” ‘There is a principle, proof against all argument, a bar against all progress,
and which if persisted in cannot but keep the mind in everlasting
ignorance-and that is, contempt prior to examination.’—PALEY.
Just read this quote and thought it described K perfectly. K was a master at Zen, Hinduism, Vedanta, Buddhism and Christianity. He spoke authoritatively of all these traditions as “time-binding nonsense”. All this, without first examining the tradition in question. Everything that others said was reduced to “time binding nonsense” and everything he himself said was gospel truth.
He asked his “followers” not to read books, and yet he wrote more than 70 books. Once when he was asked which books of his one should read. He said read them all, in the reverse sequence (the last book first, and the first book last). He said that there was an advantage in not knowing what Marx, or the Buddha or others said, as that could become a conditioning, not realizing or not wanting to realize that reading his own books could result in conditioning too.
He thought he was the greatest being on earth for all time (because of the process – which was experimental, and was being tried on a human being for the first time in history, specifically, leaving the crown chakra open for an extended period of time, which was very painful, and unique in the world’s history).
When Bohm at last becomes enlightened he will be a much better teacher than K.
-saurab”
This message is from the yahoo group J_Krishnamurti, 12/18. .Thank you very much, Saurab. Am also posting your qualifier which followed the above message, and will make some comments later.
“There is one contribution that K has made in my life, and that is to expand the horizon of my personal enquiry.
Being a Hindu, before I read K, I was of the opinion that *devotion* was the most important thing in spirituality. Devotion to the guru, devotion to saints, devotion to God, and so on… which is more or less in line with mainstream Hinduism, and also Christianity (which is similar to Hinduism in this respect).
Even though today I do not accept his teachings fully, they have been responsible in shaping my world view. The topics he raised in his dialogues, the questions he would put forward, were all responsible in triggering my own enquiry into these things, even though my conclusions sometimes differed from his. For that I am very grateful to him.
–saurab”
Deconstructing Krishnamurti 