* Core of the teaching (1980) * Review of the Notebook (1976)
* Discussion on Death * "The inner awareness was always there.”
(With David Bohm - 1980s) (Interview with Rom Landau in 1934)
* On Evolution - To American students * The Deathbed Statement (February, 1986)
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A review of his own Notebook, after its publication in 1976:
“… To Krishnamurti what seems the most important thing, and he has repeated this in all his talks and dialogues, is that there must be freedom to observe, not some ideological freedom but freedom from the very knowledge and experience which has been acquired yesterday. This brings about a tremendous problem. If there is no knowledge of many yesterdays, then what is it that is capable of observing? If knowledge is.not the root of observation, what have you with which to observe?
Can the many yesterdays be totally forgotten, which is the essence of freedom? He maintains that it can. This is possible only when the past ends in the present, meeting it fully, head-on. The past, as he asserts, is the ego, the structure of the ‘me’ which prevents total observation.
… Krishnamurti explains very carefully in manifold ways the necessary memory and the psychological memory. Knowledge is necessary to function in any field of our daily life but psychological memory of our hurts, anxiety, pain and sorrow is the factor of division and hence there is a conflict between the essential knowledge which is required to drive a car and the experience of knowledge which is the whole movement of the psyche. He points out this fact in relationship, in our fragmented ways of life. …
As far as I have come in my studies I have not found the phrase ‘the observer is the observed’, with its full meaning. … One of the most important things that Krishnamurti has found is this great truth which, when it actually takes place, as it has occasionally happened to me personally, literally banishes the movement of time. … With critical examination I find this book totally absorbing because he annihilates everything thought has put together. It is a shocking thing when one realises this. It is a real physical shock.
Can a human being live in this state of absolute nothingness except for his daily bread and work - in the total emptiness of consciousness as we know it? As K points out over and over again, consciousness is the movement of all thought. Thought is matter, measurable, and thought is time, which implies that psychologically there is no tomorrow. That means no hope. This is a devastating pschological fact and our everyday mind is not only shocked by this statement but probably will refuse to examine it closely. It is death now.
From this death arises a totally different quality of energy, of a different dimension, inexhaustible, and without an end. He says this is the ultimate benediction. …”
{Mary Lutyens, Volume 2: Years of Fulfilment, pp. 212-13}
[Ellipses and Emphases added; Emphasis in the original]
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Discussion on Death:
"The following extract (Krishnamurti and Bohm 1985, pp. 149-53) on the holomovement and death seems particularly appropriate,
in view of Bohm's recent passing (as well as Krishnamurti's in 1986)."
K: "What is movement, apart from movement from here to there, apart from time--is there any other movement?
B: Yes.
K: There is. . . is there a movement which in itself has no division? . . . Would you say it has no end, no beginning?
B: Yes. . . Can one say that movement has no form?
K: No form--all that. I want to go a little further. What I am asking is, we said that when you have stated there is no division, this means no division in movement.
B: It flows without division, you see.
K: Yes, it is a movement in which there is no division. Do I capture the significance of that? Do I understand the depth of that statement? . . . I am trying to see if that movement is surrounding man?
B: Yes, enveloping.
K: I want to get at this. I am concerned with mankind, humanity, which is me. . . I have captured a statement which seems so absolutely true--that there is no division. Which means that there is no action which is divisive.
B: Yes.
K: I see that. And I also ask, is that movement without time, et cetera. It seems that it is the world, you follow?
B: The universe.
K: The universe, the cosmos, the whole.
B: The totality.
K: Totality. Isn't there a statement in the Jewish world, "Only God can say I am."
B: Well, that's the way the language is built. It is not necessary to state it.
K: No, I understand. You follow what I am trying to get at?
B: Yes, that only this movement is.
K: Can the mind be of this movement? Because that is timeless, therefore deathless.
B: Yes, the movement is without death; in so far as the mind takes part in that, it is the same.
K: You understand what 1 am saying?
B: Yes. But what dies when the individual dies?
K: That has no meaning, because once I have understood there is no division.
B: . . . then it is not important.
K: Death has no meaning.
B: It still has a meaning in some other context.
K: Oh, the ending of the body; that's totally trivial. But you understand? I want to capture the significance of the statement that there is no division, it has broken the spell of my darkness, and I see that there is a movement, and that's all. Which means death has very little meaning.
B: Yes.
K: You have abolished totally the fear of death.
B: Yes, I understand that when the mind is partaking in that movement, then the mind is that movement.
K: Yes, I would say that everything is. . . . One can never say then, "I am immortal." It is so childish.
B: Yes, that's the division.
K: Or, "I am seeking immortality." Or "I am becoming." We have wiped away the whole sense of moving in darkness. . .
B: Just going back to what we were saying a few days ago: we said we have the emptiness, the universal mind, and then the ground is beyond that.
K: Would you say beyond that is this movement?
B: Yes. The mind emerges from the movement as a ground, and falls back to the ground; that is what we are saying.
K: Yes, that's right. Mind emerges from the movement.
B: And it dies back into the movement.
K: That's right. It has its being in the movement.
B: Yes, and matter also.
K: Quite. So what I want to get at is, I am a human being faced with this ending and beginning. [This] abolishes that.
B: Yes, it is not fundamental.
K: It is not fundamental. One of the greatest fears of life, which is death, has been removed.
B: Yes."
Extract from: Lifework of David Bohm: River of Truth by Will Keepin, posted online by Alex Paterson
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“The inner awareness was always there”:
Rom Landau: "How did you come to that state of unity with everything?"
K: "People have asked me about that before, and I always feel that they expect to hear the dramatic account of some sudden miracle through which I suddenly became one with the universe. Of course nothing of the sort happened. My inner awareness was always there; though it took me time to feel it more and more clearly; and equally it took time to find words that would at all describe it.
It was not a sudden flash, but a slow yet constant clarification of something that was always there. It did not grow, as people often think. Nothing can grow in us that is of spiritual importance. It has to be there in all its fullness, and then the only thing that happens is that we become more and more aware of it. It is our intellectual reaction and nothing else that needs time to become more articulate, more definite."
Extract from Landau's book: God is my Adventure, reproduced in the Kinfonet biography of Krishnamurti. This interview was conducted in California in 1934, when he was thirty-nine.
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On evolution:
Questioner: “Do you believe in evolution? You have often said that understanding is immediate, the act of learning is on the moment; where does evolution play a part in this? Are you denying evolution?
K: It would be foolish - would it not? - to deny evolution. There is the bullock cart and the jet plane, that is evolution. There is an evolution of the primate to the so-called man. There is evolution from not-knowing to knowing, Evolution implies time; but psychologically, inwardly, is there evolution? Are you following the question? Outwardly one can see how architecture has advanced from the primitive hut to the modern building, mechanics from the two-wheel cart to the motor, the jet plane, going to the moon and all the rest of it - it is there, obviously there is no question whether these things have evolved or not. But is there evolution inwardly, at all?
You believe so, you think so, do you? But is there? Do not say `there is' or `there is not'. Merely to assert is the most foolish thing, but to find out is the beginning of wisdom. Now, psychologically, is there evolution? That is, I say `I shall become something" or `I shall not be something; the becoming or the not being, involves time - does it not? `I shall be less angry the day after tomorrow', `I shall be more kind and less aggressive, more helpful, not be so self-centred, selfish', all that implies time - `I am this' and `I shall be that'. I say I shall evolve psychologically - but is there such evolution?
Shall I be different in a year's time? Being violent today, my whole nature is violent, my whole upbringing, education, the social influences and the cultural pressures have bred in me violence; also I have inherited violence from the animal, the territorial rights and sexual rights and so on - will this violence evolve into non-violence? Will you please tell me? Can violence ever become non-violence? Can violence ever become love?”
{Talks with American Students, Chapter 12, New School for Social Research, New York}
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The Deathbed Statement (1986):
On February 17, 1986, Krishnamurti died of inoperable cancer of the pancreas, which had spread to the liver; in the last weeks of life he was occasionally given morphine for the pain. Nine days before his death he made this final statement at Ojai, in response to an earlier question put to him in writing from Mary Cadogan. This last statement was tape-recorded by Scott Forbes (the only other person present) at Krishnamurti's request (with pauses as indicated):
"I was telling them this morning -- for seventy years that super energy -- no -- that immense energy, immense intelligence has been using this body. I don't think people realize what tremendous energy and intelligence went through this body -- there's twelve-cylinder engine [sic]. And for seventy years -- was a pretty long time -- and now the body can't stand any more.
Nobody, unless the body has been prepared, very carefully, protected and so on - nobody can understand what went through this body. Nobody. Don't anybody pretend. Nobody. I repeat this: nobody amongst us or the public know what went on. I know they don't. And now after seventy years it has come to an end. Not that that intelligence and energy -- it's somewhat here, every day, and especially at night. And after seventy years the body can't stand it -- can't stand any more. It can't. The Indians have a lot of damned superstitions about this -- that you will and the body goes [sic] -- and all that kind of nonsense.
You won't find another body like this or that supreme intelligence operating in a body for many hundred years. You won't see it again. When he goes, it goes. There is no consciousness left behind of that consciousness, of that state. They'll all pretend or try to imagine they can get in touch with that. Perhaps they will somewhat if they live the teachings. But nobody has done it. Nobody. And so that's that."
{The Open Door, by Mary Lutyens, 1988, pp. 148-49; emphasis in the original}
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Comment: This deathbed statement has been the subject of ongoing controversy, due principally to the phrase "many hundred years". Many people have seen this as an acknowledgment that this "supreme intelligence" (ie, the otherness) is only for a select few and thus is essentially pre-ordained in human history. It will only operate in a carefully prepared and protected body which is selected out from humanity by this intelligence. This dovetails neatly with the unique awakening of 1922 and the resultant "process" that he underwent for decades after.
It leaves an opening, of course - "perhaps they will somewhat", implying that there is a partial awakening that we can attain. But this is distinct from an immense intelligence that "uses" the body, as an apparent direct human "manifestation".
There is another way of looking at this statement however, one which has not hitherto been canvassed. It could be incorrect.
The man at the time was for the most part in the grip of strong pain, to the point where morphine was used, even though it is a known fact he had experienced adverse reactions to even such things as mild drugs in the past. Late-stage metastatic terminal cancer is not conducive to clear thinking. The biographer states that there were times in the final weeks when he refused to talk as his mind was not clear. Was this statement uttered at a time when his normal judgment was clouded?
The fact is that no-one, not even this man, could and can accurately predict the future. In fact the talks themselves imply this. Life is action, life is constantly changing, every moment is a unique event. The "end of time" means the end of predicting the future for the future is not what is, and cannot be known.
So this statement predicting the future starkly clashes with the essence of the talks. Hence, it may well be wrong.
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Core of the Teaching (1980):
The following statement contains the essence of the teachings and was written by Krishnamurti on October 21, 1980:
"The core of Krishnamurti's teaching is contained in the statement he made in 1929 when he said: 'Truth is a pathless land'. Man cannot come to it through any organization, through any creed, through any dogma, priest or ritual, not through any philosophic knowledge or psychological technique. He has to find it through the mirror of relationship, through the understanding of the contents of his own mind, through observation and not through intellectual analysis or introspective dissection.
Man has built in himself images as a fence of security-religious, political, personal. These manifest as symbols, ideas, beliefs. The burden of these images dominates man's thinking, his relationships and his daily life. These images are the causes of our problems for they divide man from man. His perception of life is shaped by the concepts already established in his mind. The content of his consciousness is his entire existence. This content is common to all humanity.
The individuality is the name, the form and superficial culture he acquires from tradition and environment. The uniqueness of man does not lie in the superficial but in complete freedom from the content of his consciousness, which is common to all mankind. So he is not an individual.
Freedom is not a reaction; freedom is not a choice. It is man's pretence that because he has choice he is free. Freedom is pure observation without direction, without fear of punishment and reward. Freedom is without motive; freedom is not at the end of the evolution of man but lies in the first step of his existence. In observation one begins to discover the lack of freedom. Freedom is found in the choiceless awareness of our daily existence and activity.
Thought is time. Thought is born of experience and knowledge which are inseparable from time and the past. Time is the psychological enemy of man. Our action is based on knowledge and therefore time, so man is always a slave to the past. Thought is ever-limited and so we live in constant conflict and struggle. There is no psychological evolution.
When man becomes aware of the movement of his own thoughts he will see the division between the thinker and thought, the observer and the observed, the experience and the experiencer. He will discover that this division is an illusion. Then only is there pure observation which is insight without any shadow of the past or of time. This timeless insight brings about a deep radical mutation in the mind.
Total negation is the essence of the positive. When there is negation of all those things that thought has brought about psychologically, only then is there love, which is compassion and intelligence."
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"Conflict is the very structure of the self."
{Commentaries on Living: First Series, Problems and Escapes, page 124}
{Commentaries on Living: First Series, Problems and Escapes, page 124}
{Page last updated - May 12, 2008}
“It is not experiences that corrupt the mind but what they leave behind, the residue, the scars, the memories.”
{Krishnamurti Foundation Trust, Bulletin 4, 1969}
{Krishnamurti Foundation Trust, Bulletin 4, 1969}
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