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August 2007 Volume VIII Issue II |
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EDITORIAL This is the 60th anniversary of independent India! A nation, after centuries of serfdom, had become free from the yoke of foreign rulers. It had all the dreams of a golden era that would dawn after August 15, 1947. Ananda Reddy
Indian Tradition: An International Online Dialogue The participants of the dialogue: BM, who lead the dialogue (from Miamisburg, OH, USA); PG (from Arras, France); KS (from Santa Clara, CA, USA); GR (from Baroda, Gujarat); KP (from Gauteng, South Africa); MD (from Mumbai, Maharashtra) BM to all (14 March 2007): What is the place India holds in the world-consciousness, the special role India has to play in the future evolution of our individual and collective consciousness, in making this human life into a divine life? As The Mother once said, “India ought to be the spiritual leader of the world. Inside she has the capacity, but outside… for the moment there is still much to do for her to become actually the spiritual leader of the world. There is such a wonderful opportunity just now!” (CWM 13: 375) Sri Aurobindo writes in The Foundations of Indian Culture: The whole root of difference between Indian and European culture springs from the spiritual aim of Indian civilisation. It is the turn which this aim imposes on the all the rich and luxuriant variety of its forms and rhythms that gives to it its unique character. For even what it has in common with other cultures gets from that turn a stamp of striking originality and solitary greatness. A spiritual aspiration was the governing force of this culture, its core of thought, its ruling passion. Not only did it make spirituality the highest aim of life, but it even tried, as far as that could be done in the past conditions of the human race, to turn the whole of life towards spirituality. (SABCL 14: 121) A few years ago I bought a beautiful picture book called Living Faith: Windows into the Sacred Life of India. It is a collection of photographs taken by the Indian photographer, Dinesh Khanna. The flap of the book has this to say — “Living Faith is an intimate, revealing record of a deeply spiritual way of life. It acknowledges the strength of private worship and shared faith, which ultimately transcends the more visible but short-lived realities of discord.” One has to see the pictures in this remarkable collection to get a sense of what Pico Iyer (who has written an introductory essay to this book) refers to as “something of what India does, at its best: namely, to take individual moments of worship, private acts of devotion – the soul in solitary colloquy with its God – and somehow bind them into the larger fabric of society and life.” (p. 21) What I enjoyed most in this collection of photographs is how they capture the idea of visual, lived expression of Divine (and love for Divine) that is present everywhere in almost every street corner in India. The sheer profusion of “sacred” can be both mind-boggling but also quite healing in its own way, and certainly representing in visual terms the ideal of spiritual aim of life. The separation between human and Divine, between secular and sacred is not as sharp and divisive as we see in the western societies. At least that is how I have come to know and experience India. Of course, in some elite metro areas one will now find some artificially created, sanitized, western style urban-ness, but that is still quite unreal, and the moment one steps out of it, one is in the middle of pulsating, throbbing human expression of Divine or an attempt at bringing Divine closer to human — in a make-shift temple created by simply placing an old, half-broken statue of a deity or simply a stone marked with holy red powder, or a picture of one’s favorite deity glued awkwardly on the dashboard of a car or taxi — almost everywhere. Certainly, the most common form of spiritual practice (sadhana or yoga) for majority of people in India is the yoga of love and devotion (Bhaktiyoga). It is everywhere, in all religious traditions. The book, Living Faith: Windows into the Sacred Life of India, is an excellent visual representation of this. It seems in Indian context there still abounds a plethora of external influences which may or perhaps do play an important role in imprinting on the hearts and minds of people of all ages and backgrounds that there is more to the visible world of Matter, that there is Divine Presence in all of the world and life that we see, and that spiritual aim of life can co-exist with other aims of life. Science, Rationality and Reason have generally found a peaceful co-existence with Spirituality there than is generally seen in the West. For example, in schools also, including the public schools (run by government) children are not exposed to a sense of a complete separation of sacred and secular. No school function starts without an invocation to whatever is accepted as Supreme, Higher Power. Even in public schools the day starts with some form of prayer to the Higher Invisible Source (or God in ordinary terms) asking for wisdom, grace and strength, but the conception of God in these prayers is of the one that transcends all religions or is outside of all religious conceptions. I can think of several such school prayer songs that have been sung by generations of school children in India. (This is in contrast to the long-standing debate on prayer in public schools in the US, for example.) All of this makes the idea of spirituality lot more “living” and “real” (at least, in the externally visible sense) than may be possible where spirituality is primarily understood through an intellectual-philosophic standpoint, or where the division between sacred and secular spheres of life is much rigid. These differences do make a difference. I wish to strongly emphasize, however, that none of the above description of a visibly vibrant religio-spiritual culture in India stands in any opposition to the truth that we all are spiritual beings, regardless of where we are born, where we live and the cultural heritage we inherit from our background. We all have the spark of Divine within us, which is trying to reveal itself in and through all our life experiences. Spiritual practice or sadhana facilitates this bringing forth of the psychic being, to help us recognize and grow within us an inner central aspiration toward Divine. Because we all are multiple selves within us, all our physical, vital and mental preparation and cultivation also help us grow into our knowledge of the Self and is a preparation toward the cultivation and flowering of the psychic and of the spirit. Even if most of our formal educational experiences have been focused around mind, because of our innate psychic and spiritual aspiration we are not content, we aspire for something beyond our minds, for something beyond the visible. And that aspiration is behind why we are here working together on this course! Why are we not satisfied with the status quo, why are we progressively reaching out and digging within to the wider, deeper and higher dimensions and domains of the individual, the social, the universal and the eternal? It is simply because that to aspire toward the Divine is the one aim of human life that distinguishes us from all other life in the world. And in that sense, spirituality lives in all of us, and around all of us, regardless of the outer physical context. Divine is beyond all the man-made fabrications of “East” and “West”, it can’t be known by an intellectual synthesis or reconciliation of all that humans have philosophized. It can only be lived and experienced, and it requires persistent will and constant aspiration — individual and collective. Generally, spiritual seeking is understood as seeking for God, or seeking for God-realization, union with the Divine. That is the goal of most spiritual/yogic traditions of the past. Sri Aurobindo explains that Integral Yoga is called ‘Integral’ because it takes up the essence and many processes of the old yogas, and then goes beyond in its newness which is in its aim, standpoint and the totality of its method (Integral Yoga: Sri Aurobindo’s Teaching & Method of Practice, pp. 37–38). Integral Yoga aims to bring the Superconscient into the waking consciousness and let the union with Divine or Superconscient guide the process of transformation of the nature (Ibid., pp. 35–37). In other words, Integral Yoga can be said to begin where old yogas end. Spirituality outside of any and all man-made religions, outside of the many man-made conceptions and images of God, spirituality that is all-pervading in all life, all matter — that is what is to be sought, that is what needs to be lived and experienced. Spiritual consciousness that is higher, wider and deeper than the ordinary human consciousness but includes and transcends it all, spirituality that seeks to integrate the inner and outer existence, spirituality that aims to transform the human life into divine life — that is what is to be sought. In this context, let me provide a glimpse of what Sri Aurobindo writes about the inner vision of the India: India saw from the beginning,—and, even in her ages of reason and her age of increasing ignorance, she never lost hold of the insight,—that life cannot be rightly seen in the sole light, cannot be perfectly lived in the sole power of its externalities. She was alive to the greatness of material laws and forces … Hence from long ages of this insight and practice there was ingrained in her her spirituality, her powerful psychic tendency, her great yearning to grapple with the infinite and possess it, her ineradicable religious sense, her idealism, her Yoga, the constant turn of her art and her philosophy. It is this integral nature of spirituality that Sri Aurobindo teaches us; that, he reminds us, has been and will continue to be the gift of India to the world. The truth of “All Life is Yoga” (SABCL 20, p. 4, last line) finds its roots in this eternal Indian Tradition. KS to BM (18 March 2007): PG to BM (18 March 2007): BM to KS (19 March 2007): But if this nature of socialization pattern is seeming shaky because of social-economic changes that are part and parcel of the development process these days, what do you think will be needed as time goes by? Should other institutions pick up some of the acculturation work that families used to provide? Is there a need to rethink the role and character of other organizations that are part of children’s social-cultural experience? What alternative “developmental” models or definitions of progress might emerge from within the Indian Traditions or cultural ways of being that could offset the negative impact of this economization as you point out? Some things to reflect upon … BM to PG (19 March 2007): I wish to add a couple more examples to further strengthen this line of argument. I am not sure if you ever saw or heard about the TV adaptations of two epics, the Ramayana and the Mahabharata which were first serialized by the Indian state-run channel Doordarshan between 1987 and 1990. These programmes soon became the most popular serials ever shown on Indian television. Several media reports in India talked about the ritual viewing of these shows all over, particularly North India, streets being deserted while the shows were on, viewers performing purification rituals, garlanding their TV sets, and participating in what became a national devotional activity. One survey claimed that the Mahabharata was seen by 92 per cent of all people with access to television. The popular response to these serials, particularly the Ramayana serial because it was the first, was of such a huge magnitude that it inspired several ‘academic’ sociological studies — in India and elsewhere. Many such studies were in criticism of the show’s impact, and pointed to the spreading wave of a certain ‘religio-nationalistic’ consciousness that could prove to be a threat to the ‘secular’ character of Indian pluralistic society. Very few of these studies actually tried to make sense of the Indian public response from within the Indian cultural traditions, and challenged these more ‘modernist, sociological analyses’ which don’t generally recognize or appreciate the traditional Indian socio-cultural mindset. One such example was from a wonderful essay, All in the (Raghu) family: A Video Epic in Cultural Context by Philip Lutgendorf (1995) who remarked — Such critics are often out of touch with the religious customs of their own urban neighbors, and choose to overlook, for example, the purificatory puja of motor vehicles, printing presses, and other mechanical devices, which is common throughout the country [p. 241] … Ramayan [became] the most popular program ever shown on Indian television, and something more: a phenomenon of such proportions that intellectual and policymakers struggled to come to terms with its significance [p. 217] … for majority of Indian viewers, the Ramayana serial was not simply a program to “see”, it was something to do – an event to participate in – and this participation was nearly always a group (extended family, neighborhood, village) activity [p. 243]. PG to BM (19 March 2007): I have read short versions of Mahabharata and Ramayana. My first contact with Indian spirituality was at the age of 14 through the Gita that I had picked it up in my parents’ books. It can be added that I have been to Badrinath, just nearby there are two little temples in caves, one dedicated to Ganesha and the other to Vyasa, there was a man telling the beginning of the story. KS to BM (20 March 2007): BM to KS and PG (20 March 2007): From the first time I came to India—in 1914—I felt that India is my true country, the country of my soul and spirit … my purpose is to show that truth lies in union rather than in division ... I am French by birth and early education, I am Indian by choice and predilection. In my consciousness there is no antagonism between the two, on the contrary, they combine very well and complete one another. (CWM 13, p. 43) KS, I agree that the question about finding alternative developmental models or definitions of progress is a very broad one. I am thinking that perhaps as we all deepen our understandings of Indian Traditions and Indian cultural frameworks — both in an intellectual way and in a real, lived sort of way — we will be able to initiate this inquiry with the necessary courage that you speak of. It also occurs to me that so far the developmental models that India and many other non-western civilizations/nations have had to work with were those that grew out of very different cultural traditions and trajectory of intellectual thought. And in the absence of any indigenous or home-grown alternatives, and as a result of several reasons nations and societies like India have evolved their understandings and processes of development and progress with some form of borrowed or artificially-imposed structures of ‘modernity’. Result is more confusion, more problem, more disharmony between tradition and modernity, between Indian State and various sections of society, between different religious/ethnic communities, etc. Sri Aurobindo, in his Social and Political Thought, gives us glimpses of an alternative trajectory of human and societal progress that make us examine these issues in much detail and with a wider lens. I find your response about inter-community relationships an interesting one. Besides the points you mention I also think that this type of border-crossing resulting from various socio-economic-cultural changes also makes an impact in how the Indian Traditions continue to renew themselves in a grounds-up sort of way and how the cross-fertilization of traditions, customs and practices make for an overall richer cultural tapestry. You give the example of spiritual institutions that may fill some of the gaps in terms of socialization of people into Indian Traditions, what do you think of the role of educational institutions? I realize this in itself may be a very, very huge topic to take up...but I just mention it here for any future reflection and contemplation. GR to BM (21 March 2007): BM to GR (21 March 2007): Some questions for all of us to ponder upon. KP to BM (21 March 2007): That said, culturally modern India has me a bit worried: the growing commercialization (everyone must own a TV/motorbike/cell phone, etc. etc.); the corruption; alcohol abuse (in the villages around Auroville for example that seems to tear into the very fabric of family/community life, with the violence and abuse that goes with that. (I don’t know if that is also a result of westernization). I can just hope that India will move more in the direction that Sri Aurobindo wanted (becoming the spiritual leader of the world?) than trying the western model, of money and materialism. And yes, I agree, it is truly amazing and wonderful how India integrate spirituality into the everyday life. BM to KP (21 March 2007): So you are very right — when we look around in the modern-day India, we don’t see the India that The Mother and Sri Aurobindo speak of, the India that many other spiritual masters in different times have spoken of. We see people chasing after newer models of cell phones, branded jeans, designer sarees and all the luxuries of material life. We see people glued to TV advertisements to stay up to date with new marketing gimmicks and sales. These middle-class and upper-class lifestyle aspirations create another whole set of problems for very large sections of Indian society which are unable to afford these comforts. Crime and all other social problems increase manifold. Commercialization is running rampant. Capitalism and all its attendants — social, cultural, political — are coming in from every open door and window they can find in the modern-day, liberal, open-economy India. I am reminded of something V.P. Varma wrote in his book — Political philosophy of Sri Aurobindo — “Capitalism can only utilize certain feelings for its own purposes; it cannot create them.” (1960, p. 192) When I first read it, I said to myself — how simply he presents a really deep and complex idea! We generally like to blame American or western style capitalism — I have done it so many times myself — for many of the problems of present world and present-day India. But then the very human feelings (frailties, perhaps?) of possession, acquisition, greed for wealth, power to exploit and extract from those that are weaker than us, etc., are so easily ignored in our incomplete analysis of how to make the world better. We don’t want to objectively examine and accept these frailties and work towards a deeper transformation of our individual nature. Why? Because that is such a hard work, it almost seems impossible. But then a part of us always knows that nothing else would ever work, it hasn’t. And this is true for everyone, everywhere. And it is also true that this transformation — in individual and society — doesn’t come without many initial hardships, even failures, without taking many wrong steps. The path is not linear and straight, the curves, detours, spirals, layovers, even fallbacks are pretty much on every turn. What may also be needed is to look beyond these surface moves and turns. I recall Sri Aurobindo’s words from The Synthesis of Yoga — “But all life, when we look behind its appearances, is a vast Yoga of Nature who attempts in the conscious and the subconscious to realise her perfection in an ever-increasing expression of her yet unrealised potentialities and to unite herself with her own divine reality.” (SABCL 20, p. 6) So it is highly likely, perhaps even more than likely that underneath all the craze for camera cell phones, fancy outfits, expensive cars, film stars’ endorsements, slogans of ‘India Shining’ etc. — all of which is visibly popular in the modern urban India — if there is an underlying, mostly hidden and sometimes revealing itself, spirit of an evolution of consciousness, individual and collective, all the rest is an outer appearance — not to be dismissed, but to be seen in its right spirit as a temporary necessity, and gradually and consciously perfected as the individuals and society ascend on the path of transformation. Nature uses all possible means to accomplish its task. Perhaps it may be argued that even the unbridled commercialization of individual and collective mindset may serve its own special purpose in the individual’s and society’s ascend to a transformed outer and inner life. To quote Sri Aurobindo once again, this time from one of his speeches in 1908 — “A nation is a living entity, full of consciousness; it is not something made up or fabricated. A living nation is always growing; it must grow, it must attain ever loftier heights. This may happen after a thousand years or in the next twenty years, but happen it must” (Speech delivered on 15th January 1908) (CWSA 7, p. 812). I find comfort every time I recall these words of The Mother — “Our hopes are never too great for manifestation. We cannot conceive of any thing that cannot be.” (CWM 14, p. 186) If India as the spiritual leader of the world is an idea that cannot be, it would never have been conceived. GR to BM (22 March 2007): KP to BM (22 March 2007): MD to BM (22 March 2007): And if such was the force of her spiritual drive, it shakes me awake to the realisation that I don’t want to call myself an Indian if I cant be an Indian. ‘Indian’ is not just a geographical implication, its a responsibility, one that makes you seek the divine in every movement and every moment. It makes me see the divine, even if it is only for a short while, all around me, and makes me come alive to the fact that “All life is yoga”. The task before us, if India must be the spiritual leader of the world, is to revive this aim and make it a living reality in our hearts. Anyone who lives this aim is an Indian; and for that matter an American or a German can be more ‘Indian’ than an Indian. This section of the dialogue has made me see, once again, the true significance of the word ‘Indian’ and has made me want to live up to the privilege that it presents. I truly hope that somehow this spark of Indian-ness be lit in every child and every adult through discussions like this one conducted by the Sri Aurobindo Centre for Advanced Research. BM to all (22 March 2007): 1. “Differences of credal belief are to the Indian mind nothing more than various ways of seeing the one Self and Godhead in all. Self-realisation is the one thing needful; to open to the inner Spirit, to live in the Infinite, to seek after and discover the Eternal, to be in union with God, that is the common idea and aim of religion, that is the sense of spiritual salvation, that is the living Truth that fulfils and releases. This dynamic following after the highest spiritual truth and the highest spiritual aim are the uniting bond of Indian religion and, behind all its thousand forms, its one common essence.” (SABCL 14, p. 127) 2. “… not only was this greatest and widest spiritual truth seen in India with the boldest largeness, felt and expressed with a unique intensity, and approached from all possible sides, but it was made consciously the grand uplifting idea of life, the core of all thinking, the foundation of all religion, the secret sense and declared ultimate aim of human existence. The truth announced is not peculiar to Indian thinking; it has been seen and followed by the highest minds and souls everywhere. But elsewhere it has been the living guide only of a few thinkers, or of some rare mystics or exceptionally gifted spiritual natures. The mass of men have had no understanding, no distant perception, not even a reflected glimpse of this something Beyond; they have lived only in the lower sectarian side of religion, in inferior ideas of the Deity or in the outward mundane aspects of life. But Indian culture did succeed by the strenuousness of its vision, the universality of its approach, the intensity of its seeking in doing what has been done by no other culture. It succeeded in stamping religion with the essential ideal of a real spirituality; it brought some living reflection of the very highest spiritual truth and some breath of its influence into every part of the religious field. Nothing can be more untrue than to pretend that the general religious mind of India has not at all grasped the higher spiritual or metaphysical truths of Indian religion. It is a sheer falsehood or a wilful misunderstanding to say that it has lived always in the externals only of rite and creed and shibboleth. On the contrary, the main metaphysical truths of Indian religious philosophy in their broad idea-aspects or in an intensely poetic and dynamic representation have been stamped on the general mind of the people. The ideas of Maya, Lila, divine Immanence are as familiar to the man in the street and the worshipper in the temple as to the philosopher in his seclusion, the monk in his monastery and the saint in his hermitage. The spiritual reality which they reflect, the profound experience to which they point, has permeated the religion, the literature, the art, even the popular religious songs of a whole people.” (SABCL 14, pp. 127–128) 3. “India recognised authority of spiritual experience and knowledge, but she recognised still more the need of variety of spiritual experience and knowledge. Even in the days of decline when the claim of authority became in too many directions rigorous and excessive, she still kept the saving perception that there could not be one but must be many authorities. An alert readiness to acknowledge new light capable of enlarging the old tradition has always been characteristic of the religious mind in India. Indian civilisation did not develop to a last logical conclusion its earlier political and social liberties, - that greatness of freedom or boldness of experiment belongs to the West; but liberty of religious practice and a complete freedom of thought in religion as in every other matter have always counted among its constant traditions.” (SABCL 14, p. 130) 4. “… spiritual knowledge perceives that there is a greater thing in us; our inmost self, our real being is not the intellect, not the aesthetic, ethical or thinking mind, but the divinity within, the Spirit, and these other things are only the instruments of the Spirit. A mere intellectual, ethical and aesthetic culture does not go back to the inmost truth of the spirit; it is still an Ignorance, an incomplete, outward and superficial knowledge. To have made the discovery of our deepest being and hidden spiritual nature is the first necessity and to have erected the living of an inmost spiritual life into the aim of existence is the characteristic sign of a spiritual culture.” (SABCL 14, pp. 139–140) 5. “… the spirit of Indian religion and spiritual culture has been persistently and immovably the same throughout the long time of its vigour, but its form has undergone remarkable changes. Yet if we look into them from the right centre it will be apparent that these changes are the results of a logical and inevitable evolution inherent in the very process of man’s growth towards the heights.” (SABCL 14, p. 141) 6. “Indian culture recognises the spirit as the truth of our being and our life as a growth and evolution of the spirit. It sees the Eternal, the Infinite, the Supreme, the All; it sees this as the secret highest Self of all, this is what it calls God, the Permanent, the Real, and it sees man as a soul and power of this being of God in Nature. The progressive growth of the finite consciousness of man towards this Self, towards God, towards the universal, the eternal, the infinite, in a word his growth into spiritual consciousness, by the development of his ordinary ignorant natural being into an illumined divine nature, this is for Indian thinking the significance of life and the aim of human existence.” (SABCL 14, p. 156) 7. “It has been said with some truth that for the Indian the whole of life is a religion. True of the ideal of Indian life, it is true to a certain degree and in a certain sense in its fact and practice. No step could be taken in the Indian’s inner or outer life without his being reminded of a spiritual existence. Everywhere he felt the closeness or at least saw the sign of something beyond his natural life, beyond the moment in time, beyond his individual ego, something other than the needs and interests of his vital and physical nature. That insistence gave its tone and turn to his thought and action and feeling; it produced that subtler sensitiveness to the spiritual appeal, that greater readiness to turn to the spiritual effort which are even now distinguishing marks of the Indian temperament. It is that readiness, that sensitiveness which justifies us when we speak of the characteristic spirituality of the Indian people.” (SABCL 14, p. 161) 8. “All beings are to the Indian mind portions of the Divine, evolving souls, and sure of an eventual salvation and release into the spirit. All must feel, as the good in them grows or, more truly, the godhead in them finds itself and becomes conscious, the ultimate touch and call of their highest self and through that call the attraction to the Eternal and Divine. But actually in life there are infinite differences between man and man; some are more inwardly evolved, others are less mature, many if not most are infant souls incapable of great steps and difficult efforts. Each needs to be dealt with according to his nature and his soul stature.” (SABCL 14, p. 162) 9. “… while Indian culture made a distinction between the lower and the higher learning, the knowledge of things and the knowledge of self, it did not put a gulf between them like some religions, but considered the knowledge of the world and things as a preparatory and a leading up to the knowledge of Self and God … All knowledge was woven into one and led up by degrees to the one highest knowledge … The whole right practice of life founded on this knowledge was in the view of Indian culture a Dharma, a living according to a just understanding and right view of self-culture, of the knowledge of things and life and of action in that knowledge. Thus each man and class and kind and species and each activity of soul, mind, life, body has its dharma. But the largest or at least most vitally important part of the Dharma was held to be the culture and ordering of the ethical nature of man.” (SABCL 14, p. 167) 10. “Indian thought took for granted … the ethical nature of man and the ethical law of the world. It considered that man was justified in satisfying his desires, since that is necessary for the satisfaction and expansion of life, but not in obeying the dictates of desire as the law of his being; for in all things there is a greater law, each has not only its side of interest and desire, but its dharma or rule of right practice, satisfaction, expansion, regulation. The Dharma, then, fixed by the wise in the Shastra is the right thing to observe, the true rule of action. First in the web of Dharma comes the social law; for man’s life is only initially for his vital, personal, individual self, but much more imperatively for the community, though most imperatively of all for the greatest Self one in himself and in all beings, for God, for the Spirit. Therefore first the individual must subordinate himself to the communal self, though by no means bound altogether to efface himself in it as the extremists of the communal idea imagine. He must live according to the law of his nature harmonised with the law of his social type and class, for the nation and in a higher reach of his being — this was greatly stressed by the Buddhists — for humanity. Thus living and acting he could learn to transcend the social scale of the Dharma, practise without injuring the basis of life the ideal scale and finally grow into the liberty of the spirit, when rule and duty were not binding because he would then move and act in a highest free and immortal dharma of the divine nature. All these aspects of the Dharma were closely linked up together in a progressive unity.... But behind all dharma and ethics was put, not only as a safeguard but as a light, a religious sanction, a reminder of the continuity of life and of man’s long pilgrimage through many births, a reminder of the Gods and planes beyond and of the Divine, and above it all the vision of a last stage of perfect comprehension and unity and of divine transcendence.” (SABCL 14, pp. 167–168)
BM to all (21 March 2007): 1. Sri Aurobindo writes: “Spirituality is indeed the master-key of the Indian mind; the sense of the infinite is native to it.” (SABCL 14, p. 400) Can you provide some example(s) to illustrate your subjective understanding of this statement? For instance, is there any specific work of Indian art, sculpture, architecture, poetry, literature that comes to your mind which may help you see the truth of the above statement? 2. What, in your view, is the contemporary relevance and significance of the life-affirming spirituality of Indian tradition as described by Sri Aurobindo? 3. Any other thoughts/comments you may like to share in response to this week’s readings? BM to all (26 March 2007): Regarding the special place of “Bindu” in his art, Raza tells us (http://www.shraza.net/vision.html): “Even in the work of these saints, the bindu occupies pride of place. The bindu is the symbol not only of Hindu spirituality, but also of Indian art, aesthetics and awareness of life ... It is absolutely primordial in its nature. When I paint the bindu, I am aware that I am literally in the womb of time, with no disturbance of sound or sight and that I am creating a spark of divinity. I am not painting for the buyer or the lover of my art. I paint to go on a journey within myself. I am excited that when I paint the bindu on my space – which is the canvas – in the solitude of my studio, it is an act of supreme consecration. Wherever my painting hangs, I create a temple.” PG to BM (28 March 2007): To add other examples to those already mentioned in some previous posts, the conception of Time in India seen as a series of very long kalpas of creation, upholding and destruction is breathtaking with a scale of billions of years. Personally, I have been overwhelmed when I saw for the first time some Jain temples on Internet. Especially the Palitana sanctuary in Gujarat, I felt a deep ineffable impression of infinity. It can be noted that I had also some overwhelming experiences with the western classical art too in the museum of Louvres in Paris for instance that I consider as a temple of Art. The statues of Buddha in the Greco-Indian style are also very inspiring, a grasp of peaceful and limitless Nirvana is manifested in human forms. There are the yantras and mantras too, they are symbols of the Divine in design and sound. The symbols of Sri Aurobindo and Mother can be considered as yantras. Secondly, regarding your question of the life-affirming spirituality of India, I would say that Sri Aurobindo recognizes that India could be a spiritual leader for a worldwide change of consciousness towards a spiritual age. India has exported us culture not by arms but through the spread of its ideas and has a slow but vast ability to assimilate. Westerners have been touched by the eastern spirituality on the whole for the last decades, especially Buddhism considered for its wisdom and its appealing agnostic and pragmatical approach. The spiritualities requiring more shradda/faith are less influential. The western contempt coming from the time of colonialism is less stronger than in the past. Thirdly, while reading The Foundations of Indian Culture, I have been struck by the analysis of the western mind and the comparison with the Indian one. This is truly a pearl. At the beginning, I was mainly interested with the strict yogic aspect, now that I study more his cultural and social works, I appreciate all the more his genius and vision for the humankind. I feel a deep gratitude towards the Divine, Sri Aurobindo, the Mother and all the spiritual giants more or less famous. MD to BM (29 March 2007): Om Purnamadah: Purnamidam The meaning is: Purnamadah — ‘That’ (the transcendent creator who is beyond time and space) is whole/Eternal/Infinite. The Vedic way of chanting mantras is by using only three notes : sa, komal re and komal ni. These three notes are in very close succession in the Indian musical octave and together create a mystical and very powerful effect. The combination of these three notes also helps in bringing about focus, concentration and intensity. The sound of such a chanting helps the brain to slide into slower and slower brain wave patterns (from beta to theta). Many scientific studies have shown the healing and uplifting power of mantras. Mantras can bring about different qualities, virtues, modify body temperature, help digestion, invoke various forces of Nature and even soothe and dissipate negative emotions. The ‘maha mrtyunjay’ mantra has been for centuries the last recourse of healing and has breathed life into many a dying creatures. I am sure many of us have experienced what happens when one chants or listens to the continuous chanting of a mantra. It may have been at a wedding ceremony or a Diwali pooja or even a house warming or a simple purifying ‘havan’. The whole being slips naturally into inactivity and experiences enormous levels of stillness, power, and quiet joy. Today after reading the Shanti path I understand more deeply what the mantra does and how. And today I salute to the genius of the Vedic Rishis who created these mantras. Is this not a towering example of the real Indian Tradition where spirit, intellect and creativity combine supremely to give life its highest splendour and richness? It is so often that we think of India’s greatness as solely spiritual and overlook her abundant joie de vivre and her enormous intellect. But after reading Sri Aurobindo’s points about India, I don’t think I will ever commit this error again. At least this is how strongly I feel today. The second mantra that I would like to talk about is the OM itself also known as the ‘Pranav’ mantra. My experience with OM is very beautiful and one that has stood the test of time. I have used it in all possible circumstances and it has always invariably helped. I have used it to fall asleep, to cure a headache, to get rid of itching, to feel courage, to tackle nervousness and to simply feel happy. More than chanting it is the repetitive listening of OM that I have found very effective. Here are some wonderful descriptions of OM: If anything goes wrong, repeat OM, all will go well. — The Mother (Mona Sarkar, Sweet Mother: Harmonies of Light, Sri Aurobindo Ashram, Pondicherry, 2000, p. 3 (ISBN 81-7058-159-1)) OM Namah Paramaatme — OM! Salutation to the Supreme Spirit. OM is the imperishable word, OM is the Universe, and this is the exposition of OM. The past, the present and the future, all that was, all that is, is OM. Like-wise all else that exist beyond the bounds of time, that too is OM. — Mandukya Upanishad It amazes me so much to think that someone could have discovered a thing as stupendous as OM. Nowhere in the world have we heard of such a mighty discovery! A word that has the power to set things right, to purify, heal, create and connect with the divinity within must be regarded as one of the greatest boons bestowed upon human life. It cannot be the work of intellect alone for it is a Supreme Truth that can be seen only by the Supreme Truth within. I would like to take this opportunity to share two passages from Sri Aurobindo where he talks about the mantra. The first is from The Upanishads and the second from Savitri. … speech is creative: it creates forms of emotion, mental images and impulses of action. The ancient Vedic theory and practice extended this creative action of speech by the use of the mantra. The theory of the Mantra is that it is a word of power born out of the secret depths of our being where it has been brooded upon by a deeper consciousness than the mental, framed by the heart and not constructed by the intellect, held in the mind, again concentrated by the waking mental consciousness and then thrown out silently or vocally — the silent word is perhaps held to be more potent than the spoken — precisely for the work of creation. The Mantra can not only create new subjective states in our selves, alter our psychical being, reveal knowledge and faculties we did not before possess, can not only produce similar results in other minds than that of the user, but can produce vibrations in the mental and vital atmosphere which result in effects, in actions and even in the production of material forms on the physical plane … The Vedic use of the Mantra is only a conscious utilisation of this secret power of the word. (SABCL 12, pp. 169–170) The following passage from Savitri is nothing short of meditation itself and as it describes the power of the Mantra, is in itself a supreme Mantric power: As when the Mantra sinks in yoga’s ear I chose to elaborate on this one example of the Mantra because it represents to me the whole of the Indian Tradition with its spirituality, creative life force and structuring intellect, all woven into one mighty process. The other examples that strike me as fascinating are the Gita and the Nataraja. The Gita with its abundance of spiritual knowledge applied to life and mind and action as no other scripture does. The statue of Nataraja that symbolizes perfect human form celebrating the Spirit’s Infinite Ananda in a surge of ecstatic dance with its symbolic “mudras” and its life-affirming “tandav” posture. In all humility I bow to the sense of Infinite native to the Indian mind. BM to PG (29 March 2007): I appreciate your sharing with the group some insights from your experience of discovering these marvelous germ is Sri Aurobindo’s social and cultural thought. KP to BM (29 March 2007): From the introduction, the 4th paragraph of the Introduction says that if one wants to enter into the heart of a people or a culture, one should listen to their music. And Indian music, no doubt, reflects the heart of India. The Indian classical music derives its special nature and character, not so much from its structure and rules, as from its quest and goal. Music, in India, has played many roles and served many purposes. It has been part of the folk tradition, it has enriched the lives of all sections of the society, it has adorned the courts of kings. But it has never entirely forgotten its spiritual origin and nature. There have always been musicians for whom music has not been merely entertainment or a profession. For them it was not even a question of art for art’s sake or music for music’s sake. It was rather a whole view of life expressed as harmony and beauty of sound. It was believed that ‘music is a door, beautiful to look at no doubt, but its real value lies in its opening and leading us into a new and wondrous realm.’ The Visnu Purana declares, “All sounds are part of Him who wears a form of sound.” In the poetic words of Sri Aurobindo: All music is only the sound of His laughter, The true musician seeks to find this Being in himself and to express this Truth which underlies all creation. And later on one learns how there is a whole system, also for music, of guru and teacher, a discipline or Sadhana, the Guru Shishya Parampara. Regarding the second question (What, in your view, is the contemporary relevance and significance of the life-affirming spirituality of Indian tradition as described by Sri Aurobindo?), I have to agree with PG that ‘‘Westerners have been touched by the eastern spirituality on the whole for the last decades’’. A less ‘spiritual’ example may be the increasing popularity — here in South Africa at least — of Bollywood films. And all these are for me signs of the coming influence of India worldwide, in all areas of life. A few questions for you BM: What are the 64 accomplishments? “… it embraced all life, politics and society, all the arts from painting to dancing, all the sixty-four accomplishments.” (Peter Heehs, Editor, The Essential Writings of Sri Aurobindo, Oxford University Press, New Delhi, 2003, p. 120) BM to MD (29 March 2007): I highly value this statement of yours — “the real Indian Tradition where spirit, intellect and creativity combine supremely to give life its highest splendour and richness.” Very well said! BM to KP (29 March 2007): Your other examples about the recent influences of Indian Traditions and culture are also very appropriate. I am happy to know that if I ever visit South Africa, I will be able to enjoy Hindi movies on TV! You ask some important questions, I will try to address them briefly here. (a) The sixty-four accomplishments (or 64 kala as commonly referred — ‘kala’ meaning art form) represent a set of sciences or art forms covering all possible fields of human activity that one could think of. The idea being that each individual, according to his or her aptitude, ability, disposition, talent, etc., would learn some or as many of these art forms and be accomplished in those fields of work. One interpretation of these 64 kala(s) is listed on this website — http//www.en.wikipedia.org/kala. (b) I am not so sure I can address this question very well at this point as I am not familiar with the European history, especially in the realm of religion and spirituality. But I do remember reading a rather interesting article about a year and half ago, which briefly described the history of mystical traditions in the West. I am pasting the link for that article below — perhaps you may find that of some relevance: http://www.noetic.org/publications/review/issue27/r27_Taylor.html Even though the focus of this article is mostly on the history of American visionary tradition, its European connections can’t be missed. (c) Yes, the reference to spiritual atheism is about Buddhism and Jainism, and the reference to materialistic atheism will be about Charvaka (Carvaka) school of philosophy. For a brief review, see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charvaka It is important to note however that the two English words commonly used to refer to Buddhist and Jain systems as ‘atheist’ or ‘heterodox’ don’t necessarily convey the same meaning as Nastik which would be a more appropriate term to refer to these schools of thought. The word Nastik referred to those schools of thought that didn’t accept the authority of Vedas as Supreme Knowledge. Carvaka school of thought emphasized that all knowledge is possible only through sensory input, and thereby denied the existence of any ‘spiritual’ realm. (d) Oh, history of India, just as historiography of India is quite a contested and politically charged field, if you go by the debates going on in the world of educational and curriculum policy making in India! But if you are interested in a more ‘inner’ history of India (and ‘inner’ is almost always shaped by the ‘outer’ and vice versa), I will recommend the one by Prof. Kittu Reddy, History of India: A New Approach (New Delhi: Standard Pub., 2004, 503 pp., ISBN-81-87471-14-X). MD to BM (30 March 2007): All aspects of the Indian life are undergoing trial and turbulence. Individual, family, politics, constitution, education, commerce and everything else seems to be falling apart with a startling urgency. The youth of India is moving unstoppably towards a fantastic bubble of westernized living with a belief that this is the way to be. And this trend in turn has become such a pressing problem in Indian families: the whole Indian family structure is falling apart. In the big metros the use of psychiatric counseling and treatment is so common now. Discord, disharmony and dissatisfaction are brimming from all over. It is not in my capacity to say how such a state of affairs is ever going to turn into a “spiritualised society” but when I look into my heart, I see hope, I hear promise. There is a feeling inside that a beautiful change is round the corner, that an eager divine force is behind this confusion pushing it violently to crack open to a new order. Even the youth in its blind race towards the West is actually hankering, searching for another Truth than the existing one, waiting for something nobler to be given to them, something that satisfies their need to celebrate life and their questioning intellect. In my personal experience with my young cousins and nieces I see a tremendous understanding and ease with spiritual ideas. They are not shy and hesitant in the face of spirituality, all they want is for someone to put in a way that makes sense to their minds and hearts, which is what Sri Aurobindo refers to as “an original dealing of modern problems ...” Indian art has recently acquired a very high ranking in the world art scenario. There is a whole bunch of new artists and painters, just as BM pointed out, who have been saying that they paint for themselves, for a deeper need within that does not care if the painting is bought or not. And strangely it turns out these are the ones that sell and make it big. Truth in the artist’s heart meets the same Truth in the buyer’s. Many of the founders of the biggest software companies in India are in the South where it was easier for the deeper values to combine with the purity of the intellect to produce ‘super-successful’ world giants in the field. There is a sudden mushrooming of schools all over that promise superior education in terms of higher values, a freer approach, beautiful premises, modern technical support and a better curriculum than the one our government has been dishing out in the name of education. Indian dance has of late assumed such richness of diversity and synthesis with new ideas from other cultures and from its own that the result is a beautiful fusion that springs straight from the richness of the soul. New forms of Kathak, new renderings of Oddissi have won the hearts of audience, both Indian and European, and brought tears to their eyes for speaking the language of the soul. “The shaping for itself of a new body, of new philosophical, artistic, literary, cultural, political, social forms by the same rejuvenescent will, I should think, be the type of the Indian renaissance — forms not contradictory of the truths of life which the old expressed, but rather expressive of those truths restated, cured of defect, completed.” (SABCL 14, p. 399) — points out Sri Aurobindo. Shouldn’t this be our new national anthem reminding and insisting constantly to express the Truth of life? In moments when I am selfless and connected I can see the working of that force in my own life, arranging things in a silent but sure manner, working out things for a spiritual order. And by spiritual I actually mean more joy, more harmony, more synthesis. It’s not so hard to see the action of the Spirit because its all over, on every side, nudging relentlessly from every nook and corner, from every highway and bi-lane, not so discreet anymore. The coincidences and miracles are too many to be ignored if only we were interested. It’s as if it wants to be uncovered and be seen and act freely in all its power. It all boils down to one single point: the ability and need to look at the Spirit behind everything, just as the ancient Indian Tradition did. If somehow, through education or counseling or whatever, the thrill of discovering that which is behind the apparent, the inner Guide, the mechanics of the Spirit could be experienced once I think the trick is done. It will find its way into the new found life energy and intellect and make of the modern Indian in western clothes more of an Indian than the one who spent half his life singing in temples. My heart says this can be done and is worth everything but how is the subject of a thesis for mightier men to figure out. Let us take a moment off to toast to the victory of the ‘Soul Factor’! KS to MD and everyone (1 April 2007): A sense of infinite is native to it. Yes, I have seen it functioning. The Indian ‘Kolam’ that decorates the entrance of every house, early morning, hundreds of dots turning into a beautiful art with loops and turns with absolute symmetry. Each day it gets rewritten and each day it is unique. Yes, I have seen it functioning. In the lullaby of mother to make the child sleep, the child sleeps in Divine atmosphere. All these outward activities do go through change, and new changes may baffle the seeker temporarily. At those times if we remember what Sri Aurobindo says, I am sure those outward activities can be done with the touch of Divine. BM to MD (2 April 2007): BM to GR (22 March 2007): This is very well said! Your point about integral development is made very clearly. I am happy to read your response and appreciate your thoughts and perspective on this topic. I am happy to see open interactions and exchange of ideas in this dialogue, and I hope this is helping all of us as we deepen our understanding of the topics we are exploring in this section. I hope we can continue this trend in the following weeks also. BM to MD (22 March 2007): “The task before us, if India must be the spiritual leader of the world, is to revive this aim and make it a living reality in our hearts. Anyone who lives this aim is an Indian; and for that matter an American or a German can be more ‘Indian’ than an Indian.” You have shared a very thoughtful and deep understanding of what it means to be an ‘Indian’. This makes us see that Indian-ness doesn’t come with where one is born or is living, but with how one is ‘living’. I am happy to read your well-composed comment on this week’s readings and reflections. The various examples you have given also help in making the point that the Indian way of seeing and seeking “Divine in every movement and every moment” manifests itself when we are able to make spirituality as the basis of all life and all actions. BM to MD (25 March 2007): It is a very interesting question — ‘what does it mean to possess the infinite?’ I am tempted to say that perhaps one way to address it may be that perhaps the answer to the question partly lies in the first part of the quote you cite here — “yearning to grapple with the infinite …” This yearning has no limit, this aspiration is not for a certain limited truth, but for the Truth that is Infinite, just like the Infinite is ... well, Infinite. So the yearning to possess the Infinite may be more about a conscious attempt at manifesting the Infinite in a finite form so the intellect can grasp it, but with a deep awareness that no form can ever truly capture the Formless Infinite. The Divine is Infinite, Limitless, and hence the aspiration to identify or unite with the Divine is infinite too. Yet the aspirant continuously seeks to see or feel this Transcendent Infinite manifested in all finite forms and names. The artist-aspirant captures the Infinite in the art she creates, the sculptor-aspirant possesses It in the Durga statute he makes. And with each realization the aspirant moves from one partial truth to a higher, deeper, completer truth ... that too is perhaps meant by possessing the Infinite, yet always yearning to grapple with it more. I am reminded of the famous lines by T.S. Eliot — “We must not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we began and to know the place for the first time.” So even at the end of exploration, it is as if the journey hasn’t begun yet. But still, the journey did begin, the yearning has begun, the grappling is continuous, and even after possessing the Infinite, the Infinite still remains Infinite ... beyond possession. As I thought more about your question, several examples quickly came to mind — the intricate symbolism behind the forms of Nataraja, Ganesha, the splendour and magnificence of Indian temple architecture, the true meaning behind elaborate puja rituals, etc. But I felt all these would have been a bit, well, bookish. So I am tempted to share a very simple example. Something that happened recently, — and perhaps more from a secular realm. (But then, what is really ‘secular’ if “all is brahman” [SABCL 18, p. 465] ?) Just this past week, my husband and I went to a concert of ghazals (Urdu poetry set to music) and Punjabi folk music. The singer was a woman of Indian origin and settled in Canada, who was visiting different US cities for performances, etc. The write-up about the singer was impressive, so even though we hadn’t heard any music of hers we went to the concert hoping that it might be reasonably good. Sadly, we both were quite disappointed — not just with her singing, but I specifically felt that the selection of ghazals (poetry) she used for her compositions lacked something very important. She made a point in her performance to highlight the fact that she prefers more ‘contemporary’ poetry which captures the sensibility of our times and reflects our modern experiences, etc. Except for one selection that she sang — a nazm penned by Bahadur Shah Zafar (the last Mughal emperor of India) which he wrote in the prison after being captured by British, all the other poems she sang were quite disappointing. At least to me, they were! On our way back as we were debriefing about the concert, I remember saying things like — her music wasn’t doing anything for me, it is as if the singer was not ‘all there’, or as if the ‘soul’ was missing. I will perhaps never be fully able to express what it was that I found missing in those poems or her singing, but I know that I wasn’t experiencing what I have experienced while listening to many other ghazals sung by other singers, even when the poetry has been very contemporary and very ‘secular’. The story however doesn’t end here. A couple of days later, on an evening at home I was listening to a new CD of ghazals sung by Jaggit Singh, Kush Baat chale is the title of the CD, and all the ghazals (poetry) is by a contemporary Hindi/Urdu poet and film maker, Gulzar. The second track opens with a very contemporary couplet recited by Gulzar himself. It goes like this — (I will first write the Hindi words of the verse — though he uses a couple of English words too in some of his contemporary writing — and then translate the verse in English): Yaad hi ek din mere mez pe baitha — baitha sigarette ki dibia par thum ne (Remember one day while just sitting at my table And the moment I heard this verse, I knew what it was that was missing in the poetry being sung by the Indo-Canadian singer at the concert a couple of days ago. It was as if there was no attempt by the writers of those poems to take the listeners beyond their limited experience of the world. It was as if the poetry and the singer were both themselves not ready to go beyond a finite world of experience and sensory — rational input, nor were they interested or able to move their listeners to that world of imagination and mystery. It was as if they were not interested in grappling with the infinite world of imagination where even the most contemporary and secular thought can become an instrument for showing us a little glimpse of the Infinite Mystery that surrounds all the finite, limited world of forms and names we see and experience around us. May I be bold enough to say that this line of Gulzar about the flower that is blooming on an old sketch of a plant is an attempt of grappling with the Infinite? The story still doesn’t end here. I was so touched by this verse about the flower, I went online to read up a little about this album and some new poetry that Gulzar has been writing. And on one website I learned that Gulzar has invented a style of writing three-line verses which he calls ‘triveni’ (some of these triveni verses are in this album also). And Gulzar explains why he calls poetry style triveni — “The third line changes the meaning of the first two lines which seemed complete by themselves. I named it triveni. Like at the sangam in Allahabad, Ganga and Jamuna are the two apparent colours of the water, the gupt (hidden) one is Saraswati; after the first two lines if you can show a Saraswati, it becomes a triveni.” What Gulzar may be referring to as the “gupt” (the hidden) third line which when revealed changes the meaning and essence of the first two lines, is perhaps the X factor, the yearning and grappling with the Infinite to possess it, yet being aware that it is always beyond possession. If we can experience the essence of the third line, we grasp the meaning of the first two lines also but in a new way. And this essence can only be grasped by entering into a relationship of identification, a perfect union. If we can experience that hidden Saraswati, it is a Sangam, it is a possession. So sorry, this response has become very long … but I really liked the question! I hope others will also add their thoughts on this question. And to close it now, here is one triveni verse by Gulzar from this album … Zindagi kya hai, jaan-ne ke liye (What is life, to know this MD to BM (25 March 2007): KS to BM (26 March 2007): MD to KS (27 March 2007): BM to all (30 March 2007): The very sense of liberation one feels and experiences when reading or contemplating on Sri Aurobindo’s or the Mother’s words is because the meaning of ‘spirituality’ that comes through is beyond any mentally constructed, ideological boundaries. Spiritual in this sense is not separated from non-spiritual because there is no non-spiritual. Because Matter is also Spirit concealed in another form, and the Spirit trying to reveal itself from within Matter, Life, and Mind is what we may understand as spiritual seeking. All is Divine, is created by the Divine and moves in Divine; and the individual, universal and eternal aspects of Existence represent the tri-fold manifestation of the all-pervading Consciousness that IS. In such a vision there is nothing that is not spiritual. In more approachable terms, spiritual seeking begins with a journey of in-search for one’s psychic being or soul, the inner teacher that guides all other parts of the being in the light of what is Divine, what is highest within and without. In The Life Divine, Sri Aurobindo tells us what is not spirituality, before telling us what it is. This distinction is important because it also helps us understand the context in which Sri Aurobindo presents for us his widest and deepest view and understanding of Indian Spiritual Traditions and how these traditions have shaped and shaded the fundamental nature of Indian culture including art, architecture, sculpture, and socio-political system. … spirituality is not a high intellectuality, not idealism, not an ethical turn of mind or moral purity and austerity, not religiosity or an ardent and exalted emotional fervour, not even a compound of all these excellent things; a mental belief, creed or faith, an emotional aspiration, a regulation of conduct according to a religious or ethical formula are not spiritual achievement and experience. These things are of considerable value to mind and life; they are of value to the spiritual evolution itself as preparatory movements disciplining, purifying or giving a suitable form to the nature; but they still belong to the mental evolution, — the beginning of a spiritual realisation, experience, change is not yet there. Spirituality is in its essence an awakening to the inner reality of our being, to a spirit, self, soul which is other than our mind, life and body, an inner aspiration to know, to feel, to be that, to enter into contact with the greater Reality beyond and pervading the universe which inhabits also our own being, to be in communion with It and union with It, and a turning, a conversion, a transformation of our whole being as a result of the aspiration, the contact, the union, a growth or waking into a new becoming or new being, a new self, a new nature. (SABCL 19, 857)
BM to all (30 March 2007): Discussion of Indian Spirituality based on the Bhagavad-Gita 1. What is the nature of the “gradual advance” that Gita teaches us with regard to the right way to live? Reflect on the following passage: [Gita’s] call is to the individual who has become capable of a complete spiritual existence; but for the rest of the race it prescribes only a gradual advance, to be wisely effected by following out faithfully with more and more of intelligence and moral purpose and with a final turn to spirituality the law of their nature. (SABCL 13, p. 549)
BM to KS (2 April 2007): I am happy to read your responses. The examples about Kolam and a mother’s lullaby having the touch of Divine are very beautiful indeed. Being from the North India (Delhi) where the Kolam/Rangoli tradition is not generally practiced on a daily basis — at least not among North Indians, every time I am in Pondicherry I feel such a sense of joy and wonder watching women draw intricate patterns with such grace and flow. Now, reading this following statement of yours, a question comes up for me. You write — “This wave of spirituality does wonders at certain localized points in different fields (a Tendulkar in Cricket, a Dr. APJ Kalam in Science & Technology, a Vinodh Koshla in Innovation).” Sri Aurobindo speaks about spirituality being the master-key of Indian mind, and sense of infinite being native to it. With the examples that you list above are you suggesting that the heights of excellence and accomplishment achieved by these individuals is a manifestation of their being able to rely upon this master-key of spirituality? I am not sure if I am framing the question very appropriately, but my point is that we examine a little more deeply whether the “wonder” that is possible when one is able to access this inherent master-key of spirituality happens only in these extra-ordinary achievements or accomplishments, or whether it is also manifested in our day-to-day ordinary acts of living and working in different fields of human activity ... as in the other examples of Kolam and lullaby that you list. Perhaps it is a matter of inner attitude regardless of what activity one is engaged in. Any thoughts on this? MD to BM (3 April 2007): BM to MD (3 April 2007): MD to BM (4 April 2007): This process of the “gradual advance” deals with the whole ladder of evolution in the individual from Matter, Life and Mind because that is where man presently is all the way up to the secret Spirit. And in doing so, assigns a huge role to the mind of man with all its distinctive tendencies: this “gradual advance” is … to be wisely effected by following out faithfully with more and more of intelligence and moral purpose and with a final turn to spirituality the law of their nature. SABCL 13, p. 549) The mind’s role in the “gradual advance” would be to check the ‘asuric’ tendencies of life: the vehement and unreasonable pursuit and fulfillment of power, ego and desire. The vital and material man must accept for his government a religious and social and ideal dharma by which, while satisfying desire and interest under right restrictions, he can train and subdue his lower personality and scrupulously attune it to a higher law both of the personal and the communal life. (SABCL 13, p. 550) The Gita’s message to the mind is that although its intellectual, ethical and social standards are much needed and help in preparing the individual for a spiritual life, they are not the ultimate truth. The mind works under the limitations of the triple lower nature, tamas, rajas, and sattwa: … and that can only be based in the freedom of our highest self, can only be found by passing through its vast impersonality and universality beyond mind into the integral light of the immeasurable Godhead and supreme Infinite who is beyond all dharmas. (SABCL 13, p. 550) In this way the mind can guide our life and action to move from the present confusion, error and chaos to higher levels of harmony till our nature be ready to meet the Spirit. At the same time Sri Aurobindo points out quite simply that life will not allow itself to be regulated by the ideals of the mind and how often in the history of the world has such an attempt ended in a compromise or complete failure. But because the mind somewhere recognizes the presence of a Reality beyond it and has a sense of its existence, it is more capable of carrying out its role as guide and with the help of its deeper emotional and psychic nature it can successfully lead to the Spirit. Thus mind becomes the framework in which life makes the “gradual advance” until the Self finds a refined enough nature to emerge and take over from the mind. KP to BM (4 April 2007): Firstly, those who live the vital and material life. They can satisfy their desires “under right restrictions”, and must accept “a religious and social and ideal dharma” by which they can train and subdue their lower personality. Secondly, those “occupied with the pursuit of intellectual, ethical and social standards” etc. They must “repress and get rid of the ignorant formulations of the lower mental elements and the falsehood of egoistic personality” amongst other things. The third category is the “absolutist seekers of the Infinite.” (SABCL 13, p. 551) They must not find the Supreme only in silence and inaction but in the world and in work, etc. And then Sri Aurobindo speaks about a larger promise: the Gita declares that all can if they will, even to the lowest and the most sinful of men, enter into the path of this Yoga. “And if there is a true self-surrender and an absolute unegoistic faith in the indwelling Divinity, success is certain in this path.” (SABCL 13, p. 552) A question here: Given that the Integral Yoga goes further than the yoga given in the Gita (in my understanding they are not exactly the same), can the sentence above — that success is certain if there is a true self-surrender — be applied to Integral Yoga as well? Keeping in mind that Sri Aurobindo himself cautioned that one should make sure about the call before attempting the Yoga? An instance in my own life..Here I may mention my first visit to India; I was completely overwhelmed, I landed in Mumbai and had planned to travel by train to Pondicherry but found myself on an overnight very fully packed bus to Goa instead, the whole trip was threatening to become one big nightmare; it was July and very hot and monsoon time on the west coast of India, etc., and everyone was cheating this stupid westerner and asking exorbitant prices, etc., I was seriously considering going straight back to South Africa on the next plane. So I took an aero plane to Bangalore instead, after phoning the Ashram in Pondicherry and asking them to send a taxi. All the way, to the airport, sitting for hours waiting for the flight, on the flight, I just kept repeating the Mother’s and Sri Aurobindo’s names, in a mantra. By this time I was not only psychologically very fragile, but also very weak, I could feel a full-blown flu coming on and my stomach was not well. Landing in Bangalore, I could almost kiss the taxi-man from the Ashram, all dressed in white. But then another nightmare began: India’s roads. My nerves were so shattered after a few hundred kilometers that I could do nothing else than sit back and throw my hands up in a gesture of surrender and say to the Mother, ‘Thy will be done’. And peace descended. We reached Auroville at about 3:00 a.m. that morning; and the next day at 6:00 a.m. I was up, completely refreshed, all signs of any illness had disappeared, and I had the happiest 3 weeks of my life. However hard I tried, I could not achieve the same state of self-surrender ever since. It seems that an especially difficult situation is needed for that, at least in my case. BM to MD and KP (4 April 2007): MD, your point about our being “eternal seekers and discoverers” is an important one, and it opens up the path for grasping the eternal significance and meaning of Gita’s message for all of us — at different stages in our seeking and discovery through various lifetimes and evolutionary processes. KP, your point about the “absolutist seekers of the Infinite” begins to complete the full picture. And which gets further complete by the larger promise of the Gita that all can enter the path of yoga with true self-surrender and absolute unegoistic faith. Your experience about your travel to Pondicherry is deeply touching. Reminds me of the Mother’s words — “Surrender is the decision taken to hand over the responsibility of your life to the Divine.” (CWM 3, p. 126) It occurs to me that perhaps the beginnings of the answer to the question you pose here may exist in the layers of this experience itself that you share with us. I will address the question further in a separate post. BM to KP (4 April 2007): This seems to me a very important question. I am inclined to address it at this point without going into the differences between Integral Yoga and yoga of the Gita. I hope that is okay with you. I think if we mentally or intellectually try to reconcile this truth of being really, really sure about the call to enter the Integral Yoga, and the other truth of approaching our innate seeking for the Divine through the path of a true, really true and complete, pure self-surrender and an absolute faith and confidence in the Divine, we may be able to do so. The Mother has said in one of her talks that if one were to truly read and grasp completely and thoroughly the true meaning of everything Sri Aurobindo has written, one would find that there is not a single fixity or rigidity of thought anywhere because for everything that he has written he has also given us another and many possible sides of these truths, in a way sort of demonstrating that nothing must be accepted as the only truth in isolation from the other truths that are just as true. He has shown us ways to transcend the contradictions and limitations of our endless intellectual thinking through about these seemingly contradictory truths by aspiring towards a Higher and yet Higher Truth. So in his essay, “The Hour of God” he writes about the moments when the “Spirit moves among men and the breath of the Lord is abroad upon the waters of our being” (CWSA 12, p. 146) — indicating the moment of “Call”. He continues — “Unhappy is the man or the nation which, when the divine moment arrives, is found sleeping or unprepared to use it, because the lamp has not been kept trimmed for the welcome and the ears are sealed to the call.” (CWSA 12, p. 146) And then he goes on to say that the only way to answer to such a call in these moments is if we have prepared ourselves by cleansing our “soul of all self-deceit and hypocrisy and vain self-flattering that thou mayst look straight into thy spirit and hear that which summons it … .keep thy soul clear, even if for a while, of the clamour of the ego. Then shall a fire march before thee in the night and the storm be thy helper and thy flag shall wave on the highest height of the greatness that was to be conquered.” CWSA 12, pp. 146–147) So in his beautiful poetic way he tells us that both are equally essential — the surety of the call and the true self-surrender. But then how do we, with the noises and chatter that go on within various parts of us, know for sure about the “call”? The Mother tells us — Only those who have come after having had some experience of life and came because they wanted to come, and had a conscious reason for coming, they can of course tell me, “I came because of that”, and that would be at least a partial explanation. The truest, deepest reason may still elude them, that is, what they specially have to realise in the Work. That already requires having passed through many stages on the path. Essentially, it is only when one has become aware of one’s soul, has been identified with one’s psychic being that one can see in a single flash the picture of one’s individual development through the ages. Then indeed one begins to know… but not before. Then, indeed, I assure you it becomes very interesting. It changes one’s position in life. There is such a great difference between feeling vaguely, having a hesitant impression of something, of a force, a movement, an impulse, an attraction, of something which drives you in life — but it is still so vague, so uncertain, it is hazy — there is such a difference between this and having a clear vision, an exact perception, a total understanding of the meaning of one’s life. And only then does one begin to see things as they are, not before. Only then can one follow the thread of one’s destiny and clearly see the goal and the way to reach it. But that happens only through successive inner awakenings, like doors opening suddenly on new horizons — truly, a new birth into a truer, deeper, more lasting consciousness. (CWM 9, pp. 18–19) (Search for the Soul in everyday living.) So, does this mean that as imperfect human beings we have no way of knowing of the certainty or surety of the “call”? Perhaps intellectually we may not know it, but there is another way of knowing from within which grasps at the hidden and disguised truths — even if only in fragments at the beginning — that the minds fail to ‘understand’. It is this inner knower that finds peace and surety in opening to the force of the Mother and surrendering to her even when the mind keeps running around seeking its own satisfaction and explanation. And through this progressive opening and surrendering, the mind is gradually quieted too, and one begins to slowly realize the wisdom of words such as these — A conscious power has drawn the plan of life, And, “It is a great mistake to suppose that one can “do” the Purna Yoga — i.e. carry out and fulfil all sides of the Yoga by one’s own effort. No human being can do that. What one has to do is to put oneself in the Mother’s hands and open oneself to her by service, by Bhakti, by aspiration; then the Mother by her light and force works in him so that the Sadhana is done.” (SABCL 25, p. 130)
MD to BM (5 April 2007): Part of the Gita’s message to the individual is to discover his inner law and intelligently live in accordance with it. One instance in my own life that led me to self-realisation in the light of this message is what I decided to do after graduating from SAICE. I decided to do an MBA in a reputed Institute, as was the current trend with all the ‘bright’; students. I prepared for all the required examinations and did fairly well too. I was selected immediately and began the course. The experience was very different from what I had been through in Pondicherry, but enriching in certain respects at the same time. Three months down the line I fell very sick and had to come home. Circumstances created themselves in such a way that I went back only to wind up and extricate from the not so-cooperative authorities the money I had paid in advance for the whole year. I was back for good. What I did after coming back was actually the best way to kick start my life in the ‘real world’ after the protective and nurturing environment of SAICE because I had moved in some way to a deeper self-realisation. I rushed into the MBA not because it was the best thing for me but because it was what was expected from me. I allowed myself to succumb to the pressure of superficial and external forces around me instead of resisting them with the strength of my inner law. I did not even consider the promptings of my mind that was clearly trying to dissuade me from doing the MBA on the grounds of the exorbitant fees of the course and its futility for someone with my temperament. The ‘life’ or vital part of my being had made this choice and presented every possible explanation to the mind for doing what it had decided to. There was no way it was going to give up! I could feel the strength of its obstinacy. So the higher force intervened and built exactly the circumstances needed for me to quit the MBA as soon as possible. Without much damage I was decisively made to come right out of there. Luckily I could see the play of forces and awoke for the first, to the existence, meaning and significance of my own deeper law. The calls of the life force are indeed hard to resist but with the aid of the enlightened mind and even a small inner awakening it is possible to do the right action. Although I regret all the time, energy and money spent, I am grateful to this one experience that led me to my first self-realisation. BM to MD (6 April 2007): As Sri Aurobindo writes so beautifully in Savitri — Nothing we think or do is void or vain; MD to BM KS to BM (6 April 2007): I am also becoming slow in reading, but I hope to devote time at a pre-fixed time (as Mother says) everyday and benefit form this program. I am fortunate to join this course. Thank you … PG to BM (7 April 2007): The teaching encompasses the actions in life, as nothing can stand without any action in the universe. For instance the outer aspects of religion can help people in organizing their own life, the more we progress the more we go to the essence of the spirituality, and the less the ritual side is relevant, even the sattvic aspect of religion has to be transcended. BM to PG (9 April 2007): KS to BM (10 April 2007): BM to KS (10 April 2007): BM to all (11 April 2007): And at this point in our discussion, in keeping with the spirit of the topics we have been discussing here, I would like to highlight the last two passages from the fourth part of Sri Aurobindo’s essays on Renaissance in India. He writes: “India can best develop herself and serve humanity by being herself and following the law of her own nature. This does not mean, as some narrowly and blindly suppose, the rejection of everything new that comes to us in the stream of Time or happens to have been first developed or powerfully expressed by the West. Such an attitude would be intellectually absurd, physically impossible and, above all, unspiritual; true spirituality rejects no new light, no added means or materials of our human self-development. It means simply to keep our centre, our essential way of being, our inborn nature and assimilate to it all we receive, and evolve out of it all we do and create. Religion has been a central preoccupation of the Indian mind; some have told us that too much religion ruined India, precisely because we made the whole of life religion or religion the whole of life, we have failed in life and gone under. I will not answer, adopting the language used by the poet in a slightly different connection, that our fall does not matter and that the dust in which India lies is sacred. The fall, the failure does matter, and to lie in the dust is no sound position for man or nation. But the reason assigned is not the true one. If the majority of Indians had indeed made the whole of their lives religion in the true sense of the word, we should not be where we are now; it was because their public life became most irreligious, egoistic, self-seeking, materialistic that they fell. It is possible, that on one side we deviated too much into an excessive religiosity, that is to say, an excessive externalism of ceremony, rule, routine, mechanical worship, on the other into a too world-shunning asceticism which drew away the best minds who were thus lost to society instead of standing like the ancient Rishis as its spiritual support and its illuminating life-givers. But the root of the matter was the dwindling of the spiritual impulse in its generality and broadness, the decline of intellectual activity and freedom, the waning of great ideals, the loss of the gust of life. KP to BM (12 April 2007): PG to BM (12 April 2007): MD to BM (13 April 2007): KS to BM (15 April 2007):
THE INDIA WITHIN ONESELF India’s story stirs up the soul as much as it touches the heart and impresses the mind. India’s story spans over millennia of human love, seeking and achievement. India’s story is the story of the soul’s march in evolution. India is more than her historical events and present happenings — her bustling streets, crowded markets, her westernized cities, industrial rampage, communal riots, chaotic government, the corruption and the killings, the Tsunamis and the quakes, on one hand her surging millionaires and on the other her sprawling poverty, the fastest growing economy and the largest armed forces, the happy co-existence of temples, churches and mosques, the art of living a million Durgas, the sound of the conch shell and the rumblings of distant chants, her majestic forts and opulent palaces, miles of saffron fields and acres of lush paddy, the mysterious Himalayas and the sacred Ganga, are but images of her real self. They are herself but she is greater than them, they are herself but not entirely her… They are but incidents, not the whole story. Judging her on the face value of these disparate facets would be a grave injustice to India and her people. India is a soul and a force with a universal purpose to fulfill.
The Impact of India’s Spiritual Heritage in my Life In my childhood, I discovered the eastern culture on the whole, thanks to some Japanese mangas. It was among my first contacts with the East. I was attracted by the Buddhist aspects I could feel in some of them, the Dhyana asana for instance was a like a magical and inspiring posture for me. I remember a book with pictures to stick, there were some pictures of Hatha Yogis that impressed me. So I had noted this physical gracious approach of spirituality, this holistic approach of spirituality stroke me despite my young age, something quite strange to my strict and traditional catholic background.
Co-existence of Spirituality and Modernity Can spirituality and modernity co-exist: The answer is affirmative yes and even more than that. For a beautiful dance drama to be held, a stage is very essential. For modernity to have arrived, spirituality is the base. Let’s step back a while. What is modernity? It is very common to feel time goes very, very fast. Last 100 years of technological advancements produced tremendous impact on human life. Internet revolution, space travel, transplant surgeries, nano-technology, etc., are helping humans to surpass physical limitations like national boundaries, one’s time and space. Particularly since 1950, advancement in all the fields is amazing. I remember one of the Darshan messages on the “Golden Jubilee of The Supramental Manifestation Upon Earth”. Are these early results of the appearance of Supermind in Earth’s atmosphere? “As I looked at the door, I knew and willed, in a single movement of consciousness, that “the time has come”, and lifting with both hands a mighty golden hammer I struck one blow, one single blow on the door and the door was shattered to pieces. Yes I believe so and I strongly believe that the Supramental Force and Light has worked through the scientists, technologists, business and commerce to evolve much faster in these 50 years. Is this all modernity? Yes. These are all modernity and spirituality is the base for it.
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