Life Ahead by J. Krishnamurti

Author:J. Krishnamurti
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: New World Library
Published: 2015-02-28T00:00:00+00:00

Questioner: What is religion?

Krishnamurti: Do you want an answer from me, or do you want to find out for yourself? Are you looking for an answer from somebody, however great or however stupid? Or are you really trying to find out the truth of what religion is?

To find out what true religion is, you have to push aside everything that stands in the way. If you have many colored or dirty windows and you want to see the clear sunlight, you must clean or open the windows, or go outside. Similarly, to find out what true religion is, you must first see what it is not, and put that aside. Then you can find out, because then there is direct perception. So let us see what is not religion.

Doing puja, performing a ritual—is that religion? You repeat over and over again a certain ritual, a certain mantram in front of an altar or an idol. It may give you a sense of pleasure, a sense of satisfaction, but is that religion? Putting on the sacred thread, calling yourself a Hindu, a Buddhist, or a Christian, accepting certain traditions, dogmas, beliefs—has all this got anything to do with religion? Obviously not. So religion must be something which can be found only when the mind has understood and put all this aside.

Religion, in the true sense of the word, does not bring about separation, does it? But what happens when you are a Muslim and I am a Christian, or when I believe in something and you do not believe in it? Our beliefs separate us; therefore our beliefs have nothing to do with religion. Whether we believe in God or do not believe in God has very little significance; because what we believe or disbelieve is determined by our conditioning, is it not? The society around us, the culture in which we are brought up, imprints upon the mind certain beliefs, fears, and superstitions which we call religion; but they have nothing to do with religion. The fact that you believe in one way and I in another largely depends on where we happen to have been born, whether in England, in India, in Russia or America. So belief is not religion, it is only the result of our conditioning.

Then there is the pursuit of personal salvation. I want to be safe; I want to reach nirvana, or heaven; I must find a place next to Jesus, next to Buddha, or on the right hand of a particular God. Your belief does not give me deep satisfaction, comfort, so I have my own belief which does. And is that religion? Surely, one’s mind must be free of all these things to find out what true religion is.

And is religion merely a matter of doing good, of serving or helping others? Or is it something more? Which does not mean that we must not be generous or kind. But is that all? Is not religion something much greater, much purer, vaster, more

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