Rigpa is not a reliable organisation from which to learn Buddhadharma, not if it’s your sole source of tuition and not if you believe everything your teachers say without examination or question. Yes, I learned meditation from Rigpa, and yes, I learned a great deal of authentic Buddhadharma, but I also studied many of the original texts and gained most of my subtle understanding from them. Rigpa only provided the basics and an understanding of the nine yanas, a framework into which I could ‘slot’ the other teachings I studied.
The big curriculum issue
The big lack in the Rigpa curriculum was that it was completely devoid of Madyamika, the teachings on the ’empty’ nature of reality that you really need to not only understand but also have some experience of before you begin vajrayana. And yet, vajrayana was practised (with very few and very light weight teachings on what you were supposed to be doing) by anyone after they’d been studying the preliminaries for a couple of years.
I assumed that at least the senior instructors would have this understanding, but after Ian Maxwell died, I rarely found anyone who could satisfactorily answer my questions on either study or practice at the vajrayana level. I had to find my answers elsewhere.
When some of the madyamika teachings appeared for the Dzogchen Mandala, they were highly inadequate, and yet kept ‘secret’ for the Dzogchen Mandala only, yet the study was nothing more than a summary; one could learn more from reading any one of the many books available on the subject.
Why did I study with Rigpa and Sogyal, then? Convenience. They had a solid presence in Australia where we lack the choices of teachers available in other parts of the world. They made the teachings available to me. And I found Sogyal’s teachings inspiring back when it was all new to me. That faded well before the letter written by eight students exposed his abuse.
I am extremely grateful for my wall of dharma books!
I requested an update on the curriculum from Rigpa Australia, hoping that they had rectified this issue, but they ignored my request.
Even at a beginner level you can’t be sure
At a beginner level where you’re just learning basic meditation, Rigpa tuition should be fine – after all, it’s just meditation, right? But you might be being taught to spiritually bypass the very issues you should be looking at in order to be a mentally healthy person. This depends on the instructor, of course. But when I was an instructor, I didn’t know about spiritual bypassing, and yes, I did it in my own practice and I taught it, following what I had learned in Rigpa.
Might this have changed? Might the instructors that remain in Rigpa have become aware of it such that they know how to safeguard against students misunderstanding meditation in this way? Unfortunately, because those still in Rigpa appear to be uninterested in re-evaluating anything in terms of their beliefs and teachings, it’s highly unlikely. I suspect that, like me before I started investigating cult tactics, many have still never heard the term. Unless they have followed this blog or read Fallout: Recovering from Abuse in Tibetan Buddhism. Indications are, however, that rather than use this blog as a way of understanding the perspective of those who have left Rigpa in disgust, most of those who remain in Rigpa choose to ignore the blog’s existence.
And when it comes to compassion? Well, those of us who have been treated with disdain or barely veiled hatred, even by Rigpa instructors , who have had our attempts to communicate consistently ignored, been misrepresented and even vilified as demons know that even though some may speak all the right words when it comes to the compassion teachings, they cannot actually practice compassion in life. Those making the decisions in the organisation have consistently shown an inability to behave in a compassionate way towards victims of abuse and institutional betrayal.
Management’s latest indication of this lack of ability to connect with those they and Sogyal harmed is them setting up a restorative justice process ( a theory of justice that emphasises repairing the harm caused by criminal behaviour) without consultation with those Sogyal abused (to see if they would welcome this or see any point in it) and with the perpetrator dead, and without having admitted that any crime was committed.
You might say that at least they are trying to do something towards genuine healing, but considering that the lawyers they’ve engaged to undertake this restorative justice will require payment – and lawyers don’t come cheap – I feel that money would be better spent following recommendation 10 in the Lewis Silken Report on the independent investigation, which says, ‘So far as is consistent with the wider financial responsibilities of Rigpa, a fund should be created to provide professional counselling to those affected by abuse.’ Given the way the whistleblowers and their supporters have been treated by Rigpa people, I feel that this latest move is more about making them look good than any genuine attempt to hear what we’ve been trying to tell them for a couple of years.
The abuse issue hasn’t died with Sogyal
As long as Rigpa management, lineage holders, teachers and instructors don’t recognise and admit that Sogyal committed crimes, and for so long as they think that ‘crazy wisdom’ as modelled by Sogyal is acceptable behaviour, there is a danger that those most abused will become abusers.
Research has shown that ‘children who are abused are much more likely to become adults who abuse (between 30% and 40% of people who are abused as children go on to become abusers themselves)’ We are talking about adults here, of course, but certainly some of those in Rigpa’s inner circle were abused as children, and even if not, if victims of abuse never face the fact they have been abused, they may unconsciously repeat the pattern, particularly in a situation where such behaviour has been modelled by something they look up to as a spiritual guide.
Look at Shambala! The abuse in that organisation is widespread and inter-generational and it started with their founder Chogyam Trungpa. Why would Rigpa be any different when they, too, don’t recognise abuse as abuse?
Those who take charge after the death or removal of the abuser may not be as bad as their abuser – we would hope – but a friend of mine who did sewing at the annual Myall Lakes retreat had a boss who used to scream at her for no apparent reason, every year. Every year my friend told me about it and about how she never wanted to work with this woman again, but every year she came back and did it again. Why? She considered that it was up to her to learn to handle it, that being able to put up with it would be a mark of spiritual achievement.
That’s the dysfunction in Rigpa that had everyone putting up with Sogyal’s abuse, and until they recognise how that idea has been used as a reason for people in power not to moderate their worst impulses, that dysfunction will remain.
Emulating one’s teacher
We were taught that a good student comes to know their teacher’s wisdom mind and that, in order to facilitate that development, we should try to think/be like him. I have read in a Tibetan Buddhist text somewhere (The Words of my Perfect Teacher I think) that realised students emulate their teacher, so those who believe every word they read without examination and who still believe that Sogyal was genuinely a Mahasiddha will supposedly be aiming to emulate him – even if they don’t admit it, since beliefs direct people’s behaviour even if they aren’t aware of it. This idea that one should emulate one’s teacher is alone a good reason for ending the lineage.
Do they really understand the teachings?
In section 2 of my book Fallout: Recovering from Abuse in Tibetan Buddhism – a fully referenced section drawing on the work of respected scholars and masters – I explore the misunderstanding and misuse of Buddhist beliefs that enabled the abuse in Rigpa. Widespread misunderstanding of the most subtle aspects of certain teachings at the highest level is at the core of Rigpa’s inability to admit that Sogyal committed crimes or even actually did wrong (apart from Rigpa Australia whose representative did publicly admit that Sogyal did wrong), and this impedes any possibility of genuine change. Unless management and instructors examine these beliefs using their critical thinking faculties, they will remain stuck right where they were when Sogyal was alive, and all they have done in their Rigpa Moving Forward will remain as nothing more than window dressing.
Those who misunderstood the teachings such that they saw nothing wrong with Sogyal’s behaviour will pass on their misunderstandings. So Rigpa is a lineage with misunderstanding of the teachings and dysfunctional behaviour at its core. What better reason is there for ending this lineage?
Unfortunately, however, it continues, with those who were most abused and most responsible for the enabling and cover up still running the show. The three most responsible have stepped aside from management roles, yes, but PG is teaching, and PP appears in many Rigpa photo opportunities right at the heart of things. The majority of those in the Vision Board were also complicit in the cover up, as well as at least some of those teaching at national levels
Who is checking their understanding? Their spiritual advisers all seem to think that beating increases wisdom. Now the abused who think they were blessed not abused become the teachers, since those who recognised the abuse as abuse have surely left.
The core of healing is confession
Another indication that they don’t actually understand the teachings, or at least don’t practice them is that the healing practice of Vajrasattva that we accumulate 100,000 recitations of as part of the vajrayana preliminaries (ngondro) is quite clear on what is needed for healing. They call them the four powers. This is from the Rigpa Wiki (an excellent resource btw) on these four powers.
O Maitreya, bodhisattva mahāsattva, if you possess four factors, you will overcome harmful actions that have been committed and accumulated. What are these four? The action of total rejection, the action as remedy, the power of restoration, and the power of support.[1]
The Noble Sutra of the Teaching on the Four Factors
The action of total rejection, also known as the power of regret, is recognising that you have done wrong, understanding that it was harmful and owning up to it. In other words, confession.
Confession (Tib. བཤགས་པ་, shakpa, Wyl.bshags pa) — the process of admitting or ‘exposing’ one’s misdeeds before a witness or support, feeling regret for them and vowing not to repeat them in future.
Rigpa Wiki
And yet, Rigpa communications to their sangha speak of healing without having either admitting their misdeeds, shown any indication that they feel regret for anything other than the damage done to their reputation by those misdeeds being publicly exposed, or that they vow not to repeat them in future. They have made half-hearted attempts to sound sorry and say they will do better, but you can hardly vow not to repeat harmful actions if you don’t recognise exactly what you did wrong.
Rigpa teachers and instructors taught this practice of Vajrasattva, but did they ever actually truly practise it? If so, how did they miss this vital point? And if they did get this point, then why do they not apply it as their guide in life? Isn’t the point of studying Buddhadharma and practising meditation that we live it? Isn’t it reasonable to expect that a ‘spiritual’ organisation would behave in accordance with what they teach?
Postscript
I know that some Rigpa people feel that I have done a lot of damage by saying these kinds of things and they feel hurt by my behaviour. They feel that I have turned against them – and I understand that it looks that way – but actually I only bother to spend time to write this kind of thing because I care. I care that they actually practice in life the dharma they are supposed to be teaching. To not do that, to not live what you preach, is a tragedy.
I am aware of the upset this kind of thing will cause, but I do it in order to wake Rigpa people up. They have ignored or sidelined my attempts to speak to them on these matters – as you’d expect from cult members – and that leaves me only this way to try to help clean out the rot that infests the organisation. My criticisms are a direct result of Rigpa management’s failure to genuinely communicate. They speak of reaching out, but no one from Rigpa has contacted me or followed up on my efforts to communicate with them. They speak of listening, but they do not hear.
Rigpa can rise from its ashes, but healing can only happen if they recognise and confess their negative actions, and I don’t think they can recognise those actions on their own. Rigpa needs members of the What Now group to help heal Rigpa. We don’t need them to help heal us. We healed each other, and how we did it, and what we, as a group, came to understand is all laid out in Fallout. If they can’t manage to read that book with an open mind and a willingness to reflect on what it contains, then we can’t help them.
I find it helpful to remember that likely all Rigpa and many ex-Rigpa students share a concern for the future of Tibetan Buddhism in the West. The letter exposing Sogyal’s crimes would never have been written without that concern. What connects us is stronger than what divides us.
Without a concerted effort to act in accordance with the Buddha’s teachings and examine the beliefs that enabled the abuse, all of the factors I’ve spoken of above will remain and will be passed on, either consciously or unconsciously. All they will be doing is propagating their misunderstanding. This is why Sogyal’s lineage should not continue.
Image by Bernhard Renner from Pixabay
Spot on Tahlia. I have written a condensed version of this exegesis to Martina and Tim at Restorative Justice. I will also forward this blog to them if that is OK with you .
Sure. It’s a public blog. I just added a bit at the end that you might like to read. From ‘The Core of Healing is Compassion’ to the end.
SL had no “lineage” but a family business with prestigious TB accomplices who benefited of his cash machine and who endorsed his position , some of them even now after the abuses official revelation.
SL was a gifted and perverse charlatan for sure, not a genuine lineage holder.
You and I know this, but many don’t. I call it a lineage because that’s how those who remain in Rigpa see it.
With regards to lineage, will we ever definitively know if SL was, in fact, a reincarnation of Tertön Sogyal? Of course, it would be far easier to make sense of his aberrant behavior were it proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that he was not. Jigme Phuntsok Rinpoche was also considered to be a reincarnation of Tertön Sogyal and from all accounts, lived an exemplary life.
Otherwise, and I have not received a satisfactory answer to this question, how can it be that a reincarnation from such great practitioner turn out so badly? Especially when we have it to compare with Tertön Sogyal’s other exemplary reincarnation?
Does anyone know how those still very much connected in some way to the lineage of Tertön Sogyal explain and/or make sense of Sogyal Rinpoche’s destructive abuse?
What do we mean by lineage?
Is it the chain of reincarnations or the chain of oral transmissions? And which one is more important?
Recently I red a Zen practice book and there was a text which they recite with all the masters of the chain of the oral transmission from the Buddha to the present masters.
If the oral transmission is more important in Buddhism, what I think it is because only in TB there is a reincarnation lineage and not in other forms of Buddhism, then the question becomes apparent was it realy wrong what SR thought. The curriculum of the meditation and vajrayana mandala were not wrong, I don’t know nothing about the dzogchen curriculum because I was never a dzogchen student.
I don’t know were SR got his teachings from but he must be a part of the or a chain, despite his bad behaviour. And as former Rigpa participants or Rigpa remainers we are also part of that chain. The best thing for Rigpa is to do is to admit the wrong doings, thereby showing that they understood the teachings.
Actually, we have no idea what Terton Sogyal’s behaviour was like either, do we? Chokyi Lodro was also supposed to have been a great lama and we were all under the impression that he was someone to emulate until we discovered otherwise when OT in ‘The Life and Times of Chokyi Lodro’ said how he used to beat the monks. In other words, those considered great lamas of the past also weren’t saints in the way we in the West think of them.
And I can answer your last question easily. They think he was a genuine crazy wisdom master and that his abusive behaviour was enlightened action, not abuse. That was what we were all taught in Rigpa, and that’s a good example of the kind of beliefs that prove Rigpa can’t be trusted as a genuine source of wisdom.
Absolutely right! Well said. The hypocrisy of Soggy & his enablers must be called out if the benefits of the Dharma are ever truly to take root in the West.
What kind of Vajrayana is this?
Is it still possible to call this Buddhism (related to the Buddah Salyamuni).
I don’t actually think the vajrayana is Buddhism at all. It’s Hinduism and some Bon practices that have been altered a bit by the addition of refuge, bodhicitta and dedication prayers to make them psuedo-Buddhist. Tibetan Buddhism does teach Buddhism, and at the Theravada and Mahayana vehicles it is Buddhism, but once you get into the vajrayana it doesn’t really relate much to what the Buddha taught.
Most of the vajrayana teatchings come from Tantras realised and dispatched by Mahasiddhas, and their symbols are not far from Hindu’s : Deities, letters, cakras,mantras, etc..
These symbols and methods were in the mood of this past time indeed.
I find interesting the representation of the famous yogi Virupa sitting near a trident with a damaru attached to it, it is very Saddhu looking 😉 but symbolises the 3 Lines and the damaru , the essencelessness of sound and the interdependent nature of phenomenas.
The Lamdre initiated by Virupa is 100% buddhist 🙂
I don’t know for the Dzogchen …
The feudal TB is quite deconected with our time , and it’s pedagogy too and the attempts to modernise it were mostly a wreckage, a sinking,…especially with SL, CTR, and their”circus” of “very good friends” ,full of abuses and debauchery.
All this is so complicated, so many lineages and levels of transmision…
If it can liberate you from samsara, then it’s a buddhist teaching. After all, buddhism is not confined to the teachings that Shakyamuni gave during his lifetimes, before him there were buddhas, and after him there will be more buddhas appearing in the world to teach dharma that leads to liberation from samsara.
So, if a teaching has the capacity to lead to liberation from samsara as defined in the doctrin of appearance and emptiness nature, that is the core of teachings that can liberate from samsara, then it’s buddhist, no matter which human being brought it into this world first and no matter what it looks like on the outside. The criterium is, does that teaching have the capacity to do the job, or not.
That vajrayana works as a means to overcome samsara completely is proven by teachers who survived decades of Chinese torture and labour camps without any signs of trauma and with compassion and bodhicitta motivation completely intact. Two living examples here are Alak Zenkar Rinpoche and Garchen Rinpoche.
By the way, the whole buddha dharma is a “hindu” teaching, most people following some kind of vedic religion accept Shakyamuni as an emanation of one of their divine beings. So, yes, buddhism is in essence a “hindu” teaching.
As to, let Sogyal’s lineage die with him, what do you even mean with that statement? The lineages he taught in was mostly held was Longchen Nyingthik and the lineage that his predecessor, the Terton Sogyal founded through his terma teachings. These will obviously not die with Sogyal Lakar because he was by no means the only holder of these teachings. Longchen Nyingthik by Jigme Lingpa is one of the most popular practice lineages within the Nyingmapa and there are literally dozens of teachers basing their teachings on these. And the terma teachings of Terton Sogyal were propagated widely by Khempo Jikme Puntsok in China and I’m sure he produced lineage holders.
By Sogyal Rinpoche’s lineage, I don’t mean the Longchen Nyingtik, I meant his version of it, as he taught it. Think of a family tree with branches; I’m talking about his branch, the Rigpa branch. That’s all. Not the other teachers of the LN.
As for your definition of Buddhism. I disagree. Buddhism is what the Buddha of this epoch taught. Buddhism isn’t the only way to ‘liberation’, so the criteria of Buddhism being something leading to liberation would mean that you could call some forms of Christianity Buddhism. You’re confusing ‘dharma’ with Buddhadharma/Buddhism.
Ah, thanks for the reply. But here we have to pose the question. Who actually were the lineage transmitters in Rigpa? After all, Sogyal did the dzogchen teachings, but hardly any vajrayana empowerments. So, in actual fact, all the “Sogyal” students have their vajrayana samayas not with Sogyal but with these other teachers. The recent scandal has no influence on these connections whatsoever.
As to the people who were and chose to remain Sogyal dzogchen students, there is freedom of religion, I think they have every right to do so, just as people have a right to follow the teachings of Osho or even Scientology if they wish to. And I personally believe that Rigpa should give these people a place to do so. This is going to be seperate from teachings for newer students anyway because the so called dzogchen mandala events have always been closed and for approved Sogyal dzogchen students only. So probably no new admissions here.
As for the future of Rigpa, I don’t believe that any future participants will be turned into “Sogyal students”. After all, the teachings he mainly gave were dzogchen, and for those you need a living human being as a teacher. Any new people drawn into Rigpa will most probably be interested in the teachings of Sogyal’s living, breathing successors. And here Khandro Rinpoche is a reasonably safe and qualified choice.
And since Sogyal was the only person in that organisation who is accused of abusive behaviour and the highly culty inner circle is mostly dissolved we don’t have to be afraid that more abuse is going to happen.
Sogyal didn’t name a successor (as far as i have heard he asked Mingyur Rinpoche, but that one seems currently unavailable but has apparently promised to get involved as soon as he has the capacity to do so), so in terms of teachers and teachings Rigpa can become anything the currently in charge people plus the general audience wishes it to be. So I don’t see a problem in Rigpa turning into a legitimate platform for a variety of teachers of Tibetan buddhism that is neither culty nor fosters abuse. I am totally pro Rigpa as an organisation that is not based on a single teacher as central figure but rather on a pool of qualified teachers who in their approach complement each other well. And that’s what is currently looking most likely as the future of Rigpa.
Many people need a “master” not a Teatcher…
If the good causes and conditions of a good karma will arise, then a genuine Vajra holder will manifest…but i doubt, especially when i see the high level of the golden-enablers of the samaya breakers and abusers these last 40 years….
I just beleive in causality…and to apply the story of the dog tooth becoming a Buddhas relic by faith is difficult to apply to uneducated and unrealised masters even seen as deities ….
We will see what happens 🙂
Apropos Rigpa’s involvement in the Buddhist Union of the Netherlands (BUN) and the European Buddhist Union:
https://openbuddhism.org/a-false-narrative/
BUN-chairman and Rigpa-stalwart Michael Ritman recently blocked testimonies by victims and survivors of abuse during a symposium at the Free University in Amsterdam.
For Dutch readers of this blog: On February 23, 2020, BUN-member Stichting Buddho published its own critical review of the FU-symposium in three parts—‘The Preparation’, ‘The Day Itself’, and ‘What Now? You’ll find the full references and links in the Postscript and footnote 28.
A cult remains a cult when it has gone so far in condoning and overlooking lies against Buddha’s intent and sexual abuses for decades, showing no compassion for the victims of SL as you show it.
Most of prestigious past and today enablers, accomplices and “very good friends” of SL and Rigpa belonging to the TB “firm” still don’t want to talk about this scandal and try to keep their comfortable position in Rigpa and Shambala too…
Disgusting and appaling omerta like in the mafia .. making witnesses diseapear….
More on the Dutch Buddhist Union’s chilling actions:
https://openbuddhism.org/the-dutch-buddhist-unions-chilling-actions/
And the beat goes on…
https://openbuddhism.org/target-practice-a-buddhist-unions-framing-tactics/
Oane Bijlsma, speaking for herself: https://openbuddhism.org/my-time-in-rigpa/