The schools that have been informed by K’s teachings have as their essential purpose the cultivation of the whole human being. This fundamental integrity, which involves the harmonious development of body, heart and mind, is the necessary answer to the pervasive fragmentation of human society and consciousness. For that, education cannot limit itself merely to imparting knowledge and skills with a view to an integration into the labor market or the social structure, but it must assume full responsibility as regards the psychological or inward reality, as this is the determining factor in the conflictive dynamics of our relationships. That is why this pedagogical approach above all proposes to free the human being from the factors of division and conflict, whose essence is the self-centered movement of thought.

This proposal, therefore, implies an essentially ethical view of education and its basis is the transformation of the individual by way of self-knowledge. Relationship, as the very foundation of life, offers us a mirror in which to see ourselves reflected as we are, since it is the field in which our way of being, our conditioning and creativity, are shaped and manifest themselves. Therefore the relationship with nature, things, people and ideas constitutes the nucleus of the educational process, which is founded on the arts of seeing, listening, questioning and learning, veritable pillars of the great art of living. These schools are meant to cover three fundamental areas of activity, namely to provide the students with the knowledge and skills necessary to function in society, to uncover and cultivate their innate talents, and to awaken a deeper concern for the whole and wholeness of life. In the current state of education, most of the energies are poured into the first and second aspects, i.e. into those areas having to do with the cultivation of knowledge, capacity and specialization. This is in keeping with the general concept of education as a means of social adaptation, which not only includes a functional integration but also the adoption of a given collective identity and its normative values. The third aspect is generally ignored or left up to the individual, whereas it is the most universal and should be at the heart of the educational process,as wholeness is the fundamental and inalienable intent of man.

This fundamental concern with wholeness and universality is expressed in terms of six fundamental aims, namely to bring about a quality of skill and precision in action, a close and caring relationship with nature, a view of humanity as a unified whole, a deep sensitivity to beauty, a quality of deep affection and the awakening of intelligence. These aims inform the whole learning process ,from the curriculum to the relationships among the people involved, be they teachers, staff or students. The learning process is primarily heuristic in nature, i.e. aimed at self-learning and discovery. For this to come about, and for wholeness to flower, it is essential to create an atmosphere that is free from the destructive patterns of arbitrary authority, with its conditioning structure of reward and punishment. Such a structure is sustained by imposition and fear and brings about hurt and therefore the development in the child of reflex patterns of self-protective reaction. Comparison and competition must also be absent, as they are the essential factors in generating the structure of envy on which society, with its respectable injustices, is based. K always said that wholeness can flower only in freedom and that freedom comes with responsibility, a responsibility that is not the outcome of duty but the expression of the sensitive concern with the harmony and integrity of relationship as a whole. It is in such a secure and caring environment that a quality of creative joy can come about.

The question of freedom and wholeness, however, is not limited to establishing a harmonious outward environment but also involves awareness of deeper psychological factors, such as attachment and violence, which have such devastating potential and constitute an abiding substratum of human ignorance. In fact, no such harmonious outer environment could be established without addressing these inward factors of destructive conditioning. Ignorance, as K pointed out, is fundamentally not knowing or not understanding oneself, and it is this ignorance that is at the heart of our human problems, for human reality is constituted by the psyche, by thought. It is this psyche that, in its misguided pursuit of security, has brought about fragmentation, division and conflict in the world. Therefore this world cannot be changed from outside, for the causes of its deep malaise lie within the psyche itself. That’s why an education that aims at wholeness necessarily implies understanding and transforming oneself. Such self-understanding involves not only verbal inquiry and reflection but also a quality of observation that K called choiceless awareness and undivided attention, which is the beginning of meditation. This intensifies sensitivity and can bring about a sense of inward space and silence that is the subtle ground of the selfless movement of wholeness and insight.

According to a former principal of Rishi Valley, G.Narayan, Krishnamurti himself summarized his general aims for education as:

1.Global outlook: a concern for the whole over and above the part and a non- sectarian approach free from prejudice;

2.Concern for man and the environment: the ending of division and conflict between human beings and a nondestructive relationship with nature, as humanity and nature are one indivisible process;

3.Religious spirit and scientific mind: the latter involving an uncompromising commitment to the observation and understanding of facts,and the former signifying a quality of innocence and communion with all things resulting from its inner aloneness or lack of identity. For K it was this religious quality of wholeness that alone could bring about a new culture in which the knowledge of science would find its right place.

Naturally,there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in our philosophies and a short description like this cannot do full justice to the whole range and implications of such a general proposal nor, for that matter, to what goes on in the schools informed by it. It is clear, however, that the challenge of such an education is total, for it is none other than the challenge that humanity has posed to itself since the beginning. Truth is indeed pathless. The known ways invariably end up in the unknown and the undertaking of that journey rests, as ever,with each and every one of us, for truth is not a matter of knowledge but of perception and nobody can do that for another. It is this very unknown, with its space and silence, that may be the answer.

Javier Gómez Rodríguez
February 2002