Selling the Dharma

[oldbob]

oldbob, You say "Perhaps the Lord Buddha never charged for the Teachings" perhaps.....!! Do you understand the purity, the spirit, the depth of the teaching?

Hi greentara,

Perhaps I was being rhetorical. Your poems and thoughts are wonderful and truly appreciated.

I am quite sure I do not understand anything of the purity, spirit, and depth of the teaching. Not one word.

Can you kindly explain how these enlightened qualities of Lord Buddha relate to the topic of selling the Dharma?

ob

[greentara]

oldbob,Wanting to sell or flog the dharma, just shows these teachers have little faith in the power of the teachings. You have to trust the words of the Buddha ,they have their own momentum. A 'megaphone' approach won't make people realize any faster. You can't water down the splendour of nirvana/liberation as just another product to market. Ok nuff said.

[Yudron]

I just got a couple of posts on Facebook advertizing the new book Dakini Power--that has all the same women we Americans already know, who are wonderful, but the same writers and public speaker who are featured in out Buddhist magazines and so forth. And I think we all know that Shambala Sun and Buddhadharma are like a repertory theater; more or less the same cast of teachers featured over and over, no matter what the topic. As one friend of mine said "Who the hell is Pico Iyer?" I don't have anything negative to say about these teachers, but the marketing of them is just so relentless.

If you want to write about American or European yogis or yoginis--please open your eyes to the rest of the old timers. The one's who stay in retreat, or run a Dharma prison program, or establish Dharma centers for their teachers, or paint thankas, translate texts, or have mastered the lama dances, and so on. There are 100 ways to be a powerful Dakini here. Wouldn't it be interesting to ask the Tibetan lamas who teach here to recommend who they think should be featured... who their best students here are?

I don't mind the marketing of Dharma nick nacks. I do mind the over-the-top marketing of teachers.

[muni]

Perhaps if we can ask the Masters to collaborate a little, and share the Teachings more openly, maybe more people can get the benefit.

Perhaps in 100 years, we will all have no interest, vested or otherwise. Recognizing this, maybe it is time to make access to the Teachings, universally available.

Perhaps you can bring this to the attention of your Teacher.





oldbob

[Ramon1920]

The reason selling the Dharma isn't acceptable is because it attracts lowlifes to teaching, it limits teachings to the poor, it can make teachers look hypocritical, and it can cause worldly people to become jealous.

The advantages of selling the dharma are really minor compared to the trouble it brings.

If you make selling Dharma acceptable, you'll immediately have a boom of lowlifes pretending to be great teachers and new bogus transmissions that promise to be better than the traditional to attract more people, which,.. I guess has already happened,.. But don't fear, Buddhism will lose it's popularity as it's image is destroyed by people like the lady in the video lol, then it will just be the serious people for a while again.

[dorjeshonnu]

buddhism has historically relied on the favour and support of ruling elites, like any other religion, for approval to teach, for land, and for access to householders. these days there is not much space on this planet for monarchic empire-building like that of asoka. when your ruling elites are merchants, it is the choice of one tradition or another to present primarily dharma, or to present primarily marketing. it is very popular these days to appeal to modern sensibilities about worldly responsibility and stewardship efforts. even gyalwa karmapa has stated that practitioners should be acting to save the environment and so on, rather than pursuing exotic meditative accomplishments. he was also photo-bombed by starbucks at the invitation/request of ponlop rinpoche when he visited the united states. you can find the pictures of him holding up the coffee cup online.

the only place to start the negotiation of this relationship is with sponsored retreat spaces, on purchased land, held in trust for an emergent western clergy of lay and monastic practitioners in community. there is no need for gigantic buddha statues until the wider culture properly understands what that sort of thing represents, at which point they can finance that themselves, knowingly and intentionally. most every buddhist tradition is represented in the western hemisphere, whether through diaspora or as religious colonization, but until a native sangha is reliably established - governed locally and recognized internationally - there is very little we as buddhists bring to a negotiating table with business except as consumers. with organization comes membership, with membership comes the power of a group within a democratically governed marketplace. with organization comes all kinds of problems of legitimacy and transparency and so on. yet if practitioners do not start to organize toward the result of self-governance here, by whatever means, the business of community governance will eventually be established for us by business interests, communities will survive or falter based on the whim of investors, dharma will remain culturally colonial, and we will sit on sponsored cushions and learning concentration by fixation on a rupa decorated by a corporate logo.

[oldbob]

It boils down to what works and what doesn't - and even helping one person is a wonderful turning of the wheel and should be applauded.

Facts on the ground. (No pun intended.)

So here I am on beautiful Margarita, at a well planned center of ChNNR,

http://www.tashigarnorte.org/eng/index.html

that was established more than 10 years ago and has had around 3 million US, invested in land, houses, infrastructure and Gompa.

Yesterday, 4 people show up for the 5:30 AM webcast from Tenarife, 20 or so show up for the Ganapuja, and 20 or so showed up for the World-wide Transmission, Anniversary of Garab Dorje, including 2 new-comers.

As of this morning one person is signed up for the retreat of Mandarava (2-6 March) with a VERY qualified Teacher, Nina Robinson, and 8 people are signed up for the one week Zhinas retreat with ChNNR that starts in 10 days.

Neither retreat appears to be listed on their website or Facebook page, either as an event, or calendar, item. For Nina, if I recall rightly, they had originally adopted a price of $150, no discounts, (I am told at the advice of the International Gakyil) which has now been dropped to $60, NO DISCOUNTS, perhaps at the sad laughter of oldbob. Hopefully more people will sign up now that the price is more in line with what people can afford. Still I am told that the average wage here in Venezuela is $100 per week. Many people cannot afford even the $60 on top of the transportation and hotels. NOT TO GIVE DISCOUNTS FOR STUDENTS AND THE ELDERLY IS JUST SILLY, OR SAVAGE, depending on how you want to frame it.

The retreat of ChNNR is priced at $200, with discounts. Sanity prevails, (UNLESS YOU MAKE $100 PER WEEK) until you inquire what the payment rate is for karma yoga (for those who want to have work / study) and are told: 25 Bolivares an hour which is a little more than 1$US. This means that someone would have to work for 100 hours (13 or so, 8 hour days) "even at the reduced, 50% off, poor peoples discount rate." IMAGINING THAT ANYONE WOULD WANT TO DO WORK STUDY, AT THIS RATE OF PAY, IS EITHER SILLY OR SAVAGE, depending on how you want to frame it.

viewtopic.php?f=48&t=8836

This thread gives a fuller blah blah of my thoughts (and those of others) on the issue of Dharma pricing.

There has to be a better way.

Everything IS completely pure - just as it is - just sometimes it is a little hard to integrate bodhicitta and the pricing structures of Dharma centers.

No cognitive dissonance here!

Long life to the Dzogchen Masters, in good health and with success in all things.

[Pero]

As of this morning one person is signed up for the retreat of Mandarava (2-6 March) with a VERY qualified Teacher, Nina Robinson, and 8 people are signed up for the one week Zhinas retreat with ChNNR that starts in 10 days.

Wow... Well on the other hand, this looks like a good time to spend some time with RInpoche a bit more intimately hehe. Too bad I can't afford to fly over there. Although even if I could Margarita always sounded dangerous to me.

The retreat of ChNNR is priced at $200, with discounts. Sanity prevails, (UNLESS YOU MAKE $100 PER WEEK) until you inquire what the payment rate is for karma yoga (for those who want to have work / study) and are told: 25 Bolivares an hour which is a little more than 1$US. This means that someone would have to work for 100 hours (13 or so, 8 hour days) "even at the reduced, 50% off, poor peoples discount rate." IMAGINING THAT ANYONE WOULD WANT TO DO WORK STUDY, AT THIS RATE OF PAY, IS EITHER SILLY OR SAVAGE, depending on how you want to frame it.

I thought karma yoga didn't get payed, you just received the discount or even got in for free?

[Pero]

As of this morning one person is signed up for the retreat of Mandarava (2-6 March) with a VERY qualified Teacher, Nina Robinson, and 8 people are signed up for the one week Zhinas retreat with ChNNR that starts in 10 days.

Wow... Well on the other hand, this looks like a good time to spend some time with RInpoche a bit more intimately hehe. Too bad I can't afford to fly over there. Although even if I could Margarita always sounded dangerous to me.

The retreat of ChNNR is priced at $200, with discounts. Sanity prevails, (UNLESS YOU MAKE $100 PER WEEK) until you inquire what the payment rate is for karma yoga (for those who want to have work / study) and are told: 25 Bolivares an hour which is a little more than 1$US. This means that someone would have to work for 100 hours (13 or so, 8 hour days) "even at the reduced, 50% off, poor peoples discount rate." IMAGINING THAT ANYONE WOULD WANT TO DO WORK STUDY, AT THIS RATE OF PAY, IS EITHER SILLY OR SAVAGE, depending on how you want to frame it.

I thought karma yoga didn't get paid, you just received the discount or even got in for free?