Jiddu Krishnamurti on Idea of God and Escapism

Questioner: Man must know what God is before he can know God. How are you going to introduce the idea of God to man without bringing God to man's level?

Jiddu Krishnamurti : You cannot, sir. Now, what is the impetus behind the search for God, and is that search real? For most of us, it is an escape from actuality. So, we must be very clear in ourselves whether this search after God is an escape, or whether it is a search for truth in everything - truth in our relationships, truth in the value of things, truth in ideas. If we are seeking God merely because we are tired of this world and its miseries, then it is an escape.

Then we create God, and therefore it is not God. The God of the temples, of the books is not God, obviously - it is a marvelous escape. But if we try to find the truth, not in one exclusive set of actions, but in all our actions, ideas, and relationships, if we seek the right evaluation of food, clothing, and shelter, then because our minds are capable of clarity and understanding, when we seek reality we shall find it. It will not then be an escape. But if we are confused with regard to the things of the world - food, clothing, shelter, relationship, and ideas - how can we find reality?

We can only invent reality. So, God, truth, or reality is not to be known by a mind that is confused, conditioned, limited. How can such a mind think of reality or God? It has first to decondition itself. It has to free itself from its own limitations, and only then can it know what God is, obviously not before. Reality is the unknown, and that which is known is not the real.

So, a mind that wishes to know reality has to free itself from its own conditioning, and that conditioning is imposed either externally or internally; and as long as the mind creates contention, conflict in relationship, it cannot know reality. So, if one is to know reality, the mind must be tranquil, but if the mind is compelled, disciplined to be tranquil, that tranquillity is in itself a limitation, it is merely self-hypnosis. The mind becomes free and tranquil only when it understands the values with which it is surrounded.

So, to understand that which is the highest, the supreme, the real, we must begin very low, very near; that is, we have to find the value of things, of relationship, and of ideas, with which we are occupied every day. And without understanding them, how can the mind seek reality? It can invent ``reality,'' it can copy, it can imitate because it has read so many books, it can repeat the experience of others.

But surely, that is not the real. To experience the real, the mind must cease to create because whatever it creates is still within the bondage of time. The problem is not whether there is or is not God, but how man may discover God, and if in his search he disentangles himself from everything, he will inevitably find that reality. But he must begin with the near and not with the far.

Obviously, to go far one must begin near. But most of us want to speculate, which is a very convenient escape. That is why religions offer such a marvelous drug for most people. So, the task of disentangling the mind from all the values which it has created is an extremely arduous one, and because our minds are weary, or we are lazy, we prefer to read religious books and speculate about God; but that, surely, is not the discovery of reality. Realizing is experiencing, not imitating.

Source: Jiddu Krishnamurti Talk, In India (Bangalore) 1948

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