J. Krishnamurti
Jiddu Krishnamurti (May 11 1895 - February 17 1986) was "discovered" as a young boy by C.W. Leadbeater in India on the beach at Adyar in Chennai. He was subsequently brought up world-wide by members of the Theosophical Society - Adyar, who believed him to be a prophecied (see Second Coming; Maitreya Buddha) incarnation of God or Messiah.
Eventually Krishnamurti ended up disbanding the Order of the Star of the East, in 1929, of which he had been made the leader, and which was founded to support him. He spent the rest of his life teaching his own philosophy. Although Krishnamurti himself did not accept followers, his teachings have many followers to this day.
Central to his teachings is the idea that truth is being free of self and being aware without judgement. Basic themes include the unity of observer and observed, fear, love, nature, meditation, thought, tradition and evolution, and choiceless awareness.
Krishnamurti believed that the act of meditation brings order to the activity of thought. By reducing the usual noise and chaos in the mind through meditation, he believed that the mind would remain quiet, without thought, unless it had a valid purpose. He believed that ordering mental activity like this is one key to ending mankind's sorrow and confusion.
A tremendous volume of material exists documenting the philosophical investigations of Krishnamurti (or simply "k" how he preferred to be called) mostly in the form of recorded conversations and talks, although k also wrote several series of short essays and kept a personal journal at least twice in his life. Of particular importance are a series of conversations recorded in 1980 with theoretical physicist David Bohm that resulted in the publication of The Ending of Time and The Future of Humanity.
Quotations
- "Truth is a pathless land. Man cannot come to it through any organization, through any creed, through any dogma, priest or ritual, not through any philosophic knowledge or psychological technique. He has to find it through the mirror of relationship, through the understanding of the contents of his own mind, through observation and not through intellectual analysis or introspective dissection." ,
- "If one can really come to that state of saying, 'I do not know,' it indicates an extraordinary sense of humility; there is no arrogance of knowledge; there is no self-assertive answer to make an impression. When you can actually say, 'I do not know,' which very few are capable of saying, then in that state all fear ceases because all sense of recognition, the search into memory, has come to an end; there is no longer inquiry into the field of the known."
- "Obviously what causes war is the desire for power, position, prestige, money; also the disease called nationalism, the worship of a flag; and the disease of organized religion, the worship of a dogma. All these are the causes of war; if you as an individual belong to any of the organized religions, if you are greedy for power, if you are envious, you are bound to produce a society which will result in destruction. So again it depends upon you and not on the leaders ? not on so-called statesmen and all the rest of them. It depends upon you and me but we do not seem to realize that. If once we really felt the responsibility of our own actions, how quickly we could bring to an end all these wars, this appalling misery! But you see, we are indifferent. We have three meals a day, we have our jobs, we have our bank account, big or little, and we say, 'For God?s sake, don?t disturb us, leave us alone'."
- "Freedom from the Known is death, and then you are living."
Partial list of published works
See also
