Only by Destroying Subud Can We Achieve
its Goal
Ryan Smith
The Problem:
Subud
literature claims to provide no teaching, yet there is much teaching. This is
extremely dishonest and leads members to adopt the teachings and customs of
Subud for fear of rocking the boat, not because of any genuine experience in
the latihan. Members quit doing latihan because of this.
The Solution:
Remove
all teaching from Subud. Members should be able to experience these things for
themselves, and if not then these things clearly don't matter.
With
all teaching removed, the only thing that remains for Subud is to facilitate
the transmission of the latihan, and this should done in a way that minimizes
anything that could be misconstrued as teaching.
The Details:
Subud
either has teaching or it does not.
If we
accept that Subud has any teaching at all, then the door is open for
elaboration on that teaching with more teaching. Further teaching follows, and
Subud becomes what it is now: a low-grade religious cult loosely centered
around the latihan.
If we
deny all teaching, then the only thing that remains is the one thing that
cannot be taught but must be experienced: the latihan, aka the exercise.
Steps
to achieve this goal:
1.
Recognizing that Subud itself cannot be changed, members interested in not
following teaching must leave.
2.
Create a new group that omits all teaching such as the talks, separate latihan
for men/women, the latihan schedule and time limit, the symbol, the waiting
period, the jargon, the designation of helpers, the name. Give the new group a
nominal name, since people will have to talk about it somehow.
3.
Create a publicly available constitution that prevents teaching from taking
over. The form could be a web site, a pamphlet, or simply a card given to all
members upon initiation. The constitution need only contain what a current
member says to a new member upon initiation:
‘I am
going to show you an exercise that I find useful in my life. I hope you can
make use of it yourself. Feel free to ignore anyone, including myself, who
tells you the exercise should be like this or should be like that. Ready? Here
we go.’