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On Krishnamurti Books 

By Reza Ganjavi

As I gradually downsize my physical life and possessions, I go through almost a hundred books I studied by J. Krishnamurti. Study is the key point. I am not his follower and I do not "believe" in anything he says and I think some of the statements he said were wrong (as you can see below). He provides pointers and insights, some of which are very profound. He also says certain statements that are not true or I disagree with, but he even said himself, "don't follow me". He said this statement many times. He also said it to me directly, when we met -- he also gave me a flower - and we had beautiful profound exchanges (shaking hands, talking, walking). 

I'm going through the markings I made in the books, to select some statements, and keep them as a summary and then given away or dispose of the book.  Some like Think on These Things, or Commentaries on Living, have so many markings that I might as well keep the whole book. It's interesting to see, after years of first reading these books, what still resonates, what is a part of me, what seems insignificant, and what is so profound. 

As the River Joins the Ocean

G. Narayan's book reminds me of the biographies which try to make K into a god. He puts a lot of focus on idolizing K. The book has some questionable parts. Not a valuable book, in my view. 

Four Dialogues at CSUSB University

One of the books I came across was FOUR DIALOGUES WITH MR. J. KRISHNAMURTI and High School and University students and teachers, organize by my old friend Dr. Brij B. Khare with whom I've lost touch for many years (if you're reading this Brij, please contact me).  Professor Khare taught at California State University San Bernardino, California 92407.

Many of the participants are not very familiar with K's work apparently, so he covers many of the basics, which are interesting. I studied this book deeply, as with most of his other books, and made underlines and side notes, and editorial corrections, challenges to the ideas, and filled out extensive evaluation sheets of each of the four dialogues. 

The Presence That Stays

The book contains testimonies by people who knew K. It was published by the JK center in Hyderabad. It has many interesting writings by 

• Dear physicist/philosopher friend, Professor P. Krishna

• An old friend Ms. Ahalya Chari whom I visited in Chennai (Madras) and went to her home which was on the grounds of the Theosophical Society, across from The School run by dear friend Mr. G. Gautama. 

• Old friend Friedrich Grohe whose contributions backfired, in my opinion -- he went from being a benevolent benefactor, to a negative influence, in the view of myself and several close friends of Krishnamurti, because of the repercussions of the influence mongering of his "Gang" / big money on the foundations. Years ago Friedrich and I did many walks together in the mountains, and I've stayed at his house many times. He taught me yoga, pranayama, eye exercises, etc. which Krishnamurti taught him. He is in his 90's now (in 2023). I wish him well. I published a major report on his organization some years ago that's on my website's writings section www.rezamusic.com , called the Fifth Foundation, and a major report on KFT/Brockwood's mismanagement where Friedrich and his Gang emerged as a central figures. 

• Mrs. Radhika Herzberger, a serious scholar of K's work, and former principle of Rishi Valley School, and daughter of Pupul Jayakar. I've had profound email exchanges with Mrs. Herzberger.

• Mark Lee, with whom I was friends until I realized he was behind some strange things such as reportedly giving green light, together with James Paul, both of whom were trustees of KFA, to Michael Krohnen to attack me at a public even held in the K library which was K's own home where Mary Zimbalist lived, and I visited Mary many times.  I also had the impression that Mark Lee was double faced and weak as he was run over by the Grohe Gang influence but always managed to stay in the foundation as a trustee. He may have been a good administrator at some point, but I and some friends of K believe he is somehow clueless about K's teachings. He's on record for telling fictitious stories about K, so I don't trust his recollections, and unfortunately don't trust his editorial works either. But I wish him well. I was at his house many times, and know and like his dear wife Asha. 

• Dear friend Evelyne Blau with whom we organized video showings in Los Angeles, and I've been to her house several times.

• Donald Ingram Smith, an old friend and author, who dated a friend of mine who was 18 while he was 80 and they were very good together despite the judgements of others

• Vikram Parchure, whom I met in Thailand. Dr. Parchure's son. I met Dr. Parchure at Brockwood Park, and he taught me some exercises. Dr. Parchure had sex with a female friend of mine who was a student at K schools, while she visited India. 

And others. Some of the writings were ridiculous and tried to make a god out of K. And distortions such as appear in some biographies. 

Mr. Krishna Nath and Others' Disrespect for K's Wish Regarding Early Works

K made it clear on a number of occasions, that the early works should be ignored. 

In his book: On The Teachings, Mr. Krishna Nath whom I met in a Swiss summer gathering, disrespected that and published a number of material, which are so NOT Krishnamurti, and K knew it and so he expressly asked that that work be ignored, yet years later that simple wish is disrespected and the material is published. Anyone who reads that material, gets a totally wrong idea of what K and his teachings is about. K had a significant awakening after which he totally discarded some of the things he said earlier. 

Garbage Book: Star in the East by Roland Vernon

In my big pile of K books - stored in a big luggage that's now found its way to the surface to be processed, I came across several terrible books that I had marked as garbage -- such as Roland Vernon's preposterous, horrible, incompetent, biased biography of Krishnamurti, "Star in the East".

Garbage Book: Two Birds on One Tree by Ravindra

Another garbage book is Ravi Ravindra's Two Birds on One Tree. He really illustrates how clueless he is about K's teachings. Yet, he is invited as a speaker by Mark Lee and some others at the Krishnamurti Foundation America who are also clueless about core teachings of K which are meaningless unless you live the truth they point to (which have nothing to do with K anymore as truth is truth -- for example, the importance of speaking truth and living noble values like integrity, compassion, etc.). 

My opinion on some at KFA being clueless about K's teachings is based on observing how its leaders have behaved which are so contrary to K's teachings. I've written about that, and still have a major publication to make about the disastrous mismanagement of KFA by Jaap Sluijter and company. 

See: https://www.rezamusic.com/writings/on-j-krishnamurtis-work/about-ravi-ravindras-garbage-ideas-tabloid-book-kfa

See video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yza0e98peEU

See my notes about promotion of Ravindra's garbage book by Friedrich Grohe's Gang: https://www.rezamusic.com/writings/on-j-krishnamurtis-work/the-fifth-foundation

The Theme Books

The Theme books that Mark Lee and company put together after K's death was a disaster. They started specializing K's books by themes,  which made them boring and dull. Compare a boring book in the series "On..." to the general books like Freedom From The Known, or many other books of his, it's evident that these series was a disaster. And such an emphasis was put on the man -- with a big picture of him on the cover (which was not the case in many of the older books including his best-seller "Think on These Things" which had no picture of him - and the first book of his which I read -- I suppose because people like Mark Lee never grasped the depth of what K was talking about -- so they focused on the person instead of the message -- and Mr. Lee went on to promote himself as Mr. Everything Krishnamurti, after K's death, which led to the horrendous situations where he would just make up fake stories in order to sizzle up interest in himself I guess. That's my opinion based on factually incorrect, fictitious nonsense Mark Less has promoted about K. 

But he was not the only one. Other people in that circle were also largely missing the point -- people like Michael Krohnen, who cooked for K.  Just because some people were in K's vicinity doesn't make them philosophers or even good students of K as the real studying is of one's own self, reactions, which in these isolated, protected, small environments of the Foundations, is less present that people living their daily lives who study themselves in the mirror of relationship, earnestly, without direction or motive except to find out and inquire into what-is. 

The ultimate disaster in these foundations, in my opinion, are people like Friedrich Grohe's Gang including Raman Patel, Rabindra Singh, and the people they instated at the foundations such as Jaap Sluijter, the disastrous Executive Director of KFA, Nasser Shamim and Mina Masoumian KFT / Brockwood Park, whom in my view, based on many facts, fast tracked these organizations down a path Krishnamurti dreaded and unfortunately predicted. 

Biographies

I did a lot of underlining and marking of the biographies, all of which I read with interest. But at this stage in life I find the content uninteresting. I know all about Krishnamurti's development since childhood and don't think it's relevant, as he pointed out himself too, to some of the key challenges and pointers he offered which are very helpful in healing minds and hearts. 

Pupul Jayakar and Mary Lutyens biographies are reportedly distorted, as per opinion of people I respect. One of the books is deemed as fiction than a biography. However, they contain some interesting and important quotes by K, which I underlined when I read them way back when, and will retain those quotes. Mrs. Pupul Jayakar's book has many valuable letters from K, and lots of fun anecdotal stories -- their validity is not known. She also has a lot of herself in the book, which is valuable if we keep in mind that she's expressing her subjective impressions - some of her personal stories with K are quite interesting. But I must also say that as we see in some videos, K was very frustrated in some talks with Pupulji because she didn't seem to grasp some key points, so it was like pulling teeth. 

Trustee Meetings 

I have a number of artifacts which are not published as books, which contain discussions K had with trustees of various foundations, schools, international committees, etc. -- I took the important quotes. What stands out is his dislike for organizations including his own. 

~

VARIOUS

THESE I AUDIO-DICTATED SO THERE ARE PROBABLY A LOT OF EDITORIAL TYPING SPELLING ISSUES. I will read through and correct them as time allows. 

Thought is limited because it’s a material process and matter is limited. Except the other type of thought that’s not born from chaotic content… /// also b/c it’s based on experience. Limited so divisive – so conflict.  – identification with group  : want sense of being.

Our society doesn’t see individual qualities -  just adapt to environment

To see needs calm mind – if traumatized it’s hard to see

In education spontaneous way of learning is suppressed

If you have understood an experience then that experience is over it leaves no residue. It is because we do not understand experience because we remember the pleasure or the pain of it that we are never inwardly simple. Those who are religiously inclined pursue the things that make for outward simplicity. But inwardly they are chaotic confused with innumerable longings desires knowledge. They are frightened of living of experiencing.


When the mind is not cluttered up with words then thinking is not thinking as we know but it is an activity without the word without the symbol therefore it has no frontier. The word is the frontier


So he's distinguishing between thinking with words thinking when the mind free from words


If you are simply aware of the whole structure of habit without resistance then you will find there is freedom from habit and in that freedom a new thing takes place.

It is only the free mind that can perceive something beyond itself.

Conflict will always exist as long as the idea is more important than the fact.

Meditation is a process of freeing the mind from systems end of giving attention without either being absorbed or making an effort to concentrate.

A mind that listens with complete attention will never look for a result because it is constantly unfolding. Like a river it is always in movement. Such a mind is totally unconscious of its own activity in the sense that there is no perpetuation of a self, of a me, which is seeking to achieve an end.

This is a nonsense line - he says a problem comes into being only when there is a search for result. When does search for result ceases then only is there no problem.

Another nonsense statement: there is no sorrow when there is perception of what is.

If comes obscurely not when you are watching wanting. It is there as sudden as sunlight as pure as the night but to receive it the heart must be full and the mind empty. Now you have the mind full and your heart empty..


If there is a gap between what is said and your own reaction to what is said, in that interval, whether you prolong it indefinitely, for a long period, or for a few seconds, in that interval, if you observe, there comes clarity. It is the interval that is the new brain. Immediate reaction is the old brain, and the old brain functions in its own traditional accepted reactionary animalistic sense. When there is an abeyance of that
When the reaction is suspended, then you will find that the new brain acts, and it is only the new brain that can understand, not the old brain

Having lost the song we pursue the singer. We learn from the singer the technique of song, but there is no song. And I say the song is essential. The joy of singing is essential. When the joy is there the technique can be built up from nothing. You will invent your own technique, you won't have to study elocution or style. When you have UC and the very seeing of beauty is an art.


Is not to ask What is the purpose of life of existence? But to be clear the confusion that is within you. Just like a blind man who asks what. If I tell him what light is he will listen according to his blindness according to his darkness but suppose he is able to see then he will never ask the question what is light. It is there.


Similarly if you can clarify the confusion within yourself find what the purpose of life is, you will not have to ask, you will not have to look for it, all that you have to do is to be free from those causes that bring about confusion



Sorrow breeds sorrow. sorrow is time as thought. To end sorrow is to come into contact with death why living, by dying to your name to your house to your property to your cause so that you are fresh young clear and you can see things as they are without any distortion.


One has to live everyday dying period dying because you are then in contact with life.


With love do what you will, there is no risk, there is no conflict. Then love is the essence of virtue.


Freedom comes when you understand the whole problem of envy greed ambition and the desire for power. It is freedom from those things that allows the extraordinary thing called character to flower. Such a man has compassion He knows what it is to love, not the man who merely repeats a lot of words about morality.


When the mind is completely empty only then is it capable of receiving the unknown. The mind is not purged until it understands the content of relationship, its relationship with property come on with people, until it has established the right relationship with everything. Till it understands the whole process of conflict in relationship, the mind cannot be free. Only when the mind is holy silent, completely inactive, not projecting, when it is not seeking and is utterly still, only then that which is eternal and timeless comes into being.

The mind cannot be still as long as it is ignorant of itself.

That state of creation has no cause therefore a mind in that state is every moment dying and living and loving and being..

To meditate is to purge the mind of its self-centered activity etc etc but also it's good to be quiet and be be quiet of course but he didn't really highlight that that much as much as you should have but these are razzles words reza

What is deeply and thoroughly understood will not repeat itself.


These are Reza's words

most people the most difficult thing is observing what is. But that is the beginning of self-knowledge. The mirror of relationship does not distort and allows the person to see what they are which brings freedom from conditioning


It is a great art for the mind to be completely silent without coercion. And only then is there a possibility of experiencing that which may be called God.


Life Ahead

Contentment is not satisfaction. Contentment is something very vital. It is a state of creativeness in which there is the understanding of what actually is. Begin to understand what you actually are from moment to moment, from day to day, you will find that out of this understanding there comes an extraordinary feeling of vastness, limitless comprehension.



If you are really aware outwardly the inward awareness also begins to awaken and you become more and more conscious of your reaction to what people say to what you read and so on. External reaction or response in your relationship with other people is the outcome of an inward state of wanting of hope of anxiety fear. This outward and inward awareness is an unitary process which brings about a total integration of human understanding. 

 
I must begin to see the false in my relationships with ideas, with people, with things. When the mind sees that which is false, then that which is true comes into being and then there is ecstasy, there is happiness.



We demand a belief when we want to escape from a fact into an unreality.


Religion is not escape from the fact. Religion is the understanding of the fact of what you are in your everyday relationships, religion is the manner of your speech, play You Talk the way you address your servants, the way you treat your wife, your children, and neighbors.




For most of us contradiction is an extraordinary field in which the mind is caught. I want to do this, and I do something entirely different. If I face the fact of wanting to do this, there is no contradiction. And therefore at one stroke I abolish all together all sense of the opposite. And my mind then is completely concerned with what is, and with the understanding of what is.


Goodness then is not a quality, not a virtue, is the state of love.



The moment the mind ceases to think in terms of becoming something, there is cessation of action which is not stagnation. It is a state of total attention which is goodness


That can be goodness only when there is a totality of attention in which there is no effort be or not to be.


Through a process of evolution, through time, can the me which is the center of evil, ever become noble good? Obviously not. Which is evil, the psychological me, will always remain evil. But we do not want to face that. We think that through the process of time through growth and change I will ultimately some reality. This is our hope, that is our longing. That the eye will be made perfect through time.

What is this eye this me? It is a name, a form, a bundle of memories, hopes, frustrations, longings, pains, sorrows, passing joys. We want this me to continue and become perfect can we say that beyond the me there is a super me, a higher self, a spiritual entity which is timeless, but since we have thought of it that spiritual entity is still within the field of time is it not? If we can think about it, it is obviously within the field of our reasoning.


To learn is a movement from the known to the unknown.


The greatness of relationship is it's very insecurity. By seeking security in relationship you are hindering its function, brings its own peculiar actions and misfortunes.


Most of us avoid or put aside the tension in relationship, referring the ease and comfort of satisfying dependency, an unchallenged security a safe anchorage. Family and other relationships become a refuge, the refuge of the thoughtless.



The craving to become causes fears, to be, to achieve, it depends and genders fear. The state of non-fear is not negation, it is not the opposite of fear no it is courage. In understanding the cause of fear there is its cessation, not to becoming courageous, for in all becoming there is the seed of fear.

Dependence on things, people, or an ideas reed's fear. Dependents arises from ignorance. From the lack of self-knowledge, from Inward poverty. Fear causes uncertainty of mind-heart, preventing communication and understanding.

Through self-awareness we begin to discover and so comprehend the cause of fear, not only the superficial but the deep, causal and accumulative fears. Fear is both inborn and acquired, it is related to the past, and to free thought feeling from it, past must be comprehended through the present. The past is ever wanting to give birth to the present which becomes the identifying memory after me and the Mine the eye the self is the root of all fear