Society based on Acquisitiveness & Ambition...

• Questioner: It is true that society is based on acquisitiveness and
  ambition; but if we had no ambition would we not decay?
• Krishnamurti: This is really a very important question, and it needs
  great attention. Do you know what attention is? Let us find out. In a class
  room, when you stare out of the window or pull somebody's hair, the teacher
  tells you to pay attention. Which means what? That you are not interested in
  what you are studying and so the teacher compels you to pay attention - which is
  not attention at all. Attention comes when you are deeply interested in
  something, for then you love to find out all about it; then your whole mind,
  your whole being is there. Similarly, the moment you see that this question - if
  we had no ambition, would we not decay? - is really very important, you are
  interested and want to find out the truth of the matter. Now, is not the
  ambitious man destroying himself? That is the first thing to find out, not to
  ask whether ambition is right or wrong. Look around you, observe all the people
  who are ambitious. What happens when you are ambitious? You are thinking about
  yourself, are you not? You are cruel, you push other people aside because you
  are trying to fulfil your ambition, trying to become a big man, thereby creating
  in society the conflict between those who are succeeding and those who are
  falling behind. There is a constant battle between you and the others who are
  also after what you want; and is this conflict productive of creative living? Do
  you understand, or is this too difficult? Are you ambitious when you love to do
  something for its own sake? When you are doing something with your whole being,
  not because you want to get somewhere, or have more profit, or greater results,
  but simply because you love to do it - in that there is no ambition, is there?
  In that there is no competition; you are not struggling with anyone for first
  place. And should not education help you to find out what you really love to do
  so that from the beginning to the end of your life you are working at something
  which you feel is worth while and which for you has deep significance?
  Otherwise, for the rest of your days, you will be miserable. Not knowing what
  you really want to do, your mind falls into a routine in which there is only
  boredom, decay and death. That is why it is very important to find out while you
  are young what it is you really love to do; and this is the only way to create a
  new society.
• This
  Matter of Culture, Chepter-1,
• J.
  Krishnamurti

Bharat Ek Khoj

Here are the verses from the start and end titles of Bharat Ek Khoj.

(Part- I)

Srishtee se pehle sat nahin thaa, asat bhi nahin
(Before creation there was no truth, or untruth)
Antariksh bhi nahin, akash bhin nahin thaa
(no universe, not even the sky)
chhipaa thaa kyaa kahaan, kisne dhakaa thaa
(Where was it hidden, who hid it ?)
us pal to agam, atal jal bhi kahaan thaa
(At that time there was no water)

Srishtee kaa kaun hai kartaa
(who is he creator ?)
Kartaa hai vaa akartaa
(…)
Oonche aakash mein rahtaa
(Who stays up there in the sky )
Sada adhyaksh banaa rahtaa
(who is in charge)
Wahin sachmuch mein jaantaa..Yaa nahin bhi jaanataa
(He truly must know everything, and maybe not!)
Hai kisi ko nahin pataa, nahin pataa,
(no one knows..no one knows)
Nahin hai pataa, nahin hai pataa

Sanskrit…. (Part- II)

Weh tha hiranyagarbh srishti se pehle vidyamaan
(he was born out of the depths..before creation)
Wahi to saare bhoot jaat ka swami mahaan
(he is the lord of all life)
jo hai astitvamaana dharti aasmaan dhaaran kar
(the one who is there over land and sky)
Aise kis devta ki upasana karein hum avi dekar
(who is this god who we pray to ?)

Jis ke bal par tejomay hai ambar
(He whose strength the sky is held up with)
Prithvi hari bhari sthapit sthir
(and the earth lies green and stable)
Swarg aur sooraj bhi sthir
(the heavens and the sun stay stable)
Aise kis devta ki upasana karein hum avi dekar
(who is this god who we pray to ?)
Garbh mein apne agni dhaaran kar paida kar
(In whose womb lies fire)
Vyapa tha jal idhar udhar neeche upar
(who controls here, there and everywhere)
Jagaa chuke vo ka ekameva pran banker
(who gives rise to life)
Aise kis devta ki upasana karein hum avi dekar
(who is this god who we pray to ?)

Om ! Srishti nirmata swarg rachiyata purvaj raksha kar
(creator of creation, the heavens and who looked after our ancestors)
Satya dharma palak atul jal niyamak raksha kar
(who keeps the truth, justice and the essence of life)
Phaili hain dishayen bahu jaisi uski sab mein sab par
(whose hands seem to stretch over all there is )
Aise hi devta ki upasana kare hum avi dekar
(this is the god who we pray to)
Aise hi devta ki upasana kare hum avi dekar
(this is the god who we pray to)

Love....

Question: What do you mean by love ?

Krishnamurti: We are going to discover by understanding what love is not, because, as love is the unknown, we must come to it by discarding the known. The unknown cannot be discovered by a mind that is full of the known. What we are going to do is to find out the values of the known, look at the known, and when that is looked at purely, without condemnation, the mind becomes free from the known; then we shall know what love is. So, we must approach love negatively, not positively. What is love with most of us? When we say we love somebody, what do we mean? We mean we possess that person. From that possession arises jealousy, because if I lose him or her what happens? I feel empty, lost; therefore I legalize possession; I hold him or her. From holding, possessing that person, there is jealousy, there is fear and all the innumerable conflicts that arise from possession. Surely such possession is not love, is it? Obviously love is not sentiment. To be sentimental, to be emotional, is not love, because sentimentality and emotion are mere sensations. A religious person who weeps about Jesus or Krishna, about his guru or somebody else, is merely sentimental, emotional. He is indulging in sensation, which is a process of thought, and thought is not love. Thought is the result of sensation, so the person who is sentimental, who is emotional, cannot possibly know love. Again, aren't we emotional and sentimental? Sentimentality, emotionalism, is merely a form of self-expansion. To be full of emotion is obviously not love, because a sentimental person can be cruel when his sentiments are not responded to, when his feelings have no outlet. An emotional person can be stirred to hatred, to war, to butchery. A man who is sentimental, full of tears for his religion, surely has no love. Is forgiveness love? What is implied in forgiveness? You insult me and I resent it, remember it; then, either through compulsion or through repentance, I say, "I forgive you". First I retain and then I reject. Which means what? I am still the central figure. I am still important, it is I who am forgiving somebody. As long as there is the attitude of forgiving it is I who am important, not the man who is supposed to have insulted me. So when I accumulate resentment and then deny that resentment, which you call forgiveness, it is not love. A man who loves obviously has no enmity and to all these things he is indifferent. Sympathy, forgiveness, the relationship of possessiveness, jealousy and fear - all these things are not love. They are all of the mind, are they not? As long as the mind is the arbiter, there is no love, for the mind arbitrates only through possessiveness and its arbitration is merely possessiveness in different forms. The mind can only corrupt love, it cannot give birth to love, it cannot give beauty. You can write a poem about love, but that is not love. Obviously there is no love when there is no real respect, when you don't respect another, whether he is your servant or your friend. Have you not noticed that you are not respectful, kindly, generous, to your servants, to people who are so-called `below' you? You have respect for those above, for your boss, for the millionaire, for the man with a large house and a title, for the man who can give you a better position, a better job, from whom you can get something. But you kick those below you, you have a special language for them. Therefore where there is no respect, there is no love; where there is no mercy, no pity, no forgiveness, there is no love. And as most of us are in this state we have no love. We are neither respectful nor merciful nor generous. We are possessive, full of sentiment and emotion which can be turned either way: to kill, to butcher or to unify over some foolish, ignorant intention. So how can there be love? You can know love only when all these things have stopped, come to an end, only when you don't possess, when you are not merely emotional with devotion to an object. Such devotion is a supplication, seeking something in a different form. A man who prays does not know love. Since you are possessive, since you seek an end, a result, through devotion, through prayer, which make you sentimental, emotional, naturally there is no love; obviously there is no love when there is no respect. You may say that you have respect but your respect is for the superior, it is merely the respect that comes from wanting something, the respect of fear. If you really felt respect, you would be respectful to the lowest as well as to the so-called highest; since you haven't that, there is no love. How few of us are generous, forgiving, merciful! You are generous when it pays you, you are merciful when you can see something in return. When these things disappear, when these things don't occupy your mind and when the things of the mind don't fill your heart, then there is love; and love alone can transform the present madness and insanity in the world - not systems, not theories, either of the left or of the right. You really love only when you do not possess, when you are not envious, not greedy, when you are respectful, when you have mercy and compassion, when you have consideration for your wife, your children, your neighbour, your unfortunate servants. Love cannot be thought about, love cannot be cultivated, love cannot be practised. The practice of love, the practice of brotherhood, is still within the field of the mind, therefore it is not love. When all this has stopped, then love comes into being, then you will know what it is to love. Then love is not quantitative but qualitative. You do not say, "I love the whole world" but when you know how to love one, you know how to love the whole. Because we do not know how to love one, our love of humanity is fictitious. When you love, there is neither one nor many: there is only love. It is only when there is love that all our problems can be solved and then we shall know its bliss and its happiness.

The first & last freedom

J. Krishnamurti

Q&A

Questioner: How can we live happily?

Krishnamurti: Do you know when you are living happily ? You know when you are suffering, when you have physical pain. When somebody hits you or is angry with you, you know suffering. But do you know when you are happy? Are you conscious of your body when you are healthy? Surely, happiness is a state of which you are unconscious, of which you are not aware. The moment you are aware that you are happy, you cease to be happy, don't you? But most of you suffer; and being conscious of that, you want to escape from suffering into what you call happiness. You want to be consciously happy; and the moment you are consciously happy, happiness is gone. Can you ever say that you are joyous? It is only afterwards, a moment or a week later that you say, "How happy I was, how joyous I have been". In the actual moment you are unconscious of happiness, and that is the beauty of it.

From Life Ahead...

J. Krishnamurti