Talk:At the Feet of the Master

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I have the At the Feet of the Master and I am pretty sure that when Krishnamurti says that those are not his words but his Master's words, he means that those are the Father's words. Michelle

I have seen mentioned in other reviews on the net that his insights in this book were profound for his age but he never claimed them as his own and neither did Annie Besant so this is likely a result of enthusiastic readers not having scrutinised the PREFACE and/or FOREWORD or a possible lack of the same material in other editions, perhaps even a misreading of the phrase "Master's thoughts clothed in His pupil's words" which is clear if read in context that the pupil was only responsible for possible paraphrasing of the teachings and not originating them.

One would have to delve a bit deeper into this particular Master/pupil relationship and the path they were on to determine how they place the source but from my personal readings I would suggest that on the path described in this book the Master is the "Son" or "messager" of the supreme "God" and a conduit for such teachings, typically pupils ascribe all teachings to their Master, the Master's defer to their Master or directly to "God", as the pupil does not have a connection with "God" yet they can only relay the information as coming from the source they received it from and that is their chosen Master.

Further in relation to the content on the page.

"He was referring to Leadbeater's claim that the Master Kuthumi was releasing the instruction to the young boy during the night while he was asleep."

I think that the statement quoted above needs a bit of substantiation or correction. If there is nothing to back it I think it might be changed to "He may have been referring ..." to keep it a bit more accurate.

In a soft cover copy of the book by ALCYONE, a 1968 reprint (called the 30th edition) of the 20th edition (1953 copyright date) of the 1910 Adyar Edition by the Theosophical Publishing House.

In the PREFACE [Annie Besant] writes that the teachings were given to him by his Master, and written down from memory during his preparation for initiation, however two sentences and two other words were added to his recollections by the Master implying that the contents were inspected and corrected and can be taken as an sanctioned text by his Master. The author in the FOREWORD also indicates that the words were given to him. If he was to have received this information while asleep as implied in the quoted section it is not suported in the book itself. Rather the means used to convey the information are described by the following words: "Master's own words", "verbal reproduction", "spoken teachings", Master's lips", "words of the Master", "words which He spoke", "what is said", "hear the Master's words", "every word" and "speak".

The only words that might be ambiguous are "given", "from memory", "Master's thoughts", "taught me" and "every hint" but they can be used to describe any form of communication and not something only imparted while asleep.

It is clear that these teachings were oral in the most part and implying they were imparted when asleep should not promoted. Idyllic press (talk) 09:28, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

emphisis

No. It is not more intuitive and easier to link. 99.99% of all articles use ''' or ''. Also, you are not using it the semantic way, you are just replacing everything with it. Per MOS:BOLD, the use of semantic bold tags is to be avoided and regular wikimarkup is to be used. Things like the newspapers, magazine titles and movies use wikimarkup as they are there for syntax. The cite templates use <i>. The use of <em> does nothing that wikimarkup does as they look identical. It serves no purpose. Less than 500 articles use it. As 99.9% of editors don't use it and don't see it, it only serves to make things more confusing. You also changed the wikimarkup to the templates when you arrived. Don't change things when it is already there and used on 99.99% of all articles. Bgwhite (talk) 08:01, 23 December 2015 (UTC)

Then I suggest WP:TFD for the templates {{em}} and {{strong}}. Whether 99% or 0.9% of the articles use them is otherwise immaterial. If you had actually read the source you would have seen that emphasis is not used for every instance, only where it makes sense. I have written 99.5% of this article, under various IPs, and using these templates is both consistent and appropriate as they do not break anything. On the contrary: certain browsers do not display wikimarkup properly, and using the templates can work around that. I don't understand what your problem is. This is not about style, but even if it was, your changes would seem frivolous. 208.87.234.201 (talk) 15:12, 23 December 2015 (UTC)

How in the world does a reader know the difference between {{em}} and ''? Every browser displays <i> and <b> correctly and have done for a couple of decades, so don't use that excuse. You remove the   and go with the template because, "more intuitive and easier." 99.99% of all articles and editors don't use {{em}}, so it is NOT "more intuitive and easier" to use {{em}}. You try to do the most complicated route instead of the easier route. The reader doesn't know, the editors don't use it, it does nothing. Bgwhite (talk) 02:57, 8 January 2016 (UTC)

I have answered the concerns above. But you keep insisting. This is not about style, the emphasis is indicating meaning, not typographical convention. As for {{nbsp}}, nobody forces you to use it. And you cannot force me to not use it. So I guess that's what it is. 65.88.88.200 (talk) 14:29, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

You have NOT answered. 1) How does the reader know the difference? 2) Per MOS, the strong template is not to be used. 3) The em template doesn't go on the article's name in the first sentence. Period. Bgwhite (talk) 20:16, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

I replaced {{em}} in the title's instance on the lead with italics (the subject is a book). I agree this is the correct way. However {{strong}} is appropriate for emphasis. Per Template:Strong/doc#Use cases and WP:BOLDTITLE (which does not disallow {{strong}}, and makes clear that this is semantic boldfacing). I read MOS:BOLD as a guideline on the relative merit of italics vs. boldfacing in typographical emphasis, not semantic emphasis as this is the case. 65.88.88.127 (talk) 18:26, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

short reference

Don't revert edits without thinking.

I checked the reference before my edit and it is insufficient. It just states (without sufficient explanation) that the company kept the publication rights, but not the copyright. However, in the jurisdiction where it was originally published and where the company was incorporated, no such distinction existed. So either it owns the copyright or it doesn't; what the ref says makes, on the face of it, no sense. This has nothing to do with my personal opinions on whether it should or shouldn't be. I think the death of the author plus seventy years rule is insane, but that doesn't matter, this isn't about what should be the case, it's about what is the case.

Next point, the date mentioned is irrelevant unless you intend to discuss the company's name change. It has no bearing at all on the rights situation and mentioning it in the way the article currently does suggest that it does and that is wrong.

And the as of template isn't allowed to be used in cases like this, it is only meant for marking information that may be out of date.

I assume anyone who needs to buy this book can find it easily.

I don't dispute that. Even if you couldn't buy a new print, I don't doubt there are plenty second-hand copies floating about. The full text can even be found online, so if you really cannot find it and you desperately need a paper version, you can get a printer to send you a copy. But when an article says Book X is still in print, that gives the reader of the article a certain impression, is it not?

Because normally a book gets published by a publisher. Publishers don't just print books, they, among other services, distribute books to stores, promote books to stores and take on risk. If, say, The Lord of the Rings gets a reprint, it's because Harper Collins still senses enough popularity and demand to see bread in it.

But all recent prints of At the Feet of the Master that I could find where either: 1) Printed by the Theosophical Society in America which has its own reasons to make sure the book is there for people looking for it. And, if I were a suspicious person, I might add that they may want to pretend it makes sense for the book to be still in print even if a regular publisher wouldn't.

Or: 2) Publishing services. These are services that will print anything, whatever you ask, regardless of demand or quality. Often they don't offer copy-editing / layout services, or maybe at a level that's so subpar that it's actually just another way to wring some more cash out of the client. And the client, which for all clarity in this case is the commissioner of the print, not the reader, might bear the full risk of getting the first edition sold. Or no books may be printed at all until someone asks, but even then they'll ask a fee; in that case their business model is that most of the commissioned books won't get sold.

You can see why that puts some heavy question marks around the use of ¿in print? in this article. Maybe you can find a regular publisher that carried it recently, in which case fine, but I consulted several online catalogues and when browsing prints of this book I had to go back in time quite a while to find a print by a real publisher.

This is a separate discussion of whether the book is popular. It might very well be very popular, but if the article intends to argue that point by claiming it's in print, it'd better find a recent edition by a proper publisher. And if it doesn't intend to, it should stay clear of saying ‘in print’ because otherwise it'd be lying to the reader.

Is this book a classic?

The lead currently describes this book as a spiritual classic. I couldn't fond that in any third party sources. I don't believe it belongs in the lead. Two IPs added it back in. Does anyone have a source? If not, this needs to be removed from the lead. Big Money Threepwood (talk) 01:42, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

The specific quote "spiritual classic" comes from this source (as has been pointed out to you before):

C. V. Williams near the top of page 27. This is referenced in § Publication history via this footnote (#16 currently). The author is an unrelated academic who did research on Krishnamurti and wrote a biography, originally published by the Indian academic publisher Motilal Banarsidas in 2004. The work has been reviewed favorably in both academic and non-academic media.

Apart from that, any book that generated as much publicity in the general media as the article states, sold as many copies, and could still be easily found/purchased (because still in print) 100 years after the original publication, could also be considered a classic, at least within the confines of its genre.

Your edit will again be reverted as unwarranted removal of pertinent information. 24.103.241.218 (talk) 17:52, 29 January 2024 (UTC)