Bringing about a totally new mind

J. Krishnamurti

Krishnamurti Foundation of America

Ojai, California

 

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Copyright © 2016 Krishnamurti Foundation Trust Ltd and Krishnamurti Foundation of America. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

 

FIRST EDITION

Published by Krishnamurti Foundation of America

 

Editor: Stephen Smith

Associate editor: Alok Mathur

 

ISBN: 1539500446

 

Krishnamurti Foundation of America

www.kfa.org

www.jkrishnamurti.org

ISBN 13: 9781539500445

Also by J. Krishnamurti

 

Life Ahead

Education and the Significance of Life

On Education

Think on These Things

Talks with American Students

 

 

 

 

 

Is it not the function of education to help man to bring about a total revolution? Most of us are concerned with partial revolution, economic or social. But the revolution of which I am talking is a total revolution of man at all the levels of his consciousness, of his life, of his being. That requires a great deal of understanding. It is not the result of any theory or any system of thought; on the contrary, no system of thought can produce a revolution: it can only produce a particular effect which is not a revolution. The revolution which is essential at the present time can only come into being when there is a total apprehension of the process in which man’s mind works—not according to any particular religion or any particular philosophy or any system—the understanding of ourselves as a total process. That is the only revolution that can bring about lasting peace.

– J. Krishnamurti

 

 

 

 

 

Foreword

 

1.     The Purpose of Life

2.     Education and the Purpose of Life

3.     The Aims of Education

4.     Educating the Educator

5.     The Individual and Society

6.     Fear, Anxiety, Emptiness

7.     Emptiness, Loneliness, Sorrow, Death

8.     Being Alone with Death

9.     The Conditioning Process

10.   Education and the Conditioning Process

11.   Relationship of the Teacher with the Student

12.   The Child and the Adult

13.   The Observation of Relationship

14.   Relationship with the World and People

15.   Relationship to Nature (Working with One’s Hands)

16.   The Integrated Human Being

17.   The Integrated Human Being (The Role of the Educator)

18.   Brain and Mind

19.   Knowledge, Memory, Experience, Thinking

20.   Thought Process, Ego Process

21.   Identity and Identification

22.   Concentration, Awareness and Attention

23.   Listening, Looking, Learning

24.   Freedom

25.   Freedom and Order in School

26.   Fear and Authority in School

27.   Insight

28.   Inquiry and Investigation

29.   Investigation with School Students

30.   Comparison and Competition

31.   Harmony of Body, Mind and Heart

32.   Thinking Together

33.   Thinking Together about Education

34.   Negative Thinking

35.   Intelligence

36.   Intelligence, Global Thinking and Education

37.   Intelligence and Cleverness

38.   The Scientific Mind and the Religious Mind

39.   The Scientific Mind and the Religious Mind (with School Students)

40.   Creative Energy

41.   The Conscious and the Unconscious Mind

42.   Common Consciousness

43.   The Significance of Subjects

44.   Right Action

45.   Excellence

46.   Education and Revolution

47.   Love and Compassion

48.   Love, Compassion and Wisdom

49.   Silence and Meditation

50.   Meditation with School Students

51.   Meditation and Education

 

Source Notes

 

 

 

 

 

Insights into Education presents the educational philosophy of J. Krishnamurti in an easy to use, topic-based format. It is a practical handbook, not a book for private study; indeed, as experience has shown, it comes alive best when used as an introduction to group investigation and dialogue. What it offers to teachers everywhere is an inroad into the many matters of concern with which they are faced on a daily basis. That we cannot continue as we have been doing, with rote-learning, fact-finding, and a modicum of analysis as the building blocks of education, is obvious to anyone who is at all aware—aware, that is, not only of the outer world with its amazing and accelerating technological advancement, but of the alienation, poverty, and despair, the “gutters and suicides” of our times. It is these very issues that are tackled here, sometimes implicitly but always at depth.

What Krishnamurti proposes, and here discloses, is a different approach to learning altogether, one that distinguishes itself radically from what we normally understand by that term: the accumulation of knowledge, with its application and testing. For, by thus narrowing down our understanding to the pragmatic and the measurable—a tendency, moreover, that is on the increase—we forfeit the opportunity to probe deeply and to awaken intelligence in our students and in ourselves. What is meant by intelligence in this context is not the capacity to memorize and measure, but that subtler ability to see the whole which comes alive in a human being when he/she sees the limits of the measurable. To awaken this intelligence is the goal of education.

‘Intelligence is the capacity to perceive the essential, the what is; and to awaken this capacity, in oneself and in others, is education.’

– J. Krishnamurti

Of course, the intelligence of which he speaks, which is really a shift in the dimension of learning, cannot be come upon solely by discussion. It requires the kind of orientation towards learning which sites it equally in the inner and the outer: as I learn about the world I am learning about myself. For, in terms of consciousness, the two are one.

But while challenging the basis and the thrust of education there are topics here that any teacher will recognize: Freedom, Freedom and Order in School, Fear and Authority in School, etc. Nor are these presented as the “final word”; on the contrary, each topic is intended for investigation, to be exposed and explored in actual situations. What is proposed is in no way dogmatic or canonical but rather that, in the spirit of inquiry, we open up the storehouse of the teachings so that their dynamic resonance can be felt and applied. In the context, for instance, of a dimensional shift it would be interesting to see in practical terms how this can be worked out in contemporary classrooms, including the approach to specific subjects. There is no prescribed method as such; what there is are clear, overarching statements and a host of indicators as to how to proceed. Try Listening, Looking, Learning for starters.

Some of the topics were originally intended for the use of teachers talking with each other as part of a reflective metadialogue, and these are of a more philosophical nature. But in reviewing the material for publication now, the editor feels that there is little time, existentially or practically, for these once well-established, nice distinctions. The situation is too urgent; as Krishnamurti puts it, ‘The house is burning.’ We may even be doing the students a favour by opening up for them, easily and early, such abiding topics as fear, loneliness and death. For, surely, they are already aware of them and may even bring fresh insights to them. To many of us it is increasingly obvious that we are all in the same boat and that differences of age, sex, colour and class play very little part in the furtherance of true learning.

Stephen Smith: Ojai, California, May 2015

 

 

 

 

 

Does life have a meaning, a purpose? Is not living in itself its own purpose, its own meaning? Why do we want more? Because we are so dissatisfied with our life; our life is so empty, so tawdry, so monotonous, doing the same thing over and over again, we want something more, something beyond that which we are doing. Since our everyday life is so empty, so dull, so meaningless, so boring, so intolerably stupid, we say life must have a fuller meaning . . .

A man who is living richly, a man who sees things as they are and is content with what he has, is not confused, he is clear; therefore he does not ask what is the purpose of life. For him, the very living is the beginning and the end. Our difficulty is that, since our life is empty, we want to find a purpose to life and strive for it. Such a purpose can only be mere intellection, without any reality; when the purpose of life is pursued by a stupid, dull mind, by an empty heart, that purpose will also be empty. Therefore our purpose is how to make our life rich, not with money and all the rest of it, but inwardly rich, which is not something cryptic. When you say that the purpose of life is to be happy, the purpose of life is to find God, that desire to find God is an escape from life and your God is merely a thing that is known. You can only make your way towards an object which you know; if you build a staircase to the thing that you call God, surely that is not God.

Reality can be understood only in living, not in escape. When you seek a purpose of life you are really escaping and not understanding what life is. Life is relationship, life is action in relationship; when I do not understand relationship, or when relationship is confused, then I seek a fuller meaning. Why are our lives so empty? Why are we so lonely, frustrated? Because we have never looked into ourselves and understood ourselves. We never admit to ourselves that this life is all we know and that it should therefore be understood fully and completely. We prefer to run away from ourselves, and that is why we seek the purpose of life away from relationship.

If we begin to understand action, which is our relationship with people, with property, with beliefs and ideas, then we will find that relationship itself brings its own reward—you do not have to seek. It is like seeking love. Can you find love by seeking it? Love cannot be cultivated. You will find love only in relationship, not outside relationship, and it is because we have no love that we want a purpose of life. When there is love, which is its own eternity, then there is no search for God because love is God.

The First and Last Freedom, pp. 280-81

The questioner . . . explains in his letter that he is a married man, the father of several children, and is most anxious to be informed of the purpose of life. See the tragedy of it and do not laugh. You are all in the same position, are you not? You beget children, you are in responsible positions, and yet you are immature in thought, in life; you do not know love. How shall you find out the purpose of life? Shall another tell you? Must you not discover it for yourself? Is the purpose of life the routine of office work, year after year? Is it the pursuit of money, of position and power? Is it the achievement of an ambition? Is it the performance of rituals, those vain repetitions? Is it the acquisition of virtue, to be walled in by barren righteousness? None of these is the end purpose of life. Then what is? To find it, must you not go beyond all these? Only then will you find it.

The man of sorrow is not seeking the purpose of life, he wants to be free from sorrow. But, you see, you are not aware that you suffer. You suffer but escape from it, and so do not understand it. This question should reveal to you the ways of your mind and heart; the question is a self-revelation. You are in conflict, in confusion, in misery, which is the result of your own daily activities of thought and feeling. To understand this conflict, confusion and misery, you have to understand yourself, and as you understand, thought proceeds deeper and deeper until the end purpose is revealed. But to merely stand on the edge of confusion and ask the meaning of life has no meaning. A man who has lost the song of his heart, he is ever seeking, he is enchanted by the voice of others. He will find it again only when he ceases to follow, when his desire is still.

Madras 1947: Talk #8, CW Vol. IV, pp. 129-30

 

 

 

 

 

Questioner: What is right education? As teachers and as parents we are confused.

 

Krishnamurti: Now, how are we going to find the truth of this matter? Merely forcing the mind into a system, a pattern, is obviously not education. So, to discover what is right education, we must find out what we mean by education. Education is not to learn the purpose of life, but to understand the meaning, the significance, the process of existence; because if you say life has a purpose then the purpose is self-projected. To find out what is right education you have first to inquire into the whole significance of life, of living. What is present education? Learning to earn money, acquiring a trade, becoming an engineer, a sociologist, learning how to butcher people or how to read a poem. If you say education is to make a person efficient, which means to give him technical knowledge, then you must understand the whole significance of efficiency.

What happens when a person becomes more and more efficient? He becomes more and more ruthless. What are you doing in your daily life? What is happening now in the world? Education means the development of a particular technique, which is efficiency, which means industrialization, the capacity to work faster and produce more and more, all of which ultimately leads to war. You see this happening every day. Education as it is leads to war, and what is the point of education? To destroy or be destroyed. So, obviously, the present system of education is utterly futile; therefore what is important is to educate the educator. These are not clever statements to be listened to and laughed off. Because without educating the teacher, what can he teach the child except the exploiting principles on which he himself has been brought up?

Most of you have read many books. Where are you? You have money or can earn it, you have your pleasures and ceremonies—and you are in conflict. What is the point of education, of learning to earn money, when your whole existence leads to misery and war? So, right education must begin with the educator, the parent, the teacher; and the inquiry into right education means inquiry into life, into existence, does it not? What is the point of your being educated as a lawyer if you are only going to increase conflict and maintain litigation? But there is money in that, and you thrive on it. So, if you want to bring about right education, you must obviously understand the meaning, the significance, of existence. It is not only to earn money, to have leisure, but to be able to think directly, truly—not consistently, because to think consistently is merely to conform to a pattern. A consistent thinker is a thoughtless person: he merely repeats certain phrases and thinks in a groove. To find out what is right education, there must be the understanding of existence, which means the understanding of yourself, because you cannot understand existence abstractly; you cannot understand yourself by theorizing as to what education should be. Right education begins with the right understanding of the educator.

Look at what is happening in the world: governments are taking control of education—naturally, because all governments are preparing for war. Your pet government, as well as the foreign government, must inevitably prepare for war. A sovereign government must have an army, a navy, an air force. To make the citizens efficient for war, to prepare them to perform their duties thoroughly, efficiently, ruthlessly, the central government must control them; therefore they educate them, as they manufacture mechanical instruments, to be ruthlessly efficient. If that is the purpose and end of education, to destroy or be destroyed, then it must be ruthless; and I am not at all sure that that is not what you want, because you are still educating your children in the same old fashion. Right education begins with the understanding of the educator, the teacher, which means that he must be free of established patterns of thought. Education is not merely imparting information, knowing how to read, gathering and correlating facts, but it is seeing the whole significance of education, of government, of the world situation, of the totalitarian spirit which is becoming more and more dominant throughout the world. Being confused, you create the educator who is also confused, and through so-called education you give power to destroy the foreign government. Therefore before you ask what right education is, you must understand yourself; and you will see that it does not take a long time to understand yourself if you are interested to find out. Without understanding yourself as the educator, how can you bring about a new kind of education? Therefore we come back to the eternal point, which is yourself. And you want to avoid that point, you want to shift the responsibility onto the teacher, onto the government. The government is what you are, the world is what you are; and without understanding yourself, how can there be right education?

Rajahmundry 1949: Talk #3, CW Vol. VI, pp. 20-22

 

 

 

 

 

The ignorant man is not the unlearned but he who does not know himself, and the learned man is stupid when he relies on books, on knowledge and on authority to give him understanding. Understanding comes only through self-knowledge, which is awareness of one’s total psychological process. Thus education, in the true sense, is the understanding of oneself, for it is within each one of us that the whole of existence is gathered. . . .

Without understanding ourselves, mere occupation leads to frustration, with its inevitable escapes through all kinds of mischievous activities. Technique without understanding leads to enmity and ruthlessness, which we cover up with pleasant-sounding phrases. Of what value is it to emphasize technique and become efficient entities if the result is mutual destruction? Our technical progress is fantastic, but it has only increased our powers of destroying one another, and there is starvation and misery in every land. . . .

The right kind of education, while encouraging the learning of a technique, should accomplish something which is of far greater importance; it should help man to experience the integrated process of life. It is this experiencing that will put capacity and technique in their right place. . . .

Ideals and blueprints for a perfect utopia will never bring about the radical change of heart which is essential if there is to be an end to war and universal destruction. Ideals cannot change our present values: they can be changed only by the right kind of education, which is to foster the understanding of what is . . .

The right kind of education is not concerned with any ideology, however much it may promise a future utopia: it is not based on any system, however carefully thought out; nor is it a means of conditioning the individual in some special manner. Education in the true sense is helping the individual to be mature and free, to flower greatly in love and goodness. . . .

Another function of education is to create new values. Merely to implant existing values in the mind of the child, to make him conform to ideals, is to condition him without awakening his intelligence. Education is intimately related to the present world crisis, and the educator who sees the causes of this universal chaos should ask himself how to awaken intelligence in the student, thus helping the coming generation not to bring about further conflict and disaster. He must give all his thought, all his care and affection to the creation of the right environment and to the development of understanding, so that when the child grows into maturity he will be capable of dealing intelligently with the human problems that confront him. But in order to do this, the educator must understand himself instead of relying on ideologies, systems and beliefs.

Education and the Significance of Life, pp. 17-25

To really tackle the problem of what is true education, to understand the whole significance of education, why we are educated, what it is all about, is an immense thing not just to be talked about for a few minutes. You may have read or be capable of reading many books, you may have great knowledge, an infinite variety of explanations, but that is not freedom. Freedom comes with the understanding of oneself, and it is only such freedom that can meet without fear every crisis, every influence that conditions; but that requires a great deal of penetration, meditation.

New York 1954: Talk #3, CW Vol. VIII, p. 227

 

 

 

 

 

Questioner: May we know your ideas on education and how it can be imparted?

 

Krishnamurti: This is an enormous subject, and to try to answer it in a few minutes is quite absurd because its implications are so vast, but we will state it as clearly and as simply as possible because there is a great joy in seeing a thing clearly without being influenced by other people’s notions and ideas and instructions, whether they be the government or the specialists or the very learned in education. What has happened in the world after centuries of education? We have had two catastrophic wars which have almost destroyed man, that is, man as a means of knowledge. We see that education has failed because it has resulted in the most dreadful destruction that the world has ever known. So, what has happened? Seeing that education has failed, governments are stepping in to control education. They want to control the way in which you should be educated, what you think—not how you think, but what you think. So, when the government steps in there is regimentation, as has happened throughout the world. Governments are not concerned with the happiness of the masses, but they are concerned with producing an efficient machine; and as our age is a technical age, they want technicians who will create the marvellous modern machine called society. These technicians will function efficiently and therefore automatically. This is what is happening in the world, whether the government is of the left or of the right. They do not want you to think, but if you do think then you must think along a particular line or according to what religious organizations say. We have been through this process, the control by the organized religion, by the priests and by the government. It has resulted in disaster and in the exploitation of man. Whether man is exploited in the name of God or in the name of the government, it is the same thing. As man is human he eventually breaks up the system. So, that is one of the problems. As long as education is the handmaiden of the government there is no hope. This is the tendency we find everywhere in the world at the present time, whether it is inspired by the right or by the left, because if you are left free to think for yourself you may revolt and therefore you will have to be liquidated. There are various methods of liquidation which we need not go into.

In considering education we will have to find out the purpose of education, the purpose of living. If that is not clear to you, why educate yourself? What is significant? What are we living for? What are we struggling for? If that is not clear to you, education has no significance, has it? One period will be technical, another period will be religious, the next period will be something else again and so on. We are talking about a system and so is it not important to find out what it is all about? Are you merely being educated in order to get a job? Then you make living a means to a job and you make of yourself a man to fit into a groove. Is that the purpose? We must think of this problem in that light and not merely repeat slogans. To a life that is not free from systems, whether they be modern or ancient, free of even the most advanced and progressive ideas, education will have no meaning. If you do not know why you are living, what the purpose of being educated is, then why make so much fuss about how you are educated? As it is, you are . . . becoming cannon fodder. If that is what we want, then certainly we must make ourselves extremely efficient to kill each other; and that is what is happening, is it not? There are more armies, more armaments, more money invested in producing bacteriological warfare and atomic destruction than ever before, and in order to accomplish all this you must be technicians of the highest order, and therefore you are becoming tools of destruction. Is not all this due to education? You are becoming fodder for cannons, regimented minds. Or else you become an industrialist, a businessman grabbing after money, and if this does not interest you, you become addicted to knowledge, to books, or you aspire to be a scientist caught in his laboratory. If there is any higher purpose to our lives and we do not discover it, then life has very little significance; it is as if we committed suicide. And we are committing suicide when we make ourselves into machines, either religious machines or political machines. So if we do not discover what the purpose of life is, education has very little significance.