Shri Atmananda (Krishna Menon)

One of the greatest teachers of the twentieth century
by Philip Renard

I am pleased to present the first of a two-part article from Philip Renard, about the Direct Path master, Atmananda Krishna Menon. See Philip’s lineage at https://www.advaita.org.uk/teachers/atmananda_parampara.htm

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It is a pity that until this day the great Advaita teacher Shri Atmananda (Shri Krishna Menon, called Gurunathan by his disciples) remains a rather unknown figure to many people. With this article I hope to contribute to the recognition of the importance of him as a Source for direct understanding of ultimate Truth.

              Two small books written by him, Atma-Darshan and Atma-Nirvriti, form together in fact a modern Upanishad. Upanishads are classical texts that have been added to the Vedas as concluding parts since about the eighth century BC. The term Vedānta (Vedaanta) indicates this; it means ‘the end (anta) of the Vedas’, and is a reference to the Upanishads.1 A modern Upanishad is a collection of statements so definite that the Vedanta tradition begins again, as it were. Not a commentary on something existing, but a text that has emerged from current, ‘ever fresh’ Consciousness.

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Q.512 Direct Path vs Traditional – Pt. 5

Part 5 – Teaching method

Q: Regarding the quote by Jean Klein: In “The Book of Listening”, Jean talks about how he thinks “books are dead” and do not carry the ‘perfume’ of the words, which is what is really transformative. And that what is important is the live meetings with a true teacher, who speaks words that ‘come from silence and lead back to silence’. In many books by Jean Klein he says to not emphasize the words, that which is behind the words. To put it crudely, Jean Klein’s main method, I would say, is that of transmission. So the books of Jean Klein should be read with that in mind. So I do not think everything he says should be taken literally. There is a lot more to his teachings, but the above is a very rough summary. Whether or not this technique (transmission) is effective is another matter.

Regarding the other quotes, they are just providing descriptions of what experience is like, but I never took it that realizing that this is true alone will make you enlightened. For example, Rupert, often says that it is not enough to know what we are not, it is necessary to see what we are [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nOxfCkbWTZA around 01:30 and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gmDTwg8fAlE around 02:05] In other words, he’s saying that it is not enough to know what experience is, you must also ‘go’ to yourself and investigate the nature of that which is aware.

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