Jiddu Krishnamurty By Express News Service BENGALURU: What is a religious mind? What is the state of the mind which can see what truth is? You may say, ‘There is no such thing as truth, there is no such thing as God, God is dead, we must make the best of this world and get on with it. Why ask such questions when there is so much confusion, so much misery, starvation, ghettos, get rid of racial prejudices, let’s be concerned with all that, let’s bring about a humanitarian society?’ Even if you did, and I hope it will be done too, this question will inevitably be asked. You may do it at the end of ten, fifteen, fifty years, but this question must be asked otherwise life, as we live it, can have some significance but without finding out a state, if there is such a state, which puts an end to time. So, if you will, we might profitably go into it. First of all, there must be freedom to look, freedom to observe, if there is or if there is not – we cannot possibly assume anything. We cannot hope for anything if there is any assumption, any hope, any fear, then the mind is distorted, then the mind cannot possibly see very clearly. So freedom is absolutely necessary to find out; even in a scientific laboratory you need the freedom to observe, you may have a hypothesis but if that hypothesis interferes with the observation, then you put aside that hypothesis, any conclusion, any knowledge and it is only in freedom that you can discover something totally new. So if we are going to venture together, not only verbally but non-verbally, then there must be this freedom from any sense of personal demand, any sense of fear, hope or despair, one must have clear eyes, unspotted, unconditioned so that out of freedom you can observe. So that is the first thing, obviously. As we have gone in the past three talks, into the question of fear and pleasure - if that has not been clear and if one has not applied oneself to the question of fear, then what we are going to explore will not be possible. And obviously our minds are conditioned by beliefs: the Christian belief, the Hindu, the Buddhist and so on. And unless there is complete freedom from belief of any kind, psychologically, inwardly, then that freedom is denied and therefore it’s not possible to observe, to find out for oneself if there is a reality which cannot be corrupted by thought. And one must be free also from all this social morality because the morality of a society is not moral. And a mind that is not highly moral, a mind that is embedded in righteousness is incapable of being free. And that’s why it’s important to understand oneself, to know oneself, to see all the structure of oneself: the thoughts, the hopes, the fears, the anxieties, the ambitions, the competitive, aggressive spirit. Unless one understands and deeply establishes what is the righteous behaviour, then there is no freedom, because then the mind gets confused by its own uncertainties, by its own doubts, demands, pressures.

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