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I learned all this through Theon. Probably, he was .. I don't know if
he was Russian or Polish (a Russian or Polish Jew), he never said who
he really was or where he was born, nor his age nor anything.
He had assumed two names: one was an Arab name he had adopted
when he took refuge in Algeria (I don't know for what reason). After
having worked with Blavatsky and having founded an occult society in
Egypt, he went to Algeria, and there he first called himself 'Aia Aziz'
(a word of Arabic origin meaning 'the beloved'). Then, when he began
setting up his Cosmic Review and his 'cosmic group,' he called
himself Max Theon, meaning the supreme God (!), the greatest God! And no
one knew him by any other name than these two - Aia Aziz or Max Theon.
He had an English wife.
He said he had received initiation in India (he knew a little
Sanskrit and the Rig-Veda thoroughly), and then he formulated a
tradition which he called the 'cosmic tradition' and which he claimed to
have received - I don't know how - from a tradition anterior to that of
the Cabala and the Vedas. But there were many things (Madame Theon was
the clairvoyant one, and she received visions; oh, she was wonderful!),
many things that I myself had seen and known before knowing them which
were then substantiated. page 219 - Mother's Agenda, volume 1, 4th Nov. - 1958 |
But generally - and this is something Theon had told me (Theon was very qualified on the subject of hostile forces and the workings of all that 'resists' the divine influence, and he was a great fighter - as you might imagine! He himself was an incarnation of an asura, so he knew how to tackle these things!); he was always saying, If you make a VERY SMALL concession or suffer a minor defeat, it gives you the right to a very great victory.' It's a very good trick. And I have observed, in practice, that for all things, even for the very little things of everyday life, it's true - if you yield on one point (if, even though you see what should be, you yield on a very secondary and unimportant point), it immediately gives you the power to impose your will for something much more important. I mentioned this to Sri Aurobindo and he said that it was true. It is true in the world as it is today, but it's not what we want; we want it to change, really change. page 476 , Mother's Agenda , volume - 1, 12th Nov. 1960 |
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The Christians say it's the spirit of evil, but this is due to a lack of understanding.
Theon always told me that the true interpretation of the Biblical
story of the serpent in the Garden of Eden is that humanity wanted to
pass from a state of animal-like divinity to the state of conscious
divinity by means of mental development, symbolized by eating the fruit
of the Tree of Knowledge. And this serpent, which Theon
always said was iridescent, reflecting all the colors of the prism, was
not at
all the spirit of evil, but the power of evolution - the force, the
power of
evolution. And it was natural that this power of evolution would make
them taste
the fruit of knowledge. Now, according to Theon, Jehovah was the chief of the Asuras, [[Asura: demon of the mental plane embodying the forces of division and darkness. ]] the supreme Asura, the egoistic God who wanted to dominate everything and keep everything under his control. And of course this act made him furious, for it enabled mankind to become gods through the power of an evolution of consciousness. And that's why he banished them from Paradise. Although told in a childish manner, there's a great deal of truth in this story, a great deal. page 62 , Mother's Agenda , volume 2 , 4th Feb. - 1961 |
Theon also taught me how to turn aside lightning.
Is it possible?!Ah, yes-he used to do it. But it must take a formidable power!Oh (laughing), he had a formidable power! Theon had a formidable power.... One stormy day (there were terrible thunderstorms there), he climbed to the high terrace above the sitting room. 'It's a strange time to be going up there,' I said to him. He laughed, 'Come along, don't be afraid!' So I joined him. He began some invocations and then I clearly saw a bolt of lightning that had been heading straight towards us suddenly swerve IN THE MIDST OF ITS COURSE. You will say it's impossible, but I saw it turn aside and strike a tree farther away. I asked Theon, 'Did you do that?' He nodded. Oh, that man was terrible - he had a terrible power. But quite a good external appearance! Have you seen his photo? No? I'll have to show it to you. He was a handsome man, about sixty years old - between fifty and sixty. page 65 , Mother's Agenda , volume 2 , 4th Feb. - 1961 |
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The recollection of those times is stored somewhere in the
terrestrial memory, that region where all the earth's memories are
inscribed. Those who contact this memory can tell you that the earthly
paradise still exists somewhere. [[ This is the origin of such legends
as Shangri-la. But 'psychics' most often confuse two planes of
reality, attributing to their SUBTLE vision a physical reality which it
does not have or no longer has: they have merely entered into contact
with the memory of a place - for places, like beings, have a memory. ]]
But it doesn't exist materially.... I don't know, I don't see it.
(silence) Of course, these things can always be explained symbolically. Theon explained man's 'exile' like this: when the Being - the hostile Being - assumed the position of the Lord Supreme in relation to the terrestrial realization, he didn't want humanity to progress mentally and gain a knowledge permitting it to stop obeying him! ... That is Theon's occult explanation. According to Theon, the serpent wasn't the spirit of evil at all: it was the evolutionary Force. And Sri Aurobindo fully agreed; he used to tell me the same thing: the evolutionary power - the mental evolutionary power - is what drove man to gain knowledge, a knowledge of division. And it's a fact that along with the sense of Good and Evil, man became conscious of himself. Naturally, this ruined everything and he couldn't stay: it was his own consciousness that drove him out of Paradise - he could no longer stay. Then was man banished by Jehovah or by his own consciousness ? These are just two ways of seeing the same thing! In my view, all these old Scriptures and ancient traditions have a graduated content (gesture showing different levels of understanding), and according to the needs of the epoch and the people, one symbol or another was drawn upon. But a time comes when one goes beyond these things and sees them from what Sri Aurobindo calls 'the other hemisphere,' where one realizes that they are only modes of expression to put one in contact - a kind of bridge or link between the lower way of seeing and the higher way of knowing.page 123-24 - Mother's Agenda, volume 2, 11th March - 1961 |
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things are very interesting. They must form part of the work I
have come on earth to do. Because even before encounteringTheon, before knowing anything, I had experiences at night, certain
types of activities looking after people who were leaving their bodies -
and with a knowledge of the process; I didn't know what I was doing nor
did I seek to know, yet I knew exactly what had to be done and I did
it. I was around twenty. As soon as I came upon Theon's teaching (even before meeting him personally), and read and understood all kinds of things which I hadn't known before, I began to work quite systematically. Every night, at the same hour, I was working to construct - between the purely terrestrial atmosphere and the psychic atmosphere - a path of protection across the vital, so that people wouldn't have to pass through it (for those who are conscious but without knowledge it's a very difficult passage - infernal.) I was preparing this path, doing this work (it must have been around 1903 or 1904, I don't remember exactly) for months and months and months. All sorts of extraordinary things happened during that time - extraordinary. I could tell long stories.... Then, when I went to Tlemcen, I told Madame Theon about it. 'Yes,' she told me, 'it is part of the work you have come on earth to do. Everyone with even a slightly awakened psychic being who can see your Light will go to your Light at the moment of dying, no matter where they die, and you will help them to pass through.' And this work is constant. Constant. it has given me a considerable number of experiences concerning what happens to people when they leave their bodies. I've had all sorts of experiences, all kinds of examples - it's really very interesting. Lately it has increased, become more precise. page 234 - Mother's Agenda, volume 2, 24th June - 1961 |
The way Theon told it, there was first the universal Mother (he didn't call her the universal Mother, but Sri Aurobindo used that name), the universal Mother in charge of creation. For creating she made four emanations: Consciousness or Light; Life; Love or Beatitude and (Mother tries in vain to remember the fourth) ... I must have cerebral anemia today! In India they speak only of three: Sat-Chit-Ananda (Sat is Existence, expressed by Life; Chit is Consciousness, expressed by Power; Ananda is Bliss, synonymous with Love). But according to Theon, there were four (I knew them by heart). Well, these emanations (Theon narrated it in such a way that someone not a philosopher, someone with a childlike mind, could understand), these emanations, conscious of their own power, separated themselves from their Origin; that is, instead of being entirely surrendered to the supreme Will and expressing only.... [279] Ah, the fourth emanation is Truth! Instead of carrying out only the supreme Will, they seem to have acquired a sense of personal power. (They were personalities of sorts, universal personalities, each representing a mode of being.) Instead of remaining connected, they cut the link - each acted on his own, to put it simply. Then, naturally, Light became darkness, Life became death, Bliss became suffering and Truth became falsehood. And these are the four great Asuras: the Asura of Inconscience, the Asura of Falsehood, the Asura of Suffering and the Asura of Death. page 280 - Mother's Agenda, volume 2, 28th July - 1961 |
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The other tradition - Theon said it was the origin of both the
Kabbala and the Vedas - also held the same concept of divine life and a
divine world as Sri Aurobindo: that the summit of evolution would be the
divinization of everything objectified, along with an unbroken
progression from that moment on. (As things are now, one goes forward
and then backwards, then forward and backwards again; but in this divine
world, retrogression won't be necessary: there will be a continuous
ascent.) This concept was held in that ancient tradition - Theon spoke
to me very clearly of it, and Sri Aurobindo hadn't yet written anything
when I met Theon. Theon had written all kinds of things - not
philosophy, but stories, fantastic stories! Yet this same knowledge was
behind them, and when asked about the source of this knowledge he used
to say that it antedated both the Kabbala and the Vedas (he was
well-versed in the Rig-veda).
But Theon had no idea of the path of bhakti, [[Devotion, love for the Divine. ]] none whatsoever. The idea of surrender to the Divine was absolutely alien to him. Yet he did have the idea of the Divine Presence here (Mother indicates the heart center), of the immanent Divine and of union with That. And he said that by uniting with That and letting That transform the being one could arrive at the divine creation and the transformation of the earth. Theon was the first one to give me the idea that the earth is symbolic, representative - symbolic of concentrated universal action allowing divine forces to incarnate and work concretely. I learned all this from him. Page 296-97 - Mother's Agenda, volume 2, 2nd Aug - 1961 |
Then comes what Theon called the 'nervous sub-level,' which lies between this subtle physical and the vital. And it acts as a protection: if it is stable, harmonious and strong, it protects you - it protects you even physically - from contagious diseases, for instance, and even from accidents. I experienced it when I was living at Val-de-Grâce. It was the year I resolved to attain union with the psychic being and I was concentrated on this from morning to night and night to morning. Every day I spent some time in the Luxembourg Gardens. They were right near the house, but to get there I had to go all the way down Rue du Val-de-Grâce and cross Boulevard Saint Michel, where there were streetcars, automobiles, buses - the whole circus. I would remain in my concentration the whole time, and once, while crossing the boulevard, I felt a shock about this far from my body [slightly more than arm's length], so spontaneously I jumped back - just enough for the streetcar to pass by. I hadn't heard anything; I was totally absorbed, and without that warning I would surely have been run over; instead, I jumped back just in time, and the streetcar sped by. I understood then that this nervous sheath was something entirely concrete, because what I had felt was not an idea of danger but a shock - a material SHOCK. So it's true that as long as this envelope is strong and undamaged, you are protected. But for instance, if you are over-tired or worried or flustered - anything that brings disorder into the atmosphere seems to make holes in this envelope, and all kinds of things can enter. Perhaps this is what Sri Aurobindo is speaking of. Page 303 - Mother's Agenda, volume 2, 5th Aug - 1961 |
Once when I was at Tlemcen with Theon (this happened twice, but I'm not sure about the second time because I was alone), my body was in a cataleptic state and I was in conscious trance.... It was a peculiar kind of catalepsy in the sense that my body could speak, though very slowly - Theon had taught me how to do it. But this is because the 'life of the form' always remains (this is what takes seven days to leave the body) and it can even be trained to make the body move - the being is no longer there, but the life of the form can make the body move (in any case, utter words). However, this state is not without danger, the proof being that while I was working in trance, for some reason or other (which I no longer remember, but obviously due to some negligence on the part of Theon who was there to watch over me), the cord - I don't know what to call it - went snap! The link was cut, malevolently, [[Through Theon's malevolence, in fact. ]] and when it was time and I wanted to return, I could no longer re-enter my body. But I was still able to warn him: 'The cord is cut.' Then he used his power and knowledge to help me come back - but it was no joke! It was very difficult. [[Satprem remembers that a few years earlier Mother had told him about the circumstances of this incident: during her work in trance, Mother discovered the location of the 'mantra of life'-the mantra that has the power to create life (and to withdraw it, as well). Theon, an incarnation of the Asura of Death, was of course quite interested and told Mother to repeat this mantra to him. Mother refused. Theon became violently angry and the link was cut (the link that connected Mother to her body). When he realized the catastrophe his anger had caused, Theon grew afraid (for he knew who Mother was) and he then, as Mother recounts, made use of all his power to help her re-enter her body. Later, Mother gave this mantra to Sri Aurobindo ... who let it quietly sink into oblivion. For it is not through a mantra that the secret of life (or death) is to be mastered, but through knowledge of the true Power - in other words, ultimately, knowledge of the reality of Matter and the mechanism of death: it is the whole cellular yoga of Sri Aurobindo and Mother. ]] And this is when I had the experience of the two different states, because the part that had gone out was now without the body's support - the link was cut. Then I knew. Of course, I was in a special state; I was doing a fully conscious work with all the vital power, and I was in control not only of my surroundings but.... You see, what happens is a kind of reversal of consciousness: you begin to belong to another world; you feel this quite distinctly. Theon instantly told me to concentrate (I was finding it all interesting - Mother laughs - I was making experiments and getting ready to go wandering off, but he was terribly scared that I would die on him!). He begged me to concentrate, so I concentrated on my body. When I re-entered, it hurt terribly, terribly - an excruciating pain, like plunging into a hell. Into a ... ?Into a hell (Mother laughs). It was frightful. it doesn't last long. He made me drink half a glass of cognac (he always made me take some every day after the trance because I would work in trance for more than an hour, which is generally a forbidden practice). Still, I am quite sure that with anybody but me and him, this would have been the end. I would not have reentered. Page 306 - Mother's Agenda, volume 2, 5th Aug - 1961 |
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I have done my best, all these years, to try to keep him at a
distance. He has a power - a terrible asuric power. Between you and me, I
saw him like that from the start - that's why I became involved with
him. I never intended to marry him (his family affairs made it
necessary), but when we met, I recognized him as an incarnation of the
'Lord of Falsehood' - that is his 'origin' (what he called the 'Lord of
Nations'); and in fact, this being has directed the whole course of
world events during the last few centuries. As for Theon, he was....
It was not by choice that I met all the four Asuras - it was a
decision of the Supreme. The first one, whom religions call Satan, the
Asura of Consciousness, was converted and is still at work. The second
[the Asura of Suffering] annulled himself in the Supreme. The third was
the Lord of Death (that was Theon). And the fourth, the Master of the
world, was the Lord of Falsehood; Richard was an emanation, a vibhuti,
[[Indian tradition makes a distinction between a direct 'incarnation' (avatar)
and a simple 'emanation' (vibhuti) coming from the
consciousness of a god - or a devil. ]] as they say in India, of this
Asura.
Theon was the vibhuti of the Lord of Death.
It's a wonderful story, a real novel, which will perhaps be told
one day ... when there are no more Asuras. Then it can be told.
Anyway, it was because of Theon that I first found the 'Mantra of
Life,' the mantra that gives life, and he wanted me to give it to him,
he wanted to possess it - it was something formidable! It was the mantra
that gives life (it can make anyone at all come back into life, but
that's only a small part of its power). And it was shut away in a
particular place, [[Not a physical place. See conversation of November
7, p. 380. ]] sealed up, with my name in Sanskrit on it. I didn't know
Sanskrit at that time, but he did, and when he led me to that place, I
told him what I saw: 'There's a sort of design, it must be Sanskrit.' (I
could recognize the characters as Sanskrit). He told me to reproduce
what I was seeing, and I did so. It was my name, Mirra, written in
Sanskrit - the mantra was for me and I alone could open it. 'Open it and
tell me what's there,' he said. page 367 - Mother's Agenda, volume 2, 5th Nov. - 1961 |
About the discovery of the Supermind in the Veda and by Sri Aurobindo. There is something I don't quite grasp.Because in the Veda it's incomplete. No, they had a hint, like a vision of the 'thing,' but there is no proof that they realized it. What's more, had they realized it, it seems to me that we would certainly have found some traces - but no traces remain. Theon knew something about it, and he called it 'the new world' or 'the new creation on earth and the glorified body' (I don't remember his exact terminology); but he knew of the Supermind's existence - it had been revealed to him and he announced its coming. He said it would be reached THROUGH the discovery of the God within. And for him, as I told you the other day, this meant a greater density - which seems to be a correct experience. Well, on my side, I have made investigations and had innumerable visions concerning the earth's history, and I spoke about it a good deal with Sri Aurobindo.... page 375 - Mother's Agenda, volume -2 , 5th Nov. 1961 |
There is also what Theon and Madame Theon used to say. They never spoke of 'Supermind,' but they said the same thing as the Vedas, that the world of Truth must incarnate on earth and create a new world. They even picked up the old phrase from the Gospels, 'new heavens and a new earth,' [[II Peter 3.13. ]] which is the same thing the Vedas speak of. Madame Theon had this experience and she gave me the indication (she didn't actually teach me) of how it was to be done. She would go out of her body and become conscious in the vital world (there were many intermediary states, too, if one cared to explore them). After the vital came the mental: you consciously went out of the vital body, you left it behind (you could see it) and you entered the mental world. Then you left the mental body and entered into.... They used different words, another classification (I don't remember it), but even so, the experience was identical. And like that, she successively left twelve different bodies, one after another. She was extremely 'developed,' you see - individualized, organized. She could leave one body and enter the consciousness of the next plane, fully experience the surroundings and all that was there, describe it ... and so on, twelve times. I learned to do the same thing, and with great dexterity; I could halt on any plane, do what I had to do there, move around freely, see, observe, and then speak about what I had seen. And my last stage, which Theon called 'pathétisme,' [[A word coined by Theon, which might roughly translate as 'the sublime.' ]] a very barbaric but very expressive word, bordered on the Formless - he sometimes used the Jewish terminology, calling the Supreme 'The Formless.' (From this last stage one passed to the Formless - there was no further body to leave behind, one was beyond all possible forms, even all thoughtforms.) In this domain [the last stage before the Formless] one experienced total unity - unity in something that was the essence of Love; Love was a manifestation more... 'dense,' he would always say (there were all sorts of different 'densities'); and Love was a denser expression of That, the sense of perfect Unity - perfect unity, identity - with no longer any forms corresponding to those of the lower worlds. It was a Light! ... An almost immaculate white light, yet with something of a golden-rose in it (words are crude). This Light and this Experience were truly wonderful, inexpressible in words. Well, one time I was there (Theon used to warn against going beyond this domain, because he said you wouldn't come back), but there I was, wanting to pass over to the other side, when - in a quite unexpected and astounding way - I found myself in the presence of the 'principle,' a principle of the human form. It didn't resemble man as we are used to seeing him, but it was an upright form, standing just on the border between the world of forms and the Formless, like a kind of standard. [[By 'standard,' Mother means a sort of model or archetype. ]] At that time nobody had ever spoken to me about it and Madame Theon had never seen it - no one had ever seen or said anything. But I felt I was on the verge of discovering a secret. Afterwards, when I met Sri Aurobindo and talked to him about it, he told me, 'It is surely the prototype of the supramental form.' I saw it several times again, later on, and this proved to be true. I think I made this experiment in 1904, so when I arrived here it was all a work accomplished and a well-known domain; and when the question of finding the Supermind came up, I had only to resume an experience I was used to - I had learned to repeat it at will, through successive exteriorizations. It was a voluntary process. When I returned from Japan and we began to work together, Sri Aurobindo had already brought the supramental light into the mental world and was trying to transform the Mind. 'It's strange,' he said to me, 'it's an endless work! Nothing seems to get done - everything is done and then constantly has to be done all over again.' Then I gave him my personal impression, which went back to the old days with Theon: 'It will be like that until we touch bottom.' So instead of continuing to work in the Mind, both of us (I was the one who went through the experience ... how to put it? ... practically, objectively; he experienced it only in his consciousness, not in the body - but my body has always participated), both of us descended almost immediately (it was done in a day or two) from the Mind into the Vital, and so on quite rapidly, leaving the Mind as it was, fully in the light but not permanently transformed. It wasn't the first time; when I was working with Theon at Tlemcen (the second time I was there), I descended into the total, unindividualized - that is, general - Inconscient (it was the time he wanted me to find the Mantra of Life). And there I suddenly found myself in front of something like a vault or a grotto (of course, it was only something 'like' that), and when it opened, I saw a Being of iridescent light reclining with his head on his hand, fast asleep. All the light around him was iridescent. When I told Theon what I was seeing, he said it was 'the immanent God in the depths of the Inconscient,' who through his radiations was slowly waking the Inconscient to Consciousness. But then a rather remarkable phenomenon occurred: when I looked at him, he woke up and opened his eyes, expressing the beginning of conscious, wakeful action. page 378-381 - Mother's Agenda, volume -2 , 7th Nov. 1961 |
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But truly, EVERYTHING was changed at that moment: something was achieved. It was the perception of Power - the Power that comes from Love (what Love is to the Supreme Consciousness, which has nothing to do with what we usually mean by the word 'love'). And it was ... it was simple! None of those complications resulting from thought, intellect, understanding - all that was gone, all gone. A formidable Power! And it made me understand one thing, that the state I had been put in (by the Lord of Yoga, in fact) was for obtaining the particular power that comes through an identity with all material things, a power possessed by certain persons - not always yogis, certain mediums, for instance. I saw it with Madame Theon: she would will a thing to come to her instead of going to the thing herself; instead of going to get her sandals when she wanted them, she made the sandals come to her. She did this through a capacity to radiate her matter - she exercised a will over her matter - her central will acted upon matter anywhere, since she WAS THERE. With her, then, I saw this power in a methodical, organized way, not as something accidental or spasmodic (as it is with mediums), but as an organization of Matter. And so ... I began to understand: 'With this comes the power to put each thing in its place!'... provided one is universal enough. page 414 - Mother's Agenda, volume -2 , 23th Nov. 1961 |
I have spoken of this before. I told the story of the
Chinese revolution, and how this being left me, saying.... It was just
five years before the Chinese revolution. I've told the story. I know I've told it - but it was never noted down. I used to dictate. Théon taught me to speak while
in trance (that is, he had taught my BODY to express itself), and I
would tell him everything I was doing while doing it. And he never noted
any of it down - I suspect he did it on purpose: he wasn't interested
in making revelations. So it's all lost. But had it been noted down,
hour by hour, minute by minute, it would have made an extraordinary
scientific document on the occult - extraordinary! He never noted it
down. He stopped at the subtle physical - he refused to go any farther. It was Satan, the Asura [[Asura: demon of the mental plane embodying the forces of division and darkness. ]] of Light who, in cutting himself off from the Supreme, fell into Unconsciousness and Darkness (I've told the story many times). But anyway, when I was with Théon, I summoned that being and asked him if he wanted to enter into contact with the earth. It's worth mentioning that Théon himself was an incarnation of the Lord of Death - I've had good company in my life! And the other one [Richard] was an incarnation of the Lord of Falsehood - but it was only partial. With Théon too it was partial. But with Satan it was the central being; of course, he had millions of emanations in the world, but this was the central being in person. The others ... let's keep that for another time. He agreed to take on a body. Théon wanted to keep him there: "Don't let him go," he told me. I didn't answer. This being told me he didn't want to be more material than that, it was sufficient - you could feel him move the way you feel a draft, it was that concrete. And he said he was going to set up the Chinese revolution. "I am going to organize a secret society to set up the revolution in China," he told me. "And mark my words: it's going to happen in exactly five years." He gave me the date and I noted it down. And EXACTLY five years later, it happened. Later I met people coming from China who told me it had all been the work of a secret society. They told me about it because that society used a certain sign, and instinctively, unknowingly, I had made that sign while one of them was talking to me (Mother puts one fist on top of the other). And the person said, "Ah, so you're one of us! " I didn't reply. Then he told me everything. But it's really interesting because the exact date was given. "The revolution will take place in exactly five years," he told me. He knew it before he left. "And that," he continued, "will be the beginning, the first terrestrial movement heralding the transformation of...." (Théon didn't use the word "supramental"; he used to talk about "the new world on earth.")[[ The reader will remember the formation of the Kuo-min-tang and the troubles in the Yangtze Valley which took place in October 1911 and led to the fall of the Manchu Dynasty in 1912. Thus it was in October 1906, at Tlemcen, that Mother had the encounter she relates here. It was also in 1906 that Mao Tse-tung, at the age of fourteen, came into conflict with his father, a prelude to his revolutionary career. ]] But I did note that down. I had forgotten the whole story, because I now live constantly in the Becoming. But it came back to me. And all the disbelief in the world can't contradict that piece of evidence. The note itself was stolen from me while I was moving to a new house. Two things were stolen: that note and the mantra of life (I have told you about that). And I have a suspicion that it was an occult theft, not an ordinary one, because no one even suspected the value of those papers - for most people they had no interest at all. page 44 - Mother's Agenda, volume 3, 15th Jan. - 1962 |
But I also remember reading The Tradition, before I met Sri Aurobindo (it was like a novel, a serialized romance of the world's creation, but it was very evocative; Théon called it The Tradition). That was where I first learned of the universal Mother's first four emanations, when the Lord delegated his creative power to the Mother. And it was identical to the ancient Indian tradition, but told like a nursery story; anyone could understand - it was an image, like a movie, and very vivid. page 55 - Mother's Agenda, volume 3, 27th Jan. - 1962 |
And to Théon, the God of the Jews and Christians was an Asura. This Asura wanted to be unique; and so he became the most terrible despot imaginable. Anatole France said the same thing (I now know that Anatole France had never read Théon's story, but I can't imagine where he picked this up). It's in The Revolt of the Angels. He says that Satan is the true God and that Jehovah, the "only God," is the monster. And when the angels wanted Satan to become the one and only God, Satan realized he was immediately taking on all Jehovah's failings! So he refused: "Oh, no - thank you very much!" It's a wonderful story, and in exactly the same spirit as what Théon used to say. The very first thing I asked Anatole France (I told you I met him once - mutual friends introduced us), the first thing I asked him was, "Have you ever read The Tradition?" He said no. I explained why I had asked, and he was interested. He said his source was his own imagination. He had caught that idea intuitively. page 56 - Mother's Agenda, volume 3, 27th Jan. - 1962 |
There is indeed the case of Madame Théon's sandals, which came and put themselves on her feet instead of her feet going and putting themselves in the sandals, but that ... that belongs to yet another realm. It wasn't what you would call a "natural" phenomenon: she was applying her will and her action, and the substance of the sandals was becoming receptive. But does that mean the world will be that way? ... I don't know. page 199 , Mother's Agenda , volume 3 , 6th June 1962 |
"Mortality is the effect whose cause is disequilibrium. It is accidental and temporary...." According to Théon, you know, the world has been created and destroyed - creation and pralaya - six times. And each time, a particular attribute was manifested, but since that attribute couldn't reach fulfillment, the world was "swallowed up again." Now it's the seventh time, and the attribute is Equilibrium. And when Equilibrium is established, there will be uninterrupted progress - with no disequilibrium, naturally: that is, a deathless state, with no disintegration. (Satprem continues the reading:)"There is but one royalty, one aristocracy: the royalty and aristocracy of intelligence. "There are four classifications of terrestrial formations: mineral, vegetal, animal, and psycho-intellectual or human-divine. Among the four, in order, there are no divisions. "Divine unity, embodied and manifested by collective humanity...." It was in both French and English. He called it "Fundamental Axioms of Cosmic Philosophy." It was the work of a certain French metaphysician who was well known around the turn of the century - his name began with a B. He met Théon in Egypt when Théon was with Blavatski; they started a magazine with an ancient Egyptian name (I can't recall what it was), and then he told Théon (Théon must have already known French) to publish a Cosmic Review and the "Cosmic Books." And this B. is the one who formulated all this gobbledygook. There used to be the name of the printer and the year it was printed, but it's not there any more.... Yes, it is: "The Little Tlemcenian's Press."It comes from Tlemcen? Yes.This B. seems to have had the idea that the perfect man, the immortal man, would be spherical! And then Théon always used to say (he told me the whole story himself): "I told him it wasn't possible, it would be too impractical - people couldn't kiss! " His idea of a joke. Théon also told me that when B. came to Tlemcen (they first met in Egypt, then again in Tlemcen), he saw the house Théon was building and asked, "Why is your house painted red? Does it have some mystical significance?" And Théon replied, "No, it's because red goes well with green!" So you get the picture. But I don't remember his name any more; in his time he was very well known, he was a contemporary of the fellow who wrote The Great Initiates. Schuré?Yes, Edouard Schuré. He was a contemporary of Edouard Schuré, a bit older (I met Schuré, by the way - a rather hollow individual). His name began with a B and he's the one who formulated these "Axioms." You once mentioned someone called Barley....Ah, that's it! Barley. Yes, it must be Barley. Madame Théon, who was English, was the one who wrote, but she used to write stories, while this ... this looks like Barley's work to me, because I read something at the end, on the last page, which is rather.... It's pathetic, actually, it's all really pathetic. (Mother leafs through the pages, laughing as she reads:) "The only legitimate cult is the cult of man...." Yes, that's the superman, whom he calls "psycho-intellectual." The superman - the only legitimate cult....It all seems a bit flimsy....Very. I don't think it's worth wasting your time on. But it was interesting to find these first pages because ... look at the symbol (Mother shows Satprem the first page). Yes, I saw it! The symbol is interesting. It looks like Sri Aurobindo's.I am the one who designed Sri Aurobindo's, and I adapted it from this one. Look, they made the central square very elongated. The one done here is more correct: Pavitra made all the sides equal. But the one for the Cosmic Review was elongated, with the lotus in the center. It's the same [as the one for the Cosmic Review], only elongated so that the two triangles meet and form a square. I am keeping this to show Pavitra, because that's what I had first tried to make. But obviously the one we have now is correct. It was Théon who told me it was Solomon's seal. Now then, did you bring your book? (Unenthusiastically.) Yes.... (Mother starts leafing through the "Axioms" again) They make all kinds of recommendations here: for instance, when you go out of your body you should wear a loose-fitting robe, a robe kept specially for that.Why is that? What's the idea?A question of aura. The idea is that the forces accumulate. And she even used to say it was preferable not to wash the robe! "Ideas." There's something true behind. She also used to say that to stay in your body you should cover your feet with a piece of blue cloth (when you sleep, of course, your feet are bare); put a piece of blue cloth over your feet and it keeps you in your body. ???It's the result of Madame Théon's occult experiences, from which they made a general rule. But the reason for a loose-fitting robe is obvious: it's important not to get cold during such experiences, and there shouldn't be anything hampering you. And also, it's important that nothing interfere with your circulation, which diminishes greatly and must be protected. These things are practical, but.... On the whole it's pathetic. All those things put so neatly into paragraphs always look a bit flimsy and dogmatic.Yes, they're stupid. They are affirmations of contradictions - I mean affirmations aimed at contradicting certain things. It's not meant at all to affirm something that has been SEEN, seen and transmitted, but to contradict all the stories of original sin and all the religions, which, according to Théon, always address themselves to more or less hostile beings. Théon also used to say that man was born perfect, but had taken a tumble. The story of the earthly paradise?No, Théon always said that the "Serpent" had nothing to do with Satan, it was the symbol of evolution (Théon was entirely pro-evolution), the spiral path of evolution, and that the earthly paradise, on the contrary, was under the domination of Jehovah, the great Asura who claimed to be unique, who wanted to be the only God. For Théon, there is no such thing as a one and only God: there is the Unthinkable. It's not a "God." But to me this seems to come from his Jewish background. Because Théon was Jewish, even though he never mentioned the fact (the Tlemcen officials made it known: when he arrived he had to tell them who he was). He never spoke of it and he had changed his name. They said he was of Jewish origin, but they could never say whether he was Polish or Russian. At least the person who told me never knew. But for the Jews it's the "Unthinkable," whose name must not be uttered (it is uttered only once a year, on the "Day of Atonement"; I think that's what it's called). It's the word Yahveh, and it must not be uttered. But the prayers speak of the "Elohim," and the Hebrew word "Elohim" is plural, meaning "the invisible lords." So there was no one and only God for Théon, only the unthinkable Formless; and all the invisible beings who claimed to be one and only gods were Asuras. He used to call Christ "That young man"! (Laughter) It was very funny. Anyway, that's the story. I found this again, and it amused me. page 454-55 , Mother's Agenda , volume 3 , 15th Dec. 1962 |
Even now, as soon as I remain quiet with you when you are here, there is always a sort of limitless immensity, with such a pure, tranquil light.... And it's white, but a white that might have some blue in it, but so pale that it's white. Théon gave a name to this region (he had special names for all those regions), I don't remember, but above it, there were only the regions he called "pathetism" (quite a barbarous name), which were regions belonging to the unmanifested divine Love. I myself experienced the passage through all these regions, and this one [the region of white light in which the meditation took place] was the very last belonging to the light ... I don't recall, he used to put together all the regions of light, and then, beyond them, the regions ... basically, they were regions of divine Love, but unmanifested, that is to say, not manifested as it is on earth. Those were the last regions before reaching the Supreme. And this one [in the meditation] was the last one belonging to the essence of light, that is, Knowledge. And it is ... oh, there's such peace, such tranquillity and such LIMPIDITY in it - especially that sense of limpidity and transparency. A tranquillity that's more than peace, but it isn't inert immobility, I don't know how to express it. It absolutely gives the sense of a vibration of extreme intensity, but ab-so-lute-ly tranquil, tranquil, luminous, without ... almost with a sense of motionlessness. And so limpid, so transparent! Whenever I remain outside action like that and you are here, that's always what comes, always. Last time also, when I saw those two curves of your being - the curve of the past and the curve of the future meeting on your birthday - well, it was again in this light. But today ... And limitless, you know, outside time, outside space - magnificent! The great, great repose. And when you are here, it's always like that. That must be where you draw your inspiration from. It must be from there. It's good! (Mother laughs) And very pleasant, I don't know how to explain. Very pleasant. And absolutely silent, but conscious, very conscious, and in perfect tranquillity - light, light, light, nothing but that: the essence of light. The ascending curve went beyond that, into those regions Théon had given that barbarous name of "pathetism." When one went beyond and entered those regions, then there was ... it was the Supreme outside the creation, beyond the creation. That's where I saw the representative form of the new creation (and that was before I ever heard anything about Sri Aurobindo and the Supermind), that's where I saw the form that must succeed the human form, like the symbolic representation of the new creation. That was two or three years before I heard of Sri Aurobindo and met him. So when he told me about the supramental creation, I said to him (laughing), "But of course, I know, I saw it up there!" No one had told me anything. It's only when I went to Tlemcen that Madame Théon told me what it was. She knew how to go through all the states of being, from one to the next, and on to the next ... leaving the body corresponding to each state of being in its region and moving beyond. So then, quite spontaneously and naturally, I learned to do it. And I did it there, that's how I saw this prototype, all the way up, all the way up. Theon's teaching wasn't at all metaphysical and intellectual: everything was expressed in a sort of pictorial objectification; and as I said the other day about that vision [of the "birds"], it's a richer expression, less limited than the purely intellectual and metaphysical expression. It's more alive. And that's pleasant - I like meditating with you. It's not "meditating," it's a silent and very pleasant contemplation-concentration. That's why, when you are here, I sit without uttering a word! But you lose the sense of time altogether. page 232-33 , Mother's Agenda , volume 7 , 12th Oct - 1966 |
"... It's a highly superior equilibrium. "It reminded me of Théon who used to say that the world had been put forth and reabsorbed six times; in other words, that there had been six creations and six pralayas. [[Pralaya: the destruction or end of a world. ]] And that now we were in the seventh creation, the last. The world would find a new, higher equilibrium, not static but progressive, which means there would be unending progress in equilibrium and harmony, without pralaya." page 141 , Mother's Agenda , volume 8 , 6th May - 1967 |
True, it could be the intermediary. But the other thing would really mean a different degree of energy - the absorption of a dif ferent degree of energy. As you used to do in the past when you breathed the smell of flowers, for instance, or as Madame Theon used to do when she put a fruit (I forget which) on her chest.A grapefruit!... Oh, I saw that, it was extraordinary! She would put the fruit on her chest and ... it would dry out! She would simply put it there and ... she would keep it for a few hours, and when she removed it, it was all flabby, there was nothing left! But I often thought it should be possible for you to feed on air.Ah no, the air is disgusting! It's full of everybody's breathing. That's the problem, it's disgusting. Something else is needed. page 218 - Mother's Agenda , volume 11 , 27th May - 1970 |