Parabola's Spring 1989 issue: Disciples & Discipline Master and pupil and their relationship, obedience, disobedience, authority, and freedom: these are some of the big concepts we have been trying to understand. If at first glance it is not so clear how the idea of freedom connects with discipline and obedience, we refer you to Diogenes who put the matter in a nutshell with the statement that his teacher had freed him: how? "By teaching me what is mine and what is not mine."    In the moment that I know what is mine, I also know where to look for my direction and my director: what authority I must obey and what other I must refuse. There are many candidates for "master" vying for my allegiance, both within and without, and no guarantee whatever of finding a true one, one whose aim is not to enslave his pupil but to foster in him the development of his own master within. There is nothing but the sensitivity and precision of the inner compass to rely on in order to distinguish between the true guides and the false, to determine whether to submit to the harsh training of a Marpa to obtain enlightenment, or to follow the beckoning of a Jim Jones that may lead to death by a quaff of cyanide. But here at least is a sign of the true teacher: if he is a Marpa, there will come a moment when he forces his pupil not to obey but to disobey, because a limit has been reached and the disciple must step out on his own feet, on his own unsupported authority. --from the editorial Focus Cover: Russian folk art, from the cover of the French edition of The Way of a Pilgrim (Paris: Editions de Seuil, 1957) In this issue:

• "The Call for the Master" by Karlfried Graf von Dvºrckheim - The Way as idea, actuality, and inner truth
• "Learning from Nature's Discipline" - An interview with Wilderness Program field director Dennis Thompson
• "Traveling Songs, Waiting Songs" by Janet Heyneman - A western woman's journey into Noh's cave of the heart
• "Hero, Healer, and Martyr: Greek Paradigms of the Teacher" by Dona S. Gower - The tradition of discipleship in ancient Greece
• "Diogenes the Hound" by Roger Lipsey - Shock techniques of a Hellenistic "Zen master"
• "The Weasel" by Louis Charbonneau-Lassay, translated by D. M. Dooling - A most unusual symbol for the disciple from Le Bestiaire du Christ
• "The Yoke of Obedience" by Philip Zaleski - Eternal search for the right relationship to the Rule
• "Confronting the Next Impossible: Musical Studies with Nadia Boulanger"by Laurence Rosenthal - A composer-pianist recalls his years in Paris with the world-renowned teacher
• ARCS: "Ordeals along the Way"
• "The Stairway" by P. D. Ouspensky - Finding the first threshold before the real path can be glimpsed

Epicycles - Traditional stories from around the world

• "The Roar of Awakening" / Hindu
• "Monkey and Master Subodhi" / Chinese
• "Three Masters and Their Disciples" / Zen
• "Monkey's New Master" / Chinese