Joseph Weber’s Transcendental Meditation in America will be published this month. Editor Catherine
Cocks took a
moment to talk to him about what drew him to write about transcendental
meditation.
Catherine Cocks: What brought TM to Fairfield, Iowa, and what did local
people think when the movement’s members first arrived?
Joseph Weber: The movement bought the campus of a bankrupt
Presbyterian college in Fairfield, Parsons College, in the 1970s when it was
looking for a place to house a fast-growing university it had created in
California. Many Fairfielders were mortified at the prospect of meditators
descending on their little farm town, fearing what some thought of as practices
that were at least un-Christian if not Satanic. They fretted that newcomers
would be a bunch of hippies. In fact, they proved to be quite strait-laced, by
order of the guru. Still, there was a gulf between them and the locals that in
some respects endures years later.
CC: The Beatles were big TM supporters back in the 1960s. Are
there any comparable celebrities who support the movement today?
JW: None are comparable, but there are celebrities who
endorse TM-style meditation and help parts of the movement. Among these are
comedians Jerry Seinfeld and Russell Brand, talk-show maven Oprah, shock-jock
Howard Stern, newsman George Stephanopoulos and newswomen Candy Crowley and
Soledad O’Brien, along with actors including Hugh Jackman. Celebrity endorsers
have long been central to movement marketing and that endures, though some backers
are getting long in the tooth, as are the followers.
CC: Why do you think spiritual practices from India, China,
and other Asian nations have become more popular in the United States over the
past fifty years?
JW: Americans have been materially successful beyond belief
but are spiritually hungry. Traditional religious practice doesn’t cut it for
many. So they look elsewhere, and the beliefs and practices of the East seem
appealing, especially those that calm restless minds or promise to sharpen
those minds. At the same time, Eastern spiritualists have known they could find
a ready market in the United States. Maharishi Mahesh Yogi was one in a line of
such spiritual entrepreneurs who had come to the United States over many
decades to popularize their ancient practices and, in the process, do pretty
well for themselves.
