Krishnamurti - From whom are we learning?

Krishnamurti Subtitles

RV83S2 - From whom are we learning?
Rishi Valley, India - 26 November 1983
Seminar 2

0:53	K: Are you better? Good. I have been given some questions. If you don’t mind, I’ll talk a little, and we’ll discuss or answer these questions. Which would you prefer? Either I answer some of these questions, after I’ve talked a little, or would you like to discuss? What, sir? Questioner: Discussion.
1:45	K: Perhaps, we can do both. If I may, I’d like to talk over with you several things.
2:11	What does it mean to learn? Is there a teacher to teach you, not only academic subjects, but to teach you to understand yourselves, oneself – how to look at the world, with all its calamities, miseries, confusion and corruption. Is there a teacher? Or, you’re both the teacher and the disciple. You understand my question? That’s what I would like to talk over with you.
3:12	And also, what does discipline mean? – ‘school’, from Latin and Greek, means leisure, to have a great deal of leisure, leisure to learn. Also, I’d like to talk over with you this question of discipline, and also, whether we can face this world, with all its travail, its confusion and all the rest of it, intelligently. So, I’d like to talk over together these three questions. Whether there is a teacher outside you, or you are both teacher and disciple. There is no guru apart from you, no leader, no saviour, no external authority, except in certain areas. And so you are both the teacher and the disciple. We’ll go into that.
5:08	The other thing is discipline. The meaning of that word ‘discipline’, it comes from the root ‘disciple’. Disciple – one who learns, not who follows, not who obeys, conforms, but one who is learning. And the other thing is – if we can talk over together – when students leave this place, how to help them or how to cultivate that intelligence that will meet the world. Can we talk over these three together? Which means will you kindly listen to what is being said? Because most of us find it awfully difficult to listen to somebody else. We have got our own thoughts, we are immersed in our own problems, our own backyard troubles, and so on. We are immersed in those things, so it’s awfully difficult to listen to somebody, completely, not partially. Is it possible to listen? Not to interpret, not to translate what one is saying in terms of your own words, but actually listen to what another says, without any barrier, both the linguistic barrier and the barrier one creates through resistance, not wanting to listen it might be disturbing. So, we hardly ever listen. We hear, because most of us have fairly acute hearing, but we hardly ever listen. I hope we see the distinction between the two. This morning, can we put aside our conclusions, our prejudices, and actually listen, not only to what the speaker is saying but also, listen to all the birds, listen to the whisper among the leaves, listen to a squirrel going up the tree, listen to the poverty around you, listen to all the noise the trees make, though it’s very still. Could we, this morning, listen so that we can think together, not agree together, not follow, verbally, what is being said, but actually think together. Is that possible? Or, each one of us is so terribly self-centred, that we never come into a relationship with another at the same level, at the same instant, with the same intensity so that we are thinking together. Could we do that, this morning? I’m just suggesting, it’s up to you.
10:00	From whom are we learning? Apart from technological subjects, like mathematics, geography, physics and so on, carpentry, how to drive a car, how to put computers together, you have to learn from somebody. We extend that same movement into the psychological world. You are following all this? Are we together? There, we say somebody must help us, somebody must show us how to understand ourselves. Right? Either we read philosophical books, listen to psychological professors, take degrees and so on, but isn’t all that a process of being informed about yourself, about the psyche? You understand what I’m saying? Are we together in this? May I ask, are we together? So, I am asking, who is the teacher? Is there a teacher at all? Is there a guru at all, a leader, an example to follow? Or is it possible to read the story of mankind, humanity, of which you are? We are, each one, the entire humanity. Would you accept that? Would you agree to this? Not verbally, but actually realise the truth of the immense significance of a statement that you are the rest of mankind. Not representative of mankind, but you are the rest of mankind, because you suffer, you have anxieties, worries, problems, insecurity, like the rest of human beings right throughout the world, whether they live in America, Europe, Russia or China, or in this unfortunate country. Your consciousness, what you are, other human beings share the same ground as you do. Right? You are actually, not theoretically, not as an ideal or as a hypothetical issue, but you are the rest of mankind. So, you are the story of mankind. You are the book, if we can put it that way, of the story of human beings who have lived on this earth, standing on two legs, for the last 40 or 50,000 years. So, who is the teacher? You understand my question? From whom are you learning? If one can read the book of mankind, which is yourself, then there is neither a teacher nor a disciple – you are that. I wonder if you understand what I am talking about. Are we together in this, a little bit? Little bit, that’s good enough.
15:32	We are saying your consciousness, with all its reactions, its beliefs, its dogmas, its fears, pleasures, sorrows and all that, is shared by all human beings. That’s a fact. If you are that, you are the guru. You understand? I wonder if you understand all this. You are the disciple. There is no teacher out there, and you, the disciple. So, you are learning about yourself all the time. And in the very process of learning, you are teaching. I wonder if you understand this. Am I making this clear? No, not verbally. Verbally, any person can describe the mountain, the beauty of a mountain, paint it, describe it, explain it biologically and so on, but to see the beauty of the mountain, go up to it, climb, be very near it, feel the extraordinary vitality, the strength, the beauty of it, does not lie in descriptions or verbal explanations. We are questioning the whole system of the guru and the disciple, the whole methodology of following somebody, taking vows to some symbol. Could we discuss that for a while? And go on to discipline and so on. If I may ask – I’m sure you won’t reply – do you consider the speaker sitting on this little platform, your guru? Then why are you listening to him? Why are you taking the trouble to come here to find out? Either you want to be informed, or we are learning together – not you, the disciple, the speaker, the teacher, but together, we are reading the extraordinary story of mankind, which is you. I wonder if you get this. I see you don’t react to this. Is it that we are so heavily conditioned, that the idea that you are the rest of mankind, and there’s nobody to help you learn about the vast life except yourself. Right? Apparently, you don’t react to all this. So, let’s go on to the next subject, shall we?
20:30	What is learning? What do we mean by learning? At a school, the educator is informing the student about mathematics, because the poor student doesn’t know anything about mathematics. And society demands that if he is to become an engineer, he must know mathematics, up to a certain point. The teacher has been conditioned by society, which he himself has created, the student is learning from him, memorising. Right, sir? He’s acquiring information, storing it up in his brain, which is to collect information as memory and hold it. That’s generally what we call learning. Right? I learn how to climb a mountain, I learn about matter through science, telescopes and all the rest of it, or I learn from you how to ride a bicycle and so on. Apart from that learning, is there any other kind of learning? Gosh, you’re all so – are we together in this? What do you say? Is there a learning which is not merely memorising? Do you see that life, living, is a constant movement? It’s not static, it’s a tremendous movement. You can’t learn about something which is living. All that you can do is to watch it, follow it, not memorise it and say, ‘This is living’. I wonder if you follow all this. Right? Am I talking to myself or to you? So, when we talk about learning in a school here, as in Rishi Valley, we have the idea that learning is from a book or from a professor, educator who is going to inform you about a particular academic subject, and you store that up, become an engineer, philosopher, or whatever. But life, living, is a tremendous movement. It’s not ever stable. It’s not ever static. It doesn’t stay in one place. So, learning becomes then a constant change and movement. I wonder if you follow this.
24:58	So, where does discipline play a part in all this? Discipline, as it is generally understood, is to conform. Each academic subject has its own discipline. Right? Is this all Greek or…? Agree to that? If I am studying mathematics, I have to watch very carefully, it has its own order. Discipline, as it is generally understood, is to conform, modify, accept, obey the pattern, which prevents us from learning. The meaning of discipline is to learn. Right?
26:21	The other question is, what is intelligence? Can we, as educators living in this valley or other universities, or colleges, how do we help a student to face the world intelligently? What do we mean by that word ‘intelligence’? The word, etymologically – I’ve carefully looked it up in several dictionaries – means to read between the lines. That’s one part of it. To gather lot of information, gather lot of information, facts, and use it correctly. You cannot use all that you gather, both psychological, outward facts, if there is an interference of personal prejudice. Or, if you act according to some conclusion. Right? That’s not intelligence. Through negation of what is not intelligent, you come to the positive of intelligence. Are you following all this? Are we beating the same drum together? What is intelligence which is not the activity of limited thought? Thought has created intelligence, its own intelligence. To go to the moon, it has to have tremendous intelligence, of 300,000 people who are working together – that’s what we were told – 300,000 people working together, each doing his part, perfectly. The desire to go to the moon has to have great intellectual activity, thought, creating the instruments, working together, going to the moon. That required a great deal of intelligence. To build a computer as they are doing now, requires a great deal of intelligence – investigation, change, all that, which is the activity of thought creating its own intelligence. Right? That intelligence is limited. Is there an intelligence which is not limited, an intelligence which is not put together by thought? You understand all this? All religions have been put together by thought. They may call it revelation, straight from the god, or straight from the horse’s mouth, it’s still put together by thought. And thought is limited. We went into that, briefly. So, is there an intelligence which has no relationship to the activity of the brain? Dead silence!
31:36	Is love the activity of thought? Right? Is love desire, pleasure, which are related to thought? Right? So, where there is love, there is intelligence. Right? Love is not jealousy, anxiety, love is love. It’s not personal or impersonal, it’s like a flower. You either have it or you don’t have it. So, I’ve talked about these three factors. You are both the teacher and the disciple. You are both the guru and the one who is learning. Your responsibility then is not only to learn, teach but also to instruct. I wonder if you understand. You’re a teacher, you are learning. And that can only come to be, when one realises that you are really – in your blood, not just up here, in your whole being, that you are rest of mankind. You are mankind. Therefore, you have no nationality, or the whole nonsensical structure. And also, discipline, to learn. Learn as you are going down the lane, watching everything, never holding what you’re watching, memorising and acting from memory. I won’t go into that. It’s a very complex problem. Whether it’s possible for the brain – I am just suggesting it – not to record. I won’t go into it now, because that requires quite a different road that will take us somewhere else.
35:00	So, discipline, learning and intelligence. Really, they are one whole, they’re not separate activities. Finished. Shall I read these questions, first, and discuss afterwards? What do you say? Is this convenient for you?
35:44	‘We tend to make your teachings into a system in our schools. What can we do about it?’
35:55	‘We tend to make your teachings into a system in our schools. What can we do about it?’ First of all, what’s a system? What’s a method? What’s a practice? Do you understand my question? Why do we make a system of anything? A government, bureaucracy has a system – they do it automatically, you don’t have to think – you say, ‘I’ve received a letter, I pass it to you, your responsibility, you pass it on to somebody else. Then you’re completely safe. Gurus also offer systems. We like that, because if we follow, we are more or less secure, if we obey. We make, more or less everything, into a system, into a method, which becomes mechanical. It’s very easy to follow, to do things mechanically. The questioner asks, how can we prevent this in the school. Right? First of all, do we realise our brains, through centuries long of time and duration, have become almost mechanical? Get up in the morning, do puja, whatever you do, go to the office or college or school from 9 to 5, and it’s safe. It’s a mechanical process of living, whether it is sexual, whether it is religious, whether it is business, or politics. It is establishing a pattern which you follow regularly. So you don’t have to think very much. And we like that. That’s an easy way of living. So, we reduce everything into a system. Cleaning your teeth with a brush, doing it for so long, it’s automatic. Right? Eat the same kind of food and so on. So, gradually one’s brain becomes mechanical. I don’t know if you have noticed it. Right? You are dissatisfied with the western religious culture, so you come to this country and follow some idiotic guru. It’s the same pattern, but here it is more romantic, and all that. So, what happens? Our brains, through thousands of years, have become gradually mechanical and so, gradually, dull – that’s a fact. Insensitive, not alive. And the questioner says, ‘What can we do about this?’ What will you do about it? Not me. What will you, who are here, or in another college, university or school, what will you do about it when you realise that our brains, which are an extraordinary instrument – it’s really the most extraordinary instrument – so alive, so astonishingly capable. What they have done technologically. That brain has become mechanical. I do puja for the next 40, 50 years. If I am a Catholic, Mass, the rituals, all that. Your rituals, all that, we think is very religious. Whereas, we never enquire into why the brain, which is so astonishingly alive in one direction, has become so dull in another. Do we see the danger of it? Each one of us, do we see the danger of a brain becoming mechanical? It is dead, isn’t it? When you are doing the same thing over and over again, it is not alive. Do we see the danger of it? Here, or in any other place? If you see the danger of it, you won’t make a system of the teachings or anything. You understand? If you see a cobra – there are some of them here, I have noticed several. If you see a cobra, which is tremendously dangerous, you run. So, we don’t see the danger of this. If you saw the danger of reducing everything to a system, then you will never form a system. Obviously! It’s only the dull, mechanical mind, which finds safety in a system. Right? That’s simple. So, when you reject a system, then your brain is moving, living. I won’t go into that.
43:54	How can we help a child to be secure? How can we help a child to be secure? Why do you ask me this question, if I may ask? What do you mean by the word ‘secure’? When you fulfil your desires, you feel secure, right? In the urge to fulfil, and in the fulfilment, there is a certain sense of safety, you have done something. Security is denied through nationalism, because nationalism is one of the causes of war. Right? So, when you are a nationalist, you are denying security not only for yourself, but for future generations. To be secure from disease – is that possible? Living in a polluted world, in a world that is so disastrously active in a wrong direction, how can it be secure? So, where is there security? You understand my question? Is there security in your belief? – that there is God, a saviour – you know all that. Is there security in all that? Is there security in illusions? If one is aware that you are caught in a delusion or illusion, is there security in that? If one becomes aware of it. But if one is not aware of it, faith, belief, some imaginative process, you feel safe, secure. But that is a state of total insecurity. So, where is there security? Go on, sir, tell me. Please, I’m waiting for your answer. Where is there security? Not in books. Right? If you are a Muslim and Koran is your Bible, and you hold to that tremendously, it creates a division in the world. That division is going to bring war, which is taking place now. Books, images, beliefs, dogmas, in all that – unless one is totally blind, deaf and dumb – in all that there is no security. I don’t know if you realise that. Nor in your family, nor in your own confidence. So, where is there security?
48:15	Q: If one can see false as false.
48:21	K: No, sir. You are quoting. Don’t quote. Please, forgive me.
48:31	Professor Hiralal: The question has been posed to you probably because the teacher would like to make the child feel at home.
48:43	K: Yes, sir, I’m coming to that.
48:48	HL: Probably, that is the import of the question.
48:53	K: First let’s find out, as grown-up people – if we are, whether there is security at all, or there is security. You understand my question? Answer it, sir, please!
49:25	Q: In the present system, there is no security.
49:28	K: In any system there is no security. Why do you say ‘present system’? Future system? Q: We do not know of it.
49:44	K: So, where is there security? If we can understand there is security somewhere, and be established in that, then we can ask the question, how to make a child, as Dr Hiralal put it, feel at home. What does it mean to feel at home? We’ll go into all that. But first, is there security?
50:26	Q: There can’t be security within the framework of thinking.
50:30	Q: There can’t be security within the framework of thinking.
50:34	K: Then where are you seeking it?
50:39	Q: Within the framework of thinking.
50:41	K: Yes, sir! Is that an idea?
50:46	Q: No, if we see the fact that thought is always towards a goal, and when you are towards a goal, there can never be security.
50:58	K: Have you, a human being, put aside security in the framework of thought?
51:06	Q: Only when... K: Not say, ‘only when’. Do you see it? We love to theorise about all this kind of stuff, we never meet it face to face. Right? I’m asking, most respectfully, where is your security? You’ve sought it in your family, community, the nation, the tribe, in your particular gods. Right? Every person is doing that, in his own imagination, in his own conclusions, in his own theories, beliefs and so on, so on. In all that, there is no security. Then where is there security? Oh, you people don’t... The speaker says there is security only in intelligence. Not the intelligence of your cunning mind, cunning brain. There is that security where there is love, and that love is the ultimate intelligence. In that, there is security. Now, how do you make a child feel at home in this valley? He comes to you, already conditioned by his parents, already feeling that he’s going to some strange place, frightened, being pushed by the parents to come here, homesick – how do you make him feel at home? Don’t look at me, sirs, ask this question.
53:53	Q: The question becomes invalid. K: Why?
53:58	Q: Because there is no ‘how’.
54:06	K: All right, I won’t use the word ‘how’. In what manner will you make him feel at home?
54:18	Q: There won’t be any set manner.
54:24	Radhika Herzberger: There is no set manner.
54:28	K: Isn’t there? Not set manner.
54:32	Q: No set manner. I am with the child, then.
54:37	K: I am the child. I am the child. I come here from my home, where my parents have bullied me, telling me all day long what to do and what not to do. And I am frightened, there at home. Right? I am conditioned there, and they send me to this place, against my will, against my desire. I don’t want to go there, because I am used to that kind of life. I come here, and I feel extraordinarily…. like a stranger. Right? What do you say to that? Isn’t that so? For God’s sake, what’s the matter with all of you? Then, as a teacher, what am I to do, to make him feel completely at home? Because the child needs the security of environment, the child needs somebody to say, ‘You are safe here. You’re safe, we’re going to look after you, we have affection for you. First, don’t you welcome him? He is your guest. Right? We are all guests on this earth. You may not like that, but that’s another point. So, he is a guest here. Right? And you treat him as a guest. Am I right? Make him feel completely at home. What does that mean?
56:57	Q: I would welcome him. I would welcome him or her.
57:03	K: I said that, welcome him. What does it mean?
57:07	Q: Love him.
57:15	Q: To be concerned.
57:20	RH: To be concerned, to love. K: What does that mean?
57:28	Q: To accept him. K: What do you mean ‘accept him’?
57:32	Q: Accept him in his true bliss.
57:47	Q: You observe him. You observe the child.
57:54	K: What are you all talking about? HL: Why don’t we be simple about it? When we have a guest in the house, what do we do? I think the answer is quite simple. We try to meet his reasonable needs, to make him comfortable, as much as possible.
58:15	K: Observe him, love him, welcome him – what does it all mean? Do you really mean what you say? Do you really observe the child? Or you have already classified him? Would you kindly answer my question?
58:43	Q: I said that I would love him.
58:49	K: Do you love anybody? Q: Yes.
58:54	K: What do you mean by that word?
59:02	Q: Perhaps it cannot be put into words. What she means by love, perhaps it cannot be put into words.
59:09	K: Why not? You put a great many things into words. Why not this?
59:18	Q: Loving him or her, independent of conditioning. Q: Unconditional love.
59:37	Q: I mean that one tends to look all the time at people as they are conditioned to be. But love is independent of that.
59:53	G. Narayan: She’d have affection for the child independent of his conditioning. Am I right?
1:00:04	K: I don’t understand this.
1:00:07	Q: If there is a child, say, a 10 year old child, who is conditioned...
1:00:15	K: I am trying to understand, madame.
1:00:17	Q: If I respond to his conditioning, it would reinforce it.
1:00:21	K: I’m not talking about his conditioning.
1:00:24	Q: I am trying to explain that I’ll love him, apart from his conditioning. Conditioning is not present in love.
1:00:33	RH: She means she would respond to the child without putting imagery, without identifying…
1:00:42	K: All right. Is that what you call love?
1:00:47	Q: Love in its purest. K: What?
1:00:51	Q: Love in its best form is you meet somebody without labelling them...
1:00:58	K: Is that what you call love? Madame, we’re not talking about you, I’m not being personal. Do you love your wife or your husband or girlfriend? You are all married, aren’t you, most of you? In India, this is done immediately. And do you love your wife or your husband?
1:01:51	Q: But there it is reciprocal. It becomes reciprocal there.
1:01:56	K: She gives you, or you give her. Q: Both.
1:01:58	K: So, that you call love?
1:02:01	Q: It’s reciprocal affection.
1:02:03	K: That’s what I am saying, sir, instead of using big words, you give her something, she gives you something. Is that love?
1:02:13	Q: No. K: Then, why do you...? You exploit her and she exploits you. You have an image about her and she has an image about you. Right? Don’t be nervous. I am not talking about you. Gosh!
1:02:46	Q: When you have a guest and you feel that it’s your house, the guest can never feel comfortable. The same with the child. If the child comes and we feel that we are both guests in this place and are here for the same purpose, to learn together, to explore together everything – environment, knowledge, everything that the place offers, perhaps, this is the way to welcome the child.
1:03:36	K: Sir, is love something to be cultivated, through exploring together, walking together, holding hands together, sleeping together? Sex? Is all that what you call love? Would you kindly answer my question? Can there be love when there is ambition? Don’t say, ‘No’, you are all ambitious. You don’t it relate to your life, you just live on theories. Can a man who is violent love? Can a politician love, who is seeking power, position, status? Oh, I give up. So, the child comes here. Is it possible to make him feel completely at home? What does that mean? No fear. Right? Right, sir? No fear of any kind. Is that possible?
1:05:33	Q: Only if one is completely at home, oneself. Perhaps, only if one is completely at home oneself.
1:05:44	K: If you are the teacher here and you welcome that child, to make him feel at home, you must give him the feeling that you are not creating fear in him. Right? Right sir? That means you yourself are working at fear. So, you are freeing yourself from fear. Are we? I’m not looking at anybody, so it’s not being personal.
1:06:26	Q: I don’t know if you will discard my question. I am tremendously secure in you.
1:06:32	K: In me? Q: Yes. Please, listen to me.
1:06:37	Q: I wish I had a grandfather like you walking always with me. Why? You please explain. I am attached to you.
1:06:46	K: Sir. Go slowly. I haven’t heard. You find security in me. Q: Yes, tremendously.
1:06:56	K: What next?
1:06:57	Q: Then I feel I always have a grandfather like you walking along with me, always.
1:07:06	RH: He wants you to be a grandfather who would walk with him, always.
1:07:15	K: I’m fairly old, sir. I’m 89.
1:07:18	Q: People may be laughing. I mean it, very seriously.
1:07:23	K: I know you are, sir, I’m not belittling, sir. Why do you want a grandfather?
1:07:30	Q: I don’t know.
1:07:31	K: Oh, yes, you do know. We’ll go into it. Why do you want somebody to whom you can look up to – grandfather, grandmother, guru...?
1:07:42	Q: I am dumb in front of you, sir.
1:07:46	K: Good! No, no, don’t laugh. Let’s start from there, for God’s sake.
1:07:54	Q: When we do not have our own security, we try to seek it.
1:07:57	K: He has asked a question. He said, ‘I am dumb’. Right, sir?
1:08:04	Q: Yes.
1:08:05	K: That’s the first honest statement. Now, let’s start. Can you be free of being dumb? Do you compare yourself with another that makes you feel dumb? I meet you. I meet Dr Hiralal. He is IIT, a great professor, brainy, been to Europe, America, all the rest of it. I see him, and I say, ‘My God, he’s an extraordinary person. I’m not as clever as he is. So, I’m making myself dull by comparison. Am I not, sir?
1:08:58	Q: You switch over the tables. K: No, sir.
1:09:01	Q: No, I am sorry.
1:09:03	K: Please, sir, just listen to my question. Do I make myself dull through comparison? I compare myself with him, or somebody else, who is extraordinarily bright, and I say, ‘My God, how dull I am’. So, do I become dull through comparison? Or if I don’t compare at all, am I dull?
1:09:40	Q: I think he said ‘dumb’. Did you say dumb?
1:09:42	Q: Dumb. K: Yes, yes. D-U-M-B.
1:09:50	Q: I don’t feel dull when I need you, when I’m tremendously secure in you.
1:09:58	K: You said, sir, forgive me, ‘I am dumb’.
1:10:02	Q: Dumb, yes. K: Dull?
1:10:05	Q: Dumb.
1:10:10	Q: D-U-M-B.
1:10:15	GN: He feels dumb...
1:10:18	K: D-U-M-B? Q: Yes.
1:10:19	GN: He feels dumb in your presence.
1:10:23	K: Just a minute, sir. Do listen.
1:10:28	Q: Perhaps, he means speechless. Q: Yes, that’s what it means.
1:10:34	K: I am asking a simple question, sir. Do I feel dumb because I compare with somebody who is far cleverer, brighter, nicer looking, all that? And I say, ‘My God, I am dumb compared to him. If I don’t compare, am I dull, dumb?
1:11:04	Q: Sir, I play this game, intellectually. Listen, carefully. Again, I say that I am tremendously secure in you.
1:11:16	K: What am I to do? Don’t laugh. He feels security in X, in this person, you feel security in your temple or in your conclusions – it’s the same thing! A cabinet minister feels completely secure as long as he’s in government.
1:11:42	Q: They don’t seem to be the same thing, sir. We feel something different, we’re not able to express. In you, we find that you love us, but I don’t know how to love. I don’t know anything. I simply feel completely happy in your presence. I would like you to be with me all the time in my life.
1:12:04	K: You would like to be with me all the time. So, you want me to nurse you along.
1:12:14	Q: I don’t know what it is – I feel completely...
1:12:17	K: It’s the same old thing, over and over again. I feel secure in knowing some Prime Minister, I feel secure in knowing that God exists, I feel secure in my business. I feel secure. Right, sir? In other words, I feel secure depending on somebody. Right, sir? I die. What happens then? Then you create an image of me. Right? Whether that image is made by the hand or by thought, then you worship that image and you feel completely safe there. Right? I’m sorry, we have gone away from this point. Child comes here, and I want to help him. I want him to feel completely at home, which means he must have no fear here. Right? Right? Would you agree to that? Who am I talking to? Is it possible to make that child, that student who comes here, feel he has no fear here at all?
1:14:17	Q: Sir, if we make the child feel completely secure, does it not lead to attachment?
1:14:22	K: We are going into it, sir. Could we think together for a minute? A person feels secure at home when there is no fear. Right? Agree, sir? Agree? That means no examinations – listen carefully – he’s not being compared with B, who is cleverer than him. So, no comparison, no sense of superior and inferior. Will you work that out in a school? Only then does the student feel completely at home, which he doesn’t in his own home, because he’s frightened of his father, he’s beaten him up, scolded him, or his grandmother, or his mother, or his aunt, somebody or other. They like to bully younger people. Right? They never bully the older ones, the bosses. So, is it possible to help the child to feel at home, which means no fear of any kind?
1:16:15	Q: Krishnaji, so far we have been talking about teachers giving security to the children. K: I did not.
1:16:22	Q: I am a student over here and I don’t feel completely secure. Is there a way of being part of the system and feeling secure?
1:16:36	K: Are you reducing it to yourself that you don’t feel secure here, and you’d like to be secure?
1:16:46	Q: Is there a need to be secure?
1:16:49	K: I am asking you. Q: I don’t know.
1:16:52	K: I said there is only security in intelligence, complete security in intelligence. It’s my function, as an educator, to help the student to be extraordinarily intelligent, not in the intellectual or verbal or scholastic sense, but to have that intelligence.
1:17:18	Q: I’m not finding that help from the educators. What do I do for my part? I don’t find that help from the educators over here.
1:17:29	K: There are no educators like that, anywhere.
1:17:32	Q: What do I do for my part? K: Lump it. Or, in spite of the educator – you understand? – in spite of the educator, become intelligent. Right? Don’t depend on anybody. What time is it? Q: Quarter to eleven.
1:18:17	K: Can I answer the last question? What is it to teach without reward and punishment, since we convey our approval or disapproval to a child in such subtle ways? What is it to teach without reward and punishment, since we convey our approval or disapproval to a child in such subtle ways? How do you train a dog? Have you ever trained any dog? Have you ever trained any dog? I happened to be with one dog, and trained it. If he obeys you, you reward him with a biscuit. Right? When you want him to heel, you say, ‘Come here’, and give him something. Don’t we all act on that same principle – reward and punishment? Utter silence. Don’t we all react to punishment and reward? That’s the principle, that’s the way we live. For God’s sake, face it! From the highest politician down to the lowest, uneducated, poor villager – reward and punishment. The question is, is it possible to educate a child educate not only the child but ourselves in talking over together, to educate him without this principle of reward and punishment? Come on, answer me. You are the teachers.
1:20:57	Q: But isn’t the delight a child may feel in discovering something, also a reward? Is the delight a child may feel in discovering something, also a reward? Is this reward and punishment working on a level interior to the child?
1:21:16	K: No, you are training him on the principle of reward and punishment. And the questioner says, ‘Is it possible not to do that?’ He asks, can we help to educate a child, without this principle?
1:21:50	Q: It is possible. K: It is possible. Why do you say that?
1:21:56	Q: Because the student and teacher go together into the field.
1:22:05	K: Is this a theory or actuality?
1:22:11	Q: It’s not a theory.
1:22:16	K: In this school or any other school, is there a teaching, educating, in which this principle of reward and punishment doesn’t exist at all?
1:22:33	Q: Has Krishnaji heard about a man called Machador? A man called Machador, or Machador, I don’t know the pronunciation. But he is working in Latin America, where the children are brought up to be of high grade intelligence where they can meet challenges, or questions, dealing with...
1:23:02	K: I don’t know the gentleman. Why do you quote him?
1:23:07	Q: I have read about him.
1:23:09	K: Why do you bother to read about him? I’m asking you, if you’re a teacher, if you are a father, or a mother, can you live a life in which there is no reward and punishment? You follow a guru – very simple, because he is going to reward you. No?
1:23:46	HL: Sir, I think the question that has been posed has three aspects in the context of the school. One is, reward and punishment, the other is approval, disapproval.
1:24:06	K: Same thing, sir.
1:24:07	HL: The third thing is comparison in the sense of evaluation, assessment in regard to various academic subjects. I think these are three aspects which the teacher has to learn. I think that... we may formally avoid grades or assessment, but in some aspect or another, it has to be done, cannot be avoided. But I think we are tending to confuse, to take this question of comparison or evaluation or reward or punishment, approval, disapproval, all fields. That is where the difficulty lies.
1:25:01	K: Yes, sir, but I begin at home.
1:25:05	Q: Pardon? K: I have to begin near. And the nearness is the school, I am here. I am responsible for a lot of children, students. I see how deplorable it is that this principle is carried out – reward and punishment, approval, disapproval. What am I to do? I think it’s wrong, in principle, to educate anybody by reward and punishment. Help me to find out how to live, how to educate without this beastly thing going on.
1:26:09	Q: Are our natural consequences of action also like rewards and punishments?
1:26:17	K: Yes. I’m asking that.
1:26:23	Q: If you teach yourself, there’s no reward or punishment, but if somebody teaches you, there is reward and punishment.
1:26:30	K: Sir, do you realise what we are talking about? You have a class of twenty students. They’ve all been brought up at home to be self-centred. Right? They’ve all been educated, trained to be concerned with themselves. And they come, there are twenty little monkeys, who are completely self-centred. Right? Little bit off here and there, but they are self-centred. They look at the whole of existence from that point of view, as they grow up, like all of us, self-centred. How will you help them not to be so self-centred? Would you kindly tell me? What am I to do to help the student to be more considerate, to be concerned about others? To love others, not ‘me first and everybody else second’, where competition is encouraged, games are... the whole thing. What am I to do? You can talk theoretically about it, because you are not teachers. But if you are actually a parent, a teacher, an educator in this place, what are you going to do? If you see it’s wrong, totally destructive, this principle of reward and punishment, being trained like a dog or a monkey, what will you do? May I go into it? That’s all! You want me to tell you. What would I do if I was a teacher here? What would you do if you were a teacher here? I have a responsibility for so many students. They are all, you know, disturbed, coming here. They are all wanting their own way, you know, all the rest of it. I see they are used to punishment and reward, examinations, keeping records. They are used to all that. I want to break up that. I want to break up that pattern. And I really mean I want to break it up. I don’t say it merely verbally and then go back to the old thing. I really want to break up this system of reward and punishment, with all its implications. So, what shall I do? Because reward and punishment creates fear, right? Are you sure? Creates fear. So, my concern then is – I forget reward and punishment – my concern then is, can I help them and myself in helping them, to be free from fear? Do you understand? I want to help them. In helping them, I’m also helping myself to be free from fear. Right? I’m not the person who says, ‘I have no fear, I’ll help you’, but the educator and educated are both in the same boat. Agree? They are in the same boat. So, if an educator says, ‘My friend, I’m also frightened, like you, let’s work it out. Right? Let’s work it out. So, he asks me, ‘What are you frightened about, sir?’ ‘I’m frightened because there is a boss above me’. Right? In talking it over with him, I discover my fears and he is discovering his fears. You understand? There is a relationship between the educator and the educated, in discussing about fear. Not theoretically. Saying, ‘I’m afraid of my wife’, and he says, ‘Sir, yes, I’m afraid of you’. Fear is common between us. Not my wife, or him being afraid of me – fear. Right? You understand what I’m saying? No? Oh, for God’s sake. So, I say, ‘What is fear?’ How does it come about? What’s the root of it? Right? So, I’ll go into it. I’ve established a real communication with the student. Then both of us are helping each other to be free. I don’t put myself on a pedestal. ‘I’m the teacher’, we are both on the same level. I wonder if you realise this. Time. Is time a factor of fear? Yes. So, is it possible...? This is too complex. Is it possible to understand the whole movement of time? Because fear is part of that movement. Time and thought are the basic cause of fear. I’m going to help that student to understand this fact. It may take a whole term, but I’m jolly well going to see to it. Right? Time to stop, sirs, sorry. If you get up, I’ll get up, sirs.