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"You use knowledge as a means of self-protection, security, and you want to be quite sure that
you have the same experiences as the Buddha or the Christ or X. But a man who is protecting
himself constantly through knowledge is obviously not a truth-seeker."
The First and Last Freedom, p.156 |
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"Addiction to knowledge is like any other addiction; it offers an
escape from the fear of emptiness, of loneliness, of frustration, the
fear of being nothing. The light of knowledge is a delicate covering under which lies a darkness that the mind cannot penetrate. The mind is frightened of this unknown, and so it escapes into knowledge, into theories, hopes, imagination; and this very knowledge is a hindrance to the understanding of the unknown. To put aside knowledge is to invite fear, and to deny the mind, which is the only instrument of perception one has, is to be vulnerable to sorrow, to joy. But it is not easy to put aside knowledge. To be ignorant is not to be free of knowledge. Ignorance is the lack of self-awareness; and knowledge is ignorance when there is no understanding of the ways of the self. Understanding of the self is freedom from knowledge." Commentaries on Living, First Series, p.26 |
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"The cloak of knowledge conceals but can never liberate us from our ever increasing confusion and sorrow."
Commentaries on Living, First Series, p.27 |
