The Phenomenology of Compassion: a Study in the Teachings of J
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
VERVALDATUM/DVF DATE THE PHENOMENOLOGY OF COMPASSION: A STUDY IN THE TEACHINGS OF J. KRISHNAMURTI by VERONICA BOUTTE submitted in accordance with the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF LITERATURE AND PHILOSOPHY in the subject of RELIGIOUS STUDIES at the UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH AFRICA PROMOTER: PROFESSOR J.S. KRUGER NOVEMBER 1996 1111111111111111111111111 01684281 "The Phenomenology of Compassion: A Study in the Teachings of Jiddu Krishnamurti" Table of Contents Acknowledgments................................................ p. ii Chapter 1 Introduction................................................... p. 1 Chapter 2 The Nature of ''What-Is'' ................................. p. 28 I The Perception of Immanence ........... p. 28 II The Encounter with Transcendence •...... p. 39 III Krishnamurti and "What-Is" ............ p. 56 Chapter 3 The Prison of the Known ...•..........•.••••.............. p. 71 I Conditioning, Belief Systems, and Fear. p. 72 II Freedom and the Nature of Knowledge .••• p. 88 III Freedom and Integral Intelligence ..... p. 100 Chapter 4 Can We Live without ,Conflict? ...•...••.•........•........ p. 112 I The Roots of Personal Conflict ........ p. 113 II The Breaking of Anger ................. p. 126 III The Mirror of Relationships ........... p. 138 Chapter 5 The Meaning of Dialogue ....••...........••••...•..•...... p. 154 I Dialogue is Communication beyond Words. p. 155 II Thinking about Thinking •..•.••...•..•.. p. 167 III What Is Global Dialogue? .............. p. 183 Chapter 6 Practice, Solidarity: "We Are the World" .••.............. p. 1$ I Sharing the Spirit .................... p. 196 II The Network of Holistic Solidarity .... p. 204 III A Sense of Universality ............... p. 213 Chapter 7 Science and the Religious Mind .........•••••••••••....... p. 224 I Science and the Mindfield ............. p. 226 II Science and the Reign of Conformity ... p. 235 III The Soul of Chemical Atoms ............ p. 247 Chapter 8 A Call for Being and Action ...••..•.•............•....... p. 255 I The Call to Being ..................... p. 257 II The Piotential for Action ......•.....••• p. 266 III Being at Home in the World ............ p. 274 Chapter 9 Concluding Remarks ......•...........•.•............•.•... p. 285 I Krishnamurti and the Holy Ground of Freedom p. 285 II From Faith to Intentionality .......... p. 290 III Teaching from Within ..•.............•.. p. 295 Bibliography ............................................. p. 305 i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This work was made possible in great part through the dedication and encouragements of my professors at The American University, particularly Dr. Charles J. White, Chair of the Department of Philosophy, who suggested I contact UNISA, and Dr. David Rodier, who graciously offered to be my promoter in the United States. The same sort of help was provided spontaneously by Dr. Raymond Martin, Professor of Philosophy of Psychology at The University of Maryland, a long time scholar and author on Krishnamurti. Besides the academic environment, I had the support of the Krishnamurti Foundation of America in Ojai, CA. My thanks go to M.E. Mark Lee and to Ms. Evelyn Blau, whose graceful elegance in her approach to the teachings was a great inspiration. The Washington, D.C. branch of the Theosophical Society, with the presence of Edward Westbrook, who had several private conversations with Krishnamurti, was a steady source of support. Finally, my utmost gratitude goes to Professor J.S. Kruger at UNISA, who spent his sabbatical taking care of my progress on this thesis, and to my friends Mark Peura and Geoffrey Royce who patiently and unwaveringly demonstrated the teachings in practice when I most needed it. ii CHAPTER 1 Introduction I have drunk at the clear and pure waters at the source of the fountain of life and my thirst was appeased. Never could I be thirsty, never more could I be in utter darkness. I have seen the light. I have touched compassion which heals all sorrow and suffering; it is not for myself, but for the world ... 1 Presently, we are facing an interesting paradox concerning philosophical and religious aspirations. On the one hand, a massive abundance of literature on metaphysics, spirituality, and the occult is available to readers, in addition to religious books and scriptures from all faiths which have been translated and made readily available across continents. Despite this profusion of spiritually oriented material, challenging and meaningful questions no longer seem to find satisfactory answers, especially when it comes to modern moral and existential problems. The frustration seems to grow in proportion to the amount of writing produced. Swami Yogananda's remark seems timely: "Silence is what the whole world needs." On the other hand, what this situation shows is the urgency of a psycho- 1 Evelyn Blau. Krishnamurti 100 years. New York: Stewart, Tabori & Chang, 1995, p. 34. 1 spiritual longing, as well as a desire to explore modes of communication other than conceptual and verbal. Whoever feels the potential strength of humanness is bound to ask questions at some point, in privacy or in times of crisis, perhaps during what might be a breakthrough, a period when one feels suddenly more conscious. But in the context of philosophy and religion, the word "psyche" does not explicitly indicate whether different modes of knowing exist, or if it might even be possible to access new realms of perception. Yet, to say that a shift in consciousness is occurring at the turn of the millennium sounds like a publicity for a New Age magazine. Nevertheless, a form of deep scrutiny about the religious needs of our time is what lies beneath tentative statements on the spirit. For example, I find it very revealing that the following sentence would appear in the most widely read journal on education in the United States: 11 If anything characterizes modernity, it is a loss of faith in transcendence, in a reality that encompasses but surpasses our quotidian affairs. 112 If this were not clear enough, famous television presenter and commentator Bill Moyers is even more convincing: "Any journalist worth his or her salt knows the real story today is to define what it means to be spiritual. This is the biggest story, not only of the decade but of the century. 11 Besides the pertinence of the philosophical observations brought by postmodernism, even a superficial overview of the 2 In "The Chronicle of Higher Education" (Jan. 9, 1978). 2 current publications on religion, spirituality, parapsychology, modern science, and the healing arts tends to indicate a pressing need for many cultures to contribute to their own psychological recovery from a world shaped and ruled by thought. However discreet this aspiration might be, one might think that it surely deserves adequate consideration and mature sustainment. a) The Reason for this thesis My experience of living in eight very different countries over two decades, combined with a non-conformist lifestyle, has been an excellent tool for learning how to be my own source of support in times of deep external and internal struggles. I could report at length about my witnessing, and sharing to some extent, the cruelest aspects of human suffering in remote parts of the world. But I can only say here that all were variations on the forms of injustice and poverty brought about by greed and many unconscious quests for personal self-aggrandizement. My own feelings of perplexity and anxiety arose in the form of negative emotions and reactions to extreme conditions in the world. It seemed obvious to me at the time that a civilization which develops technology to kill human beings for mere ideologies, breeds and slaughters animals for overconsumption of foods, and pollutes air and waters with an outrageous wastage of goods would be willing to find ways to observe itself courageously ••• Like we are told in Buddhist philosophy, human suffering is the result of cause and effect. People suffer primarily because 3 of the limits of the thinking mind; we doubt, fear, and kill not because we are born violent, but because of the struggle involved in seeing ourselves and external conditions as they are. Paradoxically, there is also a strong, persistent and broad reluctance to accept that there is more than what is seen on this level of reality. Even the world greatest philosophers, with all the insights which transpire from them, rarely mention the possibility of infinity as an actuality. It would seem evident, however, that the finitude of concepts is what might be inadequate to deepen one's Being into Truth. It finally occurred to me, during occasional experiences of silence, that the rise of kindness (objective and subjective) happens in direct observation unobstructed by thought. This movement of the integrated mind and heart is the way in which compassion manifests itself. From this stage on, what was left to do was finding the means and inspiration to connect the movement with action. During the course of my formal and informal studies in philosophy and religion, I had the privilege to meet several individuals whose life was transformed by the books and talks of Jiddu Krishnamurti. Krishnamurti shows that resistance stops in the movement of a quiet mind. Consequently, after conscientious debating, I have chosen to reflect on these teachings in the context of an academic essay. I find that the mission of a great teacher in any discipline is to convey a practical understanding of the core of humanness; one should be able to find, in the words of a teacher, an inner intensity and a 4 comprehension which can modify everyday living. For those individuals I know personally, including myself, reading Krishnamurti has been, and continues to be, a life-changing event. There are other reasons for choosing Krishnamurti besides my own resonance with his work. From the books, Krishnamurti may appear as a contemporary version of the classic mystic, as well as a great humanist. But can the man really be labeled as such, or labeled as anything? Together with a few great ones of the same generation (I would like to mention among others Sri Aurobindo, Karlfried Graf Durckheim, Bede Griffiths, D.T.