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Richard’s Correspondence on Mailing List ‘B’ with Respondent No. 27
RICHARD (to Respondent No. 12): As you choose to use Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti as your authority for making
this statement, then you must – I repeat must – acknowledge his authority in order for your words to carry weight. And that
authority is, as I have already observed in other posts, ‘That which is sacred, holy’ (which Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti would
willingly ‘bow down to; that I would prostrate myself to’. RESPONDENT: Maybe you have already mentioned it, but if so, I missed it. Do you know in which book Krishnamurti said the above, especially the approx. year said. Krishnamurti mentioned ‘the sacred’, but his speeches prior to his speech disbanding the ‘Order of the Star’, seemed to be heavily influenced by Theosophical Society. From what I have read, such a quote seems more likely to have been said before. If not, then so be it. If someone quoted you, prior to ‘achieving’ your present state, I would not be surprised if it varied greatly from what you may say now. RICHARD: I will re-post the original paragraphs that this thread derived from and you will be able to see for yourself. I do not have the book in question to hand, but I read it sometime during the late eighties and, as I recall, it had only recently been published then.
RESPONDENT: When Krishnamurti referred to the sacred, was he referring to something separate, something to be worshipped, something to prostrate himself? RICHARD: As you will have seen from the above post, yes indeed he was ... without the slightest doubt. Another example: [quote] ‘Meditation is ... emptying the mind of everything known. Without this, you cannot know the unknown. Truth, or God, or whatever name you might like to give to it, must be something new ... God or Truth [is not] the result of propaganda ... that is not the truth. Truth is something living every day. Therefore the mind must be emptied to look at the Truth ... [then you may understand] what Truth is, or God, or whatever name you like to give to it’ [end quote]. (‘Meeting Life’ Copyright © 1991 Krishnamurti Foundation Trust, Ltd. Extract from: Bulletin 9, 1970-71) RESPONDENT: In his book, ‘The Awakening of Intelligence’ published in 1973, there is a chapter called ‘The Sacred’. If you are interested in what Krishnamurti considered sacred, maybe it is worth reading ...<SNIPPED FOR BREVITY>... having read the whole chapter, talk of ‘prostration’ is not there. If [quote] ‘the mind reaches the highest point of absolute order’ [end quote] prostration would imply the mind bowing down to itself. RICHARD: I could not agree more ... prostration does indeed imply the mind bowing down to itself. All reverence and worship of ‘that which is sacred, holy’ amounts to nothing more than narcissistic self-aggrandisement. The ‘self’ that causes all the atrocious animosity and anguish in this otherwise delightful world transmogrifies itself into a grand ‘Self’ (by whatever name) ... and otherwise intelligent people speak in hushed tones about it! It is generally capitalised, you will notice, and some people go to great lengths to deny that Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti and his ilk – enlightened masters – are surrendered to this spurious divinity. The trouble with people who discard the god of Christianity is that they do not realise that by turning to the Eastern spirituality they have effectively jumped out of the frying pan into the fire. Eastern spirituality is religion ... merely in a different form to what people in the West have been raised to believe in. Eastern philosophy sounds so convincing to the Western mind that is desperately looking for answers. The Christian conditioning actually sets up the situation for a thinking person to be susceptible to the esoteric doctrines of the East. It is sobering to realise that the intelligentsia of the West are eagerly following the East down the slippery slope of striving to attain to a self-seeking Divine Immortality ... to the detriment of life on earth. ‘That which is sacred, holy’, for example, is simply the Eastern term for ‘God’; thus any order designated [quote] ‘absolute order’ [end quote] translates easily as ‘The Kingdom of God on earth as it is in Heaven’ ... in Western terminology. At the end of the line there is always a god of some description, lurking in disguise, wreaking its havoc with its ‘Teachings’. Have you ever been to India to see for yourself the results of what they claim are tens of thousands of years of devotional spiritual living? I have, and it is hideous. If it were not for the appalling suffering engendered it would all be highly amusing. (Editorial note: the exact quote is as follows: [Ms. Pupul Jayakar]: ‘... the feeling of presence was overpowering, and soon my voice stopped. Krishnaji turned to me, ‘Do you feel It? I could prostrate to It?’ His body was trembling as he spoke of the presence that listened. ‘Yes, I can prostrate to this, that is here’. Suddenly he turned and left us, walking alone to his room’. page 364; Jayakar, Pupul: ‘Krishnamurti – A Biography’; Harper & Row; San Francisco; 1986).
RICHARD (to Respondent No. 12): I am well aware that Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti repeatedly said: ‘The
description is not the described’ and you are doing what he said not to do. To wit: ‘Do not quote anyone, least of all the
speaker’. Unless you are living the actuality of that phrase ‘The description is not the described’ then you are mouthing
empty rhetoric. RESPONDENT: There is one problem with this quote. Krishnamurti also often asked that people do not accept what he says, not to follow, but to find out for themselves. So if I do not quote Krishnamurti because he asked me not to, then I am going against his other request, that I do not accept anything he says. Now that’s confusing! RICHARD: Well said! Mostly, people who apply themselves diligently to Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti’s ‘Teachings’ wind up being hopelessly confused. I spent three months with a ‘Krishnamurtiite’ in the Himalayas in 1984 and through intense and rigorous discussion, I came to know the pitfalls and shortcomings of Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti’s ‘Teachings’ through and through. Anyone following the ‘Teachings’ simply ties themselves in knots ... and to no avail. People become too clever for their own good. RESPONDENT: So I guess I will just stuff the consequences and do what I feel like doing, and if that involves quoting Krishnamurti or Joe Blow, so be it. RICHARD: Good on you. I, personally, have no objection to anyone quoting anything at any time or any where, as long as they acknowledge they are not living it. It is just that I started of being engaged in correspondence with someone living today and wound up in a debate with a dead man’s words (words which, by Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti’s own admission on his death-bed, had not set anyone free in sixty-odd years). If someone is so foolish as to create the impression when they engage in a dialogue with me that they are living the reality of these words when they are not ... then, as I wrote, one is ‘mouthing empty rhetoric’. Although, as far as I am concerned, it is all a massive delusion anyway, but I just thought I might demonstrate the ridiculousness of quoting Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti when one is not living the reality of the words.
RESPONDENT: In one of the first posts I ever sent to this list, I wondered why anyone described Krishnamurti’s words as ‘teachings’. Maybe, a better description would be Krishnamurti’s comments on life as he saw it. Just because someone you met in the Himalayas, was attempting to mould their life according to those comments, as there probably are on this list, that does imply that that was Krishnamurti’s intention. RICHARD: I was merely following the precedent that Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti himself set. He consistently referred to all his words as ‘Teachings’. As these words came from a source that he described as ‘that which is sacred, holy’, it is clear that he was bringing some unknown god’s wisdom to earth. RESPONDENT: In previous posts I have also mentioned that normally I do not quote Krishnamurti unless it makes sense to me. There may be occasions when I may say, Krishnamurti spoke about this or that, but as it doesn’t make sense to me, I see no point in saying he was right or wrong. Many people on this list including yourself, speak of things, which I am unwilling to state as right or wrong. That is why I am on this list. To examine and question my feeling, my life and how I react to the comments of others. RICHARD: This is a healthy approach ... you have already discovered that Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti’s ‘comments’ are in fact divine ‘Teachings’. Who knows what you may discover next. RESPONDENT: Even Krishnamurti said, ‘I hope you are not merely listening to the speaker; that has no value at all because the speaker is not teaching you a thing’. Just because others look on his words as principles to be lived, does not mean that this was Krishnamurti’s wish. So if Krishnamurti on his death bed said that his words, ‘had not set anyone free in sixty-odd years’, then based on his previous statement, that makes sense. RICHARD: Yes ... except that in 1929 he stated: ‘I have only one desire – to set humankind free’. As he spent the next sixty-odd years talking to people about freedom, then his death-bed confession is a remarkable admittance of the failure of divine words to be effective in ameliorating the Human Condition. I, for one, ‘get the message’. I looked elsewhere for the understanding of the cause of malice and sorrow within me. I found that source ... and succeeded. I am now happy and harmless. I never experience fear and aggression ... and have not done so for five years. Also, do you not think that a person bringing ‘Teachings’ is being somewhat disingenuous when they say that they are ‘not teaching you a thing’? RESPONDENT: As listening to his words alone has no value, then how could his words alone set anyone free. The only value in listening to another is in examining what you are actually feeling at the moment of listening. The major difference I can see between Krishnamurti’s words and the words of many others, was his ability to express clearly, what he was feeling, and that most of what he said makes sense to me. I will listen to his words, the words of No. 12, the words of yourself etc, but all that really matters is not with choosing who is right or wrong, but in clearly seeing what I feel. RICHARD: You used the words ‘feeling’ and ‘feel’ as being the final arbiter of what is going to make sense ... by which I take it that you mean what is most conducive to peace and harmony. As the cause of the dearth of peace and harmony is made by feelings and beliefs, then how on earth can you trust feelings so absolutely as being the ultimate determiner of appropriate action and behaviour? Feelings – emotions and passions – and beliefs (emotion-backed thoughts) are what is killing people. RESPONDENT: Out of curiosity, do you feel that your words alone will fundamentally change another? RICHARD: There is that word ‘feel’ again. I do not ‘feel’ that my words will fundamentally change another ... I can know that they will for they are words of facts and actuality and seeing a fact can set you on the wide and wondrous path to an actual freedom. But when you say ‘words alone’ what are you implying? Words are all we have to communicate with each, is this not so? If words will not do anything, then what is the point in reading and writing and talking? Are we to sit and do nothing about the atrocious animosity and anguish that pervades every nook and cranny of the otherwise fair earth that we all live on? As there have been over 160,000,000 people killed in wars this century ... is this what you wish on the residents of the next century? Another 160,000,000 useless and unnecessary deaths? Not to mention all the destruction of what makes life comfortable? I can know what my death-bed confession will be.
RESPONDENT: I was not in India for too long, and though I heard of the religious spirit of the country, on a bus to Agra I was talking to a man who had fled what is now East Pakistan, and he spoke with the desire to kill Muslims in his heart. He may have been an extreme example, but from what I saw and have read, I do not consider India any more ‘spiritual’ than the west. As I have said previously that very distinction of people or things as spiritual or not spiritual sounds ridiculous to me. RICHARD: It may be ridiculous ... but adherents of different religious and spiritual affiliations can sometimes be very busy killing and torturing each other. Some Indians like to think their country is the most spiritual country on earth ... and as such have a lot to offer to the world. RESPONDENT: As I have said previously, while stoned years ago, I read a few books of a so-called ‘spiritual’ nature, then a book by K. In my travels I met all those fellow travellers, wrapped up in Eastern mythology, but it held no attraction for me. The strange thing is that on reading K, his reverences to the sacred etc, had little interest to me. On reading him, it was his examination of the process of thought, that made sense to me. As I said in an earlier post today, if it didn’t make sense, I just left it. I first read Krishnamurti over 25 years ago, but have lived a so-called ‘un-spiritual’ life. I still have no interest in the sacred as something divine to be worshipped, and though you seem to interpret Krishnamurti as having done so, that is not what I feel having read Krishnamurti. RICHARD: It is not my interpretation ... it is a well-documented fact. RESPONDENT: In other words, two different people can have totally different feelings on listening to another. From what you have previously written, you appear to have been involved in the normal spiritual modes of examination. Though you may now be questioning this, you seem to be still interpreting others according to that background. As long as someone listens to Krishnamurti as just another eastern mystic, then when he uses words like sacred, my feeling is that you are listening to words alone, which you will interpret according to usual eastern ideas of sacred. RICHARD: When you say ‘listening to the words alone’, what are you suggesting? That there is something lying behind the words that I am missing?
RICHARD (to Respondent No. 12): If you still wish to become enlightened, you will need to sublimate your
passions – surrender your wilful self – and move into accord with some metaphysical Absolute, like Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti did
in 1922 under a pepper tree, as detailed by Ms. Mary Lutyens. Abject subjugation of the will should produce the essential
servitude – great cunning is required – and the rest is up to the ‘Grace of God’. RESPONDENT: In a previous post I remarked that Krishnamurti spoke differently before his speech disbanding ‘The Order of the Star’. That speech was in 1929. Whatever happened in 1922 under a pepper tree sounds like many so-called enlightenment experiences. RICHARD: It does not only ‘sound like’ one ... it was one. And it is not a ‘so-called’ enlightenment ... it was enlightenment. One only has to do some comparative reading of other people’s Self-Realisation to recognise the obvious similarities. Tell me, please, because I am so curious: If he did not become enlightened then – as you say he did not – then when did he ... in your opinion? RESPONDENT: He concluded his speech in 1929, saying: ‘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 men absolutely, unconditionally free’. Whatever happened in 1922 could not have been too enlightening if he spent a few years prior to 1929 ‘thinking about this, slowly, carefully, patiently’. RICHARD: Oh, I was not aware that enlightened people were not allowed to think ‘slowly, carefully and patiently’. Do you really consider that they make lightening-like decisions on the spot? RESPONDENT: It sounds to me that whatever Krishnamurti experienced in 1922 was the product of his theosophical background. RICHARD: Partly that, yes ... and partly the cultural milieu of the country he was born in. But as enlightenment is mainly the result of taking the rudimentary self born out of the instinctual fear and aggression and nurture and desire one is born with as being one’s true being and origin, then I would first look to that as being the source of his experience . RESPONDENT: If you are really interested in what Krishnamurti was on about, it may be of interest to read the whole speech from the KFA site. It is in the following post. [The 1929 ‘Dissolution of The Order of The Star’ speech]. What he said then is equally valid today. RICHARD: You really should not give me more fuel for my fire, you know, because I will only go through it and pick out the damning evidence that he was, in fact, spiritual to the bootstraps. Okay, then what did he say then that is equally valid today?
That seems to be quite clear and unambiguous: ‘I am the Truth’ ... with a capital ‘T’ to designate divinity. And just in case it is not clear there is the follow-up statement: ‘me, the embodiment of Truth’ ... which easily translates in Western terminology as: ‘I am God made flesh’. Now ... what else did he say then that ‘is equally valid today’:
I see the word ‘spirituality’ in there ... followed by a ‘self which is eternal’ ... which translates as ‘immortal soul’ in Western parlance. Methinks you just shot yourself in the foot.
RICHARD: When you say ‘listening to the words alone’, what are you suggesting? That there is something lying behind the words that I am missing? RESPONDENT: Apparently yes. Words are communicative tools for describing things, feelings whatever. Words can even describe a rational or irrational groupings of other words, but that description is not that which is being described. If in listening to you all I hear is a few words like ‘Richard’, ‘enlightenment’, ‘no feelings’, ‘no fear’ mistakenly I may feel that I know you. All I know is a few very limited ideas. If you are mesmerised by a few words, than you will miss the facts. As humans, words have their place, but the actual is not beyond the words. The actual is. Words are a description of what was actual, so in a sense, the words are beyond the facts. These ever changing facts are not something ‘spiritual’ to be worshipped, since by the time you get round to talking about it, what you are worshipping is already dead and gone. So listening to words alone is a very superficial affair. Your saying, ‘It is not my interpretation ... it is a well-documented fact’ is a good example of listening to words alone. You have interpreted Krishnamurti (and others), and are mistaking the descriptions by yourself and others with the facts. Most people rush in with a description of a fact, and worship their description. RICHARD: So let me see if I have understood you (I do not have the book so this is not a direct quote): When Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti said that: ‘There is that which is beyond thought, that which is sacred, holy; that I bow down to; that I would prostrate myself to’ ... then when I ‘rush in with a description of the fact’ that he was referring to divinity I am ‘mesmerised by a few words’ ... and I miss ‘the facts’. May I ask then, since you know and I do not, what are ‘the facts’ that I am missing? Was ‘that which is sacred, holy’ only a piece of chewing gum? (Editorial note: the exact quote is as follows: [Ms. Pupul Jayakar]: ‘... the feeling of presence was overpowering, and soon my voice stopped. Krishnaji turned to me, ‘Do you feel It? I could prostrate to It?’ His body was trembling as he spoke of the presence that listened. ‘Yes, I can prostrate to this, that is here’. Suddenly he turned and left us, walking alone to his room’. page 364; Jayakar, Pupul: ‘Krishnamurti – A Biography’; Harper & Row; San Francisco; 1986). Now, if Ms. Pupal Jayakar’s recollection of the incident is a factual record of what actually took place, then it is obvious, is it not, that Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti was in the state of reverence himself ... he was in veneration of what he named: ‘The absolute’, ‘the other’, ‘the supreme’, ‘that which is eternal, timeless and nameless’ (which is still divinity by whatever name). And there are many, many other instances throughout the extensive writings, by both himself and others, that clearly points to the fact, does it not, that he was a spiritual and religious man? What, then, am I to make of this if not a creator god:
Where am I ‘rushing in’ with interpretations? Is it not obvious? Why do you defend the indefensible? * RICHARD: I was merely following the precedent that Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti himself set. He consistently referred to all his words as ‘Teachings’. As these words came from a source that he described as ‘that which is sacred, holy’, it is clear that he was bringing some unknown god’s wisdom to earth. RESPONDENT: As I have already shown he also said, ‘I hope you are not merely listening to the speaker; that has no value at all because the speaker is not teaching you a thing’. RICHARD: But do you not think that a person bringing ‘Teachings’ is being somewhat disingenuous when they say that they are not ‘teaching you anything’? RESPONDENT: If all we listen to are descriptions, then you will probably interpret one description as the fact and describe any other description as a contradiction. Every description can be described as contradictory, if the listener hears and compares words alone, and has little interest in the actual facts. Your description of K’s words has so little to do with what he spoke of, that I wonder if you have ever just listened to K, without rushing in with some interpretation, which you mistakenly believe are the facts. RICHARD: Seeing that I am ‘rushing in with some interpretation’ ... am I to presume that you are not? And before you come out with some facile explanation, let me remind you that you wrote above: ‘Your description of Krishnamurti’s words has so little to do with what he spoke of, that I wonder if you have ever just listened to Krishnamurti, without rushing in with some interpretation, which you mistakenly believe are the facts’. As you are not ‘rushing in’ ... then you tell me: what are these ‘facts’? * RICHARD: This is a healthy approach ... you have already discovered that Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti’s ‘comments’ are in fact divine ‘Teachings’. Who knows what you may discover next. RESPONDENT: Apparently you have not listened to anything but your own interpretations. I have not discovered ‘divine teachings’ in anyone. That is merely your distorted interpretation of my words. That is what I discovered next. RICHARD: So I take it then that ignorance is bliss? It was, after all, you who designated his ‘Teaching’ as being ‘comments’ ... even when he himself called them ‘Teachings’. Are you saying that you know better than Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti himself what to call them? * RICHARD: You used the words ‘feeling’ and ‘feel’ as being the final arbiter of what is going to make sense ... by which I take it that you mean what is most conducive to peace and harmony. As the cause of the dearth of peace and harmony is made by feelings and beliefs, then how on earth can you trust feelings so absolutely as being the ultimate determiner of appropriate action and behaviour? Feelings – emotions and passions – and beliefs (emotion-backed thoughts) are what is killing people. RESPONDENT: There is nothing final about feelings, they just come and go. As for being the ‘final arbiter’ that is another of your distorted perceptions of my words, as is your opinion that I am concerned with ‘what is most conducive to peace and harmony’. Who said I trust my feelings? RICHARD: Well now ... you did when you said in your previous post: [quote]: ‘I still have no interest in the sacred as something divine to be worshipped, and though you seem to interpret Krishnamurti as having done so, that is not what I feel having read Krishnamurti. In other words, two different people can have totally different feelings on listening to another. As long as someone listens to Krishnamurti as just another eastern mystic, then when he uses words like sacred, my feeling is that you are listening to words alone, which you will interpret according to usual eastern ideas of sacred’. [endquote]. I see the words ‘feel’, ‘feelings’ and ‘feeling’ in there ... what do you reckon? RESPONDENT: My feelings can be as distorted as your ‘Clayton’s feelings’. (For those who don’t know there are ads for non-alcoholic drinks called Claytons. What you have when you are not having a drink). RICHARD: This is the classic ‘straw man’ argument. RESPONDENT: I agree that emotions, passions and beliefs can be described as feelings, and that such feelings divide and can lead to killing people. RICHARD: I am pleased that we can agree on something. RESPONDENT: Feelings can also be used as a description for what the brain senses at any moment. You look at a beautiful face, the brain senses. That is what I describe as feeling. If you have a better word, let me know. RICHARD: The heart goes ‘flip-flop’? If it is beauty then it is an affective response ... not a sensate response, as you try to make out. RESPONDENT: When you say you have no feelings, are you saying you do not interpret others, and have opinions about them? RICHARD: Being devoid of feelings I have the freedom to appraise without prejudice. If there is insufficient information, I can certainly form an opinion and make an interpretation ... but then I will clearly state that this or that is only an opinion or an interpretation when I speak about it. When I point out a fact ... the fact speaks for itself. RESPONDENT: When you look at snow capped mountains, does your brain sense beauty at that moment? RICHARD: No, I never feel beauty. The eyes delight in colour, light and shade and so on, just as the taste buds enjoy flavours ... these are pure physical sensations. In other words: Pleasure ... perfect sensual pleasure. RESPONDENT: When you read a post that considers your interpretations to be distorted, what does your brain sense at that moment? RICHARD: That there is a person trapped within the Human Condition telling me that I have got it wrong. However, as they are not free of malice and sorrow, then their words carry no weight at all. I call it ‘empty rhetoric’ ... if I am being polite. * RICHARD: I do not ‘feel’ that my words will fundamentally change another ... I can know that they will for they are words of facts and actuality and seeing a fact can set you on the wide and wondrous path to an actual freedom. RESPONDENT: When you say ‘know’ that is just a Clayton’s feeling. Another distortion of the actual, which you interpret as a fact. Your brain senses something and describes it as a fact, my brain senses and describes it as a feeling. RICHARD: And is your description of your brain sensing as a feeling accurate? Can feelings be trusted absolutely? If not, what then do you rely on to make valid appraisals? RESPONDENT: You place your description at the lofty level of ‘knowing’ while considering ‘feelings’ as wishy washy. RICHARD: Not only ‘wishy-washy’ ... downright unreliable and dangerous into the bargain. 160,000,000 people have been killed in wars this century alone because of feelings – emotions and passions – being the ruling force. RESPONDENT: The difference is that I don’t mistake my feelings as facts. RICHARD: Are you still so sure about that after what was discussed above? RESPONDENT: Whereas your descriptions have become the facts for you. RICHARD: Not ‘become’ the facts ... are the facts. RESPONDENT: Enjoy the trip anyway. RICHARD: Thank you.
RESPONDENT: Maybe you can use this post as another attempt to flog a dead horse [with another belief system]. RICHARD: No thank you ... because you have closed the door on the possibility of perfection and peace-on-earth when you write: ‘Enlightenment can only be from moment to moment. Which does not imply that because one moment was clear, that the next moment will be clear’. You stick with your belief system ... and I will stick with my ‘belief system’.
RICHARD (to Respondent No. 12): Yet enlightened people have had something happen that sets them apart
from the normal person ... and they say it is an ego-death. Why do you read Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti? Certainly not because he was
your Mr. Normal now is it? It is because he was an enlightened man. He underwent an ego-death in 1922 ... all enlightened people
can point to a single edifying moment – a date – when their ego died. Why is there all this quibbling about it? Until this
fact is understood, then there is no purpose served in proceeding any further with a discussion. RESPONDENT: Krishnamurti must have had a deep experience in 1922 and maybe for years he clung to and related that experience to others, but by 1927/28 he relates in his speech rejecting the role others had designed for him, that his decision was the result of many years consideration, not some flash in the pan experience. RICHARD: Because you objected to my repetitious words I stopped bothering you some months ago ... especially when you had closed the door on the possibility of perfection and peace-on-earth by writing to me that:
You have endeavoured to get a response from me since then on a few occasions ... and now you try again. Do you genuinely want to find out for yourself just what is going on? Or is this just another attempt to push the line that Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti was but a normal man who had some outstanding insights into living? Because with only a little more than a cursory glance at that 1929 speech – which you kindly sent to me – the following sentences catch the discerning eye. Viz.:
The most outstanding statement is this one: [quote] ‘Because I am ... the Truth that is eternal ... why have false, hypocritical people following me, the embodiment of Truth? [end quote]. That is quite clear and unambiguous: ‘I am the Truth’ ... with a capital ‘T’ to designate divinity. And just in case it is not clear there is the follow-up statement: ‘me, the embodiment of Truth’ ... which easily translates in Western terminology as: ‘I am God made flesh’. And to forestall any attempt to lump 1928 into the ‘immature’ Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti basket ... may I introduce a quote from the ‘mature’ Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti. Viz.:
Therefore the ‘Truth or God’ amounts to nothing more than narcissistic self-aggrandisement. The ‘self’ that causes all the atrocious animosity and anguish in this otherwise delightful world transmogrifies itself into a grand ‘Self’ (by whatever name) ... and otherwise intelligent people speak in hushed tones about it! It is generally capitalised, you will notice, and some people go to great lengths to deny that Mr Jiddu Krishnamurti and his ilk – enlightened masters – have surrendered their will to this spurious divinity. The trouble with people who discard the god of Christianity is that they do not realise that by turning to the Eastern spirituality they have effectively jumped out of the frying pan into the fire. Eastern spirituality is religion ... merely in a different form to what people in the West have been raised to believe in. Eastern philosophy sounds so convincing to the Western mind that is desperately looking for answers. The Christian conditioning actually sets up the situation for a thinking person to be susceptible to the esoteric doctrines of the East. It is sobering to realise that the intelligentsia of the West are eagerly following the East down the slippery slope of striving to attain to a self-seeking Divine Immortality ... to the detriment of peace-on-earth. ‘The Truth’ for example, is simply the Eastern term for ‘God’ (‘Brahman’ or ‘Buddha’); thus any ‘comments on life’ designated [quote] ‘Teachings’ [end quote] translates easily as ‘God’s Word’ ... in Western terminology. At the end of the line there is always a god of some description, lurking in disguise, wreaking its havoc with its ‘Teachings’. Have you ever been to India to see for yourself the results of what they claim are tens of thousands of years of devotional spiritual living? I have, and it is hideous. If it were not for the appalling suffering engendered it would all be highly amusing. RESPONDENT: Others continued to give great importance to that 1922 experience, but the following answer to a question asked in 1945 states his thoughts on such remembered experiences:
RICHARD: When he says ‘most of us’ do you really think that he includes himself in that category?
RICHARD: It is important to notice that his definitive experience in 1922 was most definitely invited ... and was not too great for his ‘mind/heart’.
RICHARD: Whereas Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti did not ‘reduce it to his own level’ ... he kept it at the mountain-top where it belonged.
RICHARD: Now Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti’s description of his own mind does not fit this description at all ... does it?
RICHARD: And do you really think that Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti did not ‘know how to sing it’ himself?
RICHARD: And, of course Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti considered himself to be ‘mature’ ... did he not?
RICHARD: Do you really think that he lumped himself in with those people he calls ‘with many’?
RICHARD: Now here is the cruncher that has led many a Krishnamurtiite astray: do you really think that when he says ‘we’ that he includes himself? If you do, then you are sucked in badly. Another one that draws in the undiscerning is this one: [quote]: ‘I hope you are not merely listening to the speaker; that has no value at all because the speaker is not teaching you a thing’. [end quote]. Yet he consistently referred to all his words as ‘Teachings’. As these words came from a source that he described as [quote]: ‘that which is sacred, holy’, [end quote] it is clear that he was bringing some god’s wisdom to earth. Does no one not think that a person bringing ‘Teachings’ is being somewhat disingenuous when they say that they are not ‘teaching you anything’? Over to you.
RICHARD (to Respondent No. 12): Yet enlightened people have had something happen that sets them apart
from the normal person ... and they say it is an ego-death. Why do you read Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti? Certainly not because he was
your Mr. Normal now is it? It is because he was an enlightened man. He underwent an ego-death in 1922 ... all enlightened people
can point to a single edifying moment – a date – when their ego died. Why is there all this quibbling about it? Until this
fact is understood, then there is no purpose served in proceeding any further with a discussion. RESPONDENT: Krishnamurti must have had a deep experience in 1922 and maybe for years he clung to and related that experience to others, but by 1927/28 he relates in his speech rejecting the role others had designed for him, that his decision was the result of many years consideration, not some flash in the pan experience. RICHARD: Because you objected to my repetitious words I stopped bothering you some months ago ... especially when you had closed the door on the possibility of perfection and peace-on-earth by writing to me that: [Respondent]: ‘Enlightenment can only be from moment to moment. Which does not imply that because one moment was clear, that the next moment will be clear’. You have endeavoured to get a response from me since then on a few occasions ... and now you try again. Do you genuinely want to find out for yourself just what is going on? Or is this just another attempt to push the line that Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti was but a normal man who had some outstanding insights into living? RESPONDENT: As you said ‘until this fact is understood, then there is no purpose served in proceeding any further with a discussion’, I did not address my last post to you. Personally, I was talking to anyone who wished to listen. RICHARD: Oh come now ... you are being disingenuous. It is the accepted convention on all mailing lists that when you respond to another person’s post you expect a reply. And you did indeed expect a reply ... just look what happened when I stopped replying to you some months ago. Viz.:
RICHARD: Well, I am indeed ‘dealing with that actuality’ now ... and what is your pathetic response? Like a sulky little school-boy you say ‘I did not address my last post to you. Personally, I was talking to anyone who wished to listen’. So, as you cannot have it both ways ... which is it that you want, eh? Do I reply or not? RESPONDENT: To me, you are just a parasite who will borrow anyone’s soap-box to propagate his particular belief system. RICHARD: As a parasite is person who lives at the expense of another person or of society in general (like an animal or plant which lives in or on another and draws its nutriment directly from it and harming it in the process) and is a person who obtains the hospitality, patronage, or favour of the wealthy or powerful by obsequiousness and flattery someone who is totally dependent on others as in a hanger-on, a sponger, a cadger, a leech, a bloodsucker, a drone, a scrounger, a freeloader ... then would you care to substantiate your wild allegations with some facts? And whose ‘soap-box’ are you referring to? This is an un-moderated mailing list open to all ... there is no stipulation that one be a Krishnamurtiite. Are you trying to muzzle me? Why? Many months ago another – more discerning – poster wrote: ‘Krishnamurti. bid us look at both western materialism and eastern spiritualism with a clear eye and a questioning mind. Richard wants to include Krishnamurti. himself in the enquiry and I see little to argue with in that particular aspect of his presentation’. What have you got to lose? Anyway ... what ‘particular belief system’ are you talking about? RESPONDENT: At the end of the sermon you sent me, you say ‘Over to you’, well sorry, I have better things to do than to respond to every torn morsel from a speech. RICHARD: That were no ‘torn morsels’ at all ... they were direct quotes selected to substantiate my point as I do not indulge in wild and unsubstantiated claims. The reason why you will not respond is because you cannot continue to dissimulate in the face of direct evidence. RESPONDENT: I will answer if I see any point and maybe even ask a few questions, but if I do, I don’t expect it to make one iota of difference to you, but just maybe it will to someone else on the list, who is a not a full-blown soap-box preacher . RICHARD: As a preacher, by definition, believes in an imaginary god and I am a thorough-going atheist through and through ... this statement is meaningless. And as this is twice you have stressed how you desire others on this list to listen to you, then it makes all your objections about me hypocritical. RESPONDENT: The strangest thing is that for a person who preaches against religious beliefs, you have a belief in the ‘soul’, which my dictionary defines as a spiritual part. RICHARD: Would you care to back up this ridiculous claim with some copied and pasted quotes of my words where I say that I believe in the soul? Are you for real? I bag the soul – right along with the ego – as being a delusion born out of an illusion. RESPONDENT: At times you say very sensible things but then you reveal your beliefs, and you appear so normal. This goes for everyone on the list. You say you have no anger, which is so laughable, since you apparently are incapable of seeing the anger you express, whenever you feel the need to defend the beliefs you laughingly believe you are not propagating. RICHARD: You have to be grasping at straws if you can see anger in any of my words ... I am having so much fun here at the keyboard. I use an exclamation mark, for example, for what it is designed for: it is for surprise – or emphasis – and does not indicate anger. RESPONDENT: Krishnamurti, like you, like me, like the local town drunk, like Einstein was a normal person. Apparently you do not consider yourself or Krishnamurti as normal. Well I do. RICHARD: I know you do ... I wrote indicating that I knew that (above) already. Viz.:
RESPONDENT: You usually are more sensible than the town drunk, but at times even drunks can be very sensible. Therefore, I listen to you both, but usually find you more sensible. In the same way, I usually find Krishnamurti more sensible than your preaching. I have no intention of deeply analysing why, but personally I find that reading a passage by Krishnamurti makes me think, whereas reading a post by you, sends me to sleep. Though, I do make an effort to stay awake. RICHARD: If you have no intention of ‘deeply analysing’ what drives you – meaning that you personally do not wish to participate in peace-on-earth – then that is your business ... yet realise, the next time you complain about all the violence you see on TV., that you are as ‘guilty’ as the next person. * RICHARD: Now here is the cruncher that has led many a Krishnamurtiite astray: do you really think that when he says ‘we’ that he includes himself? If you do, then you are sucked in badly. Another one that draws in the undiscerning is this one: [quote]: ‘I hope you are not merely listening to the speaker; that has no value at all because the speaker is not teaching you a thing’. [end quote]. Yet he consistently referred to all his words as ‘Teachings’. As these words came from a source that he described as [quote]: ‘that which is sacred, holy’, [end quote] it is clear that he was bringing some god’s wisdom to earth. Does no one not think that a person bringing ‘Teachings’ is being somewhat disingenuous when they say that they are not ‘teaching you anything’? RESPONDENT: Just as I don’t expect you or the town drunk to always make sense, why should I expect Krishnamurti to be any different. Krishnamurti said ‘Truth is something living every day’, so it was very normal, but not in the sense of being dull. Most people apparently associate normality with dullness. I find the normal very interesting, very vibrant. So when Krishnamurti becomes poetic and calls the normal sacred or holy, I find nothing insensible in such comments. The best quote of all was ‘Truth is something living every day’. As Krishnamurti was alive when he spoke, then he was the truth, just as you are or I am. Just as I see you as normal, so I see Krishnamurti as normal. I don’t see you, Krishnamurti or myself as divine. RICHARD: Oh, you say he is just being ‘poetic’, eh? And he is not divine, either, you say? I would rather go by his own words than your interpretation. Living the ‘Teachings’, he says, means that one loves life ... and to do this one enables god to manifest itself in one’s very body via a spiritual connection. Only, he says, he prefers to use the word ‘life’ instead of ‘god’. So when he says ‘love life (god) and put this love before everything else’ he is being very precise ... he is saying: ‘love god and put this love before everything else’ To wit:
Okay so far? The essence of ‘being poetic’ is that you are to love god ... do you see this? Now, where is this god? Shall we find out – in his words – who he is? Viz.:
Now, we know already that he uses the word ‘life’ to mean ‘god’, right? So what he is clearly saying is: ‘I am everything, since I am god’. Shall I drive this point home? Viz.:
Shall we go on? Viz.:
From all this one can easily see that Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti basically said: ‘I am life ... life is god ... I am god made manifest’ ... because he did say ‘I am everything, since I am life (god)’. To make sure that you do not misunderstand he says: ‘Truth, the real God – the real God, not the God that man has made’. Therefore, ‘life’, ‘god’ and ‘truth’ are one and the same thing. Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti basically said: ‘I am god made manifest ... god is truth ... I am truth’. Now, because he urges his listeners to ‘drink the pure water which I have’ – and it is a water that ‘purifies and heals wonderfully’ – then some considerable light is thrown on his oft-repeated statement about not being a teacher. Because he says: ‘The real thing (‘life’, ‘god’ and ‘truth’) wants a total, complete human being whose heart is full, rich, clear, capable of intense feeling, capable of seeing the beauty’. Love, for him, is an ‘intense feeling’ – which is clearly affective – in the ‘full, rich, clear heart’. By being in his presence and experiencing his love (god’s love) then whatever ails you will be cured ... especially if you know how to ‘listen’. So, what does he mean by ‘listening’? Two years before his death, when asked to reflect upon the importance of his own life, he replied:
He said:
Now do you know what ‘listen’ means to him? It does not mean listen with your ears ... it means ‘drink me’ (just like in the Christian’s Holy scriptures). Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti basically said: ‘Listen to me (drink me in) ... just for two minutes, drink me and recognise yourself as being me: I am life. Love life. Life is truth. Love truth. Truth is God. Love God. I am God made manifest’. And if ‘god’ and ‘life’ and ‘truth’ and ‘love’ all being synonymous for him is not enough evidence for you, he goes on to elaborate on this theme and includes ‘reality’ and ‘bliss’ and ‘beauty’ into what constitutes ‘god’:
It is all so familiar ... Gurus and God-men have been saying and doing and being and urging this religious or spiritual or mystical or metaphysical solution for millennia. All the Masters and Messiahs; all the Saints and the Sages; all the Saviours and the Avatars have failed to bring about their much-touted Peace On Earth. Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti was simply the latest in a long line of failures. And he wanted this for his listeners:
And to forestall any of those ‘immature’ versus ‘mature’ Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti excuses, he stayed with the same message all his public life, changing only the way he said it:
Do you still wish to maintain that he was like you and the town-drunk? RESPONDENT: When someone stands on a soap-box and fails to see that Krishnamurti was commenting on everyday normal things, and apparently fails to see the beauty in everyday normal things, then what I hear from you, just does not make sense. RICHARD: Do you still maintain that it is Richard who is failing to see what Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti was talking about? RESPONDENT: If that is your ‘Actual Freedom’, then you’re welcome to it. RICHARD: An actual freedom is way beyond your comprehension if you cannot even comprehend enlightenment.
CORRESPONDENT No. 27 (Part Two) RETURN TO CORRESPONDENCE LIST ‘B’ INDEX RETURN TO RICHARD’S CORRESPONDENCE INDEX The Third Alternative (Peace On Earth In This Life Time As This Flesh And Blood Body) Here is an actual freedom from the Human Condition, surpassing Spiritual Enlightenment and any other Altered State Of Consciousness, and challenging all philosophy, psychiatry, metaphysics (including quantum physics with its mystic cosmogony), anthropology, sociology ... and any religion along with its paranormal theology. Discarding all of the beliefs that have held humankind in thralldom for aeons, the way has now been discovered that cuts through the ‘Tried and True’ and enables anyone to be, for the first time, a fully free and autonomous individual living in utter peace and tranquillity, beholden to no-one.
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