Theos-Talk Archives (February 1997 Message tl00278)

By popular demand...

>  At Ommen Camp on August 3, 1929 Krishnamurti by his own act dissolved the
>Order, and his reasons for this action are contained in this pronouncement.
>
>===============================
>      TRUTH IS A PATHLESS LAND


>      by J. Krishnamurti
>
>  We are going to discuss this morning the dissolution of the Order of the
>Star.  Many people will be delighted, and others will be rather sad. It is a
>question neither for rejoicing nor for sadness, because it is inevitable, as
>I am going to explain.
>
>  You may remember the story of how the devil and a friend of his were
>walking down the street, when they saw ahead of them a man stoop down and
>pick up something from the ground, look at it, and put it away in his
>pocket.  The friend said to the devil, "What did that man pick up?" "He
>picked up a piece of Truth," said the devil.  "That is a very bad business
>for you, then," said his friend.  "Oh. not at all," the devil replied "I am
>going to let him organize it."
>
>  I maintain that Truth is a pathless land, and you cannot approach it by
>any path whatsoever, by any religion, by any sect.  That is my point of
>view, and I adhere to that absolutely and unconditionally. Truth, being
>limitless, unconditioned, unapproachable by any path, whatsoever, cannot be
>organized, nor should any organization be formed to lead or to coerce people
>along any particular path.  If you first understand that, then you will see,
>how impossible it is to organize a belief. A belief is purely an individual
>matter, and you cannot and must not organize it.  If you do, it becomes
>dead, crystallized, it becomes a creed, a sect, a religion, to be imposed on
>others.  This is what everyone throughout the world is attempting to do.
>Truth is narrowed down and made a plaything for those who are weak, for
>those who are only momentarily discontented.  Truth cannot be brought down,
>rather the individual must make the effort to ascend to it.  You cannot
>bring the mountain-top to the valley.  If you would attain to the
>mountain-top you must pass through the valley, climb the steeps, unafraid of
>the dangerous precipices.  You must climb towards the Truth, it cannot be
>"stepped down" or organized for you.  Interest in ideas is mainly sustained
>by organizations, but organizations only awaken interest from without.
>Interest, which is not born out of love of Truth for its own sake, but
>aroused by an organization, is of no value.  The organization becomes a
>framework into which its members can conveniently fit.  They no longer
>strive after Truth or the mountaintop, but rather carve for themselves a
>convenient niche in which they put themselves or let the organization place
>them and consider the organization will thereby lead them to Truth.
>
>  So that is the first reason, from my point of view, why the Order of the
>Star should be dissolved.  In spite of this, you will probably form other
>Orders' you will continue to belong to other organizations searching for
>Truth.  I do not want to belong to any organization of a spiritual kind,
>please understand this.  I would make use of an organization which would
>take me to London, for example: this is quite a different kind of
>organization, merely mechanical, like the post or the telegraph.  I would
>use a motor car or a steamship to travel, these are only physical mechanisms
>which have nothing whatever to do with spirituality.  Again, I maintain that
>no organization can lead man to spirituality.
>
> If an organization be created for this purpose, it becomes a crutch, a
>weakness, a bondage, and must cripple the individual, and prevent him from
>growing, from establishing his uniqueness, which lies in the discovery for
>himself of that absolute, unconditioned Truth.  So that is another reason
>why I have decided, as I happen to be the Head of the Order, to dissolve it.
>No one has persuaded me to this decision.
>
>  This is no magnificent deed, because I do not want followers, and I mean
>this.  The moment you follow someone you cease to follow Truth. I am not
>concerned whether you pay attention to what I say or not.  I want to do a
>certain thing in the world and I am going to do it with unwavering
>concentration.  I am concerning myself with only one essential thing; to set
>man free.  I desire to free him from all cages, from all fears, and not to
>found religions, new sects, nor to establish new theories and new
>philosophies.  Then you will naturally ask me why I go the world over,
>continually speaking.  I will tell you for what reason I do this; not
>because I desire a following, not because I desire a special group of
>special disciples. (How men love to be different from their fellow-men,
>however ridiculous, absurd and trivial their distinctions may be!  I do not
>want to encourage that absurdity.) I have no disciples, no apostles, either
>on earth or in the realm of spirituality.
>
>  Nor is it the lure of money, nor the desire to live a comfortable life,
>which attracts me.  If I wanted to lead a comfortable life I would not come
>to a Camp or live in a damp country!  I am speaking frankly because I want
>this settled once and for all.  I do not want these childish discussions
>year after year.
>
>  One newspaper reporter. who interviewed me, considered it a magnificent
>act to dissolve an organization in which there were thousands and thousands
>of members. To him it was a great act because he said: "What will you do
>afterwards, how will you live?  You will have no following, people will no
>longer listen to you." If there are only five people who will listen, who
>will live, who have their faces turned towards eternity, it will be
>sufficient.  Of what use is it to have thousands who do not understand, who
>are fully embalmed in prejudice, who do not want the new, but would rather
>translate, the new to suit their own sterile, stagnant selves?  If I speak
>strongly, please do not misunderstand me, it is not through lack of
>compassion. If you go to a surgeon for an operation, is it not kindness on
>his part to operate even if he cause you pain?  So, in like manner, if I
>speak straightly, it is not through lack of real affection -- on the contrary.
>
>  As I have said, I have only one purpose: to make man free, to urge him
>towards freedom, to help him break away from all limitation, for that alone
>will give him eternal happiness, will give him the unconditioned realization
>of the self.
>
>  Because I am free, unconditioned, whole, not the part, not the relative,
>but the whole Truth that is eternal, I desire those, who seek to understand
>me, to be free, not to follow me, not to make out of me a cage which will
>become a religion, a sect.  Rather should they be free from all fears from
>the fear of religion, from the fear of salvation, from the fear of
>spirituality, from the fear of love, from the fear of death, from the fear
>of life itself.  As an artist paints a picture because he takes delight in
>that painting, because it is his self-expression, his glory, his well-being,
>so I do this and not because I want any thing from anyone.
>
>  You are accustomed to authority, or to the atmosphere of authority, which
>you think will lead you to spirituality.  You think and hope that another
>can, by his extraordinary powers, a miracle transport you to this realm of
>eternal freedom which is Happiness.  Your whole outlook on life is based on
>that authority.
>
>  You have listened to me for three years now, without any change taking
>place except in the few.  Now analyze what I am saying, be critical, so that
>you may understand thoroughly. fundamentally.  When you look for an
>authority to lead you to spirituality, you are bound automatically to build
>an organization around that authority.  By the very creation of that
>organization, which you think, will help this authority to lead you to
>spirituality, you are held in a cage.
>
>  If I talk frankly, please remember that I do so, not out of harshness, not
>out of cruelty, not out of the enthusiasm of my purpose but because I want
>you to understand what I am saying.  That is the reason why you are here,
>and it would be a waste of time if I did not explain clearly, decisively, my
>point of view.
>
>  For eighteen years you have been preparing for this event, for the Coming
>of the World-Teacher.  For eighteen years you have organized, you have
>looked for someone who would give a new delight to your hearts and minds,
>who would transform your whole life, who would give you a new understanding;
>for someone who would raise you to a new plane of life, who would give you a
>new encouragement, who would set you free - and now look what is happening!
>Consider, reason with yourselves, and discover in what way that belief has
>made you different - not with the superficial difference of he wearing of a
>badge, which is trivial, absurd.  In what manner has such a belief swept
>away all the unessential things of life? 'That is the only way to judge; in
>what way are you freer, greater, more dangerous to every Society which is
>based on the false and the unessential?  In what way have the members of
>this organization of the Star become different.
>
>  As I said, you have been preparing for eighteen years for me.  I do not
>care if you believe that I am the World-Teacher or not.  That is of very
>little importance.  Since you belong to the organization of the Order of the
>Star, you have given your sympathy, your energy, acknowledging that
>Krishnamurti is the World-Teacher - partially or wholly: wholly for those
>who are really seeking, only partially for those who are satisfied with
>their own half-truths.
>
>  You have been preparing for eighteen years, and look how many difficulties
>there are in the way of your understanding, how many complications, how many
>trivial things Your prejudices, your fears, your authorities, your churches
>new and old all these, I maintain, are a barrier to understanding. I cannot
>make my self clearer than this.  I do not want you to agree with me, I do
>not want you to follow me, I want you to understand what I am saying.
>
>  This understanding is necessary because your belief has not transformed
>you but only complicated you, and because you are not, willing to face
>things as they are. You want to have your own gods - new, gods instead of
>the old, new religions instead of the old, new forms instead of the old -
>all equally valueless, all barriers, all limitation, all crutches.  Instead
>of old spiritual distinctions you have new spiritual distinctions, instead
>of old worships you have new worships.  You are all depending for your
>spirituality on someone else, for your happiness on someone else, for your
>enlightenment on someone else; and although you have been preparing for me
>for eighteen years, when I say all these things are unnecessary, when I say
>that you must put them all away and look within yourselves for the
>enlightenment, for the glory, for the purification, and for the
>incorruptibility of the self, not one of you is willing to do it. There may
>be a few, but very, very few.
>
>  So why have an organization?
>
>  Why have false, hypocritical people following me, the embodiment of Truth?
>Please remember that I am not saying something harsh or unkind, but we have
>reached a situation when you must face.
>
>  So why have an organization?
>
>  As I said before, my purpose is to make men unconditionally free, for I
>maintain that the only spirituality is the incorruptibility of the self
>which is eternal, is the harmony between reason and love.  This is the
>absolute, unconditioned Truth which is Life itself.  I want therefore to set
>man free, rejoicing as the bird in the clear sky, unburdened, independent,
>ecstatic in that freedom.  And I, for whom you have been preparing for
>eighteen years, now say that you must be free of all these things, free from
>your complications, your entanglements.  For this you need not have an
>organization based on spiritual belief.  Why have an organization for five
>or ten people in the world who understand, who are struggling, who have put
>aside all trivial things?  And for the weak people, there can be no
>organization to help them find the Truth, because Truth is in everyone; it
>is not far, it is not near, it is eternally there.
>
>  Organizations cannot make you free.  No man from outside can make you
>free; nor can organized worship, nor the immolation of yourselves for a
>cause, make you free, nor can forming yourselves into an organization, nor
>throwing yourselves into works, make you free.  You use a typewriter to
>write letters, but you do not put in on an altar and worship it.  But that
>is what you are doing when Organizations become your chief concern.  "How
>many members are there in it?" That is the first question I am asked by all
>newspaper reporters. "How many followers have You?  By their number we shall
>judge whether what you say is true Or false." I do not know how many there
>are.  I am not concerned with that.  As I said, if there were even one man
>who I had been set free, that were enough.
>
>  Again, you have the idea that only certain people hold the key to the
>Kingdom of Happiness.  No one holds it.  No one has the authority to hold
>that key.  That key is your own self, and in the development and the
>purification and in the incorruptibility of that self alone is the Kingdom
>of Eternity.
>
>  So you will see how absurd is the whole structure that you have built,
>looking for eternal help, depending on others for your comfort, for your
>happiness, for your strength.  These can only be found within yourselves.
>
>  So why have an organization?
>
>  You are accustomed to being told how far you have advanced, what is your
>spiritual status.  How childish!  Who but yourself can tell you if you are
>beautiful or ugly within?  Who but yourself can tell you if you are
>incorruptible?  You are not serious in these things.
>
>  So why have an organization?
>
>  But those who really desire to understand, who are looking to find that
>which is eternal, without beginning and without an end, will walk together
>with a greater intensity, will be a danger to everything that is
>unessential, to unrealities, to shadows.  And they will concentrate, they
>will become the flame, because they understand.  Such a body we must create,
>and that is my purpose.  Because of that real understanding there will be
>true friendship.  Because of that true friendship - which you do not seem to
>know - there will be real cooperation on the part of each one.  And this not
>because of authority, not because of salvation, not because of immolation
>for a cause, but because you really understand, and hence are capable of
>living in the eternal.  This is greater thing than all pleasure, than all
>sacrifice.
>
>  So those 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 organizations 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.