Beyond Appearance

One day in 1909 a theosophist named Charles Leadbeater saw a boy on an Indian beach and had an epiphany that someday he was destined to become the World Teacher. According to the teaching of the theosophical society, every two thousand years or so, the spirit of the World Teacher Lord Maitreya incarnates into the body of a human being. The fourteen year old street urchin soiled with dirt and adorn with rags would be the next vehicle.

The boy was Jiddu krishnamurti who just looking at had an air of simplicity and lacked the slightest trace of selfishness. Soon other members of the theosophical society agreed with Charles Leadbeaters assessment of the boy and adopted this scraggly underfed youth into the tutelage of the society. His teachers repeatedly beat him for stupidity, he was clothed and fed and his spiritual instructions begun. To the surprise of everyone in the society, the urchin turned into an extremely handsome young man with intellect to admire.

In 1911, the theosophical society formed the order of the star in the east, a group intended to prepare the way for the coming of the World Teacher. Jiddu krishnamurti was made the head of the order. He was taken to England where his education continued and everywhere he went he was pampered and revered. His air of simplicity and contentment could not help but impress and in 1922 he declared “I have drank from the fountain of joy and eternal beauty”. I am God intoxicated”.

He soon began to have visions which other theosophists interpreted as visits from the World Teacher. But Jiddu krishnamurti had a different kind of revelation in which he realized: the truth of the universe come from within. No god, no guru, no dogma could ever make one realize it. He himself was no god or messiah, but just another man. The reverence that he was treated with disgusted him and in 1929 much to the shock of his followers, he finally disbanded the order of the star and resigned himself from the theosophical society.

And so Jiddu krishnamurti became a philosopher, determined to share the truth he has discovered: you must be simple, removing the screen of language and past experience. Through this means anyone could attain contentment. Repulsed by adoration jiddu krishnamurti grew more and more detached, he talked about himself as a third person. Yet the effect was the opposite of what he expected, the affection and reverence people felt for him only grew. His followers fought jealously for signs of his favor. Women fell deeply in love with him, although he was a life long celibate.

Jiddu krishnamurti found out a very disturbing thing about people. People do not want to hear that your cultivation come from years of effort and discipline. They prefer to think that it come from your person, something you were born with. They also hope that proximity to you will make some of that power rub off on them. They did not want to read his books or to spend years practicing his lessons. They simply wanted to be near him, soak up his aura, hear him speak, feel the light that entered the room with him.

Understand that it takes years of discipline to find any lasting quality in life. Jiddu krishnamurti lived a life in discovery and search of truth. It was all he wanted in life. He renounced every other thing to be in tune with the truth. People found him deeply attractive and enlightening but did not know that his strength came from a complete surrender to a life of spiritual practice and discipline.