a question for the traditionalists among us

[Luis Gonzalez-Reimann]

At 11:42 AM 05/17/2000 -0400, Chris Beetle wrote
:
>Are there verses in Puranas and/or related texts advocating gurus who do not
>fall 'within a specific sectarian branch of Hinduism' or which fall into a
>'a specific sectarian branch of Hinduism' other than VaiSNavism, and if so,
>what are they?

I do not have a list of references from the Puranas, but the book mentioned
by J. Houben on this matter is a very good place to start (by the way, the
author is Steinmann, not Steiner).
The "Guru-Gita" is widely available through the (zaiva) Siddha Yoga
Foundation.

An interesting passage is TaittirIya UpaniSad 1.11, which seems to concede
that Vedic students can distinguish between the good and bad behavior of
teachers.


Luis Gonzalez-Reimann
University of California, Berkeley