Early Writings of Krishnamurti - 1927 1928 1929

Foreword to Early Writings

With the death of his brother Nityananda, on the 13th of December 1925, Jiddu Krishnamurti found himself in deep personal crisis, perhaps the most painful episode of his life. While in the throes of this great sorrow, he struggled to understand what he was going through. In fact, the death of Nitya appears to have been a decisive turning point in the spiritual evolution of Krishnamurti. Nitya's death served as a springboard for Krishnamurti, catapulting him towards his final liberation. By 1927, at the age of 31, his spiritual development is complete and the forceful and overwhelming impact of this recent mystical experience is visibly evident in the immediate years thereafter. It comes through in the language, vocabulary and style of this period.

Krishnamurti´s language in this early period was in flux and changed drastically from year to year. He introduced new modes of expressions - the Kingdom of Happiness, Liberation, Truth, Voice of Intuition and Individuality - that were soon dropped and replaced in turn. Indeed, Krishnamurti is purported to have categorized his talks and writings before 1933 as "patchy" and wished that the early writings are ignored. However a closer examination reveals that although his language was evolving, the essence of his teachings remained consistent from this period until his death. With remarkable rapidity and in direct response to misinterpretation and translation on the part of his audience, Krishnamurti began "cleansing" his words and so developed the lean, precise and contemporary language style that he became renowned for.

The early works not only shed light on the origins of the central, underlying concepts of the teachings but also reveal why he felt it necessary later to adopt his trademark, stark, non-compromising stance. However, if examined with the benefit of having read the later works, the emotive nature of these early works need not cover over the fundamental insights that Krishnamurti's teachings embody. On the contrary, if we are wary of the inherent danger of misinterpretation, this material affords a rare glimpse into a mind that has only just discovered the “Kingdom of Happiness”.

In these early stages Krishnamurti spontaneously describes what he is experiencing and attempts to communicate the kind of mind required to achieve this state of "true happiness". He uses words in a natural and "innocent" fashion as he is yet to discover the important role his choice of words will play. The value of these early works lies in this “impassioned” delivery. Most importantly they open up the "hidden how" that Krishnamurti so deliberately ensconced in the teachings later on.

Certain terms in the early works seem to be at first diametrically opposed to the fundamentals of the teachings as we know them today. Specifically, Krishnamurti spoke then of the importance of having "pure desire", absolute certainty, true memory - all the while emphasizing that one’s “efforts” have to be based on understanding rather than on conviction or agreement. All in all, the early writings provide a vital clue in solving one of the basic conundrums of the teachings - namely, how it is that, "out of total inaction, there is an action that is tremendously positive, but not in the sense of the positive and the negative."

INTO THE LIGHT

Madras, India 1927

Wherever I have been, in America, in England, in France, in Switzerland, in Italy or in Holland, there have been great signs of revolt, of revolt in search of something real. You will find the American greatly desiring to find out what is happening. He relinquishes the past, forgets it and has no tradition, and seeks something new that lies beyond; and for me the greatest happiness is in that beyond which is hidden -which is not really hidden at all but lies within each one.

In search of that reality, in search of that lasting truth, we go out into the shadows and lose ourselves. What we have to do is to come out of the shadows into the light. You must give up so many things, you must give up tradition, and you must give up yourselves, in order to find the greater truth.

Because I have been so long in revolt, because I have been longing to find out what existed beyond these transient things, I have found out. I am saying this not that I may exert authority on yourselves, but only to point out that in search of the truth, in search of this lasting happiness, you must shed everything, you must renounce everything, and come with me. There is an idea that in the glorification, in the annihilation of the self, you cannot help the outside world. On the contrary, when you are beyond the need of help, you can give true help. When you are beyond the clouds and have a constant vision, a perpetual view of the truth, then whatever you say will resound in the heart of each one.

So because we are in the country that to a great extent still holds the jewel of spirituality, the world looks to us, and because we Hindus, English and other nationalities that live in India have seen the Dawn arise and bring forth a new light, we must go out and give that light to the world. We can do that when we have individually conquered, individually come out into the open life, naked and pure, and when we imbibe there the happiness that awaits each one.

ESTABLISH YOUR PURPOSE

Bombay, India 1927

Human beings forget the goal to which their life leads; hence there is always confusion. Because of the lack of foresight of the thing they desire, they are confused and they are lost, and it is for this reason that you must establish for yourself whither you are going, what your purpose is in life. And when once you have established this for yourself -not by the authority of another, not by the authority of sacred books, nor by the authority of individuals but by a clear-cut ideal- and have definitely decided to follow it, you will attain liberation. And if you have been able to establish such an ideal, then that ideal will become part of your own life and you will walk towards that goal, all things becoming easy to you.

Now, you will see wherever you look -beyond the seas, in America or in Europe- you will find that there is confusion of purpose. The people of the West are seeking happiness, as everyone else in the world is seeking, but they are seeking it in material things. Because they have lost the purpose, because they have forgotten the goal, they are lost in the things that do not matter. If, for example, you desire to go to a particular house and you know the path that leads to that particular house, and you know where the house exists and its exact address, the path to that house will be quite easy and you will go there, avoiding pitfalls without any difficulty. When you know the goal, you will get there, time being of no account. But if you did not know to what house you were going, and what was your goal, you would get lost in the bye paths, in the narrow streets, and in the wayside houses. But when once you have established for yourself the goal towards which you are tending, all things, which lead you away from that goal will have no attraction for you. It is for this that men struggle through their days, during their years and during their many lives. It is, to me, that Kingdom of Happiness which gives Liberation. We are like the river that at the beginning is small but grows as she flows towards the sea, in search of liberation. On her way she accumulates many experiences, feeds many banks and many trees and quenches the thirst of many people and gathers many waters; and slowly, through many places and through the progress of time, she reaches the sea, where she finds her liberation. But when entering that sea of liberation, she brings her experiences of sorrow, of delight and of joy and gives to the sea a part of them. That is the purpose of a human being. When once you have found that and established that for yourself, then life becomes very easy, life becomes very simple and also comprehensive, and all the religious shackles and complications, all religious superstitions vanish, and you remain as steadfast as the sky, looking and trying to learn from everywhere. To attain Liberation has been my aim for many years together. Because when once you have tasted that Liberation you will really be able to help. Then you are beyond the limits of birth and death. Because you have entered into that Kingdom of Liberation and Happiness, you will become one of the great helpers of the world.

Thus the purpose of human life is to accumulate experience and from that experience to learn wisdom, and from that wisdom to hear the voice of intuition, which will lead us towards the goal which belongs to everyone, irrespective of caste, race or religion, irrespective of forms of worship of any God. So you see, if you have that view, if you have such a purpose in life, then all the restricting ideas of your religious thought, all your narrowness will vanish and you will become like the sun, giving light to all those who seek it. And there lies the beauty of life, which is seen in the bright running waters. We must therefore come out of our stagnation and go into the stream of Liberation.

EERDE GATHERING 1927, QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS

Eerde, Holland, 1927

KRISHNAJI: As the questions are mostly on the same subject, I think I will answer them by saying that one can, at any stage of evolution, wherever one may be, attain Liberation. It is perfectly true, whatever one's stage of evolution, that by determining the goal -let us say for the moment that it is Liberation- one alters one's attitude towards life and brings about the correct environment, surroundings, that will help one to attain that Liberation. As long as one sees that goal in its clearness one does alter one's modes of life, and so attains. Of course it is not the mere perception of a thing that makes you part of it; you must struggle for it, you must work for it, and the alteration of your life comes about through the desire to act in such a manner as to attain the goal.

Every big town has many stations from which you can go out. If you did not know where you wanted to go, and you visited every station in that town, you would naturally be lost, but if you made up your mind to go to a particular station, the very making up your mind to go to that station gives you facilities, opportunities of going there. If you are a rich man, you will take a car, which can go in ten minutes; if you are poor you will allow, say, three-quarters of an hour to go by tram, but you both, rich man and poor man, leave the same station if both desire to go to a particular spot. Time, as such, is of no consequence as long as there is the desire.

Imagine that you are on one side of a river and that on the other side are blue fields. The whole of humanity stands on this side looking at the beauty of the other side; very few have the desire to jump into the river. Of the few who jump, there will be some strong ones who can swim directly to their goal. Others will be carried down by the stream; they will be landed lower down and will have to walk up. It does not matter so long as one gets there. If a man has developed strong muscles and can hold his breath, he can battle with the current and swim straight to the goal; whereas a weak man is carried about by the current and will land lower down. But he can walk up - he is on the other side already. The desire to plunge into the river is the main thing. The time taken to cross may be a quarter of an hour, a life, or two lives. It is of no consequence.

In the desire to alter one's course -whether it be the desire to become a millionaire, or to become a painter, a violinist, a musician- you have to sacrifice. If you desire to become a millionaire, you must concentrate all your forces, all your determination, and all your anxiety, everything, to keep your health perfect. If you are a violinist, you must be careful of your arm, your fingers; you must not row too much, because that would mean developing useless muscles; so you sacrifice those things that have no value for those that you think have value. For me, I maintain that Liberation is the end, so I sacrifice everything else to that one particular thing.

QUESTION: Will one who attains Liberation leap over the various evolutionary stages of growth into some formless Nirvana of bliss, to come forth no more? Or must those stages still be traversed -but with the light and joy of the Nirvana consciousness ever present?

KRISHNAJI: You can leap over all the stages of evolutionary growth if you experience all the stages of those growths, paths and experiences, through your imagination, through your process of climbing. Let me put it this way. There is a building with many stories, and a man may work up through those stories, looking through every window on each floor, horizontally progressing until he comes to a staircase, which leads him up to the next floor. Another man knows and conceives the goal which is enticing him, which is calling him; and as he climbs he looks through one window and that gives him sufficient view, sufficient experience, sufficient knowledge of what is contained on that particular floor, and so he need not go through the horizontal process of acquiring experience, and thus attains more quickly. I do not think it matters whether he comes back or remains in the flame. If I am a spark, as a separate individual I enter into that flame and become part of that flame; whether I return and bring others to the flame depends, I think, upon the personal desire. If I desire to come back and conquer the world of Maya again, I can do so. Once I have the centre well established in me, I can do anything from that centre; from that I can go forth, having established it as my home, as the bee which knows its hive can go miles away, certain that there is a home, that there is a flame.

QUESTION: To attain Liberation is it not essential to form a link with a Teacher who is himself liberated, and to feel such a tremendous longing to be one with him, that it carries one to the goal? It seems that a "general" longing for Liberation could not be intense and one-pointed enough

KRISHNAJI: Liberation may be personified in one individual, or in ten individuals, or, as Theosophists would say, in the Teacher Himself, the World-Teacher; but if you have that desire to attain Him who is the embodiment of Liberation and have an intense and tremendous desire, tremendous longing to become part of Him, then it certainly is easier to have such a Teacher to guide you and to help. But again the difficulty arises that if you bring in certain individuals, you will need interpreters of those individuals. There is a question as to whether Krishnamurti is the World-Teacher or not. There will be people who will say that Krishnamurti is the vehicle; others will say he is one in whom the World-Teacher will from time to time visit and through him give forth His message; some will maintain that Krishnamurti will grow into His consciousness and so become one with Him, and hence that there will be no separation between the two. These are thoughts in which for our mental gymnastics we can indulge. You can say Krishnamurti is that and someone else can say Krishnamurti is not that; you will never convince someone who thinks quite the opposite. So the question does not lie in whether Krishnamurti is the vehicle or whether his consciousness has grown into the consciousness of the World-Teacher. The question remains unanswered, because if you accept the authority of one you cannot accept the authority of the other. And so it will go on forever and ever. But if you examine what he says and try to grow into his teaching, then it makes it perfectly simple. I think we shall have incessant wrangles over the corpse of Krishnamurti if we discuss this or that, wondering who is now speaking. Someone asked me: "Do tell me if it is you speaking or someone else". I said: " I really do not know and it does not matter".

What matters is that you should understand, and not wonder what the phenomenon happening is. You do not see, so you are not certain -not that seeing makes anything certain. If some people told you that it is the visitation, you would have to accept that authority, but if that authority changes its opinion tomorrow you will have to change your opinion also and so you will be lost. And to make certain for your own self it must be established in yourself. The desire for Liberation is all that matters. Leave all else for the complicated minds, for the philosophising mind is to wrangle over. That will come eventually. In two thousand years there will probably be another society to discover whether it was this or that.

QUESTION: Does that imply that a person without a Teacher could not attain Liberation?

KRISHNAJI: He may perhaps take longer. Suppose a man has traveled all over the world, and knows the way of the world, and comes back to tell an intending traveler where to stay and what to take with him, it makes it much easier, more comfortable. Hence a Teacher is necessary for those people who are uncertain of the goal, who are not sure, who are doubting, who have no strength, who need their purposes, their determinations, awakened and made strong. But for those people who have already seen the goal, who have already perceived, and have experienced that flame which is Liberation, to them he will act as an encouragement, he will be the embodiment -but they will get there without him.

QUESTION: Can one help others by influencing them consciously?

KRISHNAJI: If you think you are wiser than anybody else, then you interfere. I would never voluntarily interfere with anybody unless they asked me to interfere and asked my advice and questioned me. Then I would give my opinion, but unasked I should never think of interfering. Why should you interfere with another? It may be his karma to walk a different path, to walk in a different direction, to have his mind differently composed from yours; and if you force him to adapt himself to you, you are doing him wrong.

QUESTION: For a practical mystic what would be the most effective way of helping others to reach Liberation? By becoming a fit channel for love and peace?

KRISHNAJI: I think the best way of helping others to reach Liberation is by reaching it yourself. If you had not reached it, and talked vaguely about it, you would soon be found out. The moment you are liberated, or struggling for Liberation, you do become a channel; but I dislike the word channel because it implies that you are acting for somebody else, and that somebody else is master over you, which personally I do not like.

QUESTION: What qualities do you consider most necessary for those who would be your disciples?

KRISHNAJI: It all depends. Suppose you went to a painter and asked him what qualities were necessary to become a painter, it would be very difficult for him to answer you. In the same way it would be difficult if you went to a musician, a composer or a writer and said: "Look here, I want to become what you are." He could only teach you the technique; he cannot give you the qualities of a great artist.

QUESTION: Do you look on the work of the World-Teacher as that of teaching individual men the way to liberation, only, or also as inspiring civilisation with new ideals in all departments -in art and religion, as well as in political and social life?

KRISHNAJI: I will explain my answer with a simile. We go into a garden and see a rose in magnificent bloom. One person who is an artist merely thinks of that rose in terms of painting; another who looks at that rose will go away and meditate; a third will translate that delight into some social activity. People approach religion in the same way as they approach that rose; it depends on the individual, on his temperament, his point of view, his idea of how best he can translate it to the outer world. For instance, say I am interested in education. I want to translate that Liberation in terms of educational ideals and to put it before young people, and children, so as to make them grow according to those ideals. Another person, seeing that Liberation, might be a keen social worker and might translate it in social terms and so help people to attain it.

QUESTION: How should suppression be used in control of the self?

KRISHNAJI: There should be no suppression. You know what happens when you kill some poison on the surface -that same poison will break out again somewhere else. If you try to cure a sore on the body without curing its real cause, it will come out somewhere else. I should never personally suppress anything, for the moment you do so it comes out in another form; but you should learn to control it and to transmute it -and translate it into activity.

QUESTION: What would you define as intelligent revolt?

KRISHNAJI: I feel every person should be in revolt because he should not mould himself to anyone's pattern. You should not mould yourselves to me any more than to somebody else. But in revolting you should be intelligent; that means that you should use the accumulation of your experience, use your intelligence as your guiding point, and revolt with that guide always in view, not just kick blindly, because that means that you are creating karma.

QUESTION: Some of those who in life are acquiring Liberation may have made certain ties which must be fulfilled, but for the younger people who have not formed such ties, would you say it meant not incurring them or incurring them in a new way?

KRISHNAJI: I have always wanted to attain Liberation; I have always wanted to come near the Buddha so that there should be no barrier between Him and myself. I let nothing interfere with that desire: I put aside all other desires; I said, I want to arrive at a certain stage as soon as I can, and anything which interferes must be set aside, must be conquered. I incurred no responsibility, which would come, in the way of my desire, and I have attained it. But do not think I mean that if you are longing to marry, longing to paint, that you should stop yourselves.

QUESTION: Is it not true that action done as duty and with detachment does not make karma?

KRISHNAJI: Yes, I think so.

QUESTION: In The Kingdom of Happiness you said it does not matter what is the degree of evolution of the individual; does that mean that at every degree of evolution one can attain Liberation?

KRISHNAJI: I am sure of it. Take a Sudra (of the lowest caste): if his desire to attain is so burning, so intense, that he throws aside everything, he will attain.

QUESTION: Do you mean by Liberation only a degree or stage of Liberation? Is it union with the Manifested Deity or with the Absolute?

KRISHNAJI: To me Liberation means, as I said yesterday, the destruction of the separate self, because it is the separate self, the self that is so dominant in each one that creates karma that binds. Once you have destroyed that self you are liberated and it does not matter whether you belong to the Manifested or to the Unmanifested, whether you belong to this house or that house, to this stage or that stage, for these are only technical terms.

QUESTION: If Liberation is the cessation of self, why do you associate happiness with it any more than unhappiness?

KRISHNAJI: 'Where the idea to live is a mistake and the idea not to live is an error...' You can call it happiness or unhappiness -Nirvana, Kailas, Heaven- until we find a word that everyone understands.

WHY DO YOU SERVE?

Ommen, Holland, 1927

It was very good of you to have invited me to speak at your gathering and I am going to talk this evening about that which has been occupying your minds for the last three days -service. I will leave it to your judgment to decide whether I am a mystic or an occultist, because words tend to confuse the mind, and to make distinctions is invidious and leads to misjudgement and separates one person from another. To me there is neither occultist nor mystic, because all are the same, whether they be physically active in creating things around them, or mentally or emotionally active, or whether they retire from the world and dream and create through their dreams. So I am going to speak from the only point of view that I know, which is neither that of the mystic nor that of the occultist. I am not going to distinguish during my talk between either of them, because in my mind these distinctions do not exist.

Before one begins to create, either mentally, emotionally or physically, it is necessary to find out what is the purpose of creation, what is the purpose of production, what is the purpose of activity, what is the purpose of retirement. To me the purpose of all service, of all thought and feeling and activity, is the perfecting of mind, emotions and physical body, because, without the perfection of those three, without harmony between them, you cannot have the well-being of the whole. Hence it is necessary to establish whither we are going, what is the purpose of this existence with its struggles, joys and sorrows. To me, the whole purpose of life consists in the coming down and climbing up, the coming forth from the flame, the gradual development of the spark till it becomes again one with the flame. As the flame, so will all become, without distinction, whether you now call yourselves mystics or occultists. To me there are no separate paths, there is but one path. If you climb a mountain, at its base you will find hundreds of paths leading upwards, but as it gets steeper and nearer to the end there is but one solitary unique path. There may be many paths below, but when you are at a higher stage there is only one.

Now we must look at service -that which you have been discussing- from that one point of view, that is, from the highest, where there is only one path, which is the path of peace. Those who are interested, who are striving, who are working for that attainment, for that peace which shall come to the world, must look at all problems from that one point of view. Though I admit, as every thinking man must, that there are many temperaments, many types, yet these many types and temperaments only exist in the mind, they are not seen from the mountain top. Hence, if you divide too much, if you separate too much, there will be disunion, even though we are all working for the same end. If you go to India you will perceive that there are many temples, many shrines, many churches where men are all worshipping, all acknowledging the same God, but that when they leave the temple they will not look at each other, because of their many temperaments, their many types. In this way God is divided, as the fields of the earth are divided by human beings, with their hedges, with their narrow barriers. You divide God by these temperaments, by these types, and hence there is disunion.

You will tell me that I am not of your type, you will tell me that I am a mystic and you will tell another that he is an occultist. What is the difference? In what way does a mystic suffer more, or less, than an occultist? In no manner whatever are they different except in the degree of sorrow. They may have sorrows of different kinds, but they all have sorrow, and hence they are all ordinary human beings, and my contention is that there should be no division. If you are wise, you will not separate people by their temperaments, nor catalogue them.

If you recognize that there is a fundamental unity, that all human beings are essentially the same, essentially united, though they may have different skins and different minds, then there will be a real desire to help, a real desire to serve. I have been told so often that I am a mystic, that my path is shorter and more difficult than that of another. My path is as your path; we shall all meet at the end, whether you are an occultist or a mystic or an active individual, we shall all arrive together at the mountain top, where we shall forget those narrow divisions and subdivisions of the mind.

Those who would help must have that intense burning to give the knowledge that comes from understanding. Though you be very learned -well-versed in books- you will not understand if you think that by these complicated theories alone, without that burning desire, you are going to help the world. Every person who has found for himself certain happiness, desires to share it with others.

So I would look on activity from two distinct points of view. First there is the activity which is born out of knowledge and wisdom and then there is the activity which is born out of ordinary, physical common sense. Here you are all concerned with helping the world; you have been talking about it for the last ten days, in a most excited, agitated fashion sometimes. What exactly do you mean by "helping the world"? Who wants you to help the world? Are you so very superior to me or to the ordinary person in the outer world? In what way is your knowledge lasting and certain? Is that which you give born out of certainty, out of your own understanding? When you are certain of your own knowledge, you can consider helping others. Most of your knowledge is second-hand; most of your theories are second-hand; most of your wisdom you have gathered in books; most of your devotion is narrow and limited. Hence that help which you give will be transient, because it is not of your own creation, born of your own certainty. That which you give will not help truly, unless you can give it from within, from your own understanding and knowledge of life. Most of you are not in touch with the world, though you may live in the world. I want you to be certain of your own desires, certain of your own knowledge, certain of your own purpose.

In order to find out what is your own, you must question, you must doubt. I went on doubting and questioning till I was certain of my own knowledge, till I could say that I knew, till I was positive. Now whether anyone doubts, or scoffs, or feels himself intellectually superior, makes no difference; that which I have found is my own, that which I have gathered through the past centuries, through the past millennia, that which I possess... is of my own creation. I am made perfect in my own knowledge, in the knowledge that counts, in the knowledge that has value, that guides, that protects, that gives strength.

If you have such a knowledge -acquired by your selves- then your service to humanity will be of value. You can give real help only when you are above receiving help. I do not say you should not help others while you are searching, but the purpose of all should be to gain that wisdom, that knowledge, so as to help truly, so as to give certainty to those people who are in doubt, who are suffering or dwelling in passing joys. Hence those who desire to help, either materially on the physical plane, or by creating ideas in the mental -they are fundamentally the same- must be certain of their own knowledge, must possess that wisdom which gives certainty, must have drunk at the fountain of wisdom. Otherwise, however much you may desire to help, you will only feed the transient bodies. Which is of greater value, to feed the body or to ennoble the soul? Both are essential, but you must not begin at the wrong end. You must begin at the ennobling of the mind and the heart, the purifying of the soul, and then whatever you do, whatever your actions, whatever your thoughts, whatever your feelings, they will be in right proportion to your knowledge; not grotesque, not out of place. Hence you must use discrimination, to distinguish between that which is lasting and that which is passing, that which is permanent and that which is fleeting. When you are able to distinguish and choose between the false and the real, your service will be of help.

You are all looking forward to the time when you will be in the sixth root-race, but in waiting for the sixth root-race do not miss the beautiful day. You are all waiting to acquire knowledge from people who have authority, whoever they be; you are waiting to be fed and while you are waiting the summer is over and the darkness sets in and you are still waiting for the sixth root-race. It is because you have very little knowledge of the present life that you want to escape it and so you look forward to something in the future, something beautiful, pleasant, ecstatic and wonderful. It is what you are now that counts; leave the sixth root-race alone. It is what you create at the present moment that has value. If you sow corn do you expect an oak tree to grow? If you sow wheat do you expect to have pomegranates? If you sow grapes do you expect apples? What you do now will produce the very results that you desire. It is within your own power to attain happiness and liberation, no one can give them to you; they are not offered to you on a platter which you can refuse, they lie within yourself, and if you are great, if you have the capacity to escape from the limitations of time, then you will be even beyond the sixth root-race.

So I should like to come back again to what I said at the beginning, to that activity of which the Western world is so full. You can be a great mystic and yet be active emotionally and mentally, though perhaps it is more difficult to be so on the physical plane. You will find perhaps if you go to India that, because of the climate, they are more active emotionally and mentally than physically. Here it is very cold and you have to be active in order to keep alive, but that activity does not mean that you are solving the world's problems, perhaps you are adding to those problems, adding another barrier.

So friends, if you really desire to help, as you must desire, you must not only be active, you must also contemplate, you must seek solitude, you must have dreams. Why is there so much trouble in the world between the Orient and the Occident? It is because in the Orient they think the physical does not exist, the physical is a maya, it passes away and a new life comes into being; whereas here the physical is the only thing of value, so you say: "Let us make merry while this life lasts", and you forget that there is the other side to the picture. So when the two clash -the physical on one side and the emotional and mental on the other- there is always trouble, there is always misunderstanding; but when you can combine the two, when you can make the world perfect in the knowledge of the two, then there is happiness. And those people who have the desire to serve, who have this burning desire to help, must understand who it is that they are helping and why they are helping. To help really and truly and lastingly you must have within you eternal peace, eternal certainty and liberation. Without the vision, without the knowledge of that for which you are working, whatever you do, whether it be mental, emotional, or physical, will have no value. That is why those of you who belong to organisations, who are well-learned, in books, must be careful that your knowledge does not become merely theoretical, without the background of experience and certainty, for without that certainty beware how you help people. If you can allay sorrow, if you can give balm to the aching wounds, then you will not care to what types and to what stages of evolution you may belong. All that you will desire will be to help, because you possess certainty and because you have that knowledge whose function in the world is to give wisdom.

So friends, you are like everyone else in the world though you may call yourselves by different names, for you are still in the valley of sorrow, and you can only attain that clear light of happiness which is within you by your own struggling, by your own authority, not by the authority of another. By your own knowledge, by your own sorrow you can find the way; and when you are certain, when you are positive, when you are sure in your own wisdom, then what you give will be of great help, will be of lasting value, will aid and give happiness to those that have it not.

EERDE GATHERING 1928

Eerde, Holland, 1928

Since you have been good enough to put to me these questions, I am going to answer them from my point of view, from a point of view which to me is the only way of looking at life, the only way which will solve the problems that confront each one of us. Now as I have said, liberation in its absolute sense is liberation that is the outcome of all experience and not the mere destruction of feelings. And such liberation is necessary for the ultimate, the final, and the absolute happiness. I mean by that happiness which is the accumulation of intelligence, the power of greatness, the creative power of the genius. When you look at liberation and happiness from that point of view, it is not negative, neither is it destructive, but it is a positive assertion of that power which goes to create, which brings about order -not the order of the peasant who creates a vineyard on the mountain side, but the order of an artist who brings about order out of chaos, out of the confusion of the traditional and serried ages of the past, an order that can be interpreted according to individual development. I am going to answer all these questions from that point of view alone. You may say: that is much too simple: and you may say that it does not satisfy the very intellectual people. And here I must add that I am not setting myself up as an authority, which you can quote to others or to yourself, to bolster up your point of view. The other day I was talking to a man in Bombay who after a lengthy discussion, said to me: What you are saying will bring about supermen who will stand on their own feet, who will create order for themselves, who will be the absolute rulers for themselves; but what will happen to the man who is down below, who depends on outside authority, on crutches, who is forced, urged to a particular morality which may or may not suit him? I answered him: Take what is happening in the world at the present time. The strong, the violent, the powerful, the rigid, the men of power and strength are at the top, and the weak, the tender, the struggling are below. Now put that in contrast to the tree whose sustaining power, whose strength lie in its deep roots, which are all hidden away below, and on the top there are the delicate leaves, the tender shoots, the weak branches. In human society as it is at present constituted, the strong and the powerful are supported by the weak, whereas in Nature, the strong and the powerful are below to sustain the weak. So long as you look at every problem with a twisted and a crooked mind -I am using the words crooked and twisted in the right sense, not in a colloquial sense- you will accept the pre-tent conditions: whereas I look at problems from the other point of view.

Because you are not convinced on your own knowledge, you are repeating authority, you are bolstering up by quotations, the authority of the past against something new. Against that argument I have nothing to say, but if you look at life from a point of view that is unbiased, that is not warped by authority, that is not sustained by the knowledge of others, but that is upheld by your own sorrow, by your own thoughts, by your own culture, by your own understanding, by your own affection, then you will understand what I am saying, for the meditation of the heart is understanding. I would much rather have a few people who really understood than ten thousand who merely repeat. Go, as I went, to a Brahmin town where the influence of Brahmanism is very strong. There they look at everything in life from the point of view of: "We have been taught". Now personally -and I hope you will understand what I am saying and not misunderstand it- I have no belief and I have no tradition. That has always been my attitude towards life. As life is different from day to day, and as I want to understand life from day to day, it is no good having a belief and a tradition, which bind me and prevent me from comprehending life.

All men everywhere in the world have a belief, it does not matter what it is, and that belief guides their mind, whereas life should guide and not belief. And the understanding of life only comes when there is not this tradition of belief bound by morality. After all, the end of life is perfection through the attainment of liberation and happiness; and you can only achieve it by gathering experience and not by adding more beliefs, more traditions, more superstitions, more dogmas and more sectarian theories to those you already have. You may have to go through that particular stage of wanting beliefs, but it is not the end. Take a stream; see how small it is at its very beginning, at the very source, how delicate, how tender, how pure, and how unsullied. And as it goes on through many fields, through many countries, feeding many trees, giving nourishment to many peoples, it is getting wider and wider, accumulating more rivers, gathering more waters to itself, till at last it reaches that ocean where there is no limitation. The whole weight of waters behind that river is urging, pushing the stream which it sends out, never allowing it to stop still for a minute in any particular spot, because when it lies in a tranquil condition, there is stagnation. So those who would reach the ocean of freedom must never be still, must never be contented, for that means lying fallow, which is what I call mediocrity.

So with that as an introduction, I shall go on to answer these questions, but please, remember I would much rather have comprehension and understanding, than acceptance of my authority and a blind belief. A blind belief leads to that form of religion, which is the frozen thought of man, and out of those frozen thoughts you build the temple.

And you can never satisfy a person who judges things with a mind that is prejudiced, narrow, and bound by morality and tradition.

I have talked to a great many people who are violently anti-Theosophical, anti-Star, anti-World-Teacher and anti other things -thinkers, artists, materialists, violent supporters of religion- and in every case they have been my friends. Because I know what I want and I have got it, I have attained my goal, I am certain of my purpose and I am certain of what I mean by liberation. Now there is a danger of too critical an examination of this liberation, because when you say: it is this -it is not that. I know exactly what I mean, but in the majority of those cases in which people try to interpret what I mean, they are not certain for themselves, and so they are swayed by criticism, by what other people say. Some people say: Krishnamurti is not leading a perfect life, he ought to do this or that, other people say that he is telling us what we have always been longing to hear, others that he just repeats banalities of life which we have read in better language hundreds of times. And so you do not know where you are. But you do know where you are if you have the goal fixed in front of you, which is of your own creation, of your own making. Then you can speak with as much authority, the authority of your own experience, as I do. And if I speak of authority, it is in this sense of my own knowledge, not the authority that warps the minds of others.

QUESTION: Is there a connection between the path leading to Liberation and the path of Discipleship leading to Mastership?

KRISHNAJI: If the path of Discipleship leading to Mastership leads to Liberation there is a connection, if it does not, then there is no connection. After all, what does a Master in the accepted Theosophical language mean? It means a person who has attained perfection. What does perfection mean? It means -and I want you to think this out for yourselves- a state, a condition, in which you are no longer able to receive any further experience. I am sorry to give a crude example, but it is like this. Take a sponge -a sponge is useless so long as it is empty, but when you soak it in water and it is saturated, then it is complete. It can no longer receive more water. Likewise a man who is perfect is beyond all experience, beyond the capacity of learning anything further from experience. And that is, after all, liberation.

QUESTION: When one longs for freedom and tries to grasp what it means, an unreasonable fear keeps creeping up. Is there any good way of dealing with this?

KRISHNAJI: Have no fear. Most people in the world -it does not matter who they are- are bound by fear of going wrong, fear of heaven and hell, fear of approval or disapproval, and so all the time they are fearing. When you realise that there is no such thing as good or evil, that there is no such thing as heaven and hell, that there is no such thing as failure, because everything is a matter of experience, then fear disappears. So liberation is the conquering of fear. For it is fear that binds, that warps, that perverts. If somebody told me that I was going to hell, it would not make any difference to me. If somebody told me that I was doing wrong, it would make no difference to me, because I am not afraid. But most people are afraid of conditions, which they have not tested. And you can only test them by the knowledge which you gain from experience. If you feel fear, face it. Fear comes when you have a dark corner in your mind or in your heart in which you keep unsolved problems. It is like this. You never go to a temple with your solved problems. You go to a church or temple to worship or to pray, when there is a problem confronting you to which you cannot find a solution. That is what religion has become -a peg on which to hang all your unsolved problems.

QUESTION: One day we are gay and happy, the next we are sad and depressed for no apparent reason and the brighter we were, the worse we seem to get afterwards. How can we get a more steady flow?

KRISHNAJI: Go to India and you will see day after day, month after month, a cloudless sky, brilliant sunshine and a parched land. Then you go elsewhere and you may see cloudy days, grey fields and many shadows dancing on the land. You must have both. You must have sorrow, depression, misery, and struggle, and you must have the clear open skies and an absolute freedom. You cannot escape; they are necessary as rain to a parched land. When you look at it from the point of view of everything as a matter of experience from which you rather your strength to go forward, there is no such thing as sadness or depression, pain or pleasure. They are like pigments, which a painter uses, colours that go to create, to make up a picture. He does not consider why this or why that; there they are, and he utilizes them. Most people are in the stage of confused thought and feeling, and the miracle of order comes when you, like the artist, are creating order out of this chaos, when you are beginning to fix for yourself the goal.

QUESTION: You say that any and every human being, if he will, can understand and attain liberation while the Teacher is amongst us. You teach that synthesis of body, emotions, and mind is essential for freedom or liberation. But how can a really primitive man -and there are many in the world, in Australia, Africa, South India, for example- who has scarcely begun to develop mind, who lives in a seething cloud of unorganized emotion, be capable of immediate synthesis and liberation? I ask this because I am interested in primitive folk and their needs, and feel that organized religion, such as Brahmanism, Buddhism, or Christianity is essential for their growth.

KRISHNAJI: I will answer this question in this way. Suppose I had a child, how would I bring him up? For the primitive people are but children. The same question has been asked so often: What would you teach the young child? First of all, I do not teach anybody -but I would help people to understand. What I would make the child understand, what I would say to the child as to the barbarian, the primitive man, is: your final goal is freedom; and I would explain what freedom means. But in order to attain it you must have discipline, you must have order, you must have certain rules as in a school. You are helping the primitive man, the child, to grow up. Take a tree for instance, a small plant; while it is young, you protect it from the winds, the rain, and the brilliant sunshine -you nourish it carefully. But you know a stage will come when you can no longer control its growth, when it will be far too big for you to feed, for your small protection. Likewise, if you put before the child or the primitive man or the inexperienced man, from the beginning, the idea that his goal, the end of his life is freedom and happiness, but that while he is growing he must have protection, then he will understand. But it does not mean that protection should corrupt his end, which is what most people think. If I had a school and was the principal or headmaster of the school, I would say to my students: Look here, I want every one of you boys and girls to be as free as I am -not bound by authority, by tradition, by morality laid down through the serried centuries of the past; but freedom does not mean the negation of order, freedom does not mean the setting aside of discipline because I discipline myself. If I say this, do you think they won't see it? Because you are sincere, because you really encourage freedom, you build; you protect them in every possible way to make them grow towards that freedom, not by suppression, or the obeying of authority, the following of blind belief or untested conditions of thought. Quite a different attitude of mind is required. If you will kindly keep the simile of the tree with its hidden strength below, and the weak on top, then you will see what I am talking about.

QUESTION: There are many intellectual, cultured men and women who do not see greatness in an idea, unless it is presented in a complicated form. How would you tackle such people?

KRISHNAJI: First of all, you disturb them mentally and emotionally. The intellectual people, the cultured people, are as much in sorrow, are as much disturbed, as the man who is not cultured, as the man who has few possessions. It is not a question of how I am going to convince such people or tackle them, life will tackle them; and you help life to tackle them by your understanding of life. I have tackled orthodox Brahmins, who are very difficult to convince; but I have done it because, after all, the greatness of simplicity is the proof of attainment.

You are asking all these questions from a point of view which comes from a mind and a heart that do not understand. Because you have not solved for yourselves, and because you think you can put before intellectual people, cultured people, pet ideas of your own, of course they knock them promptly on the head. But if you go to them with one experience of your own, which is of your own knowledge, they cannot refute it. It is the usual game of mediocrity trying to struggle with the main stream of life and getting drowned. You must tackle the main stream of life, you must go out into the middle current, you cannot stand by the bank and throw your pet ideas into the mid-stream, because they will be drowned and will never come up again. But if you grow and struggle in the main stream, even though you may be drowned, your struggle remains.

QUESTION: You have said: we must not imitate others, not mould ourselves after the pattern of another, but it is the desire to come out of our own limitations, out of our own mediocrity which makes us look upon people in whom we see perfection of one kind or another with a desire to imitate that perfection and thereby gain it for ourselves. I feel I cannot do without this imitation. I see no other way of gaining perfection. If I only think things over in myself I do not reach anything better than myself, which is far from perfect. Can you please make me understand this?

KRISHNAJI: Surely. Most people have an idea that perfection means a destruction of the self, whereas it is the contrary. Perfection means the purifying of the self, which in its turn means the development of the individual uniqueness. Now you think this out. Suppose I see perfection in another. I want to imitate the idea of that man's perfection, not him. Take a man who makes a mosaic picture: there must be many colours, which go to the making up of that picture, towards the perfection of that picture. So if your colour is green or red or pink, if you are developing that colour, you are bound to fit into that picture, which is, which must be, if it is perfect, harmonious. And hence if you are developing one colour and I am developing another colour, when we meet there is no colour at all, there is unity. So if you merely imitate my idea of perfection, you are doing wrong, you are killing the idea of perfection. When you imitate my idea of perfection, you are suffocated, you are destroying and killing, in other words, you kill your own self. You cannot kill yourself, you can only purify yourself. After all that is perfection. There is no other god except a man purified, nothing greater, nothing more perfect than the human being ennobled. So if perfection is merely the copy of the perfection of another, it is not your perfection. Let me say it in this way: when I want to paint a picture and you are a master, I come to you and I say: I want to learn nature of colour, of proportion, relief and atmosphere. But how to paint, I want you to teach me your technique, the nature of colour, of proportion, relief and atmosphere. But if ever I begin to paint your picture, I shall never learn, never create; but if learning your technique, I go out and paint my own pictures, I am developing my individual uniqueness. I hope I have made that clear, that it is not perfection to imitate the perfection of another; it is on the contrary the destruction of the idea of perfection. But if you worship that individual perfection which is the outcome of experience, observance and the comparison of the perfection of others, then such perfection, when it is developed, is the unity of all perfections. And hence there is only one basis for unity.

QUESTION--a: What is your attitude towards the Theosophical teachings about the Masters and Discipleship?

KRISHNAJI: What is my attitude towards the Masters and Discipleship? They are only stages, on the way towards freedom. If the idea of them helps you towards the attainment of liberation, then that idea is essentially right. Again, there is no such thing as right and wrong. I can only answer this from my point of view. I want to cross the river and if someone came to me with a boat of whatever type, and if I thought that the boat would take me towards my end, I should take it certainly, but my end is freedom. And what is of help, that is for each one to judge. It is not for anyone to say: you must go through this or that particular way. There is no one-way, though there is only one path. Now it is like this. You know, when you go climbing a mountain, you notice how there are hundreds of paths coming to a certain point on the mountainside, but as you go higher and higher nearing the summit, there remains only one path. There is only one path, which leads to the summit, because there cannot be many paths where there are a great many precipices. There is only one path towards the summit and it is of that path I am talking. I am not concerned with the hundreds of paths lower down because when you understand the direct path, the other paths do not matter. The other paths only complicate the mind. Please, this is only my point of view, and if you disagree, so much the better, because it will make you think and if you think sanely, with common sense, without prejudice, you will come to agree.

QUESTION--b: Given the presence of the World Teacher, is there any need of discipleship in the technical sense of the term?

KRISHNAJI: I don't know what it means. You see, you have certain definite ideas and thoughts; in accordance with which you want me to mould myself. I am not going to do that, any more than I want you to mould yourselves to my particular point of view. Please do not think that I deny or assert any of these things or that I disbelieve in them. To me, as I said, there is only one thing of value, of portent, which gives to me the full knowledge of life. It is that I want to be the master singer of life, and I am, because I understand life without the prejudices, the narrowness, the limitations that come when you are going through experiences, and if any one asks me if this or that thing will help towards a particular goal, the goal I am talking of, I would reply that they must judge for themselves, must experience if it is any help. But at the same time I am pointing out that there is a simpler way than all this, that is as the path which lies at the summit, the path that is open to those who are desirous of experience and the fruits thereof, who do not obey blindly, whose life is not bound by morality and tradition, by sets of belief and unbelief, whose life is not suffocated, not warped by fear.

QUESTION--a: Do you not think one can stay too long at a spiritual centre so long that he ceases to grow bigger and slips negatively into a rut?

KRISHNAJI: First of all, I do not know what a spiritual centre is. If you mean it is bad to stay in one place too long, I should say: you are right; it does not matter where it is.

QUESTION--b: I have heard the opinion expressed that centres were like harbours where a ship came to discharge and to receive cargo. It might stop at many such harbours for a time, but always it returned to the high seas. What do you think?

KRISHNAJI: I should say that every house in the world is such a harbour; every house in the world is such a centre if you know how to utilize it. If you have the knowledge, if you have the understanding, if you have the goal fixed in front of you, then you will utilize those harbours for discharging and taking in of experience, but what generally happens at these harbours is that when you arrive there is a strike ¬generally a coal strike. I am using this simile not in its literal sense. If there is a strike in the harbour where your ship is lying anchored, you can never put out to sea again. So you realize the danger of resting in a haven where you are dependent for your fuel on others. If you depend on others for the fuel, which will give power to your desires, strength for your determination, then such a harbour is useless, such a harbour is danger. Most people are in such harbours and hence there is no certainty of their putting out to sea, of their testing their strength in the open waters. But if you are a constant traveller, always on the move, taking each shelter as it comes, taking the fuel for understanding where you find it, then you are not afraid of strikes, of losing yourself; for even in heaven, if there be one, you can lose yourself. But if you walk on the road of life, with your mind fixed and your heart aching to reach your goal, then everything becomes easy, then harbours and centres are unnecessary.

You will promptly ask me: why do you have Eerde? Shall I tell you? To create discontentment, to create immense agony and a great longing in the mind and in the heart of those who come here, for then out of that will be born the flower which shall give them the scent to encourage them towards their goal.

QUESTION: If a person who longs to create found himself working under conditions where his initiative, his self-expression, his creative efforts, were all suppressed, would it not be impossible for him to gain freedom under such circumstances, would it not be batter for him to seek a place where he would have an opportunity to create something, if only one thing?

KRISHNAJI: I should say certainly if it means this. If a person who is here at Eerde, or in any other place, or at home, finds that his circumstances are killing him, killing his desires, killing his powers to go out, then I should say: leave it, but leave it with understanding, because you might go to another place and find that still you have not found this freedom, but that probably you are more of a prisoner than you were before. You can attain freedom wherever you are, but that means that you must have the strength of a genius. For a genius after all is a person who grows out of his circumstances, who is beyond his circle. So if a person thinks that here or elsewhere he cannot develop his unique perfection, before he leaves this or any other place, before finally deciding, let him understand that wherever he is, if he is not strong enough, his circumstances will drown him; that wherever he is, if he is strong enough, he can grow to perfection, I know it is a question of two negations, but there it is. It is like a person who says: I am going out into the world to seek experience. Probably at the very first step he takes out of the house he misses the experience of his life. There is nothing new under the heavens or under the sun, but everything is new to a man who understands life. I hope I have explained this.

QUESTION: If we have the Truth, the Kingdom of Happiness within us, why the long struggle incarnation after incarnation, through many sorrows, much suffering and fleeting pleasures?

KRISHNAJI: It is necessary to go through all this, in order to find out if it really is within you. How do you know it is within you -because I say so? Or someone else says so? After all, Truth is the understanding of life, there is no other truth except that, and to understand life you must go, as does the river, through every field, and find out what is your own potential power. Suppose I say -as I do say- that it is in the power of everyone to find out himself the Truth, which is the understanding of life, you will reply: I have not the power, I am making all these mistakes, I am influenced, I am sad, I am this or that. But that is just my point. In order to discover the power in yourself, you must go through all experience, but you do not want to do it. You had much rather that I gave you a visa to Nirvana without any customs. But when you got there, you would find that it is not Nirvana at all, but as much a hell as the earth. Don't you see, the individual problem is the problem of the world, and if you do not solve your own problem, if you do not solve your sorrow for yourself, if you do not unearth, uncover for yourself the world where happiness lurks, you will never disclose that world to other people. You will never find Truth, if you do not understand life, if you do not understand what I mean. And to find Truth, and to understand life we must have experience, and hence you must go through life after life, time after time, following the wheel of sorrow. But there is one other way of doing it, and that is by vicarious experience -not vicarious atonement- but experience which you utilize fully, but this way requires great affection. To understand the experience of another and to get at the gist of that experience, you need immense affection. And there are very few possessing such affection. Hence you must go through experience in the ordinary way. If you have that immense affection, then life and the understanding of life become simple.

QUESTION: I would like to hear from the author of The Kingdom of Happiness how he proposes to bring happiness to those millions who live in abject poverty and misery, who never in their life taste a square meal, who have to freeze during six months out of twelve, who have to slave all their life; of whom a young social worker recently said: "Give us first bread, and then come with spiritual food"; to those countless girls and women who have to sell their bodies in order to keep them alive. I would also like to know how he is going to bring peace to blood drenched Europe.

I can't be happy as long as I see all this misery.

KRISHNAJI: It is like this. If you see an accident it the street, a man crushed by a motor, you do not promptly throw yourself under the next coming motor. You see misery, killing, blotting out of life, and you say: I am going to help create laws for the protection of life against motors! ..is not that a normal attitude? Let us take another example. Suppose somebody is ill in your house, you do not promptly become ill in order to help him, you utilize the help of a doctor. Your first thought is that you must make him as healthy as you are, not become as unhealthy as he is. When yon look at life from that point of view, it becomes quite different. If I were able to feed thousands of people tomorrow by some miracle, they would only be starving again the day after tomorrow; they would be in the same conditions which made them hungry. What we are concerned with is the changing of conditions. How do you change them? By tackling the principal thing that creates bad conditions, and that is selfishness, lack of affection, brutality, and so on. You will say that this is a very long process -but it is the only way. Please think it out, because I have no time to expand it. This is a question which comes up at every meeting. People say: what is the good of your being a World-Teacher if you cannot give me my happiness, if you cannot give me my bread for tomorrow? I say that by altering the attitude of mind and heart, you will create conditions, which will be lasting. All social workers now are feeding people, helping them to be different and so on and on and on. But they will never solve the question of selfishness, brutality, envy, jealousy, and the gnawing of the heart and the disturbance of the mind. And with that I am concerned, because if you solve that, you will solve everything else. Again I would like to remind you, to bear in mind this simile of the tree -the tree with all its strength, its glory, its power hidden and supporting the weak. You are solving the problem the other way. They are always bound to be the weak, the poor of mind and heart, the inexperienced; and it is the people who have experience, who have strength, who are full, who must support them. You are looking at the problem from the usual traditional point of view. Newspaper reporters ask me everywhere: why don't you go and work and do this and that? If I were to go and do all that, I should not be tackling things the right way. I should only be touching one branch of the tree, whereas I am concerned with the life of the tree. You may think that is an easy way of looking at things, but it is not. Yours is the most complicated view. When you go to a doctor what does he do if he's a good doctor? He is not going to cure one symptom from which you are suffering. He says: Don't not bother about the symptoms, I am going to help you to have strength to destroy all symptoms which give pain, by purifying your blood, giving you the proper nourishment that will help your blood to destroy impurity. That is the only way to tackle it. If you want to make a tree grow, it is no good decorating the branches. What you have to do is to feed and strengthen them. What you are all the time doing, is this. You all want to progress, and none of you know towards what. I say that progress towards freedom is the only thing that matters. For the tiger that is kept in a cage, to him progress is walking up and down without an end, and without letting him out of the cage you say that, in order to help him, you are going to decorate the bars of that cage. But glorifying the bars with beautiful decoration will never help the tiger to get out. Progress only comes when you have a fixed purpose, everything else is but the decorating of the cage, which binds humanity.

QUESTION--a: Please give us at least the broad outline of what the spiritual aristocrat, the genius unfettered by authority, should do to help the unhappy, suffering masses of humanity.

KRISHNAJI: I have been trying to do that the whole morning.

QUESTION--b: How can one talk of liberation and happiness to people who are the exploited slaves of the cruellest industrial system the world has ever seen? How can they help being mediocre who have no time, no strength left, after their day's work, for self-culture?

KRISHNAJI: Do not say that the working people workers comfortable, to give them leisure; they would with dogmas, with beliefs, with sects, who have put aside suffering and equally joy -such people are mediocre, not the working man, not the man who does not know where he will get his next meal. He is not mediocre. The man who knows where to get all his meals is generally mediocre.

QUESTION--c: How can one talk to them of revolt when revolt would only mean further suffering. How can we help those people who need help most?

KRISHNAJI: By showing them how to revolt intelligently towards a purpose, towards the attainment of that freedom which is essential for all. It is not enough to make of industry a wonderful thing, to make the workers comfortable, to give them leisure; they would still be bound by that same limitation. Ford is giving them leisure, making conditions ideal, and many, many industrialists are doing the same things, and yet they are only decorating the cage, they are supplying things which will but encourage useless desires. And as long as those desires exist, there are sure to be poisonous systems throughout the world. My concern is to utilize the desire in order to make men free, and not merely to decorate to gilded cage of civilization.

BUILD ON UNDERSTANDING

Eerde, Holland, 1928

I should like to summarise all that I have been saying here during the last week, so as to make clear to your minds my point of view. The most important thing to me is to have the desire for freedom, not based on personal authority, on personal aggrandisement, or personal desires, but on the intrinsic value of that freedom which brings with it happiness. It is not because I want you to be free that you must desire to be free; it is not because I want you to be happy that you must desire to be happy. You seek freedom because of that desire which is born within you as the outcome of great struggle, of great suffering and great longings. If you have not this desire for freedom, your structure will be based entirely on authority, and hence it is bound to be shaken and destroyed in the very process of building. That which is to last for centuries, cannot be the work of one man alone. Societies, institutions, religious bodies, based on one man's idea or on one man's authority or personality are bound to be perverted and distorted.

If that point is clear in your mind, you will not be shaken in your understanding by the authority or by the overwhelming splendour of any personality. If you search for that understanding which is based, not on the charm or the grand phrases or the light of another individual, but on your own desire, then it will last; otherwise it will perish.

I do not want to have followers, because the moment you follow someone else you cannot truly build. I have never wanted any disciples. I abhor the very idea of anyone calling himself my disciple. Be rather the disciple of that understanding, which is the fruit of ripe thought and great love, be the disciple of your own understanding.

I mean this very, very seriously -so seriously that I would not compromise with anyone on this point, however great he might be. If you are really following your understanding of the Truth, you are following me, you are understanding me. But if you only follow the understanding of another, you are betraying every truth; you are destroying with one hand the structure you are building with the other.

You have asked me how to take my message to the world. If that message has not become also yours, it will be of no value. If you are going to be like gramophone records, repeating my phrases, you will make another society, another religion, and another temple in which you will throttle life. To convince another of truth of your understanding which you may have gathered here, you must yourself become the message.

If my authority or personality can sway your emotions and your thought, so the authority or charm of another may upset your whole understanding. If you base understanding on authority or personal worship, it can have no lasting foundation, and it is of the utmost importance to understand this. In ancient times the authority of one man's achievement was utilized to spread his teaching and understanding of life. Now it must not be like that; on the contrary, one man's achievement must awaken the understanding in you, and in the strength of that understanding you will go out into the world, not with the personal banner or the authority of the achievement of another.

It would be much easier for me to say, "Quote me, and utilize me as your authority to spread what I am teaching". But if you did this the message would not be of your understanding. But if you understand and are really living that understanding in your daily life, then there will be no corruption or limitation of the Truth.

I do not want to build. You who live at Eerde are building this place on your understanding of the Truth, and if your understanding is small, your structure will be small. If it is based on authority it will crumble. But if your understanding is great, your structure will be great and lasting and will endure all storms.

Do not be carried away by my words, but think deeply of the Truth I put before you. You can make your life at Eerde a mirror, where the individual effort to understand will be reflected without perversion.

In too many institutions the organization swallows up the individuals who compose it, and the man who has built it up. When the founder disappears the pristine beauty of his idea disappears also.

The foundation on which to build your structure must be understanding in freedom. Do the right thing, because you yourself want to do it. It is not me or for another to tell you what is right. If you start with that idea, it is essential that you should be frank with yourself. Do not deceive yourself with fine ideas, with personal desires, personal prejudices, narrow understanding. If you are angry and are frank about that anger your frankness will kill that anger. But if you are angry and try to cover up that anger by the excuse of another's action you will never conquer it. The same thing with passion. If you have physical passion and learn to understand the reason for it, and do not deceive yourself, then that passion will not be your master. If you want to do something which is contrary to the established order of society, whether of the world or of a sect or of a religion, and have thought out carefully the consequences of your action, you are perfectly right to do it; you are doing the right thing, for yourself. But this requires intelligence and impersonal examination of yourself, not being carried away by petty emotions over things that do not matter.

The world is suffering from the edicts of authority, whereas it should be encouraged to seek understanding. Dig a well in your own garden, rather than follow the urging of the crowd to go to some distant well for the quenching of your thirst.

We are going to have many difficulties here in the future. Every year it is going to be more and more difficult, I hope. And the greater the difficulty, the greater will be the understanding required. That is why I should like you all to go through tremendous difficulties. This may seem a hard thing to wish for, from one point of view -but if you look at it sanely and with balanced judgment, you will agree with me.

You should not make of this place a modern, comfortable monastery, where you avoid difficulties, where individual sustained effort is neglected, where emotional conflicts and upheavals are feared. After all, what is the characteristic of a true genius? The power to conquer circumstances in the light of his perception of the Truth. If his perception is small, he will conquer very little; but if his perception is vast, his desires will be immense, and he will invite mountainous difficulties to be conquered.

Desire can only be increased and made splendid by true perception. If your perception is limited, your desires will be limited. But if your perception is as wide and free as the open skies, then your desires will be wide, free and untrammelled. When you have that large perception, you will no longer be bound by pettiness and jealousies, by angers, fear, likes and dislikes.

It matters vitally that you should understand, that you should tear me to pieces in order to understand, because you are going to build and not I. If you have the true perception of life, it will affect the manner of your behaviour, the mode of your talk, the way of your feeling. When you are angry and jealous and full of yourself it shows that you have not yet acquired a great perception. You must be on the watch not to miss a single incident in your life, out of which you can draw the essence of its perfume.

You are going to create public opinion, you are going out into the world as the scent from Eerde. If your perfume of understanding disappears after a few hours of exposure to the bright light of the sun, it will be of no value.

It is essential to have this wide view, this true perception, this understanding and love of life. On that you can build a structure which can never be destroyed.

When you truly are you can act truly. You cannot separate your being from your action. If there were even a few in the world who really understood, we should create a new world; we should alter the expression of life. But if there is no understanding, another religion, another sect, another church, another god will be created.

THE PURPOSE OF THE ORDER OF THE STAR

Ommen, Holland, 1928

In welcoming you all to Ommen, I should like to say how happy I am to see once again so many familiar faces, from so many different countries.

I hope that at the end of the Camp you will go away more certain of yourselves, able to distinguish between that which is lasting and that which is fleeting. To find out the eternal you must consider, not the effects, but rather the cause of all things.

I hope that you will follow my thought fully and with consideration, because I have much to say and I want to epitomize it for you as tersely as possible. I want you to think carefully, because the time has come when you must all make up your own minds, when you must become as tempered steel, when you must be as the white fine so that you will change the course of thought and feeling in the world, and not merely meander smoothly along, as you have done up till now.

As you have come from all parts of the world to listen to me, and are returning to your various countries to take back your understanding, you must be certain in your knowledge, you must be firm in your conception of the Truth, and you must no longer be concerned with reconciling, conceding and trying to adjust one thing to another. I have made up my own mind never to yield to things that have a purely momentary value, but always to concern myself continually and without wavering, with the fundamental cause of things. For the building will be perfect, will be lasting, only if the foundation is deep and strong.

Before I go further, I want to nuke it perfectly clear to each one of you that I do not desire to put myself on a pedestal to be worshipped, that I do not desire to form a new religion, that I have no disciples, and that I do not wish to enforce by authority that which to me is knowledge, which to me is the beginning and the end of life.

If you merely twist what I am saying to suit your own thoughts and effect reconciliation with your own beliefs, it will be a waste of effort. I say that what I have to give will cure, will heal all wounds; and when you understand this you will no longer be wounded in your minds and in your hearts, you will no longer be caught up in the wheel of sorrow. But in order really to understand, do not take what I put before you and try to mould it and twist it to your old conceptions of truth. I am talking about the tree top, and do not in any manner confound this with the green blade of grass.

Do not think that liberation, happiness and Life can be twisted -and utilized to suit your old ideas. If you do not agree with me, I do not mind. If you are violently in disagreement with what I say, so much the better, because then you will be willing to contend, to discuss, and try to understand my point of view. But if you merely say "I agree with you" -and then twist those words of mine to suit your old ideas- the new ideas will break you.

The Truth I set before you is much too lovely to be rejected and much too great to be accepted without thought. If you would understand, you must come with the intention, not of bringing the Truth down to your understanding, but rather of climbing to the great heights where it is to be found.

You can truly perceive only when you have yourselves climbed to the great heights.

Now we come to the consideration of the Order of the Star and its purposes. Many people have approached me -both here and elsewhere- with the request that I abolish the Order. "Such an organization," they say, "is unnecessary". I have always listened, and I have tried to find out the reason for their desire. Because they have seen organizations usurp authority and become dominated by personalities, they wish to abolish the Order. The Order of the Star should be a bridge for new ideas and should not be the embodiment of those ideas. It should act as a bridge across which those who have caught a glimpse of the Truth may talk of their understanding to the world at large. Looked at from that point of view this organization is useful, but if its members make of it an end in itself, then it should die.

No organization of any kind holds the Truth. To find the Truth it is not necessary to belong to any organization whatsoever. We must not make of the Star a crystallized organization. If you say to the world, "You must pass through the organization of the Star in order to understand the Truth," then you are perverting the Truth. Consider the organizations, which already exist in the world and say: We hold the truth, and in order to understand the truth you must come through our portals. Truth does not abide with any organization, nor is it at the core of any movement. Organizations and movements should only exist as bridges to the Truth. To claim authority as the vessel of Truth is to `step down' the Truth. I am using `step down' in its technical sense -as in a power station electricity is generated and there stepped down for utilization.

I hold something more precious than any ointment, more lovely than any jewel, and for the understanding of that you must help people by awakening in them the desire to search, to break away from their old traditions, habits and customs and let life flow through them.

Now, in order to keep Life -which can never be bound- this organization must be flexible, must encourage people who will disagree with it, who will not believe in the idea of the World-Teacher but who may have a longing to find that balm which will give tranquillity to an aching heart and to a confused mind. You can only keep an organization full of life when it is not narrowed down to a particular form of belief. Organizations become barriers when beliefs become more vital than life itself, when they are more concerned with their own growth than with the understanding of the Truth.

I have been asked why I do not concern myself with certain movements. Am I antagonistic to them? I am not antagonistic to anyone or any movement. I am only concerned with the ideas which will set life free in each one. It is more important to break the bondages that constrain life, than to create new forms, new fantasies, and new phantoms to be worshipped. If we are not careful in the beginning, careful in the middle and careful at the end, we shall destroy the very thing for which we are searching, we shall misguide our desires, we shall pervert our very longing to attain.

It depends on each one of you in what manner you envisage the Truth. Do you desire to set up another form, another religion, another god, and another belief? I hold that all these are a bondage to life. Do you need a crutch to carry you to the mountain top? A weakness, unless you have conquered it and thereby strengthened yourself, will always be a hindrance. Religions, beliefs, forms, dogmas are barriers between people; and in breaking down those barriers you free life. Most people in the world are concerned with creating new rites, new religions, new dogmas and new gods. They are inviting people to leave their old cages, in order to come into new cages. Of what value is a new cage to a bird that wishes to be free, to a life that is made miserable in bondage?

It will depend on you whether Truth is again betrayed by your attempts to reduce it to the level of the understanding of the multitude, as has ever been done by religions and their votaries. They say, "as the people do not understand the Truth, we are going to help them by bringing the Truth down to their level". This can never be done, for Truth is free, unlimited and beyond thought, beyond all the forms and the paraphernalia of religions. Truth cannot be held in bondage, any more than life: and in the fulfilment of that life, which is Truth, lies happiness. If you understand that Truth can never be reduced, stepped down, conditioned, then you will encourage people to seek the Truth and not try to bring Truth down to them. When a child is beginning to walk, if you are a wise parent, you allow it to fall, and in that very falling it will gain strength. You cannot bring down the beauty of the mountain top; you cannot gather the winds in your fist, you cannot hold the waters in a garment. So to those who are in sorrow, who are struggling, who are trying to understand, you should say, "Go, towards the Truth, struggle, break through all barriers; instead of trying to bring the Truth in a conditioned, limited form down to your particular understanding". In limitation, in bondage there is always sorrow; and in the breaking away from bondage, in setting life free there is happiness.

So I say again, do not pervert what I am saying to suit your particular ideas. I am talking about that which is eternal, that which can never be changed, or captured and held in bondage. And if you merely repeat my words, with a mind that is limited and conditioned and a heart held in a cage, you will not understand. If you are not seeking, if you have not rejected everything in order to find the Truth, you will merely be repeating words through a mask.

A man who has to fly in an aeroplane is concerned about his aeroplane and the way to fly. If a man on a bicycle comes to him and asks him in what way he can utilize a bicycle in the air, he will say, "There is no connection between an aeroplane and a bicycle. Though they both are capable of motion they are different."

Before you can create understanding in the world around you, you must be certain of yourselves. You invite people to come into your cage of the Star -to ask them to have new sets of beliefs, to impose new conditions on life, new limitations? Because you yourselves are in bondage, though perhaps in a somewhat larger cage, you want others to come into your cage. That is not the way to find happiness, that is not the way of the Beloved, that is not the way of the Truth; these are far away from all limitations, and not through bondage shall you find but through freedom. I do not want to convert any of you to my point of view, for, as I have often said, to try to convert another is a gross form of prejudice. I am certain for myself that that of which I speak is eternal; I am certain of my attainment, I am certain of my union with the life which is the Beloved; hence I am that life which is the Beloved. To that life no one can add anything or from it take away. By saying that, I do not want to create an emotional whirlpool so that you may believe in what I say. By my understanding of Truth I do not want to add to your bondage -and it will become a bondage if you yourselves have no desire to break away from all that binds. If you are not certain -not because of what I say, but because the Truth itself is so vital, so immense that it must call to itself each one of you- if that certainty is not all-powerful, then all your beliefs, all the words that come out of your mouths, will be as the chaff that is blown before the wind.

Because you have been carried along on the smooth waters by doubtful authorities -I am using the word with great care, for all authority is bound to be doubtful in the end, because all authority can be cut down and destroyed as a tree- if a new authority speaks, you will again accept him without thought, since you have been accustomed to obey. You believe by authority and disbelieve by authority, not concerning yourselves with Truth. It is that Truth which I want to establish in your minds.

I want you to be certain, without any condition whatsoever, that what I am saying is the Truth, not because you have been told that I am this or that, but because of the intrinsic value of the Truth I bring.

As I said before, I do not want a following, I do not want disciples, I am not ambitious, I do not want to create a huge organization, in its narrow sense, throughout the world. If I did, then I would ask you to obey, then I would ask you never to question; but on the contrary, I ask you to invite doubt so that your beliefs can be tested, your anxieties, your desires can be questioned, so that out of that shall be born the lasting, the eternal. If you do not understand, then what you create in your different countries will not be based on the lasting but on something that will decay and perish away. I assure you, I would much rather have one or two persons who really understand, who will be adamant, who will never concern themselves with things that have no value, than a thousand who have no understanding, who yield to the unessential, unimportant.

So, find out for yourselves whether your understanding is based on belief, established by authority, or whether your own longing, your own desire's urging you to come towards me for the finding of the Truth. This is much too serious to play with, much too important to make crooked by the lack of understanding. We have come to a time when each one must make up his mind to put away the things that are unessential, the things that have no value in freeing life, and must be adamant in holding to the things that are vital and necessary to set life free. If you are free, then you will help others to be free. If you are a slave, you will help others to become slaves, and you will make this organization slavish, conditioned, a bondage to life, by your lack of understanding. But if you understand truly, you will create greatly and for eternity.

COLLECTIVE MEDITATION

1928

To meditate is to create, and to contemplate is to gather the material with which you can create. If you contemplate, if you pour out your devotion, you are gathering material. When you contemplate, you dream, you go away to other planes, other fields, other pastures, and gather; and when you meditate, you concentrate all that you have gathered and you build. So when you meditate you must concentrate, though it is very difficult. We are all different individual beings and we all want to get to the source of Life. We know what that source is and when we meditate together we ought to get there together. I can get there perhaps a little quicker than someone else can, and other people much quicker than I can. But we must advance together and feel together.

It is when we are all working together, advancing together, really joyous together, that there is a difference in our outlook, our attitude, wherever we go. Do not just wander in your thoughts when you meditate together. You can do that when you are in the garden by yourself; then you should contemplate and gather. But when you meditate you should concentrate and build.

Forget your various gurus, your various paths, your various types, and your various temperaments. There is only one Master in the world, only one Teacher, only one Source, and if you touch that Source, if you drink at that Source, then you will help humanity. The Beloved, whom we follow, is everything. When you think of him, when you are part of him, when he is yourself, you forget your temperaments and types. All of us are one, all want happiness, all want Truth, and all want to be free.

Meditation should help you to get into touch with the reality of life, with the beauty of life, and with that happiness which is eternal. Meditation should give you the impetus that you need for spiritual attainment. You must watch, recollect and compose yourselves, so that your minds and your hearts become tranquil, so that like a still pool you can reflect the glory of the Beloved. Then you will have that tranquillity, that peace, that subdued dignity and that great love which is your natural heritage. Do not stagnate, do not keep to your old standards, but ever acquire new and fresh ideas. Climb a little higher, so that you have a different view of the mountain-top and of the valley, a different view of the sunrise, and if you do that you will gain a new strength, a new vitality and a new happiness. Whether you are learned, or ignorant, young or old, you must all struggle to attain the real friendship, the lasting happiness which is born out of the realization of the supreme Truth.

THE VALUE OF INDIVIDUALITY

1928

The spirit of mediocrity is everywhere gaining on the spirit of aristocracy. By aristocracy I mean an aristocracy of culture, of refinement of thought and feeling. The spirit of the bourgeois -which is the spirit of pettiness, narrowness and mediocrity- desires to pull down the spirit of true nobility, not the nobility of titles and possession of a multitude of things.

The desire to follow, to imitate, to be loyal, which prevails in the world at large, is the antithesis of real understanding. You all want to be free, but freedom can only be achieved when you are above loyalty, above the desire to imitate, to mould yourself to the thought of another.

Even among cultured people there is the tendency to reduce all ideas to form, to some definite and concrete pattern and then to reproduce that concreteness in themselves. The only way to step beyond this stage of limitation, which in its essence is mediocrity, is to aim at true freedom.

Most people think that freedom means to be able to do just what they please; but true freedom does not imply lack of discipline, or restraint and control.

If you will permit me for a moment, I will take my own example. I have always wanted to be free -and I think I am now free from the circles that have been drawn around me, that is, the circumstances around me. Everyone, in his life, has certain special circumstances, which force him, urge him to mould himself to a particular pattern. The genius is a person who frees himself from those circumstances, who grows beyond them. As I wanted to be free, I had to watch all the time what circles were being drawn round me. It is very easy to follow, to be loyal to someone else, but it is much more difficult to be loyal to oneself. It seems to me that the spirit of mediocrity can only be conquered if everyone tries all the time to struggle, to put aside those influences, which urge him to conform, and to mould himself to a pattern.

Agreement and acquiescence of the wrong kind breed mediocrity. But if there is a real revolt of the mind and an immense desire for affection and understanding, then the spirit of mediocrity can be overcome. To bring the mind into a state of great revolt seems to me the first duty of everyone, because then true comprehension will be born. I would much rather have people who are against all that I say but are struggling to understand, than people who agree with me all the time without understanding. I have found all over the world that I can talk with people who are absolutely unconvinced, who are skeptical, who are prejudiced and who scoff in interviews and at public meetings, with greater ease than with those who imitate or blindly follow and thus put a wall between true understanding and themselves.

True contentment comes through understanding, and stagnation through self-satisfaction. At Eerde there must be no stagnation, because here we should cultivate the spirit of absolute freedom of thought.

There is no other righteousness than the righteousness of behaviour and that can only come with the true desire for the spirit of freedom. Eerde ought to produce not mediocrity, but minds and hearts that have in them the quality of genius, and you can only have that if there is at the background of life the desire for freedom.

Another tendency prevalent everywhere is the desire to quote authority. This is especially so in India where the mind is cultivated in the spirit of the past. To whatever I say they object, "it is written in our sacred books, Shri Krishna has not said it, the Buddha has not said it", and so all the time one is judged, not by the truth of the present, but by the tradition and authority of the past. Agreement, with understanding, is the essence of friendship.

THE RIGHT BASIS OF LIFE

1928

In order to work properly and help usefully, we must have the right basis for life; we must have the right source for our energy. If we believe in brotherhood, we must first of all examine and see in what manner we understand the word "brother". It seems to me that brotherhood conveys the idea of the destruction of self, the destruction of that poisonous weed which develops in the individual and sets him apart from others; makes him feel separate; whereas if we understand brotherhood right it means the uniting of the self with everything; and with that union there springs up an enthusiasm, a longing to bring others to the light of that Truth, in which the separate self ceases to exist.

In order to help truly, we must have touched the source of our being; and from that source we can start to make all things new.

In order to understand the truth that we are different and yet are one, we must have knowledge and experience. Unity does not mean that we have destroyed variety or difference -on the contrary- it would be terribly monotonous if we were all alike, if we all had the same point of view, the same outlook. We all look at the Truth, but through our own individual understanding.

The difference between an ordinary person and a genius is that the genius has touched the source, which is the Truth. But the ordinary person, even if his desire were to help, will not be of real use to the world, as he has not perceived the Truth. So those who desire to help must first understand something of the Truth. Most of you at present are still like children who need to be instructed; but as time goes on and you struggle, both individually and collectively, to acquire knowledge for yourselves, that knowledge will become a part of you. And when knowledge has become your own, when it is of your own acquirement that which you have gained through suffering, through pleasure, and through intense joys, whatever you do, whatever your actions and feelings may be will bear the stamp of Truth.

Then you must make Beauty a dominant aim in life: the beauty that does not mean the accumulation of superficial things, but which is simplicity. Simplicity is greatness; simplicity of character, simplicity of mind, simplicity of body, creates perfection. Let us look for a moment at the Greeks. They had none of our modern conveniences, none of the paraphernalia of modern civilization; but they had that sense of true beauty, which is simplicity. You cannot be truly beautiful if you have not beautiful minds and clean hearts, if you have not great and noble ideas and feelings. By creating superficial beauty you may think that you have achieved perfection; but when stripped of its physical covering, the ugly savage is still there.

Spirituality means beauty -beauty in thought, beauty in feeling, and beauty in action. Most of you are ever trying to find new ways and means of achieving physical perfection, but you do not turn your minds to that which is lasting. If you start from the right point of view, from the right source, you will make the physical more beautiful because you have minds and hearts which are really noble, really great.

Many think that spirituality means seriousness and gloom. Spirituality, if properly understood, is the science of happiness; because the only goal worth attaining is the perfect happiness which comes when you have made your body, your mind and your emotions perfectly in unison with your will. What causes happiness and unhappiness? Unhappiness arises when you do not understand, when you have not conquered worry and depression. But when you have discovered that source which is Truth and Life, you are not then the slaves of weal or woe, the world then has no hold on you. The transient things have no value, and you learn to stand apart from them and watch.

If you look on spirituality as the kingdom in which you can find happiness, to which you can go whenever you are really thrilled with life, whenever you see great beauty, whenever you have great visions, whenever you read great literature, whenever you feel acute sorrow or great joy, then it becomes part of you, then you live eternally in that kingdom. Spirituality is not the knowledge of books, it is not theories of life -it lies within yourselves. When you have found it you shall have the happiness that cannot be destroyed, which shall not wither with time or age.

From that point of view, wherever there is struggle, wherever there is sorrow, wherever there is happiness, wherever there is the desire to live nobly and to attain Truth, there abides spirituality, which is the true basis of life.

AN INTERVIEW

Eerde, Holland, 1928

INTERVIEWER: I should like to ask you about certain ideas that I have had for long in the back of my mind. How are the ideals which you are giving out going to reach people?

KRISHNAJI: They may for the time being be limited to the few.

INTERVIEWER:How are they going to reach the masses of people throughout the world?

KRISHNAJI: That depends on the few.

INTERVIEWER: Is it not possible that your ideals, just as a river is sometimes swallowed up by a desert, may be lost in the desert of ignorance and apathy?

KRISHNAJI: I do not think so. I do not think that ideas can ever be killed.

INTERVIEWER:Take America, just as an example of a country of which it may be said that things, possessions, have multiplied quicker than culture. Do you find that your ideas are "going across" in America?

KRISHNAJI: I do not know.

INTERVIEWER: I can picture the ideas going across but will they take root or will they

KRISHNAJI: -die out, you mean?

INTERVIEWER: Yes, may not the stream be absorbed by the desert?

KRISHNAJI: What is it exactly that you want to find out, where is your question leading?

INTERVIEWER: How are those ideas, which I admit are absolutely vital -how are we going to arrange

KRISHNAJI: -that they reach the people?

INTERVIEWER: Yes, that we get them across to the people and that they continue to get across to the people in the future?

KRISHNAJI: That is the whole point. I feel if people really understand what I am talking about to them, it will be a matter of life and death.

INTERVIEWER: Yes.

KRISHNAJI: And hence, if it is so important, they will transmit it to others.

INTERVIEWER: Good. Then it comes really to this: each individual must make it a question of life and death -not in the narrow sense.

KRISHNAJI: No, no.

INTERVIEWER: -but deep and vital. Now the next point. It was said, somewhere, of the Lord Buddha that he was willing to wander forth as a lonely elephant, as one who could beat a path through the jungle for others to follow

KRISHNAJI: -other people can follow, sure.

INTERVIEWER: -but we want to get a number of people.

KRISHNAJI: -a number of elephants, that is just the point.

INTERVIEWER: Does not that point to the tremendous value of combination?

KRISHNAJI: And that is why there is need of people who really understand. It is more necessary to have people who really understand than mere followers. Because followers can go away from the path of the lonely elephant, as has happened right through the ages. But if people understand, they will make the path of the lonely elephant wider.

INTERVIEWER: Exactly. Now there is this point: You keep saying that you have attained, that you have found the Truth, but

KRISHNAJI: -go ahead, sir.

INTERVIEWER: -but the Truth which you have attained hardly seems to have become sufficiently clear and defined for the majority of people to grasp. I cannot quite see it. Sometimes I get a glimpse. You say every individual person in the world can himself contact life direct. Now is that the Truth, or just part of the Truth?

KRISHNAJI: You cannot say, "This is the Truth, and the entire Truth." The more you investigate the more it develops. And as we are concerned for the moment with merely explaining one facet of it; everybody thinks that the particular facet of the moment is the only facet. On the contrary, the moment you have understood you will get more and more. It is like the water of a well

INTERVIEWER: -the more you take, the more remains, but there is a continual demand on the part of the people throughout the world for definitions, definitions, definitions.

KRISHNAJI: Yes, that is the first difficulty; to realise that you cannot limit Truth. And it is because they have been limiting Truth for so long that they want this limitation to continue.

INTERVIEWER: Dealing with that, is it not a justifiable criticism of life to say that the majority of artists are doing just that thing which most people are trying to do, defining it, defining Truth, only doing it more perfectly

KRISHNAJI: -expressing it in their particular mood

INTERVIEWER: -trying to catch the Truth and express it and almost inevitably feeling uncomfortable.

KRISHNAJI: Of course.

INTERVIEWER: Could one go a stage further and say that the supreme artist is the individual who has given up the attempt to express the Truth, who contains it rather?

KRISHNAJI: Of course, but he must express it.

INTERVIEWER: Could he do that in complete calm as the Taoist?

KRISHNAJI: Yes, but that is one expression.

INTERVIEWER: A completely simple one.

KRISHNAJI: But already a limitation.

INTERVIEWER: You sometimes get, as in the Eastern method of approach to Truth, specialisation, as in some systems of yoga, but is it not possible that some part of the new expression of things is in dealing with all sides of life equally?

KRISHNAJI: That, is right, sir. That is the harmony of life.

INTERVIEWER: You would not over-specialise then?

KRISHNAJI: Of course not. What is the good? It is like a man that has a very good intellect with dried up emotions. He is specialised in intellect; but that is like having a lovely tree without any flowers. A lovely flower without any scent.

INTERVIEWER: Leading on from that, is it not possible to say that the thing that is binding most people today is the mind?

KRISHNAJI: But I think we ought to develop the mind as well as the emotions.

INTERVIEWER: Put it another way. Would it be true to say that the mind is the only instrument that the majority of us are using today?

KRISHNAJI: I am not sure. I do not think so. I do not think any person can ever judge anything by pure intelligence, by pure intellect. On the contrary, the vast majority use what is a mixture of emotions and thought.

INTERVIEWER: But you can get a person with mind only and everything else left out. Pure mind.

KRISHNAJI: With emotion killed out?

INTERVIEWER: Cold.

KRISHNAJI: They are very few.

INTERVIEWER: Going back to the idea of combining to alter the future -do you see a number combining to simplify life, to bring about a definite simplification of daily life?

KRISHNAJI: To simplify, yes. But simplicity does not mean getting rid of useful things that have been invented for helping the world. See, a vacuum cleaner is simple and should be used. Think of the time spent in cleaning a room. You can go around on your knees and clean it but it takes a long time. A vacuum cleaner does it in half the time and does it better. We must learn to use useful things.

INTERVIEWER: All the same it seems as if the world were in a sort of mad rush to get hold of these things.

KRISHNAJI: That is just the point, because they think that things are an end in themselves and that things are going to give them happiness and peace and tranquillity; on the contrary, they do not.

INTERVIEWER: And we have to substitute somehow the idea that they are useful, and not the end?

KRISHNAJI: People are realising that.

INTERVIEWER: There is another point that I would like to hear more about. There is a definite school of thought in each country that thinks that all the trend in life today towards internationalism is fundamentally against the best interests of the race.

KRISHNAJI: Yes, yes?

INTERVIEWER: These Nationalists feel that the purity of the human races should be kept.

KRISHNAJI: Sir, it is only the purity of the body that you are looking at, is it not?

INTERVIEWER: Partly, and the implications which arise.

KRISHNAJI: You cannot keep ideas from passing from country to country. Ideas are like the air.

INTERVIEWER: Ideas are international, yes, but

KRISHNAJI: Some people may object, but you cannot live without air and you cannot live without ideas; and ideas have no nationality.

INTERVIEWER: So long as ideas remain innocuous and do not really affect humanity, they circulate without hindrance.

KRISHNAJI: Ideas gradually change all things.

INTERVIEWER: That is my point: are these ideas going to result in great ultimate changes -

KRISHNAJI: Surely.

INTERVIEWER: -or are the strong individuals going to succeed in keeping people where they are?

KRISHNAJI: Sir, just a minute. Take the Labour Party in England. Ten years ago everyone laughed at it. Now it is coming up, they are quite afraid of it now. In exactly the same manner.

INTERVIEWER: These ideas of yours will grow and grow.

KRISHNAJI: Of course. Like the idea of the League of Nations. Everybody laughed at that at first.

INTERVIEWER: But take the early beginnings of Christianity. What was it that kept the vital ideas of early Christianity alive? Was is not the persecution to which the Christians were subjected? Can your ideas go forward and spread and affect the world, without the necessity of a tremendous struggle of some kind?

KRISHNAJI: Of course, that is just the point.

INTERVIEWER: Suppose I go back to my own country and that I and those who share your views just live quietly and naturally, these ideas of yours will just remain

KRISHNAJI: -be merely intellectual. I quite agree.

INTERVIEWER: We have got to do something. Have we to go out and talk, or have we to do something new?

KRISHNAJI: The first thing to do is to change oneself. Practise is the first thing, not precept. Change yourselves inside and then go out and talk.

INTERVIEWER: Get hold of the ideas first and then go out -

KRISHNAJI: How did Peter and Paul and all those people do? First they got enthusiastic about it and then they went out with the fire of enthusiasm, saying: I will go out and tell of this thing that I have known.

INTERVIEWER: It is my feeling, I quite admit, that we cannot divorce ourselves from the old idea of propaganda.

KRISHNAJI: But propaganda in the old style is hopeless. Propaganda with practice and definite example has much greater power. You are lying it. It is your own fire that is making you do it, not because somebody tells you.

The discussion then turned to Mr. Krishnamurti's views on war.

INTERVIEWER: I have heard you refer several times in your talks to war. It seems to me that much of the best that humanity has ever got has come through war. Religious wars have often liberated men from petty tyrannies of ceremonialism; have to a great extent established freedom of thought. Could these good results have been obtained otherwise?

KRISHNAJI: Otherwise than by war, you mean, sir? Otherwise than by war?

INTERVIEWER: Yes, exactly, war. Otherwise than by fighting.

KRISHNAJI: It is like saying, "I have grown strong through disease". Your strength is not caused by disease, is not the outcome of disease.

INTERVIEWER: No. But I would put it this way: War is the outcome of intelligent revolt -on a big scale.

KRISHNAJI: I do not agree. It is unintelligent revolt. I consider war to be the revolt of the stupid.

INTERVIEWER: Yes.

KRISHNAJI: Look at the result. War is like a river that has burst its banks. There is tremendous overflowing waste. Useless, stupid waste of intelligence. A waste that breeds contention and more contention. It all arises, I think, because the purpose of life has been lost; hence all these things are the result of a vain life.

INTERVIEWER: Quite so. But that vanity.

KRISHNAJI: Not the true sense of vanity, rather the uselessness of life, not the vanity of life.

INTERVIEWER: Well, the uselessness of life. You have that in the world today and it is resulting in a condition of things where the overflow, the bursting of the banks may take place any time.

KRISHNAJI: Yes, yes. What is your question?

INTERVIEWER: Although you have said again and again that we can escape from the necessity of war I cannot quite see that we have yet reached the stage where that is possible.

KRISHNAJI: But that is like saying that we have not reached the stage where we can progress, can do good, without doing evil. It is no good saying to a man that he cannot keep well unless he becomes diseased. Just think it out.

INTERVIEWER: It may be that efforts will again be made to enchain mankind physically, to do away with small nationalities -and unless the individual revolts against the oppressor greater evil will come.

KRISHNAJI: No, how do you know?

INTERVIEWER: I do not know. I am just wondering. Have we rather to remove causes?

KRISHNAJI: But of course. I do not deny that good has and does ultimately come out of evil. But that is no reason to pursue evil that you may get good out of it. Why not go to it directly and get good out of everything -remove the causes? Sir, you would not say -I put it this way- in order to appreciate freedom we should put people in prison.

INTERVIEWER: No, I see that. I see that argument applied plainly, even to war...

KRISHNAJI: To anything.

INTERVIEWER: There is only one other thing I want to ask about, and it is about things that you have already dealt with in your talks. Is not the great ritualist, cannot a great ritualist be simply a great artist working in that particular medium? Otherwise I cannot see how you can get away from decrying all the great churches, magnificent cathedrals in Europe and elsewhere.

KRISHNAJI: Now you are again saying: Must we go through evil to get good. You mean, sir, you cannot create churches, temples, and these wonderful structures for the sheer love of beauty?

INTERVIEWER: Of course you can.

KRISHNAJI: Your idea is: Let us have ceremony first, out of ceremony will develop a system which will give us powers to create a church of perfection. Why go through this complicated way?

INTERVIEWER: The temple comes as an expression of life.

KRISHNAJI: But after all, a church is only a house, a temple.

INTERVIEWER: Yes, but a house is created for people to live in and it is the idea for which a cathedral is to exist that produces the cathedral. And it seems to me that a great ritualist may be regarded as an artist using the cathedral as his background.

KRISHNAJI: I quite agree. He can be the artist but he goes beyond that when he says, "This is a help to humanity". No artist says "This is a help to humanity".

INTERVIEWER: No.

KRISHNAJI: He just creates. He does not say as does the ritualist, "This is a stage through which you must go".

INTERVIEWER: I can see the possibility of your ideals working out in the individual in a way that will not result in the appearance of people with a blazing flame of enthusiasm within them. Might it not be that you get a number of people who are completely simple and gentle, of a type that the world will pass by?

KRISHNAJI: I do not think so. After all, evolution is attending to that. It may take a long or a short time. Do you not see sir; it is like a man sowing a field. Some seeds will mature while others will die.

INTERVIEWER: And applying that to what I was saying you would hold that the simple people are those who have died out?

KRISHNAJI: No. They will be the people who will fructify, who will give. It must be so, otherwise it would be hopeless. Please, let us take the example of Peter, Paul and all the rest of the apostles of Jesus. Why did not their ideas just die off? Because they were strong within them, because circumstances were such that they were able to do things.

INTERVIEWER: Was it not that the church of the time gripped hold of the ideas, gripped them and kept them before the people? Or was it the martyrdoms that did it?

KRISHNAJI: It was not the church of the time. It was the tortures, the martyrdoms. About what I say nobody cares, everybody laughs, even our own friends do not know, for I have only just begun. They say, "I wonder if it is right or wrong, if it is plausible, if that is the end, if this is the way to attain, if he is telling us the Truth or is just hypnotising himself and deceiving himself." They are uncertain, and what I have to do is to clear up their uncertainty at present. So it is like clearing out a wood for building a house, which will protect the forest from fires. But you must clear the wood, get a space where there will be no trees.

INTERVIEWER: We are at this stage.

KRISHNAJI: Of course.

INTERVIEWER: The final question; You talk of attaining and of people not being sure as to whether this is the method, the way of attaining. Is it possible for an individual to attain, having a real simplicity in his interior life, a perfect calm and peace, or does something have to be added to that

KRISHNAJI: Of course, sir, absolutely.

INTERVIEWER: -some great mystical experience?

KRISHNAJI: That will come. After all, a great many people are very simple, charming, gentle, smooth and still waters and all that, but they have not got the depth. And what gives them depth is experience, suffering, great joys, great enticements, rejections.

A CONVERSATION WITH STOKOWSKI

Eerde, Holland, 1928

STOKOWSKI: Every art has its medium of expression. The dramatist -stage, actors, lights, costumes, decoration in color and form. The sculptor -stone or wood; the poet words; the painter -canvas and pigment; the musician -air vibration. It seems to me that music is the least material of the arts, and perhaps we could even conceive of an art still subtler than that. I was very impressed by a light-color organ called the "Clavilux'", invented by Thomas Wilfred of New York. He has developed what seems to me a new art of color in form and motion, and it occurred to me that there are aspects of music that are extremely immaterial, that are almost pure spirit -and that some day an art might develop that would be immaterial, pure spirit...

KRISHNAMURTI: Don't you think that it is not so much a question of comparing one art with another as of the evolution of the individual who produces that art? With regard to the possibility of evolving an art still more subtle than music, isn't it the question of inspiration? Inspiration, according to my idea, is keeping intelligence enthusiastically awakened.

STOKOWSKI: I feel that inspiration is almost like a melody or a rhythm, like music that I hear deep, deep inside of me, as if it were a long way off.

KRISHNAMURTI: Because you are a musician you will hear that intelligence to which you are awake all the time, and will interpret it through music. A sculptor would express that intelligence in stone. You see my point? What matters is the inspiration.

STOKOWSKI: But do you think inspiration has much "rapport"...

KRISHNAMURTI: ...yes, connection...

STOKOWSKI: ...with intelligence?

KRISHNAMURTI: In the sense in which I am using it, yes. After all, sir, that is the whole point. If you are not intelligent, you are not a great creator. Therefore, intelligence, if fanned and kept alive, will always act as a medium for inspiration -I don't like the word "medium", because it is used in so many other senses; if you keep intelligence awake all the time, it is searching for ideas, for new ways of connecting itself with life. And that is what I call inspiration. You get a new idea because you are keeping your intelligence awakened.

STOKOWSKI: That is not the sensation I have inside at all. I can describe it this way: when I have an inspiration, it is as if I remember, become conscious of something which five minutes or ten minutes ago somehow came into my brain. It was there before but had not come into my consciousness. I have the feeling that it has been there in the background a long time -I do not know how long-and that it has just come forward.

KRISHNAMURTI: I should say that is intelligence which is working to get this idea. After all, sir, please let us take it concretely: a being without intelligence would not be inspired in the highest sense of the word.

STOKOWSKI: Not in the highest, no.

KRISHNAMURTI: I feel inspired when I see a beautiful thing, beautiful scenery, hear beautiful music, or someone recite poetry, because my intelligence is all the time seeking. I am keeping my intelligence awake, and if there is beauty, I want to translate that vision into something which people will understand. Isn't that it?

STOKOWSKI: That is one form of expression.

KRISHNAMURTI: And there are hundreds of forms. I am only one form, in the sense that we are discussing, and there may be the form of a poet, a sculptor, musician and so on.

STOKOWSKI: I have the feeling inside of me that inspiration comes from a higher level than intelligence.

KRISHNAMURTI: No, I say intelligence is the highest level. Sir, intelligence, to me, is the accumulation of experience; it is the residue of experience.

STOKOWSKI: What is the relation between "intelligence" in your sense of the word and "intuition"?

KRISHNAMURTI: You can't divide intuition from intelligence in the higher sense. A clever man is not an intelligent man. Or, I should rather say that a clever man need not necessarily be an intelligent man.

STOKOWSKI: No, but often there is a great distance between an intelligent man and an intuitive man.

KRISHNAMURTI: Yes, because again it is on a very different scale. Intuition is the highest point of intelligence.

STOKOWSKI: Ah, now I feel entirely with you.

KRISHNAMURTI: Intuition is the highest point of intelligence and, to me, keeping alive that intelligence is inspiration. Now you can only keep alive that intelligence, of which intuition is the highest expression, by experience, by being all the time like a questioning child. Intuition is the apotheosis, the culmination, the accumulation of intelligence.

STOKOWSKI: Yes, that is true. May I ask you another question? If as, you say, liberation and happiness are the aim of our individual lives, what is the final goal of all life collectively? Or, in other words -how does the truth, as you enunciate it, answer the question as to why we are on this earth and toward what goal we are evolving?

KRISHNAMURTI: Therefore the question is: If the goal for the individual is freedom and happiness, what is it collectively? I say, it is exactly the same. What divides individuals? Form. Your form is different from mine, but that life behind you and behind me is the same. So life is unity; therefore your life and my life must likewise culminate in that which is eternal, that which is freedom and happiness.

STOKOWSKI: In the whole design of life do you not find any farther-on goal than freedom and happiness, any farther-on design or function for all of life?

KRISHNAMURTI: Now, sir, isn't it like a child who says: teach me the higher mathematics? My reply would be: It would be useless to teach you higher mathematics unless you have first learnt algebra. If we understand this particular thing, the divinity of that life which lies before us, it is not important to discuss what lies beyond, because we are discussing a thing which is unconditioned with a conditioned mind.

STOKOWSKI: That is perfectly answered, clear and brief. People remember better what is brief. It has always seemed to me that art-works should be anonymous. The question in my mind is: Is a poem, or drama or picture or symphony the expression of its creator, or is he the mediums through which creative forces flow?

KRISHNAMURTI: Sir, that is a point in which I am really interested.

STOKOWSKI: Now, you are a poet and I am a musician. What I am interested in is to compare our sensations when we are creating in our respective mediums. Do you ever feel a total stranger to what you have written?

KRISHNAMURTI: Oh, surely.

STOKOWSKI: I do... and I wake up the next day and say, did I write that? That is not like me at all!

KRISHNAMURTI: Now I say that is inspiration. That is your intuition, the highest point of your intelligence acting suddenly. And that is my whole point. If you keep your mind, your emotions, your body in harmony, pure and strong, then that highest point of intelligence, out of which the intuition acts...

STOKOWSKI: ...will act constantly...

KRISHNAMURTI: ...and consciously...

STOKOWSKI: And one can live by that....

KRISHNAMURTI: Of course. That is the only guide. Now take, for instance, poets, dramatists, musicians, all artists: they should be anonymous, detached from all that they create. I think that is the greatest truth. To be, to give and be detached from what you give. You see what I mean? After all, the greatest artists of the world, the greatest teachers of the world say: "Look here, I have got something which, if you really understand it, would forever unfold your intelligence, would act as your intuition. But don't worship me as an individual -I am not concerned, after all." But most artists want their names put under the picture, they want to be admired. They want their degrees and titles.

STOKOWSKI: Here is an old old question: Is the Truth relative or absolute? Is it the same for all of us, or different for each one?

KRISHNAMURTI: It is neither, sir.

STOKOWSKI: Then what is it?

KRISHNAMURTI: You cannot describe it. You cannot describe that which gives you inspiration to write music, can you? If you were asked: Is it absolute or is it relative, you would answer: "What are you asking me? It is neither." You see, you cannot say it is the absolute or the relative. It is far beyond matter, time and space. Take, for example, the water in that river out there. It is limited by its banks. Then you might say, looking at the water: "Water is always limited", because you see the narrow banks enclosing it. But if you were in the midst of the ocean where you see nothing but water, you could say: "Water is limitless."

STOKOWSKI: That is a perfect answer... you do not need to say any more -that is complete. Is there a standard or criterion of beauty in art, or does each person find his own beauty to which he responds? The question is related to the question of taste. People are always saying, this is good taste, that is bad taste. By what authority do they say that?

KRISHNAMURTI: I should say, by their own experience.

STOKOWSKI: That is a personal response. Then can any authority say what is good or bad in art?

KRISHNAMURTI: No; yet I hold that beauty exists in itself beyond all forms and all appreciations.

STOKOWSKI: Ah, then that is an everlasting thing!

KRISHNAMURTI: Like the eternal perfume of the rose. Sir, you hear music and I hear music; you hear a whole vast plane of vibrations, I only hear that much -but that much fits in with all your vast plane.

STOKOWSKI: Yes. It is a question of personal absorption, experience. So the answer is like that to the other question: In itself it is both relative and absolute, but for us it is relative.

KRISHNAMURTI: Must be!

STOKOWSKI: We see design in life, in the arts, in our body, in machines and everything, and the design of an automobile is made always with the idea of its function. What is the function of life, of all life?

KRISHNAMURTI: To express itself.

STOKOWSKI: How does order come from your doctrine of freedom?

KRISHNAMURTI: Because, sir, freedom is the common goal for all -you admit that. If each man realizes that freedom is the common goal, each one then in shaping, in adapting himself to this common goal can only create order.

STOKOWSKI: Do you mean that, in living up to the ideal of freedom, the ideal of beauty, we must all finally come to the same goal?

KRISHNAMURTI: Of course; is that not so?

STOKOWSKI: ...and so order will come?

KRISHNAMURTI: At present there are you and I and half-a-dozen others who have all got different ideas as to what is the final goal. But if we all sat down and asked: "What is the ultimate aim for each of us?" -we should say, freedom and happiness for one and all. Then even if you work in one way and I in another we still work along our own lines towards the same goal. Then there must be order.

STOKOWSKI: How should society, organized in freedom, treat the man who takes the life of another?

KRISHNAMURTI: At the present time society, working without a goal, puts him into prison or kills him; it is a just vengeance. But if you and I were the authorities who laid down law for society, we should keep in mind all the time that, for the murderer, as for ourselves, the goal is the same, which is freedom. It is no good killing him because he has killed someone else. We should rather say: "Look here, you have misused your experience, you have killed life which was trying to grow through, experience towards freedom. You also want experience, but experience which injures another, which interferes with another, cannot lead to your ultimate happiness and freedom." We should create laws founded on wisdom which is the culmination of experience, and not on the idea of vengeance. If you had a child, and that child did something wrong, you would not promptly put him into a corner. You would make him see the reason why he should not act in that manner.

STOKOWSKI: But what would you do with a child before it could speak and before it could understand what you were saying?

KRISHNAMURTI: I would protect him from things which are harmful to others or to himself. After all, a murderer is only a child...

STOKOWSKI: Yes, you would take the murderer and guard him from hurting others and himself, and educate him...

KRISHNAMURTI: Yes, educate him...

STOKOWSKI: What is the highest and ultimate ideal of education?

KRISHNAMURTI: Teach the child from the very beginning that its goal is happiness and freedom, and that the manner of attainment is through the harmony of all the bodies -mind, emotion and the physical body.

STOKOWSKI: When the child falls below that ideal and hurts itself, or somebody else, or destroys beauty of some kind, how would you describe to the child what would be the ideal course of action, instead of the destructive course that he has followed?

KRISHNAMURTI: Put him into conditions where he will see the ideal. That is, precept, example... Sir, if you are a musician, and I am learning from you, I would watch every movement that you make. After all, you are a master in music, and I want to learn. Don't you see, that is my whole point -the example is lacking...

OMMEN CAMP 1928

Ommen, Holland, 1928

One does not arrive at the Truth, which is unconditioned, unlimited, without shedding a tear. You cannot understand life without going through struggles, without having difficulties, doubts. And the more you have these, the more certain will you be of your understanding. I know that sounds rather hard, but I hope you will understand. Many of you are uncertain, are trying to find out for yourselves; so, if I may, I would suggest that you hold your emotions in check rather more strongly than hitherto; do not let them run away with you. Neither should you be so intellectual that you become hard and callous. Keep, if I may suggest, an even keel, a careful balance between mind and emotions. Do not think for a single moment that I want to upset any one of you or that I want to force decisions upon you. I do not want to urge, or coerce you, in any way. All that I wish to do is to put before you for your examination, and hence for your understanding, that which I have found to be the Truth. You may doubt it; you may say: "That is not what I want; you are not the real Teacher." But do not get caught up in your emotions and feel upset. That is not the way to find the Truth.

If you went into a museum or a picture gallery, you would not pass your criticism on every picture, unless you were a great critic of painting, and yet you are quite willing to criticise and reject without careful examination something which is far more difficult to understand than a picture, something which is far more real than a picture; and that is Life itself.

Do not say: Krishnamurti asks me to renounce. I am not asking anyone to renounce anything, because I do not believe that there is any such thing as renunciation; I do not believe that there is any such thing as a sacrifice. For a person who really understands, there is no renunciation, or sacrifice, or reconciliation. I do not want you to do anything of that kind; and please believe me when I tell you that I am speaking out of the fullness of my heart. Because I see that most people are unhappy, struggling, I want to help. If that were not my desire, I should not be here; I would much rather go away into a quiet place. Do not think that I am saying this out of hardness of heart. I do not want you to make up your minds either to accept or reject this. I want you to examine all things impartially, sanely, without being carried away by emotions or by intellectual theories. A cultured person is one who is not prejudiced in any manner whatsoever, who is desirous and capable of examining all things impartially, and who does not let his emotions and prejudices play havoc with him.

I am certain of that which I put forward -I knew it for myself; but you do not know, and so do not get upset by it, or feel irritable or superior. Examine it, and see if it is not the only solution in the world that will give lasting happiness; if it is not the only way of finding that Truth, and that freedom, which is happiness. That is the attitude you should adopt and not just rejection or acceptance of what I say. You want that which I have found, and to have it and to live with it and to embrace it you must approach it sanely, with balanced emotions and mind. It is not by becoming over-serious that you find the true proportion of things. And if you would laugh a little more at yourselves and at all your theories and at my theories too, all would be well.

QUESTION: If the Order of the Star is a bridge, carrying your teaching to the world, may not other organizations, movements, ceremonies, even churches, also act as bridges for your teaching, and to bring people into touch with you and the Truth you represent?

KRISHNAJI: A friend of mine said the other day, "You have got a complex with regard to ceremonies". Now I have no complex about ceremonies. It would be an absurd thing to make of ceremonies a principle over which to fight. It is as unessential, from my point of view, as whether it is a cloudy or a sunny day. So please put away from your minds that I want to attack ceremonies, that I have a complex with regard to them. One should not make of ceremonies a principle essential for the understanding of Truth and hence of Life. Then with regard to organizations, I would like to say this: I do not think anyone need belong to any organization, even to the Star. Organizations always usurp the Truth, and so there is danger that, instead of leading the people across the bridge towards the Truth, they prevent people from attaining. For this reason I am always rather wary of organizations. You make a chair to sit upon, but if you let the chair sit upon you, it is absurd. So likewise with organizations. If the Star movement is a bridge, which I hope it is, to carry the ideas that I put forward, and which you are to examine -you are the bridge, you compose the organization. You are the foundations of that bridge. If the foundation is not strong, the bridge will collapse. If you do not maintain the firmness, the purity of its purpose, which is to bring the world towards the absolute, the infinite Truth, then an organization will be useless and dangerous. Please do not think that, because I happen to be the Head of this organization, I want this movement to be maintained at all costs; I do not care, because, as I have carefully stated over and over again, organizations are not in themselves most essential. There are many who object to organizations -they do not want to give pledges, affirm beliefs, or accept conditions. And this organization of the Star exists purely to spread the idea, but not to be a tabernacle of the Truth; there is in this a great deal of difference. This organization should not claim that it is the special way towards the Truth, that it has a special benediction. No movement, no religious organization, must ever claim a special benediction or assert itself to be the particular path to Truth. This would be a limitation on life and hence a betrayal of Truth. Wherever there is a search, a longing, a desire to seek the Truth, there Truth exists -not in an organization of any type, however sanctified it be.

"Can other organizations help to bring people in touch with you and the Truth you represent?" This depends not on organizations but on you. Friend, you are the maker of organizations, you can either make them great, wide, include everything and exclude nothing, or you can make them narrow, limited, a closed body of dogmatic, narrow-minded and credulous people. That depends not on me but on you.

Whether other organizations can help, I do not know. I am not concerned. If I said certain organizations do help, and others do not help, and so on, you would be asking me why certain organizations help and others do not help. It is not the organizations that reveal the Truth; it is the individual who understands that helps; it is the individual who has found the Truth that creates lastingly. Truth does not depend on organizations of any kind, however ancient, however modern. And because each organization claims to be something special, to have in it special paths towards the Truth, they are betraying, they are corrupting, the Truth. Consider diligently and you will have understanding; reject violently without thought, and you will have no understanding. Little use to tell me, "We have been told of this, and that". Against that I have no answer. What I am concerned with is the purification and the stability of the mind and of the heart and not with organizations of any kind. After all, if the mind and the heart are not pure, who can tell you of their purity, of their strength, except yourself? What organization can help you to cleanse them except yourself? Because you depend on organizations, religious and moral, on outside authority for your strength, for your purification, for your sustenance, those organizations usurp and pervert your understanding.

QUESTION: Since Krishnaji does not want compromises, should we not abandon movements other than the Star?

KRISHNAJI: I am not going to tell you what to abandon and what not to abandon. For me there is no such thing as compromise, because I have nothing with which to compromise. I cannot compromise with something I have no use for. For a person who has crossed to the further share there can be no compromise with the shore which he has left behind. He has finished with it. There is compromise, there must be compromise, for a person who has yet to learn to cross, who is only investigating, who is all the time only looking at the other shore, but who has not the courage, the determination, the desire to cross to it.

If you abandon any movement because someone else tells you to do so, you will be putting yourself again into another cage. The modern tendency is not to join movements, to take pledges or to subscribe to definite objects. I have talked to many people in America, in India and in Europe and they ask: Must I join your Order? I say: Not at all. Talk to any young person who has enthusiasm, and you will find that he does not ever want to join anything. Most people join movements from the desire to seek salvation, the desire to seek certainty, the desire to seek comfort. Nobody can save you from outside -"save" is a curious word, but we will use it for the moment. The moment that you are your own guide, your own authority and your own creator, everything is well. It is much more simple to rely on your own self than to hang your soul on the peg of a movement.

QUESTION: Please tell us the ways in which we can hinder your work.

KRISHNAJI: At last, an honest question! I am afraid you are doing that successfully by not understanding what I am saying. Friend, it is not my work you are doing. You are doing your own work, and not my work. You can hinder yourself or make yourself helpful to yourself. My work is to help you to awaken your desire of attainment, of illumination, of liberation, and how you work it out is of not very great importance. You will attain, but how you can hinder most will depend on each one of you. Most people think that they are helping. I am afraid the first thing for them to realize is that they are not helping; because when you once admit that you are not helping, then you are clearing the ground to build, clearing away the forest of misunderstanding and letting in the light.

But if you say, "I understand everything", "it is very simple," then that is the way in which you are destructive, in which you are not helping. But most of you are saying all the time, "Oh, I understand you perfectly!".

QUESTION: Does Krishnaji think there are any specific movements, organizations or groups which have the power to hinder his work in the world?

I leave that to you; organizations, groups, movements, are yourselves. If you do not understand, you cannot help; and if you cannot help, the organizations and the groups or the movements to which you belong will not help either. So it is a vicious circle. You should solve problems first, gain your understanding first, and then organizations, groups, sects, and movements, will not much matter.

QUESTION: After having shown us the goal, and emphasised the necessity for destruction, can you make somewhat clearer the means by which we may reach that goal? Much stress has been laid on the destructive side of the work. Why is the constructive one so vaguely spoken of?

KRISHNAJI: "The necessity for destruction" -I do not know of what!... "After having shown us the goal..." -I have not shown you the goal. I want to awaken the desire in you to see the goal, and you will see it. If I showed you the goal, the absolute Truth without finality, it would not be the Truth for you; and if I establish for you the way towards the Truth, it will not be the way for you. It is easy to establish a way, to lay down certain ethical, moral laws which will bind you; but that is not my purpose... "Can you make somewhat clearer the means by which we shall reach the goal?" -But surely that is what I have been trying to do! That is what I have been trying to explain. But you must understand, you must create the goal, the path, not I. You would like me to say: "Get up in the morning at such-and-such a time, meditate for so many hours. Do not eat this but eat that. Think this but do not think that." You would like me to circumscribe, limit your life, and your understanding. You will then think that that is showing you the way. Life points the way to him who is desirous of understanding the Truth.

It is because you segregate yourself, because you keep yourself away from life, that you want me to show you the goal and the manner of attaining it. I have watched people who have a very systematic life, who get up at a precise hour, who eat in the prescribed manner of the so-called spiritual being -whatever that be- who do not think those things which they have been told they should not think. I have watched these people and they have not that which is the freshness of life. It is not through limiting, through a narrow and unintelligent observance of petty disciplines, that you attain. Truth is far beyond these disciplines, systems and observances. Truth does not concern itself with what you eat, in what manner you meditate, by what path you come to its understanding. It says: "I am, and if you love me, struggle with life, struggle with every event of the day, and try to understand, but do not put a limitation upon your understanding."

"Much stress has been laid upon the destructive side of the work. Why is the constructive one so vaguely spoken of?" -You cannot create without first destroying the complications around life, without making life simple. You cannot build where there are already buildings. If you would build, you must have clear space to lay deep the foundations. That is not destruction. You are only looking at the negative side all the time, because that is more convenient, and never at the positive side, which is the constructive side. If you listen diligently, you will see that there is neither destruction nor construction. If you open the door of life, and do not try to curb it, it will build where it is necessary; but because you try to curb it, warp it, then for you there is renunciation which is destruction, which is the waste of time, and for you there is sacrifice, because you have to make straight those things which are crooked.

QUESTION: Is it right to regard spiritual movements generally as similar to Krishnaji's movement? Are they not quite different?

KRISHNAJI: First of all, I have no movement. I refuse to be made into a cause, so that through me you can save your souls. Most people want causes so that they can embellish their own desire or further their own longing. They want to evolve through the cause of another rather than through themselves. But the last thing I want to do is to start a movement. Therefore there is no point in asking if "certain movements are the same as Krishnaji's movement." After all, I do not want -and I mean this sincerely and I hope you will believe it in the fullness of your heart- I really do not want to create another cage for you. What happens in most organizations, in most religious bodies, most movements, in that they ask you to leave your narrow little cage and come into their narrow little cage. It may perhaps be a little bigger but it is a cage nevertheless. And what I would do, what I shall do, is to have no cages at all, but to instil and awaken that burning desire for liberation so that you will not create a cage for yourselves around ideas, around personalities. But the moment you regard me as starting a new movement in opposition to another, the whole conception that I have of life is perverted.

I was asked in Paris by a newspaper reporter whether I was a Theosophist, whether I was a Hindu, whether I was this or that; and whether everyone must become Theosophists, Hindus and Star members in order to understand what I am saying. I said: You need not become a Theosophist or a Star member at all. And I further added that I was neither a Theosophist nor a non-Theosophist. After all, these are only labels, and there is a much bigger thing behind all labels. It is no good taking shelter behind a label, taking comfort in a movement.

As regards the question, "Are they not quite different?" -if you think they are different, they must be different.

When the first cubist picture was exhibited in Paris there was a furore against it, but people soon began to appreciate it. They all had some ideas about it, and now cubism has become quite fashionable. If you had asked a cubist painter: Are you starting cubism in opposition to the old way of painting? -He would have said: No, this is entirely different from that to which either your mind or your heart is accustomed. And that is what is happening today; in the same way there are many people in the world who are critical at the present moment, saying that I have come to destroy this and that, and that there is nothing constructive. Anything new -though there is nothing new under the sun- is bound to be misunderstood at the beginning. But there will also be those who will open their minds to reason and grapple with the new, and by that reasoning and by that struggle, open their hearts to further happiness.

QUESTION: The impression of a World-Teacher as generally conceived conveys above all the idea of Compassion. Some people find in your teaching the lack of that quality. Could you define your conception of compassion?

KRISHNAJI: A surgeon who sees a disease that is eating up a man, says: In order to cure him, I must operate. Another less experienced doctor comes, feeds him and lulls him to sleep. Which would you call the more compassionate? You want comfort, that comfort which is born of decay and which you imagine is compassion, affection, true love. The shadow of that comfort you would have, but if I gave it to you, that would not be the work of a real Teacher, of an individual who has attained. If, on the contrary, I were to show to you your own weaknesses, which are the causes of many diseases, and show to you the manner of stopping those diseases, you would say: That is not compassion. If you are suffering greatly, you go to a doctor to have the pain relieved. If the doctor is wise, he will not tell you to go on eating in the same manner as before, to enjoy the same fleeting pleasures of life; he will tell you to leave your pleasures, your fleeting enjoyments, and withdraw for a while to gather strength. But such a doctor you will not have; because he speaks the truth, he is more difficult to follow and to understand, whereas you would call another, who feeds your vanities and gives you innumerable passing comforts, the doctor of true compassion. How little understanding you have of compassion! When a mother watches her child falling, although she may help him occasionally, her desire is that he shall grow strong, and so she does not prevent him from falling. Would you not call that compassion, affection, or love? Which is nobler, or greater -to awaken the strength that lies hidden within each one, that he may ascend the mountainside for himself, or to leave him weak and pull him up the mountainside?

There was once a man who was lame. He was healed, but after some days he was taken to prison for some act of immorality. Which would be better -so heal the desires which cause the wounds, or to heal the momentary wounds, which would only lead to greater sorrows and greater pains?

All of you want comfort and hope and the dangling of heaven in front of you, and you would call that "compassion". You want to be led from one hope to another hope, from one longing to another longing, from one desire to another desire, from one satisfaction to another satisfaction. To a man who offered you that, you would give the laurels of compassion, whereas of a man who does not give hope, but who gives you the real understanding of life, so that you will conquer for yourself all ailments, all diseases and all sorrows and all pains, you say: That man has no heart or his heart is dry and empty.

If you have no real understanding of compassion, you will create the shadow of comfort, as so many have done, and thereby betray the Truth. If you do not understand compassion in its full sense, you will build up many cages, adorned, embellished and decorated. If you do not understand this quality of affection, you will build temples in which there shall be graven images for the passing comfort of others, which will again be the stepping down and hence the betrayal of the Truth. If you do not understand this love, you will create on the mountainside shelters that shall take away their strength, that shall hold people in darkness.

NATIONAL ORGANISERS MEETING

Ommen, Holland, 1928

QUESTION: You say that organizations are only of real value if they do not claim to be the vessels of Truth. If the Order of the Star is to remain a bridge between the Truth and the world, how far should it dissociate itself completely from movements, which, according to many, are claiming to be the vessels of Truth? Please consider the practical implications.

KRISHNAJI: One need never actively dissociate oneself from anything; by one's attitude one can accomplish all things. If you are going to dissociate yourself from those organizations -and I do not know which organizations are referred to in this question- your dissociation would imply that you are afraid of getting entangled. Because you are frightened of catching diseases you avoid them, but if you are clean, healthy and strong, no disease will attack you.

I do not desire that the Order should become a tabernacle for Truth. We must take care therefore to keep the organization pure, in the sense that it will act as a bridge.

QUESTION: In our desire not to compromise with Truth, we may feel it our duty to dissociate ourselves from spiritual and religious organizations. May not such action on the part of a National Organizer commit the Order to another form of belief or disbelief?

KRISHNAJI: It depends on the individual. I know all that is implied in this question. I am not going to decide this for you, though that is what you want. You would like me to say: Dissociate yourselves from everything; from this, that and the other organization. What would happen if I asked you to do this? You would act upon it, you would be obeying my authority, but there would be uncertainty in your minds and out of this uncertainty there would come to you unhappiness and a great disturbance. But if you decide for yourselves and are certain of your decision, you will not waver and your decision will be your guide. You have all been brought up to rely on authority, but Truth is never found in the authority of another, Truth is not hidden in the shelter of authority. So you have to abandon all authorities and depend upon yourselves. Because you have been nurtured and supported by authority, because all your hopes have been established in authority, you are frightened when I say: Do not depend on authority but depend on your own knowledge of life, on your own intuition, which is the consummation of all intelligence, which again is the result of experience. You want me to exert authority, but to me that would be impossible, as I hold that authority destroys understanding; I hold that you can attain only by your own struggles, by your own doubts, by your own understanding of life. For many years I held many beliefs, I never questioned and I never invited doubt, but rather I shunned it. When I began to think for myself, I no longer accepted the authority of anyone, I began to cast the shadow of doubt on everything. In this manner I put away all shadows and I became the reality. Now I am certain of that which remains with me. I have no fear, for no one can give or take away the Truth which is mine. You must no longer be like children to be told what you should do. It is not in this manner that one finds Truth.

QUESTION: Members of the Order of the Star desire to establish your ideals in the world. Can your ideals be expressed in concrete terms for others or must each one find these ideals for himself? If the latter, can there be coordinated work? Will there not be conflict?

KRISHNAJI: You mean that what I say is not concrete enough. You want disciplines, you want regular, narrow, straight paths laid down on which you can walk. You want me to say that if you follow this, you will attain; if you follow that, you will not attain. You have not understood that what I say is most practical. If it is not practical to you it is because you are not applying it to yourselves, and therefore it will have no power to clear away the dark forest of beliefs in which you are lost. With regard to the conflict, I say that if each one is a lamp unto himself, and guides himself by it, then he will not cast a shadow across the face of another. I do not want to dispute with anyone; I do not want to come into conflict with anyone, because I am following that which I know to be right, and I shall never come into conflict with another; but because you are not following your own light, and are all the time doubting, questioning your own light, wondering whether certain injunctions of authorities are not more certain, you are casting shadows and hence creating confusion.

QUESTION: Most of us have to engage ourselves in some non-creative activity for practical reasons and we find that we are often direct or indirect participators in what we consider action opposed to Truth. How far are we justified in this?

KRISHNAJI: This question is based upon another: What is important and what is unimportant in the light of Truth? Isn't that so? You must first discover what is Truth, and when you have understood though you may not have attained -you will never concede, you will never compromise with that Truth; though in things that are of very little importance in the light of Truth, you will concede and compromise.

QUESTION: Most of us have relied so far on external sources for spiritual inspiration. You ask us to reject such sources as useless. What shall we put in their place?

KRISHNAJI: I do not ask you to reject anything. If you rely on inspiration from outside, there is always the probability, the certainty even, that your inspiration will vanish. I say: Rely for your inspiration on Life itself; be in love with Life, and Life will always inspire you. Be in love with Truth, with the Goal towards which humanity is struggling and you will need no external inspiration. I am not taking anything away, you yourselves are taking away what you no longer need. I am not emptying your cup, it may perchance be that you have filled it with impure waters and now realizing that they are impure, you pour them out, and are filling the cup anew. Please realize that I am not taking away anything. On the contrary, if you understand truly you will find that you are filling, not only your cups, but the cups of others, with the lasting waters that shall quench forever all thirst. But if you do not understand your cup will remain empty, or full to the brim with impure waters. I am afraid that you always consider the negative side of what I am saying, never the positive, never the dynamic but the static; and because of this you feel that you are left with nothing, that you are hollow as a shell. If someone can really take away what you possess then it is not worth possessing. I should welcome anyone who took away those things that are not worth having. How do you think that you can find the lasting, the eternal? By continually putting aside the things that you have gathered, by ever going forward, never remaining in one shelter -however comforting, however protecting it may be- for therein is stagnation and decay. You are afraid of the coming rains that shall wash away the accumulation of ages and make all things pure.

QUESTION: What is the best way to answer the people who inquire about the Order of the Star? When I say that we believe in the presence of the World-Teacher, I find that it is difficult to explain to them what the World Teacher is.

KRISHNAJI: I was talking to a friend of mine in America who had never heard about the World-Teacher. I talked with him for many hours. At the end he said, "I do not know what you are, whether you are the Messiah or the World-Teacher, but what you say seems to be right, and I am going to try to understand and live it".

Later he asked, "Must I accept the fact that you are the World-Teacher or the Messiah?" I said, "Do not bother about this. If what I say has Truth in it -if it shines by its own light, you should follow and understand that light, and that is all that matters". Because I am certain of what I am, it is very simple to me; but because you are uncertain, you find all these difficulties. It is because you believe on authority, that you want to transplant that authority into the hearts of others.

If you as individuals have understood and are transforming your lives., your whole attitude, your minds and hearts, then people will listen to you and you will be able to go out and give them the balm that shall heal their wounds. It is because you are uncertain, because in your minds there is confusion and disturbance, that you do not know how to answer.

QUESTION: If we are asked by people on what ground we believe that you, Krishnaji, are the World-Teacher, what answer would you like us to give?

KRISHNAJI: I know the questioner is very serious, but his seriousness is misleading. If you merely repeat words which you have learned from me, they will have no value to anyone. How do you know that I am the World-Teacher? Some of you know neither Krishnamurti nor the World-Teacher. It is amusing and yet in a sense tragic, that you should pay such importance to words. I have been saying over and over again that it does not matter out of what well you draw the waters so long as the waters are pure, so long as the waters shall quench the thirst of men. You are concerned about the construction of the well and not with the waters.

QUESTION: A friend of mine told me that since he has known Krishnaji and his teachings he feels that he has been greatly helped to look at life with more understanding. He desires in return to help Krishnaji by reaching that inner happiness, of which Krishnaji speaks, but the conditions of his life are so utterly adverse to making happiness for himself possible, that he feels that he simply cannot reach that inner harmony and calmness which seem to be a preliminary condition for happiness and hence liberation.

What should we answer to such a friend, and what can we, who probably are in less adverse conditions of life, do to help him?

KRISHNAJI: In other words, he "feels that he simply cannot reach that inner harmony." You cannot reach that inner harmony away from your circumstances. You cannot attain that happiness away from the world. Because then you would be making that happiness something apart from the life of the world, and I say: The very life of the world in its fulfilment is happiness.

QUESTION: You say that God is man purified. Please explain this.

KRISHNAJI: Friend, are you not God manifested, in limitation? In fulfilling, in freeing that limited life, you attain that Supreme Intelligence without limitation, which is beyond thought. Where is the difficulty? Because the majority of people in the world have an idea that God is a being with a long beard, who is concerned with everyone individually, guiding and protecting him. Life and this idea of God come into conflict. But if you treat Life as this Intelligence -God, Truth, Happiness, Liberation- and not some superhuman being far away, then that Life itself will be an inspiration, that Life itself will guide and will protect you.

Life is God, Nirvana, freedom, and all things. That Life in its fulfilment, in its freedom, is perfection. But do not seek comfort behind these words, or shelter from the understanding, the struggle, the sorrow and the rejoicings of Life.

QUESTION: Have I rightly understood the opinion which you have often given concerning the value of ceremonies? Does it regard only our inner attitude towards them, which must be one of detachment?

KRISHNAJI: If you rely on anything whatsoever for your happiness, for your understanding, then that on which you rely will never give you satisfaction.

You ask me if ceremonies must be put aside. Do not put anything aside. Do what you think is right, not because of what I say. I say that all things on which you depend are crutches and limit you. If you would attain understanding, you must set them aside, but it must be as the outcome of your own understanding and not because of the persuasion of another.

QUESTION: Are the World-Teacher and the World-Mother incarnations of the Universal Masculine and Feminine principles?

KRISHNAJI: Life is neither masculine nor feminine. As I am only concerned with Life, these things have little importance to me. I am concerned with the way to free Life, and these expressions of Life to me are again of little importance.

Is life masculine and feminine? In the expression of Life there is man and woman, but it is Life that matters and not all these expressions of Life. These forms of Life are to you important and not Truth and the way to its attainment which is the way to the freedom of Life. In the light of Truth, the unessentials pass away and the essentials remain. But to attain that understanding, you must struggle, you must strive, you must have tears and doubt. Do not repeat after me words without understanding, for authority is like the pernicious weed that grows in the garden and kills all beautiful flowers.

I want you to be certain that it is Life which matters, that Life alone is of value. I am concerned with Life and the way to free that Life so that happiness may be attained.

QUESTION: Theosophy, as all religions do, teaches us to follow the divine manifestation in its stages of involution and evolution. But the Teacher says that a man can attain liberation at any stage of evolution. Is there not a danger of breaking the laws of evolution in seeking to liberate us before the time arrives?

KRISHNAJI: How can any person liberate you? How can an external authority, however magnificent or great, free you from your desires, from your longings, from your burdens? You will have to free yourselves -and no one can do this for you- and then there will be no breaking of the laws of evolution, even if you were to free yourselves tomorrow. You can bind the future to the present.

On a nice, warm, sunny day, the flowers that come into being rejoice, and do not question the reason why they are brought forth before others.

QUESTION: Yes or no, is the Liberal Catholic Church a direct instrument of the World-Teacher, as in 1925 at the Star Congress in Ommen Dr. Besant declared it to be? She then spoke, as she said, by order and in the name of the Lord Maitreya, the World-Teacher, and now, by the lips of Krishnamurti, the Lord declares that religions and churches are without importance. What about this contradiction?

KRISHNAJI: I say that ceremonies, churches, beliefs, religions, are unnecessary for the freedom of life. I am not going to say: Yes, or No. That is much too easy a way out of your difficulty, and in that direction lies authority and not the cultivation of understanding. Why do you do anything in life? Because somebody tells you to do it? Why do you paint, why do you compose or sing, or do anything else? Because someone else urges you? In obeying the authority of another lies the bondage of Life. If I said yes or no to this question, what would be then your attitude of mind? You yourself must decide. You must come away from the shelter of authority and seek. In that way alone lies freedom and the attainment of happiness. I do not want to say: Reject one and accept the other, and thus again create confusion in your minds. You must ponder over it, and do what you think is right, and not act on authority. Try to look at all these questions not from a limited point of view. In limitation lie confusion and torment, and away from all limitation lie clearness and understanding. All religions, as I have said, are the productions of crystallized, frozen thought. You cannot systematize thought.

No great Teacher wanted to found a religion. True understanding does not lie in bondage.

I am sorry to disturb all your carefully constructed edifices. You come to listen to me and you will take that which is convenient and pleasant to your heart, and you will reject that which is unpleasant. Probably I shall be asked again as I have been asked so often: Are you really the Teacher? You will have to find out for yourselves who I am. You will not find this out by contradictions, wranglings, discussions, controversies; but by striving after Truth, you will discover.

I hope that, by asking these questions, your minds and hearts are freed from confusion. All these questions are based, not upon the desire to find out the Truth, but rather upon the wish to create new authorities in the place of the old. I want to show you the way to free Life, but all the time you are concerned about the unessential things. Not about Life, but about the various manifestations of that Life, the numerous shadows that are cast across that manifestation.

When you understand this which the world needs, all trivialities fall away as the leaves in autumn. But that which is eternal, that happiness which is everlasting and that Truth without variation, without beginning and without end, does not really interest you. You are principally concerned about the immediate shadow of authority, the immediate present in which you are caught up. That is of more importance than that which I am saying. But as the mountain-top is a mystery to the valley, so to the man who dwells in the plains, where lie shadows, changing visions of the eternal, is Truth a mystery. I want you to look, not all the time from the valleys, from the plains, but from the mountain-top.

LONDON LECTURE

London, UK, 1928

AS I AM going to speak only for forty-five minutes I should like you to give your intelligent criticism to whatever I am going to say, rather than blind credulity. I should like you throughout my speech not to accept anything, because if you accept without true understanding there is a possibility of misleading you from a proper understanding of life.

My purpose this evening is to explain a certain point of view which I hold -to which you have come to listen- and in order to understand it fully and intelligently I should like you to be critical rather than accept anything blindly.

As I am going to speak only for a short time I am not going to enter into details, I am only going to generalise, and you, when you get back home, will have to think it out for yourselves. Only, I would beg of you, do not reject, do not accept, but use judgement with understanding and critical examination, with the desire to discover.

Now to go on with that as an introduction. Everywhere, in all countries and among all peoples, there is a desire to find out something which is hidden, which people think will satisfy their hunger for knowledge, the satisfaction of their desire for the understanding of life. Everyone in the world seeks Truth and imagines that Truth is away from the ordinary current of life, whereas Truth IS life. The understanding of life gives a knowledge of Truth and the moment you understand the working of life you are beginning to understand the working of Truth. Now most people in the world imagine that Truth is hidden away from general existence, from the ordinary human mind, from the ordinary man of thought and feeling -imagine that they must retire from the world to seek Truth, that they must acquire certain qualities, certain knowledge, experience certain sorrows and certain pleasures. I want to show this evening that the moment you understand life as it is taking place around each one of you, then you understand Truth and by understanding Truth you will solve the problems of your own lives.

There is no God except a man purified, and there is no Power exterior to himself which controls him -no guide other than himself. There is no heaven or hell, good or evil, except that which he creates himself, and hence man is solely responsible to himself and to no one else.

Now before you accept any of these things, or rather examine these things that I am going to say, I should like to suggest that for this evening at least you should not be bound by prejudice, because prejudice is like a shadow on the face of the mountain, like a cloud across the fair skies. Prejudice warps the mind so that it is incapable of understanding; prejudice is like a leaf that falls in the springtime and is destroyed by the foot of man. So a mind that desires to understand life, that is full of the desire for the knowledge of life, must be without prejudice, not already made up, narrow, limited.

In order to understand life, which is Truth, and in order to understand that each one of you is solely responsible to himself and not to another -responsible to no exterior Power, to no God or spiritual authority, to no superhuman deity- in order to understand that, you should not have a mind that is biased, that is overwhelmed by tradition.

I have just come from a country, my own country, where I have travelled seven thousand miles and visited many towns and talked to numerous people, and there one of the most difficult things is to make a mind understand and perceive clearly without prejudice; for we are, in the East, as elsewhere, full of tradition, and bringing that tradition forward to judge, it warps our minds. Tradition is necessary so long as you use it for a crutch -tradition is essential for a child, but we are not children. We have minds and hearts which are capable of clear thought and clean feelings and we must judge everything for its own sake and not be biased by any belief that we hold to be dear or true. Most people in the world bind life by beliefs, by traditional morality, and hence their lives are narrow, limited and unhappy. It is like binding the waters in your garment, or taking the wind in your fist. That is what every human being is doing, binding his life by a set of beliefs, dogmas and creeds. And in order to understand what I am going to say this evening I should like you to be without such prejudice. For I hold that it is not necessary to have any belief in order to lead a clean life, a noble life, a pure life.

This is nothing new, for there is nothing new under the sun, only new things come to those who discover, and I have discovered -I am saying this without conceit and with all humility. I have found the source that gives happiness. I have a mind ... by innumerable beliefs, by traditions, but a mind that is willing to examine all things that are put before it with clearness, with interest and with intelligence. This is the first requirement for the understanding of Truth, for the liberation of life from its narrow limitations, its beliefs, dogmas and creeds.

Take what is happening with modern painting, modern architecture and everything that is connected with modern thought and feeling. The other day in Paris I was with a friend of mine who is a well-known modern painter, and he showed me one of his pictures -one of those super-realist pictures. My first instinct was to reject it, but my friend said: "Do not judge. You are used to a certain form of painting, in which there is definite proportion, definite colour, definite idea, relief, and so on. I am trying to paint a picture which very few have attempted, and it may be absurd, but I want your intelligent and unprejudiced understanding. If you will examine it in that way you will understand what I am painting." And after a while I found that where before there was no form, no colour, no proportion and relief now there was form, there was colour, there was relief. At the beginning, because my mind was accustomed to a particular idea of form, colour and proportion, I could not understand.

So, likewise, a prejudiced mind requires a certain definite form, a mould, through which life, Truth, must come. A Hindu requires Truth to appear through his own particular form of religion; a Christian demands Truth through his own particular form, so does a Buddhist, a Mohammedan, and so on. But Truth never comes through a form, or through any definite mould which has been created by the hand of man, and in order to understand Truth, which is life, you must come prepared with an unbiased and unprejudiced heart and mind. I have said that is the first requirement. You may be Christians, Theosophists, or anything else, and hold to all the paraphernalia of religions and beliefs, but if you want to understand life -as I want to show it to you- I would make that the first condition.

Secondly, in order to understand life, and hence Truth, you should be discontented, you should be in revolt against all established beliefs, dogmas and creeds. Take what is happening throughout the world today. Wherever you go, especially among the younger generation, there is a spirit of revolt against the established order and against the established idea of morality. There is a discontentment with authority -and this is quite right, because a mind and a heart that is merely satisfied is like a pond in the peaceful wood. On such a pond the green scum grows and no animals or human beings come to it to quench their thirst. It is stagnant, and so, likewise, a mind that is satisfied. Without revolt, without discontentment, you will never find Truth. Without this revolt you will never solve the problems of your lives. Now it is very easy to get into a state of so-called discontentment, and it is equally easy to get into a state which you call contentment. The discontentment I want is intelligent discontentment. Intelligence is the accumulation of all experience and hence when you are discontented intelligently you are beginning to create, and in creation and not in destruction, lies the solution of life. That is the second qualification I should like to suggest for the understanding of Truth.

The third is that you should have a mind and a heart that are simple. Now, simplicity does not mean crudeness. Do not look at simplicity from the old fashioned, traditional, narrow, limited point of view of putting on ashes and sack-cloth, of being generally dirty, untidy, and withdrawing one's self from the world in order to solve the problems of life. I do not mean that kind of simplicity. Take a leaf and watch it. How simple it is. But behind it there lie many winters, many springs, many summers, and many autumns. It is the production of great experience, great sorrow, great struggle, out of which simplicity is born. That is what is required for the understanding of Truth. A mind and a heart that are not prejudiced, a mind and a heart that are in intelligent revolt, and a mind and a heart that are made simple through great experience.

Now with that as our canvas let us paint a picture. What is it that every human being in the world craves for? What is it that every human being, of whatever religion, whatever nationality or colour, at whatever stage of experience or inexperience, desires? What is it that everyone of you in this audience desire? You long to be happy, and that is the highest spirituality.

Every human being wants to be happy and for the attainment of that happiness he must have immense experience -not of one short life, but of many lives. Such happiness is the culmination, the apotheosis of all experience, and yet it is beyond all experience, and from the happiness comes liberation which is freedom from all things because you have learnt from all things. It is beyond all desire because you have been through all desires, it is beyond every experience because you have been through every experience. Such is happiness, such is freedom, and that is what everyone in the world is wanting. Now with that desire burning in him, a man turns to religion, he turns to something, some Power, which he imagines to exist beyond him, which controls him and which gives him encouragement, nourishment, and great delight, in treading the path of life. Now I say -though you need not accept it- that I have found such freedom, such happiness. I have struggled, I have watched many people, some rich in the multitude of possessions, some who have nothing at all, people who are religious and full of dogmas and creeds and who run on every possible occasion to a church or to the temple in order to have their problems solved -and because I have watched all these things, and because of the lives that lie behind, I have attained, and because of that attainment I would like to show you the way. That does not mean a new creed, a new crutch, a new religion, for I hold that religion is the frozen thought of men, out of which they build temples with the brick of their frozen thoughts, and in which they are held, bound, by the goods who demand special rites and ceremonies special sacrifices, traditions and superstitions.

Now if you accept anything of mine as a dogma, as a creed, you are creating a new religion in which you will be bound and in which the gods of your own creation will demand of you sacrifices. I want to liberate those individuals who are painting the cage of their limitations.

Wherever you go in the world, there are so many beliefs -in this or that particular God, in this particular idea, in that particular religion. Wherever you go there is confusion because there are so many gods, so many interpreters thereof, so many religions each claiming to have its own special heaven and hell, its own special deity. Out of this confusion shall we create order, a miracle of order from the centuries of chaos, or shall we create another belief, another god and build a new temple with the crystallization of our thoughts? Shall we find out for ourselves a new and a simple way? Because wherever there is confusion and disorder, there is disharmony and hence unhappiness.

Now as I said, happiness which is not negative but positive, happiness which is the culmination of all experience and yet is beyond all experience, happiness which gives liberation to the mind and to the heart which is bound to a limited form of thought and feeling, such happiness is the only requirement that each one of you wants, that each one of you longs for, and the moment you have that as your goal, you need no interpreters. That is the Absolute, the final goal for humanity. Hence, because you want to be happy and because you want to be free and liberated from all desires, you must go through all desires, through all experiences, in order to be freed and not for the mere pleasure of experiencing. Then, when you have established your goal, you need no interpreter, you need no outer authority.

Take a ship on the open waters of the sea. Imagine that there was no compass on that ship, it would be lost, it would not know which way to go or where lay its port. So, because individuals in the world have no goal, they are lost in the confusion of thought and in order to determine their course they must establish a goal, and that goal must be of their own creation and not that of another. As I said, every human being in the word wants to be happy; it is the only delight, the only Truth, and when you have established that goal for yourself then you have the rudder which will guide your ship. Let us imagine for a moment that each one of you has fixed that goal of happiness for himself. Then, you say, what is the manner by which I can establish that happiness within myself eternally?

Within each individual there are three separate beings; there is the mind, there are the emotions, there is the body. If you watch over your mind and over your emotions and over your body you will see that they are three different entities, each one working and struggling on its own and hence creating disharmony. It is like this: if you were in carriage and had three horses to draw you but had no control over them, you would not get to your destination because the horses would each be pulling in a different direction. But if you had control over them and a fixed purpose, then you would get to your destination with understanding and with harmony. There are in each one of you three separate beings, if I may so call them, the mind, the emotions and the body and each one must be made perfect in order to have perfect harmony. What is the ultimate for the mind? As you have fixed the goal of happiness for yourselves, as you must establish a goal for the mind. That goal is the purification of the self. This does not mean the destruction, the annihilation of the self, as most people understand it, but, on the contrary, the development of individual uniqueness. You can never destroy the self -you can purify it, ennoble it, and hence bring it nearer to its desired end. Take a mosaic: in that there are innumerable colours which go to make up the particular form which the painter desires to produce, but if the colours in it are not each perfect, it will not be harmonious. Likewise each one has to develop his own particular individual uniqueness and when he develops his own individual uniqueness to perfection, then there is unity with everyone. Suppose for a moment that your colour is green and mine is red, and so on: if you develop your colour to perfection and I develop mine to perfection, when we meet there is no colour, for as we know, all colours eventually melt into the one white light. When they meet there is absolute unity, no division, no feeling of the separate self. That is the highest goal for the mind.

So also you must establish a goal for the emotions. What is it? It is to have immense affection, and yet to be detached. Watch how affection develops. At first it is envious, narrow, limited, jealous of everything, but little by little, through sorrow, through pain, it develops, and little by little it extends and includes more and more people. So when you watch and follow affection to its ultimate goal, you will find that it has become affection with detachment.

For the body, what is it that is essential to bring about perfect harmony? First, beauty. Look throughout the world -for centuries upon centuries human beings have been seeking beauty. Go down any street in London and look into shops and you will see innumerable creams for making people beautiful, and quite rightly so. But it is no good merely producing a beautiful shell. Take a shell on the seashore. It may be beautiful, but that which created it has gone away, and it is a dead thing. Likewise, a mere beautiful form may be attractive, but it is not harmonious, it is not the Absolute. So beauty is the first requisite. Then restraint, which does not mean suppression, but understanding. And then, great simplicity. When I was travelling in India people said to me "You say we should lead a simple life. Why then do you put on clean clothes, why are you neat, why do you shave?". Simplicity does not mean retrogression. You must not judge simplicity by the traditions of two or three thousand years ago. You would not go back to that time -we are three thousand years ahead and it is no good returning to a time when ordinary physical life was crude. We have progressed. That is a dangerous word, but I will employ it for the moment! So for the mind the Absolute is to purify the self -which does not mean destruction of the self, but on the contrary to develop its individual uniqueness. For the emotions, for the heart, it is to be detached and yet at the same time to be greatly affectionate. For the body it is beauty, refinement, culture and behaviour -for with behaviour dwells righteousness. When you have these three practically carried out, then there is harmony, and when there is harmony then there is happiness.

So when once you have established the goal for yourself which is happiness from which comes liberation -that detachment from all things which is the outcome of all experience -then, as I have said, you will know the way because you have harmony within yourself. Then you do not require beliefs, then you do not require religions with all their innumerable interpreters, and you do not require the great paraphernalia associated with beliefs. You are responsible to yourself; you create order within yourself and then because you understand with the understanding that is born of experience, you see that there is no such thing as evil or good; that there is no such thing as failure or success; it is all a matter of experience, of learning, gathering your strength towards that perfection which lies within each.

As I have found that harmony, and have established within myself that happiness which is the outcome of liberation, so I would be as a signpost for those who desire to walk the path of happiness, for those who desire to understand life which is Truth. But if you stop at the signpost you will never attain. Perfection lies within the individual grasp of each one. So you must, as an individual, solve the problem for yourself and then you will solve the problem of the world. As an individual you will have to create harmony within yourself, and when once you have created that harmony, that synthetic understanding of life, then there is happiness and freedom.

AN INTERVIEW IN LONDON

London, UK, 1928

INTERVIEWER: A number of newspapers in America recently reported you as saying that you were not the Teacher, but only the voice of the Teacher. Are we to take that as your attitude?

KRISHNAJI: No, sir, I am afraid they were entirely wrong. You cannot explain to someone who comes with no idea of what you are talking about without being misunderstood.

INTERVIEWER: Then what is the reality, from your point of view?

KRISHNAJI: The reality is that I am the Teacher.

INTERVIEWER: How did the confusion arise?

KRISHNAJI: They have misunderstood what was meant by the idea of the "vehicle of the Teacher". With that they are confused, and they bring it in at every interview.

INTERVIEWER: How did it happen that various journals drew a distinction between the personality of Krishnamurti and the Teacher?

KRISHNAMURTI: Sir, I have said over and over again that, according to me, Krishnamurti as such no longer exists. As the river enters the sea and loses itself in the sea, so Krishnamurti has entered into that Life which is represented by some as The Christ, by others as The Buddha, by others still, as the Lord Maitreya. Hence Krishnamurti as an entity fully developed has entered into the Sea of Life and is the Teacher, because the moment you enter into that Life -which is the fulfilment of all Teachers, which is life of all the Teachers- the individual as such ceases.

INTERVIEWER: Then should we not concern ourselves with the glorious Being who dwells in the Himalayan mountains?

KRISHNAJI: That is of very little importance as compared with the Truth, as compared with the teaching. What is of great importance is that everyone should concern himself with what I am saying, rather than with the personality of the Teacher, the body of the Teacher, where He dwells, and so on. That will lead to confusion. Sir, it is like this: When an artist paints a picture he does not want you to consider his personality as represented in that picture -he wants you to look at the beauty of that picture. No one cares who has painted the picture as long as it is beautiful.

INTERVIEWER: I take it then that according to you, the distinction between Krishnamurti and the Teacher has come to an end.

KRISHNAJI: As far as I am concerned, it has come to an end, it does not exist; but the people who desire to adhere to their own prejudices, their own desires and their own longings, will believe what is convenient, because whatever they do not desire to take to heart they can say emanates from Krishnamurti, and what they personally like and what gives them so-called comfort, they will say comes from the Teacher. So my point is that, as the beauty of the picture depends not on the painter but on the picture itself, what I say must depend on its own intrinsic value and not on the authority of my attainment, nor on the authority of others.

INTERVIEWER: Is it not inevitable that because you are giving us this point of view your personality will be made the basis of a religion in spite of your desire not to have one formed about you?

KRISHNAJI: If people are foolish, they are bound to mix the personality and the Truth, and to build a temple around the personality and form a religion.

INTERVIEWER: Has it not always been the case, that Truth without expression cannot be realized or understood? Because of that, you who have realized the Truth must be the Truth to others, and therefore you become the symbol of Truth to them, with the danger that people will worship the personality?

KRISHNAJI: Yes, of course, that is my very point. Adhere to the Truth rather than to the personality, and take to heart the Truth rather than the authority of another.

The questioner persisted:

INTERVIEWER: And yet there is this inevitable danger of the forming of a religion with creeds.

KRISHNAJI: There is only that inevitable danger as long as there is lack of understanding; but the moment the individual understands, there will be no formation of religion. So my chief concern is to make clear the Truth which I have attained, to give an understanding of the Truth, which is the Truth for all. And hence, if there is understanding rather than blind following, people will not create a religion.

INTERVIEWER: Why, if you know the Truth, can you not lay down rules and laws for others?

KRISHNAJI: I could of course do that, but then it would bind people to my perception of the Truth. It would crystallize and limit this Truth, which, I say, can only be developed by individual uniqueness. My contention is that it is impossible to limit Truth, for that would mean that you were stepping down the Truth to the individual, who is limited. It would be useless to lay down a crystallized method for everyone to follow.

The discussion then went back to the question of the founding of a religion.

INTERVIEWER: Some of your followers say that you have come to found a religion; and even though you may deny this, they maintain that because of you and what you say a religion will inevitably be founded afterwards.

KRISHNAJI: First of all, sir, when you say that I have followers, let me assure you that I do not want followers, nor would I ever encourage the idea of following. There are laws in some countries, I believe, which prohibit anyone from following you in the street, and if someone does, he can be arrested and put into prison. So, spiritually, I wish there were a police system which would put people into a spiritual prison for following others. In fact, it does happen automatically.

INTERVIEWER: Then it is your desire to prevent definitely the formation of a religion around the personality of Krishnamurti and to take steps to avoid that?

KRISHNAJI: I cannot take any steps -I can only insist that understanding, not blind belief, should be the goal.

INTERVIEWER: But do you think there will be a religion afterwards, when you are gone?

KRISHNAJI: With that we need not concern ourselves. That depends on the understanding of the people.

INTERVIEWER: You have said that you are the Buddha, the Christ, the Lord Maitreya, and more than these. How can that be?

KRISHNAJI: I hold that all the Teachers of the world have attained that Life which is the fulfilment of life. Hence, whenever anyone enters that Life, which is the culmination of all life, then he is ipso facto the Buddha, the Christ, the Lord Maitreya, because there is no distinction there. And hence, when I say that it is more than These, it is more -from the point of view of the understanding of the ordinary individual.

INTERVIEWER: Do the Buddha and the Christ continue Their existence as individuals?

KRISHNAJI: Does life continue beyond the door? The fulfilment of life is not annihilation -on the contrary- I am much more ambitious, much more desirous, much more eager than you are. It is Life. Therefore it cannot be annihilation, for you cannot annihilate Life! When I said that I am the Buddha, the Christ, the Lord Maitreya, and more, it was not a question of superiority or inferiority. I added that phrase 'and more' very carefully, because I knew that people had a very limited understanding of the Buddha and the Christ, and hence if I said: 'I am the Christ, the Buddha', they would limit that Reality to their own conceptions of the Buddha or the Christ, and Life has no limit.

INTERVIEWER: Why is it necessary to call yourself the World-Teacher? Did Buddha require a title?

KRISHNAJI: He called himself 'The Enlightened One' and Jesus called himself 'The Son of God'. To me the term 'World-Teacher' is of as little importance as 'The Son of God' or 'The Enlightened One'.

INTERVIEWER: What is the purpose of having such a name or title?

KRISHNAJI: To acknowledge, to show, the condition of mind and heart when you have achieved. It is like saying: 'I have painted a picture'. It is like saying: 'I have written a poem'. It is an assertion of the fact of attainment, rather than the narrow understanding that is given to labels and phrases. What the phrase indicates is of importance.

INTERVIEWER: Why do you use the word 'Teacher' which suggests the idea of teaching and implies a purpose?

KRISHNAJI: As the world has to attain the fulfilment of eternal life, to me it does not in the least matter what I am called -'Enlightened One', 'Son of God', or something else. To me, it has no purpose -as little as when the Buddha said, 'I am the Enlightened One'. It does not matter what you call the gaoler so long as he has the key that will open the door of your prison! Similarly, as I have the key to release Life from its prison, it does not matter in the least what you call either the key or myself. I am not concerned about the title.

INTERVIEWER: It has been stated constantly in the papers that you are in disagreement with different individuals in the various movements connected with the Theosophical Society. Is it not true that in this fulfilment of life there cannot be real disagreement?

KRISHNAJI: Naturally, sir.

INTERVIEWER: So it is really in the minds of those who see life partially and from their limited point of view that this apparent disagreement arises?

KRISHNAJI: I quite agree with you, sir.

INTERVIEWER: But your point of view is of course different from that of others?

KRISHNAJI: It is bound to be, but that does not mean that we quarrel about it.

INTERVIEWER: Then do you mean that you have your individual truth or your individual work?

KRISHNAJI: More than that. You see, others have stepped down the Truth.

INTERVIEWER: There must, of course, be differences in the expression of each one's understanding of Truth. These sometimes seem opposed. Should they, then, be regarded as complementary to each other?

KRISHNAJI: Sir, one does not concern oneself with the expressions, but rather with life. You are looking at life through the wrong end of the telescope when you look at the expressions of life. There is a fundamental difference. Life in the savage appears different from the life that dwells in you, different in its expression, but it is all one Life. Anyone who has not fulfilled that life must step down the Truth, and when he does that, he is unconsciously betraying the Truth.

INTERVIEWER: What about the new race type, the new civilization in California that has been gradually appearing?

KRISHNAJI: Wherever there is a suitable environment for the fulfilment of Life, it will fulfil itself. To me, again, that is only a matter of the barriers of nationality, and not of life.

INTERVIEWER: Would you say that the barriers of nationality would have to be removed before Life could fulfil itself?

KRISHNAJI: When the wind blows across the various continents, it does not bring with it the nationalities of the countries through which it passes. So likewise with Life.

INTERVIEWER: In India you exhorted the people to activity. You said in America it is reported that they were concerned with the shadows of life. Americans are very active. Why, then, do you consider that they are chasing phantoms?

KRISHNAJI: Activity that perishes, that is not productive of the eternal, of the lasting, is of very little use.

INTERVIEWER: Why have the Hindus -so concerned with philosophy and with the eternal side of life- become sleepy and lethargic?

KRISHNAJI: The Hindu, the Oriental, says that the physical is but the shadow of the Eternal, of the Truth; and he says 'In order to understand the Truth, I must let the shadow go, and not concern myself with it, but with the understanding of the Eternal.' So he does not concern himself with the physical. He is more concerned with the quality of mind and heart. Hence there is disease, there is disorder, and there is chaos and neglect and the gradual running down of the physical. Whereas in the West, the shadow becomes, more important, more vital, and people forget the cause of the shadow and go about decorating, embellishing and enlarging the shadow. So there you have the two extremes: the man that is concerned mainly with the hidden life, and the man who seriously concerns himself with the expression of that life. What I want to do is to bring about harmony between the two extremes, for therein lies the Truth. The harmony of life is the understanding of Truth.

INTERVIEWER: Is the discord in families and in nations the negation of that understanding?

KRISHNAJI: On the contrary. It is a necessary stage through which you must go. Without discontentment, without revolt, you can never attain harmony. It is a necessary stage, which must be gone through by everyone. Contentment is not happiness. Contentment is stagnation and decay, whereas happiness is life and growth.

INTERVIEWER: Is war a necessary stage to attain that harmony?

KRISHNAJI: No. If you have the desire, if you establish the goal -which is harmony, which is happiness through liberation- then these stages of revolt, of war, of struggle, can be avoided -should be avoided. You are not going to wallow in the gutter if you can jump over it. You see, my discord must be different from yours; my revolt must not be the same thing as yours. It will not be a revolt if it is moulding itself around your revolt.

INTERVIEWER: You do not believe in national discord because it is created out of policies and politics?

KRISHNAJI: Certainly not. National discord is, like religion, a standardized form of revolt; and the moment a revolt is standardized, it is no longer a revolt.

INTERVIEWER: Therefore you definitely say that war is not a thing to go through, but a stage to be avoided if possible?

KRISHNAJI: Of course. It is a stage brought about by the standardizing of thought, revolt, and life -not by the freedom of life, not by the revolt of life.

INTERVIEWER: In your opinion, will the method of having various peace movements lead to the abolition of war?

KRISHNAJI: I question again if you can ever standardize peace. For, once more, the individual problem is the world problem. Therefore let us return to the problem of individual perfection and the establishing of peace in the heart and in the mind of the individual.

THE TEACHER AND THE ORDER

Eerde, Holland, 1928

QUESTION I: Will Krishnaji state to us definitely: If the order of the Star is a limitation to him?
If the order is a barrier between him and the world?
If the order has no usefulness to him?
Is it his desire to abolish the order?

KRISHNAJI 1. The Order is not a limitation to me, but probably it is to you. Either you can make of the Order a limitation, which will act as a barrier between yourselves and others, or you can make of it a bridge. And whether it is a bridge or a barrier does not depend on me. When I go and talk to people, they do not consider me and my attitude to life from the point of view of any sect or any narrow exclusive body. Hence the Order as such is not a limitation to me.

2. Again, it depends on you, not on me. After all, ideas, thoughts and feelings have no nationality, have no individuality, or at least they should not have. And if individuals who belong to the Order do not understand that, they will create a barrier. If you do not wish to exclude the world from your heart, it does not matter if the world excludes you. If you wish to give affection to every passer-by, though he may refuse it, there cannot be a barrier between you and him. If in your mind there is a division of people as belonging to groups, types and movements, to definite classes, to particular religions, to definite sets of beliefs, then there will be a barrier. Barriers are created, not by organizations, but by the limitation of life itself, by the strangling of life by narrow ideas and narrow conceptions.

3. The Order is of use in the sense that it creates a nucleus of people who are willing to treat the subjects I put forward earnestly and seriously, with a greater consideration than those who have not yet studied the useful to have such a flexible organization, not merely question. I think that for some time at least it will be to gather in members, but to put forward the new ideas; not to convert, but to help others to realize those ideas in their own way; not to preach so much as to act as an example; not to hold innumerable meetings but to show the way of attainment by one's own personal life; not to impose beliefs but to create understanding, which is beyond all belief.

And if you look at it in that way, the Order can never become a barrier between those who are members and those who are not. On the contrary, it will be a bridge by which people will come to understand the new conception of life.

4. As I said, if the Order is a bridge that will help people to cross the difficult stream of life, then it is useful; if it is not, we will abolish it. You will be the first to abolish it, I hope. I am not very interested in movements as such -and please do not think that I am standing up especially for this movement because it belongs to us. The Order has served so far to collect people who are perhaps a little more earnest, but it does not necessarily mean that they understand any more than others or that they have any peculiar privileges. So long as the Order is a bridge that will help the world to cross, I think it might be useful to keep it; but the moment it has ceased its usefulness -and that must be judged not by me but by each one of you- then it must go. One person can never constitute a barrier -you can break his ideas- but the majority of people who belong to the Order, the members as a whole, can create a barrier if they usurp the Truth, and misuse that understanding which they have gained.

QUESTION II: In what way do organizations become limitations?

KRISHNAJI: If you are an impartial observer you will notice that most organizations tend to monopolize, to usurp Truth, which can never be usurped, which can never be monopolized. Truth is arbitrary, Truth cannot be discussed, nor can anyone have an opinion about Truth, Truth is, and a wise person will try to understand by much consideration rather than by mere discussion -not that we should not discuss, but we do not arrive at Truth by contention. Truth is beyond thought, beyond feeling, beyond the artist, beyond the ruler, beyond all things. Hence, to the limited mind Truth, as such, in its purity cannot be understood. And if organizations tend to step down Truth for the purpose of their own understanding or for giving understanding to others, those organizations will inevitably deteriorate and become barriers. For this reason, I am always rather chary of organizations; because they lead to a desire to proselytize and to convert others and to gather them into our particular narrow fold.

QUESTION III: You have said much to discourage us from "works", "creeds" and active service...

KRISHNAJI: If you are so easily discouraged, that which you are doing cannot be of real value. The world is only concerned if you are building that bridge to help men and women to cross the gulf.

QUESTION IV: We serve in order to forget ourselves -so I understand you to say. Is it your meaning that activity is unimportant, and service an illusion? Can no one really help another?

KRISHNAJI: The vast majority of people are trying to forget themselves in "works". Work is a kind of drug. I am not discouraging anybody from working, life would be dull without work, and if you only had ideas but never gave expression to those ideas. But, as I said, most people work or serve in order to forget themselves and their problems. If you look into your hearts and examine this vast energy created by the idea of service, you will find that most of it is a way of putting aside your own understanding. And I hold that as long as you have not solved your own problems, as long as the individual is still confused, and is not at peace, as long as there is no serenity within himself, he cannot really serve another. He may think he is serving, but by real service I mean quite a different thing from ordinary service.

If you go to a doctor who is really great, he will tell you that certain things are necessary to effect a fundamental cure. But if you go to an inexperienced doctor, he will only tell you how to treat the symptoms and not get down to the cause of your disease. Now you have to choose, between that thing which in service will be eternal and that which will be fleeting. And I hold that service which is eternal can only come if the person who is wanting to serve has solved his own problem, has found peace within himself.

As regards the question whether activity is unimportant, my answer is: Activity in the ordinary sense, creating great works that endure for a day, is unimportant. But activity that is concerned with eternal things is essential. And you must decide what is eternal and what is fleeting.

Service which is not permanent, which does not heal the wounds or empty the weariness of the heart, is an illusion; but service which fills that emptiness in the heart and in the mind is eternal.

As to whether one can really help another, I say that you can truly help another, and not merely momentarily, if you yourself are a great surgeon, if you yourself are beyond needing help.

Please do not think that it is a matter of discouragement or encouragement or of giving comfort or hope. It is none of these things; it is much nobler, more beautiful, and more gracious than all these things.

QUESTION V: Krishnaji says we twist his message to suit our beliefs. What does he mean by "our beliefs"? Does he mean our own deep convictions that spring out of our own experience or the findings of our sincere reasoning or our gathered knowledge?

KRISHNAJI: I mean all. I will explain what I mean. Truth, I hold, does not belong to a condition of life. Truth cannot belong to one particular expression or to one kind of knowledge or reasoning. It is beyond all these things. Beliefs, experiences, reasonings, and knowledge are conditioned but Truth cannot be conditioned or limited. And because you desire to use that Truth without understanding, you are twisting that Truth to suit your own particular experiences, your own particular beliefs, your own reasoning and knowledge. You may say: How am I to prevent this twisting? By continually examining beliefs, experiences, reasoning and knowledge. You grow more and more as you gather and throw away. You do not grow if you only gather and retain that gathering within yourself. After all, when you eat a grape, you take the juice and throw away the skin. Likewise is true experience; you throw away the incident, and keep the experience. But experience must not condition Truth.

Everyone believes in this or that, and does not believe in this or that, and he expects Truth to condition itself, to limit itself, to his belief or non-belief. And because it will not, there is mystery, there is trouble, and there is strife. You cannot reduce or step down Truth. I can show to people the glory of a mountaintop, in its purity, in its serenity, but I cannot bring that great height to the conditioned mind of the people. Therefore, what I have to do is to urge, enthuse, and create desire in people to come towards the eternal. But look what is happening throughout the world. They say: The poor, the ignorant, the inexperienced will not understand the Truth, therefore I, who understand it a little more, will translate it to the measure of their understanding. And hence all the paraphernalia of religions. If you want a child to grow, the moment he is able to stand and walk on his own feet, you leave him alone; you do not help him all the day. You help him to grow strong, instead of giving him crutches, which will perpetuate his weakness. Because most people in the world have the fallacious idea that they cannot understand Truth in its fullness they must reduce, condition, step down the Truth.

The Buddha showed that Truth couldn't be translated, conditioned, limited, for the understanding of the inexperienced. But when he passed away, his disciples tried to do it and so created a religion. Likewise with the Christ, and probably it will be the same today.

I have as much desire, longing, aching in my heart to help people as you have but I say that there is only one way to help and that is to make them strong, and dependent on themselves and not on others, and to urge them to that eternal Truth which cannot be conditioned.

Never reduce or step down Truth, but rather incite the intense desire to attain the illimitable. Life then will be far more worth living than when you are content to dwell in the easy comfort of conditioned Truth. You have around you so much Truth that is conditioned, stepped down for the understanding of the inexperienced, but I speak all the time of the Truth in its unconditioned state -though words again create a limitation- I must not step it down, because to me that would be a betrayal of the Truth. Can you not see that by stepping it down, it loses its simplicity, its pristine nobleness, and thus you create complications? When you once condition Truth, you are creating those shelters of comfort where there is stagnation of the mind and of the heart. I have often heard people say: Oh, I do there things not for myself but because it helps another. That means that what you have attained, you are stepping down for others to conquer, instead of helping them to conquer in their own way, which is the only way to attain. That is how all the religions in the world are founded. And hence the very altar at which they worship Truth is the betrayal of Truth. But mere repetition that that religion is a betrayal of Truth does not mean true understanding or true conviction. I think it was Lao Tse who, when he found enlightenment, never talked about it but went away leaving a book behind him. When the Buddha was asked by his disciples to describe Nirvana, he said that he who says that it is, errs, and he who says that it is not, lies.

QUESTION VI: Does the term "World-Teacher" have any significance to Krishnaji?

KRISHNAJI: I hold that there can be only one World-Teacher at any time. There is only one life and the moment a person enters into the fulfilment of that life, he is the World-Teacher, as the Buddha was the Enlightened One, as Christ was the Son of God.

So if you really understand the term 'World-Teacher', not from a limited point of view, it is equivalent to `the Enlightened One'. What I mean to convey is that each one feels life as a separate thing within himself, apart from others. Life is one, though its expressions are many. The moment an individual feels and knows and is conscious of the eternal life, which cannot be divided, and attains to the understanding of that life, not merely intellectually, he is the World-Teacher. The term has certain significance and is of value as an idea round which other ideas can gather but that is all. Do you think that it mattered to the Buddha whether he was called the Enlightened One or not? But it helped to create and set in motion a certain train of thought, which gathered round it other ideas, other conceptions.

If you merely adore, worship a label, Truth will never come near to your heart nor an understanding of that for which the label stands. What I say is for the world at large and not for a particular nation, class, or organization. Truth and hence the giver of Truth is for the whole world and not for any particular group. You can look at the World-Teacher from any point of view you like, but people will not find any difficulty in understanding if you explain with simplicity and not in complicated words, in sets of beliefs. Then of course it becomes confusing, something mysterious and difficult to grasp. The scent, which Truth gives, is of importance and not the substance of the flower. And most people are more concerned with the substance, the shape and the size of the flower, than with its scent.

When the plant puts forth its flower, the wise will stop and look at it and will enjoy its perfume, and the unwise will pass by.

I was asked by a newspaper reporter who represented the world at large: "Must I believe that you are the World-Teacher in order to understand your message?" I said: "Do you look at the wrong end of the telescope in order to find out the size, the beauty of anything you are examining?" After all, the thing that matters is the purity of the food and not the decoration of the vessel in which it is brought. But you will find that if the food is to be kept pure and clean, the vessel must also be clean. Do not concern yourself so much with the vessel as with what it holds, whether that food is sufficient or whether it has value to nourish you.

QUESTION VII: Why is there only one World-Teacher?

KRISHNAJI: As I have said, there is only one life and the man who attains that one life is the one World-Teacher. The individual who attains that life has united the beginning and the end -and yet there is no beginning and no end- he has consciously built a bridge between the source and the ultimate goal. By the source, I mean the coming into being of that life which is condition by a multitude of things. A savage evolves and gathers to himself more and more experience, till he ultimately joins that life which is eternal. Then he has built the bridge over the gap that exists between the beginning and the end, between the source and the goal where there is one life.

That is my conception of the World-Teacher -and much more, which I cannot express in words. The term 'World-Teacher' is only a name and as a label it has no value. But it has great value to those who are held in bondage by labels, by the maya, the illusion of words. For the creating or the coming into being of the flower of humanity, for the attainment of that fullness of life everyone is responsible. By that I mean that for the creation of the individual who attains the life eternal, without beginning or end, in which the source and the goal have their being, all conditioned life has helped. By its longing to be free, conditioned life has helped to produce this Flower. As the lotus makes the waters beautiful and as the waters are necessary for the beauty of the lotus, so the bondage of every individual and the cry of every individual in bondage help to create the one who is eternally free. Hence when that being, individual or life -do not make it concrete and personal when that life which has been separate, held in bondage, attains to that life which is as the ocean without limitation, then that conditioned life becomes the World-Teacher. I am using words that you can twist and utilize according to your belief or non-belief, but Truth has nothing to do with belief or with non-belief. The fragrance of the flower of the lotus does not depend upon the passer-by. The beauty of the Flower is created by the tears of the world.

Life is eternal and when after many centuries there is a being who attains and fulfils that life, it is his delight and glory to make that unconditioned life understood by those who have not yet attained.

Whether you call that being the World-Teacher, the Buddha, the Christ or anything else, is not of importance. To give water to the thirsty, to open the eyes of the blind, to call out the prisoners from their prison and to give light to those who sit in the shadow of their own creation, is the delight of the one who has attained. And whether the waters that shall quench that thirst are contained in a particular vessel or the voice of him who calls is sweet or musical, is of very little importance. So long as there is the awakening desire within each one to answer, to take to their lips the waters that shall quench their thirst, to tear away the covering from their eyes, and to hear the cry in their prison -that is of value. And the limitation put upon life by the illusion of words is the very thing that destroys the voice of the Mastersinger.

QUESTION VIII: If he is everlasting, then how is he related to those who have preceded him, and to those who may come after him?

KRISHNAJI: When one has entered that vast, life, there is no going back, or coming forward, no question of what happens to those who have preceded or what happens to those who come after. You are only looking at the labels; you are only looking at the personalities and that is it why these questions arise. You ask: What happens to those who have preceded? -They have entered that life! And what will happen to those who come after? -They will also enter that life! It is so infinitely simple, without complication. Life is the fulfilment of all things, and in the freedom of that life is the attainment of Truth. And the individuals who have attained that life are life themselves. It is humanity that places a limitation on that life, and looks at that life through its limitations.

This life, which is the flower of humanity, which is the freedom of humanity, which is the attainment of humanity, which is the beginning and the end of humanity, this life, which is the eternal Truth, cannot be described in words. This world has no words, it is and it is not. And from the point of view of limitation from which every one of you is looking, there cannot be an understanding of the immensity, which is without limitation. When a being enters into that life, he is the flower of humanity. When you see in a garden a rose more beautiful than the others, if you could ask the rose: Why is it you are more beautiful than the others? Are you the production of the tears of the heavens? Has life given you more beauty? It would be unable to explain, but it would maintain: I am. And if you are wise, you will not tear the petals apart and examine them in order to catch the scent. I hope I have made it as vague as possible, because if I made it clear for you I should have placed a limitation on the Truth, I should have betrayed the Truth.

THE FLAME

1928

SOME YEARS AGO I was talking with a great friend of mine, one who is not altogether of my way of thinking, though he agrees with me in many things -but he is not quite so uncompromising as I am. He said to me that I was as sweet as the meandering waters without the necessary fire for the destruction of useless things, and the creation of essential things. And he ended up by saying: If you would do anything in life, you must have the white flame to carry through your purpose. Because you will be opposed in your ideas, the sweet meandering waters will be dammed and turned to other purposes of irrigation rather than give life to the parched lands. I have been thinking considerably about what he said during the last two years, and wondering if the time has come for the white flame to burn. I hold that the white flame of which my friend spoke is necessary, but it is also necessary to have patience.

This spring in Ojai I was watching a sparrow, building her nest just outside my sleeping-porch. It was the most precarious nest, because it was built in the sunblind. Any person who came along and unconsciously pulled up that awning would necessarily have destroyed the nest. I watched it day after day, and saw the nest coming into being, the immense efforts of the mother bird, its gigantic struggles to create the lovely nest, in which it laid three eggs successively, night after night. In the building of that nest in that precarious position and in the bringing forth of the young birds in spite of the carelessness of human beings and the cruelty of other animals, that little sparrow was contending against the whole world in its creation. It had the white flame, necessary to contend, struggle and assert itself. And that sparrow gave me the necessary understanding that the white flame comes, not by a sudden onrush but by patience, by continual assertion of the essential truth, by continually contending against the small things of life, against narrowness of belief and small understanding. It would have been very easy for me to have hurled myself against the wall of orthodoxy and tradition and sets of beliefs some years ago, but it would have been unwise, because the wall was much too strong; there were very few people who really understood, and therefore would have helped to create a breach in that wall. But now, since I have been here, that white flame has grown strong within me, and I will not ever again compromise with anything, I will never try to reconcile the things which are not of the truth, I, personally, will never put aside the eternal for the sake of the passing.

I have been wondering how many of you have the flame, how many of you are like the steel, forged by your own hands, by your own understanding and by your own contention against life. I am now certain for myself, I am certain of that of which I speak. Even though everyone disagrees with me, though everyone contends against me, though everyone misunderstands that which I say. The more there is misunderstanding, the more there is divergence of opinion, the more certain I am. I would that you could be likewise, not because of what I say, but because you have perceived for yourself. Then that knowledge and wisdom shall give stability to your understanding, so that nothing can destroy it, so that you will constantly have the white flame that shall burn away the dross, the useless things of life, and destroy your innumerable crutches and the divisions which hold people apart. The sweet meandering waters are very pleasant to behold and delightful to sail upon, but if you would go out to sea where there are many waves, storms and tempests, you will have to leave the sweet meandering waters behind, you will have to put them aside and venture forth to discover your own strength, to contend with your own wisdom and knowledge against those things which are unessential and unimportant. For that one needs to have courage, not the stupid courage born out of lack of thought, but courage born out of understanding, courage born out of intelligence. As perhaps some of you agree with me, and see and feel and know and understand with me: if you will not compromise with the truth, then the realization of happiness and the bringing about of that happiness in the world will become a certainty. But if you who have perceived, who have known, who have considered and understood with me, have not the white flame but are merely meandering as the sweet waters, you will not create, you will not stand against the old beliefs and traditions. The time for sweet meandering is over, not for you perhaps, but for me. Not for those who have not understood, but for those who have seen, who have known, who have understood; not for the people who are all the time concerned with reconciliation and compromise, but for those who have invited doubt and have conquered doubt, and who have set aside reconciliation.

You cannot reconcile with truth -truth cannot be twisted, warped to your purpose. You will never bend truth to your particular understanding, but rather you will have to unbend your understanding to the truth; make straight those things which are crooked in order to understand the truth. In order to straighten out those things which have been made crooked, you need a flame. If you would bend the steel to a particular shape, you heat it; so if you would unbend and make straight those things in yourself, which are crooked, you must be heated by the white-hot flame of truth. You must be like the sea, against which nothing shall stand, whose waters are in continual motion, never still, always destroying those barriers that men create to hold them back. If a person is dying, and you would revive him and bring him back to life, your sweet fear of hurting him does not hold you back from inviting the surgeon who shall heal. It is no true affection that is afraid to hurt; no love that will not contend against false sentiment, vain hopes and fleeting pleasures. If you who have seen will stand for truth without compromise, we shall go forward together; if not, you will be on the sweet meandering waters, sailing smoothly along, with your particular pleasures and your delightful, smooth reconciliation, and Truth and I will be far away.

What is the use of you all agreeing with me, sympathising with me, smiling with delight at my sayings, if there is not the true alteration of your mind and heart, if there is no straightening of those things that are crooked? I tell you that Truth is much too serious to play with; it is much too dangerous to have one part of your heart in the temple of truth and another part in the temple of unrealities and half-truths. For that way is the way of sorrow, is the way of contention, is the way of vain beliefs which shall decay. If you have not that white flame, which comes from understanding, which is born out of patience, you will not enter into that kingdom where Truth abides. As a sweet flower that decays and perishes, so shall be he who merely holds to sweet enjoyments, but if you would be as the tree that withstands every storm and dances in every breeze, you must delight in truth and walk in the light of truth.

WHY BEAR THIS TURMOIL?

Ojai Star Camp, 1929

Why bear this turmoil, this strife, this ceaseless jostle, of pain, of pleasure, of suffering, of strife, when, by your careful understanding of life's purpose, you can alter, you can remove that cloud that casts a shadow across your path? Therefore, having Life as your guru, as your motive, as the only truth -become a disciple of that. Then your mind shall know the truth as the true, shall understand the false in the falsehood, and see the real in the reality.

An ointment that shall cure all sorrow, all wounds, all suffering, is to be found in that which is lasting and that which is life, and of that I speak.

Suppose that I had been in the world at the time when the Buddha was in India, and had realised to myself that there was a great human being who understood life, who was the consummation of life, who was the beauty of life; in whom there was the whole and not the part. Knowing all that and having a burning desire to understand him, do you think I would turn to him and then say that I had some other work to do in the world, that I wanted to stay in the shadow of a religion, or that I wanted to function through a particular channel, when he himself held the whole of life?

In the same manner, I say now, I say without conceit, with proper understanding, with fullness of mind and heart, that I am that full flower which is the glory of life, to which all human beings, individuals as well as the whole world, must come.

OJAI CAMP 1929

Ojai, California, 1929

I should like to ask you why you have come to the Camp. As you cannot answer me, I shall answer you. You have come from many parts of America; first, to find out if what the others say concerning Krishnamurti is true; second, to discover for yourselves what Krishnamurti really says; and third, to find out for yourselves how to live rightly. And I am concerned with that last: how to live rightly. I am not concerned very much who you think I am. I know. Many of you think what you have been told to think. Some of you know for yourselves, intuitively or through suffering and through understanding, the fullness of my talks.

You have come here to find out how to live, to know in what manner you should conduct your lives so that you may find that Truth which is continuous. Before you can discover that, you will have to go through the process of rejection, and that very few people are willing to do... because they already have very precise, definite ideas of what I am going to say, they are finding it very difficult to understand what I am saying; it is difficult because you have it in your minds very clearly defined who I am. You have been told who I am and you have been told what the manner of my teaching will be: in what way I shall work, who are my particular disciples, what movements shall be foremost. Now you have all these barriers to the understanding of Truth...

Intelligence, pure intelligence, is the balance, the poise of reason and affection. I want first of all to establish in your minds that poise, so that you will for yourselves discover, instead of being told by others what I mean. I want you to understand for yourselves what I say. And here let me add: I say exactly what I mean. Every word I have carefully thought out; and it was a foolish thing to say: "He does not mean what he says". Many of my friends are beginning to say: "We know him better elsewhere. It is only a part of his consciousness that is functioning." How very childish these things are! They neither know Krishnamurti nor the Teacher, but they give opinions concerning both. Now, if you are going to accept one or the other, you will do foolishly. Accept neither. Neither what I say nor what another says; but reason with yourselves, so that out of that reason the flower of understanding is born.

Now, I say I am whole -entirely unconditioned. I say this not that I may have followers. I do not want anything from anyone: neither following, nor money, nor praise, nor flattery -I have only the desire to urge all others to right conduct of life. I say that I am whole, and any man who says otherwise is talking foolishly, because he does not know. I am not saying this to convince you, because that is not my desire. I want to establish in your minds and awaken in your hearts a desire for the Truth; and when you have the desire you will find the media, the technique, the way of attainment. So, please, as I said, use your critical analysis of what I say. Do not let anybody, including myself, convince you of something which you do not understand. It does not matter how old or seasoned in tradition, or how new or modern it may be. Don't you see, friends? You have all come here believing or not believing that I have something to give, to show. How can you find out, if your minds are already prejudiced, if you are already thinking: "Oh, now this is Krishnamurti speaking, and now someone else is speaking"? You will say Krishnamurti is speaking when that is convenient to you; you will say it is someone else speaking when it satisfies you.

I have been through the world now, from India to Europe and America, and it is everywhere the same. Everybody knows better than I do about myself -I am glad you see the humour of it, but your mere having humour is not of value. We can all laugh. I have laughed so much at the foolish things people say -but that again is of little value. What is of value that you should live, because you understand? That is the only thing of importance: not words, words, words. Not what you believe or what you do not believe. To what societies you belong or to what societies you do not belong. That is all childishly ridiculous.

But you have come here as members of the Star believing that Krishnamurti is the World-Teacher. At least, you have subscribed to that belief. It is a most unfortunate thing, because you do not know. Some of you know, but the vast majority that have subscribed their names do not know. If they knew, they would have been different, and you are in nowise different from the ordinary average man; that is where the sorrow of it lies.

It is like this: If you saw a great painting and desired to become a painter yourself, you would be enthusiastic to discover the master who painted the picture and pursue him and learn from him in all eagerness. But you are not interested in that. You are interested at this present moment to discover who is speaking, whether it is so-and-so or someone else -but not whether what I am speaking is the truth. Don't you see what you are missing with all these childish wrangles over unessential things? I am not talking harshly, or from lack of affection. On the contrary. I say I have found that flower which is the consummation of all life, that perfume which is the understanding of all life, that Truth which is continuous, to which every human being must pass. And to do this you must give up everything to find that, because Truth is whole, complete, and continuous.

You want that Truth translated to you in particular, in your own narrowness; you want it brought down to you, given to you in a particular sign. You will not accept truth in its entirety. The Christian will say: "I want truth through Christianity". The Hindu will say the same for Hinduism. But you do not get Truth that way. No religion, sect or society holds the Truth. You must go out of the shadows and into the clear sunshine. I hope you are thinking and I hope you are going to do something about it...

Just for the moment imagine, for yourselves, as I have often done. Suppose that I had been in the world at the time when the Buddha was in India, and had realised to myself that there was a great human being who understood life, who was the consummation of life, who was the beauty of life; in whom there was the whole and not the part. Knowing all that and having a burning desire to understand him, do you think I would turn to him and then say that I had some other work to do in the world, that I wanted to stay in the shadow of a religion, or that I wanted to function through a particular channel, when he himself held the whole of life?

In the same manner, I say now, I say without conceit, with proper understanding, with fullness of mind and heart, that I am that full flower which is the glory of life, to which all human beings, individuals as well as the whole world, must come.

Some of you may realise what others will doubt, and others still for their convenience will discover phrases that will stick in their minds and so they will lose the perfume. I am not saying this as a threat, or any such thing; either you want the loveliness, the perfection of life, or you do not want it. If you do not want it, leave it. If you want it, have it so burningly that you sacrifice everything for this one thing. It is not narrowness -when a drowning man asks for air it is not narrowness. He wants air so that he can breathe and live and be happy, rejoicing. This is not narrowness; this is not limitation. So you have to make up your minds what you are going to do: either belong to the congregation of the dead or, breaking down all the barriers, throwing aside your side issues, intimate unessential things, come out into the clear sunshine. Please, do understand me that you can never attain Truth through any one particular channel; because Truth is continuous and cannot be divided... For, after all, what is Truth? It is life, and the understanding and possession of that fullness of life that is happiness, that is perfection. So, in order to have that, you must give up all the little parts and go after the full tress with burning anxiety.

When the sunshine comes, you do not need to read by your candlelight. You put out your candle, however soft that light may be. So, if you want that which I say is the absolute, unconditioned Truth, the whole -if you want that, then you must give up all these childish things. If you want the unessential, you are perfectly welcome; only realise it. Do not play with both.

Either you want that perfection which is the Truth, that incorruptibility which is life itself, or you want comfort -comfort which breeds authority which in its turn breeds fear. The majority of you are so much afraid of what I am saying, that you are uncertain. Quite right, but out of your uncertainty you are not anxious to find what is certain. You want to be told what is true, what is false, by another, by your pet authorities, by your traditions of yesterday.

So, I hope you realize that the time comes when you must leave your nurses, your childhood state, and come out and seek. What is the difference between you and the ordinary man? Not much, I am afraid, except that you say: "We have left all the old forms of truth".

You have left all the old ideas of truth to discover the new, but you have not discovered the new because you are establishing new forms, new theories, new dogmas, new creeds, new worships, new rites, new gods. That is not the way to find Truth. To find that Truth which is absolute, unconditioned, free, you yourselves must be unconditioned, free and absolute; that is, you must push aside everything around you that places a limitation on your minds, on your hearts, and seek that freedom which is Truth itself. You hear me every year and read what I say often, but you are all the time translating what I say to suit your convenience. I have heard people say, "Oh, he does not mean entirely all that, he has got a complex over this, he has not the whole, but we know the entirety and will tell you what is the whole. This is necessary and that is unnecessary. This is right and that is wrong. Surely you are no longer children to be told what to do, what to think, in what manner to conduct yourselves, what you shall worship and what you shall not worship!

Sirs, what are you seeking? Shadows, which obstruct the light, comfort which does not exist, instead of Truth, which gives that understanding which surpasses comfort.

What is it that you are seeking? If you want comfort, you will have innumerable gods, new shrines, new rites, new literature that will choke the very life out of your hearts and minds...

What is it which, as an individual, suffering, rejoicing, thinking, feeling, struggling, caught in the passions, uncertain, unsteady -what is it that you want?

The butterfly burns itself in the light and happy is the butterfly. And if you are willing to burn yourself in that Truth of which I speak, you will be happy. But you must be willing, you must be anxious, you must have that great desire which urges you on to discover that Truth which is eternal. So, what is it, as an individual who is thoughtful, purposeful and wise in his choice, what is it that you want? Don't you see, on that depends what you are going to get, what you will have? Don't you see, on that depends your capacity to understand? Don't you see, on that depends your strength of attainment, your purposefulness, your ecstasy, your enthusiasm?

You cannot accept ideas or thoughts from my conception, or from another's, but if your ideas are born of that which is eternal, lasting, then you can live by those ideas. So to find what is the lasting, what is the eternal, you must put aside the fleeting, the unessential, the trivial.

You ask me, "Please tell me what is the essential?" How can I tell you what is the essential? I know what is the essential for me, and I know how I have attained that essential which is incomparable, unlimited, free and absolute. For me that truth is to be free from all desires, to be free from all experience, and the moment you realise that, you will find that no one can save you except yourself. Man's greatness is that no one can save him; that is the greatness of man, it is the glory of man. But what are you all seeking? You want to be saved, you want to worship at altars made by human hands, you want to worship gods created by life, and that is why I say: Worship that life which is in all things, because life created god and man -life which is free, unlimited, unconditioned and absolute. For that is the truth.

I do not mind if next year there be only two people at the Camp. One man who is sincere, who understands, is worth a multitude who cry vainly without understanding; for that man will live from everlasting to everlasting.

So, friends, during this Camp, I hope that I shall be able to help you in your choice, to discover for yourselves and perceive by these happy visions, that which will establish peace and understanding in your hearts, that which will give you sustenance, that which will uphold you in your integrity. For there is no greater truth than that you shall be united with that life which is eternal, for in that life is immortality.

AN OPEN DISCUSSION

Ojai, Camp, 1929

To the question, "Where does obedience come in your plan of education?" Krishnaji gave a reply along these lines:

"Why should any child obey? But I should make him obey in certain things. A child will obey another if he has respect for another. If I have in myself respect for the child and for myself and for others, that child will respect me, and when I ask him to do something, sensibly, he will do it. You see, we all want to make others obey when we do not obey ourselves... Individuals who demand obedience, reverence, authority, should have no place in education."

Another questioner wanted to know if there was grace from above that could help. There was not, according to Krishnaji.

"There is no grace from above that can help. If you rely on outside authority to help you, you are not achieving. Nobody can cancel your karma, as you call it. Nobody can give you that attainment, that happiness, that understanding, from outside. It is a continual process of acquiring. No divine being plants into you understanding. No amount of worship, no amount of faith, hope, or anything else you like, will awaken that flower in you. It comes by your own continual unfoldment, by struggle, by strife, by rejoicing, by understanding."

How far can we go in desirelessness without stultifying ambition and thereby stopping human progress? Was a question that puzzled someone else?

"Please don't stop desire," was the response. "You cannot stop desire; that is, if you try to stultify desire you are dead, but if you want your desire magnificent, free, then your perception of life will be magnificent."

"The moment you organize thought, it becomes a religion and it is dead. But if you use organization to carry that thought outward, which is a very difficult thing to do, then you are perfectly justified in using it."

"Sir, why do you want to contact your fellow man? To help, isn't it so? That is why these organizations exist. That is the primary idea that lies behind most organizations, to help; but I want you to find out if you are truly helping. I am not asking you to leave any organization. I am not interested in that."

One remark of his about individual uniqueness was very graphic:

"You have a mosaic made up of little stones of innumerable colours. Their sizes must be perfect, their colours must be perfect; each little stone must be perfect and the whole together must be perfect. So that stone must be produced in its own self as perfectly as possible; then it will fit in the whole. But you must have a vision of the whole first, then the manner of your development will be unique."

From corruptibility to corruptibility, through corruption you must grow to perfection: but having established that which is the standard -not of the world, but to the world- having that standard as your guide, you then become for yourself the true guide, you then become the true master of your own actions; then you are in the position to judge for yourself the quality of your incorruption.

"Now these questions are to be answered -not to solve your problems- but rather to awaken further interest, further understanding, by my answers. So please do not think that by my answering them, you have solved them. On the contrary, these questions are all solved for me. These are the questions that you have kindly put to me, and I will answer them only in so far as they appear to me; and if you accept them as final authority, I am afraid you will find that they do not solve your problems.

QUESTION: Could you kindly describe for us the feelings or reaction, viz: the state of consciousness experienced in the physical body by one having attained liberation?

KRISHNAJI: Sirs, I can describe to you a feeling, which very few, probably, have experienced, but of what value is it? I will explain as far as it is possible to put it into words, but it is so hopeless to put anything in words. When you attain liberation, that perfection, you are, and in you all things cease and have their being. It is not a sentimental thing nor an emotional thing nor an intellectual thing, but it is as the wind, swift as the violent waters -it is everything. In you there is the whole process from the very beginning until the end, and yet in you there is no beginning and no end -you are. There you are really the creator because there you find your absolute poise.

Truth is not relative, it is absolute; and to a person that is caught in the relative, the absolute is ever escaping, so it is very difficult to understand unless you yourself are made incorruptible; and I am interested in that, not in describing to you what it is, what it feels like. Of that you will know when you have attained.

The root of immortality is understanding and the very beginning of understanding is the true discipline gathered from the final fulfilment of all life.

QUESTION: In regard to those who do not fully understand your mission or teachings, and even if they may never fully comprehend from the presentation, can any harm result from the effort to understand?

KRISHNAJI: Sir, why do you make it my mission and teaching? Isn't it what you people want? Don't you want to be free and happy? It isn't my mission. It is your mission. It is what you are seeking, and not what I am seeking. Because you are making it mine, that is the reason you don't understand. Because you are not aware of your suffering, of your narrowness, of your limitations, of your corruption of life, you give to another the authority to lead you. And as I am not accepting that authority, it is useless to say it is my teaching or my message. It is the message and teaching of life, which is in everything and in everyone; and the moment you understand that, it is yours and not mine. So, as it is yours, my purpose is only to awaken that knowledge, that desire to discover for yourself. And as it is yours, you must struggle to understand.

QUESTION: How can one stimulate a desire for freedom?

KRISHNAJI: How can a man that is in prison stimulate the desire for freedom? What a question to ask! Sirs... is not the suffering of another, are not the tears of another, the laughter, the rejoicing, the corruption, sufficient to give you that burning desire to free others and yourself? But you want artificial stimulation, a drug, an enticement, a reward for your good actions, and you want me to tell you of a new God, to whom you can offer for your stimulation, to build a new altar. I hope you are thinking; not accepting what I am saying, nor rejecting. The dancing shadows, the clear sunshine, the bird on the wing, the light on the waters, the suffering of a man, or a woman, the delight, the rejoicings of your neighbours -if that does not give you sufficient desire- woe to you!

As life is one, the forms of that life are many. The moment you understand that the forms have little value, then they have their place. But to come to that perfect life, you must make your own form as perfect as possible.

QUESTION: To what extent is there freedom of action?

KRISHNAJI: Absolute. Man is free to do exactly as he wishes, and he is doing that now, anyhow. Because he is free, he wants to find excuses for his corruption. Because he is free, he is afraid that he might go wrong, and invents theories, creeds, churches, and temples. Man, being free, absolutely unconditionally being his own master, he is limited, and through that limitation he must strive toward freedom, and that is the process of life.

QUESTION: Would working for one society only tend to narrow one's view and effectiveness?

KRISHNAJI: Again, it depends on you, for if your mind is narrow, whatever you do will be narrow.

QUESTION: What is it in our nature that makes us do things contrary to our better judgment, and how may we overcome this difficulty?

KRISHNAJI: By not doing wrong. By struggling. Sir, again, the idea of overcoming something -it is not a question of overcoming. There is no such thing as failure. If I have not the strength to walk up to the mountaintop, I make the effort, fall down, and make another. It does not mean that I am failing.

You will spoil everything if you base your understanding on individuals, even on Krishnamurti. There is a much greater thing than this form, which you call Krishnamurti, which is Life; and of that Life I speak, and of that Life I would urge you to become disciples, and with that Life I would urge you to be in love.

Beauty is that love which is incapable of perversion. With that man must concern himself before he can create.

One act of understanding shall put a man on a pinnacle of great vision.

It is no good your merely congregating together in a chorus of agreement. But if one of you really lives one act, one thought that has its foundation in the root of immortality -that is, life itself- or have a feeling which has its foundation in that which is eternal, then that shall put you in a condition which will give you a greater understanding, a greater rejoicing, a greater unfoldment of that which is eternal.

Ignorance is that which is created by the individual within himself by the intermingling and admixture of that which is fleeting and lasting. Therefore ignorance has no beginning, but it has an end.

That which is real shall not bind. That which is fleeting shall bind, corrupt and put a limitation. So, the wise man, having that as his measure by which he shall judge his actions, his thoughts, his emotions, his whole life as a whole, shall begin to disentangle himself from that ignorance which is the admixture of the real and the unreal, of life and death.

Therefore, you cannot kill the self, but you can make the self grow so enormous, so vast, that it includes all life.

After all, if you follow an individual, you create out of that individual a shrine, and hence, by the limitation of your desires, limit that which you are seeking.

Don't you see, that is what I have been saying for the last few days; that the moment you perceive for yourselves the goal, the object, the fulfilment of all life for yourselves, then you do not want to follow anyone but the Truth; then you do not rely on anything but the Truth; then you do not want comfort from anything or anyone. But from the understanding of Truth there is born strength in yourselves.

If you did not say as you do, Krishnamurti says so and so, but if you realised that what I have said is the truth for its intrinsic value, it is yours and you can repeat with certainty -that certainty which cannot be shaken by any doubt or by any person. That is what I want to create in your minds and in your hearts; not the desire to follow Krishnamurti, because Krishnamurti will die.

All forms are transient things; they hold within themselves ultimate decay, and that of which I am speaking knows of no decay. The moment you adhere to that which does not die, then your integrity, your purpose, your ecstasy is lasting, fundamental, has its foundation in that which is everlasting.

Sirs, there is revolt in the world against the established order, tradition, and so on, but that revolt is not intelligent from my standpoint. That revolt is like a stream that overflows its banks; but the intelligent revolt chooses that which is essential, understanding that essential thing in the light of that freedom, of that perfection which I have described.

QUESTION: What then is the true or positive function of the mind?

KRISHNAJI: Sane balanced judgement is the function of the mind, but to arrive at that judgement, mind must have its counterpart equally balanced, and that is affection. That is the danger of this division of mind and heart. As I said yesterday, you cannot divide mind and heart. It is the same substance.

Please realise that you have to attain this ocean, this sea of life, without limitation, without corruption, which is free and eternally active. And you should rejoice at one who has attained and find out from him the glad news; and by discovery and by understanding, alter the very condition of your thoughts, the state of your hearts, so that you yourselves shall come in that shadow of perfection.

It is not a question of whether you need it. It is a question whether you want it, whether you want to be happy, whether you want to be free and establish yourself in perfection. And the majority of you do not want it, and hence all these innumerable vain useless questions. You do not want it as a hungry man wants food. You do not want it as a thirsty man wants water. You do not want it as a drowning man wants air, or as a man that is covered with wounds wants a healing balm. An ointment that shall cure all sorrow, all suffering, is to be found in that which is lasting and that which is life, and of that I speak.

You are killing the future by the past; you are more interested in the dead of yesterday than the living of today and of the future, the flower of life of tomorrow.

QUESTION: Isn't the theory of individual freedom really anarchy and a dangerous menace to social life, because all communities contain individuals who are lacking in their conception of their duties to others?

KRISHNAJI: Sir, why do you bother about other people? Why don't you live yourself? You are always concerned about your neighbour, about his weakness, his gossip and his corruptibility. You are concerned about the criminal and society, while in your own heart is the criminal. You call individual freedom anarchy. If the individual is not happy, as he is not at the present time, he is creating chaos and anarchy around him, by his selfishness, by his cruelty. You are all so concerned with the helping of another. It is a lovely thing just to help another; but what is your help? To bring him to another cage, to another chaos and to another shadow? Or do you want him to be free? Do you want him to evolve in his own loveliness? There are two kinds of influences -one tyrannical, and the other that gives encouragement, that gives understanding, that gives simplicity and affection. Your influence is tyrannous. You want everyone to be of a particular kind and that is why you have all these religions, these acts of morality. But there is the other influence which, when truly understood, gives nourishment, encouragement, because each individual must find by himself and through himself that which is lasting.

"What is it then that you want in life -love, possessions, or that feeling of comfort which men call happiness? If that is the jewel hidden in the secret sanctuary of your heart, then you will pursue it and acquire that which you desire; but if, on the other hand, you desire that happiness which is eternal, that life which is absolute, unconditioned -if that is your desire, if that is what is hidden in the sanctuary of your heart, then you will pursue that. As the lotus utilizes the mire to produce its lovely blossoms, so you will utilize the transient life to produce the perfect flower of your understanding.

"I feel," said one speaker, "that as time goes on, the central message of Krishnaji is going to make absolutely revolutionary changes in the values that are given to the arts. At present they are looked upon as luxuries. The arts will become as essential in the life of the student of the future as either food or drink."

"After all, painting pictures, writing poems, are only expressions of what you feel inside. If you feel small, petty, your writings, your paintings, your whole expression, will be small; but if you know how to live; then your art, whatever it is, will have the stamp of the eternal."

"I hold that no useful purpose can come out of fear. It does not matter whether it is for getting the right behaviour or the right conduct or peace. If by fear you make a person act rightly, it is not right action. Sirs, you cannot produce loveliness through fear, beauty through fear, and that is why you have so many catastrophes, wars, so much selfishness, rampant competition and corruption -all this is from fear or the lack of true understanding."

Man is absolute authority to himself, man is his own master, he is not liable to outer circumstances; he is, by his own sorrows, by his own complications, by his own misunderstandings, part of the world, and the world around him is his expression.

Life has no technical process of fulfilment; life has no special way by which it must tread toward its glory; life has no special meditation, yoga. It is by constant assimilation and by rejection, by examining, by analysis, by careful consideration of every little event of the day that you grow to perfection.

You cannot achieve anything by fear at any time whatsoever, because the moment you have fear in your mind and in your heart, you are putting a limitation on that desire which is seeking freedom. Desire is self, and in the purification of that desire is the fulfilment of life.

Again I say, for true affection the right standard is that love which is detached because it is attached to all things. It is like the flower that gives perfume to every passer-by and does not care to whom it gives its delicious fragrance; so should true love be. And towards that all affection must struggle, must evolve, must progress -towards that perfect love. Now you will ask me: "How shall we do it? How shall we arrive at that perfect love?" By liking someone, in however small a way, from corruptibility to corruptibility, till you arrive at that incorruptibility of love. There is no other way than by constant struggle, by strife, by gathering great storms of love and rejecting them.

Realising the great truth, it were better that you should fall from a great height than from the pavement. The mediocrity of life, the smallness of life, consists not in falling, but in falling off a small place. Were you to fall from a great height, from the house-tops, from the great mountains, then the world would rejoice and know that there is a great man, for his fall was great. For mediocrity, the smallness of mind and the smallness of emotion stifle Truth and it cannot abide with those that are fearful of their fall.

For, having a full understanding of that eternal Truth, or partial at least it may be, your love should from now on withstand that wave of corruptibility. Because if there were ten -if there were one who really was capable of pure, detached affection, that affection which gives encouragement, that points ever with clarity towards the perfection of all love, then that one individual would awaken within the hearts of many that love which cannot be tinged by corruption.

You shall walk by and people shall marvel and take comfort in your existence.

LAW AND SPIRITUALITY, 1929

Does life obey any law? That life which is absolutely free and unconditioned has no law within itself. In manifestation, which may be called the expression of life, there must be law, but there is none for that which manifests, for that which expresses itself.

And as all law is limitation, I maintain that life in freedom, which is spirituality in consummation, is above any limitation. To that which is free you cannot go with bound hands. You cannot attain the spiritual life by systems or regulations. It is an inner experience, which cannot be translated into the finite. It is so vast, so immense, that unless you experience it yourself it remains a mystery, a hidden secret.

How can there exist laws in spirituality? Truth is absolutely pathless, in spite of the well-established idea of a guru, a mediator, who will teach, who will lead you to higher and higher stages, who will encourage you and give you that innate quality of strength, of dignity and poise.

If there is no mediator, no guru, no system, no religion, then there must be constant awareness, constant self-recollectedness, which will establish the distinction between the real and the unreal. All ignorance is the intermingling of the real with the unreal. Ignorance has no beginning but it has an end. The end of ignorance is when, through awareness and constant self-recollectedness, you know for yourself what is real and what is false, what is essential and what is non-essential. It depends on yourself, not on external things, not on outward circumstances. It does not matter what these are -whether you are a millionaire or a poor man- the objective sense-world does not exist for a man who is seeking the absolute, unconditioned Truth. He is not dominated from outside; he is not controlled or encouraged or depressed by outside influences.

To arrive at that realm which is liberation and to which there is no path, no guru, no law, you must of necessity break away from this old well-seasoned tradition of mediators, of salvation from the outside. This cleavage with tradition also means that you must be free from relative good and bad, from relative right and wrong, from pain and pleasure and from worldly conventions. It does not mean that you should destroy all standards for others.

As I have said before, this is purely an individual realisation, and to arrive at that realisation for yourself there must be the withdrawal from all external right and wrong, from pain and pleasure, and conventionalities established by society. Truth is a pathless land and to arrive there you cannot have regulations. This does not mean that you should be licentious, that you should use your freedom to do exactly what you desire. Liberation is not that. If these external standards no longer exist for you, replace them by a standard based upon eternal values -a much more difficult thing to do. That true standard, that infallible value, cannot be questioned, cannot be judged; nor can it be weighed in the balance against any standard established from outside. Such a standard is dynamic; and, as it is dynamic, it is truly creative, because it is constantly varying with life, because it is life itself, whereas all your outer standards are static. When you have established such a standard you are free -free of all your gurus, your systems, your rites, your laws. That standard will not vary according to your personal whims, your likes and dislikes, according to your moods, but is a measure which will lead each individual to that liberation which is harmony, which is true creation.

Liberation is neither in the future nor in the past. It is not something to be attained in some distant future nor does it lie in the past under the control, under the domination of those who have already attained. I maintain that the now, the immediate now, holds the entire truth. The past is the ever-changing present, and to that past belong birth, renunciation, acquisition, and all the qualities that you have gained.

The past will not solve your problems nor establish harmony within yourself; so you look to future, which becomes for you the great mystery. The future is the mystery of the 'I', the unsolved 'I', because whatever you have solved of the 'I', of the self, is past, so whatever you have not solved is the future, and hence a mystery. The future will always remain a mystery because the more you enter the future, the more mysterious it becomes and the more you are held within it.

The establishment of inner harmony is to be attained neither in the past nor in the future, but where the past and the future meet, which is the now. When you have attained that point, neither future nor past, neither birth nor death, neither time nor space exist. It is that "now" which is liberation, which is perfect harmony, to which the men of the past and the men of future must come. You, who aim at bringing about that harmony in the future, must realise this eternal moment.

To me the future is not at all important, neither is the past. What is of the utmost importance is what we are in the now. Your ideas, your love, your whole being must live in the immediate, which means that you must put your theory into practice now. It matters what you are now, in what manner you live and treat other people, not what you are going to be in the future. Who cares what you are going to be? The seed that has life in it wants sunshine and rain immediately, not in some distant future -by then the seed may be dead.

That eternal moment is creation. I dislike the use of the words 'active' and 'inactive', 'dynamic' and 'static' -pass the words by and see in them something potent. If you do not live in that eternal moment, you are dead to the self, to the 'I', to the immensity of life. Unless you free yourself from all outside authorities, conventions, rights and wrongs, philosophies and religions, you can never come to that immediate now, which is creation.

To be liberated, to live in the realm of the eternal, to be conscious of that Truth, means to be beyond birth and death -because birth is of the past and death is in the future- beyond space, beyond past and present, and the delusion of time. The man who has attained such liberation knows that perfect harmony which is constant and eternally present; he lives unconditionally in that eternity which is now.

EERDE GATHERING 1929

Eerde, Holland, 1929

I FEEL very strongly that a time has come when each one of us must change drastically; that is, entirely disassociate ourselves from everything of the past because we have understood. There is not sufficient disruption in each one, there is not sufficient cleavage from the past, and that cleavage can only come when you are really anxious to find something which will give everlasting satisfaction, understanding and consolation, to replace what has been taken away.

Without this absolute cleavage from the past you will never create anything, either in yourselves or in the outside world.

You have gathered here in order to hear me, in order to understand what I am saying. The first requisite, the first essential for this understanding, is that you destroy all barriers created by the past, all superstitions, all preconceived ideas, everything that stands in the way of clear examination and clear thought. It is absolutely necessary that there should be disruption and revolt. If you understand what I am saying, you will understand yourselves, your make-up and your growth towards that perfection which is freedom, and hence you will control that growth. When you understand that, you will automatically understand me and everyone else. But to understand yourselves, you must all the time detach yourselves from your environments, from your traditions, from what you believe to be true, from what you think is essential to the goal, from what you have been told, from what you have read. Everything must go. When you are once absolutely detached -physically, emotionally, mentally- you will be able to understand the whole structure of human evolution.

You must be strong, because otherwise this new dawn, this freshness of understanding, will be corrupted, will fade, and will be lost.

I do not know why people fear to destroy spiritual values, mental and moral values. After all, the moment you destroy something mentally and emotionally, you are building something else in its place. Please think it over and you will see what I mean. When you cease to be bound by any outside morality, and you are no longer a slave to any religious superstition -either of the past or of the present- you are automatically building something that is an integral part of yourself.

I want to have people who understand this and who are living it, physically, emotionally, and mentally -synthetically, as a whole. It does not matter if there are two thousand or only two. I am not concerned at all with numbers, or with what work we should do, or whether we should own this land or the Castle or innumerable properties throughout the world: all that is of little importance. What we have to do -at least what I want to do and I am going to do it- is to destroy all the old traditions, the old ideas, the old gods, the old superstitions, created by men, which are unreal, false. And, by the very process of destruction, to create in each one a new tradition, which will uphold, which will create self-government in men, a new attitude of mind, which, by continuous process of thought, becomes a tradition, never departing from the eternal. I want to establish a new kind of thought, a new kind of life, which will automatically translate itself into action, into the way you live the way you treat others.

To create this disruption within yourself needs courage, needs determination, and you have not got it. You only go as far as is convenient, and not to the ultimate end.

There are two kinds of intelligence: one of this world, the other belonging to the world of the real. I am not talking about the intelligence of this world; I am talking about the intelligence of reality, that is, intelligence which has the capacity to choose, with cultured discernment, between what is real and essential and what is false and futile. That is the true intelligence.

To revolt with intelligence, you must be concentrated. Not through meditation and such practices, but through singleness of purpose -not in the state of mind of weaklings, but with the concentration of the strong.

You are afraid of innumerable things, of convention and of what others may say. You want to reconcile the present moment with everything around you; you want to reconcile all that has been said in the past with the present; you want to go along in the same old way, to have your Masters, your gurus, your worships, your rites, your ceremonies, and to reconcile all these with what I am saying. You cannot by any means live both with the past and with the future. You may say, "I am weak and so I need this support, I need someone to encourage me." But that is not true encouragement. If you rely on someone for your happiness, for your growth, you are becoming weaker, not stronger.

Do not look for salvation from outside in any force, or you will have new conventions instead of the old. What we have to create is men who are certain of their salvation in themselves, who are strong, certain of their purpose and not looking for external comfort, external authority, external encouragement. To be so concentrated requires constant thoughtfulness. To be unaware, not to think clearly, is the greatest misfortune that you could possibly have. Unawareness creates comfort. You have to think constantly of your true purpose in life -not artificially, you understand, but you must be full of balanced self-recollectedness.

And so, what are you going to do about it? It is no good your coming to these meetings, listening to me every day, if there is not at the same time true living born of clear understanding.

I am not concerned with the invention of new theories, new philosophies, new systems, or with new combinations of these -but entirely with ideas, thoughts and feelings that can be lived, that must be lived. I have found what to me is absolute certainty, what to me is absolute reality -not relative but absolute. I want therefore to show that those ideas which I have found can be lived by everyone, and must be lived by everyone. They are not for the specially privileged. Perfection is not a freak but a natural thing. It is the result of constant effort, constant watchfulness, awareness, self-recollection. It is the result of the continual focussing of one's efforts towards that reality which cannot be affected by any outside circumstances, by any outside authorities, by any outside influences, sorrows or pleasures.

If you agree with what I am saying you should make an effort to disentangle yourselves from all outward conditions.

What I have attained must be attained by everyone. It is not the privilege of the few; it is the flower of all humanity, of the world of men. As everyone in the world is caught in the wheel of time, space, suffering, sorrow, pain, pleasure, I want them to break away from that wheel, the wheel of the fleeting, the unessential, the unreal, the illusory, and by that breaking away, to establish for themselves an absolute certainty which cannot be questioned.

The majority of you have been listening to me for three years and yet you cannot maintain your certainty against anybody: you are uncertain; you do not know that what I say is the real. You will quote me -misquote, or quote rightly- that is of no value. You cannot stand before others without a quiver until you have certainty, until you feel you have succeeded, until you know what I say to be real, because you are strong. But that is what I want you to do. I don't want people who merely agree. But if you agree, you must agree so entirely that you will oppose everything else, be a flame that will destroy everything else. You must be one thing or the other, you cannot be neutral. If you are this flame, then your whole being, your countenance, your attitude, your affection, your thoughts, your physical environment, everything must be the expression of that. If you are not in agreement, go away; be against it as violently as you would be for it. I mean this, please; because the way you are going on is not productive of anything. What is your agreement worth? Nothing! In what way have you changed the people outside, in what way have you changed your own circumstances, your own lives? Your agreement has not produced a change, so you do not really agree. You are just as afraid as ordinary people; you are just as weak, as fearful of superstitions, authorities, and conventions. Your agreement has not produced strong men, men who are indifferent to everything but certain of their own strength.

Don't you see? You can't have both, you can't be worshippers of an image and yet speak of freedom; you can't be worshippers of pictures and yet talk of reality. You can't be slaves and at the same time talk of the emancipation that comes from the inward certainty of true understanding which is born of search. You can't be adherents to systems and at the same time talk about the freedom of the whole life. You must be either one thing or the other; be hot or cold. If you are hot, then you must burn out all external things, destroy all the weeds, the superstitions, fears, gods, unrealities, and the unessential things of life. If you are cold, then leave aside what I am saying; be selfish, narrow, fearful. Don't, please, be afraid. Be certain of one thing or the other. It is no good all the time trying to grasp one thing and after grasping it twisting it to suit the other. You can't twist it, you can't reconcile the two, the old and the new. You will thereby only create greater sorrows, greater misunderstanding, and greater struggles.

I am not trying to entice you to one thing or other. It does not matter to me whether you agree with me or not. Eventually I am going to find a few who will -one, two, half-a-dozen, will be enough- who will be so whole-hearted in this matter that they will fight the whole world. So it does not mater whether you agree with me or not -you will, eventually. If you don't now, you will agree in a hundred million years. Because I speak of that which is the flower of the world, the fragrance, the loveliness of the whole of humanity.

I don't want to mesmerise you, I want you to see clearly for yourselves. You cannot belong both to light and to darkness, to certainty and to uncertainty, to the essential and to the unessential.

If your thoughts, your emotions, your ideas, belong to the fleeting, then you will never find that about which I am talking. In order to discover whether they are the seeds which will produce the flower of the eternal, you must go through a process of elimination, of complete detachment from all those things which you have acquired.

Your ideas have not their roots in the eternal because you have not yet discovered what is the eternal. Once you have found that out, your ideal will naturally take the shape of that immortality, of that certainty.

I am talking about this life, which is the life of every one, which is changing yet unchangeable, constant yet variable, to which every human being, all the individual lives in the world, must come. For imperfection creates individuality; and perfection, which is freedom, is the flower of every human being. Before you can attain perfection, which is Life, which is Truth -absolute, not relative, not conditioned- you must realise that there is no path to it. There cannot be a path to it -Truth is pathless. The ocean receives all rivers. One river may go through one country, another river through another country, experiencing different climes, nourishing different trees, races, types of people, or flowing through desert sands: yet they all go to the same sea. Like the ocean, without paths, pathless, is this Truth.

Life is free, unconditioned, illimitable, and to attain that, you must not tread any path that is bound, that is limited. For Truth is the whole and not the part. You cannot arrive at it with uneven, half-developed minds and half-developed emotions, for it is the perfect harmony, the perfect poise of mind and heart, which is Life. Every man, every woman, every thing in life is seeking, groping, struggling, in sorrow, in pain, in ecstasy for this freedom which cannot be disturbed, which is the perfection, the fulfilment of all life.

You must be free. You must be of no god, of no religion, of no sect; bowed down to no authority, past or present, for all authority is unproductive.

If your mind and your heart are strangled by worship, by prayer, by fear, by uncertainty, then your ideas cannot have their root in the eternal, in that immortality which is perfection. Be detached from all these things. Please, I mean everything I say, don't go away afterwards and say: "He does not quite mean that; he means us to work for this particular church or for that particular religion or for these particular things". Those are excuses because you cannot find the real. You are a slave to all these things, you are living in their shadow; how can you understand the sunlight? No one can drive you out into the sun except yourself. It is so childish to talk of salvation for another. No one can save you. You yourself must make the tremendous effort and step out of shadow. If you remain in darkness, then say: "I revel in darkness and enjoy it". You have a perfect right to do that. But if you want to enjoy the light, its clearness, its purity, its serenity, you must come out of the darkness.

There is a large heron just outside who waits hour upon hour absolutely concentrated, single-minded, one pointed, to catch a fish. He does not move an inch. Likewise, to have true self-recollectedness, you need to be concentrated -not only during this period of an hour but during the whole day, which is much more difficult.

You cannot find yourself if you dissipate all your energy in talking, talking, talking -gossiping.

What I am talking about is nothing extraordinary; it is the consummation of the individual and the universal life. To understand this, and to bring theory into practice in daily action, you must be free from all external, objective influences. Up to now you have had certain standards, which you have followed, but by revolt, by the destruction of authority, by your own inclination, those standards have all been destroyed. Now each one must establish a new value for himself, a true standard which will act as a guide.

In order to find the right values, the right standards, you must go through the process of elimination. It is not merely a question of doing it mentally or emotionally; there must be a physical result of your renunciation, of your putting aside. Mind you, there is no such thing as renunciation or self-sacrifice for a man who really understands. How can there be? You are trying to put aside all those things that have been imposed upon you, that you have acquired, in order to find out what is the core of your whole substance; to find that out, naturally you must put those things aside. That is not renunciation; that is purification.

To have that freedom from all external things, in order to discover your true substance, you must be free from fear.

First of all, from the fear of salvation, because no one is going to save you except yourself. No erection of churches, creation of gods or images, no prayers, no worship, no ceremonies, are going to give you that inward understanding and tranquillity. Please, understand this: I mean everything I say; do not afterwards say: "He does not quite mean that". I am concerned with this: to produce strong men in the world, men who are incorruptible, who have clear vision and will produce and create a generation with clear understanding.

Then you must be free from ancient gods and modern gods. What are you trying to do? To be free, or to be weak children -to be guided, helped along? Eventually a man must grow strong, he must be free of all gods, because he himself is potentially godlike. He is the only god and there is no other god. So why worship something external which has no value? It is curious that you always worship gods but never the man in the field, never yourself, never the labourers. Who is the god of your worship? Some far-away deity; while you do not know even how to be friendly with your neighbours!

Next, you must be free from traditional right and wrong. What are you doing at present? You are creating, in place of the old, new beliefs, new traditions, new fears, new gods, new Masters, new gurus. I am talking about something to which all Masters, all gods, and all humanity have to come. And you are worshipping only the intermediate steps, which are of no value. If you want to change the world,if you want to destroy the shadow that lies across it and make it healthy, pure and strong, you yourself must be strong; you yourself must be free from all fear of these things. That is what I want you to do. You must destroy those things which are false, unessential, which create superstition and chaos. And to do that, you yourself must be beyond the clutches of fear.

Then again, you must be free from the fear of punishment and the enticement of reward. I wonder why the majority of you are here. Do you think you are going to gain a special reward, a special heaven, by listening to me; or a punishment if you do not? By your own substance you are rewarded; by your own thought you are punished; and no one else can hamper or hinder, punish or reward you. So, you must be free of that bogey which exists in the world: "Do the right action and you will be rewarded; do the wrong action and you will go to hell". Your whole life is conducted on the idea of punishment and reward. You may have put aside the traditional heaven and hell of Hinduism, or Christianity, but you have invented others, equally disastrous, equally unreal, and equally false. If you would discover your own purity, your own understanding, your strength, you must be free from the idea of reward and punishment.

Again, you must be free from fear of convention, of what your neighbours say, which is rather difficult -much more difficult than freeing yourself from fear of gods. Conventions are made for weaklings and weaklings are produced by conventions. But freedom from fear of convention does not mean licentiousness. Conventions are made in order to keep the weak person by force along the straight path. But if you are free from the fear of convention, that means that you must make a greater demand upon yourself for true action. You are all troubling about what would happen if we removed conventional restriction from the man in the street who wants to commit murder. That is a question which immediately arises in everyone's mind. Do not trouble about it. You created him, his weaknesses, his desires, because you yourself were afraid. So you have to change, you have to be free from conventional fears of what your neighbours think, of what your family thinks, of what society thinks, from fear of your guru -all these innumerable childish fears.

Then again, you must be free from the fear of loss and gain: financial, physical, emotional, and mental. You are responsible for yourself. Please realise that this is true in regard to everything changeable: loss and gain of money, power, love, all the innumerable things which include loss and gain. Please, think it over and you will see.

Again, there must be freedom from fear of life and death. In Life there is no life or death, it is all a continual process, never ceasing, ever changing. In Life there cannot be at one moment birth and at another moment death. It is only the physical expression that changes. And you are all pursuing death much more than Life, you are much more interested in what happens after death than what happens in Life, because to you there is life and death, which is birth and death. As there is night and day, darkness and light, so in existence there is birth and death. You must be free from the fear of that, because you want to discover your own purity, to set your own standard.

Then, there must be no fear of loneliness nor longing for companionship. You cannot stand alone, any one of you, you are afraid; you want someone to lean upon, you want to be encouraged, discouraged, or to be told: "You have done well". To be praised, flattered -your whole religion is that: reward and punishment, which is companionship and loneliness. As you cannot produce refined gold without fire, so you cannot produce strong men without adversity. You must weep and you must laugh in order to understand, and yet in Life there is neither laughter nor weeping. You must be able to stand alone, indifferent to companionship, indifferent to loneliness, because they do not exist. For, if you are in love with Life, Life has no loneliness, has no companionship. IT IS.

Then, also, you must be free from the fear of uncertainty. The majority of people who have come to listen here and in the Camp are all uncertain. A standard has been held up to them and it has been destroyed and now they are uncertain. They want the leaders to settle the matter and then tell them. The leaders are not going to settle it, because there are no leaders and there are no children. You are going to settle it for yourselves, you are going to be sure that certain things are right beyond the shadow of doubt, and when you are so assured, you will be free from that fear of uncertainty. Therefore, you must doubt everything, so that in your ecstasy of doubt you may become certain. Do not doubt when you are feeling tired, do not doubt when you are unhappy; any one can do that. You must only doubt in your moments of ecstasy, for then you will find out whether what remains is true or false.

Again, you must be free from authority, from my authority, from every authority. You cannot say: "We have been told in centuries past or in modern times". You are not children, to be told. Authority in spiritual matters cannot hold for a single instant. It is your personal experience that counts, not authority. You have been told, hundreds of times, in every religion of the world, that through your own understanding alone, through the rejection of everything, you will find. And yet you follow authority, because it is much more convenient. Be free from the fear of authority, which can be cut down as a tree and be entirely destroyed. Then, you must be free from the desire for comfort, physical as well emotional and mental. Comfort creates the desire for shelter and the shelter assumes the shape of a god. And that god is held in a tabernacle or church or a temple. That god is born of fear. So, be free from physical, emotional and mental comfort or encouragement. It is not a cold philosophy that I am giving. I am talking about Life, which is neither hot nor cold, which is not a philosophy nor a great system.

Then again, you must be free of love and hate; that is, free from caring whether you are liked or not. You must be indifferent as to whether you are hated or not. Your actions must be born, not out of love but out of your own intrinsic desire. Please, think it over. Neither love nor hate must be allowed to warp your judgement. If you do certain things or change in a certain manner because you love someone, that is not true love nor a true reason for action. Action should spring from impersonal motives. Why do you think I am doing all this? Because you all like me? I am doing it because I think it is right, not because of something else. I am doing it because I am in love with Life, that Life which has no variation, no end, no birth and no death, which is not bound in any cage of fear. But this does not mean that you must not love one another.

Then there is the fear of not expressing yourself. How can you express yourself if you do not know what you are? In order to find out what you are, you must first be free of all these things.

Fear of desire, fear of ambition, jealousy, envy, competition, and then the fear of pain and sorrow -you must be free from all these in order to discover what remains, which is eternal. Imagine that you are free, and translate that freedom into physical expression. If you are going to alter the world, you cannot belong to any one part.

It is no good changing a little. There must be a complete cleavage -that is the only way to advance. What remains after this process of elimination, of withdrawal, of destruction of all those unessential things? I will tell you what remains. A calm mind and a heart that cannot be disturbed, that is pliable, energetic, and enthusiastic. Balanced, strong, certain, ecstatic, clear and pure, resolute and determined is the mind and the heart of him who has rejected all these things.

And when you have achieved that, you can put on the garment of that which is eternal -not before. You cannot be made incorruptible if there is in your mind and in your heart a particle of corruptibility.

Man, being free, is limited. That is: man, having no outside authority to guide him, no divine control, is free to do exactly as he wishes. And in his lack of wisdom, in his limitation, in his freedom, which is a limitation to him, he is struggling through that limitation to free himself, though he is intrinsically free. By a process of acquisition, of rejection, because he is free, he is growing by limitation to freedom. Are you not all free? You are doing exactly what you want to do, no one is guiding you, no one is telling you what is right and wrong, you are absolutely free in your choice of action, in your choice of feelings, in your choice of thoughts. Because you are free, you are limited. If there were a superhuman being guiding you, controlling, dominating you -although that superhuman being was free, you would still be limited but not even free. As you are free to make your own choice, as your choice is limited, therefore your desires, your thoughts, are limited. Through being free you are limited; and through this limitation, by acquisition, by renunciation, by gathering and by rejecting, you grow towards that freedom which is Life itself, of which you are unconsciously a part. Being free, you gather experience through desire. Desire demands experience that is its outlet. And through experience you grow to that condition, to that state where you are beyond all desire, hence beyond all experience, because you have been through all experience, through every desire.

Unless you know the substance of the 'I', the purity, the strength of the 'I', you are dead to the 'I'. To discover that resplendent 'I', to acquire that calmness, that undisturbable condition, that strength and certainty, you must go through this process of elimination. If the 'I' is to take on incorruptibility, which is perfection, it cannot in any minute detail be imperfect, because perfection rejects all imperfection. By a process of elimination, rejection, renunciation -or any other words you like to use- you must arrive at that state of mind and heart where the 'I' is calm, clear, pure, determined, energetic and enthusiastic. And when you arrive at that condition, then you can begin to educate the 'I'. In order to train the mind and the heart in the light of the eternal, you must get rid of all the unessential things. As I said yesterday, the unessential things are caused by fear, and by getting rid of them, you come to the essential, the lasting, which is the 'I'. It does not mean that you must leave the world, create a monastery, reject the world; but, living in the world, which is the expression of the 'I', you must understand the true substance of the 'I'. And to discover this 'I', you must strip it of everything. That is the only direct way.

If you understand what I mean, then your actions, your deeds -because you have found the true 'I'- will not bear the fruits of sorrow or create limitation, which is sorrow. From that cessation of all disturbance comes the freedom from illusion.

If at any time your mind and your heart are capable of being disturbed, then true comprehension, true understanding of the eternal, ceases. In order not to have the disturbance of the 'I' to have a mind and a heart that are pure, that are pliable, calm, strong, resolute, determined, balanced, you must eliminate all the unessential things that will at any period disturb their equilibrium. True understanding of the 'I', which is the 'I' of every one, comes through detachment from all unessentials. And the unessentials are the product of fear, of limitation, of desire that is binding. You can only free yourself from all illusion, and attain that state of certainty, by the process of elimination.

As long as there is the separation of the 'I' from the whole, there is limitation, pain, sorrow, life and death, time, space and illusion.

Because perfection rejects all imperfection, the 'I' must take on incorruptibility, to become part of that loveliness, part of the whole, which is freedom. And, as the bees await the spring, the delicious flowers, so this is the time for man to discover the 'I'. At least while you are here, you should concentrate on this one thing, so that you will for yourselves establish that certainty of the essential and reject all unessentials, for that is the pure intelligence which is the quality of the true 'I'.

If you do not know what you are discarding, then it is not worthwhile to discard. If you only discard because I tell you to do so, or through fear, then you are not discarding at all, you are but creating a new fear in place of an old one.

Truth -and I have carefully explained what I mean by Truth- is a danger to all societies, to all organised beliefs, to all systems of thought. If an individual, you or another, has this Truth, then he is automatically a powder magazine, which will blow up all the unessentials around him. But he cannot organise it. If you perceive that Truth and live that Truth and become part of that Truth, then you become as the sunshine that dispels all mist.

The Truth of which I speak is a danger to anything that is unessential. But you have to find out for yourself what is unessential and what is essential. I cannot tell you.

You cannot organise Life or Truth. If I want to go to London, I make use of an organisation, which will give me tickets. But if an organisation claimed that it could take me to heaven, I should not use it, because I know that heaven is not a place outside myself. Do you see what I mean?

All beliefs, all ideas of salvation, of being led to a particular heaven, are attempts to organise thought. But you cannot systematise thought and thereby enslave the mind.

It matters what you are, and not what you do or how you convert the world. You will do that if you are nice and kind, if your countenance shows your thought, your feeling, and if you are really joyous, for then everyone will come to you to see how you manage to be that in this chaotic world.

So, to come back to the main point: It is as individuals that you must become centres of that dynamic energy which sweeps aside all the unessentials -as individuals, not as an organised body. If you as an individual are adamant about something because you know it to be true, then you will change the world. But you cannot change the world if you are yourself uncertain. In order to become certain of the truth of what I am saying, what should you do?

You must first consider whether your construction of life is based on authority, whether your gods and your fears really exist, and then by a process of inward elimination you begin to think out the true values of life. The inward establishment of the essential is your primary, vital work.

When I spoke to you yesterday of the fear of salvation I meant clinging to worship, prayer, external gods, authorities, superstitions, rites, churches, temples, sanctuaries. To be afraid of all that shows that you still cling to the unessential. Be really honest, not hypocritical; then you will know how these things are affecting your life.

You are going out to tell the world what Krishnamurti is saying. If Krishnamurti says that certain things are unessential, and you yourselves are performing those unessentials, indulging in them, the people from outside will naturally ask: "If Krishnamurti has not altered your life, if you yourself have not changed, in your mind and heart, what is the good of your talking to me?" Not that you want to convince anyone, or that I want to convince you. But I want you to realise that the moment you are really certain of the essential things of which I speak, you will naturally alter yourselves. That is what matters.

You must be so certain for yourself of what is the essential thing that will give to the 'I' the garment of incorruptibility, that you -because you are wearing that garment- will be a danger to all that is corruptible.

It is as individuals that you create unessentials. They do not come into being of their own accord; you create them because you do not know how to distinguish between the essential and the unessential. Who created all the mosques and temples and churches of the world? The superstitious, the priests -you and I. Because of our lack of discernment of what is lasting and what is fleeting.

When you cease from outward expressions of the unessential, you will naturally create what is essential. And that creation is of the greatest importance: not merely the withdrawal from the old, but the creation of the new.

I do not know what you are thinking, in what way you are interpreting what I am saying. After all -please don't think I am conceited- I want you to understand what I am talking about in the way I understand it, not in the way you conceive it. What is going to be the result of my talks every morning, in what way does each one understand? That is important, and that is what we ought to discuss.

What I am talking about is the whole of life itself, and you are not going to understand it in half-an-hour, sitting about casually discussing what I say. You are very concentrated while I am talking, and the rest of the day there are a hundred and one other things in your minds. You are not going to understand anything in that way. Right comprehension does not come in a flash. It is the result of continual, ceaseless struggle, all day long. It is by continual readjustment, shifting, destroying, gathering, that you acquire true comprehension.

So far as I have been able to see, you only take a part of what I say and dissect that part, discuss that part. And that little part has no value detached from the whole. It is the whole that matters, the concrete unity of the whole of life. And its various struggles, strifes, pains, sorrows can only be understood when you have caught a glimpse of the whole.

As I was saying the other day, the true education of the 'I' -that is, the individual who is separated from the whole- consists in realising that there is the eternal 'I' and the progressive 'I' which is in constant struggle with everything. One element of that 'I' is eternal and the other element of that 'I' is progressive. That is: that 'I' which requires training and educating is ever progressing towards the eternal. And in unifying, in uniting the eternal and the progressive, lies freedom and the attainment of Truth. The 'I' which is progressive is neither intellectual nor emotional. Life is not purely intellectual nor purely emotional. You are not purely intellectual nor purely emotional, but a mixture of both.

The individual, who is all the time combating society, combating groups -because a group always tends to smother, to stifle the individual- that individual, the 'I' that is progressive, should have a standard, should have values that are wholly apart, that cannot be dominated, controlled, or suffocated by the group, by the mass. Not that this standard should be purely individualistic, for as your individualistic standard varies from time to time it is of no great importance. But the standard, which the 'I', the progressive 'I', establishes in itself after going through a process of elimination, is eternal. In order to discover for yourself, in order to be above all groups, above all individualistic desires, in order to unite that progressive 'I' to the 'I' which is eternal, you, as the progressive 'I' -the 'I' that is constantly seeking experience, the 'I' that is urged on by desires, dominated by fears, limited by external circumstances, controlled by corruptible love, by hate, passion, and the desire to seek comfort, trying to conform to outside authority, afraid of loneliness- must overcome all these things.

You cannot arrive at the eternal 'I', you cannot escape to that eternal 'I' -which is the universal 'I', which is yours and mine, which is the 'I' of everyone in the world, of all humanity, which is neither being nor non-being, which is neither wisdom nor non-wisdom, which is neither action nor non-action -before you have understood the progressive 'I'. You cannot evade the struggle of the progressive 'I' and thus arrive at that 'I' which has no beginning and no end, which is still, which is in front of every runner. In the unifying, the bringing about of harmony between that progressive 'I' and the eternal 'I', lies true bliss, true happiness, the cessation of strife, the destruction of time and space, of birth and death, of existence. And yet, please do not imagine that this is a negative condition: again, it is neither negative nor positive. In order to achieve, to possess this happiness, this Truth, this freedom for which every limited, progressive 'I' is continually seeking -by experience, by strife, by sorrow, by struggle, by ecstasy, by pain- you must bring about that harmony between the fleeting and the eternal, between the progressive and the everlasting.

That is wherein the greatness of man consists: that no one can save him, except himself. In man the universe potentially exists, and his purpose is to bring about that realisation. To arrive at that absolute, the progressive 'I' must, by experience, by consideration, by thoughtfulness, by the lack of fear, reject and eliminate those things that hinder unification. This is not a philosophy merely to be thought about, mere mental gymnastics: it is Life itself, the whole, which must be lived, which must express itself physically, in all your actions.

I want to point out and I have said this before -that what I am saying is not a new theory, to be added to the innumerable theories, philosophies and systems that already exist. It has nothing to do with that. It is what I consider to be life -the whole. And, as I am living that, I say that it is the quintessence of all life, the culmination of all life, the flower of all life. I am speaking of the fruition of my life, which is the life of everyone. So, please, do not treat what I am saying as an intellectual theory to be worked out, or an emotional upheaval to be enjoyed.

I am talking about something which to me is real, which I am living. But to you it is all foreign, because you are still indulging in theories, in beliefs, in systems through which to evolve. What I am saying has essentially, vitally to do with life, that everyday life which must be made perfect -for everyone, not merely for the few.

When I say "life" I use it with a special meaning: life -not of the part, yours or mine- but that life which is the whole, which includes yours and mine -which is the seed of all things, which is mobile and immobile, transient and eternal. It is everything. That life, which is the seed of everything, created man and god. God is but man ennobled, free; and that god, which is man, is in harmony with the eternal, with life. That is the function of man; to harmonise his "I", his self, with the eternal. It is not through meditation, through philosophy, that you establish this harmony, but through strife, control and again ceaseless strife -which you do not want. You do not want strife; you want an easy, smooth path. This harmony must be established between that which is fleeting, which is in each one of us, and that which is constant, which also is in each one of us.

Life creates man and leaves him absolutely independent, corruptible, limited, a slave to circumstances. Being independent, being free, he is able to choose for himself. But through his lack of capacity, his ignorance of the essential, he chooses those things around him which are trivial.

If you look at yourselves, you will see that this applies to each one of you. If you look within yourselves, you will see that there is the changeable "I" and the changeless "I". Don't translate these as the Ego and Monad, and feel happy about it. You don't know any more about them than you do about what I am saying. If you look within yourselves, you will see that there is the changeable, the never still, and the constantly varying self. Isn't that so? Then there is at the same time the self, which is constant, changeless, certain, calm, assured. Of that self you know nothing.

So, there are these two, and it is the concern of each one therefore to make the changeable "I", the changeable self, into the changeless, still, all-conserving Self. That is: you must make, or rather transmute, the changeable into the changeless, because you cannot bring down the changeless into the changeable, you cannot bring the eternal into the transient, but rather by purification, by struggle, by denials, by sacrifices, by continual strife, you must transmute the changeable and bring it into the changeless. As you cannot bring the eternal into the transient, as you cannot bring the eternal self into harmony with the changeable, progressive self, you must make that progressive, changeable self into the eternal. What everyone is trying to do, on the contrary, is to bring the eternal into the transient. Because you want to avoid all struggles, all pain, all sorrow, to evade instead of transmuting, you have all your shelters of comfort, your philosophies, your gods, your temples, your churches and your religions. You want to evade, you want to forget, and plunge yourself into the eternal. You cannot! For where there is corruptibility, incorruptibility cannot exist; where there is imperfection, perfection cannot hold its sway. So you must make that progressive, changeable, constantly varying "I" into the incorruptible, constant, all-preserving, all-conserving, changeless, eternal "I", which is neither being nor non-being, neither wisdom nor non-wisdom.

In the process of transmutation lies the truth and not in mere attainment. It is while you are progressing towards the eternal that there is truth, not in the final fulfilment. The final fulfilment is natural, is the result of the continual process. You must look to that truth, to that life, to that liberation, to that happiness, while in the process of transmuting the progressive into the changeless, the eternal. Therefore, you must concern yourself with the "I" which is progressive, and in the caring for that, in making it pure, strong, fearless, complete within itself, wholly delivered from all illusion, lies the harmony which is eternal.

QUESTION: How do you conceive the connection, the relation between the progressive "I" and the eternal "I"? Why does the progressive "I" want to become the eternal "I"?

KRISHNAMURTI: Why do you want to be happy? Why do you want to be free? Why do you want harmony in everything that you do? Why is the sorrowful, painful, struggling "I" always seeking that which is calm, serene, balanced, poised? You want to conquer sorrow and rain and establish within yourself that which is incorruptible and hence full of happiness, that which does not bind, which is free.

QUESTION: Is "the simple union" the fusion of the progressive "I" with the eternal "I"?

KRISHNAMURTI: You all like that expression "'the simple union", but it means nothing to you. It sounds so simple that everyone thinks he can achieve it. The simple union is very difficult, because it requires a genius to be simple -not childish, I don't mean that kind of simplicity, crudeness, but real simplicity of refinement, the outgrowing of all external things. That simplicity is the result of great sorrow, great pain, great understanding. The question is: Is progress the union between the progressive "I" and the eternal "I"? Of course. But you are wanting this union with the eternal before you are in harmony with your friends, before you are friendly with your neighbours, before you are tolerant of those who are either too intellectual or not intellectual enough. To accomplish this union with the eternal, you must first have harmony within yourself. You are all thinking of it as something far away, but it is neither far nor near.

QUESTION: Is the eternal "I" the same thing as 'life'?

KRISHNAMURTI: It is.

QUESTION: If Truth lies in the process, is perfection therefore progressive? Does perfection become more and more perfect?

KRISHNAMURTI: Not from my point of view. Perfection of character is not progressive; there is something else which is progressive. It is like this: The self -the mind and the emotions- must be progressive, until it is in perfect harmony with the eternal. While you are walking towards something, that is progress; but when you enter into that towards which you have been progressing, progress of one kind ceases and a different kind of progress, a different kind of perfection, begins. While you are walking towards the eternal, there is the desire to be perfect. But when you enter into harmony with the eternal, this progressive perfection to which you have been accustomed ceases. You are looking at this with a mind and a heart that are in limitation at the present moment; so to you everything, imperfect or perfect, good or evil, is progressive; your mind judges in limitation. When I talk about that eternal which is not in limitation, you apply the terms of progressive perfection, of limitation, to something which cannot be described in words. After all, what I describe to you can only be a kind of feeling to you; it is uncertain, you cannot argue about it, you cannot explain it. But when it becomes your own knowledge, your own certainty, you will not mind discussing it, talking about it, doubting it, and no one will make you uncertain.

QUESTION: The progressive "I", which is not in perfect harmony with the eternal, is in opposition to social conditions. After being harmonised with the eternal, it appears still to be in opposition, although it is expressing the most profound needs of society.

KRISHNAMURTI: That is, "As long as the "I" is not in harmony with the eternal, that "I" must be in conflict with social conditions; but when once that "I" has attained harmony, though it has an appearance of conflict with the social and economic conditions of the world, does it not express the most profound needs of society?" When you, as an individual, are as yet not in harmony with the eternal, you must naturally oppose, you must be in conflict with all external circumstances. You are in revolt with everything that is imposed upon you superficially, by authority, through fear, through ambition. If you are in revolt with those unessential things which society, social conditions, humanity, impose upon you, when that harmony with the eternal is established, you will be still more in revolt. But you are not even in revolt with ordinary things! You are afraid; you are not really in earnest. You are in earnest about the things that do not really matter in the least; you have grown wise in childish things. We have to create strong men who are in revolt because they are harmonised with the eternal, which is a much greater thing and more lovely than being in revolt because you are in disharmony. When you are harmonised, then you want to change people, to change everything, then you have the flame that is burning clear. I want to have a dozen who are in earnest about this thing, not about their particular little gods and candles, their particular little professions. In order to be truly in revolt, to have that ecstasy of purpose which is born out of harmony with the eternal, the progressive "I" must be in revolt with all external circumstances, which means constant awareness and self-recollectedness.

QUESTION: Is it not your opinion that if everyone knows and feels himself one with life, and lives life, directed by the inner voice, which is the voice of life, all limitations fall away and we experience that happiness of which you are speaking?

KRISHNAMURTI: Again, you are returning to the mystery. Life has no voice, that inner voice is the result of your experiences. Life leaves you alone to progress towards life -the whole. It does not concern itself with individuals. Do not think this is a cruel dogma. If life concerned itself with you, you would be quite different; you would be a perfect being, emotionally, mentally, and physically. The inner voice is the result, the outcome, of your own experience, which is intuition.

QUESTION:Does the vision of the substance of the "I", of the eternal, come in a flash or step by step?

KRISHNAMURTI: Does the sunlight come in a flash? Does the sun rise suddenly into mid-heaven? Does the spring come, with all its tender foliage, in a burst? Or does darkness come upon you suddenly? You want that vision to come suddenly -that is why this question is asked. You want it to be suddenly revealed to you. It cannot be done in that way. On the contrary, it is a continual, ceaseless process -the lifting of shadow upon shadow, light upon light, pain upon pain, and pleasure upon pleasure.

QUESTION: Is the "I" of which we are all conscious the progressive "I", irrespective of its degree of attainment?

KRISHNAMURTI: Surely, Of that "I" only you are conscious, not of the eternal "I".

QUESTION: Does real progress commence only after a complete cleavage from all unessentials?

KRISHNAMURTI: Real progress commences when the progressive "I" begins to withdraw into the "I" which is timeless. How do you withdraw from all unessentials? By recognizing the stupidity, the childishness, of all those things. But how do you come to that stage? By thought, by suffering, by enquiring, by studying, by feeling greatly.

QUESTION: Is it possible to educate the "I" before we attain liberation?

KRISHNAMURTI: It is possible. Afterwards there is no educating of the "I". Again, you are hoping for a way to avoid educating the "I" now. Oh, you are not in earnest!

EXPERIENCE AND CONDUCT

1928

Everyone, through tradition, through habit of thought, through custom, has established for himself a background, and from that background he tries to assimilate and judge new experiences. If you examine yourselves, you will find that you approach life from the point of view of a particular nationality, belief or class. You are all the time translating experiences in terms of the background, which you have established. Now the purpose of experience is to discover the true value of all things. But if you are translating experience into terms of yesterday's experience, instead of helping you to grow, so that you become more and more inclusive, it is making you a slave. So do not seek to understand what I am going to say, from the point of view of your various backgrounds. Nor limit experience by terms of temperament. Temperaments are the result of separate individual existence. But that which knows no separation cannot be translated into terms of temperament; you cannot approach it through a particular temperament. If you look at it from the point of view of the part, then you do not see the whole, and naturally the whole appears in terms of the part, and you translate that part as temperament. Through a temperament you cannot perceive that which is beyond all temperaments, as from a background you cannot perceive that which is greater than all backgrounds.

Do not, however, confuse individual temperament with individual uniqueness; temperaments depend on birth, involving difference in environment, race consciousness, heredity, and so on. Individual uniqueness is continuous through birth and death, is the sole guide through your whole existence as a separate individual, until you reach the goal. In order to understand the meaning of individuality you must understand the purpose of individual existence. Life is creation, including the creator and the created, and Nature conceals life in itself. When that life in Nature develops and becomes focused in the individual, then Nature has fulfilled itself. The whole destiny and function of Nature is to create the individual who is self-conscious, who knows the pairs of opposites, who knows that he is an entity in himself, conscious and separate. So, life in Nature, through its development, becomes self-conscious in the awakened, concentrated individual. Nature's goal is man's individuality. The individual is a separate being who is self-conscious; who knows that he is different from another, in whom there is the separation of "you" and "I". But individuality is imperfection; it is not an end in itself.

Evolution -in the sense of the extension of one's individuality through time- is a delusion. That which is imperfect, which is individuality, even though it is multiplied and increased, will always remain imperfect. Individuality is intensified through the conflict of ignorance, and the limitation of thought and emotion. In that there is self-conscious separateness. Now, it is vain to increase self-consciousness, which is separateness, to the nth degree; it will remain separate because it has its roots in separation. Therefore, the magnifying of that "I am", which is separateness, cannot be inclusive. The evolution of "I am" is but an expansion of that separateness in space and time. The individual held in the bondage of limitation, knowing the separation of "you" and "I", has to liberate himself and has to fulfil himself in that liberation. Liberation is freedom of consciousness, which is not the multiplication of "I am", but results from the wearing down of the sense of separateness. The ultimate purpose of individual existence is to realise pure being in which there is no separation, which is the realisation of the whole. The fulfilment of man's destiny is to be the totality. It is not a question of losing yourself in the Absolute, but that you, by growth, by continual conflict, by adjustment, shall become the whole. Individuality is merely a segment of the totality, and it is because it feels itself to be only a part that it is all the time seeking to fulfil itself, to realise itself in the totality. Therefore self-consciousness involves effort. If you do not make an effort against limitation, there is no longer self-consciousness and individuality. When individuality has fulfilled itself through ceaseless effort, destroying, tearing down the wall of separateness, when it has achieved a sense of effortless being, then individual existence has fulfilled itself.

First you must know towards what this individual life -this existence in which is the beginning and the end- is making its way. You must realise the purpose of existence; otherwise experience has no meaning, creation has no meaning, uniqueness has no meaning. If the individual, in whom there is the consciousness of separation, of subject and object, does not understand the purpose of existence, he merely becomes a slave to experience, to the creation of forms. But if you understand the purpose of existence, then you will utilise every experience, every emotion, every thought, to strengthen you to wear down this wall of separation.

To the self-conscious individual there is subject and object, and he objectifies a far-off entity to whom he looks for aid, to whom he gives out his adoration, his love, his whole being. But the end of existence, the fulfilment of individual, is to realise in himself the totality -without object or subject-which is pure life. So it is in the subjectivity of the individual that the object really exists. In the individual is the beginning and the end. In him is the totality of all experience, all thought, all emotion. In him is all potentiality, and his task is to realise that objectivity in the subjective.

Now, if what I mean by individuality is not properly understood, people are apt to make the mistake of assuming it to be selfish, ruthless anarchism, and that is why I am careful to explain that in man lies the entirety of progress. In himself lies the beginning and the end, the source and the goal. In creating a bridge from that source to the end is the fulfilment of man. The individual is the focus of the universe. So long as you do not understand yourself, so long as you do not fathom the fullness of yourself, you can be dominated, controlled, caught up in the wheel of continual strife. So you must concern yourself with the individual, that is, with yourself in whom all others exist. That is why I am only concerned with the individual. In the present civilisation, however, collectivity is striving to dominate the individual, irrespective of his growth, but it is the individual that matters, because if the individual is clear in his purpose, is assured, certain, then his struggle with society will cease. Then the individual will not be dominated by the morality, the narrowness, the conventions and experiments of societies and groups. The individual is the whole universe; the individual is the whole world, not a separate part of the world. The individual is the all-inclusive, not the all-exclusive. He is constantly making efforts, experimenting in different directions; but the self in you and in me and in all is the same, though the expressions may vary and should vary. When you comprehend that fact, and are fully cognisant of it, you do not look outside for salvation. You need no outside agent, and hence the fundamental cause of fear is abolished. To be rid of fear is to realise that in you is the focal centre of life's expression. When you have such a view, you are the creator of opportunities; you no longer avoid temptations, you transcend them; you no longer wish to imitate and become a machine or a type, which is but the desire to conform to a background. You use tradition to weigh, and thereby transcend, all tradition.

Life is not working to produce a type; life is not creating graven images. Life makes you entirely different one from the other, and in diversity must your fulfilment be, not in the production of a type. Look what is happening at present. You worship the many in the one, you worship the whole of life personified in one being. This is to worship a type, a waxen image, and thereby you mould yourself into this type, into this image; and in such imitation is the bondage of sorrow. But if you worship the one in the many, you will not make yourself into a type. Man, because he is afraid to be kindly affectionate to the many, gives all his respect, his worship, his prayers to the one -that is, he creates an image. But life does not make types, it has nothing to do with images. To worship the one in the many needs constant recollectedness of thought, constant awareness of the impersonal, constant adjustment of the point of view of the individual to the many, to life itself. If you create a type and merely adjust the balance between yourself and that type, it is not an adjustment to life; it is purely a personal whim. But if you establish harmony between yourself and the one in the many, then you are not creating an image, nor a type, but rather you are becoming life itself. This is the difference between creation and imitation.

Imitation is forced by fear. Through fear also comes the formation of sects, of narrow groups of individuals who cling together in their imitation. A sect or a collective body comes into being when there are many who are trying to imitate a set type, which is not complete truth but only a segment of truth. A sect, as a body, cannot approach truth, because truth is an individual realisation, through purely inward, individual effort. By clinging to a group, you cannot arrive at the full realisation of being.

A man who would have no fear must realise that, though forms of individual existence may vary, though the expressions of that self-consciousness may differ, though life may express itself in many ways, fundamentally life is one. When you realise that, all fear ceases. To be fearless is to be immortal.

Immortality, which is self-realisation, is not a question of time or of a series of opportunities, but of your discovery of that self which is in you and in all things. Because you are afraid of losing your individuality, you are seeking immortality in the continuation of your individual separateness, but immortality is in the self, the life in all. When there is the desire, the craving for existence and the continuity of separate being, there must of necessity be what you would call "reincarnation". Reincarnation is a theory for many people, but it is no longer a theory for the man who lives that idea of reincarnation in the present. Reincarnation is a series of opportunities for the spiritual realisation of pure being. Until you realise that pure being (in which is the cessation of all effort), you must have a series of opportunities. But if you, as an individual, are highly concentrated in awareness in the present, then you live that series of opportunities now. If the ultimate purpose of individual existence -the realisation of totality, of pure being in which there is no separation- requires a series of opportunities provided by a series of lives, then you must needs have this theory of reincarnation. But if you, as a self-conscious individual, aware of your actions and responsible for them, desire to arrive to that fulfilment of life, then you must concentrate on that series of opportunities in the now. The theory of reincarnation is forced upon you, because the individual "you" cannot master all the circumstances of life immediately. So you prolong this individual existence in time, until the "I-ness" is worn down, until the self is realised. If, however, you are living that understanding of truth in the present, the theory of reincarnation becomes unnecessary. To realise the value of that theory in fact, you must live it, not postpone it. It is not a question of time at all, time being a series of opportunities until you arrive at the end. By the theory of reincarnation, you make life a very easy existence, you postpone your efforts till tomorrow. You want this scar of individuality to continue and to be preserved even in fulfilment. As I said before, individuality is not an end in itself, it is a means to realisation -the immense realisation of being in which there is no separateness, no individuality; pure being which is dynamic, not static, which is neither the annihilation nor the continuity of the individual.

When you, as an individual who knows separation, have conquered this separation, all delusion ceases. In this conflict of the awakened individuality which knows separateness, in this struggle, in this fight, there is, naturally, delusion and sorrow, and out of these is created the desire for comfort. Comfort is the outcome of fear. When you are afraid, you seek shelter from the conflict of life, away from life, and hence you model yourself after an established standard, you take refuge in a religion or a philosophy. The other delusion is the craving for the continuity of one's individuality, and from this delusion innumerable problems arise: What happens to man after death? Will he continue? Will he return in another body, and in what manner? Will he be united after death with his loved ones? The sorrow caused by death is but another way of being aware that you, as an individual, are a separate being: hence there is loneliness. That loneliness is caused because you give your love to another who is equally aware of his individuality; and so, when that person dies -as he must- there is sorrow. If someone dies, you want to be united with that individual on another plane of consciousness, on another plane of phenomena. You should look at it from the point of view of the continuity of life, irrespective of whether there be phenomena or not. You look at love -in which is involved hate, greed, and the opposites- from the point of view of self-conscious individuality, and you want that individuality to be prolonged through time; that is, you want the continuous expansion of individuality. Because in your consciousness there is separateness and the cognisance of individuality, of "you" and "I", there must be sorrow. When you are aware of separation, it is a limitation, and in its wake must come suffering. If you love but the external, which is only the manifestation of the real, there must be suffering. But if you love the reality in all things, there is continuity of love. You no longer ask to be united with that which you love as a separate entity. Love is its own eternity, its own continuity.

Individuality grows in the soil of love, hate, jealousy, greed, action, inaction, loneliness, the desire for company. But the man who depends on any one of these knows separation and is in the clutches of sorrow. Whenever there is sorrow there is the seeking for comfort and for the persistence of individual existence. When one realises that this craving is a delusion, then in its place is born faith -faith not in another person, not in another individual, however highly evolved, however superior, but faith in that reality which exists within oneself. That is what I call true faith -the realisation that within you lies the potentiality of the whole, and that your task is to grasp and to realise that totality.

From this realisation comes the certainty of individual purpose, the aim of individual existence, which is to be united with the totality in which there is no separation, no subject and object. Naturally, life, the totality, the summation of all life, has no purpose. It is. That life is of no particular temperament or kind; it is impersonal. But between that life and the understanding of it by the individual, lies individual existence, this scar of suffering. The purpose of individual existence is to wear down this individuality, this ego of reaction, by recollectedness, by constant awareness, by concentration in all that you are doing with this purpose ever in mind. Then action is spontaneous; it is your own desire, which is constantly urging you more and more to purify your conduct, as the result of purity of emotion and thought. Conduct is the outcome of a clear understanding of the purpose of individual existence. If conduct is born out of purity of emotion and thought, out of understanding, such action will not entangle, will not act as a cage but as an instrument for realisation.

The majority of people gathered here have freed themselves from many cages, such as philosophies, religions, social conventions, and so on. As a result they have developed, naturally, a very critical attitude. But criticism can be either superficial or profound. If your criticism goes to the root of things, you will discover, not a new cage, but an instrument which will lead you to the fundamental living reality. I am speaking of that reality which lies hidden in the heart of everyone, which can be realised by every individual, and which I maintain that I have realised and am living. It is that reality which you should criticise. But do not criticise merely intellectually; approach the subject of your criticism with affection. There may be many here who are vitally and anxiously -not merely superficially- concerned to put into practice what they have understood, to express it in conduct. If you examine, analyse, criticise with affection, then the idea will become practical and can be translated into daily action. So you should exercise criticism all the time, through observation as to whether you are living that reality. Criticism is of value only in training your observation, so that it can be eventually turned upon yourself. That is the true purpose of criticism. When you turn the light of criticism upon yourself, you begin to grow and to destroy the unessential.

Conduct is the way of life, the way to that supreme, serene reality which everyone must realise. Through discernment you will come nearer and nearer to the source of things, so that you, as an individual, will be living this reality. When once you have grasped that central reality, that fundamental principle of being, when you have criticised, analysed and examined it impersonally, and are living it -even partially- then through your own effort you are illuminating the darkness which surrounds the life of every human being, the darkness which I call the "unessential".

Now, to find out for oneself what is the essential and what the unessential, one must have the understanding vision of the ultimate purpose of individual existence. From that you can always judge for yourself what is the unessential and what the essential. Whenever there is no inward resistance towards an unessential thing, that lack of resistance may be called "evil". There cannot be a strict demarcation of evil and good, since "good" is but the capacity to resist the unessential. You discover the essential by a process of continual choice based on the understanding of the true purpose of existence. Choice is the continual discovery of truth. Choice means action, which is conduct, the manner of your behaviour. All conduct must ultimately lead towards pure being, so that we must concern ourselves not only with that ultimate reality but with the practical way of translating that reality into conduct. Everyone wants to be practical, to understand life practically. The liberated man is the most practical man in the world, because he has discovered the true value of all things. That discovery is illumination.

Life is conduct, the manner of our behaviour towards another, which is our action. When that behaviour becomes pure, then it is unimpeded life in action. Life, that reality which I have been trying to describe, is balance, and this can only be gained through the conflicting forces of manifestation. Manifestation is action. To arrive at that perfect balance which, to me, is pure being, pure life, one cannot withdraw from this world of manifestation; one cannot, out of the weariness of conflict, seek that balance away from the world. Liberation is to be found in the world of manifestation, and not away from it; liberation is into manifestation rather than out of it. When you are free in the sense of knowing the true value of manifestation, then you are free of manifestation. It is in this world that you must find balance. All things about us are real. Everything is real, and not an illusion. But each one has to find the essential, the real in all that is about him -that is, each one has to discern the unreality, which surrounds the real. The real is true worth. Directly you discern what is the unreal, reality is beginning to assert itself. Through choice of action, you discover the true value of all things. Through experience, ignorance is dissipated, ignorance being the admixture of the essential and the unessential. Out of the unessential is born delusion. In order to discover what is the essential, one must look at desire. Desire is all the time trying to free itself from delusion. So desire goes through various stages of experience in search of this balance, and can either become a cage or an open door, a prison house or an open way to liberation. One must therefore understand this fundamental desire within oneself -control it, not repress it. Repression is not control. Control is the domination through understanding; self-discipline through the understanding of what life is, of the purpose of individual existence.

When you, as an individual, have discovered for yourself the true basis of conduct, you will establish order about you, that true understanding which will break down the barriers between yourself and others. That is why my emphasis is on conduct. True conduct is self realised conduct, not based on any complicated philosophy but on one's own experience. True conduct is the translation of one's realisation into activity. In this there is no longer an attempt to become, there is always the attempt to be -the striving after being, not becoming. When you realise through experience, through continual examination, observation, impersonal analysis, that life is one, that you are part of that all-inclusive life, then you have removed the fundamental cause of fear. When you have removed that fear, there is the clear, strong, purposeful striving after being. The cessation of fear is the beginning of being. The cessation of fear is the beginning of being, and being is harmony, perfect balance in all its expressions. Being does not demand imitation, or the formation of a group or sect -the coming together as an army under leadership in the world of chaos.

Being, then, is inclusiveness, in which there is no awareness of "you" and "I". When you are aware of "you and "I", there is disharmony and hence becoming, in which fear is involved. Separation is caused by that ego or that "I-ness" which is but the self-conscious existence of the individual. When there is this separateness of self-conscious individuality, there is the craving for personal immortality, there is illusion. As I said before, individuality is not an end in itself; it is in the process of becoming until it arrives at being. Becoming is effort, being is the cessation of effort. Whenever there is effort it is self-conscious and hence it is imperfect. Being is pure awareness, effortless consciousness. The difference between self-consciousness and consciousness is that self-consciousness is the outcome of the realisation of separateness, in which there is conflict between individuals, in which there is individual existence; whereas consciousness is that selfhood in which all individual consciousness exist and in which all effort ceases, which is beyond time and space although time and space are in that consciousness. That consciousness is positive being, is true being. To arrive at that being, one must watch over desire caused by self-conscious existence. When you understand desire, from whence it springs and towards what it is going, its aim and purpose, desire becomes a precious jewel to which you cling, which you are continually chiselling and refining. Then that desire is not an imposed discipline, but becomes true discipline, which varies progressively until you arrive at pure being. Desire is its own discipline.

Liberation is not an impossibility. But it is difficult to maintain a concentrated, sustained effort towards liberation, and hence the few who attempt it. That which is in all things is not difficult to achieve, or difficult to realise, but there are many things between you and that realisation which, through continual effort, continual choice, discernment, you must eschew and put aside. That requires intense faith, recollectedness, concentration and continual energy, but that is not limited by outward conditions, by time or by age. Life has no age limit. The body wears out, as a coat wears out, but young and old, at any time, may achieve, may realize, if they are willing to concentrate, if they have this intense faith. As I said before, do not misunderstand what I mean by faith. It is not the faith in something external, but the certainty that within yourself lie the potentiality and the totality. That liberation everyone can achieve; it is not reserved for the few. So, achievement does not depend on age or environment, but on your effort, on your interest, on your desire -of which you alone can judge.

There is no such thing as failure. Failure is merely the lack of strength to achieve. You develop strength gradually; and if your real desire is to achieve, then the strength to fulfil becomes ever greater. Find out what you are interested in, on what you are laying your emphasis, to what you are giving your strength. Find out towards what purpose your secret desire is tending. You can either strangle that desire and make it narrow, or you can make it all-inclusive, free, unlimited. So you have to find out on what you are laying your emphasis in life. For the man who is uncertain and doubting -for him there is no positive being. The wise man is he who knows how to lay the emphasis on the essential.

You can only find out whether you are laying your emphasis on the essential or the unessential, by putting into practice what little you have understood of reality. In putting that understanding into practice, you will soon find out how much desire there is in you to conquer the whole. In olden days, those who desired to find truth relinquished the whole world and withdrew to a monastic or ascetic life. If I were to form a narrow, exclusive body of ascetics, you would perhaps join it -but that would be merely a superficial acknowledgement of what you want to realise. The effort to realise must come where you are, within yourself, surrounded by all manner of confusions, contradictory ideas, and what you would call temptations. (From my point of view there is no such thing as "temptation"). Throwing off one dress and adopting another is not going to strengthen you in your desire. What strengthens you is desire itself. In watching, in guiding that desire, in being self-recollected in your conduct, in your thought, in your movements, in your behaviour, in adjusting yourself to that which you realise to be the purpose of individual existence, you have the positive test of self-realisation -not in belonging to sects, societies, groups and orders. Then you utilise experience; you do not become its slave. Therefore pure conduct demands purity of thought. By purity I mean the purity brought about by reason, not through the sentimentality of belief. Reason is the essence of your experience -or of the experience of another examined impersonally, without the desire for comfort or authority- which you have analysed and criticised with detachment. This is the only way to test values in life.

In listening to what I have said about pure action, realisation, pure being, do not get lost in abstractions and metaphysics and forget ordinary conduct, the way to live, the way to be. You may theorise about pure being or happiness or liberation, but if you are jealous, envious, greedy for possessions, cruel, thoughtless, inconsiderate, of what value are your theories? To arrive at that reality you must be rid of these things, and to be rid of them you must have an understanding vision of that reality, and put your vision into practice. Otherwise you are caught in mere expressions.

So I say again, conduct is the way of life. It is the way to that supreme, serene reality which everyone must realise because in everyone it potentially exists. For that realisation there need be no discussions on metaphysics. Wherever there is sorrow, it is the outcome of this struggle to distinguish between the essential and the non-essential. All men have the desire to fight sorrow, to escape sorrow, and to treat it as a terrible thing. But sorrow and pleasure alike are the soil in which to grow, in which to diminish this sense of separateness, and this diminution is true growth. So there must be born within each one the faith of certainty. This is not come at by reason alone, but by the continual groping through experience, urged on by desire, in its search for the ultimate reality.

So, I say again, spiritual realisation is for all -because that reality exists within all. But is only the few who are willing to concentrate, who will be continually aware, constantly watchful in their choice of the essential, and will in this way realise more and more of that effortless existence, effortless being, which is serene, supreme. Those few, when once they realise, by this continual effort through understanding, through this recollectedness every moment of the day, shall know that of which I speak. Because they are desirous of finding that reality, because they have put aside all unrealities, they are no longer in the clutches of illusion; they are seeking that certainty and are not called away by uncertainty, doubt, by the unessential things of life.

My purpose has been to show to those who are willing to see that truth lies hidden within themselves. The happiness which they are seeking is hidden within their own limitations, within their own hearts, within their own minds.

Seek then the ultimate truth, which is of no person, of no sect, of no path. In the fulfilment of your individuality is the totality of life.

EERDE GATHERING 1929

Eerde, Holland, 1929

In my previous talks, I divided the self into the eternal and the progressive, but that was done not to introduce another theory or philosophy, but purely for convenience, to make it absolutely clear to you all, as it is clear to me. So please do not systematise it. Please do not work out a philosophy from it. Each one must see it distinctly for himself, not congregationally, not collectively. Liberation is the attainment of the individual, it is the concern of the individual. If you try to make it into a philosophy, or a system, or a dogma, you are making it applicable to the whole, whereas it is not; it is an individual perception, an individual strife and struggle to understand clearly.

Liberation is for the attainment of all humanity, and hence for every individual separately. You must be free of all cages. You must be free of the cage which you will make out of what I am saying. You will make it a crutch or a cage to enable you to evade certain things which give you pain. But, if you make what I am saying into a crutch or a cage, you will be as much a slave, as far from liberation, as you were before. Try to make it absolutely clear for yourself, and by your inner perception encourage yourself to make that effort which will clarify your vision, and give you understanding and right comprehension.

As I was saying, life which is everything, free and unconditioned, in which there is the seed of all things, is the universal, the eternal "I". I am trying to put into words something which can never be put into words, but do not make of it a dogma.

In order to arrive at life, which is free and unconditioned, which is all-conserving and yet cannot admit to itself anything that is impure, corruptible, imperfect, you, as an individual, as the "I" separate from this life, must create harmony within yourself and so become united with life which is free. In other words: You as an individual -whether as the progressive "I" or the universal "I" need not concern us for the moment- must be incorruptible; you, as an individual, must be free, because in you that universal life must be centred. As truth cannot be stepped down, as life cannot be limited by moralities, by worships, by gods, by shrines, you, as the individual "I", must leave these limitations of fear, of comfort, and by elimination establish harmony within yourself.

You have to become your own lawgiver, and stand wholly free from all external authorities, from all fear. As you are entirely responsible for yourself, you must first perceive this vision, this fulfilment of all life, and from that, which I say is freedom, establish your law, according to yourself and not according to another. After all, you cannot tell me what I should do and what I should not do; and I am not going to tell you what you should do and what you should not do. But you all know, if you have suffered, if you have observed, if you are in pain, in great isolation and loneliness or in great company, that all life -individually and the life which is all around you- must culminate finally in that life which is, which has no beginning and no end. Knowing that as the final goal -if I may use that word without bringing it into limitation- you can then develop an inward quality of true and proper perception, which will act as your own lawgiver.

That is the only way in which you can be free, so that you need not be afraid of circumstances, of conventions, of what other people say and think. If you are certain for yourself, with the certainty born of right comprehension, which has its seed in immortality, the freedom to which all life must come, from that you will derive your power to walk straightly. Then you need not be afraid, then you need not be concerned with the creating of dogmas and philosophies.

To arrive at that perception of freedom, you must go through the process of elimination. When I say,' you must go', please, do not do it because I ask you to. Do it. You are here because you want to understand, because you think that I have attained and that I can help you. I cannot help you really, but I can make that perception clear to you, so that you may, out of your own strength, struggle for it, and become men, free and unconditioned. You cannot perceive that vision of life with all your entanglements, and without that perception you can do nothing. I do not know what prevents you from eliminating all useless, unessential things. You have to think out individually for yourselves in what manner you are going to do it, otherwise what I am saying will be utterly useless; it will only create another crutch. Instead of the old, you will have the new.

After all, this needs a certain determination of purpose. When you go after money, or love or amusement, you are constantly thinking about it, you are excited and you devise ways and means of attaining it... But, surely, this of which I am speaking is greater than all amusement, greater than all love, greater than all money. And, if it is worth having, you must similarly devise ways and means of attaining it, you must be constantly watchful, be aware of everything that you do.

QUESTION: Some have objected to your teachings on life that life is always expressed in forms and that they can't conceive pure life as such. Now I feel that life and form are not opposites, as life seems to me to be neither form nor formless, but forms in the process of ever-changing, ever-becoming, while form itself is produced by the illusion of standing still. Would this be in agreement with your point of view?

KRISHNAMURTI: Partly. To me there is no separation of form and life, of spirit and matter, they are all one. The form is the expression of life; if the life is not strong, vital, pliable, energetic, completely and wholly free, your forms are limitations. So, you must concern yourself with life, and then forms will look after themselves.

QUESTION: You say the way you teach is the shortest, easiest way. What is the reason that apparently so few in history have found this shortest way?

KRISHNAMURTI: How many of you are willing to try what I am saying, to experiment with it? Very few. And that is the reason why there are so few in history. After all, the man who attains finds his goal after going through the process of ordinary, unessential, everyday things, just like everyone else. But, when once he has attained, he sees that all these small, unessential things are unnecessary. And so he says to others: "Don't do these things." But very few will listen. Very few will contend with him in the essential things.

QUESTION: A child is to be taught from outside up to a certain age. To which stages of evolution of mankind would the same be applicable? Our natural connection with higher, superhuman beings, as Masters and angels? (I do not think of praying to them, leaning on them.)

KRISHNAMURTI: You want to know what is the natural connection between higher, superhuman beings, such as Masters and angels, and man. What is the natural connection between a savage and a so-called civilised man? There is evolution, distance; that is the natural connection. You want to know what is the natural connection between humanity and the Masters and angels. The same natural connection as between a savage and a civilised being. But that is of very little importance to either because both the ordinary man and the Master have to come to the same fulfilment of life -of that I am speaking, not of the natural stages. So, it is no good asking who is ahead of you or who is behind you.

That is again, from my point of view, taking the unessential for the essential. You are all immensely interested in the Masters, whether they exist or not, and what my view is with regard to them. I will tell you my view. To me it is of very little importance whether they exist, or whether they do not exist, because I say man has to arrive at that liberation at which the Masters also must arrive. So concern yourself with that and not with who is ahead of you. When you have to walk to the Camp or to the station from here, there are people ahead of you, nearer the Camp, nearer the station; people who have started earlier. What is more important? To get to the station, or to sit down and worship the man who is ahead of you? Both you and the man ahead of you are very far away from the goal, both have to get there, for all life leads to that.

QUESTION: In what way does life, as seen by you, differ from the theosophical conception of the divine clan? Do you mean to say that there is no such plan, our natural connection with higher, superhuman beings, as Masters and angels? (I do not think of praying to them, leaning on them.)

KRISHNAMURTI: You want to know what is the natural connection between higher, superhuman beings, such as Masters and angels, and man. What is the natural connection between a savage and a so-called civilised man? There is evolution, distance; that is the natural connection. You want to know what is the natural connection between humanity and the Masters and angels. The same natural connection as between a savage and a civilised being. But that is of very little importance to either because both the ordinary man and the Master have to come to the same fulfilment of life -of that I am speaking, not of the natural stages. So, it is no good asking who is ahead of you or who is behind you. That is again, from my point of view, taking the unessential for the essential. You are all immensely interested in the Masters, whether they exist or not, and what my view is with regard to them. I will tell you my view. To me it is of very little importance whether they exist, or whether they do not exist, because I say man has to arrive at that liberation at which the Masters also must arrive. So concern yourself with that and not with who is ahead of you. When you have to walk to the Camp or to the station from here, there are people ahead of you, nearer the Camp, nearer the station; people who have started earlier. What is more important? To get to the station, or to sit down and worship the man who is ahead of you? Both you and the man ahead of you are very far away from the goal, both have to get there, for all life leads to that.

QUESTION: In what way does life, as seen by you, differ from the theosophical conception of the divine plan? Do you mean to say that there is no such plan, or rather, as I venture to interpret you, that in that conception of the plan the perpetual, ever-continuing flow of divine life is seen too much as something static, divided into compartments in an anthropomorphic way?

KRISHNAMURTI: I don't know what the theosophical divine plan is; I have to guess from the questioner himself that everything is laid down, static, as he says. I am only following the questioner. Another theosophist might say: No, it is not so.

To me life cannot have a plan. Life which is unconditioned, free, whole, is entirely delivered from all plans. The moment you have a plan, you are bringing that life into limitation. And, as you cannot bring down that which is unconditioned and which can never be controlled, your plan cannot then correspond to life which is free.

QUESTION: With regard to reconciliation of the old and new, are there not two different kinds of reconciliation? One tries to avoid the decision, to avoid the real issue, and endeavours to practise the old and the new, partly this, partly that. But the other kind of reconciliation is willing to decide, but wants to understand the link between the old and the new. What we have been told in the old way is, or at least seems to be, consistent in itself. What you say and what you are is not only consistent in itself, but is for me the highest form of living truth I know. But in some points I do not wholly understand either the accurate meanings of your words or the practical implications of them. I can honestly say that I try here during these weeks very hard to understand you. In my innermost being I feel I have already made my choice to go the direct path. I feel that it is now, since I have heard you during these ten days, no more a choice at all, and that I cannot go back to the past. And yet there is still some uncertainty in my consciousness. Do I understand you rightly when I say: There is relative truth in the old way (stages of the path of discipleship, inner government of the world and so on), but that both ways cannot be trodden by the same man, that the old way is not untrue, but that the individual must decide which way to go?

KRISHNAMURTI: Quite right. You must decide which you will do. This is not an ultimatum, please. It is left to the choice of the individual, because, after all, I cannot force anyone, and no one can force me.

I have followed all these old paths of discipleship, of worship, and I see that they are much too long, too complicated, unnecessary -because whatever path you may follow, whatever god you may worship, whatever shrine you may build, you are forced at last to come back to yourself and solve that self. Whatever path I followed, there was still that inward struggle, discontentment, unhappiness, loneliness, fear, looking to others for encouragement -there was always something going on within me like a volcano which is bubbling. So I say that it does not matter what you believe, what you worship, you will be forced to come back to yourself. Why need you believe, why need you worship, why need you have gods, theories, philosophies, dogmas, fears? They are useless so long as the "I" is not content, not made to understand, not tranquil, not free from corruptibility. As the questioner says, which way you follow is a matter of individual choice. You may prefer the choice of comfort, of discipleship -I place comfort in that- but you will be forced to face your life eventually, you cannot avoid it. You must have this harmony within yourself, free of all gods, Masters, discipleship, fears, traditions, births and deaths, existence -everything. Because I have followed all those and have found them all useless, I say that it is better to establish harmony within yourself rather than to seek aid from outside. The choice is yours because nobody wants you to choose one or the other -I certainly do not. You must decide. No society is going to force you to decide. That is why you cannot make a dogma or a philosophy out of this. It is an individual choice. And as you are free, you will choose either limitation or freedom, either comfort or that fearlessness which gives right comprehension.

QUESTION: Does real progress begin only after complete cleavage from all nonessentials?

KRISHNAMURTI: Progress exists all the time. It is there continually. You are progressing from day to day, you are altering little by little so there is progress of a certain kind -slow, tedious, irksome- which exists anyhow, whether you make an effort, whether you make a cleavage or not. But there is the other kind of progress about which I am speaking, that progress which leaps, as it were -if you can call it a leap- which comes by, breaking away from all non-essentials. As I said the other day, you must be either hot or cold, that is, either one thing or the other. If you say: "I am going to take life as a game, a pleasant thing", then you must be against the real things of life. But if you say: "I am going to take life with that seriousness which is unaffected, which will produce the flower of life in me", then you must be against all unessentials. You must be entirely for one thing or entirely for the other. You cannot compromise. The moment you compromise, even though there is progress in compromise, there is not that progress which you have come here to seek. The majority of you are here in search of freedom which is truth, which is life, which is the outcome of all life, which is the consummation of all life, the flower of all life. If you are seeking that in real earnest, you must seek it without compromise. Then your progress will be quicker, although the method of achieving it may be more drastic. If you break away from all your old conditions of thought, your old ideas of salvation, then, because you do not compromise, because you are certain of your search, there will be that progress which is like the flower which has waited all through the winter and bursts forth on a lovely day of spring. It is necessary, if you want this thing, to be absolutely certain in what you do. You must be aware, be self-recollected, the whole day long, so that you are not in any manner whatsoever deflected from your purpose. What is happening at present? You are uncertain -and I hope that by me, or by yourself, you will be made certain. How are you going to become certain? Not through compromise, either one way or the other. You cannot say: "I am going to seek this, I am going to play with that for a little while and with this for a little while." You have done all that. No, you must decide one way or the other in order to be certain. And to be certain you must withdraw from all external conditions of limitation, of fear. I know people will think this is a negative attitude, will think that it is very easy to withdraw and let nothing remain. On the contrary, when you withdraw from all things and find yourself, you will be certain of all things. In order to establish certainty, you must break away from your uncertainties.

After all, what do you all want in life? If it is money, popularity, fame, comfort -physically, mentally, emotionally- what I am saying will hardly interest you. But if on the contrary you want truth, it will make you more and more lonely, in the nicest sense, strong, calm and pliable, more and more your own master, will bring you nearer and nearer to that life which is free, eternal, unconditioned. If you want comfort, money, popularity, then go after them, work for them, strive after them, be the biggest person in the realm of the transient. If you do not want that, then be the biggest person in the realm of the eternal. You have to make a cleavage, you have to make up your mind to be either hot or cold. If you are hot for this thing, then you must never at any instant be in sympathy with the unessentials. Truth is a danger to all societies, because truth cannot submit to any falsification of thought or perversion of feeling. It is a constant element of revolt wherever there is the unessential, the unreal. So you, who are the seekers after truth, must be a danger to everything that is futile, childish, fleeting and unreal. That is what I meant when I said the other day that the majority of people are not in earnest. They are still supporting the unessential, consciously or unconsciously.

QUESTION: You say, "I am speaking from the eternal standpoint." How then is it possible that we, who are not living in the eternal, can know the real meaning of all you put before us?

KRISHNAMURTI: To perceive the eternal, you must have the transient about you in order to compare, to judge and to weigh them both, for the eternal lies only through the transient. This is not a cryptic saying. If you want to find incorruptible love -a love that has no variance, that is constant, that is impersonal, that is for all- you must go through the transient love. You cannot get the eternal suddenly. But do not be caught in the transient. I am speaking of that which is the result of putting aside all transient things, by suffering and other means, and acquiring that eternal which everyone in life is seeking. If you cannot see through the transient it means that you are not yet awakened even to the transient. You cannot distinguish between what is transient and what is eternal.

QUESTION: We are in love. We will not be bound in marriage. We cannot have a child. But we want the full experience of love, from basement to top floor. To act, or not to act?

KRISHNAMURTI: Do you want me to decide this? How can I decide it? What is it that you want to do in life? To be a prisoner of corruptible love or to be free of love which is corruptible? I cannot decide that. I cannot decide whether you should have a child or should not have a child. Desire calls for experience, so you have to look to the desire, not to the experience. As you cannot kill desire, as you cannot obliterate it by going into ecstasy -you have to transmute it. Find out if your desire will lead you to what you want, will lead you towards liberation.

QUESTION: When you urge us to be in revolt against the world, do you mean that we should smash, and inspire others to smash, existing external institutions, conventions, laws; or do you mean that each one should break his own reliance on or fear of these limiting externals? In other words, is it anarchy for everybody that you advocate, or is it self-government for the few who become strong and pure enough to undertake it?

KRISHNAMURTI: If you want to break external laws, I am afraid that the external law will break you. Governments would not allow it. The important thing is to break fear, the reliance on external things. In other words, this is an individual matter. If you are afraid, you are relying on external support for your right conduct. You should break all those things that uphold you in righteousness, because dependence on them means weakness of character. It is not a question of breaking outside laws, but of breaking down for yourself all those things that tend to create artificial strength from outside. That is, you must be intelligently in revolt within yourself with all those things which are unessential, and thereby become a dynamo, a power which will, of its own inherent strength, destroy everything superficial, false, unessential, that comes into contact with you. After all, laws and institutions are all created by us. The individual creates, so the individual can alter; it may take time, but the individual alone is ultimately responsible for all rules, all institutions. If the individual is weak, not strong enough to rely on his own authority, he may break down institutions, but he will create new ones. It is a question therefore of making the individual strong, vital, energetic, calm and undisturbed, and for that the individual must be in revolt with all unreal things.

"In other words, is it anarchy for everybody that you advocate, or is it self-government for the few who become strong and pure enough to undertake it?"

It is self-government for all, not for the few. Because the few will create in others the desire to govern themselves.

QUESTION: Frequently while you are speaking to us you stop short as though unwilling to hurt or offend us. Is it that you really feel that we, although we come here for a serious purpose, are not ready to face what is necessary in the way of pain?

KRISHNAMURTI: I hesitate sometimes because personally I have finished with compromise and, in my eagerness, I want others to do the same. But I cannot force them to it.

QUESTION: What do you mean by liberation?

KRISHNAMURTI: We will start it again! Liberation is not negative. Liberation, from my point of view, is the outcome of all life fully matured. Liberation is the consummation of all life highly developed, highly cultured, highly evolved. Liberation is the result of the cessation of all desires. This freedom is the natural outcome which desire is constantly seeking, the breaking down of those walls which are placed by the self upon itself through experience. You are asking what is liberation. I can only tell you that it is life, a hundred and one things, which come into being after you have gone through the process of utter elimination and are wholly delivered from illusion.

QUESTION: If any one of us attained it now would it change to us the outer world?

KRISHNAMURTI: Attain it, and then we can talk about it. You are asking me to put something infinite into finiteness, to translate it into words, for a mind that is limited. If you have not an experience of something, I cannot give you the taste of it by my words, however much I may struggle, however much I may write, lecture or talk about it. An experience of that kind is the natural outcome of human evolution, of human struggle, pain and pleasure. It is the consummation of individual life, as well as of universal life. It is impossible to describe to a person whose mind is finite something which is infinite, and which cannot be described. And could it be described, it would lose its beauty. Could you ever describe it, it would no longer be that which you were describing.

QUESTION: You say that life is free, but in general we acknowledge that nature has some laws. And modern science says that perhaps the laws of the universe are not really the laws of the whole cosmos. Perhaps the laws of our universe are changing. So, I wanted to know whether this universal life is at the same time giving and experimenting with the laws of nature.

KRISHNAMURTI: That is right. I look at it like this. There is manifestation, and in manifestation there must be law, but not for that which manifests. To life there must be an expression, and in the expression there must be law, but for that life which expresses itself there cannot be a law. I maintain that for that which is life in freedom, which is spirituality in consummation, there cannot be law, because, if it is under law, it is in limitation.

QUESTION: Your point of view quite agrees with what modern science is saying. The laws which we formerly understood as universal are only relative; it is a plan full of life.

KRISHNAMURTI: That is right. That is why you cannot have laws to lead you to spirituality; or a system, set meditation, to lead you to spirituality, the freedom of life. To that which is free you cannot go with bound hands. And as this life is within you -this vast immensity of life is within that life which is in limitation within you- to arrive at that you must struggle to free yourself from the bondage of all things. If you laid down a law, a dogma, sets of rules for meditation, it would not lead you to that freedom. Not that I am against meditation; I would not put away a single moment of contemplation. On the contrary, you should contemplate all day long, meditate all day long, not set an hour for meditation and then forget it the rest of the day. Contemplate the whole day long. But you cannot lay down a law for contemplation. You cannot make laws for spirituality. It is an inward experience which cannot be translated into finiteness, to a mind which is limited. It is so vast an experience, a life so immense that, unless you experience it yourself, it must remain a mystery, a thing that is secret, hidden, and you cannot discuss it or question it. That is what I am so much concerned with. Not that you should investigate what I am feeling, or what is liberation, but that you should develop your own perception, that you should be perfectly harmonised within, wholly free, delivered from illusion. That is what matters; not what effect it has on your consciousness, or what you will do when you have attained. You should concern yourself with how to attain it, how to be eager for it, how to search of after it.

QUESTION: An individual who has attained liberation, truth, life, has attained spiritual perfection. In the course of your talks, you said twice, speaking about life: It is that to which Masters and men have to come. Now, apart from the fact that we have heard about the Masters through a system, which is not the direct, the shortest way, and also apart from the fact whether they themselves used that shortest way or another, I always thought that, at any rate, they had attained liberation. Must I now understand that they have not, which means that they have not attained that spiritual perfection which you have reached?

KRISHNAMURTI: Why are you bothering about the Masters? I say that the Masters, man, every being, has to attain liberation. It is of very little importance whether they have attained or have not attained. The question of importance is: have you? Not who else has attained, or whether I am greater than the Masters. I really do not care. What do you know about the Masters, except what you have been told? So, you cannot compare. You cannot say I am greater than another, or less, if you have not the knowledge with which to make a comparison. To me this question is of so little importance that I do not want even to talk about it. I say that the Masters and human beings have to attain as I have attained. I am not saying that I am greater or less, or this or that. The point is whether those people who are listening to me are concerned with the achievement of that thing for themselves, whether they are anxious, whether they are strong enough, free enough to attain. It is not a question of vital importance whether the Masters exist or not, or whether you are their pupils. Who cares whether you are a pupil or an initiate, or a Master himself? The essential is that you should be free and strong, and you can never be free and strong if you are a pupil of another, if you have gurus, mediators, Master over you. You cannot be free and strong if you make me your master, your guru. I don't want that. What I want is to make you strong and free, really harmonised within, certain, not through ecstasy, but by careful and deliberate thought and feeling, after much search. This inner certainty alone will destroy all the perverseness of the unreal.

OMMEN CAMP. Ommen, Holland, 1929

Ommen, Holland, 1929

I want to speak this morning about that which is to me the subject of primary importance. You have gathered from all corners of the world, facing many difficulties, many trials, making many sacrifices with a definite purpose in mind. You have come here to discover what I think and what I am saying. To understand that, it is necessary that you should have no preconceived ideas. I have repeated this over and over again, at every gathering, at every Camp; it seems to have had but little effect. This year I am going to make my position absolutely clear, without any possibility of compromise, so that, at the end of the Camp, you will know exactly what I mean, if you are willing to examine it without prejudice, with an eager, unburdened, adventurous spirit. I want you to understand what I am saying so that in the very process of understanding you may begin to live.

To live is far more important than to have the innumerable theories with which everyone is so heavily burdened. To make my position, to make what I say absolutely clear to you, I am going to concern myself with any of your theories, with any beliefs, but only with that which is really important, really vital, really essential, which is Life itself. In order to understand what I say, in its totality, you must first examine the various reasons which have impelled you to come here. By a careful analysis of those reasons you will come down to the fundamental fact that you are seeking -each one individually, not collectively- to realise for yourselves that Truth, that Happiness, that Liberation, that Perfection which is the consummation of individual life. But to arrive at that understanding you must examine all the various enticements, the hopes of salvation or encouragement, which have impelled you to come to this Camp, and to previous Camps.

You have established for yourselves through authority certain beliefs, which I will not call knowledge because they are not based on individual investigation or individual effort, and you have disputed with me time and again over your authoritative beliefs. You have had a set of beliefs, a system of thought, and you have come here to discover what I say, and to twist what I say to suit your particular theories, your particular dogmas, your particular beliefs. The majority of you also are filled with the desire to know who is speaking -if it is Krishnamurti or some other through him. As I have said over and over again, since you know neither me nor the other, your judgment, or the judgment of anyone else, is without value.

And the majority of people who come to the Camp are uncertain in their search; they are not sure of their understanding, and they desire to be well established in their uncertainties, to be confirmed in their little understanding. The majority of you who come to the Camp have a private collection of gods, and you want to add me to your collection. I know this sounds funny, but the fact is ridiculously childish.

Again, the majority of you are so embalmed in your newly acquired prejudices that you hope that I shall comfortably fit into your scheme of things.

These are the main reasons which have prompted you to come here.

I am sorry if I speak frankly, but it is no good for a vast number of people to collect here every year only wanting their little longings satisfied. These can never be satisfied, because they are unessential, they are vain and useless. You want to know what is the right kind of ceremony you should perform, what gods you should worship, what prayers you should say, what kind of beliefs you should hold; with these I have nothing whatever to do. I am not going to deal with them any more. I am not going to deal with your beliefs, your authoritative statements, which you throw in my face at every turn of my discourse, because they are of absolutely no value. From my point of view they are absolutely unessential, none of them will lead you, or anyone in the world, to the absolute, unconditioned Truth. Please do not accept anything I say without understanding because, if you do, that again will become an authoritative belief which, instead of freeing you, will hold you in a narrower cage and will lead you to greater misunderstanding and hence to greater sorrow.

Again, many Star members throughout the world -happily the organisation to which they belong is going to be disbanded- are concerned, not with the essential things of life but rather with the authority behind the one who is speaking. If you do not like what is said, you put it on the shoulders of Krishnamurti; if it is to your liking you say that the Teacher is speaking. Do not seek the personality that embodies the Truth, but Truth itself. You have innumerable prophets, mediators, who will tell you who is who, whether it is ten per cent or sixty per cent of the consciousness of the Teacher which is working through me, or the Teacher himself. That is one of your comfortable theories, which is perverting your clear judgment that is warping your clear perception. You have many beliefs, many theories, and many uncertainties to support you in your uncertainty. A strong man, a free man, a man who has attained, a man who is truly striving after the perfection of life, has no beliefs, because beliefs act as crutches and encouragements. Through fear, through the desire of salvation, through the dependence on externals, you have created innumerable gods, innumerable shrines, temples, and churches and through them you seek that which can never be found by these means. Because you desire to seek salvation from outside, aid from external things, you hoped that I would fit in comfortably and aid you in your trivialities, in your uncertainties, that you could add me to your collection of innumerable gods. That is childish because you can never find that harmony, which is Liberation, from outside; it dwells within you at all times.

And the majority of you are so embalmed in prejudice, in your preconceived ideas of what is Truth, of what is heaven and hell; everything is so clear to you, within such a narrow compass, that when Truth appears you reject it. You do not accept Truth with open arms, you do not take it to your heart, and you do not long for it as a drowning man longs for air.

What I say has nothing whatever to do with any of the unessentials, with your worships, with your prayers, with your rites, with your beliefs, with your innumerable theories.

Are you children playing with toys, calling them by names, or are you seeking the very core, the very heart of life? That search has no value if you can be discouraged or encouraged by the sayings of another. I say again, and please bear it in mind even while I am spearing, that you should not accept anything that I say on authority but rather examine it, analyse it with intelligence and balance.

I say that I am speaking of the whole, the unconditioned, and if you would approach that totality of life, that fulfilment of life, you must not concern yourself with the mouthpiece, the instrument, but with what is said. Because you are weak, you want your weakness strengthened. But we have to create strong men, who will understand the whole and thereby change the sorrows, the trivialities that exist in the world at the present moment. Such men must be born out of this gathering, not weaklings. Weak people produce weak people, superstitious people encourage superstition, but men who have really understood, who are striving after the one essential thing, will alter the appearance of their neighbours and of themselves.

Truth is a pathless land, and you cannot approach it by any path. So if you are anxious to understand what I am saying -really anxious- then you must put aside all these things without compromise. I am certain, but my certainty should not prejudice or encourage, or urge anyone. But because you are anxious, eager to find out the Truth, you should examine with intelligent care what I am saying. I am speaking about the final fulfilment of all life, to which every singe human being has to come. If you, who gather in thousands at this Camp, are anxious to discover Truth, you must put away all your children toys. It were far better that you should be either playing in the nursery with toys, or destroying all toys, come into the world where there is no illusion, where there is Truth, certainty and that perfection which is Liberation.

You will reply that you cannot put away these toys, that you are too weak, that your morality, your integrity would not stand the storm, that you must have all these crutches to maintain you in your struggle. If you honestly acknowledge that, you are perfectly right. Then your place is in the nursery, and no one should urge you to leave it.

If I speak vehemently, please do not think that I am in any way annoyed, or making a harangue or urging you. I want you to be certain for yourselves, and not play with things that you know nothing about. It were far better to have five people in this Camp who realty understand, who are a danger to all things unreal, than thousands who know nothing, who pretend. To know, you must come absolutely unburdened, putting aside all childish things, free of fear, unconditioned, with the desire to discover.

Either play with toys entirely, or give up all toys.

Either be entirely for one thing or for the other, entirely hot or cold.

Either walk in the land of shadows and unrealities, or be a danger to all unreality and shadow. Don't you see that this is not a question of a vast number of people collecting together and urging each other to do something, but an individual matter? You must decide for yourselves what you will do. You have gathered here for the last six years, and still you are playing with thing that does not matter. Unrealities are surrounding you more and more. You have not had the strength to break away and finish with all compromise.

I maintain, without a shadow of doubt, that I am the whole, the unconditioned, not part of Truth, but the whole. And if you would understand the whole, you must come to it absolutely unburdened. If you would discover whether I am right or wrong, whether I have found that which is eternal or merely the fleeting, you must bring to that discovery an eager, adventurous spirit. How can you be sure if you yourselves are burdened, are overweighed with all these childish things that have no value, that cannot be confronted with that which is eternal. You make innumerable sacrifices, put up with discomfort and many things which are unpleasant physically, but mentally and emotionally you are burdened, heavy, prejudiced, and so you are incapable of discovering for yourselves whether what I am saying is true or false, real or unreal, essential or unessential.

So, if I may suggest it, during this week, while you are sacrificing your physical comforts, which is very easy, you should equally put aside all your childish toys, and try to realise the freedom, the immensity, the incorruptibility of Life. When once you have seen, when once you have caught a glimpse of that vision, then you will know that that of which I speak is neither destructive nor constructive, neither dynamic nor static, because I am speaking about Life, which is the whole, which is the seed of all things, and to understand the whole you must not come burdened by any part, but on the contrary, free, eager in your desire to discover.

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS

Ommen, Holland, 1929

Before i answer these questions, there is a matter which I should like to mention. I have heard over and over again, not only here in Ommen during these Camps, but also in Ojai and India, that members who listen to me think that the real Teacher cannot be as harsh as I am, that he must be really compassionate, and that, as I am so harsh, so direct, I cannot be the real Teacher. This is so absolutely childish that I do not want even to discuss it, but I will do so this once, to make it absolutely clear. You have an idea that to be compassionate one must be weak, and you attribute that weakness to those great Teachers whom you think you know. I have heard this from some of your leaders too; therefore I want to make this clear. As I said the other day, if you go to a surgeon because you are suffering from a disease, you must bear the pain of the operation. It is exactly the same with me. It is not a question of directness or harshness, but you need to be shaken and, since you do not like that shaking, you attribute your ideas of compassion and love, which are essentially weak, to someone who is not weak, and you say that such a Teacher cannot be direct, strong and emphatic. This is not a question of compassion or lack of compassion, but a question of Truth, and you must face that question irrespective of your petty fears. I have been repeating over and over again that you must approach Truth unburdened, not with your small prejudices, with your preconceived ideas. If you want to be strong men, do not attribute your various weak qualities of corruptible love, of weak thought, to Truth. Do not allow yourselves to be persuaded by anyone -though I am afraid you will- that Truth has any of the qualities which men are momentarily developing on the way towards attainment. Bearing that in mind, I will now proceed to answer the questions which have been put to me.

1. When you speak of the uselessness of all religions, ceremonies, rites, do you refer only to the old established ones, or do you include in these the Liberal Catholic Church, Masonry and other esoteric rites, not spoken of publicly, which are performed for a purpose? It is thought by some that though the older forms may be outworn, these other are still living. But if Life and Truth are one, can the Life be held in any form?

ANSWER: I have said, and I will not go back on what I have said, that you cannot approach Truth by any path whatsoever, nor through any religion whatsoever, nor through any ceremony, new or old. I include -I do not want you to agree with me, but to think it out- all forms of religious ceremony intended to help man, for I maintain that they cannot help. That is my point of view. Whether they are new or old is of very little importance. If you have not new ones you will run back to the old. Many of you have left old forms and have taken new ones in the hope of finding Truth, and you have not found it. It is not a question of saying "Oh, we shall find it at the end of eternity." Of course you will. I say that to find Truth now you must be free of all these things. Do not say afterwards that I am just substituting one word for another. To help fundamentally you cannot give external aid but must help to purify the individual effort and strengthen the incorruptibility of the self. That is the only thing that matters, not all your forms, your churches and your rites. I have answered these questions I do not know how often, and I suppose I shall go on answering them to the end of my days, because you want all these forms, because you cannot stand by yourselves, free, certain, assured of what you are seeking. If it is not one form you will invent another, because all forms created manmade. These spiritual forms are not the outcome of Life, nor do they embody Truth. I speak emphatically, but it is only my own opinion. I maintain that I have found that which every man in the world is seeking, and I say that if you desire likewise to find, you must be strong, free, and put aside all these childish things. You cannot find lasting, true, unconditional aid from without, nor is the indulgence in these things true self-expression. I know you will say: "They are beautiful, they are this, they are that." Friends, why don't you worship a cloud? Why don't you pray to the man who is labouring in the fields, or take delight in the shadows that are cast on the tranquil waters? You invent something and call it beautiful, artistic. While you are worshipping in an enclosed shrine, Life dances in the street and escapes you. You want to find Truth in the sanctuary, in the tabernacles made by man but you do not want to worship Life itself, which is everywhere, in the heart, in the struggle of everyone around you.

"It is thought by some that though the older forms may be outworn, these others are still living." If you like to believe that, you can do so. There is something greater than all these objective creations of man, and you cannot arrive at the greater through these. You want to use these as crutches, as toys with which children play, to help you to attain strength. If you continually play with toys,how can you attain strength? If you do not test your strength by throwing away your crutches, how can you know your integrity, your vitality? Again, please do not accept me as an authority. I have done all these things and so I know. Truth lies along none of these paths. It is away from these things -which are shadows, unrealities- that you find the creator of all shadows, the seed of all things and true creation itself.

So concern yourself with Life, which is the self of every human being; strengthen and make that self incorruptible, and then the forms which that self creates shall be perfect. You are taking the shadows for realities and worshipping the shadows and forgetting the realities. If you are really anxious to find, to establish happiness within yourselves, you must leave your nurseries. I do not mean this in any harsh sense or brutal manner. If you are burning for Truth you must come out of your shadows, leave your playthings, and enjoy that which creates all things, which is yourself.

2. According to your standard, what would be the true relation of "rights" and "duties"? Or are these ideas to be abandoned as arising from a mechanical or commercial view of life?

ANSWER: My standard is not applicable to your standard, because you are still playing with unessential things, and so whatever I say will be misrepresented to suit your convenience. But I will try to explain what I mean. As long as limitations create a barrier, there is sorrow. Hence, any rights or duties -I am using these words very carefully from my point of view, but I know it is going to be misunderstood- which create a barrier, create sorrow; therefore I will not have any duties or rights that create limitation. Now, you cannot shirk any responsibilities you have already undertaken. Why not? I will tell you. Because your friends, your children may starve. But it is your duty not to undertake new responsibilities if you can help it -from my point of view. You are asking these questions wholly from the wrong standpoint, because duties, rights, and other such things, seen from the point of view of the everlasting, are only a means to an end, stepping stones. But you must realise that they are stepping stones, and go forward, not stay bound by those duties and those rights.

If you are continually trying to seek Truth, and have that as your standard, judge everything else by that. Do not judge from the old standards laid upon you by duties and rights, but from the standard which you establish through search, through careful discrimination between the essential and the unessential, for that is intelligence. The capacity to choose the essential is the highest form of intelligence, because the essential is that which will set man eternally free. If you have that as your everlasting standard, by that you can measure everything that arises.

3. The great Teachers of the past have given rules of conduct, systems of ethics. Is there an eternal standard of ethics, and is right conduct the same as true creation? Is it an expression of Truth, as art is an expression of beauty?

ANSWER: "The great Teachers of the past have given rules of conduct, systems of ethics..." I doubt it. It is generally their disciples who establish the system, lay down the rules of conduct. That is my opinion. Probably you can discuss it historically, and refute it, but it won't convince me, because really great Teachers do not lay down laws; they want to set men free, and you cannot be set free by systems of ethics or by laws of conduct. It is purely an individual matter.

"Is there an eternal standard of ethics, and is right conduct the same as true creation?" There is an eternal standard for the man who has attained, and yet for him no standard of ethic exists, because he is free. I hope you understand what I mean. It is rather difficult to explain this. An eternal standard in ethical matters cannot exist, ultimately. These standards are invented by man for the right conduct of his neighbours, and never for himself. You cannot say that there is an eternal standard of ethics, because a standard is a measure by which to judge, by which to compare. When you have attained that freedom, which is Truth, you are everything, and everything conceivable is in you, because Liberation is Life, it is the seed of everything. For such a man there is no standard. Please do not misunderstand me. It does not mean that you can do exactly as you please. You cannot. The man who is struggling towards the eternal must have a standard by which to measure, and that standard is comprehension of the eternal, but no one can lay down a law for him.

"And is right conduct the same as true creation?" In a way, yes, and in a way, no. True creation is the moment of poise at which you arrive through the harmony between reason and love. I maintain that that harmony is true creation. You must arrive at that creation which is poise through right conduct, which is self-discipline imposed by yourself in the light of the eternal; not discipline imposed by another, through the fear of another, nor through the hope of salvation, but self-discipline imposed through understanding of the fulfilment of life.

I will explain it by a simile, and you will see what I mean. When an eagle is poked on a branch, ready to fly, when it is full, eager, pliable, unconditioned and ecstatic, that moment when the eagle is about to fly is true creation. Whether it flies over the mountain or down into the valley is unimportant. But to arrive at that poise the eagle has trained itself. That training is right conduct, that right conduct is self-discipline imposed on yourself because you understand the true purpose of life.

"Is right conduct an expression of Truth, as art is an expression of beauty?" It is. True creation is the expression of Truth, because true creation is perfect harmony, which cannot be disturbed, which is serene, pliable, strong and assured. That poise is Truth. That Life, which has been attained through the perfection and the incorruptibility of the self, is Truth. Therefore it is the expression of Truth, as art is the expression of beauty.

4. You say that you are the World-Teacher. Is not this but another name for a Guru? Would not the Awakener suit your purpose better?

ANSWER: It is only a name. Do not be caught in the illusion of words. I say that, for a man who desires Truth, there can be no guru, so do not make the World-Teacher into a guru. If you do, it will be a cage in which you will be held.

"Would not the Awakener suit your purpose better?" Perhaps. It is not of very great importance. What is of great importance is that you should attain, not in the future, not at some distant time, but that you should struggle, become immense in that struggle now. I cannot awaken you if you have not the desire to be awakened, so you yourself are the true awakener, which is life itself.

5. Truth is a pathless land, can there be a path of discipleship, which leads to it, or would the existence of such a path be a barrier?

ANSWER: I say do not bother about these things. You are coming back over and over again to the old things and throwing them in my face, to establish your own uncertain truths. I say that Truth is a pathless land, which cannot be approached by any path, by any way, or through another. You cannot interpret this except in one way. You are finding it all so difficult because you will not give up your old ways of thought. You want the new to be transformed into the old, and thereby to settle down comfortably in the old. "Not to be disturbed" is what you are crying for. You want to be left alone in your quiet stagnant waters. If you do, do not come here; but if you want the new, leave the old and come out, do not play with things. This is not a selfish matter. I speak strongly because there is misery, sorrow, in the face of everyone -please do not get sentimental- there is chaos, continual strife, and you are caught in it and you will not leave it because you are afraid. You would much rather dwell in that sorrow, that suffocation, than leave the old and strike out for the new. So, when I see sorrow, pain, suffering, rejoicing, pleasures that are bound by tears, I want to set man free. But as I cannot set him free -he must set himself free- my business is to awaken him, to urge him to that freedom -not through sentiment or through ecstasy or through authority, but by careful analysis, by thoughtfulness, by awareness, by self-recollectedness. Do not think that to understand me you must have studied for thirty years. I told you the other day the story of the poor man at the railway station who did not know who I was or anything about me, but understood the one thing that would make him immense, and because of that he had the courage to leap forward and leave the old behind. As in the springtime every tree gives forth new leaves, so there must be in you a continual change -and you are afraid to change. You want Truth to be given exactly in your old manner, so that you may be happy, tranquil and thereby degenerate into stagnation. I am not speaking in harshness, but this is what is happening throughout the world. To understand Truth you must plunge. Oh! You must be so eager that you will set everything aside and jump -not foolishly, not without discrimination, but with care, with thoughtfulness with the intelligence which chooses between the essentials and the non-essentials -and then you will understand.

6. What place should be given to occultism? Not as a path to spiritual salvation, but as pure science, based on experience and comparative research?

ANSWER: Its normal place. That is very simple, isn't it? Do not divide Life into this or that. In Life there is neither mysticism nor occultism. To the man who is truly liberated they are all divisions of little importance. I tell you that I am speaking about something wholly different from all these. I am talking about that on which all things depend, and from which all transformations arise, and you want to play with words, with things that are in the shadow.

7. You say to us, "If you are in earnest, fight the whole world." But would not agitation aimed at abolishing some of the terrible cruelties in social life draw us into conflict with established laws and governments, and compel us to share in, even to promote, political revolutions?

ANSWER: I say, "If you are in earnest, fight the whole world." I mean by that, fight the unessential things that support the weakness of the self. Is not that clear? So do not go about saying that I advocate revolutions. That is childish. The moment you alter the self, you alter the whole world. The moment you make your own self incorruptible, you will create clearness in the world. Politics, sociology and all these things are the outcome of the corruptibility of the self. They are weaknesses, they are perversions, and are caused by the weakness and perversion which exist in the self of every individual. So if the individual can be straightened, strengthened and made incorruptible, your laws, your regulations, your governments, will be changed.

MORNING TALK

Ommen, Holland, 1929

THIS morning I want to go over the whole of my subject in a condensed form, so that if you will use your keenest intelligence there will be no possibility of misunderstanding. It is very difficult to pierce through the illusion of words. Many of you here understand English and many do not; but even those who understand English will interpret the words in their own manner, and that is where the difficulty lies. I wish it were possible to invent a new language! Please give me your intelligent attention, analyse, criticise and make up your minds. Either what I say is entirely false or it is entirely true. If it is false, then every one of you must shout it down, destroy it. If it is true, then everything else must go, because Truth cannot exist with, cannot be set beside falsehood. Truth and falsehood cannot exist together. My purpose this morning is to make myself perfectly clear, so that you will be able to decide if what I say is true. If it is, then you must shout from the housetops, then you must live it, then it must be the one thing that matters for you. But if it is false, do not make a weak compromise with it -set about to destroy it. You must either be for the Truth entirely, or against it entirely, you cannot compromise. You cannot build in any other manner. You cannot stand in the shade and worship the sun; you must come out of the shade and delight in the sun, rejoice in its purity, so that you yourself become pure, perfect, incorruptible. You cannot compromise, for Truth does not lie in dead hopes.

In the minds of the majority who listen to me, there is an inclination to believe that what I say is purely destructive, and hence negative, that I am all the time merely pulling down, that as I do not put anything in the place of what I pull down I am not constructive. What I say is neither constructive nor destructive, because I speak of Life, and in Life there is neither destruction nor construction. It is the foolish that divide Life into the destructive and the creative. But when I say that certain things are childish, unnecessary, foolish, unessential, false, it is because I wish to make the one essential thing clear, positive, outstanding, and distinctive. On you alone therefore, on every individual alone, depends the destruction and the rebuilding. In the very process of pulling down you are building. That is what you do not realise. As soon as you have withdrawn from all childish things, from all crutches, from all unessential, futile, trivial things, inside you begins to grow that assured certainty, which is above all transient things, which is constant, which is your true measure of understanding. So it is not a matter of destruction, but rather of the desire to discover for yourself the true value, the true meaning, the true purpose of life. To discover that, you must set aside everything that is of little value, as otherwise your mind is perverted, your judgment made crooked.

As the river must go to the sea, must wander through many lands, urged on by the great volume of water behind it, so must every individual, through his own experience, through his own struggles, through his own suffering, ecstasy, rejoicing, enter that sea, which is boundless, limitless, immeasurable, which is Eternity itself. The sea cannot enter the river; the river is too limited. So the river must go to the sea. In like manner I have attained. All your worships, your fears, your anxieties, your ambitions have thrilled me, your hopes, your gurus, your discipleships have held me, but only by putting all these aside have I found. You must come to that Truth unburdened, fearless. You must not come to it with a prejudiced mind, with preconceived ideas, with false hopes, false fears, ambitions and personal glory. By putting aside everything which I held as glory before, I found that which is everlasting, unconditioned, which is Truth itself; by cutting away the past entirely, ruthlessly within myself, I found that which is eternal, which is neither past nor future, which has no beginning, no end, which is Eternal. Having by this means found that which is everlasting -and there is no other means- I would give of that understanding to others.

What is it therefore that all of you, who gather here year after year, are seeking? Please, when I ask this question, put it to yourselves, do not let it pass by. What is it that everyone is seeking? Why do you attend these Camps? To enjoy a pleasure resort? To pass a few days together with those whom you have not met for a whole year? To indulge yourselves in your petty passions? To listen to words of comfort? To be made certain in your doubtful beliefs? What is it you are seeking? What is it that every one of you desires? I will tell you what you desire -not what you desire individually, but what the world is seeking.

Ignorance has no beginning but it has an end, and every one of you is seeking to end that ignorance, because ignorance is a limitation and causes sorrow. To be unaware of the self is ignorance, and knowledge is fully to understand the self. Ignorance is the intermingling of the false and the real. Being uncertain, being doubtful, you are not sure of what is true and what is false, of what is essential and what is transient, of what is bitter and what is sweet. To know what is true, to know what is false; to recognise the truth in the true, and the falsehood in the false, is true knowledge of the self. That knowledge of the self creates no barriers aid no limitations, and hence gives lasting happiness. You are seeking the power to destroy for yourselves all the limitations that are placed upon you by yourself, and thereby attain freedom, which is happiness. Anything that leads to freedom, to poise, to the boundless, immeasurable vastness of Life leads essentially to Truth. Anything which creates a barrier, a weakness, anything which imposes a bondage, a limitation, a belief, anything which acts as a crutch, which leads to reliance on another, is false, and will not lead you to Truth. So the intermingling of the true (which is the choice of the essential that shall set you free) and the false (which places a limitation on you and hence binds you) is ignorance. The falsehoods, the unessentials, the childishnesses, the weaknesses on which you depend, the fears which you take to your heart, cannot lead you to freedom, and hence they are false, they are a limitation to be set aside.

This constant struggle to discriminate between what is real and what is false, what is bondage and what is freedom, what is misery and what is happiness, this struggle, pain, this constant battle is going on within each one. It is this problem you must solve. It is this to which you must pay attention, give your concentration, and not to the trivial things created by man, not the forms that the perverted life creates. They will exist but they are of little importance. What you have to concern yourself with is how and in what manner you will distinguish for yourself, without the authority of another, that which is true and that which is false. When you have decided for yourself you must no longer play with them, you must be either firmly for one or for the other. There can be no compromise, for compromise cannot exist in spirituality.

What is it for which everyone in the world is struggling, groping, fighting, crying? It is to be sure for himself, to grow for himself, eternally, to acquire that inward peace which cannot be disturbed either by the false or by the true. This is what everyone is seeking, and it is to this that you must give your minds, your hearts, your whole concentration. I tell you that the only manner in which you can find it is as I have found it, by setting aside all trivial things -worships, gurus, fears, paths, everything- to discover this one thing. If you want that happiness you must do likewise. I am not urging you to do it. It is not my authority that should impel you. It is because you are unhappy, because your faces are shrouded with misery, because there are tears, and laughter that is bound by sorrow, that you must seek.

There are two elements in every human being -this is not a dogma or a philosophy or a theory- one eternal and the other progressive. You must concern yourself with changing the progressive self into the eternal. In every human being, in every one of you there is this progressive self that is struggling -struggling to advance to that which is immeasurable, limitless, eternal. In making that progressive self incorruptible, by the union with that which is eternal in you, lies the acquisition of Truth. I am dividing the self into the eternal and the progressive purely for explanation, but do not translate it into other words and make a theory, a dogma, a complicated system out of it, and thereby destroy what you are seeking. The whole process of existence consists in changing the progressive into the eternal. The progressive self that is in limitation, created by itself, is the cause of sorrow. The progressive self, because it is small, because it chooses the unessential, the false, the limited, is constantly creating barriers. That progressive self is constantly asserting itself, and that assertion will exist, must exist, until there is that union with the eternal.

This progressive self is ever seeking that eternity which is not the eternity of the individual, but of the whole, which is not limited to individuals, but is the consummation of all life, individual as well as universal. The progressive self is in process of advancing, is all the time climbing, through struggle, by the destruction of barriers, and in that advancement, in that climb, it is creating, by its self-assertion, echoes. Those echoes return to it as sorrow, pain, and pleasure. That self-assertion of the progressive self will always exist and is bound to exist, until you are made one with the eternal. Existence itself, that is, the life that you are leading, is self-assertion, and that very self-assertion in limitation creates sorrow and that sorrow perverts your judgement, complicates your life. You are constantly led astray by things that are of no value, by things that are unessential, by things that place greater limitations on your search. If your search is not constantly watched over, guided, helped, encouraged, you are caught up in things that are trivial, absurd, and childish. Therefore, I say again, you cannot escape from the self-assertion, which is the cause of sorrow, but that self-assertion can be made so vast that it becomes boundless. Because what you perceive you desire. Your desire is transformed by that which you perceive. If your perception is narrow, limited, then your desires will be small. But if your perception of life is limitless, vast, whole, complete, then your desire becomes whole, vast, limitless.

The self-assertion of the "I" which does not create sorrow is timeless. The present, the immediate now, is ever the past. The moment I have done something it is over, it belongs to the past, it is dead. Every action, which takes place in the present, instantly becomes the past, and to that past belongs whatever you have understood of the progressive self. Whatever you have understood, whatever you have dominated, conquered, is over, it belongs to the past, it is dead, finished with.

All that you have understood and conquered, dominated brings you nearer to that future which is NOW. To that past which is the ever-changing present, belongs birth, acquisition, renunciation, all the qualities that you have developed. The moment you understand something of the progressive self it is over, it is finished with and belongs to the past. It is dead, dust, and nothing of it remains except that you are nearer to eternity.

The present being the ever-changing past, there remains the future, to which you all look with such delight, with such hopes, with such variation of longing that you create theories, innumerable philosophies, which have very little importance, because, as I will show you, the future is not real.

To that future, which is the mystery in which you take so much delight, to that future belong what remains of the unsolved, progressive self. Whatever you have not solved of the progressive self is a mystery, and in that mystery you are caught. That is the future, because that is the mystery of the self, which you have not conquered, which you have not gained, attained and solved.

So it remains a mystery. To the mystery of the future, which is the unsolved "I", belongs death, of which you are so afraid. Directly you understand, there is no birth, no death. Whatever remains to be understood has not come to an end. Whatever has not come to an end is a mystery, and in that mystery you place death. Because you do not understand it, it belongs to that unsolved portion of the "I" and from that insoluble mystery comes fear -fear of death, fear of the entanglements of love (love which is not returned, jealousy, envy), fear of loneliness, fear of friendship, fear of all that is of the future and belongs to the unsolved "I". You should seek that happiness you desire neither in the future nor in the past, but now. What is the good of being happy in ten years' time? What is the good of being companionable, full of friendship in ten years' time if you are lonely now, if every moment creates tears, sorrow, and misery? When you are hungry you want to be satisfied immediately, now.

To solve the mystery of the unsolved "I", of the self, you cannot look to the future, because the future, if you have not solved it, is never-ending; it is continuous. But to the man who understands, the solution is at that point where the past and the present and the future meet, which is now. The moment you understand, there is no mystery.

The eternity, which the progressive self is seeking, is neither in the past nor in the future. If it is neither in the past nor in the future, it is now. Now is the moment of eternity. When you understand that, you have transcended all laws, limitations, karma and reincarnation. These, though they may be facts, have no value, because you are living in the eternal.

You cannot solve your problems in the future; your fears, your anxieties, your ambitions, your deaths and births cannot be solved either in the future or in the past, you must solve them NOW. That progressive self which is constantly seeking, through its limitations, through its sorrow, to find eternity, must be made incorruptible NOW. Not with whether you will be corruptible or incorruptible in the future, but with whether you are corruptible or incorruptible NOW must you concern yourself, because you are concerned with sorrow now, and not in the future. You must make that progressive self incorruptible, strong, whole, complete in the immediate NOW, which is the moment of eternity.

As you should have nothing to do with the past or with the future (I am afraid you have, but that does not matter!), you must concentrate your whole attention, focus every action, every thought, towards the incorruptibility of the mind and the heart, because there is the seat of self. The moment you are incorruptible, you will be a light and cast no shadow, so that all happiness, all rejoicing will be concentrated in you; then you can truly help, and give light to those around you who dwell in darkness.

To live in that immediate NOW, which is eternity you must withdraw from all trivial things that belong to the past or to the future. Your dead hopes, your false theories, your goals, everything must go, and you must live -as the flower lives, giving its perfume to everyone- fully concentrated in that moment of time, in that NOW which is neither the future nor the past, which is neither distant nor near, that NOW which is the harmony of reason and of love.

That NOW is Truth, because in it is the whole consummation of life. To dwell in that NOW is true creation, for creation is poise, it is absolute, unconditioned, it is the consummation of all life. If you would dwell in that eternity which is now, you must look neither to the future nor to the past, but with the desire to make that progressive self incorruptible, free, unconditioned, you must live concentrated, focussed, acute, in every action, in every thought, in every love. Because that NOW exists whether you are; that NOW abides in each one, whole, complete, unconditioned. It is that eternity which the progressive self, bound in limitation which is sorrow, is ever seeking.

CAMPFIRE TALKS

Ommen, Holland, 1929

This Camp-Fire and the chant accompanying it are in danger of becoming a superstition. I have been told, wherever I have been, that in order to speak in the evening I must have a Camp-Fire and must necessarily chant at it. I can foresee what is going to happen later on! However, I am going to chant a Sanskrit verse tonight because it has a lovely meaning, and not because it produces some mysterious effect.

I have been saying over and over again that in order to live truly, greatly, one must have full understanding of the purpose of life. That full understanding, from which alone come true ideas, leads to a life that is harmonious, to the incorruptibility of thought and the perfection of love. It will establish within each one the balance, the harmony which is true creation.

What is your life? If you analyse it impersonally, and examine it carefully, you will find that your life is bound by petty tyrannies and continual strife, by worries, depressions, uncertainties, vain hopes of achievement, by a begging and a crying, by discontentment and fruitless ambition, and pleasure that is bound by tears. That is the inward state of man, of every human being: a continual jostle and strife, a ceaseless endeavour. What is the cause of this? I maintain that your ideas of life do not correspond to that which is eternal. I am going to explain what I mean by this. I am not using vague terms to cover over what you do not understand.

I maintain that to live greatly, with ecstasy of purpose, you must have the root of your ideas in the eternal, the everlasting.

In order to conquer this uncertainty, this vast strife, this chaotic combativeness, your ideas, your life, your reason, your thoughts, your affections must have their being in that which is everlasting.

It is in your everyday life that you must realise that eternity. It is in your every action, your every thought, your every feeling, that men must behold that eternity. You cannot escape to another world in search of happiness. It is while living in this world that you must find truth. It is by the process of living in this world that you attain to the vastness of life. It is your daily thoughts, your daily love, and your daily deeds that create the struggle, the strife, the pleasure, the loneliness, and the corruptibility of life. It is with these that man is all the time struggling, and in his expressions of that struggle he steals the light of another and creates chaos around himself. It is only in finding truth that you change these expressions.

It is therefore necessary to discover truth; it must be established in the conduct of your life, in the way you treat people, in the way you think of people, in the actions that are born out of thought and out of affection. In that process alone lies truth, in the process of establishing incorruptibility, in attaining perfection of thought and of love, lies truth.

You must not make of this a religion, or a dogma, or a belief, but by the conduct of your life you must show that you understand, and that you have your thought, your affections, rooted in the eternal.

The eternal, I maintain, is liberation from all corruption, for corruption is a limitation. Therefore seek the incorruptibility of the self, the self within each one, by individual and not by collective effort, for in that incorruptibility of the self alone lies freedom. Freedom of the self is truth. Knowledge of the self is life eternal: it is liberation, that poise which is true creation. For the self is the eternal, it has no beginning and no end, no death and no birth: IT IS. The limited self, which exists in each one in corruption, is seeking to establish that incorruptibility which is truth. In the process of making that self incorruptible lies liberation. You must understand that, and from that understanding derive your ideas of life. Then whatever you do, whatever your actions, your thoughts and your feelings, they will bear the stamp of eternity. You are seeking your reasons for conduct; you are drawing your conclusions from the manifestations of the self, from the expressions, from the shadows. I maintain that this is wrong, and results in chaos around you. But if you would understand truth and establish your ideas in truth, you must seek that self and make that self incorruptible. From that truth alone you must draw your ideas and live continually focussed in that truth.

From that eternal spring which is the incorruptibility of the self, which is life, your deeds, your thoughts and your love must be born. Then shall you be as the rain that comes to the parched lands, making all things new and fresh, giving delight and ecstasy; destroying those perversions, those illusions, which men take as realities.

I am going to tell you of a little incident that happened to me last year, while I was in India. I went to see some friends off at a railway station -you cannot imagine what an Indian station is like, very noisy, rather dirty, even more than stations usually are. I saw a man hovering about wanting to speak to me. He was one of those people who draw the rickshaws -two-wheeled carts in which one man sits and another man draws him. At last he screwed up enough courage and came to speak to me. He asked me in very faltering, bad English where I lived, what I was doing, and whether I was seeing my brothers and sisters off. I explained to hint where I was staying; and finally he asked me if he might walk down the platform with me. He was nearly as shy as I was! Presently he took a cigarette out of his pocket and began to smoke it. After a few puffs he asked me whether I smoked; I said I didn't. He then looked at his cigarette for a while and said: "I suppose it is unnecessary to smoke", and I said: "Probably it is." This man, whose greatest pleasure probably was smoking, said: "From now on I am not going to smoke any more", and threw that cigarette away with a violence which really surprised me.

I am not telling you that incident to suggest that you should not smoke -that is beside the point. But one act of real understanding, with real depth of feeling, will put a man on a pinnacle of great vision, of great understanding, of great delight. As I have said in my talks, to discover that eternity which is the self in fulfilment, that harmony of poise between reason and love, it is necessary, from my point of view, to withdraw from all unessential things, and there must be a physical expression of that withdrawal. Please do not imagine that because things are unessential you should continue to indulge in them. I know many people will say, "I will continue to do these things because they are unessential." That may be a very convenient way of looking, at life, but rather you must, by the process of elimination, withdraw from all these unessential things, because they are absolutely childish, trivial, and absurd. By that withdrawal you will discover the true self and discipline that self. It is not through these complications, through these unessential things, but rather by their elimination, by putting them aside, that you find truth, that you find the true self, whereby the true process of self-discipline begins.

By self-discipline I do not mean repression, but rather self-discipline through understanding, which will lead you to liberation, that poise of reason and of love. If you would find truth, that discipline of the self, which is the seed of reason and love, must take place every moment of the day, must be focussed acutely in every thing that you do. Truth lies in the process, not in the attainment. While living, manifesting, working in the daily life you find it. In the training of that self lies the truth -in nothing else. The question of importance therefore is not the invention of a multitude of theories or philosophies, but rather the discovery of the "I" which is progressive and the making that progressive "I" incorruptible. In the education, the care, the encouraging of that 'T' towards freedom, towards that realm where there is no limitation of the self, lies truth. Having as your vision that liberation of which I speak, by the process of self-discipline, imposed upon yourself by yourself, not on account of reward or fear of punishment, lies the true attainment, the fulfilment, the incorruptibility of the self. All manifestation -I am not speaking in any philosophical sense, but I am using ordinary language- is the creation of the self, is the shadow of the self. If the self is impure, corruptible, then all manifestations of that self will be impure and corruptible. So you must seek the perfection, the incorruptibility of the self, for in that alone lies truth. You must withdraw from all unessential things, for they place a limitation on the self. You must come unburdened, free, unlimited: then that truth, which is neither far nor near, shall be discovered, and he who has discovered it will be a danger to all unrealities, to all falsities of life.

When you look around and consider, you will find that the group is ever opposed to the individual. When I use the term "individual" I speak of the man who is whole, complete within himself, as distinct from the group which claims that it exists in order to benefit the individual. In every department of thought and emotion you will find this group opposed to the individual. And yet the group itself is the individual, because the group is composed of individuals. I am going to concern myself with the individual, because it is the individual who creates chaos, strife around him. Within the individual -that is within everyone throughout the world, with rare exceptions- there is chaos, strife and crookedness. And yet the group is striving to establish order, serenity and straightness. In the heart of the group, that is in the heart of every individual composing the group, there is chaos, strife and struggle: so, to establish order, serenity and straightness we must look to the individual. The individual is of the greatest importance.

The individual is yourself, and it is in making that individual straight, serene, creative, that you will find true self-expression. It is the individual that you must consider at all times, but that does not mean that your consideration should be at the expense of your neighbour: for I maintain that from the very beginning of the unfoldment of the individual he must be a light unto himself, so that he will not cast a shadow across the face of another.

No one can make the individual straight, serene, creative, but himself. By creation I mean true self-expression, not the mere creation of ornaments, chairs, pictures and so on; these I do not consider true creation. The expression of the fulfilment, the fruition, the consummation of the self is, to my way of thinking, true creation. This can only be the result of individual perception. No organisation, no religious bodies, no external coercion, no seeking of help from without can make the individual straight, serene and truly creative, because the individual is absolutely free, he is absolutely responsible to himself -that thought I would like you to consider carefully because, if you do not understand that, everything else that I say will have a different meaning, will not be properly understood, will not be clear. Every individual in the world, whatever his circumstances may be, is absolutely and entirely responsible to himself. In the self alone, therefore, lies the possibility, the power of freeing himself entirely, wholly, unconditionally from the entanglements, the corruption of imperfect love. He is the only person who can conquer his own weakness, who can master his own passions, who can control his own desires, and who is entirely responsible for his own ambitions. It is of the utmost importance, if you would bring about order, serenity, clear thought and the happiness not only of the individual but of everyone in the world, to pay attention to the individual from the very beginning. Because if the individual is within himself chaotic, he creates chaos; if he is within himself crooked, he makes all things around him crooked; if he is within himself disturbed, he creates around him disturbance.

What is the individual desiring all the time? What is he seeking continually? What is he going after in his struggle, in his corruption, in his strife, in his tears and in his pleasures? He is seeking to break down the limitations placed by himself upon himself, so that he shall attain that liberation which is perfection, the incorruptibility of love and thought, which shall establish perfect harmony, which is happiness. Desire which everyone has, which is life itself, is continually encouraging, pushing, urging everyone forward; desire is ever seeking fulfilment in experience, because it wants an outlet, it wants an expression. Experience without a purpose is destructive, whereas experience with a purpose is truly creative. That is the reason why you must first establish within yourself the purpose of life, and then, after that establishment which will be for eternity, continuous without variation from generation to generation, that purpose will be the goal, the objective to which all desire -which is life itself- shall lead. If there be such a purpose -as I maintain there is, and that I have realised it- then every experience which is the fulfilment of a desire must strengthen, free the individual from that very desire. That is: when you have been through one experience it should be sufficient to free you from that particular kind of experience. So shall you break down all limitations and arrive at that liberation which is the fulfilment of all life.

Knowing therefore the purpose of life, and knowing that the individual is entirely and absolutely responsible to himself, you overcome fear of any kind. It is fear that throttles, suffocates every human being. It is the phantom which follows every human being as a shadow, because he does not realise that for every action, and the result of that action, for every desire, and the fulfilment of that desire, he is wholly responsible. With that realisation fear of every kind disappears, because the individual is absolutely master of himself.

When you have no fear you really begin to live. You live not in the future nor in the past, neither hoping for salvation in the future nor looking to the dead past for your strength, but -because you have no fear- in that moment of eternity, which is NOW.

It is NOW that matters, not the future nor the past. It is what you do, what you think, how you live and how you act NOW that has value. Truth is neither in the future nor in the past. The man who is not bound by fear lives entirely responsible to himself, concentrated in that moment which is NOW, which is eternity.

For such a man there is neither birth nor death. Most people are afraid of death because they are afraid to live. They are more concerned about death than about how to live in the immediate moment, which is eternity, which is NOW.

Knowing therefore, what is the future of every human being, of every individual, how he shall fulfil himself in liberation, which is the incorruptibility of the self, which is the harmony between reason and love -knowing that, it matters vitally, greatly, that you should live in the realisation of that greatness and of that beauty in the immediate present.

When there is suffering, when there are tears, when there is fear in your heart, of what value is it to know that all such things will disappear in the future. You want happiness, you want freedom at the present moment, not in some distant future. No one can give you happiness; no one can free you, except yourself. Along no path can you attain, nor through any religion or sect. Liberation lies within the individual; it is entirely within his control and comes at his behest alone.

Liberation, that happiness which is unvarying, serene, that perfection, is neither distant nor near, because perfection is where the individual is, it is within himself.

For the attainment of that harmony, which is the consummation of all life, which is the perfection of the self, all that the individual is, all that he does, what he thinks, how he behaves and in what manner he loves, is of importance. Not in the future nor in the past must he begin to attain that perfection, but in the very moment of clear thought, in the very moment of understanding -which is NOW.

I have said that for attainment to the realm of spirituality, to the land of truth, to freedom, there is no law, and I want to explain this further. Intelligence is the capacity to discern the essential and the non-essential. Intelligence is, from my point of view, the essence of all experience. By constant practice of this discernment, and by constantly keeping that intelligence awake, it attains its highest point in inspiration. Inspiration, therefore, has its roots in the eternal, in the everlasting, in truth. For a man who has fully developed this intelligence, who has reached the state of liberation, which I call the harmony of reason and of love, for him inspiration is not intermittent but continuous. That continuity of inspiration is what everyone is seeking. That continuity of happiness is what every man in the world is striving after. He seeks to establish within himself the unvarying, constant happiness which ever dwells in that harmony which is perfect poise.

Such being the state of liberation, such being the condition of truth, who can help you to attain and hold within yourself that continuity, without a break, without intermission, that vast unending fulfilment of life? No one can help you but yourself, because it is not something to be arrived at by the help of another, or through reliance on another. How then is an individual to attain? Life must perfect itself to attain liberation, that is the fulfilment of every individual life. By keeping your intelligence constantly awakened you learn to distinguish between what is fleeting and what is lasting, to discern the false in the falsehood, the truth in the true. But that highly awakened intelligence can only be the outcome of constant watchfulness, of awareness, of selfrecollectedness, and of self-discipline imposed upon yourself through the understanding of the purpose of life.

Throughout the world today, authority, external authority especially, is being thrown away. The younger generation, if you watch it, is getting rid of the authority imposed by their elders who are supposed to know better. That authority is being broken down, but there is still the authority to which man clings in his heart, for his spiritual growth, an authority which he must equally get rid of before he can develop his own intelligence to its highest point. You must become the only authority for yourself; the architect of your own intelligence and hence of your own life, in the light of that which is eternal. That, I say, is liberation, the harmony between reason and love. When you have attained that, all fear, derived from the lack of understanding, disappears. Therefore, by constructing your life on the understanding of the purpose of life, you establish for yourself a continuous happiness, you are putting out a root into that realm which is eternal. It is a question of individual effort, of individual struggle, constant awareness, and constant self-discipline. There can no longer be an authority from outside for right conduct: an authority in which to dwell, on which to lean. Whatever you build in the light of that eternity will remain, because it is well established, ever dwelling in liberation. To a man who has attained there is no cessation, no intermission, in that which is eternal, which is free.

In India it is considered auspicious, especially after a marriage, when the guests are going away, that it should rain, and as you are all going away from here tomorrow, I hope you will find this rain also auspicious.

I hope that this week has been rich in experience, has altered your whole outlook, has opened a new vista of thought and immense feeling, so that you will put forth new seeds into the world of manifestation, seeds which will grow and multiply and cover the land with their loveliness. Then you will cast no shadow across the face of another, or bring tears or transient rejoicing to the heart. I hope that everyone who has been here during this week and who has struggled to understand -and there are many, I am convinced- has been made more certain, more assured, more determined than when he came. For him henceforth there will be only one thing that matters and that is: to watch over, to care for that self on which all things depend, and from which all transformations arise. Do not interpret this in any selfish manner, for if you can make the purification and the incorruptibility of the self the only thing of importance, then your actions, your thoughts and your affections will bear the mark of incorruptibility.

If you, who have gathered here during this week, have, by examination, established within you certainty, assurance, clarity of thought, you will be the strong who will nourish, sustain and uphold those who are in sorrow. In that way only can you truly help, can you give the everlasting nourishment, the waters that shall quench all thirst, the balm that shall heal all wounds. Because you have been here, because you have struggled to understand, by that understanding, wherever you go, your friends, your neighbours, will spontaneously be transformed. Not the inventions or the enjoyment of philosophies and theories, but the way you live your life, with that understanding, in the world around you, is of value.

Like an eagle that descends to the valley, so must you go out of this Camp with real determination, with enthusiasm, with ecstasy, so that you will alter, you will uproot those unessential things that surround man and so place a limitation and a corruption upon him, and hence create sorrow and misery wherever he is. You must do this by careful watchfulness, by careful examination analysis, self-discipline of that self on which all things depend and from which all transformations arise. To be more determined, to be more eager, to search out the avenues, the secret sanctuaries of thought and thereby purify and make that self incorruptible, so that you shall give joy, happiness and understanding to others, are the only things which you can carry away from this Camp.

So I wish you all a happy journey, and I hope we shall meet again next year, everyone with greater determination, with greater enthusiasm, but with a different smile and a different walk, a different assurance of his own integrity and his own strength.

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS

Ommen, Holland, 1929

I HAVE been told by many people here in Europe, and also in India and America, that what I say is not new. There is nothing new under the heavens. But, for every man who discovers, who attains, everything is new. So if you find nothing new in what I say, it is not my fault, it is the fault of those (if it be a fault at all) who have nothing new in themselves. As every day is fresh and keen, as every spring is new, so, if you would find something new, original, clear, different, you must be different To discover something new, there must be the desire in your heart to break away from the old.

1. We are constantly being told that what you say about the inutility of ceremonies, churches (including the Liberal Catholic Church), religions, does not apply to the present moment, but is intended for the sixth sub-race. What do you say about this?

ANSWER: When you are hungry, do you postpone the hour of eating? When you are drowning, do you listen to the man on the shore who says: "Tomorrow I will rescue you." When you are in sorrow, do you postpone getting relief from that suffocating hour by forgetfulness? What do you do? When you are hungry you go after food and get it. If you are drowning you struggle to have fresh air, and if you are in sorrow you want to have your sorrow removed immediately. I explained yesterday what I mean by the eternal moment and, from my point of view, that eternal moment should be the concern of everyone, and not only of the few. This realisation is not for the future, you must have it now. Of what value will it be in the future? Who will benefit? Neither yourself nor your neighbour.

Do you not all want to be free? Free from sorrow, from the constant gnawing of misery, NOW? What is the use of looking to the future? You have to solve your problems now, you have to live now, you have to struggle now, in your daily life. You have to alter the circumstances around you now. You have to clear the forest and make a pathway now, not in the future. The future will ever be the future, if you do not alter now. The future will always be a mystery, if you do not master the present. Your difficulty is that you do not know that you are prisoners. When you are in sorrow -really in sorrow-you do not utilise that sorrow to break down the walls that create other sorrows. It is NOW that matters: the way you live, the way you behave, the way you love people, the way you think of people. What does it matter what you are in the future? If you do not grow now to your greatest, by your sustained effort, the future will always elude you. If you do not grow to that incorruptibility now, you will build greater walls, greater barriers between yourself and your attainment, and thereby create greater limitations and greater sorrow.

You think you are weak, that within you there is not the power to uphold you in your integrity, you imagine that you cannot stand by yourselves. I say that you can, if you really want to, if you have the tremendous desire to seek truth, to search it out, to reason and struggle with it, and thereby establish it within yourself -and you must do that NOW, not in the future. In the future the darkness and mystery of death await you; so while living you must concern yourselves with life, and alter the course of that life, tearing away all the barriers, limitations, trivialities, that exist between you and your greater understanding. Why do you wait for the future, and what is the value of awaiting the future? In what way will the future give you its fulfilment, if you do not build greatly, vastly, dangerously, at the present moment? You are killing the future by the present. That future will always be twisted, perverted, if you do not live at the present moment. I cannot understand why it is so difficult for you to understand what I am saying. What is there so complicated about it? I say that no one from outside can give you incorruptibility of the mind or of the heart, that in that incorruptibility alone lies the perfection of life, the beauty, the loveliness, of which everyone is a part. It is so simple that you want to complicate it by philosophies, systems, creeds, religions, churches, rites. How can you live greatly, vastly, delightedly, beautifully in the future, if you do not lay the foundation now, if you are not living in that eternity now, with your greatest capacity with all your enthusiasm and eagerness?

If you are hungry, you go in search of work that will give you money to buy food. You do not postpone the hour; you go out and struggle to satisfy your cravings. Because you have not the real burning craving to find truth immediately, NOW, all these complications exist. To have that incorruptibility of the self at the present moment, NOW, is of the greatest and the utmost importance. It is only NOW that you can find it, not in the future. Go into some of the slums of London, or of any other big city, and ask the people there if they want to have food, comfort, and light in the future. You are all too comfortable in your minds, and in your hearts, and physically too. You are satisfied and stagnant and yet you want truth, which does not come out of satisfaction or stagnation.

2. The following story has been widely circulated, in theosophical and star magazines. A priest went to Mr. Krishnamurti and said that after the inspiration of the Camp he was going away to throw himself more arduously than ever into the Church work, and Mr. Krishnamurti answered, "You at least have understood my teaching." There was also a lady who asked him if she should give up co-masonry. Mr. Krishnamurti replied: "Why, are you afraid of co-masonry?" Are these stories correct?

ANSWER: What do you think? Don't laugh, please don't laugh, this is not funny. I have not refuted this story, because it is too silly. It just shows the sorrow that exists in the hearts of people, the smallness of their mind, the futility of their struggles. I am not trying to depress or to discourage you, but after I have been speaking for three years, how can you believe such things?

None of these stories are true. I maintain (how often I have done this) that these things are absolutely and wholly unessential to make the self incorruptible. If you are not seeking for that perfection of the self, then these things are necessary. I would much rather that you were in disagreement with me than invent this kind of story, much rather that you were against everything that I have said than go on compromising. Because, friends, if you are uncertain in your own minds and hearts, you will be unhappy. Make up your mind one-way, and leave the other alone. Don't play with both. Truth and falsehood, the essential and the unessential, cannot exist together for a person who is seeking the incorruptibility of the self.

3. The fear of death, not so much for oneself as for those we love, is almost universal, though more, perhaps, in the West than in the East. It is a dark mystery, from which there seems no escape, and for which there is no explanation. Can you tell us how, from your standpoint, we can set about freeing ourselves from this fear of separation?

ANSWER: By living in the present... What is death? Death is but darkness in that life which is continuous. It is a veil drawn down which separates you from someone else. Separation causes loneliness, and that loneliness causes sorrow. So you have to grapple with sorrow, loneliness and separation, not with death. Death is inevitable, it is like the night which follows the day, but to prepare for the night you must work in the day, so do not find explanations for death, but rather make the self incorruptible, which means that it is no longer separate from anything or anyone. Then both birth and death will cease. Separation is the cause of sorrow, and separation is the assertion of the self in climbing toward the mountain top. That self-assertion will exist and must exist so long as the individual is still corruptible. To a man who is incorruptible there is neither birth nor death, and hence no sorrow.

4. If it is "here" and "now" that we achieve Liberation, what development is possible for us after death?

ANSWER: It was better to ask the question, "What development is possible while we are living?" You are much more interested in death than in life. Liberation, the truth of which I am speaking, is not something external, outside, but it lies in the process of achievement, not in achievement itself. Truth lies in the continual struggle, and in the rejection and achievement, which are the result of that struggle. Truth is in the unfoldment of the progressive "I", the self, not in its final fulfilment. That progression of the self is not in the future, nor at a distant time, but while you are living, struggling, rejoicing, so sorrowing, now. So it were much better that you should seek to understand and grapple with life now, than to investigate life after death. As you prepare for darkness during the daytime, so to prepare for death, you must live. Live now, for that is the only thing that matters. To alter the course of your thought, to change your corruptible love now, is the only thing that matters. Please see this, that you must struggle constantly, continually, now, so as to create that incorruptibility in your minds and in your hearts. It is a very difficult thing to struggle continually; it requires great strength, great determination. As very few people have that, you have all these innumerable side-paths to encourage you; but even though you may wander along the side-paths, you will always come back to this one thing. You may worship at a thousand altars, perform a thousand rites, but you will always come back to this one thing. You cannot forget sorrow; you cannot put aside misery, or loneliness, or fear by these illusive means. You must go to the root of all sorrow, and there establish perfection, that harmony between reason and love, and then all these unessential side-paths will have no value.

5. I am inclined to think that to put away the past and to forget it wholly are not quite the same. Would you give us your point of view on memory? What is the right kind of remembrance, and the right kind of forgetting? The right kind of gratitude? In what way is memory related to the art of discriminating between the essential and the unessential, and should it be educated in order to function rightly?

ANSWER: This is a really interesting question for a change -"I am inclined to think that to put away the past and to forget it wholly are not quite the same. Would you give us your point of view on memory?" To me memory should be not memory of experience itself, but rather memory of that which is the outcome of the experience. You must forget the experience and remember its lesson. That is true memory. That is eternal, because it is the only thing of value in the experience. That true memory is intelligence.

As I said last night, intelligence is the capacity to choose, with discrimination, with culture, that which is essential from that which is false. That intelligence is acquired through experience, through the lessons that remain after experience. The highest form of that intelligence is intuition, because it is the residue of all accumulated experiences. That is the true function of memory.

"What is the right kind of remembrance, and the right kind of forgetting?" The right kind of remembrance, from my point of view, is to remember, to hold to that reside of all experience, so that you will not again indulge in the same kind of experience. The indulgence in experiences with which you have finished creates karma and barriers. To a wise man one experience of one special kind is sufficient. So the right kind of remembrance and the right kind of forgetting is to have learned from experiences, and to brush aside all experiences that have no value.

The next question is "What is the right kind of gratitude?" To me there can be no question of gratitude, because if you really love everyone, you learn from everyone alike. You are not attached to one person.

You are grateful in your love for everyone. You learn from your servants, if you are observant, from the labourer, from the man who digs in the field, and from your greatest hero. You learn from them all, as you are really in love with them all, and there is no gratitude to anyone. Again, you are loyal to everyone, and not to one particular person. You will be loyal to one if you are loyal to all -because you love all. I tell you it is much more lovely, much more tranquil, serene, to love everyone alike; really to hold all people in your heart, not to be indifferent to anyone, not to have that variation of corruptible love in your heart is the greatest of blessings. When you have such love, you are learning, not from one thing, but from everything moving and non-moving, from everything transient and eternal. If you love only one person, you begin to worship, to look up to that person, you begin to suffocate yourself; you are not learning from life, you are not rejoicing in life, nor are you in love with it. The question of gratitude is a question of love, and for the person who loves one and not another, there is sorrow. This is not a mere platitude, but a reality. So love is as a flower which gives its perfume to every passer-by whether he be of this colour or that, of this type or that. The flower gives its perfume to all, and if you are wise you will breathe that perfume, rejoice in it. From the love which is small, which entangles, which is corruptible, you reach to that love which does not entangle, which is incorruptible.

"In what way is memory related to the art of discriminating between the essential and the unessential, and should it be educated in order to function rightly?" Of course. That is what I have been saying. True self-discipline is the education of the "I". "In what way is memory related to the art of discriminating between the essential and the unessential?" It is not a question of in what way it is related, it is the whole. If you have not right memory, if you are always hesitating, if you are uncertain, then your discrimination has no value, but if your memory is the residue of all experience, when you are confronted with innumerable unessentials and one essential thing, you should be able to choose that one essential, because your memory is trained. Examine every experience that comes across you, as the wind that ruffles the still waters, and see if that experience is essential. If it is not, leave it alone, because if it is unessential, you have already had it. A child that has once burned its fingers will never go near the fire again. It has had its experience and the lesson remains. So if once you have had a certain experience, it should give you the fullness of all its consequences.

"And should it be educated in order to function rightly?" Are you not training it every moment of the day when you are watching eagerly, when you are self-disciplining yourself constantly in the light of your understanding of the eternal? You need not go through any special training; life trains you if you are keen, observant. It is the indolent who require assistance, those who are lazy, who are tired of examining everything that comes to them. The only manner of making the self absolutely pure and incorruptible is through self-discipline imposed upon yourself, not through repression, but through the love of that freedom which is truth.

6. What would you say to a group of college students who say they have no creed, no religion, no belief, except in material science, and who consider no ideal necessary, if they can earn a living?

ANSWER: I would ask them whether they are not in sorrow, whether they are not in love with something, whether they do not love someone. A college student, like everyone else, is in the clutches of sorrow of various kinds -though not perhaps of your particular kind. He is not worrying about what is essential, or what is the right kind of ceremony, but about his own sufferings, and he wants to be rid of that suffering. He is in love with someone, from which follow the entanglements of love, and there is sorrow. It is very easy to talk to such people, because they have not so many preconceived ideas, prejudices, certainties. They are willing to examine, to criticise, what you put before them.

7. Don't you think that it is difficult for very young people to see what is essential and what is unessential?

ANSWER: I do not know that it is only young people who have that difficulty. I have explained how to discriminate. I cannot tell you what is essential and what is false, what is lasting and what is fleeting, because if I did, it would be a cage. YOU have to suffer, YOU have to struggle, and you must be able to distinguish now. I say that essential things are those that will give you freedoms absolute and unconditioned, will give you that happiness which has no variance. All other things are unessential. You must examine and find out for yourselves what you think to be the essential. Otherwise, if I told you what were the unessential things, where would be your progress, where would be your own uniqueness in attainment?

8. To anyone detached from the need of human affection, what is the value of human friendship?

ANSWER: To be truly detached means that you are attached to everyone, so it is the outcome of all human affection, and supersedes any particular friendship. After all, true love, which is detached so that it is attached to everything, is the outcome, is the consummation of all human affections, and is the fulfilment of all love. So it is absolutely unnecessary for a man who has attained to have human friendship, because human friendship, in most cases, is the outcome of loneliness, of sorrows, of the longing for companionship. But if you are struggling all the time to establish that love which is for everyone, then you will utilise human affection, every affection that stirs your heart, to attain that perfect love.

9. If I am quite frank with myself, I must say that I have not the burning desire to attain liberation and truth. Nor -if I had that desire- would I trust that I had strength and perseverance enough to attain. I have but one earnest desire: to be a servant of the Masters for the helping of humanity. So I think the only thing for me is to go on with my work in different departments for the helping of others...

ANSWER: That is the point. You want to help others. All right, there is only one way to help others -to make yourself beyond all help, that is, to make yourself incorruptible. You cannot help truly, lastingly, in any other way. Not that you should not help in the process of attainment. How you like to dodge things!

Continued: ...On the other hand, I feel that you the "Awakener", and perhaps by your influence I may be awakened one day to the burning desire for truth and liberation...

ANSWER: You will never be awakened by my desire. You must have the desire; you must have the longing because you have suffered. I cannot awaken what is asleep in you. You must awaken it yourself, and then you will have the greatest joy of living.

Continued: ...Is it under these circumstances permitted to go on attending your Camps and meetings, although I am not yet striving for liberation?

ANSWER: Of course. Nobody is going to prevent you, or to examine whether you are really searching for liberation. How can they? Please come to these Camps if you want to come. We are not going to examine who is really striving after liberation and who is not. Who can tell? Certainly not the Camp Management, nor I. It is you who have to assure yourself if you are really struggling. Please see this. All problems in the world, and the solution of those problems, exist only within yourself. All external problems are the outcome of individual struggle. The problems outside are the expressions of the individual, chaotic struggle, and you cannot solve those outside problems if within you there is still sorrow, suffering, rejoicing, pleasure, suffocation. So, if you really want to help -which you all say you do- the only way lies through the perfection of the self, through making the self incorruptible, and in no other manner.

THE DISSOLUTION OF THE ORDER OF THE STAR

Ommen, Holland, 1929

WE are going to discuss this morning the dissolution of the Order of the Star. Many people will be delighted, and others will be rather sad. It is a question neither for rejoicing nor for sadness, because it is inevitable, as I am going to explain.

You may remember the story of how the devil and a friend of his were walking down the street, when they saw ahead of them a man stoop down and pick up something from the ground, look at it, and put it away in his pocket. The friend said to the devil, "What did that man pick up?" "He picked up a piece of Truth," said the devil. "That is a very bad business for you, then," said his friend. "Oh, not at all," the devil replied, "I am going to let him organise it."

I maintain that Truth is a pathless land, and you cannot approach it by any path whatsoever, by any religion, by any sect. That is my point of view, and I adhere to that absolutely and unconditionally. Truth, being limitless, unconditioned, unapproachable by any path whatsoever, cannot be organised; nor should any organisation be formed to lead or to coerce people along any particular path. If you first understand that, then you will see how impossible it is to organise a belief. A belief is purely an individual matter, and you cannot and must not organise it. If you do, it becomes dead, crystallised; it becomes a creed, a sect, a religion, to be imposed on others. This is what everyone throughout the world is attempting to do. Truth is narrowed down and made a plaything for those who are weak, for those who are only momentarily discontented. Truth cannot be brought down, rather the individual must make the effort to ascend to it. You cannot bring the mountain-top to the valley. If you would attain to the mountain-top you must pass through the valley, climb the steeps, unafraid of the dangerous precipices. You must climb towards the Truth, it cannot be "stepped down" or organised for you. Interest in ideas is mainly sustained by organisations, but organisations only awaken interest from without. Interest which is not born out of love of Truth for its own sake, but aroused by an organisation, is of no value. The organisation becomes a framework into which its members can conveniently fit. They no longer strive after Truth or the mountain-top, but rather carve for themselves a convenient niche in which they put themselves, or let the organisation place them, and consider that the organisation will thereby lead them to Truth.

So that is the first reason, from my point of view, why the Order of the Star should be dissolved. In spite of this, you will probably form other Orders, you will continue to belong to other organisations searching for Truth. I do not want to belong to any organisation of a spiritual kind, please understand this. I would make use of an organisation which would take me to London, for example; this is quite a different kind of organisation, merely mechanical, like the post or the telegraph. I would use a motor car or a steamship to travel, these are only physical mechanisms which have nothing whatever to do with spirituality. Again, I maintain that no organisation can lead man to spirituality.

If an organisation were created for this purpose, it becomes a crutch, a weakness, a bondage, and must cripple the individual, and prevent him from growing, from establishing his uniqueness, which lies in the discovery for himself of that absolute, unconditioned Truth. So that is another reason why I have decided, as I happen to be the Head of the Order, to dissolve it. No one has persuaded me to this decision.

This is no magnificent deed, because I do not want followers, and I mean this. The moment you follow someone you cease to follow Truth. I am not concerned whether you pay attention to what I say or not. I want to do a certain thing in the world and I am going to do it with unwavering concentration. I am concerning myself with only one essential thing: to set man free. I desire to free him from all cages, from all fears, and not to found religions, new sects, nor to establish new theories and new philosophies. Then you will naturally ask me why I go the world over, continually speaking. I will tell you for what reason I do this: not because I desire a following, not because I desire a special group of special disciples. (How men love to be different from their fellow-men, however ridiculous, absurd and trivial their distinctions may be! I do not want to encourage that absurdity.) I have no disciples, no apostles, either on earth or in the realm of spirituality.

Nor is it the lure of money, nor the desire to live a comfortable life, which attracts me. If I wanted to lead a comfortable life I would not come to a Camp or live in a damp country! I am speaking frankly because I want this settled once and for all. I do not want these childish discussions year after year.

One newspaper reporter, who interviewed me, considered it a magnificent act to dissolve an organisation in which there were thousands and thousands of members. To him it was a great act because, he said: "what will you do afterwards, how will you live? You will have no following, people will no longer listen to you." If there are only five people who will listen, who will live, who have their faces turned towards eternity, it will be sufficient. Of what use is it to have thousands who do not understand, who are fully embalmed in prejudice, who do not want the new, but would rather translate the new to suit their own sterile, stagnant selves? If I speak strongly, please do not misunderstand me, it is not through lack of compassion. If you go to a surgeon for an operation, is it not kindness on his part to operate even if he cause you pain? So, in like manner, if I speak straightly, it is not through lack of real affection -on the contrary.

As I have said, I have only one purpose: to make man free, to urge him towards freedom, to help him to break away from all limitations, for that alone will give him eternal happiness, will give him the unconditioned realisation of the self.

Because I am free, unconditioned, whole -not the part, not the relative, but the whole Truth that is eternal- I desire those who seek to understand me to be free; not to follow me, not to make out of me a cage which will become a religion, a sect. Rather should they be free from all fears -from the fear of religion, from the fear of salvation, from the fear of spirituality, from the fear of love, from the fear of death, from the fear of life itself. As an artist paints a picture because he takes delight in that painting, because it is his self-expression, his glory, his well-being, so I do this and not because I want anything from anyone.

You are accustomed to authority, or to the atmosphere of authority which you think will lead you to spirituality. You think and hope that another can, by his extraordinary powers -a miracle- transport you to this realm of eternal freedom which is Happiness. Your whole outlook on life is based on that authority.

You have listened to me for three years now, without any change taking place except in the few. Now analyse what I am saying, be critical, so that you may understand thoroughly, fundamentally. When you look for an authority to lead you to spirituality, you are bound automatically to build an organisation around that authority. By the very creation of that organisation, which you think will help this authority to lead you to spirituality, you are held in a cage.

If I talk frankly, please remember that I do so, not out of harshness, not out of cruelty, not out of the enthusiasm of my purpose, but because I want you to understand what I am saying. That is the reason why you are here, and it would be a waste of time if I did not explain clearly, decisively, my point of view.

For eighteen years you have been preparing for this event, for the Coming of the World-Teacher. For eighteen years you have organised, you have looked for someone who would give a new delight to your hearts and minds, who would transform your whole life, who would give you a new understanding; for someone who would raise you to a new plane of life, who would give you a new encouragement, who would set you free -and now look what is happening! Consider, reason with yourselves, and discover in what way that belief has made you different -not with the superficial difference of the wearing of a badge, which is trivial, absurd. In what manner has such a belief swept away all the unessential things of life? That is the only way to judge: in what way are you freer, greater, more dangerous to every society which is based on the false and the unessential? In what way have the members of this organisation of the Star become different?

As I said, you have been preparing for eighteen years for me. I do not care if you believe that I am the World-Teacher or not. That is of very little importance. Since you belong to the organisation of the Order of the Star, you have given your sympathy, your energy, acknowledging that Krishnamurti is the World-Teacher -partially or wholly: wholly for those who are really seeking, only partially for those who are satisfied with their own half-truths.

You have been preparing for eighteen years, and look how many difficulties there are in the way of your understanding, how many complications, and how many trivial things. Your prejudices, your fears, your authorities, your churches new and old -all these, I maintain, are a barrier to understanding. I cannot make myself clearer than this. I do not want you to agree with me, I do not want you to follow me; I want you to understand what I am saying.

This understanding is necessary because your belief has not transformed you but only complicated you, and because you are not willing to face things as they are. You want to have your own gods -new gods instead of the old, new religions instead of the old, new forms instead of the old- all equally valueless, all barriers, all limitations, all crutches. Instead of old spiritual distinction, instead of old worships you have new worships. You are all depending for your spirituality on someone else, for your happiness on someone else, for your enlightenment on someone else; and although you have been preparing for me for eighteen years, when I say all these things are unnecessary, when I say that you must put them all away and look within yourselves for the enlightenment, for the glory, for the purification, and for the incorruptibility of the self, not one of you is willing to do it. There may be a few, but very, very few.

So why have an organization?

Why have false, hypocritical people following me, the embodiment of Truth? Please remember that I am not saying something harsh or unkind, but we have reached a situation when you must face things as they are. I said last year that I would not compromise. Very few listened to me then. This year I have made it absolutely clear. I do not know how many thousands throughout the world -members of the Order- have been preparing for me for eighteen years, and yet now they are not willing to listen unconditionally, wholly, to what I say.

So why have an organisation?

As I said before, my purpose is to make men unconditionally free, for I maintain that the only spirituality is the incorruptibility of the self which is eternal, is the harmony between reason and love. This is the absolute, unconditioned Truth which is Life itself. I want therefore to set man free, rejoicing as the bird in the clear sky, unburdened, independent, ecstatic in that freedom. And I, for whom you have been preparing for eighteen years, now say that you must be free of all these things, free from your complications, your entanglements. For this you need not have an organisation based on spiritual belief. Why have an organisation for five or ten people in the world who understand, who are struggling, who have put aside all trivial things? And for the weak people, there can be no organisation to help them to find the Truth, because Truth is in everyone; it is not far, it is not near; it is eternally there.

Organisations cannot make you free. No man from outside can make you free; nor organised worship, nor the immolation of yourselves for a cause, make you free; nor can forming yourselves into an organisation, nor throwing yourselves into works, make you free. You use a typewriter to write letters, but you do not put it on an altar and worship it. But that is what you are doing when organisations become your chief concern. "How many members are there in it?" That is the first question I am asked by all newspaper reporters. "How many followers have you? By their number we shall judge whether what you say is true or false." I do not know how many there are. I am not concerned with that. As I said, if there were even one man who had been set free, that were enough.

Again, you have the idea that only certain people hold the key to the Kingdom of Happiness. No one holds it. No one has the authority to hold that key. That key is your own self, and in the development and the purification and in the incorruptibility of that self alone is the Kingdom of Eternity.

So you will see how absurd is the whole structure that you have built, looking for external help, depending on others for your comfort, for your happiness, for your strength. These can only be found within yourselves.

So why have an organisation?

You are accustomed to being told how far you have advanced, what is your spiritual status. How childish! Who but yourself can tell you if you are beautiful or ugly within? Who but yourself can tell you if you are incorruptible? You are not serious in these things.

So why have an organisation?

But those who really desire to understand, who are looking to find that which is eternal, without beginning and without an end, will walk together with a greater intensity; will be a danger to everything that is unessential, to unrealities, to shadows. And they will concentrate; they will become the flame, because they understand. Such a body we must create, and that is my purpose. Because of that real understanding there will be true friendship. Because of that true friendship -which you do not seem to know- there will be real co-operation on the part of each one. And this not because of authority, not because of salvation, not because of immolation for a cause, but because you really understand, and hence are capable of living in the eternal. This is a greater thing than all pleasure, than all sacrifice.

So these are some of the reasons why, after careful consideration for two years, I have made this decision. It is not from a momentary impulse. I have not been persuaded to it by anyone -I am not persuaded in such things. For two years I have been thinking about this, slowly, carefully, patiently, and I have now decided to disband the Order, as I happen to be its Head. You can form other organisations and expect someone else. With that I am not concerned, nor with creating new cages, new decorations for those cages. My only concern is to set man absolutely, unconditionally free.

AN INTERVIEW ON CURRENT PROBLEMS

Eerde, Holland, 1929

INTERVIEWER: You have said that there is no distinction between a man and a woman. What exactly do you mean by that?

KRISHNAJI: When I said that I had in mind -and you will have to think it out, otherwise it sounds as if I were just playing with words- that life behind all form is one, the expressions of that life are not of very great importance.

INTERVIEWER: Quite, but you would say that the expression is different?

KRISHNAJI: The expression is different, but it is foolish to give too great an importance to the expression.

INTERVIEWER: I understand. We should not emphasize the form so much as the life behind all form?

KRISHNAJI: The Unity -yes- rather than the diversity.

INTERVIEWER: But, would you not say that woman is different in function from man?

KRISHNAJI: Of course.

INTERVIERWER: And that she is not freeing the expression of life in herself, if she does not fulfill her function?

KRISHNAJI: Of course not.

INTERVIEWER: Both should keep their distinctive expressions without over-emphasizing them? Both are expressions of life?

KRISHNAJI: I think it is absurd to give such tremendous importance to the distinctions between men and women. When I meet someone I regard that person as a human being. I do not say "This is a man; this is a woman."

INTERVIEWER: Would you say that it is good to have organizations to deal especially with women's problems or that in helping individuals to understand life we shall thereby solve all problems?

KRISHNAJI: It is good to have organizations but not to exaggerate their importance out of due proportion.

INTERVIEWER: Instead of having separate organizations for women would it not be better in every case to have men and women working together side by side?

KRISHNAJI: I should say the latter; of course it is better to emphasize the unity of human beings rather than to emphasize the diversity of forms, that is to say, the man and the woman separately. If you have separate organizations for men and women you will tend to set them apart from each other, which is what often happens at present and is absurd!

INTERVIEWER: Do you think that with the changing world conditions the codes regulating the relations of men and women must also change?

KRISHNAJI: Assuredly, of course.

INTERVIEWER: Even if mistakes are made in process of change, is that better than to go on keeping to traditional codes of morality?

KRISHNAJI: Certainly. Because to keep always in the same place means to stagnate. I am all for changing, even if mistakes are made in the process. Mistakes do not matter.

INTERVIEWER: In India the wife regards her husband as a god and marriage is for life. In America it is just the opposite; there is equality between husband and wife and divorce is frequent. Which system in your opinion works out best for the happiness of the family, the nation, the majority?

KRISHNAJI: You cannot ask which system is the better because you cannot standardize one system for the whole of the world. You cannot have one stereotyped code of morality for every country. One system may work very well in one country and very badly in another. You cannot grow a tropical flower in a cold climate.

INTERVIEWER: Would you not in any case think it undesirable to have predominance of one sex over another?

KRISHNAJI: I should, of course.

INTERVIEWER: Do you think it is useful then for different countries to experiment in different forms of sex relationship even if the result seems sometimes undesirable?

KRISHNAJI: Yes. People must work things out for themselves. It is no good saying, "I have found a house which suits me and therefore everybody must adopt the same kind of house."

INTERVIEWER: Shall we say that the experiments of two human individuals in their relationship with each other are justified?

KRISHNAJI: Surely. They have a perfect right to experiment between themselves, if they want to do so.

INTERVIEWER: It has been generally accepted that a man may sow his wild oats, as it is called, before marriage and a woman may not, but reformers have advocated a single standard of purity for men and women. This advocacy of the single standard seems to be working out differently from what the reformers anticipated. Instead of equal purity it seems to be resulting in equal license. Would you say that this is a step forward from the old idea of one standard for men and one for women?

KRISHNAJI: I should go behind all that. I mean that this way of looking at the problem only leads to all kinds of discussions and more problems. But if you realize that the ultimate happiness for all depends not on disorder of the emotions for either sex, but in harmonizing the emotions, all these problems will vanish.

INTERVIEWER: What do you think of the communal experiments with regard to the education of children now being made in Russia and Palestine?

KRISHNAJI: I should say that in certain cases it might be excellent, in others bad. Again you cannot lay down a standard which all must follow.

INTERVIEWER: So again you would say it is an interesting experiment and we should wait and see the results?

KRISHNAJI: Suppose that a child needs very much affection; it would probably get it at home, then home life would be better for the child. But if the mother has to work and is always out, then some kind of communal institution might be better. But again I do not think that you can try and systematize education for the whole world. I would try experiments in small communities and in schools to see how they work out, instead of taking the children of an entire nation and trying to bring them up on the same system. Do you see what I mean?

INTERVIEWER: I understand. In England now, for instance, we have throughout the country home life and the public school standardized practically for the whole nation. And any experiment made outside that standardization is taboo. How can you break through that condition?

KRISHNAJI: By hurling yourself against it.

INTERVIEWER: Yes, but in questions of education it is your child that you hurl against it.

KRISHNAJI: I would experiment with my child.

INTERVIEWER: Even at the risk of his cursing you afterwards?

KRISHNAJI: Of course, it is your duty.

INTERVIEWER: You think that if you have got a different ideal of life from the community you have the duty to bring up your child in that ideal, and so try and break down tradition?

KRISHNAJI: After all, he is your child; you are partly responsible for him. I should experiment and not be concerned as to whether he will curse you afterwards. After all, he may curse you just as much even if you follow tradition.

INTERVIEWER: Do you think that there should be complete freedom in all family relationships?

KRISHNAJI: I don't quite follow.

INTERVIEWER: I mean that there should not be either jealousy or a sense of possessiveness.

KRISHNAJI: Of course not, especially with regard to children.

INTERVIEWER: That means that we should realize that the child has got its own independent life to develop. You said the other day that people are caught up in their own creation, would this apply also to a mother and her children?

KRISHNAJI: Most certainly. If you do not give your children freedom, when they grow up, they will break away from the family, and then your hearts will be broken.

INTERVIEWER: The wise parent, then, would give the child freedom to learn by its own mistakes, by its own experience.

KRISHNAJI: Of course, after all you grow by experience. But while he is young, you should try to set before him his ultimate goal.

INTERVIEWER: The training of a child begins before it can speak, how then can you set before it the goal?

KRISHNAJI: When he is very young, you must protect him from doing harm to himself and others, then later by precept, explaining to him what is going to be for his eventual happiness.

INTERVIEWER: How would you inculcate discipline without repression?

KRISHNAJI: Whatever discipline you exercise should be based on the goal he is eventually to reach, namely, freedom and happiness. I would show him towards what he is growing, his ultimate fulfilment, and help him to adapt himself to that. In everything that you do, you should keep the goal in view, and hence your discipline must aim at helping the child to realize that at a certain stage he will be above all discipline.

INTERVIEWER: Quite. In fact discipline should be merely a passage way towards freedom.

KRISHNAJI: Absolute freedom.

INTERVIEWER: Do you think it is possible to eliminate all fear in the training of children?

KRISHNAJI: Assuredly.

INTERVIEWER: Even if the people around them still suffer from fear?

KRISHNAJI: Oh, absolutely. I am sure that it can be done. It is being done in California. The children there seem to have no fear.

INTERVIEWER: Then you would say that fear was largely a matter of environment, but are not some children born more nervous than others?

KRISHNAJI: Yes, but this can be helped by not always adding to that fear; fears of getting ill, fears of getting hurt and other fears.

INTERVIEWER: How would you help young people to get over their sex impulses and difficulties?

KRISHNAJI: I would explain my point of view to them by a simile. If you wish to produce a perfect rose, you must cut off the other buds which are spoiling the growth of the perfect flower.

INTERVIEWER: But before the desire arises to become the perfect rose, would not the lesser desires continue to express themselves?

KRISHNAJI: Of course. But while expressing themselves, you would need to exercise control in order to prevent them from doing harm to you or to others.

INTERVIEWER: In other words, a community must protect its citizens?

KRISHNAJI: Yes, but always with that ultimate ideal in view.

INTERVIEWER: Then a nation in framing its laws should also have that ultimate goal for all citizens in view?

KRISHNAJI: Of course. The government that is wise will consider what is best for all its people.

INTERVIEWER: Then you would define a wise government as a government that would lead all its people toward ultimate freedom?

KRISHNAJI: Yes.

INTERVIEWER: You say that we should not be afraid of desires, nor repress them and that the more desires we have the better?

KRISHNAJI: The better, yes.

INTERVIEWER: But how would that work out in practice?

KRISHNAJI: It does work out in practice. If you have a great many desires, you will gradually eliminate them one by one, until you allow certain desires to dominate and the others to die away.

INTERVIEWER: Then you would say that everybody at a certain stage should satisfy his desires, but when he becomes too much of a nuisance to the rest of the community...

KRISHNAJI: The community always looks after itself.

INTERVIEWER: But should a person satisfy desires which can only perhaps injure himself?

KRISHNAJI: Of course. You can't prevent him, nobody can do that, even laws do not. You cannot prevent a man getting drunk if he wishes to do so, but when he becomes a nuisance, then you interfere.

INTERVIEWER: And before that, you would not try to prevent it?

KRISHNAJI: What can you do?

INTERVIEWER: I mean, it would be better to let him experiment than try to force him to be sober.

KRISHNAJI: Of course, because if you force him, he is not really changed.

INTERVIEWER: Then would you say that prohibition as it is being practiced in some countries is wrong?

KRISHNAJI: I don't think so. If you take what I am saying from a negative point of view, it will produce chaos, but if you could have laws laid down by men who have seen the goal and who want to help those who have not yet seen it to work towards that goal, the result would be to produce order.

INTERVIEWER: The goal you speak of can be the guide for those people who have seen it, but what would be the guide for those who have not yet seen it?

KRISHNAJI: Laws laid down by the men who have seen the goal and who are helping people towards that goal.

INTERVIEWER: You say that there is no good and no evil, but that all is experience; does it mean that every experience is of equal value?

KRISHNAJI: It depends upon the individual. You cannot say that all experience is of equal value for all people.

INTERVIEWER: Must everyone go through all the experiences generally called evil?

KRISHNAJI: Of course not, but it may be essential for some; it depends on the individual development. Everyone must go through all experiences but they need not go through them all in reality -they can do it vicariously, by imagination.

INTERVIEWER: Would you say in the same way that beauty and ugliness are both expressions of life or that ugliness is just a lack of harmony?

KRISHNAJI: A lack of harmony, assuredly. And evil is the same thing of course.

INTERVIEWER: So that ugliness and evil are really a distortion of good, and sorrow the other side of joy?

KRISHNAJI: All are necessary for growth but they may be experienced vicariously.

INTERVIEWER: What do you think of the respective importance of good heredity and environment?

KRISHNAJI: Both are necessary. You cannot compare the child of a savage with the child of a civilized person.

INTERVIEWER: That is to say that if you were to take a child from a very bad family, even a good environment would not change him very much!

KRISHNAJI: Of course not. You need both conditions for the fulfilment of the child.

INTERVIEWER: What do you think of Voronoff and his experiments?

KRISHNAJI: I think they are barbarous.

INTERVIEWER: Do you think that any experiments in the world of form can injure life?

KRISHNAJI: No, I would not say injure life, but retard its fulfilment.

INTERVIEWER: The effort to create a sort of ape man...

KRISHNAJI: Is the retarding of that fulfilment.

INTERVIEWER: Do you think that a scientist who is essentially an experimenter should try everything or do you consider that certain experiments are inadmissible?

KRISHNAJI: I should say that they are inadmissible if they involve injury or cruelty whether to an animal or to humanity as in war.

INTERVIEWER: Would you say that all experiments on animals are inadmissible, because they do not all involve cruelty, experiments in diet for instance?

KRISHNAJI: But you cannot say which are cruel and which are not. You may injure an animal by experimenting with its food...

INTERVIEWER: Then would you say that no experiments on animals are justified even for the advancement of human knowledge or the relief of human suffering?

KRISHNAJI: I certainly would.

INTERVIEWER: Is it right ever to appeal to a child to do right for the sake of someone it loves?

KRISHNAJI: Certainly not.

INTERVIEWER: What I mean is that the appeal is often made to children: Do that because mother or father would like it or because it will please God.

KRISHNAJI: I would never do that. I would teach him to respect what is right -the word right is a difficult word to use- I would teach him to respect the intrinsic value of things. Do you see what I mean? The true proportion of things.

INTERVIEWER: Supposing for instance, as often happens, especially in a small house, the mother has a very bad headache and the child is making a noise. Would you not appeal to it to be quiet for the sake of the mother?

KRISHNAJI: Of course I would. I should ask him to respect your feelings as you would respect his feelings if he had the same headache. We should awaken feelings of respect for each other. In other words, awaken the desire to kill selfishness.

INTERVIEWER: Should there be no motive for conduct except the desire to fulfil life, and might not this lead to gross selfishness?

KRISHNAJI: Anyhow there is selfishness, let us take that for granted. What you want to do is to purify that selfishness.

INTERVIEWER: Let me take a case of a religious organization. They find someone who is a so-called sinner and by appeals to him based upon the love of God or of a Saviour they try to turn him from the error of his ways. Do you think that this effect has gone to the root of the trouble or will be permanent?

KRISHNAJI: Of course not. It is like superficially mending a hole. You put a thin plank over it and the next time someone treads on the plank it collapses.

INTERVIEWER: Practically you would say that all these problems which I have put before you arise because people...

KRISHNAJI: Are trying to evade life.

INTERVIEWER: Because they are afraid to face life in its brutality, in its cruelty?

KRISHNAJI: In its one-pointedness, its enthusiastic one-pointedness.

INTERVIEWER: What I mean is that life is a cruel thing.

KRISHNAJI: I say no, life is a joyous thing essentially, but when you bind life by all these rigid moralities and traditions, and dogmas and creeds, then there is misery.

INTERVIEWER: The misery arises out of the binding of life rather than out of the freedom of life?

KRISHNAJI: Surely. Freedom of life does not mean disorder of life, does not mean chaos, and just everyone doing anything he wants. That is not the freedom of life. The tree, when you give it a chance, protect it when it is young, will grow straight, because it has developed its own resistance; but the moment you make it delicate, then it gets crooked.

INTERVIEWER: So that practically it comes to this -that all the cruelties, miseries, sufferings, sins, that are in the world are the result of...

KRISHNAJI: Fear. It is out of fear that people have wrapped life round with codes of morality and systems of belief.

INTERVIEWER: And so that these man-made laws and codes have produced the very miseries they were intended to cure?

KRISHNAJI: Of course, because the man-made laws have been made by men who have not perceived the final goal towards which they are making. And that is why it is so important to insist upon the final thing first, and then all the regulations, all the disciplines, will follow.

INTERVIEWER: Do you anticipate that you will get enough people to understand your point of view to carry out your ideas?

KRISHNAJI: I don't mind. It does not in the least concern me whether I shall have at the end of my life thirty people who understand or three hundred. I am like an artist who paints a picture because he must, otherwise he is unhappy -not unhappy, but he must obey that creative impulse.

INTERVIEWER: For anyone who has perceived even dimly the goal, which is the fulfilment of life, is it not a waste of time to be occupied with compromises?

KRISHNAJI: I say that when you have perceived or attained the goal, compromises, renunciations, do not exist. If you have seen the goal, compromise ceases to exist. It is then a question of a different attitude.

INTERVIEWER: I meant rather that from the practical point of view, supposing a statesman were to understand your point of view, would it not be waste of time for him to continue tinkering with things as they are now instead of giving up his present position and getting down to fundamentals?

KRISHNAJI: I should say that all compromise is a "stepping down " of the Truth, is trying to reduce something which cannot be reduced, and that for anyone who has understood life these compromises are impossible.

THE CAUSE OF SORROW

1929

All men desire to discover for themselves, with certainty, what is the purpose of life. This discovery can only be made by living and not by mere intellectual theorizing. After the discovery of that purpose they can work for it one-pointedly. But to do this they must be rid of all philosophies, dogmas, creeds, religions, particular rites -everything, because no one can, for a single moment, discover his true purpose in life, or life itself, with all these encumbrances. When man has completely detached himself from all unessential things, he can begin to discover what it is that he is seeking. It is as an individual, that he must make the discovery.

Each man is seeking to free himself from sorrow. Desire is life, and that desire is constantly battling against limitations. It seeks to be free. In search for happiness it is constantly breaking away from limitations.

Men are all the time looking for perfection. Imperfection is a limitation, and the individual life, which begins in limitation, which goes from corruption to corruption, is ceaselessly seeking incorruption and freedom. So long as there is limitation there is sorrow, and it is from sorrow that all men would escape. They are trying to find a way out of suffering, out of their entanglement in the wheel of sorrow and pain. In the attainment of perfection is liberation to be found, and in nothing else.

Seek perfection therefore rather than philosophies, theories, dogmas, religions and objects of worship -which are all unreal, childish, unessential. Men, distracted by all these, do not attack the one problem which lies at the root of all that suffocates them, which creates havoc in their self-expression, in their individual growth.

Do not waste time with shadows, which vanish as the morning mist.

So, we come back to that dynamic thing which is desire. You may worship false gods -and all gods are false- you may cling to the unreal, but desire will grow and overwhelm you, unless you encourage that desire towards perfection. With the thought of perfection alone you must dwell, because that is life; that alone will overcome the chaos, the unrealities to which men cling, instead of to the real.

What is the cause, therefore, of sorrow? With that we must concern ourselves. Sorrow and joy, pain and pleasure, light and shade, are the same thing. Sorrow must exist, as pleasure must exist. It is useless to try to escape from either. Only when you are absolutely undisturbed by either will true perfection abide in your heart and mind.

The self is ever climbing towards perfection by self-assertion. It asserts "I am" as it climbs the mountain of experience. That self-assertion of "I am" creates echoes and those echoes return as sorrow, pain, pleasure. That self-assertion of "I am" is inevitable. You cannot escape from it. Self-assertion in imperfection creates individuality. You are all the time asserting "I am", "I" think so and so, "I" feel this, "I" am much greater than someone else. The "I" is all the time creating this vast whirlpool of echoes, which return to you and bind you. But when you have attained the fulfilment of life, your "I am" will no longer create echoes, no longer create whirlpools. In the process of self-assertion, the love of life, which is the whole -to which all life, individual or universal, must come- is forgotten.

What is self-expression? You express yourself not knowing your true self. You express whatever comes into your mind, and hence there is this combative chaos of the different selves. As a tree in the forest steals the light of its neighbour, so do you in your self-expression steal the light, the understanding, the happiness of another, and so create sorrow, misfortune, and weariness. True self-expression must be the outcome of the love of life, which is freedom, which is perfection. Then you cannot come into conflict with another. Then you will have true friendliness for your neighbour. Then you will know that unity of which you speak so glibly. The moment you lose the love of life and interpose your self-expression of the moment between you and the eternal, in your limitation you are bound to suffer, to create pain for yourself and others. For that reason you should know what is the final fulfilment of all life. When once you have a vision of perfection, as part of yourself, in translating that vision -which again is self-assertion- ¬lies true creation. Creation to most people means building houses, painting pictures, writing poems. That is not true creation; that is only the creation of the self in limitation. True creation is the outcome of that harmony which is perfection, the delicate poise of reason and of love. Life itself is creation; life itself is the greatest artist. Directly you are able to attain perfection, you are also becoming the true creator because you are one with life itself.

You cannot escape from self-assertion, because existence itself is self-assertion. But the self must be made perfect through self-assertion, through the realisation that as long as that self-assertion is within bondage, within limitation, it is bound to create sorrow and pain. When you break down that limitation, because you have understood, you will have fathomed the love of life.

DISCRIMINATION

India, 1929

It is the power of discrimination which constitutes the difference between the aristocrat and the bourgeois. Personally, I believe in the idea of aristocracy, that is, in true aristocracy, not in the person who possesses a title and gives himself airs, but in the aristocrat who instinctively has the right feeling at any given moment and in any circumstances. In the ordinary phrase, he is a gentleman. If we make that idea into a bigger thing, carried on to another plane, the gentleman becomes the spiritual man. The aristocrat has been trained for ages, not only in this life but in past lives. He has submitted to restrictions here, made efforts there, till it has become instinctive with him to do the right thing wherever he is, whether in a cottage or in a palace, whether in the poor man's house or in the ashrama of the Master. Years of training have taught him to maintain certain standards, whereas the bourgeois will be clumsy and by his clumsiness he will upset others. Because he has not had training, he is incapable of discrimination between right and wrong, between the beautiful and the ugly, and to him all is a mass of confused ideas. It is these things which stamp a person for what he is.

On the Path both can exist, the bourgeois and the aristocrat, but the aristocrat always goes ahead because he feels that he has a duty to perform as an example, and this gives him an essential nobility. It should make him eager to turn round, and help others and not feel that his nobility makes him proudly distinctive or superior. After all, that feeling of superiority only comes from ignorance and will vanish when he learns that the Path is endless, that there are millions ahead of him on that Path as there are millions behind him.

In this manner we have to create a new aristocracy. The distinctions will be between those who know and those who do not know, those who doubt and those who believe. When the Teacher comes, as He has come, and when He speaks, certain people will understand at once and others will not, some will misjudge and others will recognize the Truth.

If you have practised discrimination rightly, you will know what it is to be superior to everything that happens, in the right sense of the word. Events pass you by and leave you untouched. If they are great, you go along with them; if they are noble, you feel more nobly. If they are small, you let them pass you by. If you are excited, it is only in a balanced way. You use your excitement to make yourself big, to walk a little further. It is the power of discrimination which distinguishes the saint and the sage from the savage. When the savage has to make his choice between two ugly things, he will probably choose the uglier one; but the sage chooses between the beautiful and the still more beautiful, because his power of perception and of discrimination has grown by exercise. He no longer has to make his choice between little things; he is detached from them, he is above them.

You should be striding from mountain top to mountain top, not keeping at the same level, but always climbing higher and higher and never slipping back. When you are walking up a mountain, if you slip it means that you have to make a greater effort to gain the level which you had reached before. If you want to get to the top, you must continue, you must not rest; you must not relax your efforts. You may take time, but you must not slip back.

To gain discrimination, you must take time and Work at it deliberately and with patience. You can act swiftly and suddenly when you have reached a certain stage, because you have been trained to right action; but in the early stages you must take time and weigh your motives, your actions, your feelings. Take the case of a musician; for many years he practises in private before he dares to come before the public. It is the same with those who are treading the path of evolution; they must have training and show meticulous care in the choice of the things which are set before them, because the further you go on that path, the greater will be the demand for common sense, the greater the demand for discrimination of the right kind.

Do not narrow down this particular quality, because if you have acquired this, you will also attain all other qualities. If you are the embodiment, the essence of discrimination, you need have no other quality in the world, because in that all is included. If you have developed this quality in its perfection, you use your intelligence, your emotions, your whole body, to create a new atmosphere. It is because we have not acquired it that we are continually struggling. Once you have gained it, nothing in the world can touch you. And then begins the real happiness, the real glory of thinking, feeling, acting, and living.

THE TRUE ENEMY OF FREEDOM

India, 1929

Inner and outer freedom cannot be separated. Greater than any country is life; and it is only when a country has realised and adjusted itself to the deeper laws of life that it is, or can be, really free. From this point of view, there is no absolutely free country today. There are everywhere merely degrees of freedom. But in every case where political freedom exists, there will also be found co-existing with it a certain freedom from the kind of unreal restrictions which curb and confine the spontaneous and creative flow of life. The true enemy of freedom is dead tradition; living at second-hand; the enslavement of the life of today to the worn-out formulas of a past age. And there is hardly a country in the world upon which the dead hand of tradition lies so heavily as it does on India. This is the true Indian problem. Solve it, and everything else which keeps India back today will melt away like the morning mists. The Law of Life cannot be cheated. The race or country which has not liberated its inner life cannot hope for freedom in the real sense of the word. And even if it get what seems like outer freedom, the fruit, when tasted, will be found, for all its outward fairness, to be dust and ashes within.

This is a hard lesson and, perhaps, an unwelcome one. But the true hope for India lies in the fact that, being forced by circumstances to learn this lesson in order to gain what she wants, she will emerge from the ordeal all the more fully purified through the severity of the struggle through which she must pass. The Soul of India is a great Soul in chains. Liberate it, and there will arise a giant among Nations; for there is no doubt that a regenerated India would, and will, do much for the regeneration of the whole world. We have a splendid spiritual heritage; but it has grown stale and profitless through the lack of the one thing which alone can keep any tradition fresh and profitable; and that is the Spirit of real affection and consideration for others. The most potent survivals from our immemorial past are now what? Crystallised cruelties and selfishnesses, infant marriage, the heartless restrictions which we place on widows, our treatment of women generally, the whole system of untouchability; what are these but matters in which the dead weight of custom has crushed out of us the ordinary decent feelings which should sweeten and harmonise the life of human beings? And what is caste itself but a system of organised selfishness -the desire of every man to feel himself different from others, and to be conscious of possessing something which others do not possess. These and many similar things are our heritage today; and it is under the weight of this heritage that we are groaning. But -and this is the important point- they are not the whole of our heritage, but only the dead part of it. Buried underneath it is India's true heritage, the living part, the real inheritance from the past. And this is none other than that genius for Liberation, if I may call it so, which is at the root of the Indian nature. Strip away all accretions from the Soul of India, and you will find, still strong and living, a profound detachment and a profound sense of Reality. It is this deeper Soul of India which has to be revived today; and it is this which, if it could be revived and given freedom for self-expression, would effect that miracle of regeneration of which I have spoken. For to such a Spirit nothing is impossible; and, once released, it would carry all before it. Not only would it bring political freedom, as one of its minor and natural results, but it would, in one great act of Self-assertion, make India what, I feel, she is destined to be -namely, the spiritual centre and dynamo of the World.

And what is necessary for this awakening? In the first instance, true sincerity and the capacity to look our failings frankly in the face; and in the second instance, the passion of discontent which must arise from such a clear-sighted vision. And after this must come the resolute endeavour, at all costs, to set our house in order and, whenever necessary, to set present needs above old restrictions. The time for dragging a lengthening chain is over. We must awake to the shame of having sides to our daily life, which we cannot exhibit to the coolly-appraising eye of the outsider. We must recognise how futile it is to seek to cover these up with words, when the eye of the World-Spirit is all the time calmly regarding them and judging us in their light. In short, we have got to bring our India back into harmony with reality. And only when we have begun to do this, and mean to go on doing it, can her true Liberation come.

In all this, there is much that we can learn from other Nations. Let us not be too proud to learn. In refinement and cleanliness of physical life, in laboursaving devices, in social freedom, in constructive organisation, in honourable cooperation, and in an impersonal sense of duty, there are many lessons which the West can teach us; and in proportion as our efforts at Self-perfection are genuine, we shall be ready and glad to learn, and when we have learnt, we too can teach. For there are lessons which a spiritually reawakened India could impart, which are at present outside the horizon of western thought. More than any other nation we could show mankind the dependence of physical life upon a larger invisible spiritual order. More than any other Nation could we show it that happiness lies, not in possessions, but in harmony between the outer life and the life of the spirit within. But, in order to teach, we have first to make good our right to teach; and this we can only do by a wholesale reference of every detail of our National life, not to some set of immemorial injunctions, but to common sense and the right feeling of today.

This is the first step in the direction of true liberation, which, I feel, is necessary for India.

BENARES CAMP 1929

Benares, India, 1929

Friends: The whole idea of a Camp is that the campers live in the open air, enjoy the freedom, and make it a real holiday. The campers should be free from the burdens of daily life, so that they can give their minds and hearts to unaffected seriousness. If you had to cook, it would not be a holiday: you could not give your minds and hearts to those things that matter. To me this Camp is a cultural centre. If you will follow me correctly, you will, when you go away from here, give to those around you your behaviour, your dignity, your customs which shall give them, in their turn, the right point of view toward life.

During my talks in the evening, I wish that you would benefit not so much from what I say, but from the meaning that lies beyond mere words. It is very difficult to express in words what one feels, however great an artist one may be in the use of words, which I am not. I do not want to be a rhetorician or a great lecturer; but I want to convey to each one of you those things which I have found perfect, which have given me enlightenment, that have given me the power to attain and to guard that attainment lastingly and permanently.

In order to have a clear understanding and a clear perception of those things that you wish to understand, you must open that inner eye of clear sight, which will guide you for yourselves toward your goal, which will be your true guide, your tyrant and your friend. To do that certain things are necessary. You must have leisure during the day. By that I mean leisure to think, and opportunity to put aside those things that you have acquired during the past, so that you will see for yourselves the things that are vital in your lives. You will have time to develop a sense of solitude. Most people are afraid to be alone. When you are able to think, when you are able to feel a sense of solitude, it will give you greater strength than being surrounded by a multitude.

You are here to find out for yourselves whither you would go, and by what manner you would tread that Path which will lead you to the goal of perfection, to the goal that is for all, the goal which is Truth. In order to find out, it is no good always talking, always attending meetings, always being limited by people. You must have leisure; you must have silence and solitude.

If you look around in the lives of each one of you, you will see that there is no order, that thinking and feeling have nothing to do with practical life; that your thought is cut away, is in another room as it were. The function of these Camps is to give enough understanding to your minds so that you will be able to translate your thoughts and carry them into action. Take, for example, your belief in kindness as an intellectual theory. You all think that you should treat your children kindly, be kind to your wives, and so on. In a majority of cases, it remains in the intellectual world. You have great philosophies, great ideas, you have had great Teachers in the past, but they have all become mere traditions and their teachings and philosophies are in books, but not in your lives.

If you do not make this Camp a success, it will be your own faults. You have spent a great deal of money to come here, you have had a great many sacrifices to make -though perhaps not so many as a friend of mine who walked for six weeks to come to the Camp at Ommen from Bulgaria. Though you have made great sacrifices, if you do not learn to clear away from your minds that satisfaction which lulls and kill the heart and mind, you will never be able to discover the Truth, you will never be able to attain your perfection, your individual uniqueness. You all believe in certain things; you all have devotion. But so have many people beliefs and devotion. In what way is your devotion and understanding different? In what way do you translate in your daily life your devotion and understanding? In what way do you stand out, as a lighthouse stands out on a dark shore, to warn the ships that pass by? In what way do you help the people at large? After all, that is the only thing that matters in life, and not the names you call yourselves nor the badges you wear, nor the castes you belong to. What matters is in what way you help; and you can only help truly if you have a clear perception of truth; if you have really established the goal for yourselves.

During my evening talks at the Camp, I want to put clearly before you those desires which are your own, so that you can see and think for yourselves. And I would like to point out to you again that these Camps, though they are a holiday -a holiday in the true sense from burdens, from family worries- they should not affect us so as to cause looseness. By that I mean slack behavior for I hold that behavior, when it is properly translated into daily life, becomes righteousness. If there is no behaviour, if there is no thought, if there is no feeling, righteousness goes away from us. I shall not go into the details of what I mean by behaviour. You all know very well what I mean: how you sit, how you walk, how you dress, how your mind is purified, how your heart is ennobled -all these things come within the compass of behaviour, and when once you understand behaviour in the greatest sense, then you have understood righteousness. And understanding is establishing that righteousness in your own heart.

Finally, I should like to point out that the attainment of perfection is helped by the love of visible beauty. That means that you must be surrounded by beautiful things. Beauty is one of the greatest things that we are going to cultivate in these Camps throughout the world.

We are going to have two Camps in India next year, one in the North and the other in the South. We have already bought sufficient land in Madanapalle and we are considering the lease of sufficient land near here. We are going to give these Camps visible beauty, so that you will see beauty for its own sake, you will see beauty wherever you go, so that you will develop a beautiful nature. You can only develop beauty if you appreciate beauty, and we come back to the eternal law that in order to appreciate a beautiful thing you must have greatness within you. So, friends, before I close, I would like to encourage and give help to those who would seek the new understanding of life. To gain the new understanding you must remove the various coatings, the various accumulations that you have gathered during the past. You must begin from this day on a new state, on which you will write those things that your hearts and minds desire. It depends on your own desire to attain, it depends on your desire to have that happiness which exists within each one. In order to understand and in order to establish that goal, you must have the immense burning desire born out of suffering, out of pain, out of observation. I hope that during these few days you will be re-made, remoulded into great beings who have the power to help, who can give light and understanding to those that dwell in darkness.

BENARES STAR CAMP 1929

Benares, India, 1929

I

This evening I want to make it perfectly clear that it is the individual that matters and not groups; also that it is in the highest intelligence that truth lies, and that truth cannot in any manner be "stepped down", reduced, translated or made acceptable to men who are weak. Intelligence is the capacity to discern the essential and to reject everything that is unessential. The establishing of that essential which is the quality of the highest mind is the purpose of man. I would like to suggest that, while I am speaking, you should experiment with what I am saying; that is, not merely accept it all but, if you find what I say is reasonable, well-balanced, thoughtful, then after examination, take it to your heart and alter yourself.

I do not want this to be a lecture to which you merely listen and then go home with a superficial judgment which has no value; because you are not here to judge me nor am I here to judge you. I maintain that no one can judge another, especially if his mind is prejudiced. If you take certain things for granted, if you have not carefully examined and suffered in the process of experimentation and analysis, your judgment will have no value. I am not saying this in any conceited spirit. If you take what I say with clarity, with sane balanced judgment, with an open mind which is capable of judging impersonally, impartially, you can establish for yourself a disinterested standard -these are not words that merely flow- so that while I am talking you can alter yourself. Because, after all, the only thing which matters in life is to change, to change radically, so that you will through your experiences discover for yourself what is truth. Do not accept anything, it does not matter who says it -whether it be the sages of the past, the literatures of the past, or of the present- but establish for yourself by clear thought and reason what is the true meaning of life, what is the true significance of every little incident of every day. Otherwise, you will desire all the time to escape from this world of turmoil, of phenomena, and thereby seek shelter from this strife -which means stagnation.

Now naturally, in a talk like this, you must try to get at the significance of the words I use and not be content with the literal meaning. That is, you must gather the full meaning, the full understanding of what I am saying -the implications not expressed in words, feelings and thoughts- and not merely judge by the expressions which I shall employ, because if you do, we shall misunderstand each other completely. I am going to use words which have no traditional meaning, which have the ordinary meaning of daily life, which you would employ at every moment of the day.

Let me say here that I am not preaching to you as a propagandist, to make you join any society. There is no society in spirituality. There cannot be a system for the individual attainment of truth, nor a religious body that shall enforce upon man certain undertakings. This is not a talk in order to convert any one of you, because life converts life, makes you straight if you are crooked. If you are not suffering, life makes you suffer; if you are not thoughtful, life makes you thoughtful; and if you have no emotions that stir and nourish you, life will awake your emotions, your affections, your love.

I am going to concern myself with the individual, because it is the individual that composes the world, and as long as that individual is held in the wheel of sorrow, strife, chaos, whatever he does will add further to that chaos, to that strife, to that unending misunderstanding which brings about a constant variation of struggle. The individual -that is, yourself- cannot grow or develop through conformity. That is, you cannot submit yourself to any system of thought, you cannot depend for your inward growth -which is, after all, spirituality- on another or on the scriptural sayings of any religion. I know you will all disagree. I do not mind, but you must disagree with reason. If your experience proves to be contrary to what I am saying, you are right, because it is your development that I am concerned with and not my particular sayings. If you think that your growth depends on reliance upon another, you can experiment with it, give your whole body, will, energy, enthusiasm to it, struggle with it. You will find then that it is not of much value. You exist, therefore, in order that, as an individual, you may develop. That is the only reason for which life exists, for which you as an individual are in this world. That is, the individual -you- must grow from corruption to corruption till you as an individual are absolutely perfect.

I am going to explain to you what I mean by perfection, I am not using words merely for the fun of using them. It is from corruption to corruption, from narrowness to narrowness, from limitation to limitation, that you grow until you are free, until you are absolutely perfect, undisturbed in your mind, incorruptible in your love. Now, you will agree more or less with that statement. You will wisely shake your head and go home and say it is perfectly true. Shaking of heads is of no value, neither is mere agreement. If you think I am right in this, which is essential -I am not preaching revolution or anything like that- then all the unessential things of religion must disappear, because you, in yourself, are strong enough to withstand the pressure of external circumstances. But if you think I am wrong in this, then you must fight, you must not let me speak. You cannot be indifferent, because indifference will lead to greater sorrow, greater calamities. You must be active in what you think is right and work for it with your full enthusiasm, with conviction, without compromise. That is the way to become great, either in spirituality or in the world: to have great ambitions, and be ready with your enthusiasm, with your understanding, to sacrifice all that ambition; not to be merely growing in indifference, which is limited. Conformity kills initiative. You must learn to think independently and to stand alone, though the world may judge you to be wrong. If you conform, then your initiative will be killed out. Desire is constantly seeking an outlet. Desire is continually striving against limitation. Desire can only fulfil itself in experience, can only grow through experience, can only be made vast, immense, unlimited, immeasurable, through experience. Now, if you conform to anyone or to any tradition of thought and of emotion, then such conformity to tradition instead of developing you, the individual, will stultify you. Therefore, in order to grow, you must have experience. That is the only law -if there is a law- and life has no law, no philosophy.

Experience is the only thing that will make you, the individual, grow to great heights. Therefore, you must be discontented, discontented with every flicker of thought, with every flutter of emotion, with every tradition which has been laid down. You must have the capacity to doubt, so that you will discover through that doubt what is truth, what is the essential and the lasting. But to doubt everything requires strength of intelligence, of thought, because from morning till night you have to be ceaselessly questioning, demanding, urging. What is life but a mere existence -earning money, gathering and rejecting experience, with all its sorrows- what is its value unless you live like a tremendous volcano that is a danger to everything?

To discover the true purpose of life, you must be free of all traditions of thought, whether ancient or modern, laid down by another, even if he has achieved. It is, after all, the individual who is hungry that must concern himself with his hunger. Of what value is it to know that someone else is replete with satisfaction if you yourself are hungry? The essential thing for the discovery of truth is discontentment and the absolute lack of tradition, the constant renewing of the mind from day to day, never accepting anything that has been established, but always rejecting, always eager, fresh in the demand to know. You must be free of entanglements, creeds, religions, gods and all those superfluous things, in order to find yourself, in order to find for yourself that truth -which is the truth for everyone- which is life. Because perfection lies through your own development, truth lies in the incorruptibility which is produced through corruption. You have to realise therefore that man, as an individual, is absolutely free, that the greatness of man consists in this: that no one can save him, no one can help him in spirituality, no one can make him pure when he is impure, no one can lead him to perfection when he is in himself corruptible.

Man is absolutely, wholly and entirely free. When he realises that, he will no longer have fear of the mysterious or of the known. He will be all the time eager to experiment, to gather to himself that richness of life which is the fulfilment of truth. Now you, because you are free, are thereby placing a limitation on yourself and, through this limitation, you are struggling to break down the barriers between yourself and that ultimate goal which is perfection. If you once realise this, if you really understand the significance of it, you will be tremendous tomorrow, because you will be free from the clutches of fear. After all, all your gods, your Masters, your gurus, exist because you do not know. You are relying on someone to help you, to give you guidance; but the moment you do not rely on anyone, the moment you know that you are absolutely free, you will develop yourself without the aid of another. Then you will be like a tree in a pleasant land, strong, enjoying the breezes of strife, standing clear against the skies. Don't you see that the moment you are afraid, all the confusion of life grows around you, all the paraphernalia of religion accumulate and that confusion is ever growing more and more? The moment you are free, you invite experience, because through experience alone you can grow -experience in the phenomenal world.

Without phenomena, life cannot exist. You cannot divide life into spirit and matter, it is the whole, and to understand it you must grow through the objective, with the understanding of what is the subjective.

This is not a metaphysical lecture to stimulate your intellects. Experience is the only method by which man can grow, and there is no other soil to give strength to the roots except experience. What, therefore, is the purpose of experience? Without a purpose, experience becomes chaotic. When you do not know where you are going, you are lost, you are enquiring, you are doubtful, fear comes in; but the moment you are certain, positive in your assertion of discovery, then you invite every experience to make of you a wonderful dwelling that shall have its foundation in immortality. What, then, is the purpose of life? What is all this experience, which knocks at your desire, continually working for? What is it that you are continually seeking through this experience? Desire is seeking freedom from limitation, seeking freedom with a purpose; not just licentiousness, which is as a weed thrown into the water and that is buffeted about. To break down limitation, desire is fulfilling itself in every experience. Desire is life, and that life which is in you as the individual is struggling to break down barriers, so that it shall be all-inclusive instead of exclusive, because in exclusiveness lies corruption. If you include everything in that life, which is yourself, there will be no superstition and hence no strife.

Through ceaseless effort comes the cessation of all effort -not stagnation, which is quite a different thing. That is, you, as the individual, are continually seeking to escape from the limitation which life, which is yourself, places around you, and thereby to find happiness and liberation. That is what every individual is seeking. The self, the you, the I, through experience, is seeking incorruption and to arrive at incorruption it must pass through corruption with a purpose. Because corruption only exists when the self -when you- are poor in experience. When the self is rich in experience, all-inclusive, there is incorruptibility which is perfection. Therefore incorruptibility is the poise between reason and love. Perfect balance, the harmony which knows no disturbance: this is truth.

I do not want you to accept what I say because I assert that I have found and attained to that harmony. I assert it only as I assert that it is a lovely day, and because it is within the reach of every individual and every individual must attain to that fulfilment. You will see that to such truth, which is the love of life, which is life itself, there can be no path, because that truth is inclusive of all experience. The fulfilment of every individual, whether he is the most cultured or the least cultured, the most intelligent or the most degraded and barbarous, is the inevitable goal of man.

As such a goal is not the unique possession of anyone, so it is not under the guidance of any person that you will find it. This land more than any other is riddled with the worship of gurus. You think that salvation lies through another, that perfection is only to be attained by the adoration of another, whereas truth is only discoverable and attainable through one's own perfection and, to arrive at that perfection, you must be rich in experience. For that end, you need no guide, you need no religion, you need no priests. Put them all away and you will realise the truth of what I say. You need not withdraw into seclusion to discover that which lies around you in every grain of dust, under every stone, which is in every one of you, which is life itself.

If that is the end, then you will naturally say: "How am I to achieve it? What is the means of attainment?" There is no means, because it is in developing your uniqueness, your particular greatness, that you arrive at your goal. That is, you make the end the means. What are you doing -what is every individual doing at the present time? He does not know, so he plunges into darkness and creates greater havoc, greater superstition, more dogmas, and adds to the pantheon of innumerable gods. But if you know for yourself assuredly, certainly, without the least shade of doubt, then you are beginning to realise that the end creates the means of attaining it. If you are in a dark place and you see a distant light, you make your way to it; though you may suffer, you may bleed, you may cut your feet, you are going towards that one light which will give you eternal sustenance and certainty of purpose.

Experience then becomes the only teacher. Then you do not want mediators, because you are establishing within yourself that mirror of truth which cannot be darkened by a cloud, which is absolutely impersonal, which is of no individual but is eternal. By that standard alone you can judge your actions. No one can judge, no one can place you in positions of sorrow except yourself. Then life, which is in every incident, becomes your teacher, every man becomes your guide, which is much greater and more magnificent than having a guide in some mysterious place. A living guide, which is man himself, is of greater importance than the dead teachers of the past.

The purpose of that life which shall fulfill itself in perfection, in liberation from the yoke of experience, being known, every incident, every movement of thought, every flutter of man becomes a stepping-stone to truth. Then you are aware, constantly watchful; then you compare that which is fleeting with that which is eternal, you become your own judge, your own saviour; life becomes infinitely simple. Then instead of adding to the already-existing chaos, you bring about order, assurance. Then the strong will not be on the top of the weak. The whole world will change if you live from the world of the eternal; from that world you must work in the objective world -not from the objective to the subjective, not from the phenomenal to that which is lasting. Knowing what is the eternal, what is the purpose of life, you must live in this world of phenomena; you cannot escape it. It is here that you must bring about order, it is here that you must establish the truth which is eternal, not away from this phenomenal world.

Take one example: in the heart of every human being, however weak, barbarous, civilised or intellectual he may be, there is affection; it is the perfume in the heart of every man. If you follow the process of the fulfilment of the incorruptibility of love, what does it lead to? To become like the sun, or like the perfume of a flower, that gives to all irrespective of difference. That is the fulfilment of love. If you know that, even while you are in the clutches of limited and corruptible love, then you can struggle to break them. That means that you must begin to love in that eternal way now and not in the distant future. Again, for the man who is in sorrow, there is no future, no past; he wants his sorrow quelled now. When you know that which is lasting, which has no variance, which is not relative, which has no superstition, which is truth, the harmony between reason and love, then from that eternity you must work. Every little incident will strengthen you, will be as a stepping stone to greater truth, to that happiness which is lasting.

II

THERE is nothing new under the sun. Everything has been thought out, every manner of expression has been given to thought, every point of view has been shown. What has been said will always be said and therefore there can never be anything new from the ordinary point of view -you can only vary the expressions, using different words, different connotations, and so on. But to a man who desires to test anything, any idea, for himself everything becomes new. If there is a desire to get beyond the mere illusion of words, beyond the expressions of thought, beyond all philosophies and all sacred books, then, in that experiment, everything becomes new, clear, vital.

This morning I would suggest, if I may, that in order to understand -it does not matter what it is- you must be wholly free from the small understandings, the selfishness, of duty, of sin, of evil, of good, of everything. Then only will you be able to understand, to appreciate and gather the full significance of what is put before you. This does not mean that you should have your minds absolutely in a negative condition, a vacuum -quite the contrary; but you must have a mind that is willing to examine, that is free of repression. I have repeated this for the last two or three years, but apparently the idea of tradition is only applied to certain forms of ceremony, to certain forms of ritual. I do not mean that at all. I mean by tradition a set habit of thought, a point of view which has been established through thousands of years, or newly, and hence cannot be yours.

To understand the full significance of life, you cannot approach it with a traditional mind, with traditional ideas, however well-grounded you may be in ancient literature and in all those sweet coatings which mean nothing. Because you are all uncertain, because you are perplexed, you add greater confusion to that which already exists. I am talking quite seriously, because this is to me very serious. It is only waste of time for you to come and examine someone else's thought if your mind is full of prejudices and traditional, narrow ways of looking at life, whether they are modern or ancient.

You will discover, as life expresses itself, that every time it changes. Though its expressions may be the same, the experience must vary constantly. If you would understand life, you must not come to it with a mind already made up with traditional thought, with traditional ideas, with those certainties which you take for granted because you have read innumerable sacred books. I would like you to free yourself from all these established laws and think for yourself. When you are in sorrow, does it matter what another thinks? You want to be free of that sorrow; and you may read all the sacred books, you may follow certain religious ideas, but they will not take away that sting of sorrow, they will not give you certainty of purpose, except by and through the putting aside of all those things and examining for yourself every question, every thought, every point of view that is put before you, for its own intrinsic value. When you have discovered for yourself what is certain, then you need have no beliefs, no religions, no dogmas, no gods, no masters, no gurus. Because what you are trying to do is to develop that self which is within each one to its highest form of incorruptibility. I know you will all say: "This has been said in every scripture before" -but the difficulty is that there are very few who practise it.

To have that absolute certainty of purpose, you must put aside all the uncertainties and begin anew. That is the only thing that matters. Uncertainty of life, of one's ideas, of one's conduct, of one's integrity, breeds fear; through fear you are made weak; and through weakness you create beliefs, dogmas, religions, gods and all the innumerable paraphernalia of crutches and props. So my first intention is to make you certain of yourselves, of your own ideas; not that you should accept my ideas, but rather make your own conceptions of life absolute, certain, positive. Otherwise you are like a weather-cock which is turned by every wind that comes along.

A man who is well-established in his own knowledge, born out of experience, has no fear; he establishes a standard which is eternal. Man -that is, the individual- is constantly seeking, through all variations, a standard which is absolutely impersonal, disinterested; a standard which shall be a guide, which is of no person, a standard which shall be constantly with him so that he need not rely on any person, any tradition, any gods, any beliefs, any gurus. You want to establish a mirror that shall reflect all that you think good, all that you feel, in its true colours, that shall not be warped according to your prejudices, according to your whims; a standard that shall be constant and eternal. You have to search to find out such a standard, which is both the standard of the individual and the standard of the universal. I say that there is such a standard, which is applicable to the individual as well as to life as a whole. When you once establish such a standard, you realise that you are your own master, that you are wholly and entirely responsible to yourself, that no one can help you from outside. Such a standard, when once realised, sets a man on the path of freedom.

What, therefore, is the standard, what is this goal, what is this fulfilment of life, individual and universal? The moment you know that, you can work from that realisation; that is, you can make the end the means. The moment you know where you have to go, the means of attainment is of very little importance.

A river is constantly, sedulously seeking the shortest way to the sea; that is its aim. But to arrive at the sea, it must have great volume of water -otherwise it disappears in the sand. So the life of man is constantly seeking experience, to give it great strength which shall guide it, which shall urge it towards that which is free, which is eternal, which I call liberation or any other word which you like to use. If you have that purpose which is liberation, which is the poise between reason and love, which is the incorruptibility of the self, of the mind and heart out of which are the issues of life, that, to me, is the standard which is eternal.

I want you to be certain as I am certain. I want you to be as peaceful, serene, established in certainty as I am. It is for no other reason that you come to listen to me or that I talk to you. If that is the goal, then experience, which knocks at your door every moment of the day, has value. Desire is all the time seeking experience because that is its way of fulfilment, so you cannot kill desire. If you have a purpose -the goal, the standard, the truth which is life itself- then every experience will be like the drops of water which give great volume to the river and urge it towards its fulfilment. It is not a question of external aid or of looking for salvation -a terrible word- to another, nor of relying on another for your satisfaction, for your happiness.

I say that I have attained to that truth which is liberation, which is the poise between reason and love, the incorruptibility of the self. I say this not that you should follow me or as an enticement, but impersonally, as I say that the sun is shining. Because one man has attained, it is possible for everyone to attain. The moment you realise that you are a prisoner -and that is difficult to realise- that you are enclosed within the walls of the limitations of life, then at the moment of such realisation you are beginning to be free. You are constantly seeking a way out through these barriers; you are breaking down the walls.

Experience is all the time waiting, anxious that you shall utilise it and thereby destroy your limitations and be free. Because if you are not free there is no bliss, no serenity, but constant strife, and whatever you do only adds to the confusion, to the chaos which exists in the world.

To arrive at that truth which is liberation, you must begin to set everything aside; then you must be absolutely alone, alone in thought, and from that point of view find out the means of attainment. You must have courage, you must have determination. You will have to do it sometime or other, tomorrow or in ten thousand years; because sorrow is all the time gnawing at the heart of him who has limitation, and the greater the sorrow you have, the greater the certainty of attainment. Sorrow and pleasure are the same, like light and shade. Do not avoid either but utilise the experience of both, as the soil out of which the fulfilment of the flower comes into being, and so you will gain the certainty, the integrity of heart and of mind.

You have come here to discover if I have anything new to say. But, in order to discover, you must come with freshness, with an enquiring mind, with eagerness and enthusiasm to find out -not bringing innumerable quotations from your sacred books, from your traditions, that have no value because they are not yours. Wherever I have been, in Europe or here or in America, they always say, "We have been told", "Our sacred books say this", "The Buddha said that", "Our Masters have said this". Put aside all these things and think for yourselves. That is what matters; it is your sorrow that you are confronting, not someone else's. It is by solving your own problems that you solve the problem of the world, and by no other means. By your own attainment, by your own purification of the self, you will bring peace, harmony, order, tranquillity to the world. Do not be content merely to listen, but resolve to free yourselves wholly, to be a danger to everything that is unessential, everything traditional; and thereby you shall establish certainty, not only for yourselves, but for everyone that comes into contact with you.

III

I WOULD like to point out that, to receive a right answer, you must put a right question. Right questions come if you are really puzzled, if you are really enquiring, really anxious to discover. Mere superficial, intellectual, argumentative questions have no value. You are here to discover if what I say has any value, and if it has, then it has purpose, then it is essential to the life of everyone. That is why you are putting questions to me and I will answer in that spirit alone. I am not here to discuss symptoms, but the cause of all sorrow which, when examined, will give the right cure for all symptoms. When you go to a doctor, he enquires about the symptoms, but if he is a wise doctor he does not cure the symptoms but the cause of the disease. Likewise, in trying to understand truth, we must deal with the essential, and from that work out a cure for the symptoms. You cannot cure any ailment, especially the ailment of unhappiness and sorrow, merely by dealing with the symptoms. To understand the cause, you must go through the symptoms, removing what is unessential, and all the time with great awareness, with constant persistency, stick to that essential which will cure. The difficulty with most people is that there are so many unessential things around them that they are caught up in these, and it requires great intelligence to abide by the essential and to discover what is essential.

QUESTION: Cannot one really help others unless one has attained liberation oneself?

KRISHNAMURTI: It is like asking, "Cannot one love and suffer while in the process of attainment?

You are making attainment, liberation, something far away, something to be gained in the future. Now, to the true seeker there is no future. If you are hungry, you do not say "I am going to eat the day after tomorrow." Liberation is not a thing to be attained in the distant future, it is where you are now. It is yourself. In the process of attainment lies the truth, not in finality. In the process you come into contact with everyone -which is life- and in assimilating, in discarding, in understanding this life around you, you find liberation. The idea of helping others is innate. If you are nice, you help others; if you are not, you do not help others. You make the helping of others a condition. If you are right, you help automatically. When the rose blossoms, it does not say, "I am going to give beauty." It cannot help it. With a rose it is an unconscious process, with us it has to become conscious. The moment you are beautiful, you automatically help, and in the search for beauty you cannot but give aid to others. The essential point is that you should be beautiful in everything, in your outlook, in your hope, in your beliefs, and in everything you do. In that attempt, you automatically give aid. But that should not be the reason why you seek beauty. You must seek beauty because of its own intrinsic value. Otherwise you make beauty a conditional thing, to be attained through the helping of another.

QUESTION: Is not the helping of others a condition precedent to the attainment of truth?

KRISHNAMURTI: That is a question which is liable to be misunderstood if I answer it, but I can only answer it in this way. If you are bringing about incorruption within yourself, you cannot but help another. There is no other way.

QUESTION: Can I attain at any moment without any help from without, if I so desire?

KRISHNAMURTI: Naturally. Are you not all hungry? Don't you all suffer? Don't you all have worries, disturbances, envy, jealousies? The moment you bring about calmness and tranquillity, you have established truth for yourself, but you must have the necessary impetus, the enthusiasm, the interest, the awareness to examine everything. Spirituality, the realisation of harmony, is for everyone. It is like the sunshine for everyone; but it depends on the individual how he utilises it. When the sun is shining, the lotus breeds its lovely bud and the weed breeds its thorn. It is not the fault of the sunshine. Likewise, liberation, truth is for everyone, but it depends on the individual and how enthusiastic, how eager, how anxious, how burning he is within to discover it.

QUESTION: You say that man is absolutely and unconditionally free and, because he is free, he is limited. Will you please explain how his limitation is the result of his freedom?

KRISHNAMURTI: I said that because man is free, he is limited. If you were not free, you would not create this chaos in the world, you would not create chaos within yourself. Suffering, sorrow, strife come about through limitation. The process of attainment is to destroy barriers. Because you are free, you are breaking down, you are expanding, growing; but, if you were not free, if there were some superhuman being guiding you, if the life of every individual was looked after, there would be no chaos in the world, no limitation, no strife. You would be led like children across the abyss without the least trouble, everything planned, controlled, dominated; but you are not like that, you have your desires and those desires are constantly coming up against limitation, and desire struggles and tries to break down the walls of limitation which desire has placed upon itself. If the prisoner realises that he is not a prisoner, he is breaking down the prison walls. Because you do not realise that you are free, you are afraid. You have all this gamut of religions, superstitions, beliefs, dogmas and all the rest to uphold you in your fearfulness. Whereas, if you realise that you, as an individual, are absolutely, entirely free, then you are not afraid, everything is clear. You begin to grow and purposeful and you do not invent shelters, comforts, gods. You do not look to salvation from outside.

You may have got rid of certain traditions, such as bathing in the Ganges, which you leave to those who love it, but you have your own particular tradition hanging round your neck because you are afraid, you are uncertain. If you are certain, if you are free, you must carve out your own path, which is unique and therefore cannot be trodden by anyone else. There is no common path to truth. So it is necessary for the seeker, for man, to create his own path. Even though you do not seek it, it does not matter; it comes and knocks at your door, through sorrow, through suffering. Do not bother about seeking and thereby put yourself apart from humanity, from life. The moment you realise that sorrow lies in limitation and that, because you are free, you can destroy that limitation, you are beginning to grow strong, fair, purposeful. Then you are not entangled in the limitations of creeds, of superstition, of beliefs.

You are listening to me as you have been doing for three years now, and you will go on doing it for the next ten years, but you are not really interested in all this, it is not serious to you. It is just a phantasy which you think you had better be in or otherwise you may miss something. Please believe me, you will never miss anything. What is the good of listening every day if you do not put one thing into practice? It does not matter what it is. What I am saying is easy and understandable to the savage or to the man highly evolved. The highly evolved understands simplicity and simplicity is inexhaustible; and so does the savage, because he is not complicated, he has just begun to learn. But to the man who is between these two, life is difficult, because he is not willing to go to the extremes; and therein lies mediocrity, pettiness of thought, pettiness of life, indifference. I do not know why you come and listen to me every year or what value it has. I tell you honestly that if there were two or even one really anxious to learn, to understand, burning with it, it would be much better than thousands who are indifferent.

If you, the individual, do not realise that you are free, absolutely and unconditionally, then you are bound to create complexities, and in those complexities, which are unessential, you are caught. The function of a person like me is to point out that you are caught and thereby enable you to destroy for yourself the barriers. I cannot break down the barriers, because you are free. That is where the strength, the potential greatness of man lies. He is not like an animal to be led, to be trained, to be told what to do, to rely on powers exterior to himself. You will say at once: Do not Masters exist? Is there not a plan for humanity? and all the rest of it. What I say is: Gods, Masters, gurus, are of no use for liberation. If you have suffered, if you are really hungry, burning, anxious, then what I am saying has value; if you are seeking comfort, there is an end of it. Instead of having old gods, you will have new gods, instead of having old gurus, you will have new gurus, instead of having old traditions, you will have new traditions.

QUESTION: Is it a fact that human evolution is guided and helped by a Hierarchy of adepts, and that some of them take pupils who could be trained to take their place in the Hierarchy? If so, is not that a way towards spiritual perfection?

KRISHNAMURTI: I say that gods, adepts, all these are of no use for the spiritual growth of the individual towards his freedom. Life is everywhere, and in every little instance there is a potentiality of experience. You want to neglect all that and seek somewhere else, because to be aware, to be positive, to examine and analyse every question, is difficult; it needs concentration, it needs ecstasy of purpose, and so you seek aid from outside to make you jump over the abyss of corruption to perfection. To understand truth, you must look to the essential and these are all unessential things. I do not want you to agree with me, that would be a calamity, but I want you to understand because agreement or being carried away by personalities has no value. If you understood the truth of what I am saying, understood the real significance of it, then you would be bound to live, and to live is far greater than to be in agreement with anyone.

QUESTION: Do adepts exist?

KRISHNAMURTI: It is unessential to me. I am not concerned with it. I am concerned with whether you are in sorrow, whether you are hungry, whether you are a prisoner to strife, not with whether someone exists. What value has it? I am not trying to evade the question. All I say is that I am not concerned with it. I do not deny that they exist. In evolution there must be a difference, as there is a difference between the savage and the most cultured. But what value has it to a man who is held in the walls of a prison? All that I say is that though there may be adepts, there may be gods, they will be of no assistance to you unless you yourself break down the walls of limitation. I should be foolish to deny the gamut of experience which is what you call evolution. You care more about the man who is ahead of you than about yourself. You are willing to worship someone far away, not yourself or your neighbour.

QUESTION: In At the Feet of the Master you received instruction from one of the adepts. What of it? Is it not attaining perfection, happiness?

KRISHNAMURTI: Instruction exists in everything, but if you have not the capacity to assimilate, to understand, to struggle with experience, no one can teach you. You are again mixing the essential and the unessential. The essential is that man should be free. He is intrinsically free and he should by his very freedom destroy those limitations which desire in its search for experience has placed around him. There may be Masters, adepts, I do not deny it, but I cannot understand what value it has to you as an individual.

A VOICE: Sets us on the right track.

KRISHNAMURTI: No one will set you on the right track except yourself. What is the ideal except your own perfection?

A VOICE: The perfection of another man.

KRISHNAMURTI: No. A starving man wants his own food, he is not satisfied by the fullness of another. Life is not a process of reliance on another. Life must be developed by the individual in his own uniqueness. The individual must rely on himself, must develop that disinterested standard by which he shall judge his own actions, and that standard can never be given by another, it does not matter how high or how evolved he may be. You may have Masters, adepts, but because you are corruptible, you are unhappy, you create chaos. So I say that if you, as an individual, because you are suffering, can bring about that state of calmness and serenity, and utter lack of disturbance, then you are in the process of attainment.

QUESTION: Are we right in understanding that by incorruptibility you mean an entire eradication of the sense of possession, physical, emotional, mental, or does it mean more than that?

KRISHNAMURTI: It means that and more. You may have no sense of possession, physical, emotional or otherwise; but, if you have not harmony which is, as I have explained, the poise of reason and of love, the true creation, you are not beyond the clutches of corruption. You cannot kill selfishness, you can kill unselfishness. You will see the difference. Try to be really selfish, then you become a god. After all, you cannot kill the "I", which is the self. But you can develop the self to such a condition -I am using condition without limitation- that it includes everything. You cannot kill the self -the self is in its very essence assertion and, in the process of climbing towards perfection, the echoes of that assertion come back to you as sorrow. If you know the purpose of life, then your assertion begins to be tinctured by the ultimate thing which is liberation. When I say "if you are truly selfish", please do not misunderstand me or you will say that I am preaching selfishness. I am not preaching selfishness nor am I preaching unselfishness. I am saying that the development of the self is neither selfishness nor unselfishness, so put both aside. If you are concerned with the life which is not only your self but my self, in developing that life you will naturally help consciously or unconsciously. The principal thing is to concern yourself with the purity of the self. You are all self-centred, all men are self-centred; but be self-centred in the extreme way, so that you transform, renew the self. Do not be self-centred at the expense of someone else.

QUESTION: Is it possible to become impersonal without undergoing painful experiences, by sustained right thinking and constant watchfulness?

KRISHNAMURTI: You want a spiritual pill that will clear your path and make you perfect. Pleasure is bound by tears, and you must cry, you must laugh, to attain. There is no other way. You are afraid of crying, you want to laugh all the time; but, if you look at it, laughter and crying are the same, the extremes of the same thing. But if through laughter you understand sorrow, and through sorrow you understand laughter, there is neither this nor the other. A really great painter, a master painter, is all the time watching for every movement of the leaf, for every shade of colour, for every form, so that out of that constant watching he may produce on his canvas that which shall live through eternity. So must you have the same interest to watch, to observe, to be keen on everything, and thereby paint eternity on yourself.

QUESTION: What do you mean by saying that truth is pathless? How can we go there if there is no path? Shall I be right in saying that that path is the path of understanding?

KRISHNAMURTI: Truth is the harmony of that self which is life. Now to that there can be no path. How can there be? To the development of the self, there can be no path. Everything, every experience, every feeling, every movement that exists within the self, every shadow, every sorrow, every pleasure, gives growth to the soul. There can be no path. Again, you will ask me: "But, what about the path of which we have been told?" I am not concerned with that. Man is free -please start from that basis- and he must develop his freedom in his own unique manner, so he cannot tread the path of anyone else. I do not expect you to agree with me but, without being prejudiced, examine what I say: that for the development of the soul there can be no path. If that is the truth, which I maintain it is, which is freedom, which is poise and reason, then truth is a pathless land, and if you approach it on any path, it is not truth. It defies all paths because you approach it through limitation.

A VOICE: It becomes pathless after realisation, not before that.

KRISHNAMURTI: It does not become pathless after realisation; it is because you are in limitation that you create a path.

A VOICE: Should it be the consummation of all paths?

KRISHNAMURTI: No, I am not going to be caught in your paths. It is not the consummation of all paths; all paths are limitations, so I do not want to use that word. In your mind, everything has a limitation and, if you approach through limitation, you will not understand the limitless; but by developing your own uniqueness, your own understanding -the understanding of everyone must be the same eventually because the self of everyone is the same- you will attain.

A VOICE: Each one has his own path then?

KRISHNAMURTI: Each one must develop his own path, his own uniqueness. I cannot say there is a path laid down for each one. It would mean you would be a prisoner on that path.

A VOICE: Cannot he have some vicarious experience?

KRISHNAMURTI: You can, if you are spiritually developed in emotion and greatly intelligent, but you will have to be careful that you do not deceive yourself. You will have to break down that limitation to find truth.

IV

AS this is my last talk in this camp, I want to summarise what I have been saying, and it will be a question for you of concentrated thought. In the process of thought there must be change, there must be a constant renewal of the mind. As every day is fresh and new, so to understand the process of life -in which truth lies and nowhere else- you must have a mind that is constantly changing, constantly seeking, continually on the alert, never letting an incident go by without its giving you its full richness.

That of which I speak is, I maintain, the desire of everyone. I am not talking about some mysterious thing or giving you a revelation, because a revelation becomes a religion. The moment there is a mystery involved without real understanding, fear arises. If you examine life in its purity it will answer to every call, it will reply to every need and will give you the full meaning of every struggle.

To arrive at such a position, you must be certain for yourself, whatever may happen, under all circumstances. What I put before you must be your own, so that that assurance can never be shaken. No one can gainsay the fact that your face, your nose and eyes are of a particular kind. You know them too well. You watch them every day when you comb your hair. You see them constantly and catch their reflection and no one can shake your confidence in that which you know. Likewise you must know, be certain, without a shadow of doubt, that what I am saying is your own. Otherwise, anyone can come and upset you. The moment you are certain -not merely intellectually, which has no value, but certain with that certainty which produces a result in the expressions of daily life- then that certainty has a value. That certainty is your own. No one can take it away. It is your own experience, the result of your own sorrow, of your own seeking. I am not inventing anything. I am expressing in words what lies hidden in the heart of every one of you. It must be connected with life, not away, separate from life, for I maintain that in the harmony of that life -which is yourself- and in the attainment of that harmony lies the process of truth. In the acquisition of that harmony, of that poise, of that realisation of the incorruptibility of the self, lies the truth that every man, every one of you is seeking constantly, whether consciously or unconsciously. In this there can be no revelation. Please understand this, because the moment you create an element of mystery, of something secret being exposed, there arises the whole gamut of misunderstanding, of superstition, something extraneous to yourself on which you depend. What I say has nothing to do with that. I am explaining the process of life, which every one of you is struggling to express and to understand. If that understanding is your own, if you intuitively feel it as part of your life, then you are certain, then a thousand people cannot shake you, nor can scriptures or sacred books ever alter your perception.

You, the individual, are all the time surrounding yourself with unrealities. You live in the unreality and, because that unreality is darkness, ignorance, you invent lights to illumine that darkness. The purpose of the intelligent man is to point out the various illusions which surround men and help men to destroy them. That is my purpose. As civilisation which I define as the expression of culture, and culture as the unique beauty of the self grows more and more complex, the unreality increases. In that unreality man is caught and in that darkness he wants light. He wants to find truth; he cannot, because truth repels anything that is not of its own character.

Do not, please, shake your heads. I do not want agreement, I want understanding. The moment you understand, you are beginning to live, which is infinitely greater than agreement. That is why I want you to grasp the significance of what I am saying. My purpose is to point out the unrealities which have become real to you, and make you understand. Not that I am going to force you, but rather try to make you realise for yourself the unrealities so that you may develop your own capacity to discern that which is fleeting and that which is real. When you are so assured, when you are so certain, then you will no longer invent unrealities for yourself. You may come across many unrealities, many fleeting things, but if you have certainty, you will always be able to discern and to reject, to accept and to deny. When you are certain, then is the time to sow; when you are assured, positive, then is the life to build; because then you will build in your own understanding of the truth, and develop in your own uniqueness and not through the uniqueness of another. But that capacity to understand life can only come when you are certain. I am telling you all this because I have attained it myself. It is not a mysterious force which enters a human being and alters his whole attitude of mind and heart; it is a constant struggle to readjust oneself, a constant effort to distinguish the fleeting and the unreal from the lasting and the real, to discover the truth in falsehood and the beauty in ugliness.

Bearing in mind that you must be assured, certain for yourself beyond the shadow of doubt, as to what is the purpose of life, from that point of view examine the individual. I am only concerned with the individual, though in the present civilisation the group is striving to dominate the individual, irrespective of his growth. It is the individual that matters, because if the individual is clear in his purpose, is assured, certain, then the struggle against society will cease. Then he will not be dominated by society; he will be free and independent of society, of the morality, of the narrowness, of the conventions of societies and groups. The individual is the whole universe, the individual is the whole world, not part of the world. The individual is the all-inclusive, not the all-exclusive, because the self in each one is constantly making efforts, experimenting in different directions; but the self in you and in me and in hundreds of others is the same, though the expressions may vary and should vary.

The individual is the focus of the universe. So long as you do not understand yourself, so long as you do not fathom the fullness of yourself, you can be dominated, controlled, guided, helped, urged, caught up in the wheel of continual strife. So you must concern yourself with the individual, that is, with yourself. I am not preaching a selfish point of view at all. Experiment with what you yourself think is right and not with what another says.

In the individual -that is, in yourself- there are two elements: the progressive and the eternal. The eternal is the accumulation of your experiences, which is the accumulation of the experience of everyone. For though experiences may vary in expression, the result of experience is the same in its essence. For instance, there is the experience of anger: one man may have the experience in one way, another in another way, but the result of the experience in growth is the same. To this eternal self you are constantly adding, through the incidental experiences of the progressive self and the results of those experiences. That is, you are bringing the progressive self, which depends on the incidents of every day, into union with the eternal, which is the result of your experiences and which, again, is the eternal of everyone.

It is not very complicated, or difficult to understand. I repeat: there is in each one of you that element which is the result of the accumulation of experience, which is eternal. Then there is the other element which is progressive, which is seeking all the time to make everything around it, every incident, every accident, every thought, into the eternal. The progressive, through experience, is trying to gather reality in the fleeting, is seeking beauty in ugliness, truth in the false. The eternal is what I call liberation, that part of you which is absolutely liberated. This is an analogy, do not run it to death. There is the residue of experience which gives you a certain freedom, which does not demand further experience of the same kind, and hence that part of you is liberated and belongs to the eternal, the eternal of everything and everyone. If your progressive self is not in union with the eternal, there is sorrow, there is strife, constant readjustment, constant struggle, constant searching after what is real. As a bird makes its way through the valley, over a noisy city, and always returns to its home, so, if your progressive self knows the eternal, it can wander through all the accidents and incidents of life and gather the result of every experience and return to that which is eternal. That is what you are trying to do in life. There is nothing mysterious about it, no metaphysical through is needed. Through the phenomena, through the expression, the progressive self is trying to find out what it can accumulate and thereby make itself eternal. As long as there is this gap -if I may use such a simile- between the eternal and the progressive, naturally that gap creates a continual demand to be filled, and the filling process is strife, search, experimenting, all the hundred and one things of life, because by life alone can you fill that gap, enrich that gap, make the progressive self as the eternal, so that all strife ceases.

Through strife alone comes the cessation of strife. It is not away from this world, which is the expression of the self, that you find the progress and the growth of the self. But if the progressive self does not know what is eternal, then you are like a boat without a rudder, like a bird without a nest, like an eagle that has not its abiding place on the mountain top away from the turmoil, away from the constant strife. That is why you must find out for yourself assuredly, certainly, without a shadow of doubt, what is the lasting. I say that the eternal is life; by that I mean the life of thought which is reason and the affection which is poise. As long as your individual life is held in the bondage of experience, there can be no attainment of truth, but the moment you have attained the harmony of the self, there is truth and liberation and eternity.

While you are in the process of attaining, you assert, and in the assertion you create sorrow. You must assert, you cannot escape it. It it the very essence of the self to assert, and you cannot escape that assertion by withdrawing from the world. So long as you are uncertain of that reality, of that eternity, the progressive self has nothing by which to guide itself. Then you, as an individual, are homeless, wandering hither and thither, buffeted about by every experience without gathering to yourself the essence of every experience to lead you to a definite goal. So you must find out for yourself this constant being, in whom there is neither strife nor stagnation; and that, I say, can only be done by the liberation of the life which is in prison, a prison in which every individual lives.

You can only make that which is progressive into the eternal by being master of every daily incident. The moment you understand that, you are beginning to be assured. No one else can guide you to this certainty, no one can give you assistance in extracting the essence from every experience except yourself. The self cannot arrive at the eternal, so long as it is in the clutches of every incident, which is the case with every one of you. There never can be tranquillity or full knowledge without the understanding of the self, for the understanding of the self is knowledge. When you understand that through every incident of life the progressive self is gathering every iota of experience, from that alone true self-discipline is born. In the majority of cases fear stimulates self-discipline -fear of sin, fear of convention, fear of what friends, societies, communities will say. Or through religion, which is also a cause of fear, you begin to discipline yourself; which again is wrong because, the moment there is an element of fear, it cannot lead to true self-discipline. Discipline imposed from without has no value and is not eternal; by understanding alone can you have true self-discipline. Self-discipline must be born out of the love of life, for that love assures incorruptibility. From such an understanding, you begin to impose discipline upon yourself in the light of the eternal. Such a discipline has value because there is no element of fear in it. Liberation, the perfection of life, cannot be arrived at except through self-discipline imposed upon yourself with understanding.

Instead of discussing so many vain, useless things which have no value, instead of fighting about gurus, ceremonies, religions, which are vague theories, I wish you would do one thing that you understand; and from that understanding, your whole vision of life would change. The discipline imposed upon yourself is your own unique development: you are developing your mind and your life quite differently from me, and yet the result will be the same and your self-expression cannot conflict with mine.

Most of you agree intellectually that it is a possibility; but there is no change of heart. Are you not all in sorrow, in misery, in strife, consciously or unconsciously prisoners to unrealities? You do not know your own sorrow. You do not know how much a prisoner you are in your own prison house, and so long as you do not realise it, it is useless for me to talk to you of truth and liberation. A change of heart is needed, and the change of heart must give a new expression to life -not a purely intellectual theory. There must be a complete cleavage, you must become a danger to all things that narrow, to all things that create prisons.

What are you doing at present? You are only gilding the bars of your prison and thinking that you are thereby setting men free.

Your inspiration, if you want inspiration, should be the impetus, the enthusiasm to change yourself. If you do not change yourself, your enthusiasm will be valueless, it cannot have the strength of persistency. When there is such a change of heart, there is expansion -expansion through understanding, not through fear- and as you expand, you are constantly seeking beauty, beauty in form as well as in truth, beauty in phenomena as well as in that which creates all phenomena. You change your homes, your dresses, the whole of life.

I am not speaking to you from a superior standpoint or from a different attitude of thought. I am not preaching anything which I have not thought out, and struggled, fought, sacrificed to attain. I am telling you of that which I have tried; it is not a revelation. I say that what I have attained, every one of you must attain; it is not my unique privilege, because everyone is in sorrow, everyone is struggling, everyone is seeking inspiration, everyone tries this and that, sacrifices, renounces uselessly, vainly, without understanding. There is self-discipline without understanding, meditation, concentration -all these things, without understanding the significance of life; and without that, whatever you do will only add to the already existing chaos, to the existing struggles.

First you must understand what is the significance, the purpose of life, and from that understanding will come the harmony of reason and love. From that understanding, everything will become clear, and you will have immense enthusiasm. I do not care if you do not come to any of my meetings. I shall go on talking to one person who is really interested in this. Do you think that if I wanted popularity or money or worship I would come here? Those things do not exist for me. I want understanding, because out of understanding the whole vision of life changes. I do not want you to agree, because in agreement there is no liberation; but in understanding there is life, there is a continual change, and from that arises the ecstasy, the enthusiasm, the desire to alter and not merely to decorate, to release people from prison because you yourself are free. What else is life except this? Why do you waste all your energies in discussing useless, vain things, when this will solve all your difficulties as an ointment that heals all wounds? It means that you are more interested in the dead than in the living.

Do you remember the story of a man who was shot by a poisoned arrow, and who wanted to know who shot the arrow, by whom it was made, what kind of poison was used; and while asking all these questions, he died. That is exactly what you are doing. You do not want to live, you are more interested in death and in what lies on the other side. But if you live, the other side does not exist, because the other side is only life continued.

So, friends, I know that you will all come back next year, or the year after, in the same manner of thought, and you will still be in sorrow. If two people out of this gathering understood this, they would, wherever they might go, change, fully alter the whole of life and circumstances, and would become a nuisance, a danger to everything unreal about them. They would be battling constantly against those things which are unreal, because they are certain, assured: they have confidence in that which they are saying, because they have experimented and attained to that particular understanding. Truth has no disciples, no beliefs of its own, and you must not become the disciple of truth, but truth itself. That is the love of life. From that comes reason, intelligence which is the residue of all experience, simplicity which is incorruptible. When you understand the meaning, the significance, the purpose of life, then all these complicated unrealities that exist around you will disappear, and with that disappearance you will be living a new life, a life that is of reality, a life that has ecstasy, a continual delight in all its expressions, because you are the source of all expressions and you are no longer caught up in the unrealities of life.

ADYAR GATHERING 1929-30

Adyar, India, 1929-1930

I

During my talks this week, I am going to make certain statements, and if you will give to them your unprejudiced thought and not merely take a part of what I say and bludgeon me with that part, you will be better able to understand the whole significance of what I say. As it is my intention to convey to you the fullness of my thought, naturally I would beg of you to withhold your quick judgment till you have carefully, freely, without prejudice, thought and considered over the whole matter. I want you to concentrate on what is said rather than to be concerned with personalities. There is a great deal of difference between questioning, demanding, doubting, examining, analysing the sayings and interpreting the work of an individual. It is like being desirous to find out the substance of the light and merely being misled by the lamp. Do not take the lamp as the significant thing but rather try to understand the light. In other words, I would that you could grasp the full significance of what I say, not the mere superficial meaning of words. Do not be caught in the mere illusion, the maya of words, but look behind the words.

I want to point out that I am not here to create parties, either in the Theosophical Society or in the outside world. Parties denote a lack of understanding. What I say is wholly, entirely to do with the individual and hence if you form parties round what I say, it will have no value. You have innumerable parties in the world, under different names. They are all cages with different decorations, with different mouldings of silver, of gold, heavily jewelled. But they are all cages from my point of view, and if you merely interpret what I say to form pleasant parties to oppose one another, it will have no value. I would ask you to bear this in mind.

Nor do I wish to create followers. I mean this literally because, again, what I say has to do wholly, entirely with individuals. The moment you form a group to follow another, you are destroying your own particular growth, your own individual uniqueness, greatness. Do not follow anyone, least of all me, and I mean this, please.

Nor must a mass movement be created out of what I say. The mass, though it is composed of individuals, has nothing to do with the truth of which I speak. And I would beg of you not to form a religion or a sect around me, because that again has nothing to with individuals. Truth is a matter of individual perception, it is wholly an affair of the individual. It cannot be moulded by external things. Nor do I wish disciples, because the whole significance of what I say will be, if properly understood, contrary to all these things. If you wish to understand what I have to say -and that is why you are here- please do not translate that which you understand superficially into parties, cliques, groups, disciples, followers, religions.

Then, again, it is naturally in the mind of many to discover who is speaking through Krishnamurti. I have repeated this over and over again and I receive questions on that subject repeatedly. I do not mind answering them, but it becomes futile when one has repeated the answer a hundred times. It is of no value who is speaking. No one can tell you who is speaking. If anyone did tell you, it would be his authority, his impression. No one can know another wholly, completely. Please follow this and do not merely say superficially that it is such a vague general truth that it has no value. It has, if you give careful thought to it. I cannot know you, however much I may have made myself wholly, purely incorruptible. No one can judge, nor do I judge. Who is speaking therefore has no value, the value lies in the full significance of what is said. If you are capable of judging it on its own intrinsic merit and if, after full and careful thought, what I say has value for you, you must carry it out. If you wish to compromise, it is your affair, naturally, but compromise will not bring you to what you are seeking. So please do not concern yourself in denouncing or trying to discover who is, and who is not, speaking. You are so prejudiced, bound by authority, that you cannot judge a thing for its own beauty. You do not need anyone to tell you that a rose is beautiful, or that a picture is lovely, is a masterpiece. What is of value is how you appreciate the rose or the picture, what is its significance to you as an individual. It has its own beauty, if you have the greatness to appreciate it. If you merely listen to the individual who speaks, you will create authority, you will create shrines, you will create followers, parties, cliques, sects, religions; which have nothing whatsoever to do with the individual, which have nothing whatsoever to do with truth. I know many of you will disagree. Then disagree wholly, and if your disagreement is based on reason, it has value. Find out if your disagreement is reasonable, or merely prejudiced, due to the worship of authority.

I do not want to create disharmony, but as the rain, when it comes, pays no respect to the man who is building a house or to the man who is desirous of sunshine, so, if what I have to say creates disharmony, it is inevitable. Please see this point, as otherwise these meetings will have no value. If you will always throw back at me "We have been told so and so", it has no value. What you think as an individual is what matters and not what another man may think. Your own personal experience cannot be dominated by another, and that alone has value. If your experience is contrary to what I say, you are perfectly right in following what you think is right.

This is a grave matter to me. If you dislike it, I will go away, I will speak to anyone that will listen to me. But if you are desirous of understanding, then give your mind, your reason, your love, everything to that understanding. Do not merely judge superficially and then create misunderstandings without purpose. What I say is purely wholly and entirely a matter for the individual. That is, if you, as an individual, have solved your problems, your sorrows, your comforts, your pains, your enjoyments, then in the world -which is composed of individuals- there shall be happiness, order, rational thought and the clear enjoyment of freedom. Look at all my talks, all my questions and answers; from that point of view, not from the point of view of any society or religion or belief.

If you want to discover whether what I say is true, you must judge impersonally; that is, put aside your personal likes and dislikes, your personal beliefs, because you are trying to seek the understanding of the significance of the whole of life, not merely of your particular individual life. Everyone tries to seek truth -that is, the rich, full, harmonious life- according to his particular whims, according to his particular beliefs, dogmas and religions. The Hindu will seek truth -that fullness of life- through Hinduism, the Christian through Christianity, the Buddhist through Buddhism, and so on, taking for granted certain experiences of others and thereby forming a sect through which each thinks he will discover the truth. If you want to discover truth, you must put aside Hinduism, Buddhism, all religions and seek for yourself wholly, entirely, because truth is a pathless land, life is a pathless land, and you cannot approach it from any point of view, by any path whatever. Please do not agree or disagree, but examine this statement sanely, rationally. If you think it is wrong, leave it alone and go your own sweet way. There is no question of tolerance or intolerance. Truth, if I may give a crude example, is like a vulture that awaits a dying animal: it has infinite patience. What I say is, to me, absolute, unconditional, and I have patience. If you think it is right, then live by it, because that alone has value and not what you profess with your lips.

You take certain things for granted that have been handed down to you by authority. The purpose of authority is to treat all people as children, to keep them in nurseries. I am not speaking harshly. I am speaking of facts and if you do not like them, do not accept them. If you would understand truth, you must leave your nurseries and your toys. If you are treated as children, you will remain children, naturally. If I considered you all the time as weak people who must be nourished, who must be encouraged, guided, moulded, you would never grow to manhood, to your full strength. It is by falling, by experiencing, by suffering, by rejoicing that you learn. Therefore, if you would examine what I say impersonally, you must leave all your authorities, your second-hand knowledge, your nurseries, your various religions -aspects of truth though they may be- and try to understand the whole.

As every river must enter the sea, as every stream is seeking sedulously to enter the ocean because that is its purpose, as the sea cannot enter the river, so our imperfection must grow towards perfection, because perfection cannot enter into imperfection. I say, not as authority but as a fact to myself, that I have attained that eternal life which every human being must attain. Every human being is consciously or unconsciously experimenting, suffering, sorrowing, seeking through pain and happiness, the inevitable attainment which is liberation. I say that the goal of human life is to be beyond all experience of the self -not the experience of the relative. In the relative there is variety; the phenomenal world can never be eternal, though it can bear the stamp or the eternal. To make the self incorruptible is the purpose of life and nothing else, and in that incorruption lies freedom, truth, which is full, harmonious living. You have to judge every experience that you come across, having that in mind. Your guide must be the truth -not intermediaries, but the absolute. If all humanity is to culminate in that flower which I call liberation, then every individual -that is, you- must be guided by that one thing and by nothing else.

You must be your own sole authority; therefore, you must put aside all your preconceived ideas of spirituality. You have built up an idea of spirituality and you apply it automatically to anything which is put before you. That has no value. It is what you think that matters, and not what others think. It is the mass that invents these things to uphold itself in its integrity, but it has nothing to do with your individual perception, your individual understanding of the truth. For that reason, again, if you would understand truth, you must take all of it and not one aspect. Truth cannot have an aspect, it must be the whole. You cannot take a part of it and examine that; you must examine the whole. Therefore, if you would understand truth you must put aside all these things -what your neighbours say, what your friends say, what society says, what Christianity says, what Buddhism says, or what anyone says. What matters is what you think and say. I am not preaching selfishness. Do not translate it into that and then put it aside thinking that you are very noble in not being selfish. Please regard what I say so impersonally, with such detachment, that you can extract from it the essence, the full significance of it and live by it. For the full understanding of life, for the rich, harmonious living of the individual, he must be guided solely by himself and not by his gurus, nor by rites, nor by anything.

That is my point of view. This is not creating a party spirit. I am not interested in creating a party spirit in any society. I say that to me this is the truth, and you can take it or leave it. If you take it, then alter your lives, compete with kindness, be passionately in love with everything, and do not merely be theologians carrying on discussions under the cool trees, secluded from life. There cannot be compromise.

All depends on what you are seeking, on what you are desirous of finding in life. If you are seeking companionship, comfort, then you create shelters and take comfort therein. You have churches, temples to uphold you in your search because you are afraid, and you worship and pray for comforts, from outside. Again, you must ask yourself what you, as an individual, are seeking, what all this struggle, this sorrow, this pain, is for. Fear and the desire of comfort have nothing to do with truth. You cannot approach truth through these means. You must be free of all these things, and to be free, you must ask yourself what you are seeking. I say that man is seeking to free himself from limitation which is sorrow. All limitations are sorrow. Man is seeking to be happy, so that he shall not be disturbed at any time. Through limitation man is seeking freedom by the destruction of that limitation. Desire is ever seeking fulfilment in experience. If your desire is constantly bound by limitation, there is sorrow. If your desire is free, immense, infinite, without limitation, then there is happiness, then such a desire is no longer seeking experience.

What you perceive, you desire. What you desire, you seek. If your perception is infinite, vast, limitless, your desire will be likewise. If you desire a motor car, then this desire is moulding you, you compete, you struggle, you hurt another in acquiring a car. If your desire is for comfort, you build a structure through fear and you realise what you desire. But if your desire is to be free, rich, full and in harmony with life, then your desires will mould you towards that.

Therefore, you must first perceive the essential, and you can only perceive it by setting aside all the unessential things of life. Everyone in the world is seeking that, consciously or unconsciously, and in that search he gets entangled -you are all entangled in that search- and in that entanglement he builds a house of comfort and is held therein as a prisoner. If you are seeking truth, you must disentangle yourself from this prison and realise that you are a prisoner in your own creation, in your own entanglements, which have nothing whatever to do with truth. The moment you break down that house of limitation, you are beginning to perceive truth as a whole, life as a whole, with its richness, with its fullness. Be honest to yourself. If you think that you are not a prisoner, you will remain in that prison. But if you want to be free of these entanglements, sorrows, pains, rejoicings, then break down your house, leave all things uncompromisingly, and you will find happiness, you will no longer be a slave to the continual wheel of sorrow.

It is not an attitude of world-weariness. I am not preaching that you should leave the world or destroy what is called the form. If I had not a form, I should not be able to speak. There are unnecessary things to uphold you in the integrity of your thought, in the purity of your mind, and if you get rid of them, then you are seeking the full understanding of life, then you will be happy. Out of the heart are the issues of life and as long as your heart is weak, burdened with fear, you invent all these unnecessary things; then you must have religions, gurus to uphold you. But if you are desirous of seeking truth every moment of the day, then you are beginning to tread the path of freedom. You must be entirely your own master. You must be a stern law unto yourself. It does not matter what your neighbour says. It is your happiness you are concerned with, you are bound in your own sorrow and not in another's. If you solve your problems, then you can help everything. If you are in the process of solving that sorrow, you are giving light and understanding; but if you do not destroy that sorrow, you are only creating greater prisons with more elaborate decorations.

For the man who realises that out of his heart are the issues of life, there shall be happiness, there shall be liberation. This is not an enticement set before you; do not translate it into a reward for your virtuous actions. Such a man shall unite himself with that life which is in everything and in everyone, and the greatest spirituality is to create within oneself that harmonious, rich, full understanding of life.

II

BEFORE I answer questions, I should like to make an introductory remark or two. To understand completely anything which you desire to understand, you must give your whole mind to it. You must not have a certain part of the mind functioning in one way, and the other part trying to understand in another. One part of the mind is all the time unaware of what the other part desires, because your fears, your desires, keep you from carefully examining and analysing. This habitual unawareness of a certain division of the mind must disappear. A doctor who desires to cure a chronic disease goes to the very root of the disease and from there eradicates it. But if he leaves a certain part of the disease still in the body, it will crop up over and over again. Likewise, if you would understand, you must give your whole mind to that understanding. That means that your whole mind must be discontented with all the things that the mind has created. For, after all, everything is the creation of the mind. You cannot leave one corner of the mind unexplored, unexamined. If you would find out whether what I am saying is true or false -that again is a purely individual matter- you must give your mind entirely to that examination, not keeping one part reserved as a sanctuary in which you can take shelter. There should be no secret corners in your mind, no secret sanctuaries which you are afraid to analyse.

To me, the true suspension of judgement is to give your whole mind without reserving anything. If your mind is still in continual habitual unawareness in one direction and attempting to be aware in another direction, it will not discover the true harmony which is life. Your individual life must function richly, harmoniously in everything it does. You cannot divide life into darkness and light; nor the mind. Therefore, if you would understand anything, any subject, any idea, whether it is new or old, you must have no divisions of the mind. It sounds easy. But it requires strenuous courage to break down this barrier, on the one side of which is the desire to seek, the desire to be happy, the desire to fathom every experience; and on the other side, fear, which breeds comfort, sanctuaries and dark corners.

I do not want my talk to be theoretical. What I am saying, I am living personally, individually, and if you do not also want to live it, do not listen. What we have to do is to alter ourselves. A friend of mine said to me yesterday, "Do you think that all the people who listen to you are really wanting to be happy or liberated?" I said, "I am afraid they are not. There might be one or two, or three or four." Then he asked me, "Why do you talk at all?" I answered, "Because I may find one or two who will be like a flame that will burn, that will destroy all the unessential, ugly things around them."

It is no good, therefore, merely listening, keeping one part of the mind functioning in its habitual unawareness and with the other trying to seek. You will not succeed in running if one leg is carefully bandaged up and the other is free. If you would run, you must tear away the bandage, throw away your crutches and make the attempt. Happiness, liberation, the highest form of spirituality, is to be won by the fleetest; that is, by the man who is acting, who is functioning most richly and harmoniously in life.

What we are trying to do is to put theory into practice. Theories are no good by themselves, and the man who puts into practice one theory in which he is interested will be on a mountain top of understanding. The difficulty with the majority of people is that they want their minds to be filled by someone else. They do not struggle, grapple with ideas, and then translate those ideas into action for themselves and live them. If you want to learn music, you go to a musician and give your whole heart to understand and to learn from him. If you go to a violinist and ask him to teach you how to paint, you will not learn; you must go to a master painter. Likewise, if you would have spirituality, you must go to the man or the ideas that are spiritual; and spirituality, from my point of view, means setting man wholly and entirely free.

In answering these questions, naturally I cannot solve your problems. If I did, I should not be helping you. The solution of all problems lies within yourself. All that I can do is to help and encourage you to find out for yourself. Please do not expect a solution for the immediate problem. After all, a wise doctor does not deal with mere symptoms; he wants to know the cause of the disease, and if the patient insists on merely being cured of the symptoms a wise doctor will not deal with him. Likewise, I want to deal with the cause of sorrow, with the cause of limitation. Fundamentally, to me, spirituality is liberation, and from that point of view alone can I answer and not from the immediate. That is, if you would understand and take a true perspective view of life, you must withdraw impersonally from the whole and from there examine the whole. If you are living in a valley, and you want to see the mountain top, you must go away to a great distance in order to see properly. You cannot hope to see the mountain top while you are living in its shadow, and yet that is what everyone is trying to do: to solve the difficulties of life from the point of view of the immediate. To solve any problem, especially the problem of life, of sorrow, suffering, pain, limitation, you must see the ultimate and focus your point of view on that which is the fulfilment, the fruition of life, and from that point of view try to solve your problems.

***

QUESTION: You said yesterday that truth has no aspects. Do you think then that any formulation of the truth is only of the mind?

KRISHNAMURTI: I do. To me, truth is life; that life which is harmonious, rich and full and which functions without hindrance in this world. That is the whole. A circle has no aspect. If a man sits on only one side and does not desire to find the whole, that limited aspect appears to him as the whole; that narrow limitation, that strip of the circle becomes the whole aspect of truth. It is not the truth, it is only a limitation of the truth; and to understand the whole you must have the whole experience of the truth, which is the self. Truth is not hidden somewhere away from life. Truth, to me, is the life of every individual liberated and functioning to its full capacity, a mind that is free, a love which is not limited nor corrupted by personal affections.

QUESTION: Absolute freedom from fear necessitates freedom from every kind of external dependence, including material dependence. But, in the present condition of things, interdependence is found to be unavoidable for the securing of the material well-being of the individual. So, how to banish fear entirely?

KRISHNAMURTI: If you merely depend on your stomach, the happiness of life is not for you. In this modern civilisation the individual does not count. He merely becomes a part of a huge machine. If you are caught in that machine, there is fear, there is repression, and your individual greatness is annihilated. But if you would seek freedom from fear of your own individual growth and greatness, you must tear yourself away from the machine. You will ask me, "How am I to do it?" How does a man in prison desire freedom, desire fresh air? He does not question, he is all the time trying to tear down the walls and escape into the open. If you are afraid of starving, then you must become a cog in the machine, you must become a part attached to the whole. But if you say. "I do not mind if I starve, but I will do what I think is right", then you are no longer a mediocre person, you are stepping out of the ordinary rut. Many people do step out of this mechanical world, but in stepping out of this mechanism, they create their own particular form of mechanism and that again catches them.

What are you concerned with? To become a part of this gigantic machine, this modern civilisation, which crushes the individual and his happiness? Or are you trying to seek your own liberation and hence set people around you free? If you think that you should become a cog, then become a first-class cog. If you want to be free, destroy the mechanism around you.

You merely want to dodge the irksome, the fearsome struggle of life. Then all these doubts exist, which are not true doubts, but questions of intentional or subconscious misunderstanding. If you really want to find, you must give your whole heart, your whole mind to it and be willing to suffer for it. You are all so respectable! You are afraid of your family, of your wives, your husbands, your fathers, your neighbours, your gurus. Then how can you find truth, which has nothing to do with any persons, with any society, with the machine? You should all, if I may suggest it, have this question always in front of you: Will that which I do lead to freedom, will it give me that vital energy to distinguish the essential and to put aside everything unessential?

QUESTION: In Benares you said: "We do not know even how to like people", and you had promised to explain it, but it was dropped as you turned to other things. Will you kindly make the idea clear? We pretend to be good to people but put down a mental curtain which reacts painfully on ourselves.

KRISHNAMURTI: I think this question arose from another question which was put to me: "What is the good of asking me to love people, when I do not know how to love at all?" I think that is about the truth of the matter. For if there is love, it should translate itself into action. Respect for another and for moral laws -if you have laws at all- should, from my point of view, be based on the idea of freedom. If you do not know how to love people, to be affectionate to people, to like people, then you must suffer in order to learn. There is no other way. If you are cruel to other people, they will be cruel to you. To like people is life; to be affectionate to people is life; and through that process you gradually develop till you care for all people alike without differentiation.

You are always ready to show respect to some superior being. I have often noticed that when I come to speak, or pass by somebody who is sitting, they always get up. If you show respect to me, you should show respect to your servant. I have often noticed that people when they pass me salute very low, whereas they only salute a servant with a wave of the hand. True respect is not to one person, it is to everyone, including your wife and children. If you are kind to one person who is your superior, it is of no value. But if you have the capacity to be kind to everyone that you come into contact with, you will have a releasing power of creative energy; merely showing respect to someone whom you think superior to you is but a reflection of your own desire for power. A man who desires to be in love with life as a whole must have the capacity to respect and to love everyone. Respect yourself and then you will respect everyone, and all your class distinctions and your spiritual distinctions will cease. Do not be afraid, for fear makes you mediocre, a cog in the machine.

QUESTION: You mentioned the process of thought by which we create our own circumstances. Will you please speak to us about it?

KRISHNAMURTI: I have just been speaking about it. To use the same simile again, if you are merely a cog in the machine, you are caught in the circumstances of society, of environment created by others. But if by everyday thought, by consideration, by analysis, you step out and break away from these limitations, then you are creating your own circumstances, your own environment, of which you are master, and they will no longer be a limitation or a burden to you. By a mechanical process or system of thought, by habitual unawareness, you can never liberate yourself, and liberation to me is the richness, the fullness of the self which is harmonious. That can never be arrived at by being a slave to environment, but by the overcoming of environment. You need the courage of your convictions. It does not matter what the consequences may be, if you think that a certain thing is right you must translate it into daily action. That is why a sinner is vastly superior to a man who is afraid of action, who is always in a state of stagnation which is mediocrity. I am not speaking harshly; I am speaking of facts. A man who cannot step out of the rut, who has not experimented, who has not struggled, will never be happy.

QUESTION: One finds a loss of interest in books of all kinds, in dramas and cinemas, as they do not give expression to the longing for reality or for individual creation. Is this to be expected?

KRISHNAMURTI: I do not know why this should be expected. If you seclude yourself from all these things, you are blocking up channels of interest, and you must be interested in all the things that are happening around you. You should not be apart from man's progress, whether mechanical or spiritual. You must have your contacts with it because you want to help him to grow beyond all limitations. Do not be like the ascetic who withdraws from this world because he finds it terrible. Rather be like a tree which has its roots deep in the dark bowels of the earth while its topmost branches are dancing in the sky.

To walk a great distance, you must begin nearby, to climb greatly you must begin low. The great danger of belonging to any society is that you tend to withdraw gradually, by an unconscious process, from outside things and seclude yourself by the desire to be different from other people, and thereby block the channels through which alone life can function freely.

III

IT IS absolutely necessary to look at the various difficulties, problems and complexities that surround us, from a disinterested, impersonal point of view. It is so difficult to do this that it is well-nigh impossible, unless you have creative determination to watch that your mind is not caught in the old ruts of habitual thought. You may, for example, try when you are out by yourself to dissociate yourself from all systems of thought, from your religions, your previous ideas, your experience -everything- and look at life absolutely dispassionately, as though you were examining something which has nothing whatever to do with you, which is exterior to you, which is purely objective, without bringing in your emotions or your prejudices; and you will see how very difficult it is to arrive at a disinterested standard of thought which belongs to the realm of no country, of no nationality, of no religion, no sect. When once you arrive at the perception of that disinterested thought, as eventually you must, it will act as a standard, it will become a mirror which will reflect all your feelings, your thoughts, your deeds, without perversion.

If you would really try to understand what I am saying -and that is the reason why you are all here-you must arrive, by continual, ceaseless effort, at that impersonal point of view and from that alter your everyday thought, your everyday affections, struggles, jealousies, envies, worries. You will find that point of view infinitely simpler than all your complexities. I know you will say "It is not meant for us all; it is for some chosen few; it is for the people of the future", and so on. But you are the people of the future. If you do not understand this, if you do not live it, if it is not part of your being, of what good is it? When you are starving, you do not say "Other people are replete with nourishment and so I can remain in a state of contentment." You want to satisfy yourself if you are hungry; and those who seek spirituality must be hungry in like manner.

Those who would understand life must have the desire to be released from their prison, to be free, and then they must question, demand everything from every passer-by. We must concern ourselves with the removal of this prison which we call sorrow. Sorrow, contention, struggle, are ceaselessly going on in the world -and this continual and numbing pain perverts judgment and warps our balanced thought. The sorrow of man is a continual oppression. It is this that we must consider. Sorrow is caused by the limitation of life in each man, and the moment you destroy that limitation and release that life liberation begins. It is with this question that we must concern ourselves: not with what happens when you are liberated or what lies beyond, but to set free the life which is held in bondage.

In this civilisation -civilisation is only the expression of culture and culture in turn is the expression of the self- in this modern civilisation a standardised man is coming into being. As a motor is standardised, so man is being standardised. That is, you are forgetting sorrow, instead of eradicating it and thereby becoming ecstatic, creative in your energies. Sorrow which is merely pushed aside makes man into an automaton.

There are two types of human beings in the world at present. The one says "Let me have a good time at any cost, no matter what happens to me or to anyone else." He is a 'good-timer'. His life is neither creative nor profitable, but dull and mediocre; he only desires to be amused. When I speak like this, do not look at other men, at your neighbours, your friends: they are not the men of whom I speak. You are the man. If all that I say applies to you, then alter yourself. As I have been saying over and over again, I am concerned with the individual and not with the machine, because the individual can control the machine which is civilisation. If the self is seeking to liberate life, if there is education of the soul, of the self -which is culture and that culture expresses itself in civilisation- then civilisation, which is the phenomenon of the self, will create the circumstances, the environment which shall set man free, which shall free life in the individual. Please therefore apply what I say to yourself and not to another. If it is not applicable to you, then leave it. If it is applicable, then change, alter. That is one type of man, who says, "At any price let me have amusements which will enable me to forget myself, my struggle, my pain, my complexities. Let me leave them aside and wander through the land of amusement which is wholly mechanical."

Then there is the other type, which is the ascetic. This is another form of 'good-timer'. A true ascetic wants to leave the world, he wants to escape from this so-called maya, and through continual introspection he kills more and more of the self instead of enriching it. The ascetic, because he is subconsciously afraid -though he may not acknowledge it- of the conflict of manifestation, of the contact with and reactions of his neighbours, of the struggle of earning money, says "As I cannot achieve perfection in this world, I must withdraw and have my good time elsewhere." This is another form of trying to forget the conflict.

I am naturally putting this in a very exaggerated form so as to make it clear. Both the 'good-timer' and the ascetic are trying to find convenient, consoling substitutes in order to escape from the conflict.

To understand life, you must find the via media, the middle course. You must recognise that both extremes are means of escaping and thereby consciously and purposely avoiding a conflict with life itself. When the mind is afraid of conflict, it cannot solve its problems of sorrow, pain, struggle, binding affection and thought, because through fear it seeks and invents other realms of escape and consolation. Follow your own mind and you will see that there is always the desire for comfort. You want a shadowy comfort, a tabernacle into which you can withdraw, when there is the battling of sorrow going on around you that is in yourself. Such a mind naturally seeks consolation, either in amusement or in the extreme form of asceticism.

To understand life which is manifested here -which is in action here- you cannot withdraw to other realms. You must understand life where you are. You must make yourself perfect, consummate where you are. That means liberating life within you -not you attaining liberation. The moment you release life within you so that it functions according to life which is diverse, unified, whole, complete, then you are making yourself perfect and hence consummate. The purpose of existence is to liberate life in man and the moment you bring in fear, fear of conflict, the mind seeks naturally for its consolation, for its convenience, for its comforts, for gods, away from this struggle. Gods become as a drug to lull you to sleep. It is the same with gurus. I know you will all disagree, but it does not matter. I maintain that to be natural and healthy, to understand life naturally, healthily, not through complexities, is vital and gives you spontaneity of power. When the mind is afraid to come into conflict with all the struggles of life, then you have religious forms, worships, prayers and thereby avoid more and more the harmonious, rich understanding of life here.

To see this point of view, you must be, as I said at the beginning, honest with yourself, absolutely detached from all the creations of your mind. You do not really know your own mind, you are not honest, you have not gone to the full logical extreme of thought. You have got secret, unexplored corners in your mind in which you take rest, to which you do not bring the light of your understanding. You must have the capacity to detach yourself absolutely from all your dark corners, from your creations, from your fears, from your traditions, from the experience of others... You do not know how difficult it is to do this, but you must do it if you would understand life. I know that you will listen to me day after day, and when I come back you will be exactly the same, with the same habitual thought, like a machine that works to produce useless things which have nothing to do with life though they may be convenient.

To release creative power, you must find out the true purpose of life, which is not to become superhuman, but to become a perfect, harmonious, consummate human being. Each one of you is trying to become more and more superhuman, because super humanity is away from humanity. But it is greater to be human beings, living, perfecting and being consummate in perfection, than to be superhuman. I know many of you will disagree, but disagree with reason, with thought, with real understanding of the significance of what I am saying, not with mere superficial judgment of words. You must understand this world, you must perfect yourself in this world, be consummate in this world, be creative in this world. To do that you must liberate the life in you which is universal. Therefore it is not a question of flight from complexities and reactions, either by having a good time or by asceticism or by magic or by anything else, because such things are only an escape, a forgetfulness, not a full solution of the complexities of life.

It is not a flight from humanity that you need. The human being wants to be beyond sorrow, like the 'goodtimer' and the ascetic. He wants to be free and happy, undisturbed, pliable of mind. This can only be achieved by constant voluntary awareness, which means freeing the life which is a prisoner within you. So long as life is held in bondage, so long as there is a limitation on that life, it is struggling, hurling itself against that limitation, and this battle creates sorrow. That is your problem. If you become a wholly mechanical being, this problem does not exist, because you are all the time forgetting, you become a cog in a machine which has nothing to do with life, or you withdraw yourself from this world and become a cog in the wheel of spirituality, which is asceticism, which also has nothing to do with life. The problem is how to release the life within you and set it free. None can do this for you, no one from outside -it does not matter who it is- can do this. You may look to others, you may worship others, but you must eventually, forcibly, come back to yourself because you as an individual must free that life which none other can liberate. I know I am elaborating this point over and over again. But it has been so dinned into you throughout all these centuries, through tradition, by authority, through scriptures and so on, that you must look for aid from outside.

To free this life you must assimilate experience through the channels of sense and desire, through the channels of thought and feeling. To block up or obstruct any one of these channels is to injure and place a limitation on the life which you desire to set free. If you block up any channel of sense, desire, thought or feeling, you pervert the full functioning of life, and there results a routine of thought, a dull habitual unawareness, fear and uncertainty and the lack of deep affection. You must assimilate experience through these channels; they are the only means man has, and you must not block them if you would set life free.

You must ever be in contact with life. When you are so fully, voluntarily aware, from this grows spontaneity of thought, of feeling, of sense and desire -not moulded or usurped by someone else. You do not then become a cog in a machine but function voluntarily with a spontaneity which is natural, clean, healthy, which is the perfume of life. If you look at life in that way, you will be sensitive, observant, tactful and ready to adjust yourself.

To set life free you must have experience. To develop that voluntary awareness, to be free from vice, or virtue which is the other extreme, you must be in love with life. On the one side there is the rich, harmonious life fully functioning, and on the other side the following of others through fear. It is much easier to follow the majority, to obey, to become a slave to tradition, a machine that functions by the power of a narrow binding morality, to be bound by the experience of others, to be held in the religious dictates of supermen. Now you have these two: the one, through the lack of understanding of the purpose of life, creating fear; and the other through that understanding, living the rich, harmonious life, vital, energising, active, interested in everything.

If you look at it from that point of view, you will see that none can help you; you must come into intimate contact with everything that is taking place around you -you cannot withdraw, nor can you forget. The man who is seeking to liberate that life must be beyond the shadow of fear, he must understand every experience through desire, through thought and feeling. He must give his whole mind, with voluntary awareness, to the understanding of every impact of the waves of life, and thereby gradually destroy his limitations and release that life which is the highest form of spirituality. How much simpler life becomes when you think it out from this point of view! It gives you creative spontaneity of thought and emotion so that you are no longer merely a machine. But to accomplish this, you must detach yourself entirely, wholly, from all the barriers that you have created around you, and hence destroy these limitations and set life free.

IV

I THINK that the difficulty with the majority of people is that they are very indifferent, and indifference generally breeds tolerance. Indifference is like a leaf which is blown about by every wind. A mind that is not clear, precise, that is not always judging, balancing, weighing everything, tends to become more and more indifferent and you admit to it every thought, it does not matter who writes or speaks it. It enters in and goes away without leaving a mark. Naturally such a mind is so indifferent that it accepts all things without examination and is benignly, sweetly, tolerant. That is what is happening with the more educated people. They accept everything without thought, without judging what they personally think about it. For example, if I put a thought before you, there is not the resistance to it of your own thought. It is like battling against a stone wall. But if there was an active, creative thought on your side, there would be a receptive quality which is essential to understanding. If you are indifferent to this thought and that kind of expression, the inference is that you are dominated, moulded, held in the authority of every passing thought. That is one of the most difficult things, I think, here in India. Hinduism admits all kinds of thought; you can be an agnostic, or the opposite, and yet you can be a Hindu. You admit everything, and hence you are like a house which lets in all the draughts. Your own mind is uncertain, you become indifferent, and indifference is sinful, if there is such a thing as sin. I would rather that you absolutely, categorically and violently deny all that I say than that you remain indifferent. You have become so tolerant that it is verging on indifference. We have in this country Christianity, Buddhism, all the religions, and we are not really spiritual, because we have become more and more indifferent. It were far better, from my point of view, to be really intolerant because you think your idea the best and that it is worth fighting for. I am not preaching intolerance; but to be indifferent to your ideas, to your own suffering, to your own drudgery, to your own dull life, is a sinful thing, is a curse.

An active mind that is constantly watchful must first experience. Truth must be experienced and then lived. You cannot believe in truth. It is yours as much as your nose is yours, as your feelings are yours. Truth is not to be believed with indifference, but to be lived with purpose, which comes from the ecstasy of every experience. Truth is life, to be experienced through desire, through sense, through thought and emotion. As I was saying yesterday, if you block up any one of these channels through fear, through lack of understanding of the purpose of life, you are choking up the only means by which life can be understood. That is why you cannot be indifferent. Be either wholly against or wholly for. Do not hesitate between the two. If you think I am wrong it does not matter. If you do what you think is right, and do not care for the consequences, then you will not develop this baneful indifference. A good swimmer would rather swim against the current, because he takes delight in the exercise, than follow sweetly along with the current, because there is not much fun in that. It is mere relaxation. An active mind which knows what it wants, which is ever analysing, experiencing, seeking, can never merely believe in truth. It must live truth. That to me is the thing of the greatest importance in these talks. I do not want you to believe in anything I say. I have been vaguely, shyly listening to the discussions that have taken place. A man says "Krishnamurti says this", but never what he personally feels, thinks, and is struggling for in life, because all this is becoming a matter of belief, not of experience, not of life. Truth is not a matter of belief or of personal affection. You may like me and I may like you. That is not a reason why you should believe what I say. Truth is life, and life is desire, thought, sense, emotions; and if you cannot understand and develop that, you will never have truth which is happiness, which is freedom. You cannot be indifferent, you must be actively for or against. It were much better, I think -I am saying this knowing that it will be misunderstood- to be fanatical, in the bigger sense of the word, to know what is essential and to seek it, no matter what the consequences may be. It is what you think that is essential, not what I think, because I cannot tell what is essential to you. It is a matter of individual discernment to find out the essential, and to do this you must be always aware, always discerning, rejecting and assimilating. Do not merely believe because I emphasise certain points over and over again. That is why I have often wondered whether it is worthwhile talking at all. Do not believe, but experience that which I am saying, because through experience alone can you grow and not through belief.

QUESTION: Because of your appeal not to misrepresent your thought, many who desire to tell others of your message are frankly afraid to do so. They are waiting till their individual perfection is achieved before they can go to help their fellowmen. Is it your desire that no one but yourself should explain what are the Beloved, the goal, the direct path, etc.?

KRISHNAMURTI: Then you will wait a very long time and that is also an excuse. Do not make this artificial. What is there so extraordinarily strange in what I am saying? It is because you are so unnatural that you take a natural thing as being unnatural, as being complicated, as being superhuman, extraordinary; you give to it all kinds of meanings and interpretations. A savage is very simple. He will believe, accept anything that I put before him without thinking that it is complicated, intricate and so on. And at the other extreme a genius, a really cultured man, will accept simplicity of thought. You are caught between the two, and hence this looks so difficult, whereas it is extremely simple. What is there that you are afraid of explaining? I have said over and over again that you must be kindly, really affectionate. What is there to explain in really loving people with detachment? It means that you must first love. But if you begin to explain those things which you do not understand, then trouble begins.

"Is it your desire that no one but yourself should explain what are the Beloved, the goal, the direct path?" Certainly not. What is the good of my being happy, if you are unhappy? What value is it to you if you are caught in sorrow? What does a prisoner want? He does not want explanations of the fresh air, what the trees are like, how the birds fly; he wants to be released and wants you to tell him of the immediate manner of release. The difficulty with the majority of people is that though they are in prisons, they are not aware of them and, being unaware of their own selves, and hence of their circumstances, they seek far away explanations which become more and more complicated. If there is one experience that you have gone through, you can explain it very easily, if your mind is active, if you are all the time seeking to understand life. But if you are living by second-hand tradition, and narrow morality, then explanations have no value, because they are not yours. After all, is not the goal, the Beloved, what every one of you is seeking all the time? Individuality creates perfection but individuality is not a thing in itself; it is by the fructifying contract with life that separateness disappears. If you come to think it over, really, sanely, wisely, what is there to explain in that? Why should you not explain it to others? Of course, if you do not believe in it, if you are not living it, explanation becomes difficult, and has no value. But if you are living on millionth part of it, and explain what you are living, then it has value because you cannot misrepresent what you are living. What is yours you can expound profoundly, vastly, without limitation, whereas if you are explaining something which is lived by another, your explanation goes wrong from the beginning to the end. Therefore, live first and then explanation comes as sweetly, benignly, as the flight of a bird from its nest. But if you do not live and merely talk, then you are like a four-footed animal which cannot fly. That is why if there were ten people who were really living this, and really explaining it to others, there would be a different world, a different smile, a change of countenance, a change of heart and not merely lip service.

QUESTION: You say that truth is pathless; are we to understand that in order to attain truth or liberation, each has to make his own path; that there will be as many paths as there are individuals and that there is no common path at any stage of the progress?

KRISHNAMURTI: Absolutely. Each one has to make his own path, because truth is a matter of individual perception and individual experience in turn, and you cannot follow the path of another, however great, however wise. Whatever prophet he may be, he cannot lead you. The individual must grow, the individual must become more and more unique to understand truth. Take the example of an arrow shot with a firm hand from a bow. There is no division of time and space at any time. It is a continual curve from the moment it leaves the bow till it reaches its aim. Mentally you can divide it into stages, but if you become part of the arrow, there are no stages -only one beautiful direct line. So in life there are no stages. It is like dawn which reaches the summit of light. To understand truth, which is life, you must develop your sense of touch, your sense of understanding, you must develop your desires and not repress or throttle them. Make your desires so consummate, so perfect, that they have no limitation. Do not be afraid of desires. As I said the other day, what you perceive you desire, and if your perception is small, narrow, limited, your desires will be the same. If your perception is one of a tranquil, stagnant, indifferent life, your desires will help you to that. But if your perception is to be absolutely limitless, free, unconditioned, whole, continual, active, then all your desires will be boundless, ecstatic, profound, rich. It is exactly the same way with thought and affection. If your thoughts are merely, all the time, reactions to the personal element, then they will place a limitation on you. The same with love and affection.

Life, and the unfoldment of life, is purely an individual affair, and truth, as I have explained, is not a matter of belief; it is to be experienced by the individual and hence there cannot be any path to truth. I know all that is said by your teachers and your books. But this is what I say; examine it, analyse, it, criticise it, question it and be active either in acceptance or in rejection of it. Do not be indifferent.

QUESTION: You frequently use the words "incorruptibility of love". Please explain what you mean by incorruptibility. How can love be corrupt?

KRISHNAMURTI: If you ask a question "how can love be corrupted?" it means that you do not love. I will explain what I mean. You love one person; you cling to that one person; you are jealous if that one person does not love you in return. Is that not so in your ordinary life? You like me and, if I do not like you, there is at once antagonism, struggle, a continuous battling. In the process of time, through the understanding of jealousy, hate, envy and all the experience of love, you make that love more and more impersonal, more and more detached, and you begin then to have the real understanding of the incorruption of love which is, like the perfume of the rose, given to all. The sun does not care on whom it shines. If once you attain to the pure quality of love without reactions, there will be no reaction of others on you. It is like this: you can go to the well with a small vessel or with a large vessel, but essentially whatever quantity you may have drawn, it will contain the whole of the well, for the whole quality of the water is in one part of it. Likewise, if you are capable of giving to another that love which is the essence of incorruptibility, it does not matter how much that other takes it, it is not your business. But you must have in your love the essence of that quality which is incorruptibility. That means that you must begin to love people, to be really affectionate to people, no matter if it leads to sorrow. We are so intellectually advanced that we see fear and entanglements in affection, and so we put it aside. There is all the time within you that volcano corrupting your perception. But to have love without fear, you must go through all the processes of love. You cannot merely sit still and meditate on the abstract idea of love. Nor can you attain it by reading books or listening to lectures. If you really love a person, you do not know what it will lead to -the immense struggles, jealousies, anxiety, constant watching whether that person likes you- and thereby you will develop more and more of that true quality of love. But if you are afraid of love and of affection, leave it aside. You are then blocking up one of the channels through which you must assimilate life. Therefore compete with kindliness, not with systems, not with what other people say, not with religions, with gurus, with gods, but compete with that thing which is eternal, struggle with it in order to understand. To attain the incorruptibility of love, you must begin with the corruption of love; you must begin to concern yourself more and more with your children, your wives, your husbands. It may be selfish, it may be passionate, it does not matter. By seeking the highest you are becoming indifferent to love, you are becoming so intellectually superhuman that your roots, which are deep in the dark soil of affection, are beginning to rot. That is why you prefer to believe, you prefer to be indifferent to all things, to sorrow, to pain, to pleasure and love. How can such a man grapple with life, understand life? How can a man who has no great passion, great ecstasies, understand life which is ecstasy, which is pain, which is desire, which is everything, which culminates in the incorruptibility of thought and love? To go far, you must begin near; to climb high, you must begin low. But if, from the beginning, you have the perception of where you want to go, of that end which is the perfection, the fulfilment of life, then the climbing will be a delight; the struggle will give ecstasy and not be a mere drudging painful process.

QUESTION: You suggest to us that we should fix our goal. You say you have attained the goal which for you is freedom, liberation and happiness. When I try to fix my goal, I find that it is not easy. There is nothing definite that appeals to me as my goal. Along what lines would you suggest that I should think, or act, so that I may perceive my goal, however dimly?

KRISHNAMURTI: Love your friends. Is not that a goal in itself? You have some abstract intellectual idea of this. If you are seeking something beyond, naturally it is vague, difficult, uncertain. But in the meantime you are treading on people. What matters is what you do now, how you act and react, how you behave, how you think now -not what you do in the future. What has the future to do with a man who is in sorrow? The goal or the beginning of perception of the goal is very near; it lies next to you, in you. You are trying to accept my goal, my definition of the goal. You want it to be made concrete, narrowed down for your perception. I cannot do that. If I did, it would have no value to you. But if you perceive the goal for yourself, then all your ideas, all your life, all your suffering will be the goal. It will be the goal of everyone, naturally, because everyone is suffering.

The question is "along what lines would you suggest that I should think, or act, so that I may perceive my goal however dimly?" How can I suggest what you should think? When you are in sorrow, when you are in loneliness, when you are in pain, you do not ask another "How am I to get out of it?" You try ways and means to get out of it, and do not sit down and try to understand how you go into it. When you are hungry what do you do? If you are of a violent nature, you go and steal or beg, or do something. You do not sit down and enquire into the cause of hunger, what is the goal of hunger. That is the reason why I said that truth is purely an individual matter, not to be acquired through any prophet, through any leader, or through your neighbour. If you understand life through yourself, it will be the life of everyone, because the self in you and in me is the same; and if you have fathomed, enriched, made perfect that self, then you will understand the self of everything and of everyone.

QUESTION: If we are to fix our goal intelligently, we must know at least something about it, however vaguely it may be. With a view to enable us to do so, will you kindly explain whether the goal or freedom you speak of is the freedom from compulsory births and deaths that others speak of? Also, whether this goal is the final step in attainment or is one in a series of steps.

KRISHNAMURTI: I am not going to answer that question, because you are not concerned with births and deaths. You are concerned with living in the present. When you worship death, as most people do, you want to know all about it, what are its qualities, whether there is birth and rebirth. But if you are concentrated on living in the present, acutely focussed in the present, then you are not afraid of death or of rebirth. I am not evading the question; I am not concerned with birth or death. It does not matter whether you are reborn or not. That has no value. What is valuable is how you are living now. Because the now contains the future and the past, space and time, everything. The whole of existence is in the now. This is not an extraordinary metaphysical thing to understand. The now projects into the past and into the future, in both directions, in all directions, and a man who is truly living will concern himself with life and not with death. He will concern himself with trying to make himself more and more perfect in the present, more and more incorruptible in the present. If you are hungry now, it will not help you to be told that you will be fed in ten days. If you are suffering from some vital disease, you want to be cured immediately, you are not concerned with how you got it and what is going to be the end of it. You want to be cured if you are suffering. So, please, if I may suggest it, do not concern yourself with these things, but concentrate your mind, your thoughts, your desires, your senses, in the present, and make them more and more perfect in the present and not in the future. To live in the present, in the now, to be acutely aware of the now requires great concentration. It demands such energy that you would much rather seek release in death and rebirth. Please see this, because it is vital, essential, that you should be incorruptible now, that you should try to understand now, and not bother about what lies ahead of you or behind you. There are innumerable theories as to what is behind and what is in front. You accept the one or the other. From my point of view, whatever theory you adopt is valueless. But what is of value is what you are now, how you are struggling now, in what way you are making your love more and more incorruptible, what your reactions are, in what way you treat your friends, in what way you consider others in your heart. The prisoner knows that he will be released from the prison in years to come, but he wants to be released immediately. A man who is concerned with solving the immediate from the point of view of the eternal has no future and no past. You must solve it from the point of view of the eternal, which is life, not only the life of the individual, but the life of the whole, not your immediate future, but the whole of all life. So, if you can grapple, understand and live in the present, actually, battling with full rich energy, then for you there is no birth or death.