QUESTION : Why does sex play such an important part in each one’s life in the world?

JIDDU KRISHNAMURTI : There is a particular philosophy, especially in India, called Tantra, part of which encourages sex. They say through sex you reach Nirvana. It is encouraged, so that you go beyond it – and you never do. Why has sex become so important in our life? It has been so, not only in the present period, but always. Why has sex been so deeply embedded in man? – apart from producing children, I am not talking of that. Why? Probably it is the greatest pleasure a human being has. Demanding that pleasure, all kinds of complications arise; volumes have been written with explanations of the psychological complications. But the authors have never asked the question as to why human beings have made this thing so extremely important in their lives.

Our life is in a turmoil, it is a constant struggle, with nothing original, nothing creative – I am using the word ‘creative’ very carefully. The painter, the architect, the wood-carver, he may say he is creative. The woman who bakes bread in the kitchen is said to be creative. And sex, they say, is also creative. So what is it to be creative? The painters, the musicians and the Indian singers with their devotion, say that theirs is the act of creation. Is it? You have accepted Picasso as a great painter, a great creator, putting one nose on three faces, or whatever he does. I am not denying it or being derogatory, I am just pointing it out. That is what is called creation.

But is all that creativeness? Or is creativeness something totally different? You are seeing the expression of creativeness in a painting, in a poem, in prose, a in a statue, in music. It is expressed according to a man’s talent, his capacity great or small; it may be modern Rock or Bach – I am sorry to compare the two! – they are quite incomparable.

We human beings have accepted all that as creative because it brings fame, money, position. But I am asking: is that creativity? Can there be creation, in the most profound sense of that word, so long as there is egotism, so long as there is the demand for success, money and recognition – supplying the market? Do not agree with me please. I am just pointing out. I am not saying I know creativity and you do not; I am not saying that.

I am saying we never question these things. I say there is a state where there is creation in which there is no shadow of self. That is real creation; it does not need expression, it does not need self-fulfilment; it is creation. Perhaps sex is felt to be creative and has become important because everything around us is circumscribed, the job, the office, going to the church, following some philosopher, some guru. All that has deprived us of freedom and, further, we are not free from our own knowledge; it is always with us, the past.

So we are deprived of freedom outwardly and inwardly; for generation upon generation we have been told what to do. And the reaction to that is: I’ll do what I want, which is also limited, based on pleasure, on desire, on capacity. So where there is no freedom, either outwardly or inwardly, specially inwardly, we have only one thing left and that is called sex. Why do we give it importance? Do you give equal importance to being free from fear? No. Do you give equal energy, vitality and thought to end sorrow? No. Why? Why only to sex?

Because that is the easiest thing to hand; the other demands all your energy, which can only come when you are free. So naturally human beings throughout the world have given this thing tremendous importance in life. And when you give something, which is only one part of life, tremendous importance, you are destroying yourself. Life is whole, not just one part.

If you give importance to the whole then sex becomes more or less unimportant. The monks and all those who have denied sex have turned their energy to god but the thing is boiling in them, nature cannot be suppressed. But when you give that thing all-importance, then you are corrupt.