SRI AUROBINDO (suddenly): Is Nolini Sen going today?
NIRODBARAN: He has already gone.
SRI AUROBINDO: His wife has sent a poem which she received in meditation. It is very good. Pavitra has seen the horoscopes of both husband and wife. He says they are complementary to each other. He has ability, the power of success.
NIRODBARAN: Nolini Sen told me about his wife. About himself he said that he had some organising ability. The Government used to send him to places that were difficult to organise. So he has acquired a bad name as being strict and disciplinary.
SRI AUROBINDO: He has a clear mind and seems to be an intellectual.
NIRODBARAN: He was one of the three most brilliant students of his year, the first being Satyen Bose. He says there are only two people who understand Einstein's relativity theory.
SRI AUROBINDO: In India or the world? I thought there were
five or six in the world.
NIRODBARAN: I mean in India. One of the two is Bose and the
other is Kothari. He further says that Bose pointed out some mistake
in Einstein's thinking; his corrections have been accepted and
scientists now speak of the Bose-Einstein statistics.
SRI AUROBINDO: I see. That is very creditable for India.
PURANI: What about Suleman?
NIRODBARAN: Sen says Suleman also pointed out some mistakes. ;
PURANI: No, Suleman
refutes the whole theory.
NIRODBARAN: Sen says the results of the last solar eclipse have
not come out yet. They should have a bearing on the relativity
theory.
NIRODBARAN
(after a lull): In the message on our New Year
calendar the Mother says that this is a year of silence and expectation. We are wondering: expectation of what?
SRI AUROBINDO: Of what is to come.
NIRODBARAN: That is to say?
SRI AUROBINDO: Whatever the expectation is for.
NIRODBARAN: For individuals or in a general sense? We are all
expecting the Supermind to come.
SRI AUROBINDO: How can it come unless you are all prepared
to receive it?
PURANI: I thought it was more or less an individual matter,
SRI AUROBINDO: What do you mean by "expecting the
Supermind?" Do you expect the Supermind to come without any
preparation?
NIRODBARAN: No, I don't mean for myself I mean that the
Supermind will descend into you and the Mother and perhaps a few
disciples first and we shall be benefited by it. At least that is what I
understood.
SRI AUROBINDO: You want to be benefited without doing
anything yourself. And do you expect the Supermind to do everything for you? That is supreme laziness.
NIRODBARAN: I don't say that. I say that if at present in spite of
my efforts I don't get satisfactory results and my progress is slow amd
tardy, the Supramental Force, being the Highest Force, will help me
to overcome my troubles in comparatively less time. That is what
you wrote to me on the action of the Supermind.
SRI AUROBINDO: So you will wait for the Supermind's descent. That is like Moni's idea. He says that the Divine will do
everything and one has nothing to do at all. Anyway, this used to
be his idea. I don't know what he thinks now.
NIRODBARAN: That is an extreme view. I don't go so far. I
believe or I have been led to believe that the Supermind -will help
me in every way possible.
SRI AUROBINDO: Will it?
NIRODBARAN: Won't it? As for Moni's idea, I can't say there is
no truth in it if one sincerely believes in it and sticks to it.
SRI AUROBINDO: Ah, sticks to it!
NIRODBARAN: There are people who rely entirely on Divine
Grace and have the faith that the Divine will do everything for
them. It is not entirely wrong, is it? I think you have yourself written
something like that, though, as you have said, such people are rare.
SRI AUROBINDO: Faith and ideas are quite different. Ideas are
of the mind and they are abstract. If they have no dynamic power
behind them, they remain ideas till the end.
SATYENDRA: I am also coming round to Moni's idea.
NIRODBARAN: But yours is from a different point of view. You
have tried.
SATYENDRA: Unless the fellow within, as Y calls it, awakes,
nothing can be achieved. One must have the hunger first.
NIRODBARAN: Yes, that hunger also can be created by the
Supermind.
Here Sri Aurobindo smiled. Purani brought in some other topic, at the end
of which both Satyendra and Nirodbaran looked at each other and broke into
smiles. Purani thought it was as if Nirodbaran had thrown a jet of refreshing
water on Satyendra.
PURANI: Jetting the Supermind on Satyendra?
SRI AUROBINDO: Oh, baptising him into the Supermind?
NIRODBARAN: In The Hindu,s editorial on the defence forces of
India it is said that there is not a single Bengali unit in India's land forces The majority are comprised of Punjab Muslims.
SRI AUROBINDO: Muslims?
NIRODBARAN: Yes.
SRI AUROBINDO: What land forces? The army?
NIRODBARAN: Perhaps.
SRI AUROBINDO: People say the Bengalis and the Madrasis are
non-martial races. But it has been pointed out that the English
conquered Bengal with the help of Madrasi sepoys, the United
Provinces with that of Bengali sepoys and the Muslim Punjab itself with that of Hindu sepoys. And now they are all non-martial races!
NIRODBARAN: I had a letter from Nolini Sen. He speaks of
visions of flowers and wants to know their significance.
SRI AUROBINDO: What flowers?
NIRODBARAN: A pink lotus closed and then opened by some
invisible power. He asks if it is your Force.
SRI AUROBINDO: You can write the significance.
NIRODBARAN: But he wants the implications too.
SRI AUROBINDO: The lotus would mean that the consciousness of the Divine is opening in him.
NIRODBARAN: He calls it your Force because we know the
pink lotus to be your flower and the white to be the Mother's.
SRI AUROBINDO: Where does he see the lotus?
NIRODBARAN: I think in the heart.
SRI AUROBINDO: Then it is very good. It means his psychic
being is opening.
NIRODBARAN: Maybe, but seeing visions like that is not of
much importance, is it?
SRI AUROBINDO: There is more to it than that. He hears voices
and gets inner guidance.
NIRODBARAN: There are other flowers he speaks of.
I am
thinking: if he goes on asking about such things there won't be
any end to it. (Laughter) Sen seems to have other brilliant brothers: they make a gifted family, I hear.
SRI AUROBINDO: Yes.
NIRODBARAN: One brother who is an I.C.S. is said to be the
most brilliant.
SRI AUROBINDO: Then why did he go in for the I.C.S.-to
waste himself?
NIRODBARAN: That is what Sen told him but his father seemed
to be keen about it. The I.C.S. was an easy walk-over for him.
SRI AUROBINDO: It is quite easy to pass the I.C.S.
NIRODBARAN: He also had some interest in our direction I
understand, but now—
SRI AUROBINDO: Suppressed under the burden of the
I.C.S.
work?
NIRODBARAN: Yes.
SRI AUROBINDO: In that official routine work all the brilliant
qualities are lost. There is no scope for them.
At noon after Sri Aurobindo's writing had been finished, Nirodbaran
showed him Sen's letter and Sri Aurobindo explained the significance of his
visions of flowers. Then the Mother came. Nirodbaran told the Mother aqain
about Sen's letter and said that he was much worried by thoughts and
couldn't concentrate.
THE MOTHER: Yes, he told me of that. Tell him not to worry.
The more he concentrates on the trouble, the worse it will be.
PURANI: X has replied to the review by the Vedanta Kesari of
his new book. The editor has also put in some footnotes.
SRI AUROBINDO:
What does X say?
PURANI: He seems to say that the physical light and the inner
light of the Yogi are the same light.
SRI AUROBINDO: Is he speaking from his own experience?
PURANI:
He says so, and he quotes from the Veda and the Upnishads to support him in saying that God is light. The editor
says that all light is from the Divine, of course, but the inner light of
the Yogi is different from the physical light: it has not the same
wave-length, as it were.
Then about his recent change of views, X argues that if the
spiritual journey entails a change of landscape as one climbs higher,
he is not ashamed to admit his change due to the light of knowledge
and experience.
SRI AUROBINDO: That is also what Krishnaprem says. As
one advances in consciousness from one stage to another, one
has to change his former views in the light of his present knowledge.
NIRODBARAN: X is just like Y. He also says one thing and then
contradicts it; so X isn't justified in calling him a humbug.
SRI AUROBINDO: Does he call Y a humbug for that? I thought
it was because his prophecies don't come true.
NIRODBARAN: If one makes sweeping assertions and calls them
the light of knowledge, that light can't very well be trusted.
SRI AUROBINDO: Why not? (Firmly) When one experiences
the personal God, one thinks that only the personal God exists.
When one goes beyond that, one comes to the Impersonal realisation. When one transcends both, one comes to Absolute, of
which the Personal and the Impersonal are aspects.
NIRODBARAN: But then X will go on contradicting himself all
the time. Today he praises Yoga and monasticism; tomorrow he
damns Yoga and finds no truth in Sannyasa.
SRI AUROBINDO: He is not speaking from experience. It is a
matter of opinion. (After a pause) If he had a wider mind he would
not say things like that and lay stress only on the faults and mistakes
of monasticism, losing sight of its virtues.
NIRODBARAN
(after a while): Jyotin explains the symbolism of
your poem "Trance" by saying that the star is the individual soul and
the moon the universal. The storm is doubt. And when the doubt is
cleared from the mental sky, the individual soul stands face to face
with the universal.
SRI AUROBINDO: Good Lord! I didn't know that I had put all
that philosophy into the poem. Jyotin has built a big superstructure
on a small poem.
SATYENDRA: That is the commentator's job.
PURANI: Tagore also says that critics give meanings to his poems
which he never intended. He tells them, "They are simply poems.
Why don't you take them like that?"
SRI AUROBINDO: What I have described is a condition of inner
experience.
NIRODBARAN: Yes, but the symbols do stand for something,
SRI AUROBINDO: I can't remember the poem, so I can't say
anything.
NIRODBARAN: You speak of a single-pointed star.
SRI AUROBINDO: Telling me that is of no use. I must see the
poem. What does Jyotin say about "The Bird of Fire?"
NIRODBARAN: He says that it is also symbolic but that this one
is an example of perfect symbolism.
SRI AUROBINDO: Why?
NIRODBARAN: I don't know.
SRI AUROBINDO: People read their own minds into a poem.
It's like what they make of the Rigveda's anasah—the "flat noses"
of the European commentators. All sorts of meanings are made
out of it.
NIRODBARAN (when Sri
Aurobindo was about to lie down): Reviewers seem to be a funny race. One praises a book and another
condemns it.
SRI AUROBINDO: I find nothing extraordinary in that.
NIRODBARAN: In the New Statesman and Nation Anthony West
runs down Priestley's new book while the Manchester Guardian
praises it. So also with Huxley's After Many a Summer. Anthony
West calls it a spiritual failure.
SRI AUROBINDO: West is a rationalist. He won't hear of mysticism. Anything that does not
favour of rationalism is damned by him.
NIRODBARAN: Huxley is already being called a Western
SRI AUROBINDO: And a spiritual failure!
PURANI: What does Huxley know of Yoga?
NIRODBARAN: D says he had practised some Yoga and this is
quite evident from his writings.
SRI AUROBINDO: His book is here, you said. Well, you can
read it and see for yourself.
Nirodbaran handed Sri Aurobindo the book in which the poem "Trance"
had been printed. "What's this?" he asked. Then, on seeing the title Six
Poems of Sri Aurobindo, he laughed out.
SRI AUROBINDO (after reading the poem): I have explained everything in the poem itself. I speak of the star of creation, the moon of
ecstasy and the storm-breath of the soul-change — that is, the upheaval before the change. The trance brings in a change of the outer
consciousness and nature. There is no philosophy anywhere.
(Shortly after returning the book) Let me have the book again.
(Looking at the poem once more) There is a big printing mistake here.
A hyphen has been put between "Self" and "enraptured". It makes
neither poetry nor sense.
NIRODBARAN: I remember Amal told me the same thing when
the book was out.
NIRODBARAN: I have been again trying to get intuition but no
luck.
SRI AUROBINDO
(with a look meaning "Is that so?") After your
last brinjal intuition? (Laughter)
NIRODBARAN: Yes, but nothing comes.
SRI AUROBINDO: That is because you lost your faith by that brinjal affair.
NIRODBARAN: Nolini Sen began to have inner guidance as
soon as he set his foot into Yoga.
SRI AUROBINDO: He had been doing Yoga for some time.
Only he had lost hold of it temporarily.
SATYENDRA: Inner guidance in what way?
NIRODBARAN: In his practical work.
SRI AUROBINDO: In solving practical difficulties, I suppose. He has a mind which seems open to the intuitive faculty.
Usually a man of action has a sort of insight which is half-intuition, while for a man of intellect intuition is difficult. His intellect
thinks of various possibilities, saying this may happen, that may
happen.
NIRODBARAN: Does a man of action have no intellect?
SRI AUROBINDO: He has one, but it does not come in the way
of his action. He has a vital, not a mental, intuition about things and
acts on it. I don't say he commits no mistakes but in most cases he
turns out to be right.
The English are so successful because they go by this vital intuition. Often they jumble things and make mistakes but in the end that
intuition comes to their help and pulls them through. The French
are logical; they think and reason.
PURANI: The English now are thinking of actively helping
Finland because they fear a German-Russian combination in the
Baltic.
SRI AUROBINDO: But how are they going to help Finland?
The English require plenty of ammunition and military equipment
for themselves. I don't know whether they have enough to spare.
NIRODBARAN: What
they need more badly now is man power.
SRI AUROBINDO: Yes, but still ammunition is wanted.
NIRODBARAN (after some time): What am I to do now? Intellect
comes in the way of intuition. Desire in the vital and the hard crust
of the physical—everything resists. Resistance everywhere!
SRI AUROBINDO: Well, get rid of the crust and the
desire and quiet the intellect.
SATYENDRA: But I find that Nirodbaran's vital is quiet—and his
intellect too. Perhaps the desires are less so.
SRI AUROBINDO: Oh, is it all like that?
NIRODBARAN: The trouble is that everybody sees my progress
except myself.
SRI AUROBINDO: Are you trying to apply intuition in a special
way?
NIRODBARAN:
Yes, in my medical work.
SRI AUROBINDO:
Instead of limiting yourself to a special
operation, why not try to have the faculty in a general way—in
other fields also?
NIRODBARAN: I am concerned only with medical work now.
SRI AUROBINDO:
But try it elsewhere too.
NIRODBARAN: For instance, in thinking?
SRI AUROBINDO: In everything. It is difficult to get intuition
in a special subject, especially if one has no bent for that subject. You
didn't have any particular love for medicine, did you?
NIRODBARAN: I am afraid not.
SRI AUROBINDO : Try, for instance, to find out what Satyendra
will be doing next. (Laughter)
NIRODBARAN: That will be difficult. I may be more correct
regarding Champaklal.
SRI AUROBINDO: Or, if you are a novel-reader, try to guess
what will follow. Of course, it is easy for an expert reader to do
this. (After a pause) Many people get intuitions without knowing
it.
NIRODBARAN: I know my difficulty. I came as a raw recruit to
Yoga,
PURANI: Recruits are always raw.
NIRODBARAN: Not completely.
SRI AUROBINDO: They may have had some combat experience among themselves!
SATYENDRA: Try to realise the Self first, and then everything
will follow.
SRI AUROBINDO: It will be automatic.
SATYENDRA: Yes; the faculties will open by themselves.
NIRODBARAN: Hot water seems to have a stimulating effect on
the hair cells.
SRI AUROBINDO: How?
NIRODBARAN: On your lower limbs I find a growth of hair
which was not there before.
SATYENDRA: Then Nirodbaran can try hot water on his own
head. (Laughter)
NIRODBARAN:
I was thinking of trying it, but it makes the head
so hot.
SATYENDRA: Then why not try hot and cold?
SRI AUROBINDO:
Cold water may take away the rest of the
hair! (Laughter)
SATYENDRA: If Nirodbaran proves successful, we'll all try the
remedy.
NIRODBARAN: No chance of success. Getting bald is
hereditary.
SRI AUROBINDO:
You mean it is the effect of being born
bald?
SATYENDRA: Scientists consider heredity to play a great part.
NIRODBARAN: Perhaps they ascribe to heredity whatever they
can't explain.
SRI AUROBINDO:
They are discovering so many wonderful
rays. Why don't they discover something for baldness?
NIRODBARAN: They have tried ultra-violet, but with no
result.
SRI AUROBINDO: It burns up whatever hair there is? Voronoff
seems to have succeeded with his monkey-gland operation. Besides
doing several other things, it grows hair.
NIRODBARAN: I hope it does not grow hair everywhere - as on
a monkey! (Laughter)
SRI AUROBINDO: Not so far. If it did, it might grow a monkey
tail too.
SATYENDRA: There are plenty of advertisements for curing
baldness, but the problem remains. Perhaps Nirodbaran can discover something.
NIRODBARAN: I may when I get my intuition opened or when
the Supermind opens.
SATYENDRA: The
Supermind opening is a long affair.
SRI AUROBINDO: Intuition would be easier to get.
PURANI: If one gets the Supermind, there will be no need to
find anything out.
NIRODBARAN: Yes, the hair will grow itself. There will be a
change in every cell.
PURANI: You will be all golden, I suppose.
SRI AUROBINDO: As they say in the Upanishad, the Supreme
Being with the golden beard, etc.
When Sri Aurobindo was lying down, Nirodbaran read to him a letter
from Tagore to Sahana on mystic poetry.
NIRODBARAN:
Tagore says: "Mostly we see that those whose
spiritual realisation is new cannot express that new experience in the
simple and easy old ways. In their manner of expression there is
something laboured."
SRI AUROBINDO: That is not true. If there is any obscurity in a truly mystic poem, it is because the poet tries to express faithfully his
extraordinary vision, what he has inwardly seen. Others may find
difficulty in understanding it, but it is not consciously written with a
view to making it unintelligible. It is not a laboured work. On the
contrary, if one tries to make it easily intelligible it becomes
laboured.
NIRODBARAN: Tagore goes on: "The sculptor who erects a
chapel does it on the common soil. He does not think that unless he
constructs it on Kanchanjunga his art is in vain."
SRI AUROBINDO: Can't he have a private chapel of his own
wherever he wants it?
NIRODBARAN: Besides, does an artist have all these motives
and plans beforehand?
SRI AUROBINDO: No. He creates moved by an inner urge.
What else does the letter say?
NIRODBARAN: One who has tasted heaven, if he is an artist,
will build this paradise on the earth which is accessible to all and
make ordinary clay heavenly. Language is a vessel meant to be
enjoyed by all. Even if ambrosia is served, it must be in this common
vessel."
SRI AUROBINDO: The artist can base his poem on heaven: why
necessarily on earth? Does Tagore mean to say that everybody
understands or appreciates all poetry? How many appreciate
Milton and other great poets? Besides, one must have the power
of understanding.
NIRODBARAN: Tagore further writes about the Ashram poets; "Among you, Nishikanto alone has proved his easy mastery over
language."
SRI AUROBINDO: That is a different matter from writing with
easy intelligibility for everybody.
NIRODBARAN: Why does he want us to follow the simple and
easy old ways — the beaten track?
SRI AUROBINDO: Perhaps poets when they grow very old
want old ways to be followed?
PURANI: But Tagore has himself gone off the beaten track. And
what about his prose-poetry? What age-old way is there in it? In
Gujarat, Kalelkar and Gandhi also say the same thing-that poetry
must be for the masses. Kalelkar says that even the Ramayana was
written for them.
SRI AUROBINDO: Good Lord!
PURANI: Yes, Kalelkar explains that Valmiki used to go from
cottage to cottage reciting the Ramayana and that when the epic
was finished the Rishis presented him with a Kamandalu (water
pot), a Kaupin (loin-cloth) and a Parnakutir (thatched hut)
SRI AUROBINDO: But the Rishis were not the common people
and they had retired from ordinary society. Kalelkar's is an entirely
unheard-of interpretation of the Ramayana.
PURANI: He claims to have found evidence in the poem itself
for his theory.
SRI AUROBINDO: Where is it said in the Ramayana? If Valmiki meant it for the masses he kept his meaning a secret. Nor
did he recite it to the masses. There were the professional reciters
who carried it from door to door and popularised it. That is a
different thing.
PURANI: At the Ahmedabad Literary Conference, Gandhi as
President asked, "What has literature done for the man who draws
water from the well?"
SRI AUROBINDO: How much has the President done? The
man is still drawing water! (Laughter)
Do the masses understand Kalelkar's own writings?
PURANI: Not quite. Gandhi alone can be said to be understood
by them.
NIRODBARAN: All this seems to be an attempt by people to
apply the principle of democracy everywhere. But it is democracy in
terms of socialism and communism.
SRI AUROBINDO: Yes.
PURANI: Tagore has also taken up the cry now, but formerly he
was not quite for the common man.
SRI AUROBINDO: I suppose he has further developed his idea
of the Vishwa-manava (universal man). But, truly speaking, the
universal man includes the best as well as the worst, the highest no
less than the lowest, whereas the Jana-sadharana, (common man)
appears to leave out the best and highest.
NIRODBARAN: But Tagore's literary works—for example, his
novels - can hardly be appreciated by the masses. In that sense, Sarat
Chandra Chatterji can be considered more successful in living up to
the democratic ideal.
PURANI: In Hindi, somebody wrote on art recently under the
title "Kasmai Devaya?" ("To What God?") and said, "Janardana",
the God of the people. But in practice only "the people" are insisted
on; "God" is left out of the account. Possibly there is the echo
here of Vivekananda's idea of serving Daridranarayana (God the
Poor).
NIRODBARAN: Vivekananda did perhaps see Narayana in the
Daridra.
SRI AUROBINDO: But ordinarily, in the man drawing water
from the well, people hardly have the vision of the Divine at work: they see only the peasant.
PURANI: Kalelkar says that substance is more important than
form in art. He gives the analogy of the vessel and the food in it, and emphasises that the food is the real thing. I don't understand how in
art the two can be separated.
SRI AUROBINDO: This is something like Tagore's ambrosia
and the earthen vessel. But there can't be art without form. If
substance alone counts, we don't have art. An artist has to give a
body to his vision, which is the soul of his art; but in art you can't
take soul and body as separate things. Those images—food and
vessel — can be applied to physical processes, not to any inner process
like art creation.
PURANI: When Valmiki had the vision, he was busier giving
form to it than going from cottage to cottage and popularising the
Ramayana.
By the way, there is a point made by someone about Vyasa and his
Mahabharata. He says that Vyasa was greater than Sri Krishna
because he had universal sympathy: Vyasa expresses his sympathy
with every character he created in the Mahabharata.
SRI AUROBINDO: Where does Vyasa say that? This looks like
Valmiki's intention to write for the masses. Both poets have kept
their meaning a secret! As for Vyasa's universal sympathy, one has to
understand an important distinction in art. Every creator has to
identify himself with his characters in order to make them live and
bring out their essential points. This doesn't mean that he has
sympathy with each and every character created. Homer put many
good things into his Hector's mouth. But his sympathy was, if at all
anywhere, on the side of Achilles.
A few days ago Nirodbaran showed to Sri Aurobindo Nishikanto's
new
poem in mantra-vritta blank verse, a new experiment.
SRI AUROBINDO: How do you find the rhythm?
NIRODBARAN: It seems all right. How do you find it?
SRI AUROBINDO: I can't say as I am not familiar with this
chhanda (rhythm and metre).
NIRODBARAN: I asked Dilip today what he thought about
Nishikanto's new chhanda. Nishikanto had told me Dilip had
found it very successful. Dilip said, "It is a misrepresentation.
Please tell Guru about it. (Laughter) I told him that his overflows
were very good but here and there there was roughness. I gave him a
hint but he didn't take it."
SRI AUROBINDO:
I also had the impression that there was
much weightage and crowding of things.
NIRODBARAN: I also thought there must be something wrong.
Otherwise you wouldn't have asked me. (Laughter) Dilip says that
when Nishikanto tries to do something consciously he makes mistakes. He is trying many new things.
SRI AUROBINDO: He is trying to put force and strength into his
poetry. One has to be very careful when trying new things that they
don't become heavy. He has a remarkable gift of rhythm, hasn't he?
NIRODBARAN: Yes. I had again a talk with D about effort and
told him about your emphasis on effort. He was very glad. He says Krishnaprem also lays stress on effort and that people, according to
Krishnaprem, justify their supine laziness by saying they rely only on
the Grace. "What is this idea," D says, "that Mother and Sri
Aurobindo will do everything for us and we have only to look up
at their faces?" (Laughter)
SATYENDRA: But there is no guarantee either that by effort we
shall realise the Divine. A sloka in the Upanishad says: "The Self
gives realisation to those whom the Self chooses."
SRI AUROBINDO: But it also says later on that one can't get realisation without effort.
NIRODBARAN: Effort alone may not lead to realisation. Grace
is necessary. But all the same there is no Grace without effort. A little
contradictory!
SATYENDRA: There are cases where people have got realisation
without effort. Suddenly they got brilliant experiences and that
opened them to higher planes.
NIRODBARAN: Dilip challenges anybody to show a single
example.
SATYENDRA: Why? What about Ramana Maharshi?
NIRODBARAN: I thought he had to make a tremendous effort.
He himself says he did forty years' meditation sitting in one fixed
place.
SATYENDRA: That was after the realisation which came suddenly and then the experience itself pulled up his lower consciousness into the higher.
SRI AUROBINDO: There are cases where the opening may
come suddenly, or there is a certain passage from one consciousness
to another.
NIRODBARAN: But the opening may close again.
SRI AUROBINDO: Not if it is a definitive experience. It remains
permanently. If there is only a glimpse it can close up. In my own
case, I got a definitive experience in three days quite suddenly. That
was not the result of effort.
NIRODBARAN: But you must have been making effort before.
SRI AUROBINDO: Not for this result. Lele asked me to silence
the mind and throw away the thoughts if they came. I did it-in
three days — and the result was that the whole being became quiet
and in seven days I got the Nirvanic experience which remained
with me for a long time. I couldn't have got, out of it even if I had
wanted to. Even afterwards, this experience remained in the background in the midst of all my activities.
NIRODBARAN: You must have been doing some Yoga.
SRI AUROBINDO: All I was doing was Pranayama for two
years and the only result of it was good health and a lot of poetry.
As that didn't satisfy me, I went in search of people who could help
me.
CHAMPAKLAL: What does Dilip mean by effort? Effort maybe
the result of Grace. Formerly Nirodbaran was unable to meditate,
now he can because of the Grace.
NIRODBARAN: I don't deny the Grace but I say that effort is
also necessary for the Grace to be effective. From Champaklal's
standpoint the fact of my being alive is the result of Grace. I don't
refute this.
SRI AUROBINDO: Kanai may say his Asanas are also the result of
Grace, so also Dilip's mental Asanas!
NIRODBARAN: If effort is not necessary, why does Sri
Aurobindo bombard me for being lazy, for being leisurely, etc.?
CHAMPAKLAL: I can give you an opposite answer. The Mother
said that one must have complete reliance on the Divine Grace and
the Grace will do everything.
PURANI: Even that reliance requires effort.
NIRODBARAN: In Champaklal's case it may be complete reliance but in my case Sri Aurobindo will ask me to make effort.
SATYENDRA: Sri Aurobindo's answers are contradictory; his
legal acumen nobody can question. (Laughter)
NIRODBARAN: Plenty of people complain about it. They say
he says one thing to one man and quite the opposite to another,
(Laughter)
SRI AUROBINDO: Naturally, what else do they expect?
SATYENDRA: That, I suppose, regards your answering letters; there are no such contradictions in your philosophy.
SRI AUROBINDO: No, there one has to deal with general
principles.
CHAMPAKLAL: There are persons who see visions and have experiences as soon as they start Yoga. Others have to wait and
wait.
SRI AUROBINDO : Quite true; wait, as Satyendra says, for forty years. You may go on making effort for a long time without any result and when you have given up all effort, suddenly you get the result. But the result is not due to the effort, but to the Grace.
NIRODBARAN: Dilip may come to realise that after all effort is not everything. Grace is necessary and without it effort has no value.
SRI AUROBINDO: But he believes in Grace. He himself said that it was by the Grace that he was saved in that accident.
NIRODBARAN: Yes, he did say that, but at present effort has come to the front.
SRI AUROBINDO: One day he will find that his mind has become quiet and he has started getting experiences. Not that he had no experiences before. His body used to be absolutely still at one time and he felt the peace.
PURANI: Yes, when he was meditating with the Mother.
CHAMPAKLAL (when Sri Aurohindo was lying in bed after his
sponging): What is then meant by complete reliance on the Divine Grace?
SRI AUROBINDO: It means what it says. (Laughter)
CHAMPAKLAL: No, no, I am asking a question.
SRI AUROBINDO:
I am also answering. (Laughter) You know
what is meant by reliance and what is meant by complete.
CHAMPAKLAL: Then how does effort come in?
SRI AUROBINDO: Even if you make effort, you rely on the
Grace for the result. (After a pause) If you have to run a race you run
the race but the result does not depend on the running. You have to
rely on the Grace for the result. The same is the case with medicines.
One of my cousins (Krishna Kumar Mitra's daughter) was on the
point of death due to typhoid. Nil Ratan and everybody else gave up
hope and said, "The only thing is to pray." They prayed; after the
prayer they found that her consciousness had revived and she was
all right. I was at Baroda at that time. They wired to me about
her hopeless condition. And then there is what happened to
Madhavrao's son. He was dying; the doctors had given up hope.
Madhavrao wired to them to stop medicines all and pray to God.
They did it and the son was cured. I know this as a fact. Madhavrao himself showed me the telegram.
PURANI: In your first quotation on Dawn in The Life Divine
Anilbaran finds a contradiction. He says, how can there be a dawn if there is an eternal succession of dawns?
I told him that it is the first for those who awaken to it.
SRI AUROBINDO
(laughing): It is like the hen's egg. It is the
first for those who are coming and last for those who are passing. The world also has no beginning and no end. Yet they speak of the
world as being created.
PURANI: He was also asking about the three births of Agni.
First we thought it was Agni born in the physical, vital and mental. After
looking it up, I found it was the three supreme births.
SRI AUROBINDO: Yes, it is the birth of Agni above
in the Infinite.
PURANI: He referred to Sayana and found that the three are Indra, Vayu and Agni.
SRI AUROBINDO: Oh, if he goes by Sayana, he will be finished.
PURANI: He says people won't accept your interpretation
of the Veda..
SATYENDRA: Everybody has interpreted the Veda according
to his own knowledge.
SRI AUROBINDO: These are matters of experience; they
can't be understood by the mind.
PURANI: In The Life Divine there is a quotation where you
have said, "May the restrainers tell us to go to other fields and conquer
them." Anilbaran thought "restrainers" refers only to Yogis and Tapaswis.
SRI AUROBINDO: "Restrainers" is perhaps not the right
word. "Binders" would have been better. The obstacles bind you
down
and point out your imperfections. When you have overcome
they tell you as it were, "Now you have got the right to conquer other fields."
It seemed the morning talk on effort didn't satisfy Champakalal
still in favour of Grace. So he raised the subject again; his tone was a little
excited. All the while he was asking the question, Sri Aurobindo kept
looking at the time because he did not understand what Champaklal was
driving at by his analogy.
CHAMPAKLAL: If a man goes on doing physical exercise every
day and increases the hours of his exercise every day or week, he
will improve his health. Can it be said that if a man meditates more and more he will get concrete results?
SRI AUROBINDO: Not necessarily.
CHAMPAKLAL: Then where is the place for effort?
SRI AUROBINDO: It's not like that. If a man is able to meditate
one hour at first, he will be able to meditate two hours later and then whole day.
CHAMPAKLAL: If he simply sits on?
SRI AUROBINDO: I said "meditate". Meditation means getting
into a certain state of consciousness. Simply sitting is not meditation; if he
can get into that consciousness, then he can remain there or go still further
as he increases the time.
NIRODBARAN: What do you mean by "simply sitting"?
Meditation doesn't come all of a sudden. One has to try to reject
thoughts, concentrate, etc.
CHAMPAKLAL: There are people who go into meditation suddenly. Some people are quite unaware of themselves in meditation; they become unconscious and go into a state of sleep. What is that
state?
SRI AUROBINDO: That is the first stage. One has to pass
through that to the conscious stage.
CHAMPAKLAL: How can one do that?
SRI AUROBINDO: By aspiration. Aspiration is a great thing.
If one is satisfied with that unconsciousness, he will remain there.
NIRODBARAN: Champaklal, I find, goes at once within and his
body sways this side and that.
CHAMPAKLAL: Sometimes I am quite unconscious of everything. I forget myself.
SRI AUROBINDO: What do you mean by unconscious?
Nothing happens inside?
PURANI: Sometimes it does. He gets a nightmare.
SRI AUROBINDO: From the tone of his speech, it seems there
may be a lot of activity inside. (Laughter)
CHAMPAKLAL: Sometimes I am quite conscious of my physical
posture changing or bending, but I don't correct it.
SRI AUROBINDO: The inner state doesn't take notice of the
change of the body. Rajangam also has no control.
CHAMPAKLAL: No, but it is better now.
SRI AUROBINDO: Some people have to support their neck
against something.
CHAMPAKLAL: Why is it so?
SRI AUROBINDO: It is habitual with some people; when they
go inside they lose control of the body.
CHAMPAKLAL: Sometimes, when one is enjoying peace in
meditation and somebody pokes him, he comes out of his meditation and gets disturbed, even angry. Does it mean that he had no real
peace in meditation?
SRI AUROBINDO (Laughing): It means that his vital hadn't the
peace and it needs it.
CHAMPAKLAL: But sometimes I feel an actual shock.
SRI AUROBINDO: Then you may have been in deep Samadhi
CHAMPAKLAL: I remember once when Rajangam poked
Radhananda, the Mother said, "If you poke like that you will sent
him into another world."
NIRODBARAN: The trouble is not so much about meditation,
which I admit is difficult, but about the rest of the day. One doesn't
remember the Divine at all, say, in reading, writing, etc.
SRI AUROBINDO: You have to practise Abhyasa
Yoga.¹
SATYENDRA: Nirodbaran is very much in earnest. You should
give him some help, Sir.
PURANI : His friends say that he is completely changed.
NIRODBARAN: Yes, yes!
SRI AUROBINDO: You are outraging his modesty. He
is not
making progress in the way he wants perhaps.
The talk then came to art and democracy.
PURANI: There is a contradiction in these people who advocate
art for the masses.
SRI AUROBINDO: How?
PURANI: If they really want art to be accessible to the mass
why don't they like cinema and radio?
NIRODBARAN: Perhaps they think that they will lower
their
moral standards.
SRI AUROBINDO: Common people are not concerned
with
morality.
PURANI: If all that is going to spoil their morality,
then what should art deal with to appeal to the masses?
¹Yoga of continuous practice.
SRI AUROBINDO:
Why, Charkha, non-violence, Satyagraha.
PURANI: Have you read C. V. Raman's address?
SRI AUROBINDO: I believe so.
PURANI: He says they have discovered two new elements—I
don't know how.
SRI AUROBINDO: Not discovered, but created, by changing
the position of the particles in the atom and making new combinations. But what are they going to do with them?
PURANI: The cost of making anything will be prohibitive,
though the method of breaking the atom by means of cyclotrons is
very easy. Raman has supported Einstein's theory about the unity of
matter and energy.
SRI AUROBINDO: Has anybody cast doubt on it?
PURANI: No.
SRI AUROBINDO: But what is energy?
PURANI: Modern scientists have stopped asking that question.
They only answer now, not why or what. But their own discoveries
will make the question more pointed.
SRI AUROBINDO: Quite so, because the problem is why a
different combination of particles within the atom should make a
new element.
PURANI: Energy was once said to be lines of force.
SRI AUROBINDO: That means force in movement and when
force is in motion we come to know energy. But what is force?
PURANI: They don't answer that question, either.
SRI AUROBINDO: Unless you accept a Being who applies the
force and becomes matter, there can be no real explanation. But
when this answer is given, people say, "What's this nonsense about
Somebody behind?" They say that it is only the force of Nature.
They, however, don't know what Nature is. Nature stands for a
magic formula. Everything is supposed to be explained by that
formula!
PURANI: They once held rigorously to the law of causation. But
now they find it difficult to apply in the new investigations.
SRI AUROBINDO: The law of causation only means that certain
conditions follow certain other conditions.
NIRODBARAN: How can one prove the existence of the
Somebody you have spoken of?
SRI AUROBINDO:
The proof is that there is no other explanation.
SATYENDRA: There is no "body", but only Being.
SRI AUROBINDO: Yes. I have said in The Life Divine that you
can't explain the appearance of consciousness out of matter unless
you accept a Being behind. That Being may either be unmanifest
and involved in matter or it may become manifest.
SATYENDRA: It is Brahman playing in Brahman or with it.
SRI AUROBINDO: They will accept a playing within Brahman
but not outside it.
NIRODBARAN: They want to catch Brahman with their
scientific instruments.
PURANI: Even of that they have despaired now. They are
now moving towards mathematics and speak of tensor equations!
PURANI: Training of the recruited people seems to have been
postponed.
X and Y were very happy. X
was saying that after all there is not much difference between Hitlerism and
British and French imperialism. When their self-interest is at stake, they go on killing people
mercilessly. I told him the British people don't go to such extremes
as Hitler does.
SRI AUROBINDO: He doesn't find any difference between
Hitlerism and the French Revolution? The French Revolution
was only a revolutionary paroxysm which settled soon into a normal
life. There were also persecutions but they were not like Hitler's
persecutions. Hitler's persecution is on principle. He wants power to
be kept in the hands of a few people who will rule over the whole
world and thus perpetuate the rule of power, while the French
Revolution, as soon as its purpose was served, established or paved
the way for democracy and the democratic form of government.
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