CHAPTER 4
EDUCATION
AND WORLD PEACE
J
Krishnamurti
TO DISCOVER what part education can play in the present world crisis, we
should understand how that crisis has come into being. It is obviously the
result of wrong values in our relationship to people, to property and to
ideas. If our relationship with others is based on self-aggrandizement,
and our relationship to property is acquisitive, the structure of society
is bound to be competitive and self-isolating. If in our relationship with
ideas we justify one ideology in opposition to another, mutual distrust
and ill will are the inevitable results.
Another cause of the present chaos is dependence on authority, on
leaders, whether in daily life, in the small school or in the university.
Leaders and their authority are deteriorating factors in any culture. When
we follow another there is no understanding, but only fear and conformity,
eventually leading to the cruelty of the totalitarian State and the
dogmatism of organized religion.
To rely on governments, to look to organizations and authorities for
that peace which must begin with the under- standing of ourselves, is to
create further and still greater conflict; and there can be no lasting
happiness as long as we accept a social order in which there is endless
strife and antagonism between man and man. If we want to change existing
conditions, we must first transform ourselves, which means that we must
become aware of our own actions, thoughts and feelings in everyday life.
But we do not really want peace, we do not want to put an end to
exploitation. We will not allow our greed to be interfered with, or the
foundations of our present social structure to be altered; we want things
to continue as they are with only superficial modifications, and so the
powerful, the cunning inevitably rule our lives.
Peace is not achieved through any ideology, it does not depend on
legislation; it comes only when we as individuals begin to understand our
own psychological process. If we avoid the responsibility of acting
individually and wait for some new system to establish peace, we shall
merely become the slaves of that system.
When governments, dictators, big business and the clerically powerful
begin to see that this increasing antagonism between men only leads to
indiscriminate destruction and is therefore no longer profitable, they may
force us, through legislation and other means of compulsion, to suppress
our personal cravings and ambitions and to co-operate for the well-being
of mankind. just as we are now educated and encouraged to be competitive
and ruthless, so then we shall be compelled to respect one another and to
work for the world as a whole. And even though we may all be well fed,
clothed and sheltered, we shall not be free of our conflicts and
antagonisms, which will merely have shifted to another plane, where they
will be still more diabolical and devastating. The only moral or righteous
action is voluntary, and understanding alone can bring peace and happiness
to man.
Beliefs, ideologies and organized religions are setting us against
our neighbours; there is conflict, not only among different societies, but
among groups within the same society. We must realize that as long as we
identify ourselves with a country, as long as we cling to security, as
long as we are conditioned by dogmas, there will be strife and misery both
within ourselves and in the world.
Then there is the whole question of patriotism. When do we feel
patriotic? It is obviously not an everyday emotion. But we are sedulously
encouraged to be patriotic through school-books, through newspapers and
other channels of propaganda, which stimulate racial egotism by praising
national heroes and telling us that our own country and way of life are
better than others. This patriotic spirit feeds our vanity from childhood
to old age.
The constantly repeated assertion that we belong to a certain
political or religious group, that we are of this nation or of that,
flatters our little egos, puffs them out like sails, until we are ready to
kill or be killed for our country, race or ideology. It is all so stupid
and unnatural. Surely, human beings are more important than national and
ideological boundaries.
The separative spirit of nationalism is spreading like fire all over
the world. Patriotism is cultivated and cleverly exploited by those who
are seeking further expansion, wider powers, greater enrichment; and each
one of us takes part in this process, for we also desire these things.
Conquering other lands and other people provides new markets for goods as
well as for political and religious ideologies.
One must look at all these expressions of violence and antagonism
with an unprejudiced mind, that is, with a mind that does not identify
itself with any country, race or ideology, but tries to find out what is
true. There is great joy in seeing a thing clearly without being
influenced by the notions and instructions of others, whether they be the
government, the specialists or the very learned. Once we really see that
patriotism is a hindrance to human happiness, we do not have to struggle
against this false emotion in ourselves, it has gone from us forever.
Nationalism, the patriotic spirit, class and race consciousness, are
all ways of the self, and therefore separative. After all, what is a
nation but a group of individuals living together for economic and
self-protective reasons ? Out of fear and acquisitive self defence arises
the idea of `my country," with its boundaries and tariff walls, rendering
brotherhood and the unity of man impossible.
The desire to gain and to hold, the longing to be identified with
something greater than ourselves, creates the spirit of nationalism; and
nationalism breeds war. In every country the government, encouraged by
organized religion, is upholding nationalism and the separative spirit.
Nationalism is a disease, and it can never bring about world unity. We can
not attain health through disease, we must first free ourselves from the
disease.
It is because we are nationalists, ready to defend our sovereign
States, our beliefs and acquisitions, that we must be perpetually armed.
Property and ideas have become more important to us than human life, so
there is constant antagonism and violence between ourselves and others. By
maintaining the sovereignty of our country, we are destroying our sons; by
worshipping the State, which is but a projection of ourselves, we are
sacrificing our children to our own gratification. Nationalism and
sovereign governments are the causes and the instruments of war.
Our present social institutions cannot evolve into a world
federation, for their very foundations are unsound. Parliaments and
systems of education which uphold national sovereignty and emphasize the
importance of the group will never bring war to an end. Every separate
group of people, with its rulers and its ruled, is a source of war. As
long as we do not fundamentally alter the present relationship between man
and man, industry will inevitably lead to confusion and become an
instrument of destruction and misery; as long as there is violence and
tyranny, deceit and propaganda, the brotherhood of man cannot be realized.
Merely to educate people to be wonderful engineers, brilliant
scientists, capable executives, able workmen, will never bring the
oppressors and the oppressed together; and we can see that our present
system of education, which sustains the many causes that breed enmity and
hatred between human beings, has not prevented mass murder in the name of
one's country or in the name of God.
Organized religions, with their temporal and spiritual authority, are
equally incapable of bringing peace to man, for they also are the outcome
of our ignorance and fear, of our make-believe and egotism.
Craving security here or in the hereafter, we create institutions and
ideologies which guarantee that security; but the more we struggle for
security, the less we shall have it. The desire to be secure only fosters
division and increases antagonism. If we deeply feel and understand the
truth of this, not merely verbally or intellectually, but with our whole
being, then we shall begin to alter fundamentally our relationship with
our fellow men in the immediate world about us; and only then is there a
possibility of achieving unity and brotherhood.
Most of us are consumed by all sorts of fears, and are greatly
concerned about our own security. We hope that, by some miracle, wars will
come to an end, all the while accusing other national groups of being the
instigators of war, as they in turn blame us for the disaster. Although
war is so obviously detrimental to society, we prepare for war and develop
in the young the military spirit.
But has military training any place in education? It all depends on
what kind of human beings we want our children to be. If we want them to
be efficient killers, then military training is necessary. If we want to
discipline them and regiment their minds, if our purpose is to make them
nationalistic and therefore irresponsible to society as a whole, then
military training is a good way to do it. If we like death and
destruction, military training is obviously important. It is the function
of generals to plan and carry on war; and if our intention is to have
constant battle between ourselves and our neighbours, then by all means
let us have more generals.
If we are living only to have endless strife within ourselves and
with others, if our desire is to perpetuate bloodshed and misery, then
there must be more soldiers, more politicians, more enmity - which is what
is actually happening. Modern civilization is based on violence, and is
therefore courting death. As long as we worship force, violence will be
our way of life. But if we want peace, if we want right relationship among
men, whether Christian or Hindu, Russian or American, if we want our
children to be integrated human beings, then military training is an
absolute hindrance, it is the wrong way to set about it.
One of the chief causes of hatred and strife is the belief that a
particular class or race is superior to another. The child is neither
class nor race conscious; it is the home or school environment, or both,
which makes him feel separative. In himself he does not care whether his
playmate is a Negro or a Jew, a Brahmin or a non-Brahmin; but the
influence of the whole social structure is continually impinging on his
mind, affecting and shaping it.
Here again the problem is not with the child but with the adults, who
have created a senseless environment of separatism and false values.
What real basis is there for differentiating between human beings?
Our bodies may be different in structure and colour, our faces may be
dissimilar, but inside the skin we are very much alike: proud, ambitious,
envious, violent, sexual, power-seeking and so on. Remove the label and we
are very naked; but we do not want to face our nakedness, and so we insist
on the label - which indicates how immature, how really infantile we are.
To enable the child to grow up free from prejudice, one has first to
break down all prejudice within oneself, and then in one's environment -
which means breaking down the structure of this thoughtless society which
we have created. At home we may tell the child how absurd it is to be
conscious of one's class or race, and he will probably agree with us; but
when he goes to school and plays with other children, he becomes
contaminated by the separative spirit. Or it may be the other way around:
the home may be traditional, narrow, and the school's influence may be
broader. In either case there is a constant battle between the home and
the school environments. and the child is caught between the two.
To raise a child sanely, to help him to be perceptive so that he sees
through these stupid prejudices, we have to be in close relationship with
him. We have to talk things over and let him listen to intelligent
conversation; we have to encourage the spirit of inquiry and discontent
which is already in him, thereby helping him to discover for himself what
is true and what is false.
It is constant inquiry, true dissatisfaction, that brings creative
intelligence; but to keep inquiry and discontent awake is extremely
arduous, and most people do not want their children to have this kind of
intelligence, for it is very uncomfortable to live with someone who is
constantly questioning accepted values.
All of us are discontented when we are young, but unfortunately our
discontent soon fades away, smothered by our imitative tendencies and our
worship of authority. As we grow older, we begin to crystallize, to be
satisfied and apprehensive. We become executives, priests, bank clerks,
factory managers, technicians, and slow decay sets in. Because we desire
to maintain our positions, we support the destructive society, which has
placed us there and given us some measure of security.
Government control of education is a calamity. There is no hope of
peace and order in the world as long as education is the handmaid of the
state or of organized religion. Yet more and more governments are taking
charge of the children and their future; and if it is not the government,
then it is the religious organizations which seek to control education.
This conditioning of the child's mind to fit a particular ideology,
whether political or religious, breeds enmity between man and man. In a
competitive society we cannot have brotherhood, and no reform, no
dictatorship, no educational method can bring it about.
As long as you remain a New Zealander and I a
Hindu, it is absurd to talk about the unity of man. How can we get
together as human beings if you in your country, and I in mine, retain our
respective religious prejudices and economic ways? How can there be brotherhood as long as
patriotism is separating man from man, and millions are restricted by
depressed economic conditions while others are well off? How can there be
human unity when beliefs divide us, when there is domination of one group
by another, when the rich are powerful and the poor are seeking that same
power, when there is maldistribution of land, when some are well fed and
multitudes are starving?
One of our difficulties is that we are not really in earnest about
these matters, because we do not want to be greatly disturbed. We prefer
to alter things only in a manner advantageous to ourselves, and so we are
not deeply concerned about our own emptiness and cruelty.
Can we ever attain peace through violence? Is peace to be achieved
gradually, through a slow process of time? Surely, love is not a matter of
training or of time. The last two wars were fought for democracy, I
believe; and now we are preparing for a still greater and more destructive
war, and people are less free. But what would happen if we were to put
aside such obvious hindrances to understanding as authority, belief,
nationalism and the whole hierarchical spirit? We would be people without
authority, human beings in direct relationship with one another - and
then, perhaps, there would be love and compassion.
What is essential in education, as in every other field, is to have
people who are understanding and affectionate, whose hearts are not filled
with empty phrases, with the things of the mind.
If life is meant to be lived happily, with thought, with ourselves;
and if we wish to build a truly enlightened society, we must have
educators who understand the ways of integration and who are therefore
capable of imparting that understanding to the child.
Such educators would be a danger to the present structure of society.
But we do not really want to build an enlightened society; and any teacher
who, perceiving the full implications of peace, began to point out the
true significance of nationalism and the stupidity of war, would soon lose
his position. Knowing this, most teachers compromise, and thereby help to
maintain the present system of exploitation and violence.
Surely, to discover truth, there must be freedom from strife, both
within ourselves and with our neighbours. When we are not in conflict
within ourselves, we are not in conflict outwardly. It is the inward
strife which, projected outwardly, becomes the world conflict.
War is the spectacular and bloody projection of our everyday living.
We precipitate war out of our daily lives; and without a transformation in
ourselves, there are bound to be national and racial antagonisms, the
childish quarrelling over ideologies, the multiplication of soldiers, the
saluting of flags, and all the many brutalities that go to create
organized murder.
Education throughout the world has failed, it has produced mounting
destruction and misery. Governments are training the young to be the
efficient soldiers and technicians they need; regimentation and prejudice
are being cultivated and enforced. Taking these facts into
consideration, we have to inquire into the meaning of existence and the
significance and purpose of our lives. We have to discover the beneficent
ways of creating a new environment; for environment can make the child a
brute, an unfeeling specialist, or help him to become a sensitive,
intelligent human being. We have to create a world government which is
radically different, which is not based on nationalism, on ideologies, on
force.
All this implies the understanding of our responsibility to one
another in relationship; but to understand our responsibility, there must
be love in our hearts, not mere learning or knowledge. The greater our
love, the deeper will be its influence on society. But we are all brains
and no heart; we cultivate the intellect and despise humility. If we
really loved our children, we would want to save and protect them, we
would not let them be sacrificed in wars.
I think we really want arms; we like the show of military power, the
uniforms, the rituals, the drinks, the noise, the violence. Our everyday
life is a reflection in miniature of this same brutal superficiality, and
we are destroying one another through envy and thoughtlessness.
We want to be rich; and the richer we get, the more ruthless we
become, even though we may contribute large sums to charity and education.
Having robbed the victim, we return to him a little of the spoils, and
this we call philanthropy. I do not think we realize what catastrophes we
are preparing. Most of us live each day as rapidly and thoughtlessly as
possible, and leave to the governments, to the cunning politicians, the
direction of our lives.
All sovereign governments must prepare for war, and one's own
government is no exception. To make its citizens efficient for war, to
prepare them to perform their duties effectively, the government must
obviously control and dominate them. They must be educated to act as
machines, to be ruthlessly efficient. If the purpose and end of life is to
destroy or be destroyed, then education must encourage ruthlessness; and I
am not at all sure that that is not what we inwardly desire, for
ruthlessness goes with the worship of success.
The sovereign State does not want its citizens to be free, to think
for themselves, and it controls them through propaganda, through distorted
historical interpretations and so on. That is why education is becoming
more and more a means of teaching what to think and not how to think. If
we were to think independently of the prevailing political system, we
would be dangerous; free institutions might turn out pacifists or people
who think contrary to the existing regime.
Right education is obviously a danger to sovereign governments - and
so it is prevented by crude or subtle means. Education and food in the
hands of the few have become the means of controlling man; and
governments, whether of the left or of the right, are unconcerned as long
as we are efficient machines for turning out merchandise and bullets.
Now, the fact that this is happening the world over means that we who
are the citizens and educators, and who are responsible for the existing
governments, do not fundamentally care whether there is freedom or
slavery, peace or war, well-being or misery for man. We want a little
reform here and there, but most of us are afraid to tear down the present
society and build a completely new structure, for this would require a
radical transformation of ourselves.
On the other hand, there are those who seek to bring about a violent
revolution. Having helped to build the existing social order with all its
conflicts, confusion and misery, they now desire to organize a perfect
society. But can any of us organize a perfect society when it is we who
have brought into being the present one? To believe that peace can be
achieved through violence is to sacrifice the present for a future ideal;
and this seeking of a right end through wrong means is one of the causes
of the present disaster.
The expansion and predominance of sensate values necessarily creates
the poison of nationalism, of economic frontiers, sovereign governments
and the patriotic spirit, all of which excludes man's co-operation with
man and corrupts human relationship, which is society. Society is the
relationship between you and another; and without deeply understanding
this relationship, not at any one level, but integrally, as a total
process, we are bound to create again the same kind of social structure,
however superficially modified.
If we are to change radically our present human relationship, which
has brought untold misery to the world, our only and immediate task is to
transform ourselves through self-knowledge. So we come back to the central
point, which is oneself; but we dodge that point and shift the responsibility onto governments, religions and ideologies. The government is
what we are, religions and ideologies are but a projection of ourselves;
and until we change fundamentally there can be neither right education nor
a peaceful world.
Outward security for all can come only when there is love and
intelligence; and since we have created a world of conflict and misery in
which outward security is rapidly becoming impossible for anyone, does it
not indicate the utter futility of past and present education? As parents
and teachers it is our direct responsibility to break away from
traditional thinking, and not merely rely on the experts and their
findings. Efficiency in technique has given us a certain capacity to earn
money, and that is why most of us are satisfied with the present social
structure; but the true educator is concerned only with right living,
right education, and right means of livelihood.
The more irresponsible we are in these matters, the more the State
takes over all responsibility. We are confronted, not with a political or
economic crisis, but with a crisis of human deterioration which no
political party or economic system can avert.
Another and still greater disaster is approaching dangerously close,
and most of us are doing nothing whatever about it. We go on day after day
exactly as before; we do not want to strip away all our false values and
begin anew. We want to do patchwork reform, which only leads to problems
of still further reform. But the building is crumbling, the walls are
giving way, and fire is destroying it. We must leave the building and
start on new ground, with different foundations, different values.
We cannot discard technical knowledge, but we can become inwardly
aware of our ugliness, of our ruthlessness, of our deceptions and
dishonesty, our utter lack of love. Only by intelligently freeing
ourselves from the spirit of nationalism, from envy and the thirst for
power, can a new social order be established.
Peace is not to be achieved by patchwork reform, nor by a mere
rearrangement of old ideas and superstitions. There can be peace only when
we understand what lies beyond the superficial, and thereby stop this wave
of destruction which has been unleashed by our own aggressiveness and
fears; and only then will there be hope for our children and salvation for
the world.
