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Richard’s Selected Correspondence On Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti
RESPONDENT: Wisdom is openness to ‘what is’ which is ever-changing. RICHARD: Speaking personally, I started being open to the ever-changing ‘what is’ in
January 1981; earnest enquiry led to ‘what is’ blossoming and by September 1981 ‘what is’ flowered into the
full bloom of its wisdom; earnest enquiry into the fully blooming wisdom of ‘what is’ flourished throughout the ‘eighties;
earnest enquiry into the flourishing wisdom of ‘what is’ led to ‘what is’ beginning to wilt early in the ‘nineties
... and ‘what is’ died towards the end of October 1992. Thus ‘what is’ RESPONDENT: In regard to holistic observation, learning is not an accruing of experience that we possess that we can pass on to others through our words. RICHARD: Agreed ... in regard to ‘holistic observation’ the word ‘learning’ as it is ordinarily used is a misnomer (there is no ‘accruing of experience’ in ‘holistic observation’). And that which is observed, in regard to ‘holistic observation’ is not something that a ‘we’ can possess ... let alone pass on to others as a possession through their words. I do understand this. RESPONDENT: What usually occurs is that we learn and then that learning becomes knowledge and in acting from that knowledge, learning stops. RICHARD: Agreed ... in regards to ‘holistic observation’ what usually occurs (for the dilettante) is what the word ‘learning’ ordinarily means (an accruing of experience and knowledge). And, in acting from that accrued experience and knowledge, then what the word ‘learning’ ordinarily means goes on ... and on ... and on. I do understand this. RESPONDENT: So it is difficult but necessary to always return to looking from ‘not knowing’ to use K’s expression. RICHARD: If there is a ‘return to looking’ then it is not ‘looking from not knowing’ (to use Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti’s expression) ... and probably never has been a ‘looking from not knowing’ in the first place. Because the ‘looking from not knowing’ and its action are indistinguishable ... no ‘return’ is possible. It is a one-way trip. RESPONDENT: Some call it beginner’s mind. In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert’s mind there are few. RICHARD: Might I suggest that the ‘beginner’s mind’ is nothing more and nothing less than a sophisticated ‘expert’s mind’? Naiveté is essential. RESPONDENT: In your above message, you relate a chronology of events. RICHARD: Yes. Generally speaking I use my own descriptive phrases to convey what is experienced. In this particular thread I opted for using phrases you may be more familiar with or comfortable with. This is because you had introduced the phrase ‘what is’ – which has a specific meaning given to it by Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti – so I expressed what I normally convey otherwise in that terminology. RESPONDENT: Clear seeing of what is actually happening in terms of thought as you relate that chronology is openness to what is. RICHARD: Not so ... I provided a particular quote of Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti’s (from among many, many such quotes) that specifically stated unambiguously what he meant by the phrase ‘what is’ so that it would be clear what is being conveyed: (he said: ‘... my loneliness, emptiness, sorrow, pain, suffering, anxiety, fear, that is actually ‘what is’’). I cannot be open to something that does not exist. RESPONDENT: It is not a state to arrive at after a linear process of learning. RICHARD: Given that you are au fait with Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti’s words I did not consider it necessary to include a quote detailing his ‘let it flower’ methodology ... I chose to plaster my ‘chronology of events’ with words like blossoming, flowered, flourishing, fully blooming, wilting and died ... in the (apparently misguided) expectation that you, of all people, would understand. And, as it is so well known, I am not about to provide such a quote, either. RESPONDENT: It is there is the beginning and now and now. RICHARD: Again, this is not so. I even provided another quote For this flesh and blood body ‘what is’ is history. RESPONDENT: Holistic observation is not looking from that movement, it is an impersonal seeing or insight into that movement. RICHARD: Aye ... whereas apperceptive awareness is an ever-current experiencing of being just here at this place in infinite space right now at this moment in eternal time ... and it is full, complete, utter. Neither thought nor no-thought has anything to do with this operating ... nor can they ever disturb this on-going awareness of infinitude. RESPONDENT: Your assumptions reveal that you do not understand what is meant by centre-less awareness. RICHARD: Yet when I read through the (further above) paragraph I can detect no assumptions whatsoever. You have already informed me that you are earnestly enquiring into ‘what is’ (for the love of truth and not to get something for yourself) and, as ‘what is’ has a specific meaning given to it by Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti, you are telling me that you are ‘earnestly enquiring’ into (for example) your ‘loneliness, emptiness, sorrow, pain, suffering, anxiety, fear’ as per Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti’s description. Where are the assumptions? RESPONDENT: Love, compassion, beauty, intelligence, and true attention are of that mind which is non-local and in constant renewal. RICHARD: May I propose something? If you find that you want to dismiss what I have said (above) when you come to read it, as you usually do, then why not take the phrase ... um ... ‘consciousness is its contents’ and make it into the topic instead? That is, I will consider it as already been said that what I have written (above) is, according to you, just ‘theory’, ‘belief’, ‘idea’, ‘assumption’, ‘projection’ and your remaining 96 stock-standard responses so as to save you having to type it all out, E-Mail after E-Mail, over and again. If you can successfully describe what the phrase ‘consciousness is its contents’ means in words I will be only too happy to respond to that and leave this ‘material and non-material consciousness’ issue for a later date. RESPONDENT: What is the point, when it is clear that there is no looking into a matter anew but rather the same stock-standard ‘actualist’ doctrine is typed out or cut and pasted, E-Mail after E-Mail, over and again? RICHARD: I looked into the matter of ‘love, compassion, beauty, intelligence, and true attention’ being ‘of that mind which is non-local and in constant renewal’ night and day for eleven years – I lived them, breathed them, ate them and drank them continuously – and I have as much interest in ‘looking into them anew’ as I have in looking anew into the factuality of Santa Claus or the Tooth Fairy. If you do not wish to read the same ‘stock-standard ‘actualist’ doctrine’ then why write to me? As we have shared umpteen E-Mails, you and I, over the past couple of years you must surely know what to expect by now. Also, I copy and paste so as to save typing out again what I have previously written ... I will not pretend, that by disingenuously re-arranging the same points, that I am either saying something new or that I have looked at something anew. The point of discussing the topic of what the phrase ‘consciousness is its contents’ means comes from you writing to me recently that direct perception shows there is no true division between things and then implying that this ‘undivided world’ is what ‘consciousness is its contents’ means. Vis.:
As this is not what ‘consciousness is its contents’ means
When ‘consciousness’ is seen to be ‘its contents’ there is no consciousness at all ... and not just the absence of ‘that consciousness called me’ (an ‘undivided world’ consciousness). This consciousness-less state is what the Sanskrit word ‘dhyana’ (mistranslated as ‘meditation’) refers to in the East (known as ‘jhana’ in Pali). It is otherwise known as ‘entering into samadhi’, a trance state (called catatonia in the West) wherein ‘Form’ and ‘Feeling’ and ‘Perception’ and ‘Mental Fabrications’ and ‘Consciousness’ cease to exist totally. Onlookers can see the body is totally inward-looking, totally self-absorbed, totally immobile, totally functionless: the body cannot and does not talk, walk, eat, drink, wake, sleep ... or type E-Mails to mailing lists. A never-ending ‘dhyana’ or ‘samadhi’ would result in the body wasting away until its inevitable physical death ... as a means of obtaining peace-on-earth it is completely useless. And I know intimately what I write of: for example, in 1981 I was rushed to a hospital by a frantic wife who, thinking that because I was in a coma (her impression), I was thus going to die ... and I was held in the intensive care ward for about four hours before ‘coming to’. However, ‘dhyana’ or ‘samadhi’, the action or practice of a profound spiritual or religious state for whose description words are considered to be totally inadequate, is the highest state of direct mystic absorption into Reality. This consciousness-less state cannot be obtained until a condition of mindlessness has been created through the deliberate elimination of the objects of thought from consciousness. The organs of sense perception are so controlled that they no longer pass to the mind their reactions to what is perceived. The mind loses its identity by absorption into a higher state which precludes any awareness of duality and the heart is experienced as being wider than the universe and there is infinite bliss, euphoria and rapture ... and immense power exceeding any occult power. It is a ‘no-mind’ state of formless ecstasy wherein there is amalgamation in divine reality and a total loss of body sense, physical perception and consciousness per se. In this state one rests in the highest Being for one has become lord and master of Reality. Very few spiritual seekers have reached this level for one is manifesting God timelessly – there is
absolute identification as the transcendent radiant Being – for the divine self is realised beyond the perspective of the
physical body, or the mind, or consciousness. RESPONDENT: You do not like anyone poking fun at you ... RICHARD: I have explained that there is no ‘I’ as ego and ‘me’ as soul to poke fun at ... therefore your ‘humour’ has no mark to hit. RESPONDENT: ... and this is because despite your countless testimonials, there is a self beating in your flesh and blood body. RICHARD: Has it not dawned upon you yet that all reports are testimonials and/or claims? Everything Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti reported was a testimonial and/or a claim ... for example, he claims that ‘truth, or God’ does exist because he has realised ‘God or truth’ and therefore ‘such a thing does exist’:
I could provide many, many quotes replete with such claims ... here is an unambiguous testimonial of his:
He is clearly testifying that there is no ‘me’ operating in him (if he does not live it, it is
hypocrisy, a dirty thing to do). RICHARD: Before we read your quote, it is pertinent to point out ‘what [I] am saying here’. Vis.:
RESPONDENT: That quote was: ‘We have invented god. The thinking created god for itself. That means, due to unhappiness, fear and depression we created something, called god. God didn’t create us after his image – I wished he had. Personally I have no belief in anything, the speaker just faces that what is, what are facts, the recognition of the essence of each fact, each thought, all reactions. He is fully aware of all that. When you are free of fear, free of suffering, there is no desire for a god’. RICHARD: This is a very apt quote ... Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti is clearly and unambiguously providing the testimonial that he has ‘no belief in anything’ and that he ‘just faces that what is’ and that he is ‘fully aware of all that’. As for his ‘we have invented god’ phrase, he has this to say:
Which explains why ‘there is no desire for a god’ when ‘you are free of fear’ and ‘free of suffering’ (there is ‘the real God, not the God that man has made’ operating in, or made manifest in, or using, the body). RESPONDENT: And here is another: ‘... I have never said there is no god, I have said there is only god as it is manifest within you. But I will not use the word ‘god’ ... I prefer to call it ‘life’. – ‘The Life and Death of Krishnamurti’, by Mary Lutyens. RICHARD: Another very apt quote ... Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti is clearly and unambiguously providing the testimonial that he has ‘never said there is no god’ and that he has only said ‘there is only god as it is manifest within you’ and that he ‘will not use the word ‘god’’ as he prefers ‘to call it ‘life’’. He has also called ‘god as it is manifest in you’ the ‘supreme intelligence’. Vis.:
The phrasing ‘... as it is manifest in you’ and ‘... using this body’ and ‘... operating in this body’ are interchangeable, non? RESPONDENT: And K was very clear about accepting what he says as an authority, or anyone else: ‘Why should you accept what anybody says about these matters – including myself? Why should you accept any authority about the inward movement of life? We reject authority outwardly; if you are at all intellectually aware and observant politically you reject these things. But we apparently accept the authority of someone who says, ‘I know, I have achieved, I have realized.’ The man who says he knows, he does not know. The moment you say you know, you don’t know. What is it you know? Some experience which you have had, some kind of vision, some kind of enlightenment? I dislike to use that word ‘enlightenment’. Once you have experienced that, you think you have attained some extraordinary state; but that is past, you can only know something which is over and therefore dead’. – J. Krishnamurti. RICHARD: Okay ... would you say that a person who, in providing a report which is a testimonial, uses words like ‘has done’ is indicating something that is ‘past’? And would you say, if the person were to say to others ‘do it and you will see’ (that what they have done is actual and not theory), that they were ‘distorting the basic teaching’? Vis.:
Apart from that ... what I find particularly relevant in this paragraph is his ‘why should you accept what anybody says about these matters – including myself’ sentence. * RICHARD: I could provide many, many quotes replete with such claims ... here is an unambiguous testimonial of his: [quote]: ‘Consciousness, with its content, is within the field of matter. The mind cannot possibly go beyond that unless it has complete order within itself and conflict in relationship has come totally to an end – which means a relationship in which there is no ‘me’. This is not just a verbal explanation: the speaker is telling you what he lives, not what he talks about; if he does not live it, it is hypocrisy, a dirty thing to do’. (‘Talks In Saanen’, 1974; ©1975 Krishnamurti Foundation Trust, Ltd). RESPONDENT: That does not mean that K is saying that he is an authority ... RICHARD: Where did I say that he was saying that ‘he is an authority’ in this quote? I simply said ‘here is an unambiguous testimonial of his’ (because I was responding to your ‘despite your countless testimonials’ sentence). RESPONDENT: ... he is saying that he is not a hypocrite, something you are attempting to say that he is. RICHARD: He is the one who is saying that if his testimonial (that there is no ‘me’) is just a verbal explanation and not something that he lives (but what he talks about) then that is ‘hypocrisy, a dirty thing to do’ ... not me. * RICHARD: He is clearly testifying that there is no ‘me’ operating in him (if he does not live it, it is hypocrisy, a dirty thing to do). RESPONDENT: Yes, he is testifying to it. So? RICHARD: So Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti is clearly and unambiguously providing the testimonial that there is no ‘me’ operating in him. RESPONDENT: That does not make it an authority. RICHARD: I never said it did ... I said that all reports are testimonials and/or claims and that everything Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti reported was a testimonial and/or a claim. I said this because this is what I was responding to:
RICHARD: ... if this were not a Mailing List set-up under the auspices of the ‘Teachings’ that Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti brought into the world I would be inclined to say that you would indeed be having me learn ‘a method? a path?’ here on this Mailing List. But maybe that is me making an interpretation of your intention ... yet again? RESPONDENT: It is a misinterpretation. The questions, ‘how can you’ were rhetorical. The rhetorical form: If you ... how can you ever ...’, ordinarily means that ‘if you do this, then you cannot do that’. It is not referring to a method, but suggests an impossible conjunction. RICHARD: The questions were ‘rhetorical’ questions, eh? And needless rhetorical questions at that as this issue was already addressed in another thread. Vis.:
Yet even so, not only are you still trying to get me to see the Richard you see, but you are wanting me to ‘look into’ the obstacles you see this Richard you see to be having which block the communication you see should be happening as well. Have you noticed that the bulk of your communication to me has no substance? That you are continually trying to put into place in me attributes which you consider should be present in a fellow human being (and only then can you ‘discuss together, as two friends, taking a walk together’ issues which you are familiar with)? Basically you are displaying your inability to be ‘listening’ to a fellow human saying something that does not fit into the comfortable grooves that discussions ordinarily follow among ‘K-Readers’. I once went to a video and discussion evening at ‘Vasanta Vihar’, in what was then Madras, in 1984 and nothing has happened over the ensuing 17 years – nor will happen by the looks of what is occurring here – to break ‘K-Readers’ out of this endless circling they are indulging in over and again. And what is particularly crippling is this ‘Pathless Land’ injunction. RICHARD: Yes ... he said there was a reservoir of goodness; he said that evil is always trying to get in; he said that he was being protected ... and he said that to talk about evil was to invite it. Vis.:
My question, all those years ago, was this: is it possible for evil to cease to exist entirely (so that one no longer needed protection)? Or, to put it another way, if this ‘goodness’, this ‘otherness’, is so ... um ... good then why the deterioration ‘no matter who you are’ (which includes the saints, sages and seers)? RESPONDENT: I have some personal experience of how such goodness may operate. I was with K for very brief periods and I think I experienced what he talks about. Besides K, I have had similar experiences with my own father. The experience goes something like this: in the presence of the person who represents that goodness, my mind would become very quiet and the feeling will be one of purity and wholeness. It is like being face-to-face with the eternal. Now, that feeling is ever present, although the person who evoked such feelings may not be in a physical vicinity. When I asked my father about what is it that he has in him that makes me feel the way I do, he had no answer. He repeatedly tells me that he is a very ordinary person. I do not understand what do you mean by: ‘obviously some other process is required’ in your post. I think you also mention apperception as the agent to ‘prise open the door’. What door? Can you explain? RICHARD: Yes. If ‘water can never find out what water is’ (or if immaterial awareness cannot be aware of immaterial awareness), then what can? Obviously some other process is required – if the nature of ‘the otherness’ is to be revealed – so as to ascertain why it manifests (on this planet at least) maliciously and sorrowfully rather than happily and harmlessly. Vis.:
RESPONDENT: Also, is it really important to understand what or who the person is whose presence is holistic? RICHARD: Oh, yes ... why is it, that the saints, sages and seers, who said there was no ‘me’, no ‘self’, all display varying degrees of those emotions grouped under the ‘catch-all’ words malice and sorrow? Most commonly they were subject to anger and anguish (disguised/designated as being ‘Divine Anger’ and ‘Divine Sorrow’ by themselves and their devotees and/or followers and/or readers). RESPONDENT: Isn’t the importance of such a person’s presence just that that it helps one to become quiet and dwell upon the mystery within? RICHARD: In regard to dwelling upon ‘the mystery within’ the question I dwelled upon was
this: Just what is it that is going on in regards the supposed innocence of the saints and sages and seers? RESPONDENT: Richard, over months of reading your posts on this forum, I think I have read some of the most enlightening critiques of Krishnamurti, and I thank you for your thoughtful posts. I have a few questions for you, if you don’t mind answering them: 1. Do you think Krishnamurti was a charlatan – for example I consider Sai Baba to be a charlatan: he sells enlightenment / peace etc. to the gullible. RICHARD: Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti genuinely was an enlightened man (‘Self-Realised’ by whatever name). I have written of this before on this Mailing List:
That he was subject to feeling irritated or sorrowful, for example, from time-to-time does not make him a fraud ... it comes with the territory (the enlightened state of being). RESPONDENT: 2. If K in your opinion was not a charlatan, what, if any thing, of essence do you find in his various writings and talks? RICHARD: His ‘question everything; doubt everything; including the speaker’ advice. RESPONDENT: 3. Do you think all the experiences that Krishnamurti had (as described in his various biographies) make him a possible charlatan? RICHARD: No ... such testimonials are of vital importance to determine what happens in the enlightened state. RESPONDENT: Also, what are your views on Krishnamurti’s staunchly decrying spiritual experiences of the very kind that he seems to have undergone? RICHARD: This is a subject in its own right – and dependent upon informed speculation – that is probably worth pursuing elsewhere. Sufficient for the purpose here is to observe that some individuals, throughout mystical history, have staunchly dismissed all that any other has had to say and insist that what they alone have to say is important ... Mr. Gotama the Sakyan (if he historically existed that is) is an obvious example of this. Be that as it may ... Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti’s ‘Awakening’ under the pepper-tree was set in motion six weeks (??) earlier with the intense desire to serve (the ‘Bhakti’ approach). The subsequent rejection of the occult ‘Masters’ has confounded that issue with the rejection of all traditional spiritual approaches. RESPONDENT: 4. What do you make of Krishnamurti’s dying statement that a great energy used his body and such an energy will not re-appear for many years? RICHARD: He was accurately and correctly reporting his experience. That Christianity has their Parousia; that Buddhism has their Maitreya; that Islam has their Mahdi; that Hinduism has their Kalki; that Judaism has their Messiah; that Taoism has their Kilin and so on all comes from the same type of experience. It is part and parcel of being enlightened (‘I Am That’ or ‘That Thou Art’). RESPONDENT: Was he delusional by any chance? RICHARD: All enlightened beings are deluded ... the altered state of consciousness (ASC) known as spiritual enlightenment is a delusional state. I am not ‘guru-bashing’ Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti per se ... it is the ASC itself I am targeting. I can use the accredited writings of virtually any enlightened being to demonstrate my points. RESPONDENT: 5. Do you think there is some similarity between your experiences and Krishnamurti’s experiences? RICHARD: None whatsoever (though for the eleven years between 1981-1992 there was a significant correspondence). RESPONDENT: Or, to be more accurate, is there any similarity between your conception of peace-on-earth and what K thought would usher peace-on-earth? RICHARD: Again ... none whatsoever: all what enlightenment promises is an after-death ‘Peace That Passeth All Understanding’. Despite the rhetoric, peace-on-earth is not even in its agenda. RESPONDENT: 6. Why do you choose to write on Krishnamurti mailing list? RICHARD: Partly because I have read a lot of him and have had extensive face-to-face discussions with ‘K-Readers’ (though I have read more of Mr. Mohan ‘Rajneesh’ Jain plus I was married to an ex-Rajneeshee for eleven years) and mainly because ‘K-Readers’ still have some shreds of commonsense left ... Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti never denied that the physical world existed nor ever said it was only ‘apparently real’. Indeed, when I first read Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti I read of a ‘Nature Mystic’ describing his experiences of absorption in nature – in the love of beauty – and I still say that Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti was, in part at least, somewhat tending more towards being primarily a ‘Nature Mystic’ than a ‘Jnani Mystic’ (he was certainly not a ‘Yoga Mystic’). And I only say ‘tending towards’ because of the whole ‘Bhakti Teachings’ business of the 1920’s (the rejection of the occult ‘Masters’ confuses the issue). To explain: for eleven years I was what is classified a ‘Nature Mystic’ (I am not asking anyone to believe me as I am simply telling my story) so I have intimate experience of having a total love affair with nature ... and being fully absorbed in beauty. After all, I had been a practicing artist – plus being a qualified art teacher for private schools – and thus had made my living out of beauty ... and an admiration of and a love for beauty are the primary requisites of being an independent artist. People bought my work because they loved it – literally they fell in love with its beauty – and not because it was ascetically agreeable or met some scholarly criterion for art (shape, form, texture, hue, proportion, balance and so on). With the death of ‘I’ as ego, in 1981, I abandoned my flourishing career, my alternate life-style, my self-sufficiency property in the country and commenced a barefooted, itinerant, homeless, celibate lifestyle of aimless wandering in nature: I lived and slept in forests; I lived and slept in the hills; I lived and slept in the valleys; I lived and slept beside streams; I lived and slept on the beaches; I lived and slept on uninhabited islands ... and so on. No woman could entice me as the allure of the love and beauty of nature was unsurpassable ... I had no need for a vow of celibacy. Just being in nature, totally, fully, completely, would transport me into the unknowable ... so I know full well what I talk of via personal experience as well as an, admittedly ad hoc, reading on the subject. There is a large hurdle to overcome to even begin to discuss peace-on-earth with someone who is adamant that ‘the world is not real; I am not the body’. RESPONDENT: 7. I notice that with some of the posters you enter into very same arguments. As an independent reader often I get the feeling that some of these people are quite incapable of understanding what you are saying. Still, you persist. Why? RICHARD: Anybody is (eventually) capable of understanding what I am saying ... and the challenge to have them acknowledge this is a fun challenge. I like my fellow human being ... and wish only the best for them. RICHARD: ... if what the expression ‘the observer is the observed’ means to you is that the observer and the observed exist in relationship, that is your business ... I was simply responding to the following: [Respondent]: ‘Is the observer really separate from the observed? No’. [endquote]. Your unequivocal ‘no’ to your own question gave me the impression that the phrase ‘the observer is the observed’ meant to you that the observer *is* the observed ... now that you have explained not only what the phrase means to you but why it means what it means to you as well there is probably not much point in pursuing the matter any further. RESPONDENT: In regard to the psyche, the inquiry is, am I different than my qualities? We learn to structure the psyche so there is an observing centre that is isolated so as to control. Society demands that we act a certain way, that we conform to its rules of behaviour. We should do this and we should not do that. We have to ‘behave’ or else. The brain is programmed and we as controller act from that program to direct what we do. So what is wrong with that? A central processing area seems basic to integrating impressions and sensory input. But there is a problem where that which observes is prejudiced or biased. That means it is corrupted, disordered. To ask ‘is the observer separate from the observed’ is to ask whether that which looks is observing from programming, or is it free of all conditioning? If there is looking from knowledge, from a centre built in memory, it seems like certain content ‘in here’ is looking ‘out there’. But if that which looks is free of any particular content, there is no sense of being isolated of localized or bounded. There is a spaciousness of mind that is not invented by thought. Observation from that spaciousness is choiceless, effortless, and does not exclude anything. A quality of that spaciousness is silence where there is no ideation of me or God or Self or soul or of anything else. RICHARD: Whilst I appreciate that you have further explained why the expression ‘the observer is the observed’ means to you that the observer and the observed exist in relationship, and not that the observer *is* the observed, there is not much point in pursuing the matter any further because arguing which delusion is the better delusion is not what interests me. Suffice is it to say that, as a generalisation, in western mysticism oneness with god, or union with god, means a relationship with god (‘I and God’) whereas in eastern mysticism oneness with god, or union with god, means there is nothing other than god (‘I am God’). Which is possibly why Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti’s teachings can be taken either way. RESPONDENT No. 33: Do you think Krishnamurti was a charlatan – for example I consider Sai Baba to be a charlatan: he sells enlightenment / peace etc. to the gullible. RICHARD: Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti genuinely was an enlightened man (‘Self-Realised’ by whatever name). That he was subject to feeling irritated or sorrowful, for example, from time-to-time does not make him a fraud ... it comes with the territory (the enlightened state of being). RESPONDENT No. 33: I don’t understand this. Krishnamurti repeatedly said that if someone found the root cause of sorrow, sorrow ends, completely, once and for all. He also said that irritation (anger) is violence and if you see the danger of it, it ends, completely, and for all time. Do you think he was talking about a theoretical ending of sorrow and violence? RICHARD: It is useful to bear in mind that primarily what he was talking about was stepping out of the stream so that it does not go on after physical death (just as all the saints, sages and seers have said in their own way throughout recorded history). Vis.:
Most of the ‘Teachings’, however, is discussion about clearing away all that prevents being out of the stream (aka ‘on the other shore’) where there is the timeless energy which is love, which is compassion, which is intelligence, which is the origin of all matter, of all nature, of all mankind: that which is sacred, holy ... as I have said before: despite the rhetoric, peace-on-earth is not on the enlightenment agenda. For example, the ‘answer’ is not to be found in the world:
And specifically regarding the mystic’s version of ‘peace on earth’ (aka ‘pacifism’):
Aye, it is indeed ‘extraordinarily important to understand this’: although the bully-boys and
feisty-femmes thus get to rule the world by force the committed mystic has a one-way ticket booked to the promised land ...
physical death is a blessed release into ‘That’ (by Whatever Name). * RESPONDENT: Stepping out of the stream is not ‘so that it does not go on after physical death’. RICHARD: If you had kept on reading the very next part of the E-Mail would you have still written this? Vis.:
This is not an isolated quote about the stream going on after physical death ... in fact a co-respondent posted some quotes on this subject only a little while back:
RESPONDENT: Secondly, where is it in any of the texts, the conclusion that K or anyone else, by stepping out of the stream, that personality is not still part of the stream. Meaning that other people have stopped thinking about that person, or remembering that person? RICHARD: I am not cognisant of any text that shows other people’s images of that particular person keep that particular person in the stream once they have stepped out. However, there is references that a stream-bound personality can remain earth-bound if other people will not let them go when they physically die, though. Vis.:
RESPONDENT No. 33: Do you think Krishnamurti was a charlatan – for example I consider Sai Baba to be a charlatan: he sells enlightenment / peace etc. to the gullible. RICHARD: Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti genuinely was an enlightened man (‘Self-Realised’ by whatever name). That he was subject to feeling irritated or sorrowful, for example, from time-to-time does not make him a fraud ... it comes with the territory (the enlightened state of being). RESPONDENT No. 33: I don’t understand this. Krishnamurti repeatedly said that if someone found the root cause of sorrow, sorrow ends, completely, once and for all. He also said that irritation (anger) is violence and if you see the danger of it, it ends, completely, and for all time. Do you think he was talking about a theoretical ending of sorrow and violence? RICHARD: It is useful to bear in mind that primarily what he was talking about was stepping out of the stream so that it does not go on after physical death (just as all the saints, sages and seers have said in their own way throughout recorded history). Vis.:
Most of the ‘Teachings’, however, is discussion about clearing away all that prevents being out of the stream (aka ‘on the other shore’) where there is the timeless energy which is love, which is compassion, which is intelligence, which is the origin of all matter, of all nature, of all mankind: that which is sacred, holy ... as I have said before: despite the rhetoric, peace-on-earth is not on the enlightenment agenda. RESPONDENT: Here you are interpreting only. RICHARD: I am not interpreting anything. RESPONDENT: [Richard]: ‘Most of the ‘Teachings’, however, is discussion about ...’. ‘About’ is what interpretation IS. RICHARD: The reason why I wrote that most of the ‘Teachings’ is discussion about clearing away all that prevents being out of the stream is because talking about clearing away all that prevents is what Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti says he is doing in discussions. For just one example (with emphasis added):
RICHARD: There is a wealth of information in many books written by differing peoples from all walks of life who were in contact with Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti at various stages throughout the 60+ years that he travelled about speaking of the matters discussed on this list ... No. 33 is one of those people who had direct personal contact (in his case whilst being at the Rishi Valley school) and as such his report would not, at the very least, be dismissed out of hand by any thoughtful person as being merely an ‘interpretation’. RESPONDENT: No. 33’s interpretations were not ‘dismissed out of hand’, but were dismissed after viewing his many contradictory posting assessments. RICHARD: I have read No. 33’s posts for maybe four years now – and when the original archives were on-line I backtracked through to the beginning to find out what had already been published – and I took notice of the general thrust of what he put forward regarding Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti and the ‘Teachings’ over the many years that he has been writing. I found that, by and large, he was reasonably consistent (given that it is touchy subject to question and that he received very little support and/or encouragement) and that it is to his credit that he still persists. It is such an obvious thing to do, to establish whether the speaker is living the ‘Teachings’ he promulgates, that I wonder why there is so much opposition to doing so. RESPONDENT: And I wonder why there is so much obsession with proving that K did not live what he preached. RICHARD: It is not an ‘obsession’ ... it is a simple, straightforward and obvious case of ascertaining whether the enlightened state is a worthwhile state to live in or not. RESPONDENT: I wonder what is the agenda in wanting to promulgate that concern. RICHARD: My agenda is quite clear and unambiguous: spiritual enlightenment has been proposed by many peoples throughout human history as being the solution to all the ills of humankind – not just by Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti – and as it does not release the enlightened person from anger or anguish in toto it is therefore not worthwhile pursuing. I found the following observation to be quite explicit:
There are many examples of saints and sages and seers displaying varying degrees of those emotions I usually group under the ‘catch-all’ words malice and sorrow. Most commonly they were subject to anger and anguish (often disguised/designated as being ‘Divine Anger’ and ‘Divine Sorrow’ by themselves and their devotees/followers/readers). RESPONDENT: It would seem to me that one have to ask the man point blank to know for sure what is was speaking from. RICHARD: Well, as Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti is dead that is not an option but you could try asking No. 10 ... here is what he had to say, on this very mailing list some time ago, on the subject of experiencing anguish:
RESPONDENT: Lively exchanges can certainly be misinterpreted. RICHARD: True ... but they can also be seen accurately too. RESPONDENT: Therefore, it is very possible that No. 33 cannot objectively tell the difference between ‘lively intensity’ and ‘anger’. RICHARD: Yet it is equally very possible that he can objectively tell the difference ... he certainly
knew what the appropriate questions to ask No. 10 were. RESPONDENT: I wonder what is the agenda in wanting to promulgate that concern. RICHARD: My agenda is quite clear and unambiguous: spiritual enlightenment has been proposed by many peoples throughout human history as being the solution to all the ills of humankind – not just by Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti – and as it does not release the enlightened person from anger or anguish in toto it is therefore not worthwhile pursuing. RESPONDENT: I have never read or heard (as far as I remember) K referring to the ‘transformed’ state as ‘enlightened’. RICHARD: He did indeed ... for example, three years before his death he was very precise (when he was using the metaphor of light to explain how he saw himself). Vis.:
* RICHARD: I found the following observation to be quite explicit: (snip quotes from the archives) ... there are many examples of saints and sages and seers displaying varying degrees of those emotions I usually group under the ‘catch-all’ words malice and sorrow. Most commonly they were subject to anger and anguish (often disguised/designated as being ‘Divine Anger’ and ‘Divine Sorrow’ by themselves and their devotees/followers/readers). RESPONDENT: It would seem to me that one have to ask the man point blank to know for sure what is was speaking from. RICHARD: Well, as Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti is dead that is not an option but you could try asking No. 10 ... here is what he had to say, on this very mailing list some time ago, on the subject of experiencing anguish: (snip quotes from the archives). RESPONDENT: And you used K’s quote about ‘living what you preach’ to prove your point of what – that you’re never supposed to feel anything ever again? RICHARD: My point is that the enlightened state does not deliver the goods it (supposedly) promises ... for example:
RESPONDENT: If K in your opinion was not a charlatan, what, if any thing, of essence do you find in his various writings and talks? RICHARD: His ‘question everything; doubt everything; including the speaker’ advice. RESPONDENT: But he himself did not encourage such doubting and questioning. The atmosphere in his meetings used to be of him speaking and others passively listening. Do you think his advice was for others and not for himself? RICHARD: Neither ... the truth is unquestionable (‘water can never know what water is’) when all is said and done. His ‘question everything; doubt everything; including the speaker’ advice is a sop to the intellect; a paying of lip-service to reason. Vis.:
Speaking personally, I chose to be ‘too stupid’ ... with salubrious results. * RESPONDENT: Do you think all the experiences that Krishnamurti had (as described in his various biographies) make him a possible charlatan? RICHARD: No ... such testimonials are of vital importance to determine what happens in the enlightened state. RESPONDENT: But he himself stated that no testimonials are required. He repeatedly warned against tendencies of the mind to imagine higher beings, etc. If his hypothesis is correct that no testimonials are required and that people tend to believe in supernatural etc., he could have, at least not made his various forays in to astral planes public. RICHARD: More importantly, if the ‘people tend to imagine higher beings’ and ‘people tend to believe in the supernatural etc.’ type of statements were statements of fact for him he would not have had those ‘forays’ throughout his life ... those ‘higher beings, etc.’ and the ‘supernatural etc.’ would have ceased to exist. Which is why such testimonials are of vital importance ... to determine what happens in the enlightened state. * RESPONDENT: Also, what are your views on Krishnamurti’s staunchly decrying spiritual experiences of the very kind that he seems to have undergone? RICHARD: This is a subject in its own right – and dependent upon informed speculation – that is probably worth pursuing elsewhere. Sufficient for the purpose here is to observe that some individuals, throughout mystical history, have staunchly dismissed all that any other has had to say and insist that what they alone have to say is important ... Mr. Gotama the Sakyan (if he historically existed that is) is an obvious example of this. RESPONDENT: But then this goes against what you like in K: ‘question everything; doubt everything; including the speaker’ RICHARD: Of course it does ... you may have heard the worldly adage ‘do as I say; not do as I do’? The spiritual equivalent is: ‘do not look at the finger; look at what the finger is pointing to’. I learned from the saints, sages and seers ... but not just what they would have me learn. * RESPONDENT: What do you make of Krishnamurti’s dying statement that a great energy used his body and such an energy will not re-appear for many years? RICHARD: He was accurately and correctly reporting his experience. That Christianity has their Parousia; that Buddhism has their Maitreya; that Islam has their Mahdi; that Hinduism has their Kalki; that Judaism has their Messiah; that Taoism has their Kilin and so on all comes from the same type of experience. It is part and parcel of being enlightened (‘I Am That’ or ‘That Thou Art’). RESPONDENT: Someone who warned against the tendency of the human mind to be mesmerized by such experiences, don’t you think if was true to his grain, he would have at least refrained from making his experience public? RICHARD: Human vanity knows no bounds when one is specially chosen by ‘That’ to bring a message into the world. * RESPONDENT: Was he delusional by any chance? RICHARD: All enlightened beings are deluded ... the altered state of consciousness (ASC) known as spiritual enlightenment is a delusional state. I am not ‘guru-bashing’ Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti per se ... it is the ASC itself I am targeting. I can use the accredited writings of virtually any enlightened being to demonstrate my points. RESPONDENT: I don’t get this. Why is enlightened state a delusional state? Krishnamurti himself described his mental state as one of ‘clarity’ and made sure to record that he was neither delusional nor under the influence of any drugs (when he wrote his experiences as recorded in the ‘Notebook’ and the ‘Journal’). RICHARD: Just consider, for a moment, the fact that all the ills of humankind happen in time and space as form. Then consider, for another moment, the fiction that the ‘solution’ to all the ills of humankind, as proposed by all the saints, sages and seers for millennia, is to be found in some timeless, spaceless and formless realm (and not in the world of time and space and form). If you do you will not even need to look up the word ‘delusion’ in a dictionary. * RESPONDENT: Do you think there is some similarity between your experiences and Krishnamurti’s experiences? RICHARD: None whatsoever (though for the eleven years between 1981-1992 there was a significant correspondence). RESPONDENT: What kind? Please elaborate. He died in 1987. RICHARD: The dates referred to me and not him ... I lived that/was that between 1981-1992 (love, compassion, beauty, truth, that which is absolute and so on) and the significant correspondence was between what I reading at the time and what I was experiencing at the time. I have intimate knowledge of all its nooks and crannies and I am providing a report for my fellow human beings to do what they will with ... insider information, as it were. A whistle-blower’s report * RESPONDENT: My interpretation is that the ‘teachings’ are not about clearing away ‘all that prevents being out of the stream’, but about clearing away all that IS the stream. RICHARD: The ‘Teachings’ say, over and again, ‘step out of the stream’ (and do not say clear away ‘all that IS the stream’). Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti clearly says (further above) that the stream goes on in people. Vis:
Enlightenment is about securing an after-death ‘Peace That Passeth All Understanding’ ... and not about peace-on-earth, in this lifetime, as this flesh and blood body. The committed mystic has a one-way ticket booked to the promised land ... physical death is a blessed release into ‘That’ (by Whatever Name). RESPONDENT: And the clearing away of the human stream of suffering and violence cannot occur within psychological time, as psychological time is the foundation of the stream. RICHARD: If you say so then it is so ... for you, that is. However, as the ‘foundation’ of ‘suffering and violence’ is the biological instinctual passions I will keep my own counsel on the matter. RESPONDENT: Love and compassion, as well as sacredness, are his words for the state of the mind or body which has stepped out of the trap of biologically based thinking. RICHARD: I see that you say ‘stepped out of’ the trap of biologically based thinking (and not ‘clearing away all that IS’ the trap of biologically based thinking) here. RESPONDENT: And that occurs nowhere but here and now in this world. Of course, this is my interpretation as what you say is yours. RICHARD: I am not interpreting anything. RESPONDENT: I wanted to point out that interpretation is not fact. RICHARD: I am not interpreting anything. RESPONDENT: There may not then, be any ‘enlightenment agenda’ at all, as the end of psychological thinking is not enlightenment. RICHARD: Irregardless of what you say, when Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti speaks of ‘stepping out of the stream’ he is indeed talking of enlightenment ... and peace-on-earth is not on the enlightenment agenda at all. RESPONDENT: It is simple, root, basic, ‘me-less’ perception, or awareness, which, again, can only occur in this world, not some place else. RICHARD: As this is, as you say, your interpretation I will leave you to mull over it. * RICHARD: For example, the ‘answer’ is not to be found in the world: [quote]: ‘I have found the answer to all this [violence], not in the world but away from it’. (page 94, ‘Krishnamurti – His Life And Death’; Mary Lutyens; Avon Books: New York 1991). RESPONDENT: The ‘world’ K was speaking about could also have been referring to the psychological ‘world’, that is, the cultural world of tradition, politics, religion, etc. RICHARD: No, he was speaking of both the physical world and all the violence in the physical world. RESPONDENT: You cannot derive from his statement that he was considering leaving humanity and going, say, to Mars, or that he was considering escaping to some ‘spiritual’ world. RICHARD: He was not ‘considering’ doing anything ... he was saying he had already done it (‘found the answer’ is past tense). RESPONDENT: The interpretation, mine and yours, are therefore wholly hypothetical. RICHARD: I am not interpreting anything at all. RESPONDENT: It is possible that Krishnamurti referred to ‘after death’ in his reference to ‘stepping out of the stream.’ But here is my interpretation of it, for whatever it is worth: Have you noticed how people are more or less the same across time and space? As you yourself mentioned, wars, brutality, etc. have been going on for a long time all over the world and seem to continue in more or less the same manner? I.e., there is a continuum of human sorrow and misery. Where does that continuation come from? What sustains human sorrow and misery across time and space? That source of sustenance of human sorrow is the ‘stream of sorrow.’ Stream in the sense that it has a continuity, a momentum, that remains largely unaffected by efforts to bring about peace and order in human affairs. In the language of psychology, there is a collective unconscious that sustains and maintains this stream. RICHARD: In the language of Mr. Carl Jung’s psychology, yes ... not psychology per se. RESPONDENT: As you have often mentioned, instinctual passions might be responsible for the behaviour of human beings and those instincts, though bereft of their usefulness, continue unabated. In fact, human instincts of violence riding an A-bomb become many more times dangerous. The continuance of instinctual passions in their archaic form is the stream of sorrow. RICHARD: Yes ... and the stream of malice as well. RESPONDENT: And this stream seems unaffected by individual (physical) death. RICHARD: Agreed. RESPONDENT: Therefore Krishnamurti talks about psychological death – which is what stepping out of the stream implies. RICHARD: Yes. RESPONDENT: To die to thoughts, instinctual passions, to the ‘I’. RICHARD: Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti never said ‘die to instinctual passions’ ... on the contrary, he praised passion highly. RESPONDENT: In that death the stream of sorrow comes to a halt. RICHARD: Yet as the saints, sages and seers are still subject to feeling anger and sadness, for example, from time-to-time ... what is it that ‘comes to a halt’ in their case? RESPONDENT: Is there life after death? I don’t know. RICHARD: Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti knows (as evidenced by the quotes further above). I will copy/paste just one of them down to here:
He clearly says ‘your thought of yourself goes on’ (and not just other people’s thoughts of you goes on after your death) ... and that it will go on ‘as it is going on now’ (as a ‘Christian, Buddhist, whatever you please – greedy, envious, ambitious, frightened, pursuing pleasure ...’). Ergo: step out of the stream and it will not go on after death. RESPONDENT: The question is also not important because the death that Krishnamurti is talking about is psychological death, which is the death of the ego, death of the mechanism that perpetuates the stream of sorrow. RICHARD: It may not be ‘important’ to you – and if so then this be the end of discussion – but if this subject does pique some interest in you then these two URL’s will be most illuminating: http://flp.cs.tu-berlin.de:1895/listening-l/html/archive9403/msg00015.html I cannot see how anybody – anybody at all – can meaningfully discuss Mr. Jiddu Krishnamurti’s ‘Teachings’, in relation to personal and communal well-being, if fundamental aspects of the ‘Teachings’ be shuffled-off into the ‘too hard’ basket. Otherwise all this be the stuff of dilettantism.
SELECTED CORRESPONDENCE ON MR. JIDDU KRISHNAMURTI (Part Four) RETURN TO RICHARD’S SELECTED 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.
Richard’s Text ©The Actual Freedom Trust: 1997-. All Rights Reserved.
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