TRUE EDUCATION : 9. SWAMI KRISHNANANDA

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Thursday, October 01, 2020. 5:00.AM.

(Keynote address given at a conference on education in Delhi on October 21, 1983)

Post-9.

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1.

If you agree at least partially that human society is impossible without the human individual, and if you are also inclined to agree that a conflict-ridden heap of individuals produces only a conflict-ridden human society, we come to the point that our education, which is a process of enlightenment, is not merely concerned with an empirical concept of human sociology, of society in its relationship of individuals, but is concerned with the individual himself or herself. The light has to be shed on the inner structure of the human individuality itself.

2.

Now, I mentioned another conflict. Apart from the social one, there is an individual conflict personally. There is social conflict on one side, and a psychological conflict on the other side. One cannot be differentiated from the other. They seem to be the obverse and reverse of the same coin. But why is there this individual conflict? Why should there be this nonalignment of the inner layers of the human personality? Why is the health of the total personality the hope of man? This takes us beyond ordinary formal educational curricula or syllabi in our educational institutions.

3.

Here comes a hint towards the answer to the question: Can we expect moral regeneration in human society today through the medium of formal education as it is imparted at the present moment? I am not giving the answer; I am only suggesting a gateway that can be opened for finding an answer to this question.

4.

We are conflict-ridden, and no one is totally free from internal conflict of some sort or the other. This internal conflict is projected outside in a human relationship, which is nothing but social behaviour, moral and ethical behaviour, political behaviour, and economic behaviour. I pose a question: Why should there be this internal conflict at all when we would not like to have it? How could it be possible that we are enshrining in our personality conditions which we would not like to be within us? This is a further question, into which investigations were made by our ancient Masters right from the time of the Vedas and the Upanishads and, as I mentioned, the Bhagavadgita. A single problem of what we can consider as one individual in the context of the Mahabharata epic, one individual’s little, local, topical problem, that problem of Arjuna. That little question which he raised, that question, that problem pertaining to a given historical situation in a particular temporal context gave rise to such a tremendous affirmation of mutual human relations and the very concept of duty itself. It was not a question of one person at one time in the process of human history chronologically. It was the question of mankind. It was the question of Man, an eternal question as to his position in this universe. The question of Man’s position in this universe was the question which suddenly rose up as the contents of Pandora’s box when Arjuna found himself in a terrible, vexing predicament. And every one of us is such a person.

To be continued ....

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