Man insists continually on making God in his own image instead of seeking to make himself more and more in the image of God.
SRI AUROBINDO
April, 1967
The Divine gives itself to those who give themselves without reserve and in all their parts to the Divine. For them the calm, the light, the power, the bliss, the freedom, the wideness, the heights of knowledge, the seas of Ananda. - Sri Aurobindo.
PRAYERS AND MEDITATIONS OF THE MOTHER
(1)
THE 'Prayers and Meditations of the Mother'. It is Life Divine in song, it is Life Divine set to music—made sweet and lovely, near and dear to us—a thing of beauty and a joy for ever.
To some the ideal has appeared aloof and afar, cold and forbidding. The ascent is difficult involving immense pains and tiresome efforts. It is meant for the high-souled ascetic, not for the weak earth-bound mortals. But here in the voice of the Mother we hear not the call for a hazardous climb to the bare cold wind-swept peak of the Himalayas but a warm invitation for a happy trek back to our own hearth and home. The voice of the Divine is the loving Mother's voice.
The Prayers and Meditations of the Mother are a music, a music of lyre—I say lyre, because there is a lyric beauty and poignancy in these utterances. And true lyricism means a direct and spontaneous out flowing of the soul's intimate experiences.
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This wonder-lyre has three strings, giving out a triple note or strain : there is a strain of philosophy, there is a strain of yoga and there is a strain of poetry. We may also call them values and say there is a philosophical, a yogic and a poetic value in these contemplations. The philosophical strain or value means that the things said are presented, explained to the intellect so that the human mind can seize them, understand them. The principles underlying the ideal, the fundamental ideas are elaborated in terms of reason and logical comprehension, although the subject-matter treated is in the last analysis beyond reason and logic. For example, here is true philosophy expressed in a philosophic manner as neatly as possible.—"A quoi servirait l'homme s'il n'etait pas fait pour jeter un pont entre Ce qui est eternellement, mais qui n'est pas manifesté, et ce qui est manifesto, entre toutes les transcendences, toutes les splendours de la vie divine et toute l'obscure et douloureuse ignorance du monde materiel ? L'homme est le hen entre ce qui doit etre et ce qui est; il est la passerelle jetée sur l'abîme, il est le grand X en croix, le trait d'union quaternaire. Son domicile veritable, le siege effectif de sa conscience doit etre dans le monde intermediaire au point de junction des quatre bras de la croix, la oú tout rinfini de l'impensable vient prendre forme precise pour etre projeté dans l'innombrable manifestation..."1
Or again
—"Que de degres différents dans la conscience ! II faudrait réserver ce mot pour ce qui, dans un etre, est illumine par Ta presence, s'est identifie a Toi et participe á Ta Conscience absolue, ce qui est "parfait ment eveille", comme dit le Bouddha.2
1 Of what use would be man if he was not made to throw a bridge between That which eternally is, but is not manifested, and that which is manifested ; between all the transcendences, all the splendours of the divine life and all the obscure and sorrowful ignorance of the material world ? Man is the intermediary between that which has to be and that which is ; he is a bridge thrown over the abyss, he is the great X in the cross, the quaternary link. His true abode, the effective seat of his consciousness, should be in the intermediate world at the joining point of the four arms of the cross, where all the infinity of the Unknowable comes to take precise form for being projected into the multitudinous manifestation—
2 How many and different are the degrees of consciousness ! This word should be reserved for that which, in a being, is illumined by Thy Presence, identifies itself with Thee and participates in Thy absolute Consciousness, for that which has knowledge, which is "perfectly awakened" as says the Buddha.
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"En dehors de cet état, il y a des degrés infinis de conscience descendant jusqu'à l'obscurité compléte, la véritable inconscience qui peut être un domaine pas encore touché par la lumiére de ton amour (ce qui parait improbable dans la substance physique), ou bien ce qui est, pour une raison d'ignorance quelconque, hors de notre région individually de perception."1
However, we note that the philosophical strain merges into the yogic, rather the yogic strain is already involved in the philosophical. Here is an obvious and clear expression of this strain:
—"II faudrait que chaque jour, chaque instant, soit l'occasion d'une consécration nouvelle et plus compléte; et non pas une de ces consécrations enthusiasts et trépidantes, suractives, pleine de l'illusion de l'œuvre, mais une consécration profaned et silencieuse qui n'est pas forcémeat apparent, mais qui pénètre et transfigure toute action. II faudrait que notre esprit paisible et solitaire repose toujours en Toi, et que de ce pur sommet il ait la perception exacted des réalités, de la Réalité unique et éternelle, derriére les instable et fugitives apparences."2
We are given all the disciplines necessary for the growth of the spiritual life : the processes, the procedures that have to be followed —object-lessons are given even for the uninitiated and the very beginner, as well as instructions for those who aim at the highest heights; thus :
—"II est toujours bon de regarder de temps en temps en soi et de voir qu'on n'est et ne peut rien, mais il faut en suite tourner son regard vers Toi en sachant que Tu es tout et que Tu peux tout.
Tu es la vie de notre vie et
la lumiére de notre être,
1 Outside this state, there are infinite degrees of consciousness descending down to the complete darkness, the veritable inconscience which may be a domain not yet touched by the light of Thy divine love (but that appears improbable in physical substance), or which is by reason of some ignorance, outside our individual region of perception.
2 Each day, each moment, must be an occasion for a new and completer consecration ; and not one of those enthusiastic and trepid ant consecrations, overactive, full of the illusion of the work, but a profound and silent consecration which need not be apparent, but which penetrates and transfigures every action. Our mind, solitary and at peace, must rest always in Thee, and from this pure summit it must have the exact perception of realities, of the sole and eternal Reality, behind unstable fugitive appearances.
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Tu es le maitre de nos destinées."1
Indeed philosophy and yoga go together. Yoga is applied philosophy. What is at first mentally perceived and recognised, what is accepted by the reason is made active and dynamic in life. The character embodies the abstract and general principles, the vital energy executes them, that is yoga. Philosophy brings in the light of consciousness, yoga the energy of consciousness. Here we have an expression of what may be called "yogic philosophy."
—"II faut a chaque moment secouer le passé comme une poussiére qui tombe, afin qu'elle ne salisse pas le chemin vierge qui, a chaque moment aussi, s'ouvre devant nous."2
Once again we see emerging the third note, the note of poetry. In fact the Prayers and Meditations abound in the most beautiful poetry, what can be more beautiful, even more poetically beautiful than these cadences ? —
—"Ta voix est si modeste, si impartiale, si sublime de patience et de misericorde qu'elle ne se fait entendre avec aucune autorite, aucune puissance de volonte, mais comme une brise fraiche, douce et pure, comme un murmure cristallin qui donne la note d'harmonie dans le concert discordant. Seulement, pour celui qui sait ecouter la note, respirer la brise, elle contient de tells tresors de beaute, un tel parfum de pure serenite et de noble grandeur, que toutes les folles illusions s'evanouissent ou se transform dans une joyeuse acceptation de la merveilleuse vérité entrevue."3
1 It is always good to look within ourselves from time to time and see that we are nothing and can do nothing, but we must then turn our look towards Thee, knowing that Thou art all and that Thou canst do all.
Thou art the life of our life and
the light of our being,
Thou art the master of our destiny.
2—We must at each moment shake off the past like falling dust, so that it may not soil the virgin path which, also at each moment, opens before us.
3 Thy voice is so modest, impartial, sublime in its patience and its mercy that it does not make itself heard with any authority, any potency of will; it is like a cool, soft and pure breeze ; it is like a crystalline murmur that imparts a note of harmony to a discordant concert. Only for him who knows how to listen to that note, how to breathe that breeze, it contains such a treasure of beauty and such a perfume of pure serenity and noble grandeur, that all extravagant illusions vanish or are transformed into a joyful acceptance of the marvellous truth that has been glimpsed.
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Or more beautiful than the beautiful simplicity of these lines ! : —"Comme une flambé qui brule silencieuse ment, comme un parfum qui monte tout droit, sans vaciller, mon amour va vers Toi..."1
If one asks for a classical perfection, here is a line that is on a par with a Racinian verse—
—"Mon Coeur s'est endormi jusqu' au trefond de Petre..."2 And here is a line flowing with all the milk and honey of the Romantic muse :—
—"Et les heures s'évanouissent comme des reves invécus..."3 which possesses furthermore the magic of an indefinable mysticism so rare in the French language. The mystic element gives a special grace and flavour, a transcendent significance serving as an enveloping aura to the whole body of these Prayers and Meditations.
One cannot, for example, but be bewitched by the mystic grandeur of this image :—
—"O Conscience immobile et sereine, Tu veilles aux confines du monde comme un sphinx d'eternitd. Et pourtant a certains Tu livres Ton secret." 4
In fact three notes blend together indissolubly and form what we call 'mantra'—even like the triple mystic syllable AUM.
Once, in connection with Shakespeare, I said that a poet's language, which is in truth the poet himself, may be considered as consisting of unit vocables, syllables, that are as it were fundamental particles, even like the nuclear particles, each poet having his own type of particle, with its own charge and spin and vibrations. Shakespeare's, I said, is a particle of Life-energy, a packet of living blood-vibration, pulsating as it were, with real heart-beat. Likewise in Dante one feels it to be a packet of Tapas—of ascetic energy, a bare clear concentrated flame-wave of consciousness, of thought-force. In the Prayers and Meditations the fundamental unit of
1 Like a flame that burns in silence, like a perfume that rises straight upward without wavering, my love goes to Thee;...
2 My heart has fallen asleep, down to the very depths of my being.
3 —And the hours pass like dreams unlived.
4 —O serene and immobile Consciousness, Thou watches on the boundaries of the world like a sphinx of eternity. And yet to some Thou givest out Thy secret.
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expression seems to be a packet of gracious light—one seems to touch the very hem of Mahalakshmi.
The voice in the Prayers and Meditations is Krishna's flute calling the souls imprisoned in their worldly household to come out into the wide green expanses of infinity, in the midst of the glorious herds of light, to play and enjoy in the company of the Lord of Delight.
(2)
We have spoken of the three notes or strains in the Prayers and Meditations. Apart from this triple theme which after all means mode or modulation in expression, there is a triplicity in depth. Along with the strains, there are strands. Besides the value or quality of the things, the thing itself is a composite reality containing different levels. It is not a single, unilateral, one-dimensional world, but it is multi-dimensional consisting of many worlds, one within another, all telescoped as it were, to form a single indivisible whole.
Now these prayers—who prays ? And to whom ? These meditations—who meditates ? And who is the object of the meditation ? First of all there is the apparent obvious meaning, that is on the very surface. It is the Mother's own prayers offered to her own beloved Lord. It is her own personal aspiration, the preoccupation of the individual human being that she is. It is the secret story, the inner history of all that she desires, asks for, questions, all that she has experienced and realised and the farther more that she is to achieve, the revelations of a terrestrial creature of the particular name and form that she happens to possess. Thus for example, the very opening passage of these prayers :
1 "Quoique tout mon etre Te soit théoriquement consacre, 6 Maitre Sublime, qui est la vie, la lumiere et l'amour de toute chose j'ai peine encore a appliquer cette consecration dans les details.
1 Although my whole being is in theory consecrated to Thee, O Sublime Master, who art the life, the light and the love in all things, I still find it hard to carry out this consecration in detail. It has taken me several weeks to learn that the reason for this written meditation, its justification lies in the very fact of addressing it daily to Thee. In this way I shall put into material shape each day a little of the conversation I have so often with Thee; I shall make my confession to Thee as well as it may be.., (2.11.1912)
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II m'a fallu plusieurs semaines pour savoir que la raison de cette méditation écrite, sa légitimation, réside dans le fait de Te l'adresser quotidiennement. Ainsi je matérialiserai chaque jour un peu de la conversation que j'ai si fréquemment avec Toi; je Te ferai de mon mieux ma confession; ..." (2.11.1912)
But we notice immediately that these are not exclusively personal, absolutely individual assertions. While speaking of herself, spontaneously she seems to be speaking on behalf of all men. The words that she utters come as it were, from the hps of all mankind. She is the representative human being. She gives expression to all that man feels or might feel but is not able or does not know how to express and articulate. Here is how she describes her function as a representative person—so beautifully, so poignantly :
1 "Alors j'ai pensé à tous ceux qui veillaient sur le bateau pour assurer et protéger notre route, et avec reconnaissance, dans leur coeur, j'ai voulu faire naître et vivre Ta Paix ; puis j'ai pensé à tous ceux qui, confiants et sans souci, dormaient du sommeil de l'inconscience, et avec sollicitude pour leurs miséres, pitié pour leur souffrance latente s'éveillant en eux en même temps que leur réveil, j'ai voulu qu'un peu de Ta Paix habite leur coeur, et fasse naître en eux la vie de l'esprit, la lumiére dissipant l'ignorance. Puis j'ai pensé à tous les habitants de cette vaste mer, les visibles et les invisibles, et j'ai voulu que sur eux s'étende Ta Paix. Puis j'ai pensé à ceux que nous avions laissé au loin et dont I' affection
1 "I then thought of all those who were watching over the ship to safeguard and protect our route, and in gratitude, I willed that Thy peace should be born and live in their hearts ; then I thought of all those who, confident and carefree, slept the sleep of inconscience, and, with solicitude for their miseries, pity for their latent suffering which would awake in them in their own waking, I willed that a little of Thy Peace might dwell in their hearts and bring to birth in them the life of the Spirit, the light which dispels ignorance. I then thought of the dwellers of this vast sea, visible and invisible, and I willed that over them might be extended Thy Peace. I thought next of those whom we had left far away and whose affection is with us, and with a great tenderness I willed for them Thy conscious and lasting Peace, the plenitude of Thy Peace proportioned to their capacity to receive it. Then I thought of all those to whom we are going, who are restless with childish preoccupations and fight for mean competitions of interest in ignorance and egoism ; and ardently, in a great aspiration for them I asked for the plenary light of Thy Peace. I next thought of all those whom we know, of all those whom we do not know, of all the life that is working itself out, of all that has changed its form and all that is not yet in form, and for all that, and also for all of which I cannot think, for all that is present to my memory and for all that I forget, in a great ingathering and mute adoration, I implored Thy Peace, (10.3.1914)
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nous accompagne, et avec une grande tendresse, pour eux j'ai voulu Ta Paix consciente et durable, la plénitude de Ta Paix proportionnée à leur capacité de la recevoir. Puis j'ai pensé à tous ceux vers qui nous allons, que des préoccupations enfantines agitent et qui se battent pour de mesquines compétitions d'interêt dans l'ignorance et l'égoïsme; et avec ardeur, dans une grande aspiration, pour eux, j'ai demandé la pleine lumiére de Ta Paix. Puis j'ai pensé à tous ceux que nous connaissons, à tous ceux que nous ignorons, à toute la vie qui s'élabore, à tout ce qui a changé de forme, à tout ce qui n'est pas encore en forme, et pour tout cela, ainsi que pour tout ce à quoi je ne puis penser, pour tout ce qui est présent à ma mémoire et pour tout ce que j'oubhe, dans un grand recueillement et une muette adoration, j'ai imploré Ta Paix." (10.3.1914)
Or again :
1 "Ce que j'ai voulu pour eux, avec Ta volonté, aux moments ou j'ai pu etre en communion veritable avec Toi, permets qu'ils l'aient recu en ce jour où, tâchant d'oublier les contingences exté-rieures, ils se sont tournés vers leur pensée la plus noble, vers leur sentiment le meilleur. Que la suprême sérénité de Ta subhme Présence s'éveille en eux." (22.3.1914)
But the Mother is not merely a representative, she has become all men, the entire humanity itself. She has identified herself with each person in her being and consciousness, she is one with all, all are merged in her. Her voice utters the cry of the human collectivity. Mother's Prayers and Meditations are the prayers and meditations of man. Thus again :
2 ".. .il m'a semblé que j'adoptais tous les habitants de ce bateau, que je les enveloppais tous dans un égal amour, et qu'ainsi en chacun d'eux quelque chose de Ta conscience s'éveillerait." (8.3.1914)
She has so clearly unequivocally expressed her oneness with all men. She mentions specially the miserable, the poor and
1 What I willed for them, with Thy will, at the moments when I could be in a true communion with Thee, grant that they may have received it on the day when, striving to forget external contingencies, they turned towards their noblest thought, towards their best feelings.
May the supreme serenity of Thy sublime Presence awake in them.
(22.3.1914)
2...it seemed to me that I adopted all the inhabitants of this ship, and enveloped them in an equal love, and that so in each one of them, something of Thy consciousness would awake.
(8.3-I9I4)
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afflicted mankind :
1 "Lorsque j'étais enfant—vers l'âge de treize ans et pendant un an environ—tous les soirs dés que j'étais couchée, il me semblait que je sortais de mon corps et que je m'élevais tout droit au-dessus de la maison, puis de la ville, trés haut. Je me voyais alors vêtue d'une magnifique robe dorée, plus longue que moi; et à mesure que je montais, cette robe s'allongeait en s'étendant circulaire-ment autour de moi pour former comme un toit immense au-dessus de la ville. Alors je voyais de tous côtés sortir des hommes, des femmes, des enfants, des vieillards, des malades, des malheureux; ils s'assemblaicnt sous la robe étendue, implorant secours, racontant leurs miséres, leurs souffrances, leurs peines. En réponse, la robe, souple et vivante, s'allongeait vers eux individuellement, et dés qu'ils l'avaient touchée, ils étaient consolés ou guéris, et rentraient dans leurs corps plus heureux et plus forts qu'avant d'en étre sortis."
But her being and consciousness are not hmited to mankind alone. She has identified herself with even material objects, with all the small insignificant physical things which our earthly existence deals with. This is how she takes leave of the house where she had lived, and the things it had sheltered, on the eve of a long journey :
2 "Je les remercie avec reconnaissance de tout le charme qu'ils ont su donner extérieurement à notre vie ; je souhaite que, s'il est dans leur destinée de passer pour plus ou moins longtemps en d'autres mains que les nôtres, ces mains leur soient douces et sachant tout le respect que l'on doit à ce que Ton divin Amour, Seigneur,
1 When I was a child—about the age of thirteen and for about a year—every night as soon as I was in bed, it seemed to me that I came out of my body and rose straight up above the house, then above the town, very high. I saw myself then, clad in a magnificent golden robe, longer than myself; and as I rose, that robe lengthened, spreading in a circle around me to form, as it were, an immense roof over the town. Then I would see coming out from all sides, men, women, children, the old, the sick, the unhappy ; they gathered under the outspread robe, imploring help, recounting their miseries, their sufferings their pains. In reply, the robe, supple and living, stretched out to them individually, and as soon as they touched it, they were consoled or healed, and entered back into their body happier and stronger than they had ever been before coming out of it.
(22.2.1914)
1 I thank them with gratitude for all the charm they have been ble to impart from the outside to our life ; I wish, if they are destined to pass for a long or a brief period into other hands than ours, that these hands may be gentle to them and may feel all the respect that is due to what Thy divine Love, O Lord, has made to emerge from the dark inconscience of chaos.
(3.3.19x4)
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a fait surgir de l'obscure inconscience du chaos." (3.3.1914)
It is to be noted how even a material object is taken up, purified and transformed almost into a living being by the Mother's loving touch.
The same feeling of unity and oneness extends to the dumb plant world also. It is a oneness not partial or vague but total and absolute :
1 "Une grande concentration s'est emparée de moi et je me suis aperçue que je m'identifiais avec une fleur de cerisier; puis à travers cette fleur avec toutes les fleurs de cerisier; puis descendant plus profondement dans la conscience, en suivant un courant de force bleutée, je devins tout à coup le cerisier lui-même, dressant vers le ciel, comme autant de bras, ses innombrables branches chargées de leur offrande fleurie. J'entendis alors distinctement la phrase suivante :
"Ainsi tu t'es unie à l'âme des cerisiers et tu as pu de la sorte constater que c'est le Divin qui fait au ciel l'offrande de cette priére de fleurs." Lorsque je l'eus écrit, tout s'effaça; mais maintenant le sang du cerisier coule dans mes veines, et avec lui une paix et une force incomparables; quelle différence y a-t-il entre le corps humain et le corps d'un arbre ? Aucune vraiment, et la conscience qui les anime est bien identiquement la meme."
(7.4.1917)
Indeed the Mother's voice is the voice of all men, all creatures, all beings, all things. She stands for the entire earth, not only so, she is the Earth itself; the total terrestrial being is embodied in her, earth's aspiration, and pain and yearning find utterance in her:
1 A deep concentration seized on me, and I perceived that
Thus hast thou made thyself one with the soul of cherry-trees and so thou canst take note that it is the Divine who makes the offering of this flower-prayer to heaven.
When I had written it, all was effaced ; but now the blood of the cherry-tree flows in my veins and with it flows an incomparable peace and force. What difference is there between the human body and body of a tree ? In truth there is none, the consciousness which animates them is identically the same.
(7-4-I9I7)
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1 "Le monde douloureux s'est agenouillé devant Toi, Seigneur, en muette supplication ; la matiére torturée se blottit à Tes pieds, son dernier, son unique refuge; et en T'implorant ainsi, elle T'adore, Toi qu'elle ne connaît ni ne comprend ! Sa priére s'éléve comme le cri d'un agonisant; ce qui disparaît sent confusément la possibilité de revivre en Toi; la terre attend Ton arrêt dans une prosternation grandiose;..." (7.11.1915)
This is the second status of the Mother's being, the first is the personal and individual, the second is this collective and universal being. But she is not merely the universe, she is the Mother of the universe. Hers is not merely earth's prayer, but the prayer of the Mother of the earth. It is not merely the prayer of the universe but the prayer of the Universal Mother to the Supreme Lord for the dehverance of the universe, for the re-creation of the earth—indeed, for the dehverance of herself for the re-creation of herself out of the present ignorant manifestation :
2 "O Mére, douce Mére que je suis, Tu es à la fois ce qui détruit et ce qui érige.
L'univers entier vit dans Ton sein de sa vie innombrable et Tu vis dans le moindre de ses atomes immensément.
Et l'aspiration de Ton infinitude se tourne vers Cela qui n'est point manifesté, afin d'implorer toujours une plus completé et plus parfaite manifestation." (31.8.1914)
Or again :
3 "Je suis les bras puissants de Ta miséricorde. Je suis la vaste poitrine de Ton amour sans hmites.... Les bras ont enveloppé la
1 This sorrowful world kneels before Thee, O Lord, in mute supplication; this tortured Matter nestles at thy feet, its last, its sole refuge ; and so imploring Thee, it adores Thee, Thee whom it neither knows nor understands ! Its prayer rises like the cry of one in a last agony; that which is disappearing feels confusedly the possibility of living again in Thee; the earth awaits Thy decree in a grandiose prostration.
(7.11.1915)
2 Mother, sweet Mother, who I am, Thou art at once the destroyer and the builder. The whole universe lives in Thy breast with all its life innumerable and Thou livest in
Thy immensity in the least of its atoms.
And the aspiration of Thy infinitude turns towards That which is not manifested to cry to it for a manifestation ever more complete and more perfect.
(31.8.1914)
3 I am Thy puissant arms of mercy. I am the vast bosom of ,Thy limitless love.... The arms have enfolded the sorrowful earth and tenderly press it to the generous heart; slowly a kiss of supreme benediction settles on this atom in conflict : the kiss of the Mother that consoles and heals.
(11.8.1914)
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terre douloureuse et la pressent tendrement sur le coeur généreux ; et lentement un baiser de supreme bénédiction est posé sur cet atome en conflit : le baiser de la Mére qui console et guérit..."
(11.8.1914)
And once more :
1 "Toute la terre est dans nos bras comme un enfant malade qu'il faut guérir et pour lequel on a, à cause meme de sa faiblesse, une tendresse toute speciale."
(14.10.1914)
The triple status of the Mother, the individual, the collective and the transcendental (or, in other words, the personal, the universal and the supra-personal) has been condensed and epitomised in the magical note describing her first meeting with the Lord :
2 "Peu importe qu'il y ait des milhers d'êtres plongés dans la plus épaisse ignorance, Celui que nous avons vu hier est sur terre; sa présence suflit à prouver qu'un jour viendra où l'ombre sera transformée en lumiére, et où effectivement, Ton régne sera in-stauré sur la terre."
(30.3.1914)
And the reality that Their manifestation upon earth has to establish, the supreme achievement of Their terrestrial existence is chanted, as it were, in these wonderfully mystic- Sibylline-lines :
3 "La mort a passé vaste et solennelle et tout s'est tu religieusement durant son passage. Une beauté surhumaine a paru sur la terre. Quelque chose de plus merveilleux que la plus merveilleuse félicité fait pressentir sa Présence."
(7.11.1915)
(3)
I have spoken of the triple status, the three levels of her ascending reality, these are in view of her manifestation of world-labour.
1 All the earth is in our arms like a sick child who must be cured and for whom one has a special affection because of his very weakness. 1
(14.10.1914 )
2 It matters not if there are hundreds of beings plunged in the densest ignorance. He whom we saw yesterday, is here on earth ; His presence is enough to prove that a day shall come when darkness shall be transformed into light, when Thy reign shall be indeed established upon earth.
(3-3.1914)
3 Death has passed, vast and solemn, and all fell into a religious silence during its passage.
A superhuman beauty has appeared on the earth.
Something more marvellous than the most marvellous bliss has made felt the impress of its Presence.
(7.11.1915)
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There is however, yet another status beyond—beyond the beyond—it is the relation between the Supreme Lord and the Divine Mother in itself apart from their work, their purpose in manifestation, it is their own 'Lila' between themselves, exclusively their own. The delight of this exclusively personal play behind and beyond the creation' sheds a secret aroma in and through all this existence here and it is also the source of the hidden magic that these utterances of the Prayers and Meditations contain, it is to this status surpassing all wonder that Sri Aurobindo refers so wistfully and so exquisitely sweetly in those famous opening lines, in 'God's Labour' :
I have gathered my dreams in a silver air
Between the gold and the blue
And wrapped them softly and left them there
My jewelled dreams of you.
The delight of delights, the purest delight that exists up there in its self-sufficiency overflows, spills as it were, and a drop of that nectar of immortality is what constitutes these universes here below.
NOLINI KANTA GUPTA
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CHAPTER
ENGLISH LITERATURE
(From the Renaissance to the Enlightenment)
THE Renaissance spread late to England. The English language had not developed its distinctive character and national genius until about the close of the fifteenth century. English prose was feeling its way towards some kind of expressive form, and poetry towards the lyrical lilt and harmony of sound which could embody its muse. There was a preparation going on in the sub-soil of the national language fostered by the awaking genius of the English people. The spirit of humanism was moving on the waters of England, generating a revolt against the domination of the Church, opening up new horizons of adventure and speculation, and touching its soul with the creative breath of the classics. Because the Renaissance came late to the shores of England, the national mind had the advantage of fertilising itself with the achievements of Italy, France, and Spain. From Chaucer to Shakespeare, it is a story of such expansive enrichment. But whatever England imbibed or imitated, it made its own by the alchemy of its genius.
The English language as well as the English mind gained immensely from the translations that were done of the outstanding works of the classics and the Italian, French and Spanish authors, ancient or contemporary. The Bible was translated, and became easily accessible to those who had no pretensions to Greek and Latin. Though originality was not yet born, an excellent field was prepared for the flowering of the English talent. The language gained in structural proportions, flexibility of form, and precision and lucidity of expression. Many experiments were tried, both in prose and verse, to arrive at the specific pattern aimed at by the sub-conscious mind of the nation. As it often happens, the translations paved the way for originality to arise and flourish.
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Italian literature cast a powerful spell and exercised a shaping influence, without which the literature of England would have hardly found its characteristic voice. But the growth of the English language and literature, like the growth of the English mind, was rather paradoxical. It revelled in the exuberance of the Renaissance, gladly suffered paganism to run riot in its imagination and sensibilities, thrilled to the lofty strain of the classics, and yet held on to its native conservatism, its traditional insularity, and puritanical bias. Even while greedily feasting upon the cultural and literary riches of Italy, it shrank in instinctive disgust from the heady intemperance of the Italian character, the looseness of its moral fibre, and the cloying luxuriance of its voluptuous imagination. Though it was indebted to Spain, and to a lesser extent to Portugal, it was Italy that stimulated it most. Italy fascinated and repelled the English mind at the same time. England's destiny advanced in its innate insularity towards the creative splendour of the Elizabethan period.
But with France England always felt a secret affinity. Rabelais, Ronsard and Montaigne struck deep chords in its heart. Even much of what it took from Italy, it took through the medium of French. The rationalist texture of French thought and the artistry of its language have always had a fascination for England. English thought on science, politics, economics and philosophy has been warmly welcomed by France, but in language France has always stuck to its own norm, and not a few of eminent English writers have attempted to model their style on the French pattern. Quite a mass of French writing was translated into Enghsh during the Renaissance and helped to influence the Enghsh mind.
But the most vital factor that contributed to the flowering of the Renaissance in England was its spirit of patriotism, its national pride. England caught up with the other nations in the adventure of the high seas and in the discovery and colonisation of new lands. This adventure inspired it with a confidence in its courage and resourcefulness, stimulated a desire to enrich itself, and kindled an ambition to lead the other nations in power, position and prestige. Wealth flowed into England, and with wealth came prosperity and power. English imagination was set aglow by
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the Renaissance gospel of Humanism, and the nation began to take a keen delight in the arts and graces of life. A zest for life broke all bounds of religion and custom, and expressed itself in various forms of literary creation. But the most fruitful result of this vital upsurge was the unprecedented impetus it gave to poetry. It was as if the very soul of the English muse was touched to its depths by the magic wand of the Renaissance. Well might Reformation try to cast a chill over this ardour for the enjoyment of life and a shadow over the dreams of greatness. England moved lustily forward towards the realisation of its crowning glory.
(To be continued)
RISHABHCHAND
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V
THE world flows fast like a river deep and sombre, (1)
On either side muddy banks, in between fathomless depths: (2)
For the sake of the Law Chatila has built the bridge (3)
So that travelers to the other shore may easily cross over (4)The tree of delusion has been cut down and the planks tied together (5)
Strengthen the knot, use the axe of Nirvana; (6)
Once on the bridge look not to the right nor to the left. (7)
The knowledge is near at hand, do not wander far. (8)
O people who want to go to the other shore, (9)
Ask of Chatila—the Master has no peer. (10)
NOTES
Life is a dangerous river. You have to cross it to go over to the other shore of safety, the spiritual life. But once in it, you are doomed. You are drowned in its fathomless depths or if you try to clamber up its sides you are bogged down in their sticky mud. The one thing to do is to build a bridge—it can be only out of the materials of life itself, life's experiences form the materials. They are trees, as it were, luxuriant in growth. You have to cut them down, dry them—they must be dead before they can be used as planks for the bridge. The sharp edge of a concentrated consciousness—the sense of the unreality and inanity of this existence—is the axe for cutting the growth of life.
VI
Whom do you accept ? Where do you cling ? (1)
A great call encircles me all around. (2)
The deer is an enemy to himself, because of his own flesh. (3)
Bhushuk is a hunter, he never relaxes a moment. (4)
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But the deer touches not grass, drinks not water. (5)
And he knows not the abode of his mate. (6)
But the mate tells him, "O darling, listen,
leave the forest and go forth" (7)
The galloping deer now shows not his hooves. (8)Bhushuk says: It is a thing that does not enter into the head of the deluded! (9)
NOTES
(3) The deer is the individual self, his mate; the doe, is the secret deity, the conscious being in the heart, the immanent divine consciousness.
(5) He gives up the joys of ordinary life.
NOLINI KANTA GUPTA
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AS AN INTERNATIONAL INSTITUTION OF RESEARCH
IN EDUCATION AND YOGA
SOME NOTES
I
WE would like to stress that the pursuit of Yoga and Research in Yoga are not only education, but education par excellence. Yoga means union, that is, union with the Divine in us, the Divine in the universe, and the Divine beyond the universe.
The Yoga pursued at the Sri Aurobindo Ashram is an 'Integral Yoga', which is distinctive and new. Sri Aurobindo explains it as follows :
"It is new as compared to the old yogas...
1) Because it aims not at a departure out of world and life into Heaven or Nirvana, but a change of life and existence, not as something subordinate or incidental, but as a distinct and central object...
2) Because the object sought after is not an individual achievement of divine realisation for the sake of the individual, but something to be gained for the earth consciousness here, a cosmic, not solely a super-cosmic achievement...
3) Because a method has been recognised for achieving this purpose which is as total and integral as the aim set before it, namely the total and integral change of consciousness and nature, taking up all methods but only as a part action and present aid to others that are distinctive. I have not found this method (as a whole) or anything like it professed or realised in the old Yogas...Our Yoga is not a retreading of old walks, but a spiritual adventure."
There is still a greater significance of this Yoga since it reconciles the modern theory of evolution with the deepest and highest truths of the Spirit, and envisages the possibility of the radical transformation of consciousness, fulfilling itself in the manifestation of the Spirit in Matter. One of the radical aims of the
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Ashram is to study the evolutionary process and to experiment upon the evolution of consciousness and power which far exceed those of Man, and by the action of which alone the evolutionary problems of the human race can ultimately be solved. Sri Aurobindo contends that the evolution need not stop at man; man, it is true, is the present highest term of evolution, but he is not the final term. Man can evolve—is sure to evolve in time—new faculties and powers which will manifest through a new order of society, a new age, the first signs of which are visibly evident behind the new ideals of unity, peace, harmony that are coming to the surface all over the world. If this possibility is fully grasped and organised—and India for Sri Aurobindo is the only country capable of doing this—India has before her a future which is the crowning realisation of her past.
The modern trend in the theories of evolution is to stress the possibility of the emergence of the newer and better term of existence. Samuel Alexander speaks of the emergence of the Deity as the promise of the future; Whitehead speaks of the 'ingression' of the godhead in evolution and of the God in the making. A French anthropologist and paleontologist, Father Teilhard de Chardin, has proposed a theory having a similar conclusion : the possibility for the human species to surpass itself and bring its evolution one step farther.
But, while these theories are mainly speculative and indicate only the general trends in the present civilisation which promise a new mutation, they do not offer any programme of scientific dealing with those trends to effectuate consciously and deliberately an advance in the evolutionary process. Sri Aurobindo, however, not only perceived the inevitability of the mutation of Man, but he made an intensive research into the means by which it can be aided and effectuated. He saw in the ancient Indian Science of Yoga the basic knowledge on which a further advance can be made. In pursuance of this perception he formulated a new aim and method of yoga, which, if pursued, on a collective scale, would prepare the manifestation of a new spiritual energy which can transform the human consciousness and realise a most momentous mutation. Sri Aurobindo Ashram is an institution of research and experiment
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in this direction. The highest point of modern thought thus receives here a practical shape and gradual realisation. And in undertaking this task, the Ashram assumes a vast significance and responsibihty.
A new Yoga and its practice means an intensive discipline, training and research. India's chief contribution to the world is its knowledge of the spirit and its theory and practice of Yoga. Sri Aurobindo Ashram specialises in the research in Yoga, and we are convinced that it is thus opening to India the gates of her own new future.
The Education Commission in its recent Report has underlined the paramount need to reconcile the Science—based education with the Indian tradition and the moral and spiritual values. If this need is to be fulfilled, it cannot be done either by the current kind of education, nor by any code of morals or even by any religion. What is needed is a rejuvenation of the science of Yoga, and the research in Yoga whereby spiritual (as distinguished from religious) life can be reconciled with the utmost dynamism of life and action. India needs such new types of Institutions, and Sri Aurobindo Ashram is precisely such a new type of Institution of research in education and yoga.
The Research work of the Ashram consists of three main and indivisible aspects :
There is, first, a research in the conditions that should enable the integration of the psychological principles of Truth, Power, Harmony and Realisation culminating ultimately into a divine life on the earth. The conceptions of Transformation, Divine Body and the Gnostic Being are some of the prominent results of this deep and momentous research work. The process by which these conceptions can be realised and embodied has been studied and experimented upon with the scientific rigour, some glimpses of which can be had from the letters that Sri Aurobindo wrote to the members of the Ashram in answer to the multitudinous problems that they referred to him during the course of the pursuit of Yoga. Many of these letters have been compiled and pub shed in two bulky volumes.
Secondly, there is a research in the ways .and means by which the synthesis of knowledge and world-cultures can be attained. A good deal of literature has flowed from the Ashram on this subject.
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and it has contributed to the advancement of the human civilisation towards a world-culture. More than a dozen periodicals are being published by the Ashram in several Indian and foreign languages which all breathe with the spirit of integrality and synthesis expressing itself in numerous fields of knowledge.
Finally, research is being conducted into the means by which Yoga can made a dynamic principle of education. This is one of the most important problems of education in India. India is secular; it cannot sponsor religious education; at the same time, spiritual values cannot be exiled from education ; again, spirituality which rejects life and action is unsuitable to the modern age. The only answer is to experiment upon the yogic education which reconciles spiritual values with the dynamism of life. Such an experiment would be a most pioneering and bold adventure opening the gates of the future education in the country. It is fortunate for India that the Ashram has on its own initiative taken upon itself the task of realising the consequences of such an experiment. This experiment has brought to the surface the basic questions of physical, mental, vital and spiritual education, questions of scientific and technological education, and the questions of aesthetic and professional education, giving rise to the formulation of a new system of education, called the integral system of education. This system in its turn has been the subject-matter of various research works by the post-graduate colleges of education in India. It may also be noted that a new system of education would imply a new system of teacher-training programmers, and the Ashram has undertaken this work as well. In addition, a new system of education implies a new type of syllabus necessitating new types of text-books and reference books. And in this field too, the Ashram is engaged in formulating new types of syllabi and new types of text books right from the early stages of studies to the graduation level. This has imposed upon the teachers in the Ashram a very heavy load of research work, whose value cannot be over-estimated.
It may also be added that several research scholars, teachers, seekers, and writers, from India and abroad, have visited the Ashram for study, research, illumination or guidance. The members of the Ashram have been giving their time and energy to render help and
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service to them which most often has meant an additional educational and research work. Finally, hundreds of seekers who cannot come to the Ashram have been receiving help from the Ashram through educational correspondence.
II
SRI AUROBINDO ASHRAM-RESEARCH AND TRAINING IN YOGA THE
NECESSITY OF RESEARCH IN YOGA
Man has, in his highest flights of imagination, rational thought and ardent aspiration, striven to realise conditions of unmixed bliss, harmony and perfection. All search for knowledge has behind it this fundamental motive, and the knowledge that is sought through Yoga is not an exception to this general truth. In fact, it is claimed that whereas all other branches of knowledge are fragmentary and partial in the sense that each one of them deals with only one aspect or mode of Nature, Yoga aims at the knowledge that reveals the unity of all modes and details of knowledge. If this claim of Yoga is right, it is reasonable to expect the establishment of the highest vision of perfection on earth, not by any particular branch of knowledge in its exclusive search, but by means of yogic knowledge alone.
This truth has guided the yogic endeavour all over the world, throughout the history, and in India, we find bold and courageous experiments made in the field of yoga. These experiments have shown mainly the following :
1) Man, as he is constituted, has an apparent limited capacity and personality, but has within him layers and planes of consciousness and power which can be released through certain yogic techniques;
2) Each specific technique leads to the release of certain specific layers of knowledge and power, but not all of them;
3) Mere development of powers does not lead to the bliss or harmony or perfection;
4) There is a plane of consciousness which is above the world and its operations;
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5) A permanent dwelling on that plane, which is termed as Realisation, brings about a condition of release from the world and an inner condition of peace, love and harmony ;
6) But according to the technique followed to reach that plane of transcending the world, (or this world), there is a corresponding unique experience which is different from the one achieved through another technique; e.g. the technique of Jnana Yoga leads to the realisation of the acosmic transcendental static Reality or Nirguna Brahman, while the technique of Bhakti Yoga leads to the realisation of the transcendental dynamic Reality, or Saguna Brahman;
7) Also, the capacity to deal with the world and its conditions after reaching that high plane of Realisation, differs in each technique of Yoga ; the Saint, the Rishi, and the divine warrior and worker are the different flowers of different techniques of Yoga, respectively, of Bhakti Yoga, Jnana Yoga, and Karma Yoga. The Ascetic and Hatha Yogi are the results of still different paths of Yoga. Each one of them has some capacity to deal with the world which is unique, abnormal or supernormal to present humanity, but not all the capacities combined together;
8) Unless these powers are combined together, it would seem that the conditions of the bliss, harmony and perfection cannot be established on the earth;
9) This has resulted in a tendency in Yoga to seek a mere release from the world, and either to reject the world altogether or to do the utmost possible in the world, without attempting to create on the earth the highest and best conditions;
10) There has also been a catholic and comprehensive tendency in Yoga which attempts at the combination of various techniques of Yoga; we have thus the Vedic and Upanishadic Yoga, the Yoga of the Gita, and more recently the Yoga of Tantra. But even in these Yogas there has been a limitation which has prevented them from that knowledge and power which alone can establish the highest conditions on the earth.
The problem before the Science of Yoga is : Is it possible to go beyond all the present and past knowledge acquired through Yoga, and to discover and manifest that synthetic
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and all-comprehensive knowledge and power by which alone the highest conditions can be established upon earth ?
This question becomes all the more important when we realise that the hope which Modern Science had raised concerning better world have largely been belied and modern science and epistemology have in fact come to the conclusion that unifying and comprehensive knowledge, world-saving knowledge, is not possible for the present human mental consciousness.
A Research in Yoga then becomes imperative ; Yoga is one hope, it still promises that Knowledge which unifies all modes and details of knowledge, and consequently the all-controlling Power which can establish here on the earth the conditions of Truth, Power, Harmony, and Realisation.
Sri Aurobindo Ashram is a Research Laboratory engaged seriously and one-pointedly in this search, this inquiry; to explore new fields of knowledge, to face new problems, and to discover their solutions, that is its real and only function.
III
A BRIEF ACCOUNT OF THE MAJOR RESEARCH PROJECTS & PROBLEMS
IN YOGA UNDERTAKEN BY SRI AUROBINDO ASHRAM
1) Is unifying and harmonising Knowledge possible ? This has been one of the most important problems which has required an exploration of all the modes of knowledge, objective and subjective, rational and suprarational, psychic and spiritual.
But the solution has been found only when the exploration was made into what Sri Aurobindo calls the 'Supermind'; there, in the Supermind, is the unifying and harmonising knowledge.
2) By what process can one attain to the Supermind ? Many experiments have been necessary to arrive at an answer to this problem.
Since Supermind is a unifying consciousness, no exclusive method or technique of Yoga can lead to it; only a combination of various techniques can promise the realisation of the Supermind.
Again, the combination of the various techniques, or the synthesis
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of Yoga can be conceived in two different ways :
i) to make an amalgam of all the techniques by putting them all into a juxtaposition, without really integrating them;
ii) to follow all the techniques one after the other and thus to combine the realisations of the different Yogas; (this was the experiment made by Sri Ramakrishna).
The first alternative was found to be impossible, and even if it were practicable, it would not lead to an integral knowledge, since the techniques are not really integrated.
The second method commends itself to be a plausible solution ; but in a short span of human life, it would be impossible to go through all the Yogas, except for a spiritual giant like Sri Ramakrishna.
A much more commendable solution had to be found. An inquiry was made into each and every method of Yoga in order to find out its real essence ; and experiments were made to see whether the various details in each technique could be dispensed with.
An answer was found : the most essential method in each Yoga is concentration; in Hathayoga, it is concentration of the bodily powers; in Rajayoga, it is of the psychic and mental powers; in Jnana Yoga, of the intellect; in Karma Yoga, of the will; and in Bhakti Yoga, the concentration is of the emotions. In each one, however, the concentration is exclusive only of a part of our total psychical complex. If, therefore, integral knowledge is to be found, it could be done most effectively by an all-receiving concentration. The method of synthesis of Yoga is then that of gradual development of concentration of all the powers of the psychological being, and to develop and enrich them to the utmost.
Supermind can be reached only by a synthesis of yoga, whose method is gradual concentration of all the powers of our being on their respective highest truths and realities, until all knowledge and power is realised as one unity.
3) Some sort of synthesis of yoga was also the method of the Tantra : why should that method not be acceptable?
The Tantra is certainly a kind of a synthetic yoga : but its method is to start from the body and to rise towards the mental powers and turn them to the Higher Power, or Shakti. Thus it gives a great importance to Hatha Yoga in its initial stages, and to
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the practices of the Raja Yoga. This method is very time-consuming, and even dangerous. A much more rapid and safe process would be to start, as in the Yoga of the Gita, with the mental powers and by reaching up to the Supreme to descend again to the lower parts of the being to increase and enrich and transform their powers.
4) Yoga is supposed to be a very dangerous path : can these dangers be minimised ?
The answer that has been found to this problem is that the dangers can be minimised by two processes :
1) by an all round purification of the body, life force and the mind.
Impurities are of two kinds :
Impurities of the nature of confusions, arising out of blindness and ignorance ;
Impurities due to the mixture of one principle of being with that of another ; as the desire overpowering the rational discrimination.
The Impurities can be removed by :
a) being conscious of them;
b) bringing true light in the blind spots of our nature;
c) separating one part of the being from the other and by a real harmonising of them.
2) by bringing the 'Psychic consciousness' to the forefront. One of the important discoveries of the Research in Yoga is that of the power of the Psychic Being and its role in the integral yoga.
The Psychic Being is our true 'person', whose very nature is that of purity and spontaneous surrender to the Divine.
The psychic being is called in Sanskrit 'Chaitya Purusha', and it is that which directs the development of our outer faculties. It does not reveal itself easily but works from the behind, until the outer nature is ready and by aspiration calls its presence on the surface. The emergence of the psychic being more and more on the surface purifies the outer nature. A complete emergence of
the psychic being is however a major step in the integral yoga.
The chief dangers in the yoga are due to the vital desire, ego, vanity, ambition, lust, etc. and these can be magnified when in the
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yogic process one goes from the surface consciousness to the inner or subliminal consciousness, often called, the occult or intermediate zone. It is, therefore, necessary to purify oneself sufficiently before entering into the subliminal consciousness.
5) What is the main difference between the realisation of the old yogas and the supramental realisation ?
The ideal of the old yogas is termed as 'Mukti' or Liberation. Psychologically, Mukti is attained when the outer nature of the three qualities, Sattwa, Rajas and Tamas, is questioned, and the inner Purusha or transcendental Brahman is realised, as the Real Being above the qualities. The individual is then not affected by the outer nature and its happenings; it is then said to be liberated.
The liberation is the first step in the direction of the supramental realisation. The liberation is usually achieved on the plane of the mind when it falls silent and reflects the Purusha or Brahman on the outer nature. But, it is possible to go beyond the silent Mind itself and to enter into higher planes of the mind.
A most illuminating exploration of the integral yoga is that of the planes between Mind and higher levels leading up to the Supermind. These planes are : Higher Mind, Illumined Mind, Intuitive Mind, Over mind and Supermind.
When the Supreme Reality is realised on the level of the Supermind, when the different aspects of that Reality, such as those of the static and dynamic, personal and impersonal, are fused into one integral Reality, then one is said to have attained the supramental vision of the Reality. But a mere supramental vision of the Reality is not enough.
The Vedas and the Upanishads too indicate that the Rishis of those times had such a supramental vision of the Reality. But such a vision and dwelling on that vision do not enable one to change completely the conditions of the earth-life.
6) Hence, the most important question in the development of the integral yoga was : Is the descent of the Supermind on the earth possible so as to create here the supramental conditions and supramental transformation ?
Sri Aurobindo's answer to this question is : Yes.
And it is to bring about a descent of the Supermind on the earth
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that constitutes the Yogic research work of the Ashram.
7) What is the exact process of the descent of the Supermind ?
Here comes the aspect of research where it meets the modern theory of evolution, and sheds light on the as yet unexplained or ill-explained processes of evolution.
The yogic theory of evolution is not identical with the scientific theory of evolution as it is understood today. The scientific theory stresses the development of outer form and its mutation; the yogic theory, on the other hand, considers development of consciousness as the key to the evolution of the outer form. Outer forms, according to this view, develop by an inner pressure of consciousness to emerge on the surface. There are three important stages of the evolution : growing complexity and subtlety of the outer form; emergence and ascent of a new term of consciousness; and, finally, the integration of the new term with the old from which it emerged. Complexity, ascent and integration are the three fundamental operations of the evolutionary process.
In line with this truth of evolution, there is a continuous ascending and descending process in Nature's movements; from the lower term there is a push towards a higher term; the higher term, in answer, descends; as a result the lower and the higher meet and get integrated, preparing once again the push towards a still higher term.
The descent of the Supermind is preceded by a long process of 'ascent-descent' from the mind plane to the supermind. There is, first, the ascent from Mind to the Higher Mind; the Higher Mind descends 'and occupies or influences the operations of the Mind; it descends even to the lower level of life and the body, though with a diminished efficiency. In the meantime, the Higher Mind pushes towards the Illumined Mind, and brings about its descent, once again on the Mind, life and the body; and before this cycle is completed, there already takes place the ascent and descent of the Intuitive Mind; this is followed by an ascent to the Over mind and the descent of the Over mind on the lower terms.
The descent of the Over mind marks a decisive stage in the process of the integral yoga. It consummates what is termed as the 'spiritual transformation' as distinguished from the 'supramental transformation'. The only two deficiencies that the over mental
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descent has are :
i) its efficacy is diminished more and more as it descends on lower and lower planes;
ii) it cannot transform the Inconscience, which is the lowest term below the physical.
These two deficiencies can be overcome only by an ascent to the supermind, and the ultimate descent of the supermind. First, the Supermind supramentalised the Over mind; then it transforms the Intuitive Mind in the similar way; and thus right down to the physical through the intermediary planes of the Illumined Mind, Higher Mind, Mind, life and subtle physical.
A complete manifestation of the supermind in Matter is on its way, and all the activities of the Ashram are at present dedicated to this manifestation.
This has been a long and arduous and difficult research work; many more things are in view to be done; it is hoped that the promise of yoga of a perfection and harmony on the earth will no more remain a mere promise, but a living reality.
8) At an early stage of the research work, an important question had arisen : What will be a quicker process : an individual perfection leading up to a collective perfection, or a simultaneous development of the individual and collective perfection ?
The answer to this problem came automatically as the number of individuals offering themselves for training in yoga to serve as Research workers increased gradually. Each individual, by virtue of his temperament, capacities and incapacities, serves as an experimental subject for the work on hand. This participation of the collectivity in the research work of Yoga produces many interesting and absorbing problems, the nature of which can be seen through the several books published by the Ashram under the title 'On Yoga'.
TOWARDS THE FUTURE
9) The supramental manifestation is then the yogic work and research programme of Sri Aurobindo Ashram. The future of mankind is closely connected with this work; the farther evolution of man lies through yoga; yoga is then the indispensable stage through
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which mankind will have to pass before its dream of harmony and perfection is realised. In the meantime, more concrete dreams of tomorrow are those of the Gnostic Being, Self-perfection and the Intermediate Race. The Ashram is engaged in visualising these newer possibilities, and they inspire farther programmers of yogic research.
The following questions have been of a particular interest :
(i) What will be the nature of the Gnostic Being ?
The Gnostic Being is a completely supramentalised being. He will possess fully the three supreme statuses of the supermind : the status of the comprehending consciousness which knows, views and possesses the whole universe in one total regard; the status of the apprehending consciousness, the consciousness that differentiates and stresses the differentiation, and finally the status of the projecting and identifying consciousness, which pursues each form and inhabits it by an identification with it, and yet without losing the consciousness of the supporting comprehending and apprehending consciousness.
The Gnostic being will have no specific and limited personality. Personality is a sensitive selection of certain qualities which are partly in a flux and partly in a more stable form. The Gnostic being will not be limited to any such selected complex of qualities, but will have a 'four-fold' personality, answering to four fundamental operations of the Soul-Force in its relationship to outer nature, viz., operations of Knowledge, Power, Love and Service. The Gnostic being will have a synthetic power of these operations, and a capacity to put forth any particular operation of a given personality while supporting it by the rest of the personalities. In fact, the limited notion of personality will no more apply to the Gnostic Being; he will be a 'person' in the true sense, capable of any and all supreme powers of Personality.
The Gnostic Being will have no need of any Moral Law, since all his actions will be the automatic and spontaneous Truth-expressions proceeding from a comprehensive Knowledge of the whole, and an apprehending Knowledge of each detail.
(ii) What will be the nature of the body of the Gnostic Being ? The physical body in many systems of Yoga has been considered to be an obstacle; and its fall has been regarded very often as a
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passage to a permanent liberation. The research at the Ashram has, however, shown that body is truly a very docile instrument of the Spirit, and there is no necessity of the rejection of the body. The essential characteristic of the body is its stability; and physical life gives a stable structure to all other aspects of life. Even a spiritual life, in order to be perfectly effective and stable, has to accept the truth of Matter and assume sovereignly the material robe.
But to assume the material principle is not to accept its present limitations. Matter's stability is its truth, but its inertia is its limitation which the spirit must eliminate. One of the important consequences of the supramental manifestation in body would be to turn inertia into Peace. A complete suffusion of peace even in the cells of the body would be a salient characteristic of the body of the Gnostic Being. A new kind of body, the Divine Body, is what is proposed as the physical Siddhi of the supramental yoga.
The divine body would not be subject to decay, for all the causes of decay would have been removed. A physical immortality translating the spiritual immortality of the soul and the spirit would be one of the culminating results of the Yoga, fulfilling thus the entire aim of the old system of Hatha Yoga, but by a different method and as a condition of the complete spiritual manifestation.
It would also seem that the intake of food would no more be necessary, since all intake of food is essentially a crude process of the interchange of the life-process, and in the divine body, such an interchange can take place directly from the universal Life Principle. If the intake of food is eliminated, it is reasonable to suppose that it would radically change the digestive system and, more truly eliminate it, since it would no more be necessary.
Another possibility that is conceived is the elimination of the sex principle from the divine body. The spirit has no sex, and its complete manifestation in the body would eliminate that which is not true to its real nature. In fact, sex-consciousness is incompatible with a high spiritual consciousness. With the development of the real psychic and spiritual consciousness, the sex impulse ceases spontaneously, and in a perfectly divinised body, there would be no gross organs of sex. In fact, if we examine the evolution of lower forms of life, we find that sex is not involved in some of them and even reproduction
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is done without sex act. It would not be irrational to suppose that in the highest form of life there would be the ehmination of sex altogether.
It is recognised that sex has a place in the evolutionary process; and sex„is not to be rejected on any preconceived moral considerations; there is in sex grossness; but there can be also from the sex impulse the release even of certain higher forms of life-expressions and even a sort of idealism. But for those who aspire to lead a spiritual life, sex is found to be unnecessary; and for two chief reasons, it has to be rejected during the process of yogic discipline; these two reasons are not moral, but purely practical and are derived from actual experimentation. They are : (i) there is always a presence of hostile forces accompanying the sex activity; and in order to overcome the hostile forces, sex has to be rejected; (ii) there is accompanying the sex enjoyment an excitement which clouds the psychic consciousness; and since the complete emergence of the psychic consciousness is an indispensable condition of the Integral Transformation, sex has to be eliminated.
(iii) But what then of the reproduction and continuation of the race ?
It is not suggested that the entire human race will in one block be supramentalised so as to eliminate sex principle from humanity at one stroke. Humanity, it is accepted, will remain as an open stage in the evolutionary process; and the sex principle in humanity will provide for perpetuity of the human race.
But it is also possible that the divine body will have the reproductive capacity, not through the sex principle, but by an act of will, by a sort of a materialisation of the will force, a projection of the body. In fact, the formation of the body and the birth of the body are even now a mystery and a miracle. The secret laws of these processes are still unknown. But they can be uncovered by a yogic knowledge, and the utilisation of that knowledge would enable the reproduction by a direct projection. This, however, is considered to be quite a remote achievement.
(iv) In the meantime, there is a possibility of the intermediate race, consisting of people who will be human in origin, but who, by a yogic endeavour, have transcended the human limitations. This
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intermediate race would in its turn influence the present humanity and would by that influence bring about the predominance of the forces of peace and harmony. For all great crises and violence are ultimately the result of a perception of an ideal and an undue postponement of its realisation. A growing intermediate race opening the gates of evolutionary forces to the higher and higher realisation would remedy the cause of crisis and disorder, and thus would prepare for a peaceful growth towards an ideal of human unity.
THE IDEAL OF HUMAN UNITY
10) This has been one of the most important subjects of study and research. All unity is fundamentally spiritual in character, and human unity, it is affirmed, can be achieved only through a gradual realisation of yogic consciousness in mankind, or at least its recognition as an ideal.
How to establish that general recognition ? And what are the forces working today which can help the realisation of the human unity ? A historical retrospect is also necessary to see if in the past a necessary preparation for a future human unity was not made.
A research in history from this standpoint has led us to the following conclusions :
(i) The entire drive of the human race throughout the history has been towards an ideal unity; the great empires, mutual impact of civilisations upon one another, travel of ideas, seekers, traders, and adventurers, the ideals of universal religions, idologies, and organisations, all these have been so many experiments of Man in his search of a true and lasting human unity;
(ii) but, the ideas, ideals and impulses that have inspired these experiments, and the methods that have been employed to achieve their ends, have mainly been marked by the desire to dominate and to subjugate the weaker races and nations;
(hi) the impulse to dominate has become associated with the drive towards a uniformity in all the fields of culture;
(iv) these two tendencies are still powerful in mankind; but the gradual realisation in mankind towards a true internationalism in which each nation is recognised as an equal partner of the other is a
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pointer of the future development of the mankind.
In the words of Sri Aurobindo : 'The unity of human race can be achieved neither through uniformity nor through subjection. A synthetic organisation of all nations, each one occupying its own place in accordance with its own genius and the role it has to play in the whole, can alone effect a comprehensive and progressive unification which may have some chance of enduring.'
(v) But a true internationalism can be estabhshed only on the basis of synthetic knowledge and consciousness which in turn can be most effectively and completely achieved through Yoga. Hence, the relevance of Yoga for mankind in general. And hence, too, the significance of the yogic work of the Ashram.
The integral yoga leads to integral knowledge in the light of which different systems of knowledge, eastern and western, ancient and modern, theoretical and practical, would fall into their proper place in a wide and comprehensive synthesis. The pursuit of the Integral Yoga has opened up that field of research in this direction. This programme of research can best be stated in the words of Sri Aurobindo :
"We of the coming day stand at the head of a new age of development which must lead to such a new and larger synthesis____ We
do not belong to the past dawns, but to the noons of the future. A mass of new material is flowing into us; we have not only to assimilate the influence of the great theistic religions of India and of the world and a recovered sense of the meaning of Buddhism, but to take full account of the potent though limited revelations of modern knowledge and seeking; and, beyond that, the remote and dateless past which seemed to be dead is returning upon us with an effulgence of many luminous secrets long lost to the consciousness of mankind but now breaking out again from behind the veil. All this points to a new, a very rich, a very vast synthesis, a fresh and widely embracing harmonisation of our gains is both an intellectual and a spiritual necessity of the future."
(i) Just as the past syntheses have taken those which preceded them for their starting-point, so also must that of the future, to be on firm ground, proceed from what the great bodies of realised spiritual
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thought and experience in the past have given. Among them, the most important are the Vedas, the Upanishads, and the Gita.
(i) A research in the Veda as conducted at the Ashram starts from two basic considerations :
(a) The Veda has been traditionally regarded in India as the Book of Knowledge, and the knowledge contained in it is supposed to be authoritative and unquestionable. This tradition is one of the most powerful cementing forces in India.
And yet, the Veda, as practised today, is merely a series of prescriptions of ritual and ceremonial acts and a book of Mantras to be recited along with the appropriate acts.
The modern man wonders at this which seems to him a senseless routine, and questions secretly or openly if our forefathers were not barbaric to have regarded the Veda as the Book of Knowledge and held it in supreme esteem. He is therefore either critical of the Veda or indifferent to it, or curiously and paradoxically, he obeys the Vedic acts at ceremonies by force of habit or tradition and custom.
This, indeed, is a state of confusion and inertia, concerning a subject which has been one of the basic factors in the integration of the Indian peoples.
A thorough search has got to be made, and we must attain to a clarity as to what the Veda is really about. If the Veda is a record of Nature Worship of the semi-barbaric forefathers of the Indians, as is the view of the western scholars and their Indian disciples, let us examine this view clearly, and thoroughly; and let us accept it, if we find it to be right; but let us reject it, if we find it wrong. The consequences of our rejection or acceptance of the western view of the Vedas are immense, not only for the Vedic scholars, but for the entire reshaping of India's future.
(b) If, however, we find that the Veda contains Knowledge, we must know what kind of Knowledge it is, and in what way that knowledge is relevant to the present day needs ; and finally, we should inquire if this knowledge contributes to the synthesis of knowledge.
(ii) A similar research in the Upanishads and in the Gita is called for. For there has been too much quarrel over the various interpretations that they have been subjected to; and we must try to have a fresh look into them to see if we can go beyond all the
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controversies and can seize upon the central teachings of these records of knowledge which have been so sacred and dear to India.
A deep research has been going on in the Ashram on the above subjects ; the conclusions that have been reached so far are :
(a) The Veda is a book of Knowledge; that this Knowledge is couched in ambiguous words, whose secret key can, however, be found. When this ambiguity is removed, Veda reveals itself as a most precious record of the ancient synthetic Yoga, which reconciled the Path of Knowledge and the Path of Works, and whose highest discoveries pertained to 'the abode of the Truth'.
(b) This knowledge is the perennial Mystic Doctrine which runs also through the Upanishads and the Gita. There is a real harmony among these records of knowledge.
(c) The Veda, the Upanishads and the Gita are synthetic in the methods of their quest and in the results of their quest. The Veda, which is the Book of Knowledge (Jnana Kanda) is also the Book of Works (Karma Kanda) ; the Upanishad which speaks of the static Brahman, one without the second, also speaks of all that is here as that very Brahman; the Gita, which is considered to be the Gospel of Divine Works, speaks also of superiority of Knowledge to mere works, and credits only that work which proceeds from the true Knowledge as yogic. The great controversy of the exclusive paths of Yoga has no place in the Veda, Upanishads, and the Gita.
(d) The philosophic controversies in India, particularly among the schools of the Vedanta, can be resolved only by a widening and a synthesis of spiritual experience, and the Veda, Upanishad and the Gita indicate the way by which this synthesis can be achieved.
(e) The teaching of these sacred books encourages positive and dynamic life ; and in one of their large formulae 'Annam Brahman', 'Matter is Brahman', and in the general drift of their teaching, there is a sufficient basis to work out the reconciliation of spiritual life with the demands of Matter. The modern drive of life can find its true affirmation and Uumination in this teaching.
(2) A research is being conducted in Indian History in order to mark out those synthetic drives and epochs, which, if sufficiently stressed, would contribute to the national and international integration. In this research a good work has been done in the
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understanding of Indian Religion and spirituality, Indian Art, Indian Literature, and Indian Polity.
(3) A significant note is being taken of the modern trends of Science, Technology and World Affairs, and books and research papers are being published which bear the spirit of synthesis and integration.
(a) We accept Science as one of the most liberating forces of today. The very nerve of Science is the seeking of knowledge ; it is an exploration, even if it might prove interminable. The unknown is not the unknowable, that is the underlying impulse of Science. Some of the latest conclusions to which Science has arrived at are of particular significance. There is in modern Science a clear drift towards Monism, a tendency to explain the multiplicity of phenomena in terms of one underlying principle. This drift is bound to create a welcome response in India where the major spiritual and philosophical drift has been towards Monism.
(b) The modern theory of evolution is a valuable gift of Science. We now commonly speak of evolution of Life in Matter, and of Mind in Life, and thus we are brought nearer to a still greater possibility of the Monism of Matter, Life and Mind. We are also brought to a still disturbing question of the why of evolution. And it seems that this question cannot be answered unless we integrate the modern theory with the Vedantic theory and say that Life and Mind evolve in Matter precisely because they are really involved in Matter. And once we come to this conclusion, we may perhaps go even farther and ask: May not a principle higher than Mind be involved in Mind ? If animal was a laboratory in which man was prepared, might not man himself be a living and thinking Laboratory in which superman is being worked out ? The theory of evolution points to something universal, which concerns deeply Man as such.
(c) The emergence of Psychology as a more exact Science is another sign of the direction in which Knowledge promises to develop in the coming decades.
Behaviorism and Rationahstic Materialism, in Psychology and in Epistemology, respectively, have lost much of their force. The new experiments in the phenomena of hypnotism, telepathy, clairvoyance, dreams, and other subconscious and subliminal planes have brought about a fresh outlook in
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the scientific field, which, in spite of its hesitations, seems to be rushing towards the opening of the new horizons. This is bound to pave way for a synthesis of Psychology with the Indian Science of Yoga.
(d) „It is to be noted also that the scientific temper and attitude, consisting of a freedom from preconceptions and prejudices and of a complete impartiality, are a preliminary to the yogic attitude itself; and in any attempt at the synthesis of knowledge, this attitude is indispensable.
(e) However, the modern science is still circumscribed by the legacy of the Rationalistic Materialism and of the scepticism inaugurated by Hume and perpetuated by the modern empiricism. This circumscription is a serious obstacle to the fulfilment of Science itself; but here again signs are promising, and scientists seem to disregard the doubts concerning the possibility or limitations of human knowledge. Once Science reaffirms its irresistible urge towards knowledge, artificial barriers will break down, opening a way towards the synthetic and universal knowledge.
(4) The rise of Technology has raised a serious challenge to the cherished values of human life. This has brought to the fore the real issue that faces Man today, viz, whether Man is essentially a slave of circumstances and the fabric and the machine that he weaves and makes around himself, or whether he is really free to surmount his circumstances and recreate conditions in which he can enjoy unfettered Freedom. It is essential that this problem be raised and its solution sought. For it seems that a great synthesis of the positive and normative knowledge will most probably come about through this inquiry.
(5) A serious obstacle in this inquiry is the present situation in philosophy. Philosophy, both in India and in the West, is undergoing a serious crisis.
(a) In the West, Philosophy has made a retreat from the speculative and constructive metaphysical thought, and accepting the lead of the Modern empiricism, has declared Metaphysics as meaningless. It sanctions only the positive knowledge and considers value
judgments as merely emotive responses without any knowledge-significance. Again, with regard to the positive knowledge,
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it has ruled out certainty and is busy formulating the standards of 'verifiable' knowledge, in the process of which it faces almost insoluble controversy. A retreat to constructive and speculative metaphysics is on its way; but the serious question that metaphysics faces is : is its knowledge based on experience, and guaranteed by experience ? Metaphysics as a conceptual knowledge may have its own limited certainty, but it does not satisfy the total demand of the integral being of Man. As Sri Aurobindo puts it : '...the concepts of metaphysical knowledge do not in themselves fully satisfy the demand of our integral being. They are indeed entirely satisfactory to the pure reason itself, because they are the very stuff of its own existence. But our nature sees things through two eyes always, for it views them doubly as idea and as fact and therefore every concept is incomplete for us and to a part of our nature almost unreal until it becomes an experience.'
The solution then seems to be in the experience of the contents of the metaphysical concepts. These concepts are fundamentally three : the concept of the Absolute or the Transcendental, the concept of the universal, and the concept of the particular or the individual.
The searching eye of humanity then turns to those metaphysical systems which claim to base themselves on the highest experiences. And among them, the most important are the Indian metaphysical systems. This is the underlying reason of the West opening to the East, a most remarkable phenomenon of the modern times. The West looks to the East for wisdom, and the question is : Can the East or India deliver it ?
(b) India promises it : but there is a serious obstacle, viz, the crisis in Indian Philosophy. This crisis is closely connected with the controversy among the conflicting schools of the Vedanta. For each one of these schools claims to base itself on the supreme experience of the Ultimate Reality, and yet each one regards the claim of the other as invalid.
This conflict can be overcome only by an integral philosophy which bases itself upon an integration of each one of the experiences on which the conflicting schools of the Vedanta are established. Such an integration of experience was present in the Veda, the
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Upanishad and the Gita. And in the modern times, in the spiritual experience of Sri Ramakrishna we have the same drift towards an integration. And a new advance and the full integration we find in Sri Aurobindo's supramental vision of the Reality. It is in this vision, this experience, this integral experience, that an integral philosophy can have unshakable roots. Sri Aurobindo's 'The Life Divine' is a widest and comprehensive exposition of the integral philosophy, in which the East and the West meet, and which has the force and power to guide the modern Man in his search of integral perfection and harmony.
The relating of this Integral Philosophy to the modern trends of Thought is one of the most important research projects of the scholars at the Ashram.
(6) The Integral Philosophy covers also the synthetic system of social and political philosophies, and a comprehensive philosophy of History. An attempt is made by some of the scholars at the Ashram to study the Eastern and Western theories of society and political institutions in order to uncover the truth underlying each one of them and to effect a synthesis of them. Whether it is Hobbes' Social Contract Theory or Hegel's Idealistic Theory, a comprehensive system has a place for the underlying truth of each ; and it is by the same method that a new but comprehensive diagnosis of the present crisis of mankind is obtained.
One of the important conclusions of our research in this field is that the present crisis of mankind is neither economic, nor political, nor sociological, nor even ideological; it is essentially an evolutionary crisis, demanding an integral development of mankind in order to answer it. Each system of civilisation, ancient,
mediaeval or modern, represents the sum of achievements in a particular field governed and
rehashed by certain specific psychological tendencies in man, physical, vital, moral, rational or aesthetic, philosophical, occult or religious. Each system flourished by an exclusive development of one or two or more of these tendencies, but failed too precisely because of the exclusiveness at a time when a widening and synthesis of the various psychological tendencies was called for. Man has evolved through all these ups and downs of civilisations; he has intensified and enriched his faculties through all the experience of various civilisations. Now have opened up the capacities by which the
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world tends to be one, and the impact of the civilisations upon each other is unprecedented. It calls for an integration of psychological tendencies and capacities, even of an ordinary man. It is this call for a breakdown of all barriers that causes the crisis. It can be met only by a revolutionary or evolutionary progression, towards a new type of humanity. The ideals of Liberty, Equahty and Fraternity can be fulfilled not in the man as he is, but in the man of the Future, the man that has transcended his present psychological limitations.
(7) This research in the Ashram is not merely theoretical, but it is concretely practical. Here in the Ashram, people of the East and of the West have come together, and are deliberately put together to see and work out all the problems that a universal or international civilisation might bring forth.
(8) The result has been a growing research in the various ways of life and their psychological, vital, and physical expressions, and in the various crystallised forms of art and literature. Various attempts are being made to create synthetic forms of Indian and Western Dance, new, creative and synthetic Music, forms of Art which take their inspiration from the East and the West and from the planes of synthetic consciousness which he high above the ordinary human mind. New forms of Literature shape themselves, and through drama, stories, essays and poetry or through various other literary means, they find their suitable vehicles and grow in an international and synthetic atmosphere of the Ashram.
A special mention must be made of Poetry, since Sri Aurobindo, Himself a poet, has given to the English Literature its longest epic, Savitri. Sri Aurobindo made several experiments in what might be termed as The Future Poetry. And some of the conclusions in this field are contained in His book, The Future Poetry. Several members of the Ashram have attempted to make their own experiments in the light of the idea of the future poetry, and some of these experiments have proved a success.
Even in the field of physical culture, there is the same synthetic character. No aspect of physical culture is left untouched—Indian system of asana, Japanese Judo, and Western system of gymnastics, athletics,
combative and games—all meet together in the same comprehensive embrace,
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It is in the vibrating and dynamic atmosphere created by the constant pursuit of the integral yoga and the integral knowledge that a research is being conducted in an integral system of education. An educational atmosphere conditioning, supporting and permeating the very process of education for the young ones, the Promise of a New Future.
KIREET M. JOSHI
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(BRIEF SUMMARY)
CHAPTER XXII
THE PROBLEM OF LIFE
LIFE being a divided movement of consciousness although really an undivided force becomes a clash of opposing truths each striving to fulfil itself. Mind has to solve the thousand and one problems resulting but in Life itself, not merely in thought. The difficulty lies in its ignorance of itself and the world. Man knows only the surface of his own being and does not know the universality of the Force of which he is a part; therefore he can master neither himself nor the world. He has to know and solve the problem or else give place to some higher evolutionary being.—The poise of Life is determined by the relation of the Force to the Consciousness which drives it. Accordingly we have, besides the Infinite Existence, first the life of material Nature ruled by the infallible Inconscient; secondly the life of conscious being in material Nature emerging out of the Inconscient, fallible, bewildered, only half-potent, which is our own; and thirdly the life of the real Man to which we are moving where Consciousness and Force are fulfilled and in harmony and the One at unison with the many. That life will be founded on the awareness of one Consciousness in many minds, one Force working in many fives, one Delight of being in many hearts and bodies.—Man's difficulties: first, he only knows and governs a part of himself, the greater part of himself is subconscient and it is this greater cosmic part that really governs his surface being. This is what is meant by his being governed by his Nature and by the Lord seated within through the Maya or apparent denial of Sachchidananda by Himself. It is only by becoming one with the Lord that man can be master of himself, but this union must be in the Divine Maya, in the super-conscient and not only or chiefly in this lower Maya of the mental existence.—Secondly, he is separated by his individuality from the
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universal and does not know his fellow-beings. He must be not only in sympathy with them, but arrive at a conscious unity with all and this conscious unity exists only in what is now superconscient to us.—Thirdly, Life is at war with body; Mind at war with the life and the .body, each trying to subject the others to his own law. Only the supramental can find the law of immortal harmony which shall reconcile this discord of our mortality. Each of these principles has besides a soul in it which seeks a self-fulfilment beyond what the present force of life, mind or body can give. There is a conflict between opposing instincts of the body, opposing desires and impulses of the life, opposing ideas of the mind. The principle of unity is above in the supermind.—Man as he develops becomes acutely aware of all these discords and seeks a reconciliation with himself and with his fellow-beings. This can only come by the perfection of his own existence through the principle in himself to which he has not yet attained and by embracing consciously the life of others in his own through an universal consciousness which must also be gained by the superconscient becoming conscient in us through an upward evolution.
CHAPTER ,XXIII
THE DOUBLE SOUL IN MAN
The ascent of Life is in its nature the ascent of the divine Delight in things from its dumb concentration in Matter to its luminous consummation in Spirit. Like the other original divine principles, this Delight .also must be represented in us by a cosmic principle corresponding to it in the apparent existence. It is the soul or psychic being.—As there is a subliminal luminous mind behind our surface mind, a subliminal life behind our mental life, a subliminal wider corporeality behind our gross body, so we have a double soul, the superficial desire-soul and the true psychic entity.—The superficial in us is the small and egoistic, the subliminal is in touch with the universal. So our subliminal or true psychic being is open to the universal delight of things, the superficial desire-soul is shut off from it. It feels the outward touches of things, not their essence
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and therefore not their Rasa or true touch ; and because it cannot reach the universal world-soul, it cannot find its own true soul which is one with the world-soul.—The desire-soul returns the triple responses of pleasure, pain and indiffi Ference, but the psychic being behind it has the equal delight of all its experiences; it compels the desire-soul to more and more experience and to a change of its values. By bringing this soul to the surface we can overcome the duality of pleasure and pain, as is actually done in certain directions of experience by the artist, Nature-lover, God-lover, etc. each in his own fashion. But the difficulty is to do it in the desire-soul at its centre where it comes into contact with practical living; for here the human mind shrinks from the application of the principle of equality.—To bring this subliminal soul to the surface is not enough ; for it is open passively to the world-soul but cannot possess the world. Those who thus arrive, become close to the universal delight, but not masters of life. For there are two principles of order and mastery, one false, the ego-sense, the other true, the Lord who is one in the many. By merely suppressing the ego-sense in the impersonal delight we gain the centre less Impersonal and are fulfilled in our static being but not in our active being. We must therefore gain the other centre in the Supermind by which we shall consciously possess and not merely undergo the delight of the One in His universal existence.
SRI AUROBINDO
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THE SPIRITUAL DESTINY OF THE WAKING STATE
(Continuation)
IV. WHAT IS SAMADHI OR YOGIC TRANCE?
In her own depths she heard the unuttered thought
That made unreal the world and all life meant.
"Who art thou who claim'st thy crown or separate birth,
The illusion of thy soul's reality
And personal godhead on an ignorant globe
In the animal body of imperfect man ?
...Only the blank Eternal can be true.
All else is shadow and flash in Mind's bright glass,
O soul, inventor of man's thoughts and hopes,
Thyself the invention of the moments' stream,
Illusion's centre or subtle apex point,
At last know thyself, from vain existence cease."
(Sri Aurobindo, Savitri, BK. VII C. VI, pp.607-608)
BEYOND the realm of thought, transcending the domain of duality, leaving Maya with all her changes and modifications far behind,...shines the glory of the Eternal Brahman in the Nirvikalpa Samadhi. Knowledge, knower and known dissolve in the menstrual of One Eternal Consciousness; birth, growth and death vanish in that infinite Existence ; and love, lover and beloved merge in that unbounded ocean of Supreme Felicity....Breaking down the ridge-poles of that tabernacle in which the soul has made its abode for untold ages—stilling the body, calming the mind and drowning the ego, comes the sweet joy of Brahman in that superconscious state. Space disappears in nothingness, time is swallowed up in Eternity...[and] it is all stillness indefinable....The Nirvikalpa Samadhi is the highest flight of Advaita Philosophy.
(Life of Sri Ramakrishna, Advaita Ashram, Almora, p.181) 51
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The acquisition of the highest spiritual consciousness, at least statically if not dynamically, is the goal of all spiritual endeavour. But, as we have noted before, the spiritual reaches of consciousness lie far behind and above our normal waking mentality. Now the question is : is it possible to possess the spiritual consciousness while still remaining embedded in the ordinary mental function-ings ? In other words, can the normal unregenerate surface consciousness and the spiritual one be concomitant and simultaneously operative ? Seekers in all ages and climes, who have the necessary credentials to pronounce on this point, are universally agreed to deny this possibility.
So, broadly speaking, four alternatives may open out before those who aspire after spirituality :
(a) To create a division, a separation, a dissociation of consciousness and to be spiritual within or above while the outer consciousness and its ignorant movements are indifferently watched and felt to be something intrinsically foreign and disparate. This is the solution of the 'Witness Consciousness'.
(b) To be satisfied with the indirect glories of the spiritual consciousness as reflected and refracted in the bosom of our normal mentality. This is what has been termed 'spiritual mental realisation' .
(c) To still and withdraw from the mental consciousness and retire to the supra-mental reaches. This is what can be called the 'trance-solution.'
(d) To transform the nature of the normal waking consciousness, to divinise it as we would say, by bringing down there the fullest wealth and splendour of the spiritual heights, so that its present opacity and refractoriness may be altogether rectified. This is the solution of 'divine transfiguration' as envisaged by our Yoga.
Evidently the 'Witness Consciousness' and 'spiritual-mental realisation' fall far short of our goal; for, be it once again stated, this goal is no less than the establishment of the Life Divine upon earth, a dynamic waking existence embodying Sachchidananda in his fully manifested, glories.
But since the yogic trance or Samadhi is so often held up not only as a supreme means of access to the higher possible spiritual
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consciousness but "as the very condition and status of that highest consciousness itself, in which alone it can be completely possessed and enjoyed while we are in the body,"1 We must digress here for a while to examine the nature of Samadhi and find out its utility or otherwise in the pursuit of the Integral Yoga.
Samadhi or Yogic Trance : Since mind-consciousness is normally found to be incompatible with the highest state of spiritual realisation, a veritable yoga or union must almost by definition connote the cessation of all mental functions (Yogaścittavrttinirodhah2) or even of the mind itself (manonāśo mahodaya3).
Now, to follow the terminology as used by Vyasa, the great commentator on the 'Yoga Aphorisms' of Patanjali, our mind-stuff may function in five different levels or conditions (cittabhū-mayah). These, from down upwards or from out inward, are (i) Ksipta or restless, the dissipated condition in which the mind is active and externalised and runs after objects of various sorts ; (ii) mūdha or torpid, the stupefied condition in which the mind under the influence of an excessive tamas gravitates downwards and wallows in the obscure depths of ignorance; (iii) vikspita or distracted, a condition in which the mind becomes relatively pacified and at times somewhat concentrated but thrown out again outwards because of the distracting movements ; (iv) ekāgra or concentrated, a condition dominated by sattva in which the mind is able to concentrate for a prolonged stretch of time to the exclusion of all other thoughts, upon some particular chosen object or subject of concentration; and lastly (v) niruddha or stilled, a condition in which even the act or function of contemplation ceases and, all modifications of the mind being stopped, nothing whatsoever is known or conceived by the latter.
It goes without saying that the first three conditions of the mind enumerated above are not at all conducive to the practice of spirituality (Yogapakse na vartate) ; it is only the last two that make possible any spiritual illumination. As a matter of fact, in the parlance of the Patanjali System, "ekāgra or the state of concentration,
1 Sri Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, p. 601.
2 Patanjala Sutra, 1.2. 3 Yoga-Vāsistha, Iv.35.18.
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when permanently established is called samprajñāta Yoga or the trance of meditation, in which there is a clear and distinct consciousness of the object of contemplation. It is known also as samāpatti or samprajñāta samādhi in as much as citta or the mind is, in this state, entirely put into the object and assumes the form of the object itself. So also the state of niruddha is called asamprajñāta yoga or asarh-prajñāta samādhi,. . .because this is the trance of absorption in which all psychoses and appearances of objects are stopped. . . ."1
In more general terms we may say that samadhi or yogic trance is that state of superconsciousness in which the aspirant, diving deep or soaring high in the search of the soul or the self, enters, when his consciousness, through an inward concentration, withdraws from the surface world as perceived by the senses and retires to progressively deeper interior realms of supersensuous experiences. In this process of inward withdrawal or upward ascension, the consciousness first enters the 'dream-state' and then proceeds to the 'sleep-state'. While in the dream-state, the outer mind of the sadhaka becomes quiescent and his inner mind, separated from the outer and no longer covered up by it, ranges through a wonderful world of rich and variegated inner experiences.
To obviate any possible misunderstanding that the nomenclature 'dream-state' or 'sleep-state' may engender in an unwary spirit, we may forthwith state here that the yogic dream- or sleep-states have nothing to do with the physical states of dream and sleep. "In the Yogic dream-state.. .the mind is in clear possession of itself, though not of the physical world, works coherently,. . .[Is perfectly] awake... not with the out-going, but with an ingathered wakefulness in which, though immersed in itself, it exercises all its powers."2 In the dream-state itself there is an infinite series of depths, starting with that for which the world of physical senses is almost at the doors though momentarily shut out, and reaching to depths not likely to be broken in upon by the impact or call of the sensuous physical world. As a matter of fact, "beyond a certain point the trance becomes complete and it is then almost quite impossible to
1 Chatterjee and Dutta, An Introduction to Indian Philosophy, p.305.
2 The Synthesis of Yoga, pp.594-95.
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awaken or call back the soul that has receded into them ; it can only-come back by its own will or at most by a violent shock of physical appeal dangerous to the system owing to the abrupt upheaval of return."1
With the increasing depths or heights of the degrees of consciousness attained by the soul, the experiences obtained become progressively remote and less and less communicable to the waking mind, until the trance becomes complete in an utter self-gathering of the being when the central consciousness separates from the last vestige of mentality. Then it becomes an absolute impossibility for any records or transcripts of the experiences therein to reach the portals of the normal waking consciousness. This is the state of Nirvikalpa Samadhi claimed to be the highest status of spiritual attainment and assiduously sought after by every seeker after trance.
In this ultimate trance-state of pure superconscient existence, in this supra-mental immersion in the infinite being and the unconditioned bliss, time and space and hence the world of names and forms vanish into nothing, all action of mental awareness whether of outward or of inward things is altogether abolished and everything is drawn up into the super cosmic Beyond.
Once attaining this supreme state of Nirvikalpa trance, the soul finds it difficult, well-nigh impossible, to return again to the active life-consciousness, for "it loses the hold on the cord which binds it to the consciousness of life, and the body is left, maintained indeed in its set position, not dead by dissolution, but incapable of recovering the ensouled life which had inhabited it."2
We have so far analysed in abstract terms the physiognomy of the Yogic trance. To complete the account we would now like to reproduce in brief the concrete cases of the sage Uddalaka and Ramakrishna to show how in fact the consciousness withdrawing inward passes through progressively deepening states of being to repose finally in the absolute state of Nirvikalpa Samadhi.
First the scriptural account of the trance of Uddalaka as depicted
1 The Synthesis of Yoga, P.593.
2 Idid., p. 593.
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in the great work Yoga-Vasishtha Maharamayana :1
The trance of Uddalaka : "One day the sage deliberated : 'When will you attain to eternal peace by reaching the status of mindlessness, for such is indeed the condition for getting freed from the bondage of repeated births ?'... Then the Brahmin Uddalaka sat down to concentrate and withdraw his mind. But he could not succeed at once in attaining the samadhi state, for his mind, in the fashion of a restless baboon, began to fleet from object to object.... At a later stage, the mind-monkey would at times leave outside contacts and felt eager for the enjoyment of the inner sattvic bliss; but this was indeed an intermittent mood, for most often the mind would rush towards outward objects again, as if it was stung by a venomous snake. At times, his interstate was being cleared of the obscurity of ignorance and Uddalaka visioned the glory of a sun; but in no time his Chitta became restless again and flew outward in the manner of a startled bird. Again, he withdrew inward and experienced at times a vacant space or the Zero of an impenetrable darkness As a warrior in battle kills his enemies with a sword, Uddalaka started destroying one by one all the vikalpas that were appearing in his consciousness. The vikalpas gone, he saw in the inner space a green-black Sun but proceeded immediately to eradicate this inky darkness. Then the softness of a massed lustre greeted the sage Uddalaka. But that too he eliminated in no time following the way of an elephant calf that gets into a lotus-pond and tears away and devastates the lotuses all around. Once this massed splendour was gone, Udda-laka's mind succumbed to a spell of deep sleep just as a man highly intoxicated loses his sobriety and then gets into torpor; but the sage was prompt enough to annul this state of sleep. Then his mind was filled with the consciousness of Vyoma; but just as the wind sweeps away the dew-drops, he too swept away from his mind this clear and stainless consciousness of vyoma. But, following that, some sort of dazed dullness overtook him as if he was a heavily drunk man who had just come out of his torpid state. Even this too he vanquished.
"Then, at long last, the sage Uddalaka reached the status of Nirvikalpa Samadhi, where there was neither any obscurity nor any
1 Vide Yoga-Vasishtha: Upashama Prakarana), sargas 51-54.
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ephemeral lustre."1
That, in the state of Nirvikalpa trance, the body becomes immobile like a painted image (citrārpita ivacālah2) and even a violent sense-appeal fails to bring back the soul to the waking consciousness has been equally forcefully brought out by the Yoga-Vasishtha in the following account of the Samadhi of Shikhidhvaja :
"The queen Chudala went to the forest and found there the king Shikhidhvaja seated, like a sculptured tree, in the state of Nirvikalpa trance. She deliberated : T must now seek to re-awaken the king, otherwise he will leave his body very soon.' Then the queen Chudala approached the king's body and shouted at the top of her voice. This loud sound and then the sound of the trumpet frightened and startled the sylvan creatures, but the queen's repeated attempts failed to evoke any response from the king whose body remained tranced and immobile like a granite mass.3 Chudala then laid her hands on the body of Shikhidhvaja and started violently agitating it. Thus shaken, the king's body fell down and rolled on the ground, but even then did not recover his waking consciousness. Then the queen wondered and thought, 'It does not seem to be an easy proposition to awaken my King ! Only if he still possesses the grain of a desire somewhere hidden in seed-form, that will help him to come back again to the waking state, in no other wise can he be aroused.' "4
The Trance-Experience of Sri Ramakrishna : Now we come to the very authentic historical case of the Sage of Dakshinesvara whose trance-experiences as depicted in his authoritative biography published by the Ramakrishna Order itself we reproduce below :
"Sri Ramakrishna's Samadhi covered a wide range of experiences from his perception of various visions to the annihilation of his mind in the infinite consciousness of Brahman. It had also many forms.......Thus he entered into a 'world of power', or 'a world of beauty', or
1 Yoga-Vasishtha, IV. 51-54.
2 Ibid. , IV. 37.2.
3 Cf. Sri Aurobindo, Savitri, Bk. VII C. II, p. 538:
'' . . her body became a stark
And rigid golden statue of motionless trance,
A stone of God lit by an amethyst soul.
Around her body's stillness all grew still."4 Yoga-Vasishtha (Nirvana Prakarana), 103.
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'a world of spiritual grandeur'.........He would commune with invisible beings—forms of the Divinity or Divine Incarnations of the past.
"Such visions however belong to the domain of Personality, which is not the last word in spiritual experiences. So long as a sadhaka is satisfied with this kind of samadhi, his attainments cannot be said to be complete. He has not reached unfathomable depths of the ocean, though undoubtedly he has gone far behind the surface, encountering the forms of life abounding there, but he has not yet ransacked the priceless treasures of the deep, which reveal themselves only to those who have the courage to dive on and on till they have touched bottom.
"So we find Sri Ramakrishna taking up another course of sadhana altogether different from his previous ones."1
Then, a few pages further on, the biographer gives a vivid description of the first Nirvikalpa Samadhi-state of Sri Ramakrishna :
"Sri Ramakrishna passed into the ineffable glory of the Nirvikalpa Samadhi. In that rapturous ecstasy the senses and mind stopped their functions. The body became motionless as a corpse. The universe rolled away from his vision—even space itself melted away. Everything was reduced to ideas which floated like shadows in the dim background of the mind. Only the faint consciousness of 'I' repeated itself in dull monotony. Presently that too stopped, and what remained was Existence alone. The soul lost itself in the Self, and all idea of duality, of subject and object, was effaced. Limitations were gone, and finite space was one with infinite space. Beyond speech, beyond experience and beyond thought, Sri Ramakrishna had realised the Brahman—had become the Brahman.
"Totapuri (Sri Ramakrishna's Guru or the spiritual preceptor) sat for a long time, silently watching his disciple. Finding him perfectly motionless, he stole out of the room and locked the door lest anybody should intrude without his knowledge. Then he awaited the call from Sri Ramakrishna to open the door. The day passed on, the night came. Another day and still another—three days passed and there was no call. Totapuri was astonished and went to see what was wrong.
1 Life of Sri Ramakrishna (Advaita Ashram, Almora), p. 183.
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"He opened the door and entered the room. There sat Sri Ramakrishna in the very same position in which he had left him. There was no manifestation of life in the body, but the countenance was calm, serene and radiant. He saw that the disciple was still dead to the objective world, his mind absorbed in the Self, without a flicker— absolutely steady !...
"With the utmost care he (Totapuri) determined if the heart was beating, or if there was the slightest trace of respiration. Again and again he touched the disciple's corpse-like body. There was no sign either of life or of consciousness.... It was undoubtedly a case of the Nirvikalpa Samadhi—the culmination of Advaita practice!
"Totapuri immediately took steps to bring the mind of Sri Ramakrishna down to the world of phenomena."1
After Totapuri left Dakshineshwar, Sri Ramakrishna decided to withdraw from the world of T' and 'Mine' and live constantly in unity with the Supreme. What followed then is very much revealing from our point of view and worth reproducing in the saint's own inimitable words :
"I stayed in that ineffable state for six months at a stretch, a state from which an ordinary soul knows no return, his body dropping off like a withered leaf from a tree ! There was no sense of the passage of time, of how the days and the nights went by ! Flies and insects used to get into the mouth and nostrils of my body as if in those of a corpse, but they evoked no response from me. Oftentimes I would ease nature involuntarily without being in the least aware of it ! My body would not have remained viable for long, it would have surely dropped down dead, but for the circumstance of the arrival at this time of a sannyasin with a heavy stick in his hand. He realised my state at the very first glance and felt that if this body could somehow be preserved, much good would be done to the world through its agency. It thus so happened that during meal-times he used to beat my body with the stick and no sooner did he find that a faint glimmer of awareness had come, he would push some morsels of food into the mouth. In this way, on some days, a little bit of food could reach my stomach while on other days even that much failed.
1 Ibid., pp. 190-192.
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"Six months rolled by in this wise. Then I heard the Mother's Voice : 'Come down a bit and stay in Bhāva-Samādhi, do stay in in Bhāva-Samādhi for the welfare of the world !' Then a serious disease assailed my bodily frame—blood-dysentry it was ! I then had frequent bouts of griping pains and unbearable cramps and wrenches in the stomach ! After I had suffered from such intense agony for long six months, my consciousness could come down little by little into my body and finally I regained the waking state of ordinary men."1
So we have seen what samadhi means and how the state of Nirvikalpa Samadhi is eulogised as the spiritual status par excellence. Now we proceed to show that trance-experiences however lofty or however deep fail to meet the demands of our Yoga, and at the same time indicate how our goal of dynamic divinisation of the waking physical existence can be realised.
JUGAL KlSHORE MUKHERJI
1 Swami Saradananda, Sri Sri Ramakrishna Lila-Prasanga (Guru-Bhava Purvardha), PP. 56-57-
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THE SERVICE OF HUMANITY (contd.)
WE have posed ourselves certain questions in regard to the service " of humanity. The first is : Is it the height of human endeavour ? It is evident that the question does not relate to those who do not care for the height of human endeavour. They had better be left to do what they conceive as worth doing or what pleases their thoughts and fancies. They will spin round their own axis with the complacent belief that what they are doing is really the best for the world. And they are quite welcome to their benevolent belief. It is only those who are fired with a lofty idealism and aspire to dare and achieve the highest in life, to stake their all for the supreme perfection, and scale the summits of human possibilities that take care to ponder what should be their greatest endeavour and what it will lead to. It is they who decide what should be their goal and how each ounce of their energy should be directed to its attainment.
Such persons naturally seek to know whether there is any Reality behind the fleeting appearances of the world. Is there not something infinite, they wonder, sustaining the flicker-dance of the finite forms one sees here, something that abides and endures behind this incessant flux, and is untouched by the breath of time ? Is it all a chance, or a brute, mechanical necessity that has woven this marvellous fabric of life out of dead Matter ? Or, is there a fore-seeing and fore-ordaining Intelligence that has spangled the skies with the suns and stars and the earth with endless varieties of geneses and species, and brings) order out of chaos and light out of darkness ? Is not in man and beyond him an Eye of Wisdom and an all-creative purposeful Will guiding his stumbling steps through a tangle of his own and the world's conflicting forces towards a progressive transcendence of his consciousness and power ? If there is such a Reality, such a living, all-mighty Intelligence, he asks himself, should he not endeavour as best he can to realise It and its Will ? Will not life itself be vain and empty without its discovery? What other endeavour can
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be higher than this ? Is it not this the adventure of all adventures, the sole and supreme discovery beside which all other discoveries pale into insignificance ? It must be admitted that no materialist, no sceptic can have any rational grounds to impugn the perception, the faith, and the will and determination that inspire this great adventure. It is a super scientific adventure, undertaken with all the honest curiosity and true empirical zeal of the scientist. It is the quest of Reality and the endeavour to attune life to its creative rhythms.
Our second question is : Granting that the service of humaniy is done in the best spirit, does it always contribute to happiness ? This question hinges upon another of a fundamental character : What is happiness ? We do not propose to go into an elaborate consideration of this question here, but will only touch upon what is sufficient to test the validity of the humanist standpoint. Modern man has hardly left any avenue unexplored to find happiness in the world. He has sought it in economic prosperity and the comforts and amenities it provides. He has tried all sense pleasures, but found them all wanting. What pleases him today palls upon him tomorrow. The question of health is a perpetual care, and illness is not a rare visitation, in spite of the phenomenal advance of the medical science. He has sought it in the arts and literature, in science and philosophy, in games and sports, in diverse recreations and amusements, but in none has he found serene and abiding happiness. He has sought it in the relations of
life, in love and affection, in sympathy and kindliness, in pity and compassion, -in friendship and fellow-feeling, but he has discovered to his chagrin that he has no hold over his feelings—they bubble up and melt away, and the mutual give and take upon which they depend is uncertain and ephemeral. His feelings betray their fickleness, and even when he develops a detached and large-hearted attitude towards the world and learns to expect no requital from it, the happiness he derives from it is a mere ghost of what his being yearns for. Scientific or philosophic pursuit may, it is true, give him a somewhat steady satisfaction, but it is only a mental satisfaction he derives from it—his life parts are left starving in cold indifference or coerced into resentful submission. The legitimate demands of his vital are neglected in the absorption of his mental preoccupation.
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Bertrand Russell, a thoroughbred scientist, if there was one, gives the following recipe for happiness. "To find the right road out of this despair, civilised man must enlarge his heart as he has enlarged his mind. He must learn to transcend himself, and in so doing to acquire the freedom of the universe."1 An admirable recipe, indeed. But how to put it into practice ? He admits that" the immense majority of even the noblest persons' actions have self-regarding motives, nor is this to be regretted, since, if it were otherwise, the human race could not survive."2 How, then, one wonders, is man going to transcend himself, if "zest (in action) is difficult without some self-regarding motive" ? 3 And if there are self-regarding motives, service of humanity is cankered at its very roots and becomes service of oneself. It can be neither unselfish nor disinterested. Can selfish service minister to the happiness of others ?
Russell thinks that "a man should be able to achieve happiness, provided that his passions and interests are directed outward, not inward." Multiplication of external interests is prescribed by him as a sure means of being happy, and to this end, one must give up all introversion, and "forget his own soul." "The man...whose attention is turned within finds nothing worthy of his notice..........." An oracular pronouncement seeking to demolish with a confident panache the highest teachings of the wisest men of the world ! And who are the fortunate persons worthy of happiness ? The scientists, of course, for "all the conditions of happiness are realised in the life of the man of science".4 Was Newton a scientist ? Let us see how happy he was. Newton "at the hour of his triumph—the completion of a cosmic theory that was to become the basis of all future science—was a dreadfully unhappy man."5 In spite of all his engrossment in scientific work, which generated eccentricities in him, he could not quite inhibit his ambitions and the desires of his vital nature nor the caprices and distempers of his inharmonious mental make-up. "I must withdraw from your acquaintance" he wrote to a friend, "and see neither you nor the rest of my acquaintances any more".6 The great German scientist E. H. Haeckel's life affords an instance in which
l, 2 & 3 The Conquest of Happiness by Bertrand Russel
4The Conquest of Happiness
5 & 6 Great Scientists by Thomas &Thomas
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an unscientific passion of his heart was suffered to cloud his scientific happiness. The passion assailed him so suddenly and violently when he was sixty-five years old that, torn between two loyalties— loyalty to his ailing wife and that to his new love—he contemplated suicide. The catastrophic end was, however, mercifully averted. Bertrand Russell forgets that the scientist has also a heart, an all too human heart of feelings and emotions, and that his life, like all human life, is a theatre where both tragedies and comedies are played by the complex elements of human nature and the inscrutable conspiracy of circumstances. Sustained and serene happiness eludes the scientist as much as any other man. It is not unoften that the family and social life of the scientist or the philosopher looks so wan and inharmonious. His angularities or eccentricities are the signs of a being divided against itself. And where there is no harmony in the being, there can be no happiness.
If wealth is no guarantee of happiness, as we all know, poverty is no bar to it. The poor are, on an average, perhaps happier than the rich, unless it is grinding penury that afflicts them. They are happier, because they have fewer desires and are content with what they have and get. The simplicity of their lives safeguards their happiness. But even their happiness is not impervious to grief and suffering. Disasters and calamities spare no mortal.
When modern materialist philosophers and scientists find that unalloyed and un ebbing happiness is impossible in human life, they advise the prudence of accepting a modicum of qualified happiness as the utmost one can expect to achieve. But, whether they know it or not, man is so made that he cannot rest permanently content with a qualified or limited happiness. He is ever stung by what is known as divine discontent. But why should a finite, mortal being yearn for an infinite and immortal happiness ? Because —and here is a truth of supreme importance which the scientist
willfully ignores—there is in him something or someone that is not finite but infinite, not mortal but immortal, not prone to suffering but eternally blissful. His ceaseless chase after the finite objects of the world is but a hidden chase after the Infinite, hidden from him, because he is ignorant and egoistic, self-severed from the unity of universal existence. He seeks the Infinite, but
ignorantly seeks
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it in the finite, and flits about like the bee from object to object in the vain hope of finding in them the ocean of divine honey his soul is athirst for. His yearning for unmixed and uninterrupted happiness is not, therefore, an illusion of which he has to cure himself by the remedy prescribed by the scientist, but a signature and prophecy of his destiny. The secret discontent, which dogs him even in the midst of what passing happiness he can snatch from the changing conditions of his life, is the ransom he has to pay for the endless bliss of his immortal existence. The blissful life of the mystics is a perpetual beacon to him. "Thou hast made us for Thyself, and our hearts are restless till they find rest in Thee."1
(To be continued)
RlSHABHCHAND
1 St. Augustine.
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(Continued)
WHAT is the philosophic scepticism that limits the drive of " Science ? It can be summed up in the following propositions: (i) that all knowledge proceeds from experience, (ii) that our mind is a blank slate on which ideas are inscribed solely by experience, (iii) that experience gives us no justification for prediction, necessary connections, generalisations, scientific induction. There is not even a justification for our belief that the sun will rise tomorrow. There is no justification in our seeking of order, regularity, uniformity, system in Nature, for these can never be discovered by experience, and indeed, let us repeat, it is asserted categorically, experience is the sole means of knowledge.
This is empiricism and its scepticism; it professes a natural love for Science, since Science professes to be experimental and to base its conclusions on the evidence of experience. As a consequence empiricism offers to Science its gift of scepticism and asks Science to give up all its claim to the knowledge of certainty, of causality, of universal order and universal laws. Science has not fully accepted this gift, but at the border-line where philosophy and science meet, Science appears to yield to the temptation of the gift, and to return to her field of inquiry with the limiting and disabling influence of the philosophic empiricism. The effect of this influence has been reinforced by some of the startling discoveries of Science itself. For instance, Science has come to perceive that the behaviour of Matter at its sub-atomic level baffles our attempt at determinate knowledge and at prediction. This is the famous theory in Quantum Mechanics called the Theory of Indeterminacy. This theory has triggered off a great controversy over the question of Causality in Science and Philosophy and the question of Determinism vs. Freewill in Ethics and Theology. In any case, in the present climate, Science seems to be influenced by philosophic empiricism and in turn to supply evidence and support to it.
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But while this controversy continues, we perceive that the world is wonderful, and it is the sense of wonder that is the soul of Science; this sense of wonder expresses itself, not in a bundle of statements, but in the meanings that these statements convey, the meanings that the experiences convey, the experiences which are at the root of those statements. Before the invasion of the philosophic empiricism, it was widely admitted that experience by itself is "blind" ; but there is in us a cognitive drill which penetrates into our experience and unites the object of experience with our mind and the resultant is the excitement of the self-discovery in the object-discovery, and in the equation of the subject and the object is found the notation of the meaning of experience. This cognitive drill is nothing else than the Reason, the faculty of Ideas and Concepts, the nisus, that finds its satisfaction in Understanding. This Reason, it was maintained, is not a blank slate, but an active embryo, which receiving experience of the particular germinates the knowledge of the universal; it is the pregnant bed of the concepts of "all", "unity", "order", "harmony", "system". The joy of Science is not merely in experience, but it is chiefly in the rational interpretation of experience, in fitting a stray flower in the scheme of universal flora, in perceiving connections and necessary connections, in fact, in making a leap from the known to the unknown, in knowing that which is still not experienced. Science, it was understood, was not merely experimental, it was a rational adventure for a rational assurance.
Among many powers of the Reason, the one which has been most instrumental in the progress of Science is its power of induction, which is a process of inferring the universal from the particular. This principle is a stumbling block to the possible triumph of empiricism. Some honest empiricists have admitted their failure to account for the inductive reasoning on the empirical grounds, but dogmatically enough they ignore the problem or postpone the solution of the problem. This creates a hesitation in the entire mood of scientific thinking and acts as a brake in the field of Pure Science. But why don't the empiricists admit their failure ?
The answer is that empiricism is a dogma. It assumes that all knowledge is derived from experience, and it refuses 'to budge
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from its position, even when faced with the contrary evidence
Besides, is its own dogmatic statement derived from experience ? Certainly not. It cannot be, for it is a universal statement, and since according to its own admission there can be no experience of universality, no universal statement can be derived from experience. Empiricism is indeed self-refuting.
However, modern empiricism is a revolt against Reason and there is a deeper reason for this revolt. For Reason is glorious but it has serious limitations. For the chief perception of Reason is that of the universals or of unity. And yet, Reason itself admits that it does not understand unity; on the one hand, it postulates unity to explain the particulars, and yet, on the other hand, unity seems by its nature to consume away within itself all the particulars leaving behind no reality of the particulars. The idea of unity baffles the intellect. The present moment is grasped by its connection with the preceding and the succeeding moments, leading thus the unity of past, present and future, and the only accurate description of such a unity of Time is an all-containing ever-new moment, a description which intellect confesses it does not comprehend. Hence follows the philosophic agnosticism.
What a disappointment ! To understand the particular we go to the universal or to the unity, and this unity simply escapes us ! And, in the bargain, it seems to give an assurance that the particular from the unitarian point of view cannot remain a particular ! We neither know the particular nor the universal!
Empiricists come back on the stage. The particular is frozen by the unknowable universal ? they ask. Is not then the unknowable universal a fiction of the intellect corresponding to no reality ? Particular at least, they argue, is before us ; we know what it is ; true, we cannot know it fully ; but we know at least something of it ! Whereas, with the so-called rational ideas we are led to lose even this bit of knowledge. Let us admit then the limits of our knowledge, but let us be sure and precise of whatever we can legitimately know. Science is already
experimental. Let us ask it to renounce its rational aspect, and we shall then declare that the authentic knowledge belongs to Science alone. True, we shall not know the future; true, we shall not have the certainties ; true also, we
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shall not be in a position to answer many questions that are so central to man's enquiry, particularly about the values that he is seeking. But that is inevitable. In the words of Russell: "Science tells us what we can know, but what we can know is little, and if we forget how much we cannot know we become insensitive to many things of very great importance.. . . Uncertainty, in the presence of vivid hopes and fears, is painful, but must be endured if wish to live without the support of comforting fairy tales...To teach how to live without certainty, and yet without being paralysed by hesitation, is perhaps the chief thing that philosophy in our age can still do for those who study it."
We thus seem to be swinging back to empiricism and to its uncertainties, its scepticism. From Scylla to Charybdis ! And back to Scylla with a constant prospect to go again to Charybdis ! In this state of disequilibrium and sandwiched between the conflicting affinities with empiricism and rationalism, Science cannot hope to soar very high and to fulfil its dreams or promises. But the state of disequilibrium suggests that there are truths on both the sides of the thesis and the antithesis, and that our search cannot rest until it has found a synthesis at a higher level.
A few remarks would clarify the situation and lead to the solution. Whatever may be higher knowledge, attainable to us or no, it cannot correct or sub late the facts of our experience; what we are perceiving is a fact, and this can never be frozen or evaporated into a nullity. If reason nullifies the reality of the particulars, surely, there is something wrong with the Reason. Experience is certainly a way to knowledge. But empiricism does not fully appreciate the fact that so long as experience needs to find its meaning in a larger context, there is some hiatus in experience. It is wrong to say that our sense-experience or ordinary empirical experience is in need of no interpretation and illumination. Our ordinary experiences are, as Rationalism rightly suggests, 'blind', needing to be illuminated by the rational concepts of unity, order, system, etc. The central difficulty is that these concepts baffle our understanding and are themselves in need of illumination. And that illumination must be neither of the nature of ordinary experience nor of the Pure Reason. Everything would fall in its proper place, everything would find its
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justification if there is a transcendental experience whose meaning is within itself which embraces particulars and the truth of unity and does not need any external fight to illumine it. A self-luminous integral experience would reconcile the claims of empiricism and rationalism. Anything less than the integral would involve a disequilibrium and would disqualify as a sound basis for Science.
In the West, such a basis is hardly perceptible, even though far deep in its most ancient Mysteries, there is a perception which goes beyond empiricism and rationalism. In the East, this basis is there, or was there and can be more easily recovered; but for the moment we do not seem to be in a mood of deep reflection and research, and are likely to receive Science as it comes to us from West, sandwiched and clipped between conflicting theories of Knowledge, in a state of disequilibrium. Let us hope that this mood shall not last long, for if it does, Science will not find its moorings in our Indian set-up and will simply cause the erosion of the values. Science, I think, comes to India to seek its own fulfilment whose promise India secretly holds within herself. It is wrong to suppose that Science is something peculiar to the West; what is peculiar to the West is the modern Science of Matter, but not Science as such. India had developed science to its most sublime heights and intricate details in numerous branches, and its science of the Spirit is the most solid contribution to the world-culture.
It is in this Science of Spirit that we find the affirmation of the Cosmic Consciousness and of the Integral Consciousness, an affirmation, if recognised, would give the most solid foundation for the scientific pursuits and their reconciliation with the highest human and spiritual values. Cosmic Consciousness, Integral Consciousness are not merely abstract ideas; they are experiences, but experiences which transcend the limits of the particular and give a true comprehension of what Reason conceives of unity and fails in its attempt to understand. Unity here is a living fact, a self-luminous fact; the particular too, be it noted, is not frozen, but reveals itself as a demarcation in the totality of the whole. In this experience we have not only the conception of causality, but the actual experience of causality, the working out of the necessary connections by an inherent imperative; the ideas of the Reason thus find in this experience a
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total and fulfilling justification. Not only that, but we gain a farther revelation that the method of analysis which is the present method of Science is not the only method of knowing the universe. A far more powerful knowledge can be ours if we approach the universe synthetically and intuitively. And the knowledge thus gained is likely to be much more powerful and much more fruitful. The Raja yogic claim that by the Samyama, the method of Dharana, Dhyana and Samadhi, by concentration on the object, the knowledge of the object is revealed, is not a phantasy, but a very natural and simple truth of the yogic field.
The method of Intuition is essentially the method of experience; whereas in science, experience and the field of experience are circumscribed by a mental approach of the mental analysis, in the yogic field, the method is that of experience of identity. And if we reflect on the knowledge-situation, we find that the knowledge of an object can never be adequate unless knowledge transcends its seeking activity and identifies itself with the object and returns from it as a revelation of the object. That and that only would be the indubitable knowledge.
But yogic knowledge has been criticised on the ground that it is subjective, it
is supraphysical, and that there is no physical proof of this knowledge and of
the object of this knowledge. But it may be replied that it is not true that the
physical proof of the yogic knowledge is impossible; but at the same time, it
would be irrational to demand a physical proof of supraphysical things. And
essentially, we have to admit that all knowledge is at bottom subjective or
transcendentally subjective. It has again been argued that the yogic knowledge is subject to error and apt to turn into superstition. But, it may be replied that error is not the prerogative of the yogic knowledge alone; the objection would be unsurmountable only if there were no way of eliminating error; but surely, Yoga has in its body the method of inner verification and direct comparison of experiences as the methods of the elimination of error. That experience which embraces all other experiences and is itself self-luminous is the deliverer of true knowledge and Yoga is precisely the Science of this experience, and of the experiences leading to it. But still, it may be argued, there are conflicts among the yogic experiences and among the claims
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to truth arising from these experiences. In answer, however, we must point out that in all fields of yogic experiences there are regions with regard to which there are no conflicting claims. At the same time, we must not simplify the conflicting claims by saying that the conflict is only verbal and not real. For, at a certain penultimate region of the spiritual field, there are experiences which seem to be final, and when they come upon our silenced mind, they come with an overwhelming-ness of finality. But very often these experiences are followed by some other ones and thus the partiality of the experience is corrected, not by critical or rational reflection, nor by a subaltern, by the cancellation of the previous experience, but by the enrichment of the experiences.
But still, the very fact, that there are at a certain stage conflicting experiences by the method of Intuition, shows that Intuition cannot be regarded as the highest method of knowledge. And this indeed we must grant in its fundamental substance. We might say, there must be, if there is to be indubitable knowledge, not only a knowledge by identity, but the knowledge by comprehensive identity; intuition is a torch fight, but not the plenary sunhght. The supreme method of knowledge has to be not only intuitive, but comprehensively intuitive, a method by which the whole is grasped, known, realised.
That there is such a means of knowledge is an affirmation of the Veda and the Upanishad, although during the Age of Reason this method was eclipsed. But in modern India, this method of knowledge was eminently revived by Sri Ramakrishna and we find in Sri Aurobindo a consummation of this method and the knowledge by this method.
This consummating knowledge is the all-reconciling knowledge; it is the knowledge that transcends all mental and spiritual agnosticism. It confirms the scientific assumption of the reality of the world and the conceptual certainty of the Infinite and the One, it reconciles the deliverances of experience and those of reflective reason; it unravels from religions their spiritual content and confirms their truths setting them all in a harmony; it is a knowledge that gives the clasp of the Highest and the penetration to the lowest category of Matter; it perceives all the universe as one unity, and all movements as the varied breath of the One Spirit; in its vast consciousness, there is no
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distinction between religious and secular, no distinction between sacred and profane; all is spirit and all is sacred; all branches of knowledge are so many angles looking at the one Spirit; Science, Art, Philosophy are the three varying vibrations of one essential movement of knowledge, and there is no conflict between them. Here is the vastness which consummates all aspiration towards perfection and spontaneously harmonises each with all the rest.
(To be continued)
KIREET M. JOSHI
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REVIEWS
Die Kunst Indiens (The Art of India) By Ervin Bartay. Translated from Hungarian by Edith Roth. German adaptation by Heinz Kucharski. Pub. Academie Verlag. Berlin.
This magnificent volume on the Art of India illustrated with 444 pictures and 6 colour plates is a worthy tribute to the labours of the eminent Hungarian orientalist Ervin Baktay (1896-1963). The learned doctor visited India in the course of his trip to Tibet, which place he looked upon as the original native place of the Hungarians,
The subjects covered in the course of the 29 chapters of this volume are astonishingly varied: history, geography, religion, philosophy, arts, architecture, sculpture and so on. The exposition begins with the background of the country and its inhabitants, followed by a chapter on 'Oldest Art (Stone Age)-Culture of the Indus-valley' and ends with a considered evaluation of the 'Effects of the Western Influence on the Art of India'. The writer rightly includes the Islamic contribution in the total appraisal. And while he generally follows the line taken by western scholars in the interpretation of the Indian values, he does make certain striking observations in some places which are refreshing. He points out that caste and class are not the same in Indian society. He discusses how the Ashoka Pillars testify to the elimination of the Persian and Hellenic influences from Indian Art in the Age of the Mauryas. His remarks on the 'superabundance in Iridian Art' remind us of Sri Aurobindo's comments on the subject. Interesting too is his observation that Indian Art is 'Indian, not Buddhistic, Hindu, or Jaina etc.; only their frames speak of the particular religion. The artist had no living models but created from memory and thought-picture shaped and consciously fixed within'.
Dr. Kucharski has done a great service to Indian Art by his discriminative presentation of the illustrations and the commentary.
PETER STEIGER
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Kindle the Light By T. L. Vaswani. Pub. Gita Pub. House, Sadhu Vaswani Path, Poona I. Pp. 157,
Miletus, one of the seven Sages of Greece, was asked :
Q : Who is the most ancient ?
A : God.
Q : What is the most beautiful ?
A : The Cosmos.
Q : What is the greatest of all ?
A : Space.
Q : What is the most constant ?
A : Hope.
Q : What is the best of all ?
A : Virtue.
Q : What is the quickest of all ?
A : Thought.
Q : What is the strongest of all ?
A : Necessity.
Q : What is the easiest of all ?
A : To give advice.
Q : And what is the most difficult ?
A : To know thyself. (P. 48)
And to know thyself is the theme of this anthology of writings of Sadhu Vaswani. The topics are varied but the approach is everywhere the same, to seek the Light in every form in creation, awake to the Light in oneself and in the vision of Light to find the key of Love. "Love lifted the Veil" (Jela-ud-Din Rumi) over the mystery of existence and makes life meaningful.
The pages of this book are full of this aroma of love.
M. P. PANDIT
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