Jesus’ LOST YEARS Finally Revealed! His MYSTICAL TIES to the BUDDHA! with Robert Thurman

Robert Thurman 0:00
The richest place in Jesus's time and in Buddha's time in Eurasia. Is India always. So in the Persian empires were always made traveled through the Middle East very possible from India to the Mediterranean, and that Jesus would go and would encounter some kind of spiritual science, I think is very doable. And there is a tradition that he went to Ladakh there was a tomb of Esau there and so on.

Alex Ferrari 0:36
Like to welcome to the show, Robert Thurman, how're you doing Robert?

Robert Thurman 0:39
I'm doing fine. Alex, nice to talk to you.

Alex Ferrari 0:42
A pleasure. Pleasure is all mine, my friend, I am a fan of your work. I am fascinated with Tibetan Buddhism, and also your work on compassion, and, and trying to bring the world together and awaken the world with your work and everything you've been doing throughout your life and career. And we're going to talk a little bit about your book wisdom is bliss, your new book, that's out as well. But my very first question to you, Bob, is What initially attracted you to Tibetan Buddhism? Because I'm assuming you weren't born in Tibet. So no, it's not something you were born into.

Robert Thurman 1:20
I was born on 89th Street. Although that could be Tibet, you never know. It's like New York City is detached from the hinterland, you know. By now, I wasn't born in this lifetime in Tibet. I was born out of other lifetimes in Tibet, Mongolia, I noticed yours, and not his lifetime. But what it was I was actually attracted to Indian Buddhism, like original Buddhism. But when I got to India in 1962, for the first time, I realized that the people who really knew in Buddhism were the Tibetans, because the Indians with the, you know, the transformation of India under first Islam, and then under British Christianity, you know, present Islam and then British Christianity. They lost the Buddhist monasteries. And there, there were still yogic Buddhism, sort of a little bit as a territory, but big institutions that had been there for 1700 years from last time, were gone, you know, because the relationally, the Muslims didn't see any need for a bunch of useless monks. Big, and they had huge universities, you know, like 10 20,000 people. And all over India, actually, it was a huge institution in India, and it and they also identified as sort of not believing in a creator, which would be correct, although they were wrong, and Buddhists are wrong when they present themselves as not believing in the existence of deities, because God because we definitely do believe in the existence of gods. But they just don't believe there was one that you can blame the whole shootin match for, you know. That was, that wasn't good or rejected that one and it actually God Himself, the one in Buddha's time, whose name was Brahma, you know, ma BRH, a Brahma, he said to Buddha, look, please tell people, I didn't create it, and I'm not omnipotent. I'm just really great. I'm powerful. I love people I want them to do well. I want them to be grateful and worship me when they're doing great. When horrible things happen to them. I don't want them blaming me. I, you know, we're all in it together. And so please tell them that we have our mutual karma. And it's not just me, you know, because, you know, they knew Brahma knew that sort of problem with omnipotent monotheism is that you know, if things go wrong for you in a really bad way, who's to blame? Power to do it and he did it to you. So it's like Elie weaselly, you know, he, he hated God for 50 years. He was. Luckily he forgave him before he passed away. He did, actually. And he wrote an op ed in the New York Times about forgiving him, not that he welcomes is horrible. He forgave God, he figured God is going to work it out in some other way. For all the souls you know, there was something I think, I guess I don't remember exactly his wording, but he did forget, which was really good. And I it made me and that I've been working on that for a long time. And I forgive God to you know, really, when I was little, I was annoyed with God. Yeah, because I went to a Presbyterian Church. His son, I was told, you know, it's like, really not local, well, above the wall. And then I know there's theology and religion scholar and all that All right, I see the beauty of Christianity nowadays very much Buddhism helped me see it. But initially, I had it on for God like, No, I don't like that guy.

Alex Ferrari 5:09
Well, yeah, I mean, being a recovering Catholic myself, I, I was always I was always upset at the way they portray Jesus. You know, anytime I saw Buddha, he's either happy or peace. Those are the two images, I get jenever get an angry Buddha or a Buddha that is in pain of some sort. So that that wasn't because from my understanding, Buddhism is not a fear based religion.

Robert Thurman 5:38
Fears Buddha's, okay, but they're not and people translate them as wrathful. But I don't like them because I don't consider that I just call them fierce. You know, it's like a mom screaming at a car stop, you know, her and her babies in front of it or some take your I mean, like ferocious with screaming, you know? So there's a fear there are fierce Buddhas in the esoteric thing, you know.

Alex Ferrari 6:03
What are? What are the? So what are the fears that Buddha and Buddhism what are some of the fears? Like?

Robert Thurman 6:10
In other words, well, the reason that you have the fierce Buddha's is in the esoteric is they're kind of considered to help you deal with Eros and Thanotos, especially Thanotos. In the subconscious, you know, Freud found Eros, and you know, and Thanotos like the one in the movies, you know, the movie, you know? Yes, of course, we all have that, you know, murderousness dark, dark side, in our consciousness in our unconscious. And we also have the logical side, you know, the Eros side. And we also have a confused side, which he didn't really notice as much, but he was very much into Eros and Thanatos. So his theories make people scared of them their own unconscious, actually, I'm worried that you know, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde sort of routine, you know,

Alex Ferrari 7:03
So those fears are internal fears.

Robert Thurman 7:05
And he's aware of that, but it doesn't think it's not overcome bubble by a person. And it thinks, thinks that the purpose of of psychotherapy at a deep level of spiritual psychotherapy that goes all the way is to conquer those negative things in the unconscious, so that they don't drag you in a bad way when you're reborn. Because, you know, some of the concern was that common sense, it doesn't consider that Mr. Cole or boo, I think it's just, it's like the New York Thruway still out there going up next to the river, you know, I believe that, but that's not a big mystical thing. To me. It's like common sense. Like, your life is like that for Buddhists.

Alex Ferrari 7:44
So Bob, let me ask you, when did you educate people? What are the origins of Buddhism in general? And then the origins of Tibetan Buddhism? So when When did Buddha actually, because again, I'm a recovering Catholic, so I didn't study Buddha so much. So when I understood it's maybe like three or 400 years before Christ. Is that Is that an accurate time period?

Robert Thurman 8:06
Five 600.

Alex Ferrari 8:08
Yeah, 5 or 600 years or prior.

Robert Thurman 8:10
562 BCE, okay. Sometimes people push it and say it must be later, or it's controversial. Even the Tibet se Buddha was born in the ninth century BCE, before that before, right. But, but mainly, it put him in the sixth century, the five hundreds before Christ. And he, but he, his loving type teaching is the second wave of Buddhism called the Mahayana, the universal vehicle that all beings will be saved type of vehicle, right? Not just each individual by themselves, but everybody that really emerges around the time of Christ, actually. So there's a lot of link between the Christian vision, the good, the wonderful Christian vision, about how, you know, the bad stuff goes away eventually, you know, and it's all good. God is good ultimately. And by the way, what I what was said before about the that version of Jesus that was not worshipped by Christians for 325. Correct. Worship to crucified Christ, they knew he got crucified. And therefore, he rose up from that, and he just showed that form he suffered with beings to to redeem their suffering. But he did, but they didn't worship that when they worship, there isn't one. And the one they usually had when they had images, according to art historians, is what they call Christos pitta, gogos. Which means which doesn't mean Christ the podcaster it means Christ, the teacher pedagogue in Greek, you know?

Alex Ferrari 9:47
Right! It wasn't at that time, if it's around 300 years after his death, isn't that time of Constantine and the council, the Council of Nicaea so that it's all part of the rebranding of Christianity that they did.

Robert Thurman 10:00
It was the Roman conquering thing.

Alex Ferrari 10:02
Yes, it was a Roman Catholic Church. Yeah, that's why it's called Roman

Robert Thurman 10:06
Any any form of the thing. You know, the, you know, in fact, all the world religions mostly get little twisted I think including Islam by the fact that after the founder, you know, peace and love, and we're all everything's cool and God is good and ultimate reality is good. Some ruler like a Calif, or the Emperor of Rome or some other Emperor comes along and says, no, no, I don't want you guys to be that much at ease. I want people scared, because I want to control them. So then they select things and they edit and they hire religious scholars who are going to find the kind of threatening things by the founders, you know, like, you know, hell if you don't believe this, or that any other and all the scary stuff, and they've posted out because they want to frighten their population to keep them under control. You know, I'm afraid.

Alex Ferrari 11:00
So when Buddha walked when when Buddha was walking the earth, can you talk a little bit about Buddha and his journey, I mean, I've read Siddhartha, I read Siddhartha. So I understand why

Robert Thurman 11:10
He was a wild guy, he had me know his dad had was predicted by a holy man by psychic to his dad, that if Buddha was to have, if Buddha was to stay in the path, if he was to leave the palace and become a seeker, you know, like a pilgrim or something, he would, he would be famous, but he wouldn't conquer anything, and he wouldn't do the job, you know, that his dad wanted him to do would be the king, you know. And so he had to, if he saw any suffering in the world, he would freak out because he was very intelligent and sensitive. So the dad kept them in a really paradise kind of really super for season for level, like really, even my better than fourth season, and Paradise Island sort of situation, supposedly, and, and then he discovered death, old age, sickness, and so on. And he had in his 20s, and then he did believe he went over the war, actually. And he found a higher kind of enlightenment about the nature of life. And he found the goodness of the universe. Basically, he went through serious suffering, but he found the goodness of the universe. And then he rebelled, and he would have been a king, but he rebelled against all of that. And he founded a monastic, he invented monasticism, actually, in other words, he created a social space where people could drop out of their duties in the caste system. And even women, which was very hard to do at that time, because it was very patriarchal, Indian society, you know, the women were the service, the slaves, like they still are in many countries. And then he has big teaching, which I liked. And this is what attracted me was that we human beings have godlike intelligence, we can understand ourselves and the world, we are capable of it. And that is actually a purpose of our life is to really understand the world. And when we do, we love it. We do and we love everybody, when we really understand what life is we just, and we're not afraid of death anymore, we realize that there's just a doorway, from one body to another. And once we're at the human level, not the crocodile level, but the human level, we have, if we understand that we can just go better and better and not just for ourselves, but we can also help others in the most effective, incredibly effective way. And so a very thing, you know, he was wrongly thought of by people when they discovered it. But Buddha teaches suffering. So everybody's supposed to suffer the previous Pope, you know, right singer, and also, John Paul, on the right singers advice. And then Pope Benedict, they were into, like, Oh, we're so sorry for the Buddhists because they just have so miserable. You know, because he taught me taught, because what Buddha taught is like what Socrates taught members, Socrates said, The unexamined life is not worth living. So Buddha never said anything as pessimistic as that he said, he an enlightened life will be frustrating, because you won't know where you are. And you will, you will do the wrong thing here and there and get yourself stuck in the mud. And so on that problem, the the, the examined, life will become enlightened, and then you will be really happy. And that was the discovery. In other words, indeed, people don't follow. Because they thought, Oh, that's great. Let's all suffer together in a way. He just said, you're gonna be frustrated, you're gonna be stressed out. If you think you're the center of the universe, and you have this terrible problem that nobody else agrees with you. Except Mom, where's your time? And then on the honeymoon for a while, maybe if you're lucky. Otherwise, everybody else thinks they had a senator. You know, everybody who's done enlightened, but if you're going to stand what you're not that you don't to exist, that's not the issue, you just understand that the way you are is same as others. And therefore your whole deal is to be interconnected and all of them. And the ultimate thing is everyone loves everyone. And then they don't have to molest them to show it, they just love it. And then everybody has a really great time. And that's where I think we're headed today, you know, with with, especially, since there are so podcasters out there helping. Really, yeah, you know, my dear friend, Lisa Miller, did you ever?

Alex Ferrari 15:37
Never, I never interviewed her, but I am aware of Lisa,

Robert Thurman 15:40
She is and she is so amazing. And she's covered improved. She was a psychiatrist said, spirituality is critical. The psychiatrists, guys spirituality, because they thought the church makes everybody feel bad, you know, that synagogue, the church, whatever institution, but the essence of spirituality does something to the brain, believing in the goodness of the universe, you know, feeling trust to the universe, that something in the brain that bad immunizes, the sector of the of the cortex, where serious depression creates like, a mess.

Alex Ferrari 16:13
Well, that's actually I think, I think it was, Lisa, that what I had on the show a while ago that was saying that any they did studies forgot if it was in Princeton, or what college she was at, but they were saying that if you believe in a higher power, rather, that'd be religious, or spiritual, whatever that deity is, to us

Robert Thurman 16:32
And more spiritual than religious actually

Alex Ferrari 16:34
Correct, exactly. But if you think of a higher, there is some higher power, you're like, you're less likely to have suicide, you're less likely to have depression, you're less likely to have so many things, which is it's really fascinating. Bob going back to Budda's journey

Robert Thurman 16:50
So, that's what he taught, and everybody loves it. And a lot of people dropped out. And then a lot of people got more cooldown. And the and the women who joined really flipped, and there were so there are some wonderful poems I loved. I especially love the world. And I forgot her name, many days where I forget, net. But she had said, Oh, wow, I just had lunch under the tree. I didn't have to cook it, somebody gave it to me, it was great. I only had one bowl, I don't have to wash all the dishes. I just wipe this one ball and put it back in my little sack. And I'm here on a tree. And thank you Buddha, you liberated me from three crooked things. The pestle, I used to have to pound the rice with the house get my old bent over mother in law who used to abuse me and making the hard time in the household and my hunchback husband Nirvana, it's close enough.

Alex Ferrari 17:45
Just close to Nirvana as we're getting.

Robert Thurman 17:47
That's right. Yes. You know, maybe she was in Nevada, who knows. But all she knew she was you know, I actually really thinks we ought to Laurie, this is nearby, but don't do more sort of sophisticated and complex one is that this is life is totally great. In other words, so tight is nirvana. But if we know it, if we don't know it, we're going to struggle anyway. So that's my thought. So then he taught that and it had a huge impact in India. And, you know, it's sort of half of Hinduism. So therefore, they think Buddha's the 90 emanation of God, you know, they didn't have just the one Jesus many emanations of of their idea of God, the visual version of it, at least. And so he's nine David Tarr Vishnu after Krishna. And there are only 10. You know, there's another one coming later, the Hindus think that and that's that island, because he is very much, you know, created a huge explosion in India. And then then the Tibetans ran into it when they reached a high level of empire, about 1000 years later, where are the rulers decided this was boring going on conquering people doing looting and pillaging, and, besides being boring is very unstable, because my generals want to somehow break away they don't want me to be the Emperor. So it had a political reasoning to and they look around the world and the China, India, Central Asia, the third flourishing kingdoms are empires and everywhere, we're using Buddhism to sort of enlist people in having a stake in the country, you know, they have all medicine and all kinds of sciences and psychology and related to that, so they decided to switch to that like top down and they did around starting around 600 and the end of that century 600 of the P AC or we see a CE as we say religious is Common Era. And then that we can there hold as a top down Imperials hanging because it militarism lesson and then there was a big freak out about 200 years after that we're out They've kind of lost their imperial control. But by that time, the Buddha's way of life was pretty much infiltrated all around Tibet. So then after about a 50 year hiatus, it came back very strong. And it took them about 600 years. And then they completely abandoned militarism, basically. And they could get away with that in those days because of being up on the roof of the world. You know, it's like a real, not much oxygen to have the oxygen up there. 47% of the normal sea level oxygen up there, and very big pasture clover and so forth mountains around them, you know, so they got away with that till the 20th century. And, and actually, they became quite strong, teaching Mongolian Emperor's and Chinese emperors over the ages Nepali ones, to be more cool with each other, you know, and have less warfare, but they even got the Mongols to quit in the ground. 100 after their huge empire, they got the Mongols to calm down.

Alex Ferrari 20:58
So let me ask you, that's a fascinating , it's fascinating . It's fascinating that politics always comes into play when there's religion or philosophy. It's fascinating. Going back to Buddha and his journey, can you explain a little bit about from when he left the palace and discovered, he discovered death and, and aging and these in these kinds of sufferings, and other things that he felt he discovered, he went on a journey to enlightenment. And that's something that a lot of people talk about is enlightenment. And there's a, there's a version of that in Christianity, there's a version of that and many, many different kinds of religions have this concept of enlightenment, and especially the yogi, In the yogic traditions as well. Yeah, he wasn't a straight line. And he didn't just sit under a banyan tree one day and just go, Oh, I get it. Now. There was a few ups and downs, he took wrong paths. And from my understanding, a little bit of that,

Robert Thurman 21:58
Well, the well the wrong path that he took, was over punish himself. He like he starved himself, he, he didn't need to drink water, you know, like, one tiny fingertip touch of water and one grain of rice a day for like six years. Like I'm really, really proud about this amazing picture of him looking all emaciated. A sculpture is in the Lahore Museum, actually from the Gundotra environment, which was in Afghanistan, in part and part what is now on Pakistan. And when I met that in 1962, of my first trip to India, and just floored me, you know, it's like, really like, it's like a seminary, Christ in seminary, very similar, but you know, six years long instead of 40 days. And, and then he, in a way that was part of his trip, in a way, but he also then he, he rejected it, and in the sense that he said, that didn't necessarily help. In other words, when he grew up, he was spoiled. He had a huge harem that his dad procured for him, you know, as well, before he married him was happily married. And, but you know, he was a king. So had it still had a harem, and he was, would have had grown if he'd become king. So he had a big sent us thing. So then he had a big self torturing thing for another six years, you know, and then he rejected both of those, he said, just indulging yourself or torturing yourself. Neither one is the way the key is to understand yourself. And also, he didn't teach what people wrongly a lot of them teach Buddhism as just what you do is you do a meditation where you shut off your thinking, you're just like, nah. Man, his cry of triumph was not the, I don't know anything. It was rather Wow. I know everything. And it's really great. You know, and I realized, the whole you know, I realized everyone is like me, I'm like them. And actually, there's a seed of this total blissful life force in all of them. And I am, it's all it's all with me, because I know it's there. And they can easily learn it, especially in humans. And so I'm here with the humans, you know, I don't really bother I do teach the gods to actually, there's a lot of different ranges of Gods a Buddhist you know, like the imagined the Imaginarium. Or some scholars would say, but actually, the Buddhist cosmos is filled with angels, deities, also demons, like bad guys, but but the angels and deities are stronger, or you know, so the thing is like, it's not like equal. It's not like, the bad guys are just people who've gone more astray, you could say, but into megalomania and to self centeredness, because his insight was that it has to do with exaggerated wiring where it's all wrapped around yourself, and you would think you're the greatest and then you keep banging into people who do not agree. And the universe doesn't agree it comes at you with sickness and death and pain and and You're trying to maintain sell on the greatest, and then you can become kind of a psycho, or you can get angry with it all and think so then you want to get rid of anybody who doesn't agree with you, and or you want to dominate them in some way, you know, and get them out, get them on your side, you know, like this. So, and all of that is fruitless ultimately, meanwhile, if you really love all of them, they're automatically on your side, and they love your back. ventually, you know, so that was the thing. And then here's the great thing. Then he did. This inside, he often put in terms of selflessness, he talked about selflessness. You know, anathema. It's such famous teaching. So in other words, it's like when you analyze yourself, you don't find anything inside there, that's an absolute, what you find is a transparent openness. In other words, you you become like, Neo in the Matrix, you know, you, you, you become like Neo, in other words, you are the whole matrix. So you can you can manipulate things, actually, like he did remember, those bullets are popped out of his chest. And then he merged with the bad guy and him laughing. Because he was he was the code underneath it, as well as individual cells, you know, which is why I love that movie, because it kind of illustrates that possibility, which is a kind of a, it's inexpressible. So it's a contradiction, but it's embodying a contradiction. So. So whatever you say, someone could say the opposite. So it's not a dogma. But the point is, that's what he understood. But but so by him what he meant by selflessness, he didn't mean that you just don't exist. What he meant is you have like a soul, which the Buddha is this esoteric, they call it in the exoteric. They're called mental continuum comes from the beginning lesson goes into infinity. And it perpetuity also doesn't leave time. It embraces all time and all space. And so do you, that's why the book being a full board is fine, but you don't be enlightened way short about and still very happy. And that's, that's the biggest one. And, but there is a personal continuum and all of that, and that he called the indestructible drop. It's like a, like a little drop of like a drop bindoon Sounds good, particularly in Tibetan, which is really cool, particularly literally tingly. And it's considered when we were alive, it's sort of tied up in the heart chakra in the center of a six fold, double triangle, not in the heart chakra. And, and when we pass away, it leaves the central channel right now opens and it leaves. But when you're enlightened, it's open. But you stay with any embodiment you want, you know, type of thing. I mean, it's, it's preposterous, the sort of super wish fulfillment that it presents as the goal. It's a materialist, it seems preposterous totally, you know, it's way beyond woowoo. It's so cool.

Alex Ferrari 27:57
So the one thing I love about what you're saying is because a lot of especially people in the Christian religions, all all sects of them, believe that they that the Savior came fully formed, that the Savior were and then many other religions as well, that the Savior comes fully formed. And he is here to, to guide us to the light and for him to be worship, right, from my understanding, and from my research and in studies. Not one avatar, who has ever stepped foot on this earth came fully formed. They all became they were all were born human. And every Yogi had to go through ups and downs and learn the path for themselves until they get to this form of enlightenment, which whatever word you want to use is enlightened, awakening enlightenment, to a point where you are Neo. I love him. It's one of my favorite movies of all time as well for that reason, because it's so deep in so many philosophical ideas are in it, so many truths are in it. And it opens up so many rabbit holes, no pun intended to go down when you watch a film like that, but it is Neo is I mean, not only is he Jesus, but he's also Buddha. He's also Yogananda he is also Baba Ji he's also all of the all of the avatars that you can think of wrapped into one but they all finally understood the truth that they could stay they are the code and if you are the code, you can manipulate the code and have fun with the code just as Neo did just as Jesus did when he and Yogi's do when they are able to do magic, if you will, or yogic powers, all the all this is all this is part of understanding that you are the coder you are part of you are God. You are part of God.

Robert Thurman 29:52
You're absolutely right. And the thing is that you know, but in a way you could say on the other hand, what What actually the result is or the reality of it is, is beyond our ability to formulate. This is really, in the sense that we can say, Jesus was fully formed. Or we can say that the miracle is that is the absolute paradox, that although he was God, like supposedly omnipotent, or at least omniscient, yet he made himself on a mission to suffer with us, and then return on this yet. So he came to be like us to give us the hope that even those of us like us can be like him. In other words, that's that's the driving essence of Christianity, and also Buddhism, in the sense that, but But it's, it's beginning less. There's no it doesn't come from nothing, any place. There's no nothing. That's one of my favorite news flashes is 30 years, I finally discovered that there's no such thing as nothing. Our mind create something out of a word, because we want to think that our language is controlling everything we're giving names to so then we automatically think we have a word in our string. So there must be a big blank space someplace that you volunteer that has nothing, well, nothing means it isn't there. That's the whole point of nothing. So you can't go there. And that's very important for the materialists to wake up to that, you know, but my point there is that we agree and you know, the Dalai Lama. And you're absolutely right. And the Dalai Lama is really great in terms of Buddhism historically. And I happen to have been there luckily, translating for him at Harvard Divinity School, in their early 70s, or their late 70s. And, and he was making this big fuss with all the theologians about how he wanted them to know that he didn't believe in God the way they did. And I kept Charles whispered to him in Tibet, like your holiness, don't have to freak them out right away. Come on, slow it down. No, he says, Then he got belligerent as we do, because we were a little bit fellow students from the 60s. I've known him for 60 years, I met him in the wind dragon year, the last one, which was 60 years ago. 1964. So then he gets belligerent, and he says in English, or he and he starts in English, and then he makes me translate. Further, we tell him, he says, No, I want you all to know, he says that this there is this difference? He says, because if I didn't tell you now, then you might be kept to like me, he said, and then was it like you are never friendly. And then later, you will discover, oh, he doesn't believe in God. And you might faint. Right away, or to be forewarned, you know, like, you know, labor like a laborer on the on the on the pill. But actually, what he also said, which I love is he said, and we Buddhists have been arrogant in the past years, because we were only in Buddhist countries, like we were all Buddhists. And so we thought you have to be Buddhist to awaken, but from Thomas Merton, and then he mentioned some Spanish mistakes that he made over the years, already by the automaton. And he said, I believe that every spiritual tradition that has lasted on this planet, can bring you to what we Buddhists think of as enlightenment. So I just thought that I tolerate the differences that I respected. Because if you take it to the max, what Jesus taught what Muhammad taught, he didn't mention that Muhammad, but later he did. What they all taught that Lao Tzu torture on China, that will get you to the same place. And this is really critical, because we have to stop converting each other. I don't want to convert anybody. I want everybody to stay with grandma's religion. So grandma will be happy as I was, you said, I never want anybody who is born Buddhists to be Buddhists. But I want us to learn from each other. On the other hand, how to how to use the mind, psychology, science, you know, and he's he even materialist, he thinks that's a world that's like a world spirituality is secular humanism. We don't react to it as the domineering aspect of religious institutions, and having a spirituality that take because they didn't want to go to hell, they know they did. So they say, yeah, there was no mark, but they exaggerated they become too dogmatic about care, materialism, but she doesn't say to them, because he wants to be nice with him, he leaves me to be the bad guy. Get over the dogma of this old matter, you know, because they're in the group that says it's all mine. But that's not the main group, the main group says, matter and mind are a binary pair, you know, and they are the opposite of each other. And each one only has meaning because it's the opposite of the other one. And it isn't an absolute meaning out of some reference to what I'm saying. It's very sophisticated with language, in other words, in the in the high Indian for Indian and Tibetan philosophy. So anyway, so the thing about Tibetan Buddhism is, it's not that scary and what it is is, it was nearest to India. And when Buddhists got persecuted in India, or in the 10th 11th 12th century, by outsiders coming in with other religions, then then used to go over the past, you know, some of the weekend, some of the cities as they call them, they adapt, you know, the mistakes that the yogi's, and they just went over the past, and then they're up there and will take us to the, they get, you get a little stone with only 47% Oxygen, if you don't get acute mountain disease, you will get a little salt. And so they, they, they and they felt so much that India had been the holy land that they preserved the Indian stuff really well. And ironically, because of the Chinese invasion of Tibet, they have brought it back to India, not to convert the Indians to Buddhism. He's against that he but to help simulate the Indian psychology and spiritual science, which he thinks is the most important thing for the planet. And so he's, it's a wonderful thing he is making as his legacy. Now at 90. He's building a big university, in the equivalent of Netcom. For Buddhists, which is a place called Bodhgaya, where the tree is, you know, where the Buddha said, that's like their holy place, the holiest place, there are other ones. But that's always fun. But instead of building a big temple on the Temple, he's building a university, you know, for learning that because he thinks that's what humans have to do now, which I think is kind of cool. Roddenberry? I love the guy. I do. Although we argue we, we do.

Alex Ferrari 36:30
Well, let me ask you this question. And this is a question that I'd love to hear your point of view on. There is, I always one of my favorite topics to talk about is the time when we leave Jesus in the Bible, and where we pick him up. And there's a from Third Age 12 or 13. And he shows up at 30. And apparently, he they never, that's one biggest problem I had with the Catholic Church. I always used to even as a kid, what happened? What was teenage Jesus? Like, you know, was he drinking? Was he going out? Did he cause trouble? Was he? What was he doing? And they never let go? Don't ask these kind of questions. From my studies, I've discovered that Jesus did leave and went to India went to Egypt. And then also, and they also say he went to Tibet, I'd love to hear your point of view of what historical as an academic did, is there anything that you come across in regards to that?

Robert Thurman 37:24
Oh, yeah. Well, you know, in a way I don't, to me, it's not that important, because I think of Jesus as human and divine. He is like that. And so, you know, if I don't want it sort of, like we were trying to reduce, reduce Jesus's great achievement and awesome teaching, to something he learned from Buddhists, because I mean, I think that that's but but on the other hand, I think put it this way, the richest place in Jesus's time. And in Buddha's time in Eurasia, is India, always, you know, we always think India is a poor country, but reason is poor is the bridge to extracted wealth for 300 years. So they built a railways to take it out of there. They, to them, it was a jewel in the crown of the British Empire, because it's the richest part of Eurasia, the river valleys coming out of the Himalayas are the most fertile, fantastic day. And so it always had a huge population, many cities, city states, you know, it's 35 times larger than the Nile floodplain, the different floodplains in India, so it's supporting so many more people. So also the Kings, therefore, were less oppressive of dropout, you know, yogi's wanting to just really find out what it's all about not wanting to serve in the military, or even raise a family or whatever. So they were just more people doing that. So in the Persian empires were always made traveled through the Middle East, very possible from India to the Mediterranean, and that Jesus would go and would encounter some kind of spiritual science, I think is very doable. And there is a tradition that he went to Ladakh, that western part of Tibet, which is now politically, India, but we're part of it has been grabbed by China and Pakistan, but it's politically in the app traditionally. And there's a tomb of Isa there and so on. And actually, I have a funny story, right enjoy of a friend of mine who's like a fashion photographer. Very worldly. Personally, he's spiritual, but you know, it's a worldly together person. And his he and his wife told me the story, which I was so amazed because he's not like, what you think of as a yogi. And when he was they were on a honeymoon in Kashmir, but it was peaceful there. He was fishing with I don't know why he would do that on the moon, but he was from a big boulder and a stream there. And then he fell off and smashed his knee really badly landed on his kneecap or something. I mean, it was really bad. It was in total agony and it's all up like like or watermelon, and they had to cut his jeans and everything and then they and then the tour guys said all sub we have someone who we can heal you has the hands of Krishna, you know, he'll heal you right away, don't bother with hospital do all that but he says no thanks Take me to hospital, the trainer garden. So I went to the hospital and there was an Indian doctor there. And she's a lady. And she's she looked at it. And then she came out with a giant syringe. She said, Okay, I will insert this in the knee and pull out all the fluid, that I'll put it in a cast. And then you will be that calves for three months. And then after you take the cast off, you probably have to have a knee replacement. And it's a real, it's really a mess. You know, there's nothing we can do about it. So I think you should go with the porters and go to the guy with the hands of Chris Nice. Well, he and his wife decided, well, however, both the doctor and the board's attorney, so he went, and he came to this village and then they said to him, first they didn't want to talk to him because it was a Westerner and then they let him in. And then they said, Well, we can do something but you know, it's really going to hurt and you're going to freak out and the wife has to leave the village. She has to go with a border somewhere where she won't hear screaming and whatever you don't mean, but we'll do it but when you No, no, no. She said I'm staying he said I'm staying home I can take so then then they they however said about themselves. They had the hands of Allah. They didn't say Krishna they said our it's so good to know the Hindu Muslims are getting along at that time. Sorry, it was peaceful. And so then they choose their chick Taylor, I'm the witness of this. Poor strong guys kicking talk to hold his four limbs. They are Muslim, but they had alcohol. They had them drink a bunch of whiskey first vocal was. So he was quite liberated, but still in agony. And then it was so he passed out and and listened down. They manipulate his leg and they did all this and whatever. The next morning, he wakes up, his leg looks normal. He gets up, he walks out my leg. He has a cane, but it is look ginger, but it's like a miracle actually, of course. So then they they asked him what what is this Pat hands of Allah hands or Krishna? Like what is this? And they said, Oh, we are we are from the family of Isa. And he came with Mary and this and that. And they told us a story. You know, like the apocryphal gospel type story, Mary Magdalene sort of tradition. And we inherited this. And we've had healers in this village unbroken since he saw and he was there with his family. But he went back to the west before he passed away, didn't pass away here. They rejected the place. Supposedly this tool is there. And they said, Well, we're not really into that. He was here for a long period of time. But we're only after 100 110 years. He did go back to the west. They say he they so they told him the whole story in other words that people some people know and he told me this story that this happened and he told them they did a miracle honestly, total miracle. So that's you know, raising the dead fixing the leg. You know if that's the case, you know, I mean, I don't know but I love this story. I really do.

Alex Ferrari 43:20
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But let me ask you from your point of view, because again, I'm this is one of my favorite topics to talk about is you know, it's the filmmaker in me. This is a very fantastic store. It's the filmmaker. What do you think is happening when these miracles are occurring? Because it sounds again, like a yogic or a or a Yeshua thing, where is it that the practitioners have been taught the code and they're able to tap into that to create these kinds of miracles?

Robert Thurman 44:28
Yes, yes. Well, here's the thing, like there's a sutra and exoteric sutra that is a term called the flower ornament sutra in translation from via Chinese into English from Sanskrit by my friend Thomas Cleary. And I have a part 137 recording something I read the whole thing when he passed away like two years ago, because I admire it so much. But Lynette suture, they have a bodhisattva who's like an angel or like a savior figure called Samantabhadra, which means Minister goody, goody, totally Oh, All around goody goody. And he has a special meditation that whenever he's doing anything, he visualizes where he can see that every atom likes to say he's praying like this. And every atom on his fingertip and his hands and his whole body, and the chair is sitting in the room, he's in the building and the planet. And every atom, there's another identical universe, like multiple multiverse, you know. And in that universe, he's also they're doing the same thing. And in that universe, which is in every atom here, in every atom of that Micro Universe, there's another universe, micro micro universe, and then in every atom of that micro Micro Universe is another one. And we're everywhere in that. So it's like, I call it the micro in infinite. So in other words, you your mind becomes your imagination becomes like a super electron microscope, and you go down through your imagination, if you have meditative one point and toys, and you'll go down where you never got to nothing, because there's no such thing ever get there. And it's just filled with positive energy, because you're doing the same good thing that you're doing. It's resonating like that. So that relates to the Book of the Dead stuff, which is the wrong title, but it's called Book of natural liberation by being in the between. and, and in that when we pass away, and when we get to that indestructible drop in the soul, which is the soul, what we do is our mind, this identifies from the course body, where we're proceeding with the five senses. And it starts to get into we become our own inner neuroscientific probe in our own central nervous system, which is brain and the whole body. And we have these different chakras, you know, they put wheels on flowers and different nexuses, from the general clerk to the, to the crown of the brain, you know, and you get where you can maneuver in there, and then it opens up. And then you have this super micro awareness like just like the matrix, right, Neil, sort of would see those little green things going down just code and the code, right. And so you go down to the sub sub subatomic, you get to the Higgs boson field, which by the way, is not a little particle, they pretend it's a particle just to get more grants to smash more atoms. But it's actually a feat, because they never took a hold of a particle, they just, they study an explosion and make an inference, but actually never grabbed it, it gets the Higgs boson field. And so we want to get down to where your awareness is simultaneously like it's in a course body. But it's also at the micro level where every atom in you is aware. So the atom because it feels great, and it loves the atom next to it wants to like, connect to it, and merge with it. And they all want to merge with each other. And so, because of that, a being who has that openness, can get to their micro awareness. And then they can go into the atoms of the guy's knee, and the cells and build up in the molecules and cells, and they can do stem cell with their own consciousness. And they can reform that, that knee and the cartilage and that button and get the bone and etc. Although, you know, they'll be tenuous at first dollar 10. And the person has to take it easy. And, and that's it. That's the root of the miracle. In other words, so people wrongly think, you know, like when people get stoned psychedelics introduces people to an awareness where they feel they are a field, kind of, you know, and they look at a flower and they go berserk, and they see the whole universe and the flower, you know, like, William Blake University of grain of sand, rotating, you know, they, they can get there. So then they kind of tend stupidly to think, or not stupidly, but just naturally, because it's using, they think the main thing is to stay stoned. But that is not the thing. The thing is, that's, that's the far range of what our sensitivity is capable out, where we can make be in love from the fingertips, you know, but on the other hand, the goal is to cover the whole range simultaneously. That's what that's what really awakening is. And so that's why it's such people can be amazing healers, you know, and for example, normal person who develops their own spiritual capabilities. They have natural clairvoyance or they call divine higher divine here, they know what someone's saying, 100,000 miles away, they, they can see what's happening in San Francisco, Texas, whatever. They can read everybody's mind they can do telekinesis, normally, and in fact, it's a warning for people on the spiritual path, that when these things start happening, and you'll become totally empathetic and feel what someone else is thinking completely or like in their body, almost you feel. You don't get distracted by that. And so just playing without writing first, you want to get to where you really Be open to the whole matrix before you foster that. But then once you do, if you're going to be a spiritual guru, you have to be aware of what people really need. You have to be fully empathetic. And that's because you feel the resonance. You're like a living CAT scan. And then of course, it's preposterous, when a fully awakened person, but what they call a Samyak, some Buddha, a totally, you know, integrated Buddha is, is you are empathetic with every every living thing you know, you are the one with the lifeforce, they call it the clear light of the void, or kind of infinite goodness power. It's like, I like to say, you know, they've discovered no dark matter and dark energy field might be a thing to Lincoln, because, of course, they want to capture the dark now that Arthur Bowers, meanwhile, it's dark as they can see it. And they're telling us they're about to control all of reality with their mathematics and their magic, what nonsense, just because they can make a bomb. That's it, that has nothing compared to the power of the universe. So, but what I'm saying is, what it actually is, is clear matter and clear energy. And that's all of it. And that's all of us. It's like instead of a nothingness feel materialistic they're living in. That's why they have no future lives, you know? No. So instead of a nothingness, it's a field of infinite energy that we can tap in infinitely if we know about it, but then itself doesn't do anything because he is from this perspective, it's all already done. And in a way that the mistake in the theistic religion, I think that's the Dalai Lama, he had that insight. I'm only lately could have more getting into it. And I still probably still I don't really get it, but I can talk myself into a little bit temporarily trying to explain something which is inexplicable. And I think why he said, you can get fully enlightened the way Buddhists would define it through Christ, or through Muhammad or through Lautrec. Whatever it is, if you go all the way with it, you encounter this infinite energy. And then infinite means it's like Meister Eckhart. He said, the heart of God is a desert. It's not a person with a beard who speaks Hebrew or Arabic, or Latin or Greek or something. It's, it's a, it's a vast openness, its vastness. It's like, you just melt into it, you never get to see it in a way. I like to say, enlightenment awakening, the full one is the ultimate anticlimax. Because you realize, we've all been there forever, always, without ever leaving. Play we play with, with not being with being like our separate itself, connecting everyone else through love. And because that's nice, because we don't want to win because we see it, Buddha would be breaking his vow as a bodhisattva to save everybody, save your vowel, which is what Jesus had. I'm gonna save all beings by giving myself like this. It's why Maharajji you know, Romdas's guru. It's why he used to weep when he would mention Jesus, although he's a Hindu, you know, how am I but he was to cry to do all these huge guys, all these Hindus. Or is it assembly? He would read Proverbs Rabbi Jesus, you know, so So that's the bodhisattva vow. So he would abandon that, if he just went to sort of Paradise and the matrix himself, rather than seeing that actually, they're all already there, too. And they just confused about so they're, they're, they're stressing themselves out. So I will stay with them. I'll be back. You know, Jesus, as Jesus said, It was an Arnold who said, I'll be back. He's it said, I'll be back. You know, and you but he said, I'll be back in your generation. He said he didn't say he'll be back in 20th century Texas. Baptists.

He didn't say that. And he's been with people all the time. But Buddhists would say Jesus, that's totally present still for those who believe in Him. And I think it's great that they do it, Zola's size really does. And I finally when I finally appreciate it, as long as I was a little because you know, I was a child. I was I never quite believed it. So I don't consider that I left Christianity I considered I was gonna be a secular humanist if anything, although I was taken to church here. They're not my parents are not super religious, parents materials, you know, the Protestants are

Alex Ferrari 54:39
Just enough, just enough to get that into heaven. Just enough.

Robert Thurman 54:44
Make a claim on Jesus when they die, you know. And meanwhile, what Jesus wants everybody to try to be like Jesus, and be nice towards me. He was trying to be nice to everybody raised Him from the dead. He healed them. He was friendly to them and He wants to show that the Romans, that they couldn't kill him. So they shouldn't be afraid of the Romans exactly what he really showed, because they weren't unable to kill him. That's it and love is more powerful. In other words, then, then then then murder, you know?

Alex Ferrari 55:15
No, absolutely not. I wanted to ask you, I wanted to ask you because you obviously know His Holiness and the concept of the Dalai Lama, because there's been many Dalai Lama's over, over the centuries. Can you explain to people how a Dalai Lama is chosen? And when they're chosen? I know they're chosen as children? What kind of training? Does that child get to become the leader of you know, of a religion or a philosophy around the world? Right?

Robert Thurman 55:48
Well, he's supposed to be the incarnation of Avalokitesvara. But the process is, which makes it a little hard to explain, to make it easy to explain so in a way, but you can say, he's the real he's the he's, he's the Jimmy's, the Buddha's Jesus, you know, corny, Chinese, or Avalokitesvara. And Sanskrit, Chandra is second Tibetan. So here's the idea that Buddha loves everybody, and always says for them. But the bodies had this idea. They call it near Mauna Kea, the body of emanation. And so the idea is, it's not just healing and being enclosed in one course of body one ordinary body with five senses, like a humanoid body. It's you apparently, if you become a Buddha, you can have infinite number of bodies. So you can manifest as many bodies as beings need on every planet. Also, Buddhists are totally Mahayana, Buddhists are totally noticing there are beings coming from other planets. And they didn't have ships, they didn't need ships, they came with mine travel, just like Neil could do, you know, like, knowing the code, which the code is, and there are countless humanoid planets, countless divine heavens, countless angelic places. They're also unfortunately held here and there, but temporary, and they're pretty much self inflicted by people who get really nasty, and they become dictators or something and start killing people badly, you know, and they really get really frightened of everybody, because they were killing everybody. So they become really closed up, you know, and then they torture them. But but but they're not. Nobody puts anybody there and nobody stays there forever. That's what but yeah, they do have an idea of can be very, very negative state of being you can make for yourself by being happy. But anyway, so that's what yours is. But on the other hand, there are other ones too, there are other Lamas who are supposed to also emanation of Avalokiteshvara. And then there's these female Jesus's called Tara's, Tara means Savior s female one, the Ta Ta ra. And there's many of them. And so it's like, it's in one way, it's not so special. But in one way, in the Tibetan culture in particular, they got really special about it, because it seemed like he just kept coming, and they kept inviting as the culture. And then they saw their past emperors who did the top down importation of Buddhism, first phase that they saw them as emanations of Avalokitesvara. And they, and so they saw themselves being kind of saved by Jesus. But then of course, there Jesus tells them just like our Jesus does to, you know, the Western world, is that if you're really nasty, I can't help you. You know, Jesus said, Get the only evil do or if you come to me and say you did great deeds of power in my in your name, oh, Lord. He says that right after the immaculate right after the Beatitudes, he says, I'm not gonna you know, I know you're not, you know, you didn't do what I told you didn't follow my beatitudes and give them your shirt, you know, you even try to take away their social security. So, so Jesus, the good, God always tells people, God helps those who help themselves or her. And Jesus says, God, I helped her to help others. And that's, that's the same as that. So. So that's what a Dalai Lama is. And he but he's not the only one. There's some other ones. But he sort of becomes the main one within the Tibetan culture, because it's kind of the ratification that there Jesus keeps coming and keep staying with them. It's sort of and then the culture became, like, where everybody a lot of these reincarnations were happening. And it got to be in socially where you couldn't run for sheriff unless you prove you're already been doing good for people for five lifetimes. And the way it was, the way you were recognized was, there would be signs at the time of your birth like extraordinary portents, sort of type of thing. omens. And then and your parents would often have dreams and amazing things, but sometimes spring would spout whipped cream or something, you know, stuff like that. And then and then you would have a real bright thing about you right away, and you'd be a little like Mozart or something like a kind of bit of a prodigy, but and then they will come at some point. And they would give you a bunch of tests like where you'd have your hairbrush. They come to me show you a hairbrush. And then there'd be five other better nicer hairdressers, and you're all right. And hairbrush, you'd have to pick the one that you used to use, you know, or some ritual symbol, you know, the bell, the bell that used to have and then some much more beautiful golden one, and then they've been and then you had to pick the right button. So they would do tests like that. And they would go to psychics, you know, and then they had articles. And then they had a special article lake where you would go and you would see something in the light, like the house of the person where they were born or some dryer, or they some day it would speak to, I mean, a lot, it seems. So then you would cross reference all of that, you know, so in other words, it's like if in our culture, right, in our culture, we have the materialists, we're like, they're gonna figure it all out with their microscopes and telescopes or the whole thing. And, and where they've come is where 98% of the universe or 95%, they haven't seen it yet. They're just getting started over here. Anyway, and then the other side, the psychic, so that's all we don't believe all that. And that's ridiculous. I know that culture, they have all of that, you know, they very hardcore rigorous reasoning and investigation of the mind and so forth, without needing machines much. And then they do have prayer machines, and then they have complete psychic and they have article possession.

Alex Ferrari 1:01:33
So, yeah, so what so then in Buddhism, there is they believe in psychic mediums, and they believe so they believe in psychic mediums, Oracle's channelers, those kinds of things are, see that's fast. And I didn't know that I had no idea that, in fact, that's heresy. That's heresy for

Robert Thurman 1:01:53
My wife is a big fan of yours. I also like it, but I don't have time to watch. And she's a huge fan. And she was like, oh, Pa, I mean, not to call me Barbara Tenzin or whatever you do. I'm really glad and Alex, I don't see you. I don't know. Alex like psychics and channelers. And, you know, I don't know. And I'm telling her. Listen, I have had visions I've channeled, you know, Dalai Lama tried to recruit me as his local ones. But he was teasing me, you know, because I got out of it. He actually was grabbed me by the shoulders. But I was complaining why he wasn't replacing in our particular article that I used to know who passed away. And it was a gap of a few years before the new one came up with a state article. And that's such a foreign institution today. Imagine the chaplain of the house of Congress, if that was a possession medium, I think would be medium for spirit of Crazy Horse or something. And he would have when they will convene the house of State of the Union sort of thing, both houses, he would stock up and down the aisles with a bow and arrow, but Simba he wouldn't shoot anybody but he would finger anybody betraying the Constitution, you know, the medium, you know, like an angel. Even the deity that he's channeling, they have this context that that's called PR, but that data is too powerful. No human can channel him. So do you channel his minister at Angel, who's calling towards your dark den. And then he goes, a little guy, you know, little slight guy, not you know, pencil neck type a little guy move monk who does prayers, he puts on an 80 pound helmet, and all this stuff and washes his head around like this, when he's possessed. There's face balls, as it turns like this, he spits out you throw things and he's given me a lot of spit, you know. And so I like to go to go I'm a tease me and I've had a few visions like that. So I felt I was capable. I like be really great to bring up to so I am told some Buddhists, the Dalai Lama agrees with me that we can use the word soul. In Buddhism, there's no soul, it's not a dogma, it just means that your soul is also alive thing. And it's super several. And it's like a micro micro you. It doesn't necessarily have your limbs and things like that. And it can move into all kinds of different environments. And but you have a continuum like that. And so it's changing the world when he said, there's no self he meant that you're not a rigidly fixed, absolute barcode that is somehow involved in relations but you're not a relative during the actual fix thing, you know, that frozen thing, that that's what, that's what the notes, no self, no. So even no nose, no ear, no, I know when they are negating things. The Buddha is going to negating to liberate us from our language habit of seeking. If we have a word, it's got to be something and that fits exactly on the thing and the word comes from the thing which is what makes the modern people I think that nothing is something where they place they're gonna go and have longer anesthetized sleep, which is BS, they're going to be alive the minute they die. In fact, we'll have, you know, there'll be like, like, like near where he could have many parties and even the bad guy had many products, remember?

Alex Ferrari 1:05:20
Yeah, of course, he can multiply himself a mil a billion times. So it's essentially he was trying to take over the world by exactly. Cloning himself to infinity. Exactly was to fight that.

Robert Thurman 1:05:33
What I love about our chose case, and Citrix is that remember, he finally he gave that punch to Neil. And then all of the Neil duplicates became him. And he was like, the Cheshire Cat outsold me. And then suddenly, they all changed into Neil, and then he changed into Neil.

Alex Ferrari 1:05:54
Yeah, exactly. No, it's. So

Robert Thurman 1:05:57
That's more powerful than the bad. And that's what we need in our culture. You know, it's not the Catholics, but it's the Romans. You know, it's convincing you with all of us, that the bad guy, that mean emperor, the dictator is more powerful than poor. It's a subliminal message. Of course, we say, oh, yeah, God is greater. But we were fear our fear is and then they even become scared of God. If we don't say the right mantra. Some plays forever. I mean, come on.

Alex Ferrari 1:06:35
I mean, when I read the Old Testament, I'm like, wow, this guy is really insecure. He's angry. He's insecure, he's an egomaniac you must bow to me and like, this doesn't seem like the God I want to follow. It didn't make any sense. Bob, let me ask you this.

Robert Thurman 1:06:51
I believe I got to like Yahweh. I might just just just to tease his holiness. I want to convert maybe to Judaism I really like it. I think I by God should ever call a Christian should realize give God at least a little credit for being smart. If he wanted him to be so anti semitic. Why would he put his only son to be too much

Alex Ferrari 1:07:15
Well, there's that. People forget that people forget that he was a Jew. But they always did.

Robert Thurman 1:07:23
Because what's Constantine tear dad. He wants to scapegoat the Jews instead of hangers ability for Pilate being for the Roman working. It's like, oh, you know, Constantine and Mel Gibson want to blame that, rather than taking responsibility for wrong.

Alex Ferrari 1:07:42
Now, let me ask you this, because this is a concept that I've come across by interviewing and having conversations with hundreds of a lot of near death experiencers, psychics, mediums, channels, this concept, and even spiritual gurus, yogi's I've spoken to all go through this concept that I'm about to tell you, and I'd love to hear your thought about it from a Tibetan Buddhist point of view. There are no past lives, there are no future lives, all lives are happening at the same time. And all lives ripple towards if you do something to this one, it ripples, quote, unquote, forward quote, unquote, back. And it's there's like a, an oversoul, if you will, which is the main soul, and he just little drops, every lifetime is a little drop. And we're experienced them all at the same time. And I was explained this by a channel, which I thought was amazing conversation. I go, Well, that's hard for my car, my little head to my little, the hardware we have is very limited our brain to to grasp these concepts. But I said that he said to me, Well, imagine you're watching the show on television, you're watching friends. Okay, you're watching Friends. While you're watching that episode of Friends, there's 1000 other shows playing at the exact same time as you're watching your episode of Friends. So it doesn't negate the other shows that they do exists. You're just not privy to them at this moment, because you've chosen to focus on this show at the time. So I'd love to hear your thoughts on this idea.

Robert Thurman 1:09:10
I think that's a beautiful thing. And actually what you're expressing is the Buddha perspective, is the enlightened one of the names of Buddha as three had been Yeah. Which means who knows the three times past present future, which means that, that when you become a Buddha, you are everywhere in your past, and you're everywhere in your own and everyone else's future actually limitlessly knowledge not just even on this planet. And this is taught in sort of exoteric Buddhism. I mean, the name is known that the Buddha knows everything in past present future. But in the story of the Buddha, you know, even the most simple grade school level sorry, no, like child children's version is when guests before Buddha changed perfect nirvana or sort of simultaneous or perfect Nirvana, he remembers infinite past lives of himself. So in other words, he realizes he was every kind of being imaginable already infinite that time, because beginning less, you know, you can say, and then he sees everybody else also was, but they don't know it. And he didn't know it. And then he sees that he was in every conceivable relationship with everybody in the past, both good and bad, but then why not worry about the bad one, so and then he sees all the different future possibilities of everybody. So then he sticks with them to help them get to where they also know that. So that's the same thing. But in a way, what you could say is, that is exactly what you said. And that's a broad perspective. But the way you reach that perspective, from his point of view, is to analytic investigation, like a scientist, but combined with a meditative focus. So you can really drill through everything and drill down like Bill Gates says, you know, and what happens is, whereas the present, for example, obviously, there is no present, because the duration of the exact present cannot be, everything is just a little past a little future. It's like the idea of a line geometrically. If you draw a line, it's a narrow triangle, I mean, a narrow rectangle, right? The exact line xy line is has no width. So you're never on the line. Actually, the exact point x, y, z has no size the.is, a small sphere or a small, small globe, right? If it's three dimension, so when you analyze and get down to where there is no point, the point is the exact point is where there's no point. It's just past running into future. Thank you follow. So then that means there's no past. So the past is also totally there. And there's also no future. Because future it's all it's all a seat right here. I told echo Tala who I love was a wonderful guy, and a great teacher, I think. And I told him, I said, a million Americans, when you keep teaching about now, that's good. But you really have to tell them that that now contains all their future and all their past. So it's not that it's not nothing now, in other words, they might interpret otherwise with their new holistic thing from materialism, that disconnect themselves from everything. But instead of disconnecting in the real now, they're really powerful. Now, it's where you connect it to everything from that now, you're in the hours everywhere, like just like what Alex Ferrari is gonna tell me. And that's great. That is that. And that's really true. Because this embarr, and therefore, whatever, even karma, which is the most dear thing to Buddha, because it means it's actually a biological theory of ethics. It's an ethical Darwinian ism karma. It's not just woowoo. It's a real biological theory, scientific theory, which includes all the wounds and wounds involved in being born and reborn and how you're born and reborn. But that's very difficult, but even that, and also, all descriptions of relative processes are not absolute dogmas. And since the absolute is the relative, infinite relative, therefore, any theory is only relationally valid in a specific context. And there's no final dogmas. And we have to go beyond all dogmas to really experience and really be here everywhere. So I used to teach rom Das. Here now there's no here. There's no now I knew him when he was Richard Alpert. He was having real problem because some Buddhists were telling him he was a Hindu. He was saying, I'm a Hindu. He didn't say I'm a Hindu, but he actually was a Hindu. From dialogue with point of view, he don't ever leave grandma's thing. Anyway. He said, I'm a Hindu, and I have a soul and I want to go be with the one. And my Buddhist friends tell me you can't have a soul. What can I do? Someone told Mark Epstein told me you could help me, Bob. So I said to him, Well, I can't really help you around or says you're more likely to be you're saying and I'm just whatever. But you know who can help you? I know one yogi who could help you. He says, who's that? I said Yogi Berra, Berra. I said, Yes. Well, whatever Yogi say. I said, Yogi said, When you come to a fork in the road, take it.

He loved it. He went on going on with a yogi.

Alex Ferrari 1:14:44
Listen, Yogi Bear was a modern day yogi. There's no question in my mind that the wisdom that that man threw out is remarkable. Bob, I'm going to ask you a few questions. Ask all my guests you kind of wrap it up. What is your definition of living a fulfilled life?

Robert Thurman 1:15:03
Living a life is living happily. And hopefully, with trust in the good in the power of the good. at whatever stage you're able to understand it. True, but with faith in the power of the good however you define it, therefore not giving into fear of the bad, overwhelming the good. But to me, its definition of meaningful actually really started when I can't. So simply Piers Morgan asked him on an interview you can find on YouTube, very short, but not the whole interview just that he says, Oh, I've always wanted to ask you what's the meaning of life? To those? Tell them a look. I don't know versus me life is happiness is truthfulness. And here's where Elrod Come on. And then he says, Yes, he said, reason to future is a mystery. How's it going to be? So in the present, you have hope, it will be something better. And that hope in the present makes you happy. And then you carry on? Is your way get despair? Then it's all terrible. So that's the meaning of life. So I really I thought, it gets associated happiness with hope. And with not being despair, that with the trust that the better you can make it better in the future or someone will you will someone else Jesus will put up? Well, you will. This is important. You have to chip in as basically, it's cliche.

Alex Ferrari 1:16:38
That's beautiful. That's beautiful. Now, if you had a chance to go back in time and speak to a little Bob, what advice would you give him?

Robert Thurman 1:16:45
I would tell him, don't give in to losing your temper. And don't ever go nuts with a temper tantrum. And you be honest, you know, when you really blow up, it's half theatrical, you know that. And be honest with yourself, you use it to, to, like, save yourself, right? And somebody should, but it's always harmful to you and to the other long run, might temporarily scare somebody away. But it's a bad you know, I, I got that from my little bit of abuse I had as a child, someone more powerful than me, who used to beat me up. And then I used to escalate emotionally, to sort of scare them off the habit. So if I had if I would have listened to myself, I would have said, Don't ever do that. Just you know, run away or do what you can, but that that just absolutely useless. losing your temper. I had a really hard temper. I got in the face and made people unhappy and myself unhappy and probably spoiled my circulatory system to some set cortisol.

Alex Ferrari 1:18:08
Well, I also had a little bit of a temper when I was a younger man too. And to be and to be fair, my daughters know how to get it out of me really quickly. I don't know if your kids get out of you. But my kids get out of me like that. They know what button to push when to push it.

Robert Thurman 1:18:27
It's amazing. Always a little bit power set with my with my later kids. By that time I was so tested, although they might say Well, I'm still pretty frightening and stuff, because I could still be loud, but I actually never really lost them.

Alex Ferrari 1:18:41
And don't lose it of course, but I didn't know how to get me angry.

Robert Thurman 1:18:46
Yes. They still do. They still

Alex Ferrari 1:18:50
Oh yeah, absolutely. Now what is your definition of God or Source?

Robert Thurman 1:18:55
God? Well, my definition of God is there. I really like what the god Brahma told Buddha. And I really like the Jewish name of God, which they purposely made unpronounceable why y h w h, which my mistake, sick friend tells me the H means you're inhaling and exhaling, the y and the W or inhale I forget which is which I think maybe ws exhale the y's inhale, which are semi vowels, right? That's E and O. You know the letter E I and you you know, so why, and then the two H's are your breath. So that means that's what I love about that too is that means that it's an awareness that God is not separate from you. The Protestant thing is crazy thinking of God is absolutely other because God is absolute. Well, he makes the relative world without relating to it. I mean, that's, that's crazy. You know, that's, that's, that's mentally crippling if you're forced to believe some blind faith, faith, reasonable faith is the goodness of life and the universe. And so my definition of God is infinite energy of goodness, as what it's all what it all is. So I commit to pantheistic heresy for a score to progress in particular Protestants would call, and I think most Asian religions do, and most western mystical religions too, which is why mystical aspects of all religions, I think, do feel that they're because they have the mystic fields, one with God, you know, the Sufi, the Hasidic. And, and so that means that God is not separate. In fact, God is the enabler of all life. And tight is the life force. You know, I would say, so that's my definition is that unpronounceable thing, which is inconceivable. And yet it's us it's love

Alex Ferrari 1:20:58
Beautiful. Now, what is love?

Robert Thurman 1:21:02
And love is, I think, what happens to intelligence, when it surrenders to that clear light, bliss. So love is bliss overflowing, because infinite, infinite energy is bliss, that is bliss. And yet, if you when you realize that in a body that is not capable of absorbing infinite place, because it would feel like it becomes like the sky or something, because you're not yet a being that can make many parties that are all simultaneously like the sky, then that bliss then naturally overflows. And it because you just want others to feel that and it resonates. And then the key is, is it sensitive, though to others, because it knows that another who's scared of the other because they still are stuck on thinking I'm something separate from everything. When they feel flooded with an energy, they're going to resist it, they're going to pit they are so connection to the Infinite Energy of all gods and all God and although against the the flood of love and place, and therefore they're going to experience this as if it's an intrusion. And they're going to like some track into practically a hellish resistance. So this is why the idea of omnipotence of that an active omnipotence that imposes itself on even a delicate, fragile thing is very negative, you know, it's kind of, it's like it's not good, so, so that flood of love, accepts the resistance, and then becomes like a movie producer, a creative artists, it becomes an art, you know, compassion, it really is really hard. Because the only way that a snail is going to come out of its shell and expose it soft parts that can then feel pleasure and bliss of connecting into the softness of infinite, quiet universe is, if something amuses it and it said just overwhelmingly attractive and seductive, and it's so beautiful, and I wonder, and I want to embrace it. And that's the only thing so then they become artists. You're like the, the name of the of the sutra that is considered a sort of semi auto biography of the Siddhartha, the prince who became the chakra is called Lolita Vistara. And Lolita is from Lila which means to play. And it can also mean a theatrical play Lolita. So it's like the greatest show on earth. You know, VISTA means expansive or magnificent. So that magnificent play is what it's called, magnificent show. And so that's, that's, it's an art. It's the art of I forgot to wish some what is love? Yeah, that's so love is art, actually, of course, how to make the other. It's simply defined, it's the happiness is the will to the happiness of the Beloved. As it says, no, no, greed is no it doesn't require require at all. You know what I mean? That they'd be happy, so beautiful. It's a wonderful sort of thing.

Alex Ferrari 1:24:30
And finally, what does World Peace look like to you?

Robert Thurman 1:24:34
World that His Holiness says World Peace to inner peace. I think and you know, I there's a guy I love. I don't know if you've ever podcast that him. He's sort of not so visible nowadays. I don't know. I think he's still alive. Lives in Chandler. His name is David Spangler.

Alex Ferrari 1:24:50
I've heard of him but I didn't have him on the show.

Robert Thurman 1:24:52
He when he was younger, he has an amazing story, where he was raised to be one of those TV like evangelist, his uncle was one. I think his father was one. He was like a young Krishnamurti, Christian VanScoy Krishna Murthy. And they're like 1112 or 13 or something. But then around that time around puberty, he was in a lecture by his uncle in a church and Sunday, where the uncle was doing the whole rapture thing. And ever non Christian was getting thrown in hell and all this kind of thing. And he, you know, held up his hand apparently, he told me a story I forget, I don't share my movie. 100% accurate. But basically, he held up his hand. And he said, he protested to the uncle. I like that. I don't believe God is going to be told me into so many people. I don't believe that. That's wrong. Jesus wouldn't do that. I don't agree with that. So then the uncle was in red, charcoal heat, right? So then the uncle says, who's gonna stop unless you're gonna be you know, it's putting his nephew in his place, you know? So then he claims he told me the story. He said, Yes. And then later, he was at Findhorn remember, the 60s to place in Scotland that used to grow the giant cabbages and it was all and he channeled that New Age, birth of a new age book, which was supposedly from John, he was channeling John. And they thought at the time, and I think probably it was John of Patmos, I actually think he was correcting misinterpretations of Revelation. And what he said was, that the revelation has already happened. In other words, the Second Coming is on is on. It's happening. And you already if you choose love, you stand on a filament of light, like in a while movie, you know, the James Cameron movie, Avatar, Avatar element of light. If you choose love now, and you stand on that filament of light, you're happy, and you're loved, and they might kill you, but you're happy, and then you'll be reborn happy, and it's already fine. If you are, stay with terror, you won't see that filament of light and you'll see darkness coming at you from every side, and you'll fight like hell. You know, and you'll fight like hell to save yourself. And you know, you'll be ruthless with other people, you kind of live in hell, you'll make health for yourself and others around you. So that he dedicated his life to that. And I got so in love with David Spangler because we have a prophecy in actually Indian Tantra, Indian Esoteric Buddhism, but also and actually indirectly, in Hinduism to about the 10, David or Vishnu, called the Wheel of Time, time million, Allah chakra, it's called Lux, the initiation Dalai Lama used to give all masks all over the world 34 times, which is unusual, unknown in Tibetan history, it's like once in a lifetime, a great Lama will do that initiation. But he did 34 times because of the world situation. And they predict this kind of New Age type of like a little bit like Armageddon thing, 400 years from now. And I'm very devoted, I love the text and blah, blah, blah. And then they have astrologers who agree with that, and they say, that's what this follows. He said, they have their own metrology system. Very good one. But I could say, I don't agree with that. I'm not agree with that. I'm a child of the 60s, next week, you know, not the planet cannot take this like oil industry. And that was before even though wetlands knew about climate, why it's vital as we do. And, of course, that we did, at that time, very much be aware of the nuclear potential in a nuclear holocaust potential, which is the other one, the hatred, one and the greed, one, you know, those are the two planets, destroying things. The planet can't take it for 400 more years, I used to argue with Obama's neighbor, it down, but one Lama of mine, he agreed with me. He went against the text. And I did and so David, and I really met with that, you know, so So I think that Kalachakra is here that knew that Jesus is here, that Muhammad is here, in a good way, not that nasty, you have to be a Muslim, but a good way like God is love and God is beyond any version of anything. He said to one nation in one language or another language, that force of goodness is more Allah Rockman you know, the Compassionate bargain. And because that tradition has lasted, in spite of all the conquering that went on by the conquerors. And so that's my definition of world peace is be in love with the world and be an artist and be kind to people around you. And that is world peace. And the dictators, you know, are doing a lot of dampers right now. You know, slow crania I'm a completely for them. Actually, lessons didn't have there's a Buddhist ethic about defending yourself, or non violence means if someone's genocidal invading, and you have the power to stop them do so. You know, because otherwise they'll get you to do even more evil of killing all of you say concrete, I don't have the power, you should surrender non violently, and let them because then at least they you will have killed them on their way in. And you know, you'll have to be happy and maybe that will get them to calm down. But it happened Chinese are Seven Years in Tibet still doing genocide. They are now they're having to stop. But they will. They will. They will not even we, that we have Native American people are still here. And we're starting to honor them a little bit. Finally, one of them is Secretary of Interior. And they know they, they will help us restore this, that desert. Isn't that polluted place and isn't that really great? I know one Stanford graduate environmental lady from Oduber, I think, Chippewa and she says, When the deep ecologists say that planet Earth, Mother Earth will not miss the humans messing it up, they are wrong. They might not miss the industrial greedy people. But we Native people, they'll miss us because we take care of her. And we worship her. We love her, you know, they're learning. We're teaching them to do that. So I think world peace means be happy ourselves. And I even have a slogan, I put in my in my earlier book, why that all matters. I put a slogan there. Which is, it is our duty to be so happy channels, so much happiness, that even if they kill us, we'll die happy. That's a surefire turns off a standing ovation. Believe me when you say that in his speech, people are about to go yay. Or they read the Book of the Dead and really again, there's no dead. No. Yes, it's it's a bigger life for us. And if you're cool, loving it, you can't help him get an even better neighborhood. Better mom better dad better body.

Alex Ferrari 1:32:12
Bob where can people find out more about you, your book, the new book and all the other works that you've done over the years.

Robert Thurman 1:32:20
I would say there's my latest Hay House wisdom is bliss. This is so much fun. It really has all kinds of main points, I think where I am so far. But you know, and actually, I am now doing an online reading of it. Commentary. It's quite dense. So I'm pathetic, of someone trying to read it. And, but it's really worthwhile. And this one, I want to recommend it my best seller, more than a million companies in 20 languages, but very slowly, so it didn't cry together in New York town. But since 1980s, and that my church lectured the dead right, put a real title underneath. They will let me put it the book of liberation to understanding in the between state, that's the actual name.

Alex Ferrari 1:33:08
And it's a little wordy. It's a little wordy, but I understand why the publisher didn't let you put it.

Robert Thurman 1:33:14
So famous, but the point is, the key thing about it is there's no dead. Nobody says that. Although this is where Helmut Newton, you're not I mean, Michael Newton, you know him I bet.

Alex Ferrari 1:33:25
I don't know. I Oh, yes. I know. Yes. Yes. Yes, yes, yes, yes. Yes.

Robert Thurman 1:33:29
So well, you know, he's Rich Martini, you must know Intel and I've never had him. We've never had him on never had him on, you're gonna have a fun talk with Richard Martini. Someday I'm gonna, I'm gonna send you an email introduce who you are. They're like, he'll love you. And anyway, that's Michael Newton was a psychiatrist who did a past life regression. And then he got, you got many people saying what happened in between past lives. And then you are a composite of a kind of, you know, Harry Potter's, whatever the name of that, that Hogwarts, allegory in the sky, where you go when you die, and then you meet your soul mates and then you come back and blah, blah, blah. And it's really fun. And when the venting allows that because the more the more awakened you are, the more enlightened you're, you're too big as a field as a being to just fit into one body. So you can have a new life like if one of your relatives they pass away, they may be already on their way in a new great life. And yet, you still can talk to them, because they are more than just weren't fitting in. They're not yet infinite necessarily, but they they can be still helping their successors, you know, their their relatives and friends don't unfortunately mentioned that exactly. Except because they think you have to be a Buddha to do that. But I think that's possible. Like my, my, my wife keeps introducing me to new things that don't fit into any doctrinaire idea, but they're really great. She's my my guru of the day. I have the decades five decades six decades.

Alex Ferrari 1:35:04
As as mine is, as well, my friend is mine. This is, Bob, it's been such a pleasure, my friend. It's been such a pleasure and honor speaking to you, thank you so much for not only for this conversation, but for all the work you've done over the decades to help enlighten and awaken the world. So I appreciate you, my friend.

Robert Thurman 1:35:19
I'm very honored to be with you. And I'm happy to tell my wife. Well, I didn't channel but I was still had fun. And so we had a good time. I did have a chat. I have channeled I have a oracle. But I just wanted that line. I just want to say for in Alex Ferrari context, I had a vision once that there will be no nuclear war. Very powerful. I completely trust it. I do. And I don't want to. We don't have time to go into that in detail.

Alex Ferrari 1:35:54
But I would and I would I would agree with you because that is what has been told to me as well. There are guardrails, there are guardrails put on humanity because we as a as a consciousness, have chosen to go in one direction we could have chosen to go that way. But we decided as as as a species as a consciousness to go towards the light to go towards the Enlightened path. And that's why conversations like this are happening now. Because I imagine when you were around in the 60s, they weren't talking about sexism and channelers. And, and design. It's not publicly. Yes, yeah. So So now there is a lot more interest in this kind of stuff.

Robert Thurman 1:36:32
So it's important work for encouraging people to trust you know, trust life.

Alex Ferrari 1:36:38
I appreciate you my friend. Thank you again.

Robert Thurman 1:36:40
Thank you, Alex. Thank you so much. Good luck to you, and your kids and your family and everyone may they all be really happy world peace. Let's enjoy world peace together.