Mariana Caplan - The Guru Question: The Perils and Rewards of Choosing a Spiritual Teacher

The Guru Question is a very important, perhaps definitive, examination of this fundamental question, open to professional and layperson alike. The book manages to cover virtually every aspect of this incredibly important and timely topic, and does so in an elegant, comprehensive, and succinct fashion. I think it amounts to something like the final word on the topic (or very close to it). Highly recommended for anybody on a spiritual path or considering one!

Mariana Caplans book is the most comprehensive, lucid, well-argued, utterly straightforward, and honest work on the guru question that there is. She unapologetically tackles the most difficult, nitty-gritty issues without hedging, flinching, or smoothing over any of the rough edges. This book is a must read for any serious spiritual seeker, as well as for anyone who wants to understand what the relation to a spiritual master is all about.

Mariana Caplans The Guru Question addresses this question better than any book Ive read. If you are curious about the subtle gifts and traps of the student-teacher relationship, or if you are interested in authenticating mature heart-devotion rather than following your unresolved childhood hope for love down the wrong road, then read this book.

Mariana Caplan has written a powerful book about the guru-disciple relationship. Here Mariana balances her recognition of the depth and sacredness of the relationship between a true teacher and a true disciple, with her recognition of the pitfalls that can arise when we seek from another human being the redemption that can only come from within. Writing from her direct experience with her own teachers, and drawing on the experience of others, she illuminates the mystery of the guru in a way that should be of benefit to many readers.

The best disciple is one who is prepared. Mariana Caplan astutely and sensitively explains what this means. I strongly recommend The Guru Question.

An honest, well-researched, and informative guide to this much misunderstood and yet important spiritual topic. A clear, insightful, and at times humorous look at the drama of the student-teacher relationship.

The rising of spiritual aspirations in the West, where the values of having have smothered those of being, is a source of hope for the future of humankind. However, the interest in traditional teachings transmitted by masters to their disciples is developing in a context of confusion, misunderstanding, if not of scandals. And what was a promise of peace becomes a source of suffering. Many spiritual seekers think it is their right to meet a guru, and even an outstanding guru, without ever asking themselves: Who am I as a disciple to have such a claim? Mariana Caplan explores the essential matter through her own experience and throws precious light on this theme. It pays homage to the truth, the truth being always greater than any illusions.

Essential reading for those on the spiritual path, and for those who want to see effective spiritual paths developed in our culture.

When an early version of Mariana Caplans brilliant new book, The Guru Question, arrived in my inbox and I was asked to write a foreword, I spent quite a few days of wonder and delight with this book and its subject matter before putting pen to paper. This amazing book contains many lifetimes of concentrated wisdom and honesty and is a vivid narrative of an inspiring spiritual journey. It offers profound advice for seekers on the journey of self-transformation, and most important, this book burns with a devotion and love for the true guru born of unitive but also nondual realization. Traveling with Mariana on her adventures, and following her experiences and points of discernment concerning bad and good gurus, is an enlightening experience. (The author and I have never met personally, but I hope to be pardoned for use of her first name, having traveled with her in this book through her many trials and triumphs.)

Marianas great journey of self-transformation and the deep relationship between teacher and student moves me to tell a brief story of my first encounter with my own root guru (or Lama).

When I first met this Mongolian lama, I didnt recognize him. I thought he was the butler of some big-shot guru because we met in the back room of a small, pink, New Jersey tract house that served as a monastery.

Arriving at the front gate after quite a search through a dusty suburb, I felt tremendous energy in the building and feared even to enter. My stomach was filled with butterflies; my legs wobbled. A small gentleman with short-cropped gray hair who wore a brown, kimono-like Tibetan chuba, entered the living room-cum-shrine room and asked my friend Chris and me our business. This modest man did not seem to be the source of the monasterys energy.

Chris and I were seated in a row of chairs; the gentleman sat on the other side of my friend and asked him what we wanted at his monastery. Chris had little to say, as he was mainly driving me from New York City. I, however, was on a guru quest that had already taken me through the Middle East to India and back. Wed heard of this Tibetan monastery in New Jersey, and Chris had a car. I was back in the States for a family event, and my full intention was to return to India to study with a Tibetan teacher.

Then the lamaGeshe Wangyal, to mention his name with respectmoved across the room to another row of chairs facing me. He seemed to expand in size, and then he asked me why I had come. To my amazement, I was utterly tongue-tied. Across the globein Greek monasteries, dervish tekke, mosques, and Hindu and Tibetan templesI had explained my quest for enlightenment teachings in various languages and through gestures. Now, in this modest pink house, before this compact Mongolian lama who wore no lamas robe, I could say nothing.

Eventually I stammered that I was seeking higher consciousness and enlightenment. Laughing, he said, That would be too difficult for either of us, since you were obviously unable to tread the path from New York to New Jersey on your own without getting into trouble. (I was dressed as an Asian fakir pilgrim with baggy Afghan pants and a sheepskin jacket. I had long hair, a scraggly beard, and a black patch covering my empty, left eye socket.) I have a long way to go in that direction myself, he continued. The path to enlightenment is far more difficult than the road to New Jersey!