Why Are You Being Educated?

This book consists of six talks that J.Krishnamurti gave at Indian universities and the Indian Institutes of Technology between 1969 and 1984.

Krishnamurti's association with universities goes back to the year 1922 when he visited the Berkeley University. The place made such a deep impact on him that he began to dream of creating in India a similar academic institution. In 1925 Mrs Annie Besant, president of the Theosophical Society, decided to build a World University in India, possibly close to Krishnamurti's birthplace, Madanapalle in Andhra Pradesh. That he shared her vision is evident from the 'Editorial Notes' he wrote for The Herald of the Star in April 1925: 'What has absorbed most of my thoughts and time since I got to India is a scheme for the founding of a new International University at Madanapalle in South India. Such an idea has long been a dream of mine and that dream is now going to be realized.

' Though Krishnamurti's dream did not take shape, his passion for education remained vital throughout his life, resulting in the founding of five schools in India and two abroad.

In the 1920s Krishnamurti addressed teachers and students at the Theosophical College in Adyar, Madras, and Vijayawada in Andhra Pradesh. In 1930 he gave a talk at the Boys College in Tiruchi, Tamil Nadu. Addressing students of the D. J. Sind College in Karachi on 15 February 1933, Krishnamurti begins on a characteristic note:

`I have never passed a single examination. I have sat for three examinations, but you know when you go to the Examination Hall, how everything turns black. Probably you have not felt like that, but I did, so I tried three times, and three times I successfully failed!'

However, he makes due amends for such an opening by seeking the forgiveness of the `Principal, the Professors, and yourselves'.

Krishnamurti's first significant address to students is to be found in the series of three talks he gave in 1954 at the Benares Hindu University. Towards the late 1960s and early 1970s when the campuses in the West were in revolt, he gave talks at the University of Puerto Rico, the Claremont Colleges California, and the New School for Social Research, New York. This was followed by talks at Brandeis, Berkeley, Stanford, and Santa Cruz. These talks can be found in the two volumes, You are the World and Talks with American Students.

During the same period, Krishnamurti addressed students in India too. In the six talks in this volume, his chief concern is to awaken students- and the teachers too- to the fact that the pursuit of knowledge does not liberate man from his ignorance of himself. While knowledge, especially technological knowledge, is indispensable, it also creates the illusion that we have the intelligence to meet the challenges of life. This illusion makes us neglect the vast and subtle field of the human psyche, the field of human relationship. All this, Krishnamurti declares, is the essence of ignorance.

**Contents and Sample Pages**