https://www.everand.com/book/386738651/Lives-in-the-Shadow-with-J-Krishnamurti
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542 pages
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Lives in the Shadow with J. Krishnamurti
By
Radha Rajagopal Sloss
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For nearly half a century the charismatic, strikingly handsome spiritual teacher J. Krishnamurti gathered an enormous following throughout Europe, India, Australia and North America. From the age of eighteen he was the forerunner of the type of iconoclasm that would bring immediate fame to cult figures in the late twentieth century. Yet recent biographies have left large areas of his life in mystifying darkness.
This, however, is no ordinary study of Krishnamurti, for it is written by one whose earliest memories are dominated by his presence as a doting second fathertolerant of pranks and pets, playful and diligent. For over two decades in their Ojai California haven, where Aldous Huxley and other pacifists found respite during the war years,Krinsh developed his philosophical message. He also placed himself at the centre of her parents Rosalind and Rajagopals marriage.
In a spirit of tenderness, fairness, objective inquiry, and no little remorse, the author traces the rise of Krishnamurti from obscurity in India by selection of the Theosophical Society to be the vehicle of a new incarnation of their world teacher. Breaking from Theosophy, Krishnamurti inspired his own following, retaining the dedication of his longtime friend Rajagopal, himself highly educated, to oversee all practicalities and the editing and publication of his writings.
How this bond of trust was breached and became clouded in confusion with a new wave of devoteeism lies at the heart of this extraordinary story. So does a portrait of intense romantic intimacy and the conundrum of Krishnamurtis own complex character.
Radha Rajagopal SlossRadha Rajagopal…
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Lives in the Shadow with J. Krishnamurti Paperback
4.2 4.2 out of 5 stars 106 ratings
This is not only the story of one person. It is the story of the relationships of J. Krishnamurti and people closely involved with him, especially Rosalind Williams Rajagopal and D. Rajagopal, my mother and father, and of the consequences of this involvement on their lives. Recently there have been biographies and a biographical film on Krishnamurti that have left areas, and a large span of years, in mysterious darkness. It is not in the interest of historical integrity, especially where such a personality is concerned, that there be these areas of obscurity.
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Language
English
Dimensions
15.24 x 2.54 x 22.23 cm
ISBN-10
0595121314
ISBN-13
978-0595121311
4.2 4.2 out of 5 stars 106 ratings
4.2 out of 5 stars
Amazon Customer TE
4.0 out of 5 stars A courageous exploration of an enigmaReviewed in Australia on 15 October 2017
This is an extraordinary account of the life of a man who lived out the spiritual script devised by his mentors Annie Besant and C W Leadbeater. He lived and died as the fulflllment of a belief in the persona of a World Teacher.
In his teachings one can discern certain refrains of Advaita, Buddhism, Judaism and Christianity as well as fresh and new insights which were uniquely his own.
But Krishnamurti was a mortal like the rest of us, and Radha Rajagopal Sloss does an excellent job in outlining the complexities involved in his character. She was brought up by three people who were anything but ordinary.
Her mother Rosalind, wife to Rajagopal, and mistress to
Krishnamurti, lived together in the same house as a loving family for many years. Radha claims she had two fathers
and she loved them both. This book reveals why and how all the relationships ended in tears.
Radha wrote the book to set the record straight. In the
end, Truth and Justice prevailed over Adoration and Myth.
Not everyone will be happy about this because apparently humans cannot stand too much reality.
I have read this book two or three times since it was first
published and each time I learn something new about the characters and also about myself. I also discover afresh
what Krishnatmurti and the Buddha meant when they
said "with your thoughts you create the world".
This is a courageous book, simply written but with great
affection . No person should read the Krishnamurti biographies without reading this book, not if they want a
complete picture .
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yuan zhou
5.0 out of 5 stars As illuminating as reading KrishnamurtiReviewed in the United States on 9 May 2022
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This book was for me transformative - eye opening.
Throughout my life from at least teenage years on, I’ve lived with the fundamental premise that there is such a thing as a great spiritual person. Growing up in the West, for many years I saw Jesus as the pinnacle of spiritual achievement, but also saw it in Buddha, and to a lesser extent in ‘good’ people of the world who stood out in some way for doing something apparently selfless, noble, wise etc.
After many years of searching for deeper spiritual meaning in myself - via the following of various strategies externally - various paths, so to speak - I found myself increasingly despairing of ever finding anything useful. The ancient teachings of Christianity and Buddhism were too ancient - cryptic - the meaning obscured, and muddied with edits, omissions and the like. How could I know what was really said 2000 or 2500 years ago?
This is when I discovered the modern mystics: Eckhart Tolle, Alan Watts, Krishnamurti. I listened to countless hours of the talks of all three. Amongst them, K stood out as the most impressive - at least he was the most provocative, the one who shook you (Zen style) out of your comfort zone - challenged you to look into yourself. He didn’t give the answers easily, he always said ‘come on, you need to find the answer, don’t just wait for me to tell you’.
If there was such a thing as enlightenment, K seemed to embody it as much as any verifiable person in history. This is what him so interesting to me to study.
This is also why now this biography is so interesting. Given the author grew up as essentially the family of K, she saw with a child’s eye a more complete picture of the person K than probably anyone else, for around two decades or more. Children have a way of seeing through their parents (or other adults they grow up with) better than anyone else - including the parents themselves. I can vouch for this in the way i can see through my own parents’ facades, and how my daughter sees right through mine. Kids are uniquely unbraid to point these things out too, given they have full trust that their parents will not abandon them out of offence.
What her account shows, is that K was a human being, not a super hero. This is not to deny that he had mystical insights, or that his words could be powerful forces for good. But it destroys the idea of the perfect enlightened being who is unlike a human in so many ways - as Jesus, the Buddha and countless other sages have been portrayed by the culture of popular religions. Clearly that super-hero status is a fabrication in the minds of the followers, and not a reality in the personage of the mystic.
This leaves one with a few possible conclusions.
One is that perhaps enlightenment / deep mysticism is still real, it’s just that it never transforms the host person into anything other than a human being on the external level. They may be able to access new levels of inner experience or insight - and part of their time will be spent sharing these insights, even with special energy - but this will never alter the fact that they are in a human body. Sex and/or other appetites will remain, and they will, in some areas of their life, blunder clumsily like every human being. In this there is no escaping their ‘humanity’. This also would mean that the idea of the perfect, celibate, selfless, and even magical mystic is a wishful illusion in the minds of their followers. It says more about the followers than the teacher. It says that the followers wish there to be some super-hero type entity, and so they will attribute these singular qualities to their teacher. It means the followers don’t want to accept what they are - that they are human. If the buddha or Jesus can transcend the normal human form, then they can help save us too. But if they all remained fully human in their external form, then it means ordinary people would have to put up with it too.
The second possibility is that it’s all a sham. Demand creates supply, even if it requires delusion. In this case, no one really has great mystical insights beyond what any of us have too - at moments in our lives. But due to the demand from the public for great mystical figures, certain people get propped up willingly or not, and fill these roles. In his earlier life, as the ‘vehicle’ for Theosophists, K was certainly one who experienced this thrusting upon him of social demands for a mystical figurehead. But in rejecting that mantle, he also showed on originality that in fact garnered him more followers in the long run than I believe would have been the case.
But whatever the truth of the matter - whether there is such a thing as a true mystic as a separate category of human experience, or whether it is just an aspect of every human’s experience - there is only one way to know, and therefore only one way for it to mean anything at all in our lives, and that is to know through our own experience.
This account of K shows conclusively to me, that one cannot see the mystical truths through the external actions of another person. One can only see them in one’s own inner life, or not see them at all. As we cannot see the inner life of another individual, exactly what their inner life comprised becomes a moot point - something we can never verify.
My hypothesis is that mystical experience is just like any other facet of the human being, it is something shared by all people, but certain people will have a relatively greater sensitivity or capacity than others. Just as IQ and athleticism vary across the population, so too does mystical connection.
In the ancient tribal way of life, the shaman was a person who specialised in mystical capacities, but everyone in the tribe expressed their own mystical capacity through the rituals. The shaman was just the most suited amongst them for this role, as some other in the tribe were to hunting or foraging - but the specialisations were not worshipped or deliberately exaggerated in these societies. In fact forager societies display very high levels of egalitarianism. Everyone may specialise in certain areas, to a certain degree, but what they all have in common is far greater than what differentiates them, and no one is celebrated especially over the others.
The mystic, whether 2000 years ago in Palestine, or in the 20th century in the form of Krishnamurti, seems to be a feature of the pyramidical structure of large civilisations, just as the political leader, the general, the sports star, the entertainer etc are too. In pyramidical social structures, we get ‘stars’ in every field of human endeavour.
This book, more than anything else I’ve read, has capped off my own long and winding path as a fan of spiritual stars, and shown me that that is what they are. I don’t think our adulation of stars in any field makes us happier - in fact the reverse, because it makes us feel separated in quality to them, and essentially inferior. Eventually humanity might make it back to a state of egalitarianism - which is to love your neighbour as yourself - literally, because that is exactly how you actually see them without needing to attempt to see them that way. The long arc of human evolution has been painful. It seems that seeing through what is facade to what is real, is the only way that suffering is diminished. This book has helped myself a great deal. Thank you.
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19 people found this helpfulReport
Q
5.0 out of 5 stars AmazingReviewed in the United Kingdom on 11 August 2023
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Easily one of the most amazing books I've ever read. I look up to the style and the profound humour with great admiration, and for the history I am most grateful. Thank you a million times over to dear Radha Rajagopal Sloss for this significant achievement - this has helped me so much and is a revelation and also a joy to read. This book will always be a centrepiece in our home.
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Sashi C.
5.0 out of 5 stars Shadows to lightReviewed in India on 23 March 2020
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Genuineness and truth about a life of deceit & exploitation- written with sensitivity. Gullibility of human race depicted succinctly. Thanks
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Amazon Customer
5.0 out of 5 stars Five StarsReviewed in Canada on 16 January 2016
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Super! good conditions, fast delivery, well writing!
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Bernard Bel
5.0 out of 5 stars Very enjoyable and useful!Reviewed in France on 14 May 2015
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During the 1970s my wife and I attended J. Krishnamurti's talks in Saanen almost every year. We enjoyed staying with our camping car in the Turbach valley above Gstaad! This experience, which coincided with our early discovery of Seitai (as introduced by Itsuo Tsuda) had a strong impact on our lives, notably in terms of interactions with teachers and leaders of all kinds.
The Saanen talks were our exclusive exposure to Krishnamurti's teachings. We did not read his writings nor related material. We never tried to hear about his private life - "behind the stage". We felt that staying at a distance was consistent with JK's assertion of the uselessness of seeking guidance from spiritual leaders. I believe many European followers had a similar posture, and certainly it contributed to public ignorance of the actual story.
For this reason, reading the book "Lives in the Shadow" was not such a devastating experience as it could have been, had we worshiped the image of the teacher as a model of perfection. For us it was nonetheless a shock; one more instance of the discrepancy between the public and private lives of opinion leaders and spiritual "masters". The author's balanced analysis was tremendously helpful in looking at the whole picture with a clear mind.
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