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Book Review: “Education and the Significance of Life”
Jiddu Krishnamurti leaves you no place to hide as he questions the most fundamental assertions of our culture
I always describe Krishnamurti like someone standing between Friedrich Nietzsche and Jesus.
Uncompromising in his stance against ideology, conformity, and antagonism between human beings, he always refused to set himself up as a teacher. While he was alive, he used to insist that no one should blindly follow what he said as though he were some sort of authority.
You’ll notice, in fact, that most of the time Krishnamurti just keeps asking questions. If you break down the transcripts of some of his public talks, it’s rare that he’ll make a concrete statement.
He wants you to think for yourself. He wants you to question what you’ve come to believe is self-evident. He wants you to question the dominant culture of acquisitiveness, envy, ambition, and groupthink.
In this collection of his public talks, in book form, the focus is on education, of course, and he says that there is no “method” that one can follow to become “educated,” if there’s ever an end to education at all.
Intelligence is also not separate from love. True education is a movement of the mind away from fixed structures and prepackaged beliefs. It is the…
