Have Spiritual Masters and Sages Helped Humanity?

The highest level of all spiritual quests is considered to be emptying the mind of thoughts without losing alertness of the mind. Seers with no political or social agenda have tended to  point to that simple fact and little else. Even when we examine the writings of some masters who were constrained by their religious persuasions, if we look below their theological talk their message had this one common thread -- Observe yourself. Empty your mind. We’ve had millions of holy sayings, saints and holy books, all pointing to the same singularity. But I doubt whether the Masters could change anyone by their writings or talks. If any change occurred to anyone, my hypothesis is that it would have due to that person’s existing readiness. The best a master can do is to encourage that existing spark, which may be exceptions, not the rule.
An already ready person may might remember his Master with gratitude, and might have indeed received the final spark for enlightenment from his master’s presence or words. But probably he would have become enlightened anyway if not now, later. The Master’s influence might have merely served as an incidental catalyst. On the contrary, those who are not ready to change probably would get entangled with the Master’s words, his personality, his "aura" and subject themselves to a new bondage.

In 20th century, J. Krishnamurti understood the problem with human mind. It was too “sticky.” Young, freshly enlightened Krishnamurti's goal was to "set man absolutely, totally, free." He thought the problem was that the gurus were giving too much direct information and instructions, referring to ancient sayings rather than encouraging their devotees to use their own insights,  forcing their followers to hook on to their words or techniques which formed fresh conditioning, taking the seeker back almost to square one.

So Krishnamurti tried a novel approach (well, not quite novel if you consider Nagarjuna or Linji). He was honest and did his best to keep his listeners working on their minds by closing all their escape routes, never using philosophical terms, and refusing to give any solutions. He was able to do that for 60 years and still keep his listeners. Actually they grow over the years. Krishnamurti seems to have hoped that in a moment of total frustration, totally unable to hide, the listener would suddenly see reality as it is, at an experiential, rather than intellectual, level.

But even Krishnamurti failed badly by his own admission --- despite his talking to hundreds of thousands of people globally for some 60 years, writing more than a hundred beautifully written books (albeit repeating the same little point in all of them), he confessed that only five or six people had actually changed. Devotees who  kept following him everywhere, listening to as many of  his talks for decades, don't seem to have been benefited, instead became conditioned by his non-conditioning approach!

This was not Krishnamurti’s fault. The masters did the best they could but that was not enough because of the limitation of the minds of their listeners. Those who were ready to change would have changed anyway, and those who weren't ready would make the master's words and presence as yet another conditioning.

Doesn’t the failure of even totally honest and relatively intelligent mystics, indicate the uselessness of trying to force "truth" down someone else’s throat (even if they are asking for it)? Aren’t these mystics wasting their lives? And aren’t we wasting our lives listening to them?