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ML70I - A short interview about the future of the foundations and schools
Malibu, California - 29 March 1970
Interview



0:18 Erna Lilliefelt: In a way, it's a continuation of our board meeting the other day, where you explained the importance that you felt of Brockwood's position for now and for the future.
0:30 K: All right. I understand, I get it. Mary Zimbalist: You also spoke of the extreme reason for Brockwood to endure in the future.
0:49 Lee Siegel: Which brings up my question, which is: later, a hundred years from now I hope, after you are gone, what do you want done about all the things you've said and done?
1:06 Krishnamurti: I know. You know, sir, for the last forty years there have been two schools in India: one in the north, one in the south, the north is called Rajghat, south Rishi Valley.
1:28 These schools have been running. Now they are so-called educating thousands of children, boys and girls, and they have got enormous property and very valuable property, especially the northern one.
1:51 They need a great deal of money to get the right teachers, and teachers are very poorly paid in India and therefore you get a very poor quality of teachers, because the teaching profession doesn't pay.
2:12 So the brains go to business, other professions. So they need a great deal of money not only to build but to bring about new teachers, new element altogether in it.
2:27 And they will go on even if K doesn't exist.
2:39 During these forty years, in 1923 somebody in Holland, van Pallandt, gave 5,000 acres with a castle, and that was a centre where people came from all over the world for...
3:00 till the beginning of the Second World War. And then that property was returned to the owner, and all of that dissolved because Hitler used it and all kinds of things, the mess around it.
3:16 Then in 1923 or 25 – I forget, it doesn't matter – there was a piece of land bought at Ojai, which was meant to be a place where gatherings could take place, meetings, and gradually that petered out.
3:37 Just the land remains there without any substance behind it.
3:45 And there was the Happy Valley School which we all started, but it has now slipped into... out of our hands. So, several years ago, about five years ago, a group of people said we must have a school in Europe, we must have a school.
4:07 So after talking a great deal about it, we said, let's find out whether it will be in France, Holland, Switzerland or England.
4:20 And after investigating – there had been several groups investigating each place – and they all ultimately decided it should be in England, because for legal process, linguistic and all that.
4:34 So last year Brockwood was bought. The money was given by a person and with that money Brockwood Park with forty acres were bought.
4:51 And they have started a school, now there are about 14 to 16 children, completely international, boys and girls.
5:04 You see, in all these places, both in the north and the south of India, they were not merely meant for schools, they were meant for something more, where people could gather, serious people, discuss, go into the things as we do when I am there, when I am not there, but somehow it hasn't happened.
5:30 And they are now beginning to let it happen – when I am there in India they are now inviting, and all that.
5:38 And Brockwood should be that kind of place, not only a good school, in the ordinary accepted sense of that word, with first-class academic education, but also a gathering for people to stay there for a fortnight to discuss when I am there, meet and so on, which we used to do at Castle Eerde in Holland.
6:11 And it was also the same thing at Ojai – it was meant for that – but that completely went wrong altogether.
6:19 So Brockwood became the centre for all of Europe. And there is a meeting or a gathering in Saanen every July and August, again people from all over the world.
6:37 But that is only for six weeks, where I discuss, talk and all that. But Brockwood is entirely different because we want it to go on. Even if K dies it should go on, because it will be an educational centre in the largest sense of that word, where people can come while K is alive, year after year, discuss, stay there, meet, you know, keep the thing active, scholastically as well as non-scholastically.
7:19 And so that should be sustained all the time – Brockwood, the schools in India, in the north and the south – these places should be sustained, should go on.
7:36 In India, they will go on anyhow because they have worked for forty years and those two schools are fairly well-known, and they will muddle along.
7:48 They will go on somehow. But Brockwood is now a new element, just born. It must be sustained. They need a great deal of money, they need students, they need structural improvement in the building, and so on and so on.
8:08 And also to get good teachers you need more money. And when people come there to stay, because it is rather an isolated spot, fortunately, but near Winchester, near other bigger towns, but it means transportation, you know, all that business.
8:30 We had a meeting, gathering of that kind, under a marquee last year. There were about 800 people that turned up from all over, again, which was very surprising, they never expected more than four hundred.
8:45 So, that must go on, that will keep the archives, that will keep the books, that will sustain the whole movement.
8:55 Nothing as a religious centre or a holy affair but functional and a place where people can come.
9:08 That's the whole idea. And America, I don't know, here there is the K Foundation – they will have their Bulletin, and if anything happens, what is the place of the American K Foundation?
9:26 That is what we were talking about.
9:28 MZ: Yes, that is a serious question.
9:30 K: And see what its relationship is between the K Foundation of India now – they have now formed a K Foundation in India, to which belongs the two schools.
9:45 It used to be called by a different name, now it is the K Foundation India, to which these two schools belong.
9:52 There is the K Foundation in England.
9:55 LS: Is it called K or Krishnamurti?
9:57 K: Krishnamurti Foundation.
9:59 LS: I know, but is it the letter K or is it Krishnamurti?
10:01 K: No, whole name, I am just abbreviating. And there is the K Foundation of America, K Foundation of England, K Foundation of India.
10:13 And though they are legally separate, morally and ethically and deeply they are all interrelated.
10:22 I mean, that is why some of these people from America should go to India, to England, get in touch with each other, meet each other, to feel what each one is doing, and not fighting or antagonistic to each other.
10:41 LS: About when K is not around anymore? Who interprets K's philosophy?
10:49 K: Ah, no interpretation, because that would be dangerous. You will have St. Paul and St. Peter and the whole gang come up and mess up the whole circus.
10:59 LS: Then how does...?

K: There are the books.
11:03 LS: And discussions at the centres that you talked about.
11:06 K: But you see the difficulty of interpretation, then you have the whole hierarchical system – who interprets better – you follow?
11:14 LS: Yes, I do.

K: The danger of all that we have avoided for the last 45 years. I said, don't interpret – go directly or don't go.
11:30 LS: I am speculating, but there will be people...
11:33 K: Who will... there are already people. There are already people who say, what he says we are interpreting.
11:40 LS: This is what K means.
11:43 K: Now there are dozens writing books and all that. I have said – buzz off.
11:51 MZ: Krishnaji, you have said from time to time verbally to many of us that no one has a mandate to speak for you.
11:58 K: No, that is right.

MZ: And since this is on the record, would you say whatever it is you want to say about that?
12:05 Because as there already are people who claim that mandate...
12:16 K: You see, K – the name, is very common in India.
12:22 LS: Krishnamurti.
12:23 K: Because every eighth child – and they produce like anything – is called K, Krishnamurti.
12:31 LS: Every eighth child in India is called Krishnamurti?
12:34 K: Yes, that is the tradition. Not necessarily – Krishnamurti, the meaning of that word in Sanskrit means 'the form of Krishna'.
12:45 Murti means form; Krishna is a deity. The form of the deity. And there are dozens of them. And already there is one in Saanen, who is now an enlightened one, and he is issuing tapes and records saying Krishnamurti speaks in Saanen.
13:08 LS: To be confused with you.
13:10 K: And he is playing his own game. So this is becoming rather unpleasant. And there are other people going around the world saying, 'He has asked me to talk, he has said go and spread, and so it is my own experience I am spreading', and so on.
13:30 So we can't prevent it.
13:32 LS: No, right. But you can express as you've done.
13:35 K: I have told them. LS: Which I think is important.
13:37 K: Oh yes, I have said, no, don't interpret. There is no hierarchical system. I have asked nobody to go and preach in my name or be my representative – that all becomes too absurd.
13:58 So one has to establish the right relationship, I feel, between these three foundations.
14:07 And Mr and Mrs Lilliefelt are going in August and September to Saanen and to England, and I hope people will come from India – I am going to write to them and see if they can't come, at least one of them – so that we all meet.
14:27 LS: One more question: K is gone, the schools survive.
14:34 How do you know, how will you know, how will I know, anybody, that the schools will maintain that which...
14:46 K: Who knows.
14:49 LS: Well, I would presume that by the people that you...
14:51 K: That's just it. People who really want to do this, who are serious, who are so-called – if I can use the word – dedicated.
15:04 LS: But you know those people now.
15:05 K: Some of them, but it is all very difficult. They want to but they have their own personal – you know.
15:14 MZ: People change.
15:17 K: People change.
15:23 LS: So through the schools you will survive.
15:30 K: Yes – not I – the books, the schools, the whole business of it.
15:35 MZ: The tapes.

K: The tapes and talks, records – and all the mess will begin afterwards.
15:52 LS: Thank you.
15:53 K: You see, Krishnamurti Writings, Ojai, K: you know all the story of that. LS: Yes, I do.
16:02 K: They have got a great deal of money which is lying fallow, and it should go to all this.
16:15 K: Enough? LS: Yes, thank you.