often glossed-over as "skillful means"(teaching methods) by his disciples. Luna watches her son fall prey to the seductions of absolute power(unconditional adulation, a life free of financial worry, the freedom to not be held accountable for your actions), and wonders how such a "perfect being" could be so imperfect. On more than one occasion does he refer to himself as a "god" to his mother! In addition, his commune of disciples unravels into a sort of nazi camp where conformity and fear run amuck.

"The True Teacher knocks down the Idol that the Student makes of him." - Rumi

Andrew Cohen claims that Enlightenment is a PERMANENT state of consciousness that results in an end to suffering. When I was in college, I held similar premature beliefs of enlightenment as a sort of mystical "finish-line", that once crossed, you are forever free from self-doubt, self-delusion. At the time, I sought out numerous guru-types and Andrew Cohen was the first I met. He impressed me with his fierce unflinching views on Liberation, and how it demands total objectivity, absolute seriousness to go "all the way". During his talk, he even turned a young woman away sobbing, because it disturbed her to think that "she"(in an ego sense) did not matter. Andrew radiated that kind of beatific glow and his eyes were suffused with a knowing luster. I spoke with him and an indian woman(who I later identified as his wife, Alka) after the talk casually, and he complimented me on my genuine curiosity of "high matters" at such a young age. I purchased his book, "Autobiography of an Awakening," and though I found his adventures titillating, his teachings always seemed vague and unoriginal. Nevertheless I chalked him up as a "spiritual master", just one not for me.

Now some seven years later, I know that "enlightenment" is a kind of 4-letter word. In truth, complete ego-death(something Andrew claims) is self-delusion, a fairy-tale. Luna quotes from Joel Kramer's book The Guru Papers, that a guru feels that he/she has "arrived at a place where self-delusion is no longer possible, but this is in fact the most treacherous form of self-delusion of all, and the foundation for all the others." No matter to what spiritual heights your spirit has soared, the ego never really goes away;it all boils down to your humility, vigilance, your degree of attachment.

Andrew's precriptive means are also precocious. He believes that Liberation can be had Now, if you are truly serious in going all the way. He says that you will never really be "ready," so why not now? He preaches that the goal of ego-death demands letting go of your personal history. His method in dealing with the Ego: sever it in one swift chop!

But the only way people are REALLY going to change, is if they experience real catharsis. And the only way that they can get catharsis, is if they work through their own individual problems. You have to work THROUGH the Personal in order to realize the Impersonal/Universal. Rare is the person who is ready to be "beheaded" right now! You need to work through the kinks of your Ego, iron them out, before you can be its Master. It is an on-going process, to which there is no end. You either get better or worse at it, that's just the way it is...And that is just the problem with ACohen, he rejects any sort of existential relationship with life; he thinks you can just throw your personal thoughts and emotions into the gutter and re-start your life, tabula rasa.

I am not saying that Andrew is a complete fraud. It is obvious that his initial meeting with Poonja(his guru) that precipitated his transformation, was a very powerful experience. However the events leading up to his "enlightenment" reveal an unattached young man fragile, somewhat desparate and entangled in a highly unstable romantic relationship. It is evident that Andrew lacked the maturity or emotional health that such a powerful transmission should require. He completely identified with his "enlightenment" experience, and this led to his messianic convictions....There are other incidents that reveal Andrew as highly narcissistic. His brother Joshua relates, much to Luna's surprise, that Joshua once took Andrew to see his therapist, and his therapist later confided that Andrew was the most judgemental person she had ever met.

Towards the close of her book, Luna states, "Impossible as it may appear, unattainable as it may seem, it is my opinion that only acceptance, a deep inmost consent to life in all its contradictions and complexity, can dispel suffering." Andrew could only hope to be so enlightened! I hope that he someday does come clean, and reconciles with his mother, someone who miraculously hasn't given up on him and still loves him!

This is a fascinating book. All the more so for what it leaves unexplained. Probably the biggest question: how does a controlling, childish, narcissistic guy with really nothing interesting to say continually attract followers? The first part of Luna Tarlo's book is about a mother who steps into the fledgling world of her son's spiritual quest by meeting up with him in India just before he becomes "enlightened" by a teacher named Poonja. (My use of quotes is meant to put into question not so much the concept but Cohen's self-defined relationship to it.) One of the first things I felt were left unanswered is what Luna really wants from her journey and from her son. It's made clear by inference that Luna has her own spiritual needs left unfulfilled before the trip, but it would have helped a little more to know what it was she was seeking out, and how her son Andrew became part of the answer. There is more to this story than a mother-son story.
That second question sheds light on the first. Luna feels herself to be mal-constructed or "all wrong" in some broad characterological way. And that seems to be precisely the kind of person who gets drawn into the Andrew Cohen circle. It is fair to say, as some observers point out, that Cohen behaves sadistically towards his followers, justifying such behavior by claiming that he is using "skillful means" to destroy their egos and thus help them remove their defensive posture towards the unknown or the infinite. But observing the maxim (which I tend to believe) that such leaders with an ineffable magnetism are successful in gaining acolytes because they tell people what they want to hear, we can conclude that Cohen's people enjoy the abuse they get, at least for a time. Luna relates an incident early on where Cohen aims a flurry of invective against a woman named Orit, alleging her self-absorption and promiscuity, in front of a room of seekers. Orit later becomes one of his closest acolytes. Did she in fact believe this to be true about herself, and find herself grateful to Cohen for cutting through her denials?
In return for such "gifts" of supposed clarity to his individual followers, Cohen demands absolute surrender to his will. Cohen interprets his enlightenment to mean that his earthly whims are of divine origin. I'm not trying to excuse Cohen and blame his psychologically and spiritually vulnerable followers, but I suspect there is something about Cohen's cruelty itself that keeps people hanging on. Or so it seems to me, since the more affirmative part of his spiritual teachings has an inoffensive, but kind of sophomoric, bumpersticker quality that I don't think could intrigue a seeker for very long on its own.
It's no giveaway to reveal that Luna and others eventually make a break from Andrew. But I could not help, as a reader, to wonder how that happened, too. The break stems from a visit with an Indian critic of other revered new age figures. But the process seems so quick that a picture begins to reveal itself of a whole group of people who seem to drift from spiritual adventure to adventure. Knowing a little more about what motivates them (and Luna continues to be evasive, or perhaps unsure herself, about this) would have helped a bit in placing the reader empathetically in the shoes of the acolytes. Overall, a fascinating and unique book.

This is a riveting book by an insider of a spiritual group - the mother of the guru no less! Her emotional roller coaster, her self-deprecation, her confusion, her altered perceptions and understanding, all attest to a direct experience of what it is to be a "disciple" within any spiritual group, either New Age, or Fundamentalist mainstream religion. It is a stark picture of the slippery slope a disciple climbs in an effort to achieve vicarious power through a spiritual master, and the delusions and deceptions one goes through in order to maintain one's connection to that source of power. The fact that the author was conflicted with, and complicated by, her relationship to her teacher by her motherhood of that teacher only makes her struggle more heart wrenching, difficult, and tragic.

Despite this complication, her diary of her efforts to please her teacher (or to please God, in the form of Andrew Cohen - you can substitute any name of any leader of any religion here and still get the picture), to placate his displeasure with her efforts to do so, to follow his instructions to achieve enlightenment and understanding, reveals the extreme swings between sadness and euphoria, anxiety, and outright fear that a disciple will experience within a small, isolated, and defined group. Particularly, as in this case, when the teacher claims to be God.

While Cohen often comes across as a petulant, immature, narcissistic adolescent, in spite of the beauty of his words, and the basic wisdom of his teachings, the more appalling aspect to this book is the nazi-like fear tactics of those closest to Cohen, apparently condoned, and encouraged, by Cohen himself. This should not surprise us, absolute power does that in all areas of life, but somehow seeing it so blatant within the cloak of spirituality is sickening.

Anyone who reads this book without an agenda, has to come away enlightened, at least, about group dynamics and the ease with which we give away our authority and instinctive good sense and our ability to discriminate, our efforts to escape our human condition, and our self destructive inclination to hide within the herd.

Luna Tarlo took a huge risk in exposing her experience in such a public way; she should be congratulated and applauded for doing so. I could not put the book down until I finished it.

I found the first half or so of the book tough going. Luna seemed whiney, negative and self-involved to a degree that made me wonder about how accurate her perceptions could be. But I am very glad I stuck with it because in the second half, the book became surprisingly engaging, even riveting. And when her big insights come, I felt impacted to a remarkable degree. I really believe she found the truth in the end, and expressed uncommon courage in facing her son. It's hard to put into words exactly why this book affected me so much, but it did, in a very positive way. I highly recommend it as a must-read in the face of the current spiritual arena the seeker in our society is faced with. The prospective reader should not be swayed by the one star critical reviews here, which are thinly veiled attempts by her son's students to discourage you.

It took courage for Luna Tarlo to write a frank book like this, with no attempt at making herself look good. In reality, nobody looked good at all, including her son the guru, Andrew, and all the other assorted characters in this true story. But if the goal was to show how the original "delusion" (the delusion that someone can achieve something special, some so-called permanent "enlightened state", and that that "something" can be transmitted to others through some practice, some following) can grow inevitably into a cult, it has more than succeeded. "Mother of God" serves a step by step inside look at this phenomenon, a phenomenon which proliferates daily as more and more people claim enlightened states and set themselves up in the holy business, wresting huge sums of money and devotion from their willing disciples. People will always be looking for permanent happiness and a way out of suffering, and as long as people are afraid, there will always be the Andrews to milk them. It will never change. Andrew's little "experience" has been blown out of all proportion by himself and his followers and turned into the basis for a way of life and practice. From the outside it seems childish and silly, but from the standpoint of the insider, which the author was certainly at one time, it is a deadly earnest affair. It is a helpful service that she has exposed both her own foibles as well as those of her son. It serves as a cautionary tale.

Luna Tarlo has written with honesty and courage about a great personal tragedy. Her beloved son Andrew, answers the spiritual call of an Indian guru who convinces him that he, too has vast healing powers. As he becomes crazed with his new found dynamism, he resorts to shocking manipulation and cruelty. Luna Tarlo faces the reality that he is no longer the person she once knew and the the awful prospect of losing her son by leaving his fold terrifies her. This book is a real page turner. Ms. Tarlo is more than willing to bare her own vulnerability and naivete as she struggles to embrace her son, the guru, and her sad resolve at having to break away. In a beautifully written and crafted story, she takes us all with her on a wild ride through hell.

I've seen Mr Cohen teach and did attend one of his retreats. He is a controlling sadist and bully and seems more interested in personal power and humiliation than in true freedom. Ms Tarlo has written a compelling and gutsy book, although it is only about his early years, it would be interesting to hear more about what he is up to now, behind the carefully manicured scenes.

Good account of how the shadow side of gurudom transforms gurus and undermines their humanness and basic decency toward other people, even when the guru does not fall prey to any of the usual high-profile corrupting influences of money and sex. This is not your typical tell-all story that gets hijacked by publishers' or readers' demands for lurid events, because there aren't any. What there are, instead, are depictions of the everyday encounters between a guru and his followers, and the insidious and cumulative effects on both, due to the one-way power flow the guru/disciple relationship sets up. The story here is about the gradual descent of a formerly caring human being into a manipulator who has to have everything his way, and is either oblivious or uncaring about the effects his actions have on the people around him; or perceives those effects as for some greater good that never seems to happen--at least not in the way he or his disciples behave toward each other. What is most interesting to see here is the sobering moral reversal reached by the end of the story: it's not the disciples who don't "get it." It's the guru.