Mooji

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Teachers Classical Advaita Vedanta Gaudapada Adi Shankara Mandana Misra Suresvara Vācaspati Miśra Padmapadacharya Amalananda Chandrashekarendra Saraswati Jagadguru of Sringeri Sharada Peetham Modern Advaita Vedanta Vijnanabhiksu Swami Sivananda Swami Chinmayananda Swami Dayananda Ramana Maharshi Nisargadatta Maharaj Shaivism/Tantra/Nath Gorakshanath Matsyendranath Advaita teachers Neo-Advaita Ramakrishna Swami Vivekananda H. W. L. Poonja Andrew Cohen Jean Klein Gangaji Rupert Spira Other Osho Eckhart Tolle Robert Adams
Influences Mimamsa Nyaya Samkhya Sramanic movement Yoga Hinduism Vedas Upanishads Vedanta Buddhism Precanonical Buddhism Madhyamika Yogacara Buddha-nature
Monasteries and Orders Classical Advaita Vedanta Dashanami Sampradaya Shri Gaudapadacharya Math Sringeri Sharada Peetham Govardhana Pīṭhaṃ Dvāraka Pīṭhaṃ Jyotirmaṭha Pīṭhaṃ Modern Advaita Vedanta Divine Life Society Chinmaya Mission Arsha Vidya Gurukulam Neo-Vedanta Ramakrishna Mission
Scholarship Academic Paul Deussen Daniel H. H. Ingalls Richard De Smet Paul Deussen Eliot Deutsch Sengaku Mayeda Max Muller Hajime Nakamura Patrick Olivelle Anantanand Rambachan Arvind Sharma Non-academic David Godman
Categories Advaita Advaita Vedanta Vishishtadvaita Vedanta Advaita Shaivism Kashmir Shaivism Inchegeri Sampradaya Nondualism Neo-Advaita teachers

Mooji was born Tony Paul Moo-Young in Port Antonio, Jamaica in 1954.[4] His mother migrated to the UK as one of the windrush generation when he was one year old. He was raised by his father and his mother's cousin (who became his father's lover and had more children).[3] Mooji's brother Peter went on to become one of Jamaica's top table tennis players.[4] Mooji's father died when he was eight, and he was raised by a strict uncle until he moved to London to be with his mother as a teenager.[3]

By age 30, Mooji was working as a street artist supporting his wife and child.[3] In 1985, Mooji's sister, Cherry Groce, was shot and paralysed during a police raid on her home, sparking the 1985 Brixton Riot.[4] In 1987, Mooji had an encounter with a Christian which began his spiritual quest.[5] Mooji continued to work as an art teacher until 1993, when he quit and went traveling in India. [4]

In India he met Papaji and attended his satsangs. He returned to London in 1994 when his son died of pneumonia.[4][3] Mooji visited India to attend Papaji's satsangs over a period of several years. Each time he returned to Brixton, London to sell chai and incense, as well as give away "thoughts for the day" rolled up in straws taken from McDonald's.[3] He became a spiritual teacher in 1999 when a group of spiritual seekers became his students, and began to produce books, CDs, and videos of his teachings.[4] On Tony Moo becoming known as Mooji, Mooji said, "What can I say, except that’s life." Mooji's brother Peter said that people had always followed him wherever he went.[4]

Mooji continues to give satsangs at various locations around the world, regularly attracting over a thousand people from 50 nationalities.[2][4] He also holds meditation retreats, sometimes with up to 850 people, each paying between €600 and €1000 for 7 days, including the cost of satsang.[2] He purchased a 30-hectare property in the parish of São Martinho das Amoreiras, in the Alentejo region of Portugal, and created an ashram called Monte Sahaja.[6] According to Shree Montenegro, the General Manager of Mooji Foundation, there are 20 to 40 people living full-time in the ashram.[2] A fire at the ashram in 2017 required the evacuation of close to 150 people.[7] Activities at the ashram are funded through the UK-based charity Mooji Foundation Ltd., which reported an income of £1.5 million in 2018 (of which nearly £600,000 came from 'donations and legacies'), as well as through income from its trading subsidiaries Mooji Media Ltd in the UK, and Associação Mooji Sangha and Jai Sahaja in Portugal.[8][9][10][11]

Mooji offers satsang where he invites people to bring forward questions and contemplate or inquire into their "real nature" based on the advaita vedanta philosophy of nondualism.[12][13] Mooji aims to bring people into the direct experience of who or what they are, which he says is not the body, thoughts, emotions or anything that is perceivable, but rather the "pure, untouched space in which everything arises."[14] He teaches that we are already this "timeless being" or "pure consciousness" and that it is possible to recognise this and come into a "natural harmony," which can also be termed "awakening" or "freedom."[15]

Mooji encourages his followers to avoid the "psychological mind's" influence and abide in the "Self", which he says is the untouched witness of all phenomenal existence and therefore before any "thing", including thoughts and all that is perceived.[14]

Mooji teaches self-inquiry, directing his students to the "non-dual Self" by encouraging them to question who or what they are at the "deepest level."[14] For example, one exercise is to identify the natural feeling "I am" or "I exist" and to stay with this for some time.[14] Another is to come to the recognition that everything (thoughts, emotions, sensations etc.) can be perceived, and then inquiring, "Can the perceiver itself be perceived?"[16]

Mooji was called a "Global peddler of metaphysical mumbo-jumbo" in a 22 May 2017 article in Indian publication Outlook.[17]

• Breath of the Absolute – Dialogues with Mooji. 2010. ISBN 978-81-88479-61-0.
• Writing on Water: Spontaneous Utterances Insights and Drawings. Mooji Media. 2011. ISBN 978-1-908408-00-6.
• Before I Am: The Direct Recognition of Truth – Dialogues with Mooji. Mooji Media; 2nd edition. 2012. ISBN 978-1-908408-13-6.
• White Fire: Spiritual insights and teachings of advaita zen master Mooji. Mooji Media Publications. 2014. ISBN 978-1-908408-19-8.
• The Mala of God. Mooji Media Publications. 2014. ISBN 978-1-908408-21-1.
• Vaster Than Sky, Greater Than Space. Sounds True. 2016. ISBN 978-1-908408-23-5.
• Vaster Than Sky, Greater Than Space. Coronet. 2018. ISBN 978-1-473-67466-0.
• An Invitation to Freedom. Mooji Media Publications. 2017. ISBN 978-1-908408-22-8.

• Nisargadatta Maharaj
• Neo-Advaita

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• Official website