Life
Jiddu Krishnamurti was born in Madanapalle in south India. In 1909 the Theosophist C. W. Leadbeater singled out the boy at Adyar, near Madras, and the Theosophical Society under Annie Besant raised and educated him in India and England as the expected 'World Teacher', with an organisation, the Order of the Star in the East, built around him. In 1929 he dissolved the Order, saying that truth is 'a pathless land' that no organisation, guru or method can lead anyone to. For the rest of his life he spoke and held dialogues around the world, insisting that he wanted no followers. He founded schools in India, England and California, and held long conversations with the physicist David Bohm on thought, time and perception. His talks and writings are kept by the Krishnamurti Foundations. He died in Ojai, California.
The system
- Truth cannot be reached through any authority, organisation or method.
- Choiceless awareness: observing thought and feeling without judging or controlling.
- 'The observer is the observed': the watcher is itself part of thought.
- Freedom from conditioning begins in seeing it clearly, here and now.
Key works
- The First and Last Freedom (1954) Amazon
- Think on These Things (1964) Amazon
- Freedom from the Known (1969) Amazon
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Where to start
- Freedom from the Known is short and the clearest overview; Think on These Things comes from talks to students and is very accessible.
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