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RV83S1 - Why are you educating your children?
Rishi Valley, India - 24 November 1983
Seminar 1



0:20 K: If one may suggest, I’ll talk for a while, and perhaps you would be good enough to discuss or ask questions after I have spoken. Is that all right?
0:37 Question, doubt, tear it to pieces. Let’s go into it, thoroughly, through discussion, if you will kindly do that. First of all, I wonder why we educate our children. Considering what the world is or what the world is becoming – more and more corrupt, degenerating, breaking up into various nationalities, tribal warfare and preparation for war, throughout the world, building up armaments of every kind, nuclear bombs, the whole destructive nature of man. Violent, corrupt, brutal, with occasional flashes of affection this is what the world is, society which each one of us has made. Society that is not put together by some extraneous, exotic people, but by every human being living on this earth. We have created this society. And we cannot possibly change that society, which is immoral, unethical, and fragmented. We human beings throughout the world have created that society. We are educating our students, our children or grandchildren to conform, more or less, to the pattern set by society. Either they become soldiers, sailors, businessmen, scientists, psychologists or some kind of crazy monk, and so on.
4:00 Our education is bringing about fragmentation of human action. And one questions, as we must, why we educate our children? What’s the point of it all? What’s the point of becoming an M.A., Ph.D., scientist, or a philosopher or a businessman, or some kind of religious, romantic, sentimental, idealistic human being and the world into which they have to fit. Is that what we want our education to be? So, if one may, one must ask, where is all this leading us to? What’s the point of becoming a businessman, a scientist – all that you know human beings are trying to become, to end up in mediocrity? One may be excellent in some career, a great scientist, great philosopher, or an excellent mathematician, but one’s own private life is very mediocre. The meaning of the word ‘mediocrity’ is going up halfway up the hill, never going to the very top of that hill. Right? That’s the root meaning of that word ‘mediocre’. We are turning out students all over the world to be mediocre human beings. They may have excellent degrees, excellent positions, prestige, but their daily life is conflict, misery, uncertainty, and so on. This is our life.
7:28 One asks, what’s the point of it all? Surely, human beings, not only in this country, but throughout the world, wherever you go, are seeking security, not only physical security but psychological, inward security. Each person, each so-called individual, is struggling in this chaotic, almost insane world, to find some kind of security – religious security, security in the family, security in a career. But the drive is to find some kind of security, to be safe, to have some kind of protection. And this very struggle, so-called individual struggle is, as one sees in the world, destroying the world. This is a fact. Each nation, community, family, each individual is seeking security, in opposition, in contradiction to other individuals. So, there is always this competition, violence, everlasting struggle and conflict, from the moment one is born, till you die. Again, this is irrevocable fact. If one examines one’s own life, closely, without any prejudice, this is the way of our days, an endless conflict.
10:30 And, we are educating – in schools, in colleges, in universities and so on, to have great knowledge about the earth, the whole world. Apparently – I hope you’ll be good enough to listen to this – apparently knowledge is not saving man. We have accumulated knowledge historically, scientifically, knowledge in the world of business, and so on. We have tremendous knowledge. And that knowledge is always limited, and will always be limited, by its very nature. Knowledge is the outcome of vast experience, one or two million years, or 400... – thousands of years, man has experienced, gathered knowledge and that knowledge, that experience, is always limited. There is no complete knowledge about anything and can never be. We are not being dogmatic. We are not saying this is so, but it’s a fact. Look at the scientists, how they’re gathering knowledge, adding, adding. In the last 200 years, from Galileo till now, man has accumulated tremendous knowledge about nature, matter, astrophysics and so on, based on hypothesis, experience, testing, adding, and all the accumulative process of science. That knowledge is limited. Business knowledge, also – every kind of knowledge is always limited. You may disagree with that, but if one looks at it rather closely, knowledge is based on experience and experience is limited. So, experience, knowledge, stored in the brain as memory, and that memory being limited, so is thought. Thought is limited. And apparently, that’s the only instrument we have, and that has created – may I use the word ‘havoc’? – in the world.
14:34 Thought has created great cathedrals, great temples, mosques. Thought has created all the things that are in them. Right? Thought has created the nuclear bomb. Thought has brought about extraordinary medicines, surgery, ultra-rapid communication. Thought has put together the computer – we won’t go into the whole nature of the computer. So, on one hand, thought has created extraordinary technological advancement, and also, wars. It has created nationalities, which is glorified tribalism, and this thought has also created God. Do you accept all this? Thought, in our relationships with each other, intimate or otherwise, is bringing about a division in our relationships. These are all facts, it’s not the speaker’s personal opinion or evaluation or judgment. We are looking at facts. Facts being that which has happened or is happening. And our education, whether it be the Western type of education or the so-called Eastern – if there is such a thing – is making human beings extraordinarily trivial. Man is fragmented, because thought in its very nature is divisive. So, we are educating our students, our children to be what? To be like us, to follow the same old pattern? The Communist world, the totalitarian world, according to historical decisions and their own peculiar conclusions, the Communists say, ‘Control this environment, you’ll change man’. That’s one of their tenets. They have tried to control human thought, with disastrous results. The so-called democratic world, with all its ideals, is opposed to the other. So, the world is divided into ideologies, into ideals – Communist, the religious, the democratic, and the dictatorship. So ideals, ideologies are breaking up the world. The Christian faith, with all its dogmas and rituals, and the Hindu, Buddhist, Muslim world is all based on this, faith, belief, ideologies and books, which are called sacred. I don’t know why, but they are called sacred. So, the world is this. Again, this is not the speaker’s prejudice, these are facts. Whether you like it or not, these are facts. We grown-up people assume such extraordinary authority over our children.
21:19 The other day, when we were in California, on the bumper of a car was a sticker. You know what that is? On that sticker, it said, ‘Question all authority’. To see that on a bumper in California, just a month and half ago, is an extraordinary thing. Here, tradition, authority, plays a tremendous part. Nobody questions, nobody doubts political authority, religious authority, the authority of so-called religious books, the authority of parents – sorry! – the authority of our own knowledge. So our minds, or rather our brains are conditioned, conditioned not only in the West according to their particular culture, according to their environment, to their religions and so on, by their literature, in this country, too, the brain is conditioned, as Hindus. They belong to various categories of social structure, conditioned by religion, by authority of religion, by tradition, by environment, by the food one eats, and clothes. So, our brains are conditioned – that’s a fact – by knowledge. And one asks, what’s the point of all this marvellous education? If one is a parent, and you must be, why are you educating your children? To conform to all this? To have a life of endless conflict? If you say that’s the nature of man, that he must struggle, through struggle you progress, which is such utter nonsense. You say trees struggle towards the light. But we human beings, who have lived on this unfortunate earth, which we are slowly and carefully destroying, we are supposed to use our brains, to be a little more intelligent than the animal. And we, using our brains – if we use them at all – have come to this state, to the present state, wars, conflict, unhappiness, anxiety, ridden with fear, pursuing pleasure, and the burden of sorrow. This is our life. One may not like to face it. One rather avoids it, but it’s there, like a perpetual wound, like a disease. We have become so accustomed to it, we put up with anything, especially in this country, any kind of politics, any kind of corruption, callousness, all the rest of it. You see it all around you. We come back to the same point, what are we educating them for? They pass exams, acquire knowledge in a particular field, and get a job. The parents are only interested in that. Get a job, get married, be safe. There is the whole world which is totally neglected – the world, which is the psychological realm, the inward life, you totally neglect. You stuff them with extraordinary information about matter, about physics and so on, but never pay attention to what is going on in the human psyche. We are asking most respectfully, aren’t we concerned with the whole development of man, the holistic approach, not a one-sided approach, but be concerned with the whole cultivation of the human being.
29:28 Scientists are saying there’s the left and right side of the brain. Right side of the brain has never been used. It is there. On the left side is ...all the rest of it. Again, there is this division. We divide everything. Not that there’s not division between man, woman, between these beautiful trees and ourselves, but we have never asked, as we’re asking now, if I may, is it possible to use the whole brain, not just one part of it? A holistic approach to life, not the approach of thought which is divisive, because it is limited. So, we’re asking, could we educate our children, not merely to become technicians, electronic experts and so on, but also, to go very deeply into oneself, because that world is limitless. If that world is not understood and lived – words don’t matter, but lived, which demands great integrity, honesty. From that world, change can be brought about in the outer, but not from the outer to the inner. That’s what the Communists and the Socialists are doing, that’s what the Democrats are doing. They are hoping, by changing the outer, they’re going to change the inner structure, nature of human beings. We are saying the contrary. That is, understanding the depth of life, the beauty, the goodness and so on. Inwardly, to understand by watching, in our relationship what we are, and penetrating deeper and deeper, without analysis. It becomes very difficult, I won’t go into all that.
33:06 Briefly – analysis implies the analyser. Is the analyser different from that which he’s analysing? Of course, not. You follow? The analyser is part of thought. The analysed is also part of thought. So, he is playing a game with himself, all the time. That’s not the point for the moment – we are saying the analyser is the analysed, the observer, the one who witnesses is that which he’s witnessing. There is no division between the two, because the present is both the past and the future. Sorry, that leads us totally in another direction.
34:15 Is it possible to educate our children, students in this school, and in other schools connected with this school, to bring about a holistic approach to life? That demands affection, love. Don’t get bored by that word. One asks if that feeling exists at all, whether we actually love our children. Love, not dominate, not tell them what to do, that comes a little later, but do we really love our children? Love is different from sentimentality. Love is different from devotion. Where there is love, there is responsibility. To have this holistic education implies great affection, love. Where there is love, there is intelligence, not the cunning intelligence of thought. Right, I’m finished for the moment. I’ve talked for half an hour, so let’s discuss. If you will kindly tear to pieces what the speaker has said. Question, doubt. There’s an art in questioning. So, please, it’s up to you.
36:46 Questioner: Sir, can I ask a question? You were saying about the holistic approach to life, and using of all the faculties of the brain. Today, we have not totally explored the brain, but can using it in totality be a voluntary act? Will the use of all the faculties of the brain become a voluntary act?
37:19 G. Narayan: Can the use of all the faculties of the brain become a voluntary act?
37:31 K: Do we do anything voluntarily? Or is it always compulsive, or there’s a motive behind our action? Is there action which is spontaneous, free? Sir, I’m asking. Or is our action always conditioned by reward and punishment? You used the word ‘voluntarily’, sir. What does that mean? I volunteer to join the army. I volunteer, freely, to become a businessman or a scientist. Behind that voluntary urge, isn’t there a motive? Motive means movement, and that movement has already set a direction. So, there is no voluntary action. The brain – as far as one observes, I’m not a brain specialist, please understand, but we have talked to a great many brain specialists. They go so far that the brain is conditioned, and that conditioning is based on fear, reward and punishment, and that brain, being so conditioned, can never be free. There are those philosophers, the existentialists and so on, who say that the conditioned brain can never be unconditioned. You can modify it, make the prison more beautiful, have more toilets and better food, but that conditioning will always exist. We are questioning that. We are saying that it is possible to be totally free from all conditioning. You are right to question it, to find out if it is possible. But to find out from another is like playing a game. If you went into it yourself, find out how one is conditioned and the cause of it and so on, so on. All that demands a great deal of inward enquiry. So, we are not free human beings. It’s so obvious. We are conditioned by our environment, by society, by our religions, by our literature and so on.
41:49 Professor Hiralal: When we say that we want to educate our children to have a holistic view of life, does that not become an idea, an escape from what we are today and create all the problems of an idea?
42:09 GN: He says does not the very idea of a holistic education soon become a thought, and so a deviation from ‘what is’?
42:24 K: You’ve understood? Need I repeat the question? A deviation from what is. The holistic approach, he asks, doesn’t that deviate from what is?

GN: No, what he says is, the holistic approach soon becomes an idea and so it deviates from…
42:46 K: Yes. What is an idea? You’re the experts. What is an idea? The original meaning, etymological meaning, from Greek and Latin, ‘idea’ means to observe, to see, to clearly perceive and from that perception, make an abstraction called an idea. That abstraction becomes more real than what is. You follow? Right, sir? When you use the word ‘holistic’, you can make that into an idea, but I say to find out what it means to live a holistic life, is to enquire first ‘what is’, and whether that ‘what is’ can be changed, radically. It’s not an idea, it is a way of living. Hearing the word ‘holistic’, you can make an idea of it, an abstraction, and live according to the abstraction, therefore, that becomes divisive.
44:40 HL: Sir, you have dilated upon thought.
44:46 K: Would you kindly sit down, sir? What were you saying, sir?
44:53 HL: Is that question completed?
44:58 GN: He wants to know if you have completed that answer. Yes.
45:02 HL: You have dilated upon thought. It is the root cause of so many things. Thought has created the temples, sites thought has created mosques, and nationality. It is a glorified tribalism. In that stream, thought has been condemned. Am I correct, sir?
45:31 K: I haven’t condemned it.
45:34 HL: Then when we discovered all these things, thought is the motive force, whether for noble or ill ideas. Am I correct, sir?
45:51 K: May I say, sir, first of all, we have not condemned thought. We said thought is the only instrument we have now. Thought is limited, therefore whatever it does is fragmentary. It creates, on the one hand, extraordinary medicines, communication, the computer and so on, on the other hand, it creates war, which destroys the other. Right? So, as that is the only instrument apparently we have, and that instrument is bringing about such terrible effects in the world, shouldn’t we try to find out if there is another instrument, which is not intuition? Is there another instrument which is not touched by thought?
47:14 HL: Then we have to depend on the instruction of some other agency. To find that out, we have to depend on someone else...
47:23 K: No, no.
47:24 HL:...to tell us our truth, to make us realise it.
47:29 K: We depend on others for almost everything. Right? I depend on the milkman, on the postman, on the doctor, on the government, one depends on one’s wife or husband. – one depends on everything. Through dependence, one grows attachment. Suppose I’m married, I depend on my wife. Right, sir? Is that so or not? Am I treading on a sacred cow? I depend on my wife, so gradually I get attached to her. Right? Am I all right? Through attachment grows jealousy, anxiety, fear. No? No? You should know all this, sirs! So, is love attachment? Would you kindly enquire into that?
49:15 HL: Is it that the thought processes belonging to the left hemisphere produce so much noise, we can’t see the real signal, that we’re seeking to guide us, which belongs to the right hemisphere? Is it the noise in the left?
49:37 K: The question arises, sir, whether that noise can be silent. Can the brain, which has its own natural rhythm, not a rhythm being imposed upon by thought, which makes the noise, can that noise end? That is quite a different problem, sir.
50:17 HL: Sir, yours is the first talk in a series which is supposed to deal with the question of ‘Values in Education’. Sir, I think that the purpose of all education, stated purpose, including soviet school education, is to create an integrated person. I was reading a book the other day, ‘Problems of Soviet School Education’, where the objectives of soviet school education are clearly stated. The question is not what the objectives of school education are. It’s generally conceded they are to create an individual who can think for himself, who is integrated. Now, if this is correct, then what is required is a demand for excellence, only then can a person really think for himself. Now, the question –
51:43 K: Sir, would you come up here? HL: Sir, this is related to values. Now, if there is a demand for excellence...
51:51 K: Come and sit here, sir. HL: Please, let me complete here.
51:59 K: They can all hear you better from here, sir. I’m glad the throne can be occupied by others. Come and sit down, sir.
52:12 Q: Let’s hear it from the beginning.
52:17 HL: So far as I understand, the stated objective of all education, stated by responsible people everywhere, is to create an integrated individual, who can think for himself. This also includes the objectives of soviet school education. It’s a question of approach that varies the question of perception, which is different from place to place, culture to culture. I think we are looking here for some way of creating that perception which truly leads to an individual who can think for himself. This is related, in our context, so far as I can see, to a demand for excellence, not only on the part of the teacher, but how is the teacher going to demand excellence from the students. The difficulty arises, as I see it, that excellence and its pursuit is essentially judgment-free. I would even state that excellence is even value-free. If this is the perception of a teacher, if he really, truly perceives it, perhaps, he can convey to the student the role of tradition, the role of values, social values and their true place in their lives. The difficulty is that, whereas excellence is value-free, how is that teacher to convey the values in life that are required by a child in hundreds of the things that a child has to do? I think this is a point that I should like you to discuss.
54:52 K: Do you want to share? Sit here, sir. For God’s sake, don’t leave me alone. Firstly, I question whether we’re individuals at all, and I also question the whole concept of values. Are we individuals? Are we separate entities? Of course, physically. That’s understood. But inwardly, psychologically, are we separate? Or is that an illusion?
55:44 HL: The question is that inwardly, psychologically, we are not separate, but the question is how is an ordinary teacher…
55:56 K: We’ll come to that, sir.
55:58 HL:...how is he to proceed in interaction with the children? This is the crux of the matter.
56:10 K: What is the function of an educator? You are asking the same thing. Right?
56:17 HL: Yes. I would say it is to somehow help create an integrated person. This is, again, going in circles.
56:28 K: No, sir. Just a minute. You are a teacher, I’m your student. How are you going to help me to be totally to understand the wholeness of my life, which is integration, integrity and so on, unless you are that? Unless you understand the nature of all that and are living it, what’s the good of your talking to me about it? It won’t make any difference.
57:09 HL: And yet, what is happening is not entirely pointless, sir, is it?
57:17 K: Isn’t it more…? HL: Sir, look, I am a teacher in a university. Boys come to me with a variety of their problems, not necessarily scientific problems. A certain type of relationship gets established. I feel bound by that relationship, I value that relationship. If children come to me, we discuss. I don’t know what the result is. Is it all that necessary?
57:55 K: No, sir.
57:57 HL: We discuss in affection. They come to me probably because they trust me. I talk to them because I have affection for them. We discuss. I don’t know, is it necessary to find out what is right, what is wrong?
58:14 K: It is necessary, isn’t it? HL: How, sir? To my way of thinking, sir...

K: Sir, you’ve asked. May I? You’ve asked the question, what is right? How does one find out what is right? I’m going to enquire, sir. How does one find out? Is it based on choice? This is right and this is wrong. Gone.
59:10 Q: The mic is not… Sorry to disturb you.
59:16 K: Is the right opposite of the wrong? Is the good opposite of the bad?
59:31 HL: No.

K: No, wait a minute, sir. So, what is right is unrelated totally to what is wrong. Go slowly, sir. Right?
59:51 HL: This is understood, sir.
59:55 K: Uh, uh! I question that. It’s not understood.
1:00:01 HL: That’s why I asked if it is necessary to find out what is right and wrong?
1:00:07 K: We are doing it, now.
1:00:10 HL: But when a child comes...

K: No, wait, sir. First, let’s you and I be clear on this matter, then we can talk about the child. Is right action the outcome of wrong action?
1:00:28 HL: No.

K: So, they’re unrelated?
1:00:31 HL: Yes.
1:00:33 K: If that’s clear between you and me, that there is no opposite, only that which is. Goodness is not the opposite of bad, love is not the opposite of hate. Right? If that is clear between you and me, then, I’m your student, I come to you, I want to find out what is right action. Right? Is that right action the outcome of choice? Choice – should I do this or that? Right? Where there is choice, there is confusion, because I don’t know. Agree, sir?
1:01:51 HL: Sir, this is all right. But until a child comes to me...
1:01:58 K: No, I want you… Forget the damn child, for the moment. You and I are talking about it. Is right action born out of choice?
1:02:13 HL: No.

K: No. But I must understand why choice exists.
1:02:21 HL: Choice has to exist because there are a variety of functions.
1:02:26 K: No, sir. No.
1:02:28 HL: There is a function oriented aspect of life which requires a conscious choice to be made.
1:02:36 K: Why? Why do I have to choose? Please explain to me why I have to choose between this career and that career. Does it depend on my parents, does it depend on my motive, does it depend on my desire for wealth and so on, so on – power, position, prestige, status?
1:03:06 HL: At the same time, sir, in some spheres choice has to be made.
1:03:12 K: I question it. I choose between this cloth and that one
1:03:19 HL: Whatever you choose becomes a choice. It’s not accidental.
1:03:23 K: Are we talking about physical things?
1:03:26 HL: That’s what I said – function.
1:03:29 K: Ah, I misunderstood.
1:03:30 HL: There’s a choice that has to be made in a day-to-day function. It is necessary.

K: Between this cloth and that.
1:03:38 HL: That’s what I meant. When it’s a day-to-day function, some choice has to be made. It is necessary.
1:03:46 K: Between this rotten car and that rotten car.
1:03:52 HL: But this sort of choice gets carried to other spheres also.
1:03:56 K: That’s what I am objecting to.
1:03:59 HL: You’re right to object to that. The point is, how does one convey it to a child?
1:04:07 K: I don’t want to convey it before I’ve understood it. How can I convey something which I haven’t understood?
1:04:14 HL: But there are teachers here, in schools, who are not the saint that you are.
1:04:21 K: Ah, no!
1:04:25 HL: They are probably ordinary human beings, trying to find their way about.
1:04:31 K: Sir, don’t put me on a platform.
1:04:34 HL: But you happen to be, and there’s nothing I can do to bring you down.
1:04:41 K: I’m just asking, sir, there is choice in material affairs. But that same movement is extended into psychological world, and that’s where I’m objecting. HL: You are right in objecting. But this, apparently, is some sort of a natural sort of tendency, where the brain feels it should be carried through into all spheres. Perhaps that will be the safest thing to do. It does happen. How does one convey this? This is the difficulty.
1:05:28 K: That’s fairly simple.
1:05:31 GN: May I ask something in this context? He was saying that thought has a limited function, but thought somehow takes over, and does things for which it has no basis. And you said there is another instrument.
1:05:56 K: I said, ‘Is there another instrument?’
1:05:59 GN: If there is another instrument, what is the nature of investigation that leads to the understanding of a different instrument? If it is an instrument.

K: Is that what he’s asking?
1:06:17 HL: My point is related, but a little different. I’ll give you an example. When I was in Bangalore School, a couple of years ago, there used to be culture classes. In one class were some students, and one of the teachers – there was discussion – one of the teachers made the statement that thought is pointless. Now, the question is, there is a great amount of sensitivity required on the part of the teacher to convey to a child, a student, maybe even a senior student, the enormously important and useful part thought can play. I think this would need to be emphasised, perhaps, even more. It gets emphasised automatically as so many things are being taught – mathematics, science, language, sports.
1:07:28 GN: I think that’s very simple. Thought and choice are connected. You’re saying there is choice at the functional level. That’s fairly simple. The deeper question is, when thought is taking over, where it has no valid function, how does one approach finding a different instrument, because we are stuck in this instrument?
1:07:55 HL: At the moment, I’m not thinking of instrument. There is a set of teachers having to deal with children, dealing with students from time to time, every day. How does he set about interacting with the students in thousands of situations, every day? It requires great alertness, even to interact on a nominal level.
1:08:31 K: So, what shall we do?
1:08:35 HL: What is the role? It brings in the question of values. Because if a background is there, and if one operates from that background, the type of thing that we are talking about, it’s all right. But, sir, it requires a tremendous amount of awareness and sensitivity.
1:09:03 K: That’s it, sir. How do you…?
1:09:06 HL: And how does a teacher tackle the question of values?
1:09:12 K: Now, sir, you raised the question of sensitivity. What does it mean to be sensitive? Let’s go step by step, shall we? Or is that boring?
1:09:32 HL: It is not a question of boring, but I would like to proceed further.
1:09:38 K: Proceed, sir. HL: Further.
1:09:45 K: I am your student. Right, sir? I come to you. I say, ‘Sir, the whole world is divided in values. You have a value of a certain kind, I have a value of a certain kind. I stick to my values and you stick to your values. We never question why do we have values at all’.
1:10:17 HL: Sir, I only know this thing, that to a child…
1:10:24 K: I am your child.
1:10:27 HL: I’m just saying what happened to us, when we listened to you, 40 years ago. These are facts, which should also be remembered. When we listened, the three of us – I didn’t directly listen to you, when you came in 1938 or 39, but two of my friends listened. They were so overpowered, overwhelmed by that, that one who had come first in the Inter-arts examination, he got a third class MBA.

Q: But that’s not his fault!
1:11:14 HL: No, please! This was the effect. Let us not...

K: So, what happened, sir?
1:11:23 HL: The other person... The point that I’m making is that if a child comes to me, or if I am responsible for a child, I cannot tell him that the total system of values is wrong.
1:11:45 K: Of course, not. I wouldn’t say it, at all.
1:11:49 HL: Otherwise, he’ll go entirely haywire.
1:11:52 K: I wouldn’t begin with that.
1:11:57 HL: How would you begin?
1:11:59 K: I would begin by asking what it means to observe. I’d ask him what it means to be sensitive – sensitive to the trees, to nature, the rocks, all that. What does it mean? To be sensitive means to have a relationship. I can be sensitive and not look at the rocks. I would begin with that. I’d go into what it means to be sensitive. When you see a poor woman, uneducated, dirty, what it means to have a feeling, a communication with that human being. I would begin with that. I’d say, if you have values, that woman is poor, therefore, you know, discard, be contemptuous, then that very value prevents you from being sensitive to that person, if you are class-minded, aristocratic, if you are learned, that becomes a barrier in communication with that woman – unspoken. This is all so obvious. I would begin with all that.
1:13:28 HL: When I got the circular regarding the seminar on Values in Education, I was not quite clear as to what the seminar is about.
1:13:39 K: I don’t know, either.
1:13:43 HL: I think that the scope of this seminar needs to be redefined.
1:13:51 GN: Which seminar?

Q: This one.
1:13:53 GN: Ah, I see.
1:13:58 HL: Because this demand for excellence, if we are creating an individual who can think for himself, essentially, you are aiming for something which has no value in itself, it’s value-free and it is judgement-free. You are making demands of an entirely different type. You are not trying to create any set of values, therefore, I think the purpose of what we are going to talk about during these three or four days, needs to be defined.
1:14:47 K: You were asking something?

Q: Me, sir?
1:14:56 Q: Thought has been an instrument used by men so far, and you asked whether man could look for an instrument besides thought. May I ask, sir, that even when man has transcended thought, will the concept of instrumentality remain valid? Because at the level of thought, the thinker and the thought are one. So, should we be looking for another instrument or rather transcend the whole area of instrumentality? Then, as you said, actions flow spontaneously, there being neither an instrument nor user of instrument.
1:15:50 K: Perhaps, I may have used the wrong word – ‘instrument’. Now we only have thought. Right, sir? And that is creating both good and the bad. We have lived with that thought for the last 50,000 years, and we’re still going on for the next thousand years with that – thought Now, we are asking, is there a different perception, a different observation, which is not touched by thought? That means one has to understand very carefully, not merely verbally, but actually, the nature and structure of thought. Go into it, thoroughly, so as to be absolutely clear. Thought is necessary when we are talking to each other, thought is necessary to go from here to there, to drive a car, to write a letter, to do any technological thing. A master carpenter has to use thought to see what kind of grain the wood is, and he must be aware of and know the instruments. So, thought in all those fields is necessary. Right, sir? Then, is thought necessary in the psychological world at all? The psychological world is the relationship between human beings. Is thought necessary in my relationship with my wife? Please answer that question. Is it necessary? Not merely deny it’s necessary, but in my actual relationship with my wife or husband or my friend, is thought necessary there at all or that very thought brings about a conflict, a division between her and me? Thought creates the image between her and me, and that image she has made about me and I have made about her. Those images are the cause of conflict between us. So, is it possible to live without an image? Not say, ‘Yes, I agree, it’s not possible’ and just drop it, but keep the image going. But to see whether there is an ending to image-making requires – you follow, sir? – I won’t go into all that. Thought is necessary in certain directions, certain areas, and we are saying thought is totally unnecessary in the psychological world. That’s all.
1:19:44 Q: Sir, you are talking about inwardness. If there is an inward life, then it’ll solve many problems.
1:19:55 K: Sir, I use the words ‘inward life’, ‘inwardness’ or ‘inner’ in the sense, it’s like a tide in the sea. The tide goes out and comes in. You understand, sir, what I’m saying? The tide is our reaction. There is a world which we have created, not the natural world, but the social world which we have created, then, from having created it, we become slave to it. So, it’s action as an ebb and flow. You understand? Can that action stop? I don’t know if I’m putting my question rightly. Have you understood what I said, sir?
1:20:54 Q: Whether that can stop or whether we can continue in a better way?
1:21:02 K: Our life is action and reaction. Right? Would you agree?

Q: Yes.
1:21:11 K: Our life is social responsibility, and so-called ‘individual’ responsibility. It’s a tide, isn’t it? Society which we have created, and becoming slaves to that society, it’s like a tide, going in and going out. Right? I’m asking, can that tide of action and reaction stop? This requires, sir... it’s not just a few words. This requires great investigation, because our senses respond very quickly. Right? You tell me I’m a fool and I respond very quickly. It’s a reaction. Or you flatter me and I feel great. It’s a reaction. Now, both to flattery and insult, no reaction.
1:22:29 Q: In a normal situation, we’re not able to appreciate that. We cannot understand the stoppage of action and reaction. We are full of life on both sides.

K: Yes, sir.
1:22:41 Q: A situation which you are envisaging us to understand...
1:22:44 K: No, this is life.
1:22:45 Q: We are able to understand the inward tide, the action and reaction that you have explained so clearly, but imagining a state where this ceases…
1:23:00 K: It’s not imagination, sir. It has to be enquired into. It’s not an imaginative process. I have to find out when my teacher says, ‘You’re a fool’, what my reaction is. I watch it. Or I’m totally indifferent, which means I’m insensitive. I’m watching, being aware, I’m being alert. Attention is not a reaction. Concentration is a reaction. I won’t go into all that.
1:23:55 Q: Is it Samabhava?

K: What? I’m afraid I don’t know any Indian language.
1:24:04 GN: Samabhava means equal belief.
1:24:09 K: The moment you translate into Sanskrit, I’m lost, because you are giving a specific meaning and I’m not. Sir, I am an ignorant man.
1:24:23 Q: Sir, may I ask a question?

K: Just a minute, sir. I don’t read any books about all this. I watched and in watching I realised the criteria is the world, what it is, not what it should be or my imagination. The world is brutal, and that world is created by all of us. That’s a fact. I watch if I am brutal, whether I’m violent, not that I pursue non-violence, which is silly. I won’t go into all that. I’m watching and in watching there are no values, it is so. Either I’m violent or I’m not violent. To use the word ‘violence’ – it’s a very complex process. It’s not merely physical anger and physically hurting somebody, it’s much more complex than that. A brain that is alert, watching, and you can only watch if you’re not prejudiced. If you say, ‘My country is greater than any other country, I’m not watching what the implications of countries are.
1:26:06 Q: At the beginning, you asked what is the point of our education, the point of educating our children. Can thought, can our intelligence, thought, go deeply into that question, and answer that question?
1:26:35 K: Sir, what is intelligence? You used the word ‘intelligence’. What do you mean by that word?
1:26:44 Q: I had two different meanings for thought and intelligence. Both are not the same, but where intelligence operates, then we may find the answer to your question.
1:27:02 K: So, what do you mean by intelligence?
1:27:06 Q: Not fragmentary thinking. I can’t say what it is, but I can say what it is not, because I can’t describe what intelligence is.
1:27:19 K: Would you say, the intelligence of thought? Just a minute, sir. To build a computer, which is very complex, a certain quality of intelligence is necessary. Right? So you’re saying the intelligence of thought is not intelligence.
1:27:45 Q: No.
1:27:48 K: Then, what do you mean by ‘intelligence’? Thought has created, has extraordinary capacity, a certain quality of ‘intelligence’. It has gone to the moon, which requires a great deal of intelligence. To build a submarine requires tremendous intelligence. To discover the nuclear bomb, work, work and discover, that requires a certain intelligence. You’re saying all the activity of thought which has created a certain quality of intelligence, is not the intelligence you’re talking about. Right, sir?

Q: Yes.
1:28:41 K: Now, is that intelligence, you’re saying that intelligence acts rightly, always. Suppose I haven’t got that intelligence. Is it possible for a human being to have that intelligence? Or is it just a theory? You understand, sir? Which is it, is it a theory, or you’re saying it is possible, one can have that, or there is that intelligence which operates? Now, tell me how... I don’t know what that intelligence is, is it possible for me to have that intelligence? That is what is implied in that question.
1:29:40 Q: When there is that question, ‘What is the point of education?’ when there is that question, we discuss with each other ideas and concepts, we just discuss. I may point out some ideas and you may point out some ideas, does this pointing out ideas by each of us, lead to the answer?
1:30:11 K: No, certainly not.

Q: It won’t.
1:30:14 Q: So, I have to go deeply into myself. What is the point of educating my child? To get a job? To fit into this society? We have discussed all that, and going deeply, questioning into that, can that questioning bring the answer?
1:30:35 K: Yes, sir, but it depends how. There is an art to questioning.
1:30:40 Q: Yes, sir, what is that art?

K: I may question, but then...
1:30:46 Q: That only leads to analysis.

K: No, sir.
1:30:52 HL: I’ve a suspicion that this sort of discussion tends to get lost in words. I would personally like that some purpose is set to our stay here.
1:31:15 K: What are you saying, sir?
1:31:19 HL: What are we discussing? There must be a little sense of objective.
1:31:25 K: Yes, sir. Let’s do it. What would you like to discuss?
1:31:33 HL: We have got the schools here. We have got teachers, we have got students. I would like the teachers and students to tell us what they are doing. The demand which I sense you have made today is an enormous demand on the teachers, virtually nothing on the children.
1:32:13 K: No, first the teacher, the educator.
1:32:21 HL: The first question that arises is how are we meeting this demand? The second thing that arises is whether school is the proper vehicle, or whether there is a need for another vehicle, to meet the type of demand that Krishnaji is talking about. If the children have really no part to play, why have schools?
1:33:04 K: Ah, no! HL: Yes, I understand. I am now putting words to the type of demand you are making. You are demanding it of the teachers. For now, the children are subsidiary.
1:33:22 K: Yes, I agree.
1:33:24 HL: Then the question is whether the schools are the vehicle for the type of demand that Krishnaji is making. If schools are the vehicle, to what extent is this school...?
1:33:38 K: I’ll answer that question. Isn’t it time?
1:33:42 HL: It’s time, sir, but I am looking forward to the principal and Alcaji. I don’t know how but I got caught here. If you’ll forgive me, I’ll go back.
1:34:06 K: The teacher needs education, as well as the student. We’ll reverse the process. Suppose you’re my student, I’m your teacher. I’m not only informing you of mathematics, but also, I want to have a relationship with you where both of us are enquiring. Right? I’m going to help you, you are going to help me, to enquire into the whole psychological world. We have said information, mathematics, science is different. In talking about and informing mathematics, I’ve established a relationship with you, in which we are both enquiring. Enquiring. So, our relationship is entirely different. It’s not that I’m the teacher and you are the taught. I’m helping you to enquire, which means to have no prejudice. Right? HL: Yes, I understand.
1:35:41 K: So, first I say, ‘Don’t have a prejudice’. You are full of prejudices. I am also full of prejudices. Now, let’s talk about it, so that we’re both free of it. I want to know if you’re free of it. Don’t ever say, ‘Yes’ when you don’t mean it. So, I’m full of prejudices. I think I’m a Brahman, I think I’m... I have prejudices, opinions, evaluations and conclusions, and so have you. So, let’s see if we can really be deeply free of it. I’ll spend half an hour every day about that one thing, so that, at the end of the term, we’re free of these beastly prejudices. Then our brain is free to enquire. Otherwise, I can’t. A first-class scientist may have a hypothesis, a theory, but he tests it. And if that test doesn’t come up to his hypothesis, he scraps it. We’re going to test each other for the next week, to see that we’re entirely free of prejudice. In that process, I’ve established an extraordinary relationship with you. Also, I say, let’s enquire into why you’re frightened. I’ll bring the whole of life into this. That is the function of a school and a teacher. I can do it with my wife and children, I do that, too, but a school is a ground upon which we can both walk. The word ‘school’ means leisure, originally, as you know. To have leisure to enquire.
1:38:29 HL: My point in asking the question was to give a meaning to the type of discussions we’re going to have.
1:38:46 K: Let’s start with that. You and I say, ‘Let’s work out if we can be free of prejudice in life’. Yes, sir!
1:39:03 HL: You reduce to such proportions, it’s very difficult to handle.
1:39:12 K: I’m aware that I’m prejudiced against you. I have opinions. Why do I have them? It’s such a wearisome affair. It burdens the mind, it burdens our outlook. Why do I have opinions about politicians, about Mr Reagan? It’s a waste of time and energy, essentially.
1:39:58 Q: If education is to gain holistic knowledge of what living is, and to radically change our lives, then can teaching that can take place through an analytical process, or only through...
1:40:20 GN: For education to be holistic, can this be done through analysis...?
1:40:34 K: How can I have a holistic way of living, if I am prejudiced? If I say I’m a Christian or a Hindu, it destroys it.
1:40:49 Q: For a child, there’s no question of prejudices, maybe for the teacher. How shall we help the child get knowledge of this life, and be free from limitations and prejudices, which go with the analytical process and the nature of thought?
1:41:15 HL: He’s saying the same thing. ‘Children don’t have prejudices, whereas adults do have prejudices’.
1:41:24 K: Would you agree that children, because they live at home, they’re brought up by their parents, they’re already conditioned? They’re already conditioned, aren’t they? One and a half hours is enough time. I didn’t realise I was going to talk for an hour and a half. Sorry!