A friend is interested in David Chapman but to hear what he has to say it would help if he has serious "meditation credentials" .Is there somewhere explaining more about his personal practise ? I found https://approachingaro.org/about-the-author "I have been a student of the Aro gTér lineage since 1997". It sems not such a bad idea to know if someone talking about meditation has significant experience, for example how many days/weeks/months on retreat, how many minutes/hours in a daily practise, for how many years/decades. For sure it is not an absolute measure of comptence but it is a stick in the sand. Thanks.

 But... samaya.

Those Tibetans have to protect their intellectual property.  If the secrets of tantra and Dzogchen get out they could be dangerous

It is generally very hard to get the Tibetan-influenced kids to talk about their practice. They generally have vows and the like the prevent this. I know David a bit, but I know very litlte about his practice beyond the fact that, at least when I talked with him about it at a Buddhist Geeks conference some years back, he didn't believe in magick as something that actually caused effects of any significance.

When you say "interested", what do you mean in practice? What does your friend want to do with David? Is he leading a retreat or offering online teaching or something?

Daniel

Considering this seems to be the first step in working towards a modern Buddhist tantra, I find this ironic in David's case.  It's science... except we can't talk about our direct experience.

Mark, I have two friends who claim David Chapman as their long standing teacher. Both are Tibetan Buddhists, both swear by him. Both of these friends have very long standing and deep practices, so I feel safe in assuming David Chapman does, too. Maybe even more so.

Hope this is helpful.

Pretty much, a 'shriner'  e.g   belongs to  an  order such as  the : "Ancient Arabic Order of Nobles of the Mystic".  

Aro : "A Lets dress up and pretend club, complete  with British eccentricites" !  :  Below is the main Aro Lama, does not inspire confidence (imo), you decide for yourself of course. 

http://aro-books-worldwide.org/shared/text/b/biography_ph_01_ncr_01_eng.php

They have a very strong practise and some of the things David Chapman states are quite challenging to hear. This might have sparked some interest but the push back was a lack of information about David Chapman's "credentials". I think if they knew David Chapman had a serious practise that shows he is not "just intellectualizing" (my quote not theirs) then this person might explore his point of view further.

Thanks Chris, that reassures me somewhat but I'm not sure it will stand up to my friend's critique

Stop reading my mind.

I suggest contacting David Chapman via e-mail. That could eliminate the uncertainty about what can and cannot be talked about. The friends I have to whom David Chapman is a teacher don't seem to have any problem discussing their direct experience.

To be fair, Ngakpa Chogyam is more "authority" or legitimate than almost all secular, Western meditation teachers. He's been recognized as a tulku and asked to teach by 2 different Tibetan lamas.  David Chapman has a couple articles which put a pretty good thrashing to all the critics.

That said, I still don't appreciate samaya.

Chapman : He's a very smart man, no doubt about it. But he also claims not to be a teacher? So I guess he's a teacher in secret. He tends very much toward relgious naturalism, in other words all practice may (only) have secular therapeutic and remedial value. It's tricky and as long as you know this no problem. Otherwise it's a bit of sophistry, like offering someone an empty package, as if there is substance in it. 

To get a good feel for what he is about read the whole comment below. 

On the founding lama and why I made the previous comment off the cuff ( no harm intended to either party, everyone does their bit)

From https://vividness.live/about-david-chapman/#comment-7896

To be pedantically precise about what is said: Ngak’chang Rinpoche says it was founded by Aro Lingma, a woman for whom there is no public, objective evidence. He says that what he teaches is based on visions, dreams, and past-life memories of her and other Aro gTér teachers of the early 20th century.I believe that people have visions. This is common. The contents of visions are rarely objectively true; but that is irrelevant to whether they are religiously useful.I believe that he believes what he says about the origin of the Aro gTér—I don’t think he “just made it up,” as a deliberate fabrication.I wrote about karma here. Basically, it’s nonsense.

I've enjoyed some of David Chapman's texts and his interview at the Imperfect Buddha Podcast.

I've seen how people who apparently don't have enough of their own experience to relate to such matters, have instantly called Ngakpa Chogyam and the whole Aro-school "utter bullshit" or "fakes", including their terma-teachings.

Some time ago I met with a senior nyingma lama who was a student of Dudjom Rinpoche. He said that Dudjom Rinpoche had asked Ngakpa Chogyam to teach, that there was his blessing.

Out of curiosity, who was the lama?

@Marty G:  regarding terma & tertons... do you know/like Chogyam Trungpa and the Shambhala lineage?  Cause that whole thing is terma.  Supposedly Trungpa found a scroll in a cave in Tibet that told him about spiritual materialism and his actualization of Shambhala.

If you dismiss terma summarily, you take a lot of Tibetan Buddhism with you.  If you accept terma, there's no reason not to accept Aro, unless you think white men can't jump

Lama Thubten Gonpo Tsering.
I've been Skyping with Trungpa's student who is also a senior Soto zen-teacher, Sokuzan Brown. His presence is pretty impressive, still combines kagyu mahamudra-practices and shikantaza.

Haha

Just did some reading based on your clue. 

https://shambhalatimes.org/2010/07/05/the-terton-and-the-chodak-in-the-shambhala-tradition/

https://www.chronicleproject.com/stories_110.html

I don't mind the vision quest, revelation method. It's true in one form or other in many traditions. You may be correct to some extent I may have some prejudice against whitey's doing the "Full Tibetan Cultural Outfit  Transformation". Trungpa who I never really understood a word of, remains opaque to me, but inherently genuine, he came from Tibet, it was his culture through to the bones. He did seem to strip down Tibetan Tantra to a point where the west could embrace it. He was a Trancendentalist that to me is his right of passage. The secular guys ( such as Chapman and dozens of others) have very little value ( again imo, no harm intended). They seem to like the idea of Tantra because it does not revolt against the 'world' in division, it intuits the Trancendent in and through but not exclusive to external arising. There is a mistake made there. If you remove the Transcendent you have rocks and dust, and that is not Tantra. That's materialism with a little cultural dressing, to seem palatable. Like putting mayonnaise on a turd.

On this matter if the founding Lama was a Trancendentalist then he actually 'believes' ( for want of a better term) the system, he is a man of 'Faith' (again for want of a better term) : Open to Spirit. In this case 'whatever his shortcomings' you may be better off taking teaching from him (again only imo)

(Edit :added another link)

https://vividness.live/2012/09/13/epistemology-and-enlightenment/

This contains a bit about his practice and is otherwise relevant. In another post he mentions he's had a yidam practice for years.

https://vividness.live/2014/02/06/a-killer-app-for-modern-vajrayana/

This might be of interest too.

I wonder too why he doesn't just lay out what his practice is like (including epistemological caveats). He's responsive in the comments to his page. Asking directly there would probably be easiest

'Thubten Gonpo Tsering' is a known fraud and is not a reliable source at all. He made up his interaction with Geshe Wangyal out of whole cloth, Wangyal never recognized him as anyone. It is doubtful at this point that Tsering spent anytime with Dudjom.

No. This is bull crap. Geshe Wangyal delivered the recognition on behalf of Dudjom Rinpoche. This misinformation has been expressed on a couple of forums by a person who was fast to present his one-sided information on the topic. Correct, Wangyal never made tulku-recognitions. This has been confirmed by Bob Thurman but Wangyal did deliver the message on behalf of Dudjom Rinpoche with who lama trained later.

Not going to continue this discussion with anyone with their own name displayed.