Jiddu Krishnamurti on Religion and Self-Reliance

"Religion as we generally know it or acknowledge it, is a series of beliefs, of dogmas, of rituals, of superstitions, of worship of idols, of charms and gurus that will lead you to what you want as an ultimate goal. The ultimate truth is your projection, that is what you want, which will make you happy, which will give a certainty of the deathless state. So the mind caught in all this creates a religion, a religion of dogmas, of priest-craft, of superstitions and idol-worship and in that, you are caught, and the mind stagnates. Is that religion?"

"Is religion a matter of belief, a matter of knowledge of other people's experiences and assertions? Or is religion merely the following of morality? You know it is comparatively easy to be moral to do this and not to do that. Because it is easy, you can imitate a moral system. Behind that morality, lurks the self, growing, expanding, aggressive, dominating. But is that religion?"

"You have to find out what truth is because that is the only thing that matters, not whether you are rich or poor, not whether you are happily married and have children, because they all come to an end, there is always death. So, without any form of belief, you must find out; you must have the vigor, the self-reliance, the initiative, so that for yourself you know what truth is, what God is."

"Belief will not give you anything; belief only corrupts, binds, darkens. The mind can only be free through vigor, through self-reliance."

- J. Krishnamurti, The Book of Life (Paragraph breaks added).