Asato maa sad gamaya
Tamaso maa jyotirgamaya
Mŗtyormaamŗtam gamaya.
From the unreal, lead me to the real;
from darkness, lead me to light;
from death, lead me to deathlessness.
The Answer is Sri Aurobindo.
And Sri Aurobindo’s answer to this prayer is: tathaastu.
One hundred thirty-five years ago, there was the beginning of a very Big Change on earth, in our World, the beginning of the Next Evolution, from Man to a new species, beyond this ignorant imperfect death-bound human beings, living with and in Darkness, within and without.
That was the beginning of a Fundamental Change on earth. The seed was sown on that day.
Sri Aurobindo’s birth on earth is the most positive Answer from the Supreme to the humanity that gropes in darkness. He is the Divine Will personified — for an Evolution from Man to Superman and beyond, towards the advent of the supramental beings.
OOOO
The Mother [Mira Alfassa] met Sri Aurobindo on 29th March 1914 for the first time.
She wrote on the next day :
It matters little that there are thousands of beings plunged in the densest ignorance, He whom we saw yesterday is on earth ; his presence is enough to prove that a day will come when darkness shall be transformed into light, and Thy reign shall be indeed established upon earth.
OOOO
The Mother gave us the following message, in 1972:
“Sri Aurobindo came upon earth to announce the manifestation of the supramental world and not merely did he announce this manifestation but embodied also in part the supramental force and showed by example what one must do to prepare oneself for manifesting it. The best thing we can do is to study all that he has told us and endeavour to follow his example and prepare ourselves for the new manifestation…”
The Mother also told us:
“Sri Aurobindo is an emanation of the supreme who came on earth to announce the manifestation of a new race and a new world: the supramental.
“Let us prepare for it in all sincerity and eagerness.”
On 15 August 1972, the Message given by The Mother.
“Sri Aurobindo’s message is an immortal Sunlight radiating over the future.”
And yet another: “Man is the creation of yesterday.”
“Sri Aurobindo came to announce the creation of tomorrow: the coming of the supramental being.”
OOOO
Sri Aurobindo is The Leader of the next evolution.
He was the first Person to know and declare that the humanity must go beyond itself, that Man has to evolve beyond himself towards supermanhood, and then towards becoming a supramental being. That is the Will of the Supreme, that is the design of Nature, rightly speaking, of Supernature.
While Matter is apparently Inconscient, evolution from Matter to Man is through Ignorance. Though Man has been evolved with more consciousness and knowledge in him in comparison with the Ape and other living beings, still he is half-conscious, half-fulfilled, with incomplete, insufficient and inconclusive knowledge, with more or less ineffective and superficial knowledge. Man has been evolved with Mind, is still being evolved with Mind, but what he carries with him as the Mind, is only a very small and miniature fragment the real principle of Mind. The humanity as a whole has not yet evolved or used or even become conscious of the higher and deeper ranges of Mind, which are touched and partly used only by a few. However, these few persons let us believe that transcendence of the present state is possible. Our endeavor for self-discovery and world-discovery is also only half-fulfilled, partial and inconclusive and insufficient. Our previous Leaders have led some, but the mass still gropes in darkness, and the followers have begun clashes, feuds and wars, and have the journey regressive and backward towards the primitive state of mind, though dressed and decorated with ornaments of modern superficialities.
OOOO
This earth is a field of Evolution, and from the scientific viewpoint, now man is at the apex of Evolution. But as we know, Man is not perfect. He lives with ignorance, incapacity, imbalance, disharmony, chaos, disorder, aimlessness, unhappiness, sufferings, diseases and death. However, that is only an aspect of the Truth. Inborn with him is a longing for happiness, joy, for light and knowledge. And always with him there is Hope. Without hope, he cannot be. Hope is an eternal companion of man. The humanity has to evolve into a race of supramental beings, or else he will be replaced by a race of higher beings, in order to give effect to the evolutionary progress: this is the necessity of Evolution. This is what the Mother [Mira Alfassa] has said :
Men, countries, continents!
The choice is imperative:
Truth or the abyss.
A beautiful, joyous, harmonious and luminous Future of divine perfection is waiting for Man as his evolutionary possibility and goal. This is our evolutionary Future. Man cannot continue for ever as he is and has been till now. He has to proceed ahead from the present situation, taking the opportunity given by The New Consciousness and Force that has descended. Or else, the evolutionary forces of Nature - Supernature -will surpass him and choose some other means for fulfilment of the goal : ever-progressive manifestation of Consciousness.
That is our Future, preordained. We shall have to ascend, integrally.
OOOO
The most important and unique Work of Sri Aurobindo and The Mother is leading the humanity and the earth the Next Evolution. They have told of a New and Higher Consciousness, the Supramental Consciousness, and of the Advent of this Higher Consciousness. The Supramental Consciousness is the Next plane of Consciousness that has to be evolved, for that is the Aim of Evolution. Evolution is the Manifestation of All that is ‘involved’ in Matter. And what is involved is nothing less than the Highest Principle of Existence, Existence-Consciousness-Bliss, or in simple language, the Divine.Matter is apparently Inconscient, and evolution from Matter to till the appearance of Man is through Ignorance. Man has evolved with more consciousness and knowledge in him in comparison with the Ape and other living beings. Yet he is only partially conscious, partially fulfilled, with incomplete, insufficient and inconclusive knowledge, with more or less ineffective and superficial knowledge. Man has evolved with Mind, but what he carries with him as the Mind, is only a very small and miniature fragment the real principle of Mind. The humanity as a whole has not yet evolved or used or even become conscious of the higher and deeper ranges of Mind, which are touched and partly used only by a few. However, these few persons have led us to believe that transcendence of the present state is possible. Our endeavor for self-discovery and world-discovery is also only fulfilled in a partial and inconclusive and insufficient manner. Our previous spiritual Leaders have led some, but the mass of the humankind is still groping in darkness. And the followers are busy with clashes, feuds and wars, and have made the situation regressive and backward towards the primitive state of mind, though ornamented with modern superficialities. Man lives with Ignorance in all walks of his life and existence, with an incomplete and imperfect mental consciousness that Nature has bestowed on him. He is ignorant and in dark about the results of his actions or about the certainty of his thoughts, of his future achievements, about his own survival, about his purpose on earth or even about his destiny. The human history is made of stories of our repeated bloodsheds in wars, battles and massacres. And we have divided and sub-divided and further subdivided our earth into smaller and smaller regions and fought against each other. Hatred is our way, and not Love. We are moving backwards to a regression. We are not conscious that there is a higher aim and meaning for our life and existence. We live with our narrow egoistic choices and selfish activities. We fail to know beyond our nose and most often, we shut up our eyes, outer and inner.
OOOO
On this birthday of Sri Aurobindo, let us remember Him and The Mother and also let us remember about our possible participation in the great Work of Transformation, so that the Next Future ushers in. Let us have faith in the Promise and march forward:
To eternal light and knowledge meant to rise,
Up from man’s bare beginning is our climb ;
Out of earth’s heavy smallness we must break,
We must search our nature with spiritual fire :
An insect crawl precludes our glorious flight;
Our human state cradles the future god,
Our mortal frailty an immortal force.
[Savitri]
Sri Aurobindo has also told us that man has to and will transcend himself progressively and march forward towards the advent of a ‘mightier race’ — the race of the supermen, and then of the supramental beings.
This Hope, this Dream inspired within us by Sri Aurobindo, may become as the very Inspiration of our life.
Let us remember what Sri Aurobindo has said:
A mightier race shall inhabit the mortal man’s world.
On Nature’s luminous tops, on the Spirit’s ground,
The superman shall reign king of life,
Make earth almost the mate and peer of heaven
And lead toward God and truth man’s ignorant earth
And lift towards godhead his mortality.
[Savitri]
o0OOOOO0o
Barindranath Chaki
15-08-2007
Posted simultaneously in The New Vision , Zaadz and Sulekha.
