Apparently my spam blocker is working overtime. Scott Edelstein was unable to share his comment on a reflection where I cited him, and so asked that I post it on his behalf. I said sure. And then found my own “comment” blocked by the spam filter! I’ll try to loosen up the parameters, but until then, here are Scott’s thoughts…
Thank you, James, for this valuable contribution to the discussion.
Although the information now coming out makes many of us heartsick. I think these disclosures will ultimately prove healthful and helpful. They will help—and perhaps force—American Zen to grow out of its childhood phase and into (and eventually through) adolescence. We students can no longer view our teachers in the way that children often view their parents: as all wise, all knowing, and free of faults.
When my book Sex and the Spiritual Teacher was being edited, my editor relayed to me your suggestion that the book include a chapter on female sexuality. I thought quite seriously about doing so, but ultimately decided not to, for two reasons.
I state the first one at the beginning of the chapter on masculine sexuality: Why spend an entire chapter examining the masculine psyche, while largely skipping over the feminine? Simply because sexual transgression is far more common among male teachers than among female ones—as we saw in Chapter 1, by a ratio of twenty-four to one.
The second reason is that, while male teachers who transgress are overwhelmingly male (the best estimate is 96%), their partners are not so overwhelmingly female. You make this observation yourself with Walter Nowick, whose sexual encounters were with his male students. I simply do not see sexual misconduct by spiritual teachers as inherently a male/female issue.
This is important to note, because much of the current discussion about teachers’ misconduct erroneously assumes that the students who are harmed are invariably women. This further wounds those men who have been hurt by teachers’ transgressions, by ignoring or marginalizing them.
Your readers over 50 may remember that, in the 1970s and 1980s, sexual misconduct by Catholic priests was assumed to involve women. Almost no one believed the notion that any (let alone many) of the people harmed were boys. Not until the publication of psychologist Mic Hunter’s 1991 book Abused Boys did people begin to wake up from that delusion. And for the first few years, Hunter was often vilified, pooh-poohed, and called a liar.
That said, I strongly encourage you and others to add to the larger discussion. If anyone feels that female sexuality and/or psychology play important roles in spiritual teachers’ sexual misconduct, I hope they will write about it.
And if my chapter on male sexuality is arbitrary or pretty far off the mark, then all of us will be served by someone—maybe you—advancing the discourse by explaining how and why. In such a case, I’d be very happy to say, “That’s an argument I hadn’t considered. I think the writer makes good points, so I stand corrected.”
I’d also like to add that your sangha, Boundless Way, has what I consider the best, most useful, and most workable ethics guidelines I have seen regarding sexual relationships between spiritual teachers and their students. These can be viewed at http://www.patheos.com/blogs/monkeymind/2011/02/ethics-code-for-the-boundless-way-zen-sangha.html
Here’s to the healthy development of American Zen.
All best,
Scott
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