Holy madness: spirituality, crazy-wise teachers, and enlightenment

Foreword by / Roger Walsh

Author's preface to the revised edition

Preface to the first edition

The phenomenon

Crazy wisdom in action : spiritual eccentrics in various religious traditions

The upside-down world of tricksters and clowns

The fools for Christ's sake : folly as virtue

The sufi path of blame

Jewish ecstatics

Radical spiritual eccentrics of the east

The avadhutas, masts, and bauls : India's countercultural heroes

The crazy adepts of Tibet

The zen masters of China and Japan : traditional shock therapists

Contemporary crazy-wisdom teachers : from Rascal gurus to "spiritual" terrorists

Preamble

Chigyam Trungpa : prowling tiger of crazy wisdom

Lee Lozowick : crazy minstrel

Gurdjieff : rascal guru

Aleister Crowley : mad magus

Bhagwan Rajneesh (Osho) : divine philosopher

Sathya Sai Baba : counterfeit avatar

Shoko Asahara : "spiritual" terrorist

The many faces of Adi Da (Franklin Jones)

The early years

Crazy wisdom and the futility of experience

Crazy-wise chaos and the community of devotees

The context

Spiritual practice : the path beyond all paths

The long search

The snare of pop spirituality

The paradox of discipline

The "heat" of spiritual practice

The guru : license to kill

False images of the guru

The guru function : broadcasting God

Jesus and divinization

True gurus, false gurus, crazy gurus

Discipleship : spiritual cloning or brainwashing?

The time-honored tradition of spiritual discipleship

Individualism and obedience

Levels of conversion

Cultism, guru-worship, and freedom

God, Enlightenment, and ego-death

The loss of God and faith

The ego illusion

The mystical ego

Enlightenment and the transcendence of attention

A new life through ego-death

The significance

Holy madness and the smokescreen of consensus reality

A test case

Conventional religion as counterfeit spirituality

The humanistic way of self-actualization

The cult of

Religious provincialism

Cultural veils over authentic spirituality

Understanding holy madness

Holy madness revisited

Of holiness, wisdom, and ignorance

Holy madness, spontaneity, and the chaos of existence

The playfulness and humor of Enlightenment and crazy wisdom

Holiness, madness, and morality

Madness and holy madness

The personality of adepts : self-transcendence and compassion

Holy folly and the transcendence of good and evil.