Like a singer, for example; to him the voice is the greatest security,
and when that fails he is ready to commit suicide.
What is really exciting and true is to find out for oneself a way of life
that is highly sensitive and supremely intelligent; and this is not possible
if there is fear, anxiety, greed, envy, the building of images
or the living in religious isolation. That isolation is what all religions
have supplied: the believer is definitely on the threshold of suicide.
Because he has put all his faith in a belief, when that belief is questioned
he is afraid and is ready to take on another belief, another image,
commit another religious suicide. So, can a man live without any image,
without any pattern, without any time-sense? I don’t mean living
in such a way as not to care what happens tomorrow or what happened yesterday,
That is not living. There are those who say, “Take the present and make the best of it;
that is also an act of despair. Really one should not ask whether or not it is right
to commit suicide; one should ask what brings about the state of mind
that has no hope – though hope is the wrong word because hope implies a future;
one should ask rather, how does a life come about that is without time?
To live without time is really to have this sense of great love, because love
is not of time, love is not something that was or will be; to explore this and live
with it is the real question. Whether to commit suicide or not is the question
of a man who is already partially dead. Hope is the most dreadful thing.
Wasn't it Dante who said, “Leave hope behind when you enter the Inferno?"
To him, paradise was hope, that's horrible.
~ J. Krishnamurti
from The Urgency of Change
art by Katsushika Hokusai
4 comments:
Where is the last sentence "To him, paradise was hope, that's horrible." which I think is very important?
thanks Fan, for your correction.
Love your blog! Thank you!
i stand inside of this as though inside of rain. i try to forget language. i try. (i almost do it. i try again.)
xo
erin
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