I’m always fascinated by names out from the past, especially those which were particularly big names at one point in time. Who of us does not remember the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi who is not only famous for his involvement with the Beatles, but also infamous for the many Rolls Royce’s this spiritual master managed to assemble. Lo and behold, I came across this obituary in The Week Magazine which puts that spiritual conflict into perspective. Enjoy.
News & Opinion
Friday, February 22, 2008
Obituaries
The guru who gave the world Transcendental Meditation
Maharishi Mahesh Yogi
1918 (?)–2008
To his estimated 6 million followers, the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi was a visionary whose philosophy could accomplish everything from relieving inner tension to promoting global peace. To his detractors, he was a huckster who, after glomming on to the Beatles, got rich by peddling metaphysical mumbo jumbo. Either way, the Maharishi (a Hindu word meaning “great seer”) was responsible for popularizing meditation in the West, establishing its health benefits through scientific studies, and making a household word out of the term “mantra.”
The Maharishi’s origins, in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, were as elusive as his philosophy, said the Los Angeles Times. “Various accounts give the years of his birth as 1911, 1917, or 1918.” Originally named Mahesh Prasad Varma, he apparently earned a physics degree at Allahabad University in 1942; after graduating, he studied yoga with the master Swami Brahmananda Saraswati. At one point, he “retreated into the Himalayas for a two-year period of meditation.” In 1959, he established the International Meditation Society to promote the Swami’s idea of enlightenment. The formula was simple: “A person could reduce stress and attain happiness by meditating 20 minutes twice a day on a secret Sanskrit word, or mantra.”
In an age of flower power and Vietnam, said the London Independent, the idea proved wildly popular. People from all walks of life sought the Maharishi’s spiritual guidance, most famously the Beatles, who made a much-publicized pilgrimage to his ashram in Rishikesh, India, in February 1968. “Daily meditation certainly helped the group, especially John Lennon, who came off drugs completely.” The experience also inspired much of the Beatles’ “white album.” But when the Maharishi began suggesting that he and the Beatles make a movie and tour together, they grew suspicious. The breaking point came when the avowedly chaste holy man supposedly made advances toward Mia Farrow, who had accompanied the Beatles on their pilgrimage. When the Maharishi asked why they were leaving, Lennon shot back, “If you’re so cosmic, you’ll know why.”
“None of this dented the Maharishi’s growing global popularity,” said the London Mirror. Transcendental Meditation exploded in the 1970s, attracting such celebrities as Shirley MacLaine, Kurt Vonnegut, Clint Eastwood, and the director David Lynch. Featured on the cover of Time in 1975, the “Giggling Guru”—so nicknamed because of his merriment and witticisms—built a business empire with assets of $300 million in the U.S. alone. He established a university in Fairfield, Iowa, and worldwide meditation centers at which students pay $2,500 for five-day sessions to learn how to meditate. Despite his claims of simplicity—“I am a monk, I have no pockets,” he said—the Maharishi lived an opulent life, complete with a Rolls-Royce, helicopter, and pink private airplane.
Over time, the Maharishi’s claims grew increasingly outlandish, said The Washington Post. “His introduction of ‘yogic flying’ as an advanced meditation technique, which he had described as levitation, brought scorn from critics who said it was nothing more than cross-legged hopping.” He claimed that if the square root of 1 percent of the world’s population meditated simultaneously, their good vibrations could bring about world peace. He even suggested rearranging the world’s capitals for maximum cosmic harmony. The U.S. government, for example, was to move to Smith Center, Kan., “near the geographic center of the 48 contiguous states and the nation’s center of energy.”
The Maharishi eventually became a recluse, holing up in his log cabin on the German-Dutch border and generally communicating through closed-circuit television. In a rare 2006 interview, when a journalist asked about the Beatles, he snorted, “Forget about it! I did not become great by association of the Beatles! Beatles make Maharishi great? Pah! It is a waste of thought.”
Original writing date: April 22, 2008
Article date: February 22, 2008