Have you read J Krishnamurti?

He was a liberal and his ideas have always been a great source of inspiration to me.

In fact no books of spirituality enlighten me more than his.

Once read discourses by Krishnamurti. I bet you will be liberated.

He dissolved the organization he was heading and he thwarted so much popularity, power, money and security.

He sought truth and was always honest.

Unlike the rest of Gurus he never claimed he was enlightened and he did not give false promises that he could enlighten us.

Today his works are getting more and more significance than ever before.
He never belonged to any sect.

While I read some of JK's works and heard some of his lectures, my recollection of their content is not too keen. The only thing that stands out is that he said change must come from within. Adherence to any rigid form of religion or institution is NOT a true source of enlightenment or of personal correction.

You may correct me if I am wrong in this brief analysis.

Years ago, I was a student of distinguished Professor Malcolm Bosse at the City College of New York. Mr Bosse said that he attended one of JK's lectures where he asserted personal initiative in self correction. Upon concluding his lecture, JK tossed one of his books at Professor Bosse even though they were not acquainted. It was one of his most memorable moments in life.

About 15 years ago I read a lot of his books. You can find them online too. I liked "Commentaries on Living" a lot. Even have watched some of his videos online too.

I have read Krishnamurti and he has had a great influence on me too. We could say that he was not actually spiritual person at all, but that he was in favour of a psychological revolution.

I have watched a few more of his videos on the google/youtube lately. It gives a different angle. The books almost made him seem unreal I guess. In the videos you can see he's an old man, frail, compassionate. He seemed genuinely concerned about how troubled our world is, how troubled people are. Among many other things he mentioned how few people are serious enough to really do anything about these troubles. Many may be well intentioned but apparently very few ever get to the root of problems. Most of us want to be entertained and are out for ourselves. We don't really want to change I suppose.

I liked the video(s) where he speaks with David Bohm, a scientist. I think it's called 'the future of humanity'. His interviews are often pretty good. Too bad he is isn't still around. I wonder what it would be like if he went on Oprah or some other silly show like that.

There was one video, or a series (like three 10 minute segments) where he seemed kind of creepy to me though. He's walking in a garden and there's a close up of him talking about his usual concerns. For some reason he reminded me of the Scientology guy or something like that. Just this old face talking as if out of a dream.

If of interest to anyone this site has pretty much all his writings and talks:

http://www.jiddu-krishnamurti.net/en

The wikipedia article is pretty good too.

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Originally Posted by jajdude

If of interest to anyone this site has pretty much all his writings and talks:

http://www.jiddu-krishnamurti.net/en

The wikipedia article is pretty good too.

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I found a copy of "Total Freedom", a collection of his writing, and started reading it a few days ago mostly based on this thread.

However, I don't find much of it very interesting. He disbanded some Order of the Star that he was the head of and doesn't have any method. All that is fine, but mostly what he seems to do is criticize other people for not understanding him.

With all that criticism, I don't see why anyone asks him any questions. What are they looking for?

But maybe I haven't got to the good part yet. What does anyone recommend that I read by Krishnamurti to put me in a positive frame of mind with respect to his writing?

And what is it that he is actually promoting that no one seems to understand but him?

Krishnamurti focuses more on humility. I like his writings.

I also have Commentaries on living. I believe that is a book every undergraduate should read, it is absolutely mind blowing. The use of silence, reflective listening, and desire not to just blurt things out, really stands out in my mind's eye of him when I recall reading that book on many a night at the coffee house. It is difficult to argue with someone who appears not to take a position at all though. In that regard, his critics would say that he is leaning on the ropes to avoid counter-arguments. Philosophical "rope a dope" I guess, but if it works........

Krishnamurti kept a really good diet...he was absolutely ruthless about it and avoided meat. He just avoided all the nonsense that people get caught up in--families, jobs, ambitions to be successful, and he maintained ruthlessly good nutrition.

I think if all of the nonsensical things could be avoided then people would be better readers and writers. And find the mundane things that usually pass us by more interesting. The problem is the momentum of society is overwhelming. . . people find it overwhelming to stand on their own and be original, so they just escape into some distraction or eat potato chips. Parents are stupid too.

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Originally Posted by SFG75

I also have Commentaries on living. I believe that is a book every undergraduate should read, it is absolutely mind blowing. The use of silence, reflective listening, and desire not to just blurt things out, ...

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What's so mind blowing about that? Good advice, but rather vanilla. Why wade through wordy metaphysical claptrap to get to a few home truths? I read a couple of his books when I was an undergraduate, many moons ago. He's an easy read, a bit like eating candy floss, but not very substantial, not very nutritional. He's certainly not "literature". Why read him when you could be reading a great author?

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He just avoided all the nonsense that people get caught up in--families, jobs, ambitions to be successful, and he maintained ruthlessly good nutrition.

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I've read a fair bit of JK of the years, and was into him in a big way in my early twenties. Not so much now, and for the reason that his writings can inspire the sort of sentence quoted here. Here was a man who spent his life entirely supported by his wealthy admirers, who never needed to work in the sense that most people do, and who was quite happy to endlessly criticise and disparage the people with jobs and families and ambitions — while being housed, fed, and driven and flown around the globe from one beautiful place to another solely by the efforts of those people.

His view of human relations contains a lot of truth for sure, but is also relentlessly cynical and unbalanced. Furthermore it's noticeable that, although he spoke of the ending of conflict, whenever he needed to come down to the messy level where most of us live, and actually had to sort out problems in the real world, he often seemed to cause just as much conflict —and to experience just as many difficulties— as anyone else. I find it hard not to see him as a deeply hurt individual (he had a very difficult and traumatic early life) who had certain highly unusual gifts which enabled him to take the ultimate way out of the pain of the world — ie by transcending it. He seems to me a classic 'puer aeturnus' character. Full of insight, but also fatally disconnected from the dualism of physical reality which, as embodied beings, we have no option but to deal with on its own messy terms if we are to contribute in a meaningful way.

I think he did have valuable things to say about fear, and love and insight and freedom (valuable to me anyway) though many of them seem less radical now than they did when he was first saying them, which maybe counts as a sort of success. However in terms of his ultimate expressed aim, which was a radical and fundamental transformation of humanity, it didn't happen. It may be that the reason is that his hope was simply not realistic, rather than that people are inadequate in some way.

I've watched quite a few more of his videos recently. He was an interesting speaker and some of his interviews are quite good. One thing interesting about him is that he really does not appear to be quite the same person each time. I mean there is a kind of intangible but noticeable difference about him and how he is speaking, maybe depending on the audience or the topic, but he seemed able to adjust such that his whole demeanor could change, whether or not due to so many years as a speaker in front of crowds, I don't know. Sometimes he'll be rather stern, and use "one" or "the speaker" all the time as though what he is saying is coming from some other agency. Other times he will use "I" and mention some personal things, and smile and laugh a bit. One thing for sure is that he was no dummy and I believe was onto something that not many others have been. Most of what he says, I think, is based on fact, even if most of us can't see that most of the time. He seemed very rational, not at all mystical like others say, most of the time anyway. There's no way to question some things he says. How can we really question that organized religions and nationalism have been put together by thought, as he says? I mean we don't seem to know anything that is not thought, though we know there is a lot that is not made by man -- nature, animals, the earth, the universe..

I love J Krishnamurti works and in fact I love "Commentaries on Living". He is one of my fave speakers and I always believe in his thoughts. You maybe right that he is not that 100% religious and whenever he speaks you exactly know that it is for the better and not based on what he just read somewhere. He really analyses things to the fullest so when its about time to deliver it you cannot help but to be amaze.