CHAPTER III AN EPOCHAL SYNTHESIS PART I AGES ago, when the natural unity of the spiritual vision and culture of the Vedas and the Upanishads began to give way before the developing complexity and individualistic self-affirmation of the parts of the being of man, each of which sought its own separate spiritual satisfaction and characteristic fulfilment to the neglect : and exclusion of the others, the Gitâ propounded a magnificent synthesis, and paved the way for a harmonious growth of the whole human personality into the fullness and perfection of the Divine. All the important strands of spiritual culture, current at the time or regarded as essential

CHAPTER XIII MIND AND ITS PURIFICATION PART II THE entanglement of the parts and functions of the antaḥkaraṇa being bafflingly great, we have to fix upon something in it which will lend itself more easily and with a better grace than the others to the work of purification; but it must be something which is the most evolved in the nature and able to lead it to a higher poise and a more efficient working. For, the secret of dealing successfully with the instrumental nature is to use the most developed part of it as the grappling hook for the hauling and overhauling of the other parts, and steadily diffuse its influence everywhere. If one

CHAPTER XXX THE INTEGRAL PERFECTION "A DIVINE perfection of the human being is our aim." It is not only the perfection of the soul—the soul is, indeed, eternally perfect in itself—but the harmonious perfection of the whole being, inner and outer, that is sought in the Integral Yoga. In the last chapter, we have traced the long, meandering course of the triple trans- formation. We can now say that the victorious consummation of that transformation is the perfection and fulfilment we aim at in this Yoga. "To be perfect as our Father in Heaven is perfect" is not an idle dream of the religious visionary, but the deepest, ineradicable urge of the human conscio

CHAPTER XXII KNOWLEDGE—THE LIGHT THAT FULFILS PART I WHAT IS KNOWLEDGE IN yogic parlance and spiritual philosophy knowledge does not mean mental knowledge. Mental knowledge is a knowledge of objects taken as separate integers or aspects, and not viewed as indivisible parts of a universal whole. Even when it arrives at a synthesis, it is an aggregate or a sum-total that it grasps, and never the essential unity of things. Besides, the mind can know only the surface of things, their appearances, and not their essential substance and reality. "Mind in its essence is a consciousness which measures, limits, cuts out forms of things from the i

CHAPTER XV THE PHYSICAL NATURE AND ITS PURIFICATION PART I BY physical nature Sri Aurobindo means the physical mind, the physical part of life, called the physical-vital or nervous being, and the body. Before we enter upon the process of their purification, we had better be clear about what these terms signify. As I have already indicated elsewhere, there is no Hegelian obscurity about Sri Aurobindo's philosophy, nor an indefinite fluidity in the connotation of the terms he uses. There is, on the contrary, a remarkably scientific precision and definiteness, which disarms all fear of incomprehension in those who have the will, a subtle a

CHAPTER XXV THE INTEGRAL LIBERATION PART I No ideal produces in the majority of spiritual seekers so great a thrill, such an inspiring sense of exaltation as the ideal of liberation. All rigour of self-discipline, all stress of a sustained, high-uplifting endeavour, and even all harsh austerities seem little enough price for the priceless state of spiritual freedom, if they can but contribute to its attainment. Difficulties are resolutely met and dangers courageously braved by those who are bent upon realising the essential freedom of their soul. What appears even as self-mortification or an extreme self-denial to others, may be, to a spiritua

CHAPTER XXIX THE INTEGRAL TRANSFORMATION PART III THE THREE STEPS OF TRANSFORMATION THE essential function of the soul is to offer all things to the Divine for transformation, for it has come down into mortal birth for the only purpose of accomplishing a perfect manifestation of the Divine in its phenomenal becoming. But for the soul or the psychic, our mind, life and body would have always remained in an un- relieved darkness and gone on chasing after the fleeting objects of the world, and involving themselves more and more in futile struggles and endless suffering. The psychic awakes as it evolves in Nature, and tries to influence its i

Sri Aurobindo in Baroda "These are they who are conscious of the much falsehood in the world; they grow in the house of Truth, they are strong and invincible sons of Infinity.” — Rigveda, VII.605 1893 - a memorable year! It was in 1893 that Sri Aurobindo came back from England to fight for the freedom of India and release her imprisoned godhead, and Vivekananda sailed for America carrying with him the light of the Vedanta to the benighted humanity of the West. What was Sri Aurobindo thinking, what were his feelings as he came in sight of his beloved motherland? When he had left India, he was a mere child of seven, perhaps unaware of the heavenly fire s

Sri Aurobindo His Life Unique Publisher's Note Rishabhchand, the author of this book, has to his credit a number of other books, all of them shot through and through with the Light and Presence of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother. One cannot fail to perceive in them an unusual harmony of the intellect's clear thinking, intuition's deep penetration and the spirit's permeating suffusion. They stand out impressively against the background of innate humility and colour gracefully the flow of his style and language. He wrote it indeed as one inspired by the Mother and the very fact of its serial publication in the "Bulletin of Sri Aurobindo Internat

Sri Aurobindo at Chandernagore "... We do want to realise Dharma or spirituality in an integral way and to see Indian spiritual discipline founded for ever on renunciation. But we are not prepared to accept the meaning India once attached to the words spirituality and renunciation in a spell of delusion. We want to see India enthroned as the teacher of the art of enjoyment as well as of renunciation to the world. Let us never forget that India will give to the West the lesson of the perfect enjoyment. Why are we anxious to confine Dharma to a narrow groove? Why are we anxious to base spirituality upon the unreality or insignificance of the world? All th