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abusive guru
March 2008 
The Abusive Guru: Sogyal Rinpoche
WH
I've been very hard here on gurus who have been abusive in any way toward their students or followers, especially Andrew Cohen and Rabbi Marc Gafni (here and here). So I feel like a hypocrite for posting so many of Sogyal Rinpoche's quotes without knowing that he has been one of the worst abusers.
Rinpoche as been an important part of my coming to Buddhism. His Tibetan Book of Living and Dying is one of the books that got me serious about being a Buddhist, and his Glimpse after Glimpse has been the source of a lot of inspiration in my meditation and mindfulness practices. It pains me to know that he is not a good person (or has not been a good person in the past).
Here is the story from 1994:
Best-selling Buddhist author accused of sexual abuse
$10 million civil suit filed in Santa Cruz by a woman who says Sogyal Rinpoche, author of the Tibetan Book of Living and Dying, "coerced" her into an intimate relationship
By Don Lattin
Special to the Free PressSAN FRANCISCO -- With the blessings of the Dalai Lama, a group of American Buddhist women have launched a campaign to expose the alleged sexual misconduct of a prominent Tibetan lama and best-selling author.
Sogyal Rinpoche, author of the Tibetan Book of Living and Dying, is accused of "physical, mental and sexual abuse" in a $10 million civil suit filed last week in Santa Cruz County Superior Court.
According to the lawsuit, an anonymous woman identified only as "Janice Doe" came to Rinpoche for spiritual guidance last year at a retreat sponsored by the Rigpa Fellowship meditation center in Santa Cruz, but was "coerced into an intimate relationship" with the Tibetan guru.
"Sogyal claimed (she) would be strengthened and healed by having sex with him and that to be hit by a lama was a blessing," the lawsuit states.
The suit -- which accuses Rinpoche of fraud, assault and battery, infliction of emotional distress and breach of fiduciary duty -- also charges that the Tibetan lama has "seduced many other female students for his own sexual gratification."
Sandra Pawula, spokeswoman for the Rigpa Fellowship of Santa Cruz, one of many meditation centers in the United States, Europe and Australia, declined to comment about the allegations, but said that Rinpoche is not married and does not claim to be a celibate monk. Rinpoche, who lives abroad, could not be reached for comment. The lawsuit follows a letter-writing campaign to the Dalai Lama by American women concerned about alleged sexual exploitation by Rinpoche and several lesser-known Tibetan lamas.
"What some of these students have experienced is terrible and most unfortunate," said Tenzin Geyche Tethong, the Dharamsala-based secretary to the Dalai Lama.
In a letter sent earlier this year to one of the women, Tethong said Tibetan Buddhist leaders "have been aware of these (allegations) for some years now."
Jack Kornfield, founder of Spirit Rock Meditation Center in Marin County, was among a group of two dozen Western teachers who discussed the sexual misconduct of Buddhist teachers with the Dalai Lama last year in India.
According to Kornfield, the Tibetan Buddhist leader told the Americans to "always let people know when things are wrong. Put it in the newspapers if you must do so."
Another woman allegedly abused by Rinpoche, Victoria Barlow of New York City, said she is "disgusted by the way the Tibetans have manipulated the reverence Westerners have for the Buddhist path."
Barlow, 40, said she first met Rinpoche in the mid-1970s, when she was 21, and that she was sexually exploited by him during meditation retreats in New York and Berkeley.
"I went to an apartment to see a highly esteemed lama and discuss religion," she said in an interview with the Free Press. "He opened the door without a shirt on and with a beer in his hand."
Once they were on the sofa, Barlow said, the Tibetan "lunged at me with sloppy kisses and groping."
"I thought I should take it as the deepest compliment that he was interested and basically surrender to him," she said.
Sources say the Tibetan Buddhists were trying to handle this issue within their community but decided, especially after the Dalai Lama made the comment about going to the press, to go public now.
"The Dalai Lama has known about this for years and done nothing. There is a real code of secrecy and silence," said Barlow.
The details of this article are verified in other articles that can be found on the web.
My inclination is to stop posting anything by Rinpoche on this site. As much as I think there is incredible value in his teachings, I need to respect the man as well. I don't expect all teachers to be perfect, and Chogyam Trungpa is a perfect example of a flawed man who was still a valuable teacher.
So, I'm torn and I want to throw the question out for discussion. How much can we separate the human being from the teachings? And how appropriate is it that we do that? Any thoughts?
Access: Public
Friend, please tell me what I can do about this world
I hold to, and keep spinning out!
I gave up sewn clothes, and wore a robe,
but I noticed one day the cloth was well woven.
So I bought some burlap, but I still
throw it elegantly over my left shoulder.
I pulled back my sexual longings,
and now I discover that I'm angry a lot.
I gave up rage, and now I notice
that I am greedy all day.
I worked hard at dissolving greed,
and now I am proud of myself.
When the mind wants to break its link with the world
it still holds on to one thing.
Kabir says: Listen my friend,
there are very few that find the path!
~Kabir
Thanks Metta – perfect response.
Peace,
Bill
Bill, This news disturbs me as well. Sogyal Rinpoche's book, especially the part on the compassion practice of Tonglen, brought me to Tibetan Buddhism. His writings on the state of rigpa seem to transmit that state. I have quoted him on my bio, and in some of my blog entries.
I have been very involved in a discussion group here at Zaadz on the abuses of Andrew Cohen which was news to me. If you haven't seen this discussion, its here. This issue of bad behavior from otherwise very enlightened seeming teachers is leaving me disillusioned, but perhaps I only sufferred under the spell of some un-realistic illusion of what enlightenment is?
I think that some of the writing of Ken Wilber, on stages of development, but different levels within one person, that one could have low levels of moral development while having high levels of intellectual development, for example, might explain this problem some. But one assumes that a basis in moral development is essential to enlightenment somehow. I believe that the repressive, or overly renunciate paths might create shadows and sublimation comes out in other ways, as described in the quote above by Kabir.
I think it disturbing that KW also supports abusive teaching as an effective style, (I read your blog link on Andrew Cohen) where he glorifies “bad boys and bad girls” as teachers. I read somewhere that he had originally really revered Adi Da, but now denounces him for his abuses. I think its time for the community of students and teachers to start examining this issue, to try to gain some insight. The value of these teachers, in their contribution to enlightened works is tremendous, like Chogyam Trungpa, as you mentioned.
I am left wondering if this dis-illusionment that I am left with is truely a form of enlightenment? Is this a form of “loving what is”? Is there ever a a state of full liberation, or complete enlightenment? Or is it like I've heard said, that there are only enlightened moments, not enlightened beings?
Hi Tamara,
You make a lot of good points – thanks for commenting.
I think Wilber's model is useful, as well. In thinking about developmental lines, it is very possible for the spiritual and intellectual lines to outpace the moral and interpersonal lines. I think this is common among Tibetan lamas coming to the States (a commenter made this point over at my IOC blog).
I also tend to wonder if Westerners are developmentally suited to the guru student relationship. We either cannot accept the surrender inherent in the relationship, or we surrender so completely that we abdicate reason and common sense. It seems that this was the case for the woman in NYC that felt she was abused by Rinpoche.
And I agree with you about Wilber and his relationship to abusive gurus. He took a lot of flack in the integral blogosphere for his support of Gafni when all that came down. And he still supports Cohen, who many find abusive but who has never been accused of sexual abuse the way Gafni and others have.
One commenter at IOC suggested that we can separate the guru from the teachings, assuming that the teachings are valid and useful. I'm not sure that I am there yet, but that point of view has some merit.
Peace,
Bill
The problem is, as I see it, that ethics are the base of all spiritual traditions. One purifies through ethical conduct. Ethics have at their base, a wisdom. For me, a teacher who's ethics are questionable, then his wisdom is as well. But you, as a student can take what resonates and leave the rest.
I do think that the there is a wonderful potential with the wisdom traditions of the east coming to the west, in that we can blend the strengths, and wisdoms of both for a more integral, balanced perspective.
Tamara,
I tend to agree with you in general. I want an ethical teacher. But which is better: a teacher who has ethics drilled into him/her from birth, never having tasted sin, or a teacher who has lived life a little and learned the downside of excess?
My friend Kai commented on this over at IOC – here is how he looked at it, using virtue in place of ethics:
I was playing around with the idea that there are two types of virtue (which I'm defining as the mix of ethics [actions] and morality [the internal condition]). On the one hand, there is the virtue which arises from life long practice, cultural conditioning, and rigorous isolation from temptations/impure influences: many of the eastern “gurus” have this sort of virtue. Then there is the virtue which arises from having followed all the roads of sins down to their sorry conclusion, having finally learned for oneself– experientially–the rewards and worth of the virtuous life. (You can understand these virtues with or without the context of reincarnation).
From the outside, these two virtues can resemble each other, and the first sort, so formalized, ritualistic, and historic, may even impress us more, at first, in its outward expression. But the first is untested, ultimately, and as such is far more subject to failure when supportive conditions lapse. We may scoff at the second, because (s)he who has that sort of virtue may have a very besmirched history. But the second is by far the more durable of the two.
I think I tend to agree with his take on it – and I think that maybe it addresses the problem. Although I still would not associate with a teacher who has abused students – so maybe I'm not akay with that approach.
Still, for some lamas coming here from the east, they are like kids who have been denied candy – as soon as they have free access, they feast. Except in this case it might be sex or alcohol. That second form of viture Kai mentions is more powerful because it has seen the dark side and knows the risks.
Anyway, I thought Kai was on target, despite my reservations.
Peace,
Bill
Bill,
I read that comment on your other site. I made me reflect. I read one of your recent blogs, on your own process, Reclaiming My Self and how you were trying to transcend more than include. I think this is all related. When we take on a practice that leaves out a part of us, our desires, our emotions, our pain, our humanity, that tries to artificially transcend it, this is like an arterial bypass. Perhaps we “sinners” here in the west have an advantage, in getting our desires indulged, being able to let them go seeing the futility of that path through experience. My preference is for an immanence of divinity, the integral path implies this. So much damage is done by the oh so dualistic path of renunciation and aiming for trancsendence, as if we are impure. The tantric path uses all the great stuff of our lives as fuel for the fires of transformation, transformation rather than transcendence. THat is what I think you were saying in that peice “Reclaiming My Self” about how in healing theose shut off parts you transformed them, that there was less ego. I feel that we love, and include all thos parts and thus transform, rather than transcend the ego, through the inclusivity of love. This has been the big AHA of recent months for me, written about in my blog (excuse the quote by Sogyal Rinpoche-I admit I have been a huge fan of his teachings!)
We also need to realize that the Tibetans have a different cultural attitude toward sex than we do. We'd never have pictures of people in sexual union posted all over in our culture! And I just read of how Chogyam Trungpa had sex with his future wife upon her first visit to him when she was only 15! And yes, his excesses with alcohol contributed to his early death, but he was a great teacher and did a huge amount of work, accomplishe a great deal. Is it possible that our cultural baggage affects the way we interpret the actions of these teachers? I am not speaking here about western teachers, they should know and conform to our cultural mores.
I'm in shock myself, actually. I have been in limbo, trying to find a teacher and sangha so that I can continue the Dzogchen studies I have begun on my own. Sogyal Rinpoche has been a huge influence on me, and I seemed fairly certain that Rigpa was going to be my “home.” Then I came across this article. Seriously. Just now.
I do believe we all make mistakes, I do believe we can and should be forgiven for them. But I am not certain that abusive people make good teachers. It just doesn't fit.
(I'd even like to add my own question here about finding the right teacher – especailly in light of this story. As in, what have others' experiences been?)
I am very happy to have come across this post. I continue to think shame has a big part to play in abuse, and helps explain continued attraction to abusive teachers.
The tricky part is that there is a sense of shame rooted in the separate-self sense as well, that is healthy in the sense that it is unavoidable given the state of separation. So, is the shame one feels a result of one's fundamental sense of separation, or as a result of the potentially abusive guru.
Not an either/or perhaps….
Hey Durwin,
Thanks for sharing your thoughts – I agree completely. No matter where it comes from, shame is a tricky issue.
Peace,
Bill
I am a complete skeptic…………….toward the accusers.
Despite having been alleged to have happened in the 1970's— as of 9/16/07, these accusations are still merely that—accusations. Sogyal Rinpoche has thousands of students. Who's to say these couple accusations aren't just slander and gossip? It would not be surpising. It happened also to Shakyamuni Buddha. Even the Buddha's cousin and disciple–Devadatta–who knew all the teachings by heart—-because of pride and jealousy, saw everything that Buddha did as deceitful. Just because Devadatta (and others who he managed to convince) might have seen/experienced things in a negative way, does that make their viewpoint objectively valid? This kind of betrayal and slander happens all the time, and to almost all spiritual leaders of every tradition.
Based on everything we know of the character of Sogyal Rinpoche, his upbringing, his own teachers, the testimony of countless intimate students many/most of whom are still with him, his support by other masters including the Dalai Lama, his faithfulness to teachings up to the present day. To consider that he would deliberately manipulate the teachings that he lives and breathes in order to hurt others or even use them for self-ish gain is completely out of character. Psychologically very hard to imagine for anyone with any authentic appreciation for the dharma. On the other hand it is much easier to imagine some jealous, money/attention hungry people, perhaps with their own past psychological issues/abuse histories, projecting negativity onto him. If Sogyal Rinpoche REALLY was malicious toward or abused these two women (then why did they silently wait until Sogyal Rinpoche came out with a best seller to go after him for his money rather the criminal charges??) It's sounds a little too typical.
And why on earth do these few women think it their “benevolent duty” to damage the reputation of a man who has guided and continues to guide thousands of people–men and women– to develop, in their own life experience, a limitless love and compassion for all sentient beings??????? These women are surely NOT motivated by Bodhicitta, but only ego and self-interest. It is they who need Tonglen done for them.
Even if it could be proven that there were a shred of truth to the accusations wouldn't the incalculable beneficial results of his actions in transforming his students lives (which no doubt saved countless women and men from sexual abuse or other crimes!!!) far outweight the emotional hurt caused by a few alleged romantic relationships (if they even happened) gone awry? Surely Sogyal Rinpoche benefits unfathomably more women and men than these jealous nay-saying women ever could.
When will these women and we learn? Samsara itself is nothing but delusion, misunderstanding, risk, dissappointment and suffering. That will never change. Therefore we all have to do the best we can to become free of it. All spiritual paths have risk no matter how good the reputation of the leader. Even if Sogyal Rinpoche did make a few mistakes (though I don't think there's enough evidence to support this conclusion) at least by all other accounts, despite all his fame, he wholeheartedly practices the dharma he preaches.
Life has risks. Relationships have risks. No matter how great the reputation of the leader…as long as we percieve him/her as “other” there will be grasping, doubt, misunderstanding, and negative emotions. There will be the estrangement of unknown territory, and hence risk. One purpose of devotion to a teacher is for the student to be able to overcome the view of the teacher, and all beings, as being “other”.
So should we all just try and be “safe” by following “our own” path or “no path”?? That is the surest way to trap ourselves in our own small-mind, opinions, habits, projections, failings, that trap us in samsara. Even to merely follow a therapist would be better than that!! Oh wait, therapist sometimes sleep with their patients and that's illegal. OK, so maybe we'll follow our lawyer, or maybe our president, or maybe public opinion….finally we are left with nothing at all to follow except our own negative emotions. At least with the Tibetans they have the accountability of lineage. Any old joe can't just stand up and claim to be authentic. One has to at least have trained one's mind to develop altruistic qualities before one's teachers authorize one to teach.
But if, like the sacred notion of Guru we habitually denigrate the whole concept of lineage as being “outdated, authoritarian, unamerican, un-egalitaran, corrupt etc” then what are we left with? Our oh so morally pure and trustworthy spouse or biological mother and father and family? Please….
We leave ourselves nothing but bitter distrust of all human beings, basically, misanthropy.
And who is the cause of that? No one else but ourselves. According to the teaching of the Buddha, whenever we suffer, or are personally offended and angry, it is never anything else but us (our past actions and disturbing emotions) that causes us to suffer. It is always our own dualistic mind and ego that causes all our own suffering. That we are each the sole cause of our own suffering is basic Buddhism, taught by all schools.
Therefore we should have compassion on these two women who suffer not because of abuse but, like all of us, because of their own ignorance and negative actions.
L,
thank you for your wisdom and rationality. For me, as a close student of Sogyal Rinpoche, my experience of him as endlessly compassionate and tirelessly dedicated to my enlightenment has been incredible. For me, the proof is in the pudding. I am a very strong, intelligent and self determined woman who has come from my own past of abuse. I have found Rinpoche’s ways and his teachings of the dharma to be life changing. I will be forever grateful to have found a spiritual friend and teacher such as him.
hello,
I have read Sogyal Rinpoches book.
I have listened to his teachings and I will continue to.
I have joined a retreat with him and might join some more in the future.
I have received his blessings.
Despite this all, I have decided not to make him my Guru, assumed he would accept me as his student.
Why? From the gut feeling I got when I observed his way of treating his close students. And because of his paranoiac fear of catching a cold…
Why am I posting this here? Certainly not because I want to comment or judge on Sogyal.
It is everybody's responsibility to decide how to walk that path that has been revealed. It might sound very cheerlessly: Everybody is on his own when it comes to mastering his mind. We might choose to use all or some of the jewels as skillful means. And some of us, very few, will be lucky enough to find a sincere enlightened guru.
I sincerely feel sorrow for the beings who have not the means of judgment and become victims of abusive conduct (or just misunderstandings).
(Please forgive my bad English. I am not a native speaker)