Daily Questions

I agree that Sri Aurobindo is best read directly. I don’t think even an enlightened person is qualified to speak on The Life Divine which goes far beyond what is generally understood by enlightenment. The only perfect example of living the Divine Life are The Mother and Sri Aurobindo. All others, even the most enlightened would have a certain angle of vision, including your great self. In that case any lecture on Sri Aurobindo’s Works including The Life Divine should not be undertaken and people should be left to understand by their own intellect filtering it through their own mind which somewhat amounts to the same thing, an incomprehension if perfect understanding is the criteria.

However as far as I am concerned, I don’t claim to provide a perfect understanding of the subject, in fact I claim nothing at all and my efforts are much more modest. My only purpose, if any, is to be a bridge, if possible, between Sri Aurobindo’s infinity and our finiteness. Even if one person comes an inch closer to Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, I will feel blessed. If anyone, yourself included, since you must be enlightened to know who is enlightened and who is not, can do a better work and provide a better understanding, it will be always welcome. Since it is not the person but the work that is important and unfortunately very few undertake this work or shall we say are given this mode of serving Them. Hence the field is full of unenlightened people who will surely make way to better instruments in times to come.

However there is one thing that made me wonder if you would enlighten. What is your criteria of enlightened or of truth and reality? How do you judge whether one is enlightened or not?

Kind regards
Alok

The tale of Ramayana is based on a historical event of crucial importance in far back times when humanity was at one of the critical crossroads of evolution. There was the lineage of solar dynasty kings who were born to lead humanity towards high and noble values. But alongside with them there were two more distinct shades of the human type that had also grown in power and strength. The land of the event was Aryabhoomi where the lineage of Ikshavaku and Raghu ruled with the highest Aryan ideals on the northern side of the Gangetic planes. The mid region was occupied by forest dwellers who were physically strong and mighty, closer to the animal in physique and who wore animal skin as a disguise and a way of life, like the Vanaras and the Riksha (bear). Down south was the Asura kingdom of Ravana who was slowly expanding it northwards with the help of the Rakshasas of Dandakaranya and his lieutenants like Marich, Subahu, Tadaka etc.

Though it was a part of their design, they did not or could not penetrate the impregnable Ayodhya. Sooner or later the conflict had to happen given the growing power and menace of Ravana trying to occupy territory and destroy the hermitages of Rishis and the Aryan culture. It is in the course of testing the Vanaras, to see whether he can overpower them that he had tried to challenge Bali but only to be humiliated. Since then, Ravana had made a pact of friendship with Bali which could have been potentially a deadly alliance for the civilisational values nurtured by the noble Aryans.

Now Bali, king of the Vanara kingdom. He seemed to be moving along the lines of a brute beast where might is right as is reflected through some of his stories and dealings with his brother. Yet, as arranged in the divine dispensation of things, Sugriva and Hanuman are part of the Vanara kingdom almost challenging Bali’s ways of life. In other words, the evolution of Vanaras was at juncture wherein they could either go the Asuric way through Bali and Ravana or else go the nobler humane ways through Hanuman and Sugriva. By removing Bali, Rama secured not only Kiskindha from becoming a menace or a vassal state of Ravana and his type but also secured a better and higher evolutionary possibility for the Vanaras.

This is the gist. The rest of it is incidental which I have already explained in a talk “श्री अरविंद और मानव भविष्य | TH 499”. Bali had to go for India to be secured against the Asura and to keep the flame of dharma growing in Aryavarta. The friendship with Sugriva, the method of killing Bali whom one could not defeat in frontal combat due to his capacity to draw half the opponents’ strength into himself, yet giving him an equal match by shooting through the seven palm trees as a sign that strength for strength Bali was still no match for Lord Rama are simply the outer conditions of the Divine Play.

The core was that Bali had to be eliminated for establishing the reign of dharma in Aryavarta.

The sign that one is on this path is either one is drawn towards the Mother and Sri Aurobindo with or without reason, or else, one feels within oneself the calling to walk the way, urge to take up this yoga, aspiration for the Divine provided it is not driven by any personal ambition.

Even before that one may be reasonably sure that he/she is preparing to enter this path if one is attracted towards the teachings and writings of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother.

Walking on the path makes one humble because the more one comes in contact with the Divine, the more one understands and realises that one is nothing, one can do nothing without the Divine Mother’s Grace.

Q: Where and how thoughts are formed, do they come from the subtle body?

ALOKDA: The origin of thoughts is far above like lightnings in the sky. They are rays of light that come to earth as vibrations to awaken earth and man to consciousness. But just as the rays get mixed with the mud and assume a muddy character so too these thought rays when they enter the cosmic field assume a triple character of good-bad-neutral vibrations. From the cosmic field they enter into all things as a dumb knowledge. In human beings they enter the brain and pick up the language, words and sounds to which the person is conditioned and express themselves through speech. Therefore, by training the speech, by cleansing the thoughts freeing them from all the mud and filth into which these brilliant rays are trapped we can ascend upwards as through a rope, right up to their original Source.

The thoughts therefore can be divided into two types with reference to their origin. First two closely connected to the original vibration of Light are in the higher mental worlds in a subtle form and are called paravak and pasyanti, the supreme word and the seeing word. Then when they enter our realm and get modified by the ignorance they are called madhyama and vaikhari, where vaikhari is the average human though and speech.

The Madonnas are the triple soul forces or the three modes of nature – sattwa, rajas, tamas – through which the soul expresses itself presently in the lower nature.
Savitri encounters each one of them and promises that she will return with the power of transformation and change them into the equivalent forces of a higher Supernature, – tamas into self-existent peace, rajas into luminous Force of the Divine and sattwa into the light and delight of God.

The four aspects are cosmic powers that govern creation and prepares it for the transformation.

Of course, the triple modes of lower nature eventually derive their power from the four cosmic powers just as the individual soul is a miniature representation of the Universal Divine. Thus,
– Mahakali and Mahalakshmi are parents of rajoguna, Madonna of Might that helps us struggle and fight and enjoy,
– Maheswari is the parent of sattwaguna, the Madonna of Light, and
– Mahasaraswati is the parent of the Madonna of suffering that helps us endure suffering and pain.

In the human system these powers get diverted from their true purpose and distorted due to the ego and ignorance. That is what is revealed to us through the echo in the abyss.

Q: Where did God come from and why? Where did his power come from? Why did he create a world in which there is only sorrow?

ALOKDA: The Divine is called as swayambhu (Self-born) because He/She is the Origin of all origins. It is a way of saying that He is a self existent Reality. There is no why to it except that for the purpose of the manifestation He makes himself somewhat tangible even though in the last analysis Unknowable.
Why manifestation? Well because the Delight of the Divine, the Consciousness of the Divine, the infinity of the Divine seeks to express Itself as a poet expresses what is within him. Manifestation is impelled by Delight. Pain and pleasure are means to prepare us for receiving and expressing the delight. They are stages of preparation just as a mountaineer impelled with the possibility of joy on climbing the high peaks, must prepare himself through hard training or as a child must train and discipline himself to bring out his deeper possibilities so too creation undergoes suffering as a kind of labour pain to deliver the godlike or divine possibility within us.

Q: Sir, please explain how Darwinian evolution theory is different from the evolution theory of Hinduism

ALOKDA: Darwin focused only on the outer aspect of evolution, that is to say the change of form leading to a new species. He did not quite understand the reason for this change though he did give his reasons as he thought could be the cause, foremost among them being the survival of the fittest. Later evolutionary biologists tried to provide their own understanding of the process based on the framework of genes. But still it remains a mystery as to how the grain of sand evolves into man through a series of apparently random processes and chance mutations. It is almost like saying that if one throws stones randomly it would end up some day in a strong and beautiful building. The chances of this happening are so rare that prominent biologists including Dr Watson and Crick of the gene discovery fame discarded the random mutation theory because of the extremely low mathematical probability. But instead of giving any valid answer he pushed it only one step backward by hypothesising that life was seeded here from another planet or elsewhere.

Now Indian thinkers knew about evolution as is evident in the story of dash avatar and the tantric literature that speaks of some 84 lakh different species through which the soul climbs to arrive at the human stage. Having thus arrived it can reach its maximum development by uniting with the Divine Origin discarding the form whose only purpose seems to have been to provide the scaffolding for the soul to develop from its seed state in the nescience to reach a state of awakening.
Vedanta also speaks of something similar. It focuses on the inner story of the soul evolving through various forms until it takes the human form and from there evolve or rather discover inwardly into its divine truth. As for the force leading to change of forms they termed it nature which operated intelligently because of the light of the Soul falling upon it.

This too leaves several gaps in our understanding especially as to why did the process start at all? Is there a purpose in all this long complicated play or is it all a purposeless drama unfolding in time? If the sole purpose is to go back to the Origin then why we got separated at all? Is human birth the last and final or there is more to him and something more than man is to come? Logically and intuitively it seems that it can’t be an abrupt close with an imperfect creature that man is.

It is here that Sri Aurobindo fills the gap between the material and the spiritual side of evolution. He takes up all the unanswered questions to which The Life Divine and Savitri are the most comprehensive answers.

Q: In my case, surrendering and devotion to lord Shiva comes to me more naturally. I know the base of this yoga is surrendering and opening to the Mother, but is there any problem if we surrender and open to our Ishta devatas instead, and since the divine is one, opening to the Mother?

ALOKDA: Each god comes into existence through a conscious self-limitation of the Supreme Divine. The Name and Form serve a certain function and purpose. Generally, the gods being fully conscious do not interfere with the function of other gods as it may create an imbalance in creation. Thus, if one seeks Moksha and Vairagya then Shiva is the power who destroys all illusion born of Ignorance.

Going beyond the gods is nothing new to Sanatan Dharma. This does not mean that it belittles the gods and their function in anyway. It simply means that one seeks to connect directly with the Supreme. Here however the goal is transformation of earth nature something that has never been done before. The power and the mandate for accomplishing this is with the Mother. Gods can help in their own way towards this but cannot accomplish this.

Surrender implies handing over oneself into the hands of the one to whom we surrender, opens us to the influence of the power embodied by the one at whose feet we surrender. Naturally, it has to be spontaneous and not under any outer compulsion. Generally, someone close to an ishta devata comes to the Mother because it is the ishta devata who knowing the true soul need or inner aspiration impels us towards the Mother.

Bhakti does not follow the norms of the mind and its list of do’s and don’ts. So do not worry. Follow the deepest instinct of your heart. You have been led to Sri Aurobindo by your ishta devata himself. Slowly your bhakti will deepen and grow into bhakti and surrender towards the Mother and Sri Aurobindo.

Alokda: The issue of helping humanity can be seen at various levels. In a certain sense we all help each other, knowingly or unknowingly, we take care of those close to us physically or emotionally, help those in distress, express our gratitude towards some others through some means of help we may render. Thus seen, the urge to help is one of the impulses that characterises the nobler side of our humanity. It is also a first corrective to our grosser forms of egoism and reminds us that we are neither isolated nor alone. It is the very basis of any society, including a spiritual commune. The mistake that we however make is to believe that this kind of help is akin to leading a spiritual life. Helping humanity is directed towards human beings whereas true spiritual life is directed towards the Divine. This is the first point of divergence. Of course, the former can be a preparation for the latter. An altruist sacrificing his life at the altar of humanity or an ideal is getting ready, in this life or another, to sacrifice his ego-self at the altar of divinity. Yet the two are not the same nor always simply one step away. People who help others may be quite satisfied with this activity and may not feel the urge to go deeper within themselves to at least see the motive-forces behind their urge to help. They may even feel puffed up by their ‘helpfulness’ especially when ego-self is fed with praise from others for their helpful nature. Others may be doing it for cruder motives such as securing a seat in some higher world through altruism, or to be remembered by others for their philanthropy. It is then simply a kind of ambition for name and fame which is obviously a big stumbling block towards true spiritual life.

Does it mean that a spiritual man should not be helpful or that he must remain absorbed in his narrow spiritual goal which may be just another kind of selfishness? Then what about the Gita’s famous dictum that a spiritual man is engaged ever in the good of all creatures, sarvabhutahiteratah? Well, it all depends upon the motive that drives one towards spirituality? There is no doubt a spirituality often tainted by the selfish urge to have experiences, or being regarded as some kind of a yogi or siddha or at best to merge into nirvana and be freed from the chaos and confusions of worldly life. But there is another kind of spiritual life epitomised in the life and teachings of Sri Krishna and Sri Aurobindo. According to this line of spiritual self-evolution we must first and foremost concentrate on one’s own spiritual progress which runs for a while parallel with all our human activities but the central motive must change. Thus, even while we may be seemingly engaged in helping others it should not be a service of human beings, Nara-Sewa, but a service of the Divine through this, Narayana-Sewa. Though seemingly a small inner change it makes a vast difference for the growing spiritual life within us. In the latter we remain inwardly detached to our action and slowly the sense of doership and ownership which are the natural offshoots of rajasic egoism pass away from us. Then our – helping others’ no more binds us. Nor are we moved to help merely by pity or with the sense of moral superiority or sense of righteousness but simply as a natural expression of the Divine impulsion within us. In fact, when we are in that state then the valuation of things changes and we may well recognise that distributing blankets to the poor may be simply encouraging tamas whereas fighting a battle as Arjuna did may be a great help to propel humanity forward. In fact even the same activity such a feeding the poor may stem from either a very human motive or else by a deep spiritual angst and compassion towards suffering humanity. Much depends upon the inner motive that drives us to action. That is the second important thing in yoga. From the spiritual point of view it is not the action but the force that drives us to act, the motive and the state of consciousness behind it that gives determines whether it is spiritual or not.

Finally, what is the highest help that we can render to humanity? Isn’t it the gift of Light and Hope and Peace, to bring them into contact with the spiritual forces that would pull one out of Ignorance? Distributing blankets or feeding the poor may help the body in a certain limited way but awakening someone to the need of a spiritual change is a help that endures the rub and change of time and extends beyond a single lifetime of this body. But how are we going to do it if we ourselves have not directed our energies sufficiently to gather these spiritual forces or surrendered enough to be Her luminous channel freed from the ego-sense of ‘me and my-ness’.