A Guru is needed in the religious and the yogic path. There is no need for a Guru to acquire Self-knowledge or Brahma Gnana or Atma Gnana.+

The Guru is useless so long as the ultimate truth is unknown, and the Guru is equally useless when the ultimate truth or Brahman has already been known.

A Guru is needed in the religious and the yogic path. There is no need for a Guru to acquire Self-knowledge or Brahma Gnana or Atma Gnana. 

Unless you realize the Self as the Soul, you are all blinded by the dualistic illusion. 

The Guru who pretends to be Self-realized and plays with the emotions and sentiments of the seeker is a fraud, not a Gnani. 

All the Guru Parampara is for the religious people. There is no need for a Guru who wants to tread the path of wisdom. 

Even Swami Vivekananda was Ramakrishna Paramahansa's disciple. Swami Vivekananda himself said: ~ “You have to grow from the inside out. None can teach you, none can make you spiritual. There is no other teacher, but your own Soul.”

There are two kinds of audiences - the ordinary ones who desire the transitory heaven and other pleasures obtained as a result of ritual sacrifices, and the more advanced seekers who seek to know the ultimate truth or Brahman. 

The Guru and Guru paramparas are meant for the first audience, to help lead its followers along the way. However, there is no need to follow any parampara and follow any Guru who wishes to realize the truth which is beyond form, time, and space. 

Do not mix religion with spirituality because religion is based on the ego and spirituality is based on the Soul. 

Religion is concerned with its paramparas, not truth whereas spirituality is concerned only with the truth, which is beyond form, time, and space. Religion is not spirituality. 

Sage Sankara: ~ "Though I wear these robes of a Sanyasin, it is only for the sake of bread." (Select Works of Sage  Sankara" also his commentary on Brihad) 

Thus, the above passage proves that all those who wear the sanyasin robes are wearing them for the sake of bread belong to the religion; they have nothing to do with Self-knowledge or Brahma Gnana or Atma Gnana. 

There is no need to criticize and condemn the Gurus, yogis, and swamis because they are needed for the welfare of the ignorant masses in the dualistic world.

Sage Sankara in Viveka Chudamani (2), states that the Knower of the Atman (i.e., a Gnani) "bears no outward mark of a holy man." (Stanza 539).

It means the Gurus, Swamis, and Yogis who identify themselves as holy people are not Gnanis. 

Those who are seeking the truth need not follow any Guru or any teaching. 

The one who thinks of himself as a Guru and the one who thinks of himself as a chela (disciple) will not be able to acquire Self-Knowledge or Brahma Gnana or Atma Gnana because both of them accept themselves as the body. And all their understanding, practices, and knowledge are based on the false self (ego or you). Therefore, the Guru–Shisya concept is a great obstacle in the pursuit of truth. 

A Gnani never accepts himself as a Guru nor does he accept anyone as his disciple because he is fully immersed in an awareness of the Self, which is a formless, timeless, and spaceless consciousness. There was no division in his consciousness even though he is in the midst of domain of the form, time, and space

Consciousness is like the ocean. 'I' is like waves. When the truth is realized then the waves become one with the ocean. : ~ Santthosh Kumaar