Remembering Satprem

The world is continuing with death. The humanity is still a continuing sacrifice to death.

However, for Mira Alfassa, The Mother, one of the most important aspect of the Work to be done was the conquest of death.

She said :
"Death is the problem given me to resolve."
"I am on my way to discovering the illusion that must be destroyed so that physical life can be uninterrupted.... Death is the result of a distortion of consciousness."
To the unseeing humanity The Mother has passed away, though a few have known Her in a New Body. And one of those bright few is Satprem.

He, too, believed in the Task of fighting away death. And that was his Work. He has fought with death till the last of his physical body. Before his departure, he told that the Work is done.


OOOOO

TODAY, the 30th day of 2008, is the birthday anniversary of Satprem. He dedicated his life and existence for the Future of the mankind, for the mankind of the Future, having followed the steps of The Mother and Sri Aurobindo, on the Way towards Supermanhood from the present state of the mankind, on the Way for transforming the mankind into the New Race, the race of the Supermen, the race of the Supramental Beings. After the passing away of The Mother, he left Sri Aurobindo Ashram and published the thirteen volumes of Mother’s Agenda. Further, he also wrote a number of books of everlasting value, that give us Light and directions on the New Way, which he received from The Mother during his conversation with Her.

He was born in Paris in 1923. When he was twenty years old, he was arrested by Gestapo (of Germany during Hitler’s regime) and spent about a year and a half in some concentration camps. When he came out, he was a sad, shocked and disturbed person. However, a higher spiritual destiny led him to Egypt and from there to Pondicherry in India. In Pondichery, he knew Sri Aurobindo and the Mother. Soon, he left for Guiana, Brazil, Africa etc. But again, he finally returned to India in 1953.

On 3rd March 1957, The Mother named him Satprem. His original name was Bernard. Satprem became a close disciple and a confidante of The Mother. He stayed in Sri Aurobindo Ashram. Soon after the Mother’s Departure on 17th November 1973, Satprem left the Ashram.

In 1982, having followed The Mother’s footsteps, Satprem withdrew completely to set out on a new venture, on a new adventure, uncertain and dangerous, of finding out the great passage into the next evolution beyond Man, which also means a conquest of death. And he undertook the work of exploring the cause of death and the ways and means of conquering death — Life has evolved since billions of years, but it has been conquered by death — and it still has continued to be an enigma for Mind also. Evolution beyond Mind has to be an Evolution beyond death also.

Sri Aurobindo made a prophecy in Savitri:
Even there shall come as a high crown of all
The end of Death, the death of Ignorance.In order to find out the secret of going beyond mankind, beyond death and ignorance, The Mother says, one has to plunge into the cells of the Body. The cells are the roots. The secret of the Transformation lies there.
During the 1960s and 1970s, The Mother stated that the cells of Her body were becoming more and more conscious. She said that the transformation of the cells, of the "mind of the cells", is the secret means for the physical transformation, which is of crucial importance and significance. She also said that the cells of Her body were progressively organizing themselves to a have a kind of mind of their own.

She regarded death as a state of mind of the cells which the cells accepted. If they could change their perspective, if they did not accept death as something inevitable, this would help the cells maintain themselves without any deterioration and linger their longevity.
She said that one of the secrets for physical transformation was/is to overcome the effect of the "physical mind" and the subconscient. This part of the nature is filled with inertia and has the habit of being resigned to defeat, of being negative and pessimistic in attitude and tendencies, and of grumbling. As a result, it reinforces illnesses and is a great obstruction to the physical transformation. According to Her, this was a great obstacle to the emergence of the new species. The Mother strived hard to bring in the higher consciousness into the physical and sub-conscient aspect of Her being.

The Mother said :
There is a consciousness in the cells: it is what we call the ‘body consciousness’ and it is wholly bound up with the body. This consciousness has much difficulty in changing, because it is under the influence of the collective suggestion which absolutely opposed to the transformation. So one has to struggle with this collective suggestion, not only with the collective suggestion of the present, but with the collective suggestion of the earth consciousness as a whole, the terrestrial human consciousness which goes back to the earliest formation of man. That has to be overcome before the cells can be spontaneously aware of the Truth, of Eternity of matter.

What is more essential in an Integral Transformation is to transform the consciousness of the cells. Transformation of the mind and the vital being has been achieved through yogic discipline — there has been transformation of consciousness. As The Mother has said, at least quite a few persons have been aware of the Divine Presence or the Truth of their being. But they have not attained the Total Transformation, the Integral Transformation. Even the global consciousness of the physical has been transformed — but that is not enough for going beyond human state of darkness and disease and death. There has to be a transformation of the consciousness of the cells.

The Mother has said:
Finally, there is the physical consciousness itself, the material consciousness, the body consciousness, and that is the one which has so far never been entirely transformed. The global, overall consciousness of the body has been transformed, that is, one can throw off the bondage of thoughts, of habits that one no longer considers inevitable. That can change, it has been changed. But what remains to be changed is the consciousness of the cells.




OOOOO

Satprem concentrated and worked on bringing this change in the consciousness of the cells in the physical body.

That is the Way for integrally transforming the human being towards Supermanhood. That work is Satprem’s contribution to the mankind, in which he is indeed unique and it is not yet known if any one else has walked on this Way.

Satprem says:
And then you begin to wonder if it is not the body that holds the true secret — if it is not these first cells or that microorganism from a few billion years ago that hold what we have been seeking in vain with all our scientific or intellectual artifices, if it is not this first spasm of “life” enclosed in a bubble that knows or recognizes its Nectar, its air from beyond the graves, its life denser than all our lives, its breathing more powerful than all our oxygens — and that, finally, not only the way out of this grave, but the way to let another air in here which will bring our walls down.
A new Life.
A new Earth.
A new Evolution — Evolution II.
[Satprem : Evolution II]
Satprem lived and worked for this progressive journey beyond death and beyond Ignorance. He has definitely made a great deal of progressive exploration and advancement on the Way.

And the Work must go on till the goal is achieved. That is the greatest and the most important for the mankind — to go beyond mankind. The Work has to continue and will definitely continue, as that is the Will of Divine in Evolution.


OOOOO

Some persons have recently equated Satprem and Peter Heeh. This is sheer ignorance and ingratitude. Heeh cannot simply be compared to, or raised to the height of, Satprem. Satprem has NEVER done or written anything to belittle or understate Sri Aurobindo and The Mother. He was one of the closest disciples of The Mother. And his book Sri Aurobindo or The Adventure of Consciousness is definitely one of the books on Sri Aurobindo. He is definitely a source of inspiration for the followers of Sri Aurobindo and The Mother.

That is why Satprem, the brilliant pioneer, is remembered.

Barindranath Chaki

Written on 30-10-2008,
Published on 31-10-2008

Posted simultaneously also in ASPIRATION and Sulekha.

Tags : Sri Aurobindo Mira Alfassa The Mother Satprem A new Evolution Evolution II Integral Transformation Consciousness of the Cells

The First Step

Hill after hill was climbed and now,
Behold, the last tremendous brow
And the great rock that none has trod:
A step, and all is sky and God.

[One Day : Sri Aurobindo]


The Evolution from the Ape to Man was over many a millennium back. The Homo Neanderthal and then the Homo Sapiens came into being. But Man was groping in utter Darkness : he did not find his Way, and even if it was shown to him or even if he discovered it, he lost it. He lost his Way, though his existence was and is the Search of the Way from Darkness to Light.

“Hill after hill was climbed…” — several realizations were there before Man — the Divine came to us in one form or another and led the Way. Avatars were there who climbed the hills.

And the last great rock was still there untouched, unclimbed — the rock “that none has trod” : the rock of the Supramental Consciousness. The Supramental Realization was the Step that was to be taken.

And it was Sri Aurobindo who took the Step— the first Step. That was the Task before Him, before Sri Aurobindo The Avatar.

OOOOO

On 4th April, 1910, at 4PM, Sri Aurobindo arrived at and took His first Step on Pondicherry. He had left Calcutta and, thereby, British India on 1st April 1910, and proceeded towards Colombo in a steamer named SS Duplex. As revealed from the records, He traveled in the steamer as one Jyotindra Mitter and the ticket was up to Colombo, so that His movements remain utterly misleading to the Police of British India. Bijoy Nag, Sri Aurobindo’s companion in the journey, was named Bankim Chandra Basak. On the way to Colombo, they dropped in Pondicherry.

That was the First Step by the One who brought the Greatest Revolution in the spiritual endeavours taken by Mankind. That was the end of the revolutionary chapter in the life of Sri Aurobindo — and then began His journey towards to the New World, the Supramental World, the New Creation — His true Work —the New Vision and the New Way before mankind.

OOOOO
In 1906, Sri Aurobindo left Baroda and came to Calcutta, as the first Principal of the newly formed Bengal National College. However, He soon resigned that post, being more and more actively involved in the Nationalist Movement. We should know and remember that Sri Aurobindo was the first of the Nationalist leaders who thought about a completel independence for India as the goal of the Movement, and for several years he was practically involved in this struggle. Consequently, He was arrested in the well-known Alipore Bomb Case. He was kept in solitary confinement for about a year as an 'under-trial' prisoner in Alipore jail. During this period, He had a great spiritual experience, the second of the major spiritual experiences of his life.
After He was acquitted and released, the British authorities continued to pursue him, due to the continued activities of the Revolutionaries. An inner Voice asked him to go, at first to Chandernagore, and then to Pondicherry. He secretly left British India, as He was being persecuted as a politically dangerous person, for having dreamt of the Independence of India, and then took refuge in Pondicherry.

OOOOO

In Pondicherry, He concentrated intensively and extensively to the exploration of the new spiritual possibilities. When The Mother [Mira Alfassa] joined Him and when, later, the Ashram was formed, with Her collaboration and using His newfound spiritual and Supramental discoveries and experiences and wisdom, He continued His Work: the Adventure of Consciousness, through the Supramental Discovery and Its Ascent, Descent, and through the Supramental Transformation, which He found to be the only solution for all the human problems, continuing for millennia.

What happened in Pondicherry on the 4th of April 1910, was the beginning of a unique Spiritual History. As it happened, it seemed that everything was set by the unseen Hands, ready from beforehand, and unfolded by The Divine Dreamer’s Will, through previously thought and shaped events, like the unfoldment of the Divine Lotus! And in ourse of Time, we find that as a consequence of this First Step, now the Whole earth and the the mankind are on the threshold of a Great Change.

Sr Aurobindo, along with The Mother, had the New Vision, the Golden Vision. He has foreseen the enlightned and golden Future on our earth, and hasthen endeavoured to transform the earth, to make His Vision true and real.

I saw the Omnipotent's flaming pioneers
Over the heavenly verge which turns towards life
Come crowding down the amber stairs of birth;
Forerunners of a divine multitude,
Out of the paths of the morning star they came
the little room of mortal life.
I saw them cross the twilight of an age,
The sun-eyed children of a marvellous dawn,
The great creators with wide brows of calm,
The massive barrier-breakers of the world
And wrestlers with destiny in her lists of will,
The labourers in the quarries of the gods,
The messengers of the Incommunicable,
architects of immortality.

OOO
Their tread one day shall change the suffering earth
And justify the light on Nature's face.

OOO
All shall be done for which our pain was borne.
Even as of old man came behind the beast
This high divine successor surely shall come
Behind man's inefficient mortal pace,
Behind his vain labour, sweat and blood and tears:

OOO
He shall take on him the burden of the gods;
All heavenly light shall visit the earth's thoughts,
The might of heaven shall fortify earthly hearts;
Earth's deeds shall touch the superhuman's height,
Earth's seeing widen into the infinite.

[Savitri, Book III, Canto IV: Sri Aurobindo]

Barin Chaki
Written on 04-04-2008,
Published on 07-04-2008

On 'The Divine Moment'

Comments on 'The Divine Moment'

[The Divine Moment was simultaneously published in Sulekha. The following are the comments made on The Divine Moment in Sulekha.]

♥ komlet posted in Sulekha 3 days ago
Barin Chaki.....the whole write up is so well versed and aims to strike the heart of a seeker
......read and get in touch of something special...........perhaps i can not define it right now,
thanks for your wonderful notes.

♥ krishnabaalu posted in Sulekha 3 days ago :
Wonderful; The Mother and Sri Aurobindo would have changed the world if we Indian's had realized the power of Sri Aurobindo. The true spiritual power and yogi of Modern World.

Krishna Baalu

♥ barin chaki posted in Sulekha 24 hrs ago
Thank you, komlet.
Thank you, krishnabaalu

Both of you are really special, as The Divine Moment has touched both of you.

When komlet said that there is something special, she was right, as the said Divine Moment is still alive and active, more alive and active than the otherwise dull and fleeing moments!!

krishnabaalu rightly said that the world would now have already been changed, if Indians would have accepted Sri Aurobindo wholeheartedly. But the majority of the Indians tried to follow half-truth and was diverted by other aims. That is a sad story many people know, who at least think and feel like krishnabaalu.

But let it be so!
Truth will manifest, surely, without waiting for any immature instruments!!
The lethargy and slow and tedious lives of the unchanging Apes and monkeys could not stop the coming of the Humans!!!

Barin Chaki
01-04-2008

Posted by me in
The New Vision
on 02-04-2008
Barin Chaki

The Divine Moment

Ninety-four years back, a French lady, not much known at that time to the outer world, had a meeting with Someone who secretly left British India, being persecuted as a politically dangerous person, for having dreamt of the Independence of India, and then too refuge in a corner in French India, in Pondicherry. Few people knew or anticipated the result and the outcome of the meeting.

The Mother met Sri Aurobindo on the 29th March 1914.

The consequence was the ongoing Transformation of the human world towards the Supramental Manifestation on earth. That meeting was definitely one of the most important turning point in the human history, the turning point when Man has begin his journey for transcending his imperfections and his living in ignorance and darkness, for growing towards Supermanhood, leaving his checkered human existence.

It was a Divine Moment, chosen by the Divine.

The Mother saw Him for the first time, at 3:30 PM on that particular day, in His house in Rue Francois Martin in Pondicherry. “At the very first sight, recognition came like a flash of lightning: Sri Aurobindo was verily the ‘Krishna’ she had met so often in her dreams. There was no need for speech, she sat at Sri Aurobindo’s feet and closed her eyes, only her mind was open to him. A great silence now encompassed her and flooded her soul. There was a breaking of past intellectual moulds, a dissolution of arduous mental constructions, followed by a new crystallization in the image of total identification with the incarnate Divine.” [Sri Aurobindo by K R Srinivasa Iyengar]


Of this Moment, The Mother later wrote the next day:

Gradually the horizon becomes distinct, the path grows clear, and we move towards a greater and greater certitude.

It matters little that there are thousands of beings plunged in the densest ignorance. He whom we saw yesterday is on earth, and Thy reign shall be indeed established on earth.
[Prayers and Meditations]

OOOOO

The densest darkness is still around — darkness and dark activities therein. Millions and million human beings are still immersed in that darkness — the so-called human beings who are more inhuman, and even subhuman, than human, and they are grossly involved in activities and habits that are leading the Race to disintegration and destruction and still more darkness. It seems that a significant portion of the Race has forgotten any impression of a higher Aspiration, that has been leading mankind always.

We find the instances of mass killings, for several reasons, for fulfilling dark political and religious ambitions, for satisfying insatiable animal passion and greed and deformed lust. We find disturbances everywhere, in smaller and bigger scales. We find clash and hatred and genocide at many places —in Tibet, in Afghanistan, in India and Pakistan. Killers are firing free everywhere.

But also we find that the Hope is there, the non-flickering Ray of Hope. And it has been there, since Sri Aurobindo and The Mother have kindled the Hope. Their Action together began on this day the 29th March 1914.

The greatest consequence of Their Collaboration was, and is, the Descent of the Supramental Consciousness on earth on the 29th February 1956, preceded by the Descent of the Supramental in the Person and in the Body of Sri Aurobindo on the occasion of His Physical Departure and even earlier.

The Supramental Descent was the Hope and then it turned to become the New Reality. That is the Key to the Next Future — the New Future, the New Creation.

OOOOO
Like the squirrel helping in the Setubandha in Ramayana, we also have a role in the formation of the New Future, the Supramental Future — to Work for IT within our capacity and scope, and the minimum of IT is not to have a regression, never to go back, to the World of Darkness and dense and gross animality and never to put off the fire of Aspiration..


Barin Chaki
29-03-2008

February

Indeed, the 21st, 28th and 29th days of February bring along with them the Force and Light and Joy of a New Consciousness that vibrates in the air — one may feel it also, if one tries to remain quiet and receptive and open.
That is the Force that is there on earth, in order to bring a Big Change here, from the mental and vital world to the Supramental Manifestation.
To try to commune with The Mother, with the Divine — that will be and is the best way of celebration of these days.
Let us sincerely try to have a constant communion with Her.

Barin
21-02-2008

The Transition

The Transition — The Seventeenth November

Thirty-three years back, on the Seventeenth Day of November, 1973, Mira Alfassa, The Mother in Sri Aurobindo’s Yoga, left Her physical body and walked and entered into the then newly formed Supramental Body. The World knew and told that She has passed away.

She wanted to walk into Her new supramental body along with Her old body. But that did not and could not happen. The cooperation that She deserved from the fellow human beings was not received. Someone who was close to Her on that day, did not render the needed assistance and She had to lie on Her bed, as She was medically ill. Her instructions were ignored and unheard. Her entreaties were not listened to or cared for. Someone failed to become a true representative of the aspiring mankind.

OOOOO

Medically, The Mother was ill. It was told that She was sick. Though, according to The Mother and Her followers Satprem and Sujata, She was really at the concluding stage of preparing and entering into a New Body, the Supramental Body. Many others heard of it — some believed it. Some could not believe it — some did not believe it.

The Mother had told Sujata of the New Body on 24-03-1972 :

For the first time, early this morning, I saw myself: my body. I don't know whether it's the supramental body or ... (what shall I say?) a transitional body, but I had a completely new body, in the sense that it was sexless: it was neither woman nor man.
It was very white. But that could be because I have white skin, I don't know.
It was very slender (gesture). Really lovely, a truly harmonious form.
That's the first time.
I hadn't the least idea, the faintest notion what it would look like, nothing, and I saw - I WAS like that, I had become like that. I thought Satprem should know, so he can note it down.
I don't know if I'll remember, that's why I am telling you. Because today is Friday and I won't see him till tomorrow. This way, I am sure I won't forget. You'll tell him, won't you?

Sujata: Yes, Mother.

The next day, the 25th March 1972, Satprem had asked The Mother about the New Body:
Sujata told me about the experience you had the other day, that vision you had of your body, the transitional body.

The Mother replied:
Yes, I WAS like that. It was me; I didn't look at myself in a mirror, I saw myself like this (Mother bends her head to look at her body), I was ... I just was like that.
That's the first time. It was around four in the morning, I think. And perfectly natural - I mean, I didn't look in a mirror, it felt perfectly natural……

The Mother revealed Her Agenda and Her Work before Satprem and Sujata, and they were told by Her of Her programme of creation and preparation of the New Body as a very important step in the Supramental Manifestation.

OOOOO

K D Sethna has said:

We are aware that the Supramental Body was already with Her, waiting to fuse with the human form She had worn for our sake. We are aware also that the lengthy struggle she recently went through was only the Yogic endeavour of the human form to open completely to the Supramental Body. Perhaps this form did enough and its exalted agony was needed no more to enable the Supramental Body to manifest. Perhaps that Body having assimilated the achievement of the other and thereby gained sufficient density for its subtle-physical substance, can now materialize itself on its own in a not too distant future.

OOOOO

What M P Pandit said is highly relevant :

A new body was under formation, the supramental body, in which She was to take Her embodiment as the end-result of the transformation of this body. The body was being prepared. She gave in “Notes on the Way” descriptions of this body, described how it looked. And about a year ago, She told someone, “I am trying to fuse this material body into that body but I have not been able to get the clue.” She said, “Nobody on earth has tried this, the secret is not given to me. On that point, She said, there was no help from above. She was searching.

Thereafter ……… one day it flashed to me that as soon as that luminous body was ready, the Mother would just walk into it without dying, “without dying” means not necessarily keeping the body, but without the gap in consciousness; keeping up the continuity of the personality, She would just cross in to that luminous body. It just flashed, and the way it came I thought it was more than just an idea: I noted it down in my diary. I looked up it the other day, it was dated the 24th of July 1973. I did not think it wise to speak of it to people except in my closest circle, which I did… …

Then on the morning of 17th November at about nine o’clock, a particular friend of mine — he has a certain grounding in occult experience, occult knowledge, and normally when we meet we exchange notes — told me, “I have seen the Mother’s body of light.” I got interested. “The new body is full of light but it is not dense enough to function is earth conditions. It is there, and as I was looking at it I got the feeling that the Mother would enter this body the moment it became dense enough to stand and function in the earth atmosphere, seen or unseen. But there is no question of revival of the material body.” And he added, “Those who are capable of seeing the Mother’s halo, aura, they will be able to see that luminous body.” It confirmed what I had perceived some four month’s earlier; I told him as much.

That evening at 7-25 p.m., as you all know, the Mother withdrew from her body. They say the cause was heart failure, but let me tell you the heart failure was not the cause, the heart failure was the result of her withdrawal. She had decided, the moment things were ready she walked into that body.

She has not passed away, She has just changed her body. Not changed in the manner of the Gita — soul changing bodies — consciously ; keeping the full personality she has gone into that body. And, as it was revealed to me.…, she will function in that body, work through those instruments who are open to her, expedite the remaining work — the working out of the consequences — but her activity will not be confined to the Ashram or to Auroville; for her the whole world is her Ashram….

OOOOO

A divine possibility failed due to the non-co-operation and disobedience of Man. The negative force and will prevailed for the time being and the Destiny of Mankind and the Evolution had to have a different Course. When the Old Form could not walk into the Supramental Body, a New Course was taken by divine possibility — the New Body must not have failed and must have assimilated the essence of the Old Form.


The Mother, in Her subtle body, walked into the New Body. That was the triumph of which the mankind did not know. She is continuing Her work of the Supramental Manifestation and Transformation through those instruments who are open to Her and to Her Action or Her Will, throughout the world, and it is not limited to the Ashram or to Auroville. Her work is now for the entire world and for the entire humanity

Barin Chaki
25-11-2007

Written on 17-11-2007,
Revised from 18-11-2007
To 20-11-2007

Pubished on 25-11-2007

The New Way

Barindranath Chaki
21st July 2007

The Beginning
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.
OOO

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.
[Sri Aurobindo: Savitri]

The Mother, Mira Alfassa, the spiritual collaborator of Sri Aurobindo, has Her Agenda for all of us, the humankind, and for this earth, the abode of ours — the Advent of the supramental consciousness, of the supramental beings on Earth. That is the Work to be done here on Earth — the Work of the greatest importance — furthering the earthly Evolution beyond the humankind, beyond the human imperfection and ignorance and sufferings, bringing in a total transformation of the human beings into the gnostic beings, the supramental beings.

The Earth is a field of Evolution. The Earth has seen an Evolution from the cell, that was the first manifestation of life, to the human beings, the Homo Sapiens; and it is now becoming the field of an Evolution from the human beings to the supramental beings. About this, however, the human beings in general may not be as yet aware or conscious. Evolution, at first, was the manifestation of Life in Matter, and then it manifested Homo Neanderthals and the Homo Sapiens — the human beings, as Mind descended into Life and Matter, into the earth-atmosphere. Time has come now for going beyond Mind.

Man is conscious, but to a very small extent. Of course, in Man, the dreamer and the seeker is there; the further possibility is there in him. There have been a few Leaders among us and they are regarded as the Manifestations of the Divine among us: They have spoken of Nirvana, Moksha, Liberation and the Kingdom of God. They have also accepted death and decay and sufferings like all of us, out of Their Love for us. The Way They found for us was the way of escape from this worldly manifestation. A few individual’s nirvana or moksha or journey to the Kingdom of God could not solve the problems of the remaining billions of human beings that remained on earth. As a whole, the humanity has remained far away from Light and Joy and Peace and deathlessness, from Perfection and Consciousness that can give Victory and Conquest.

Man is not the last thing in Evolution on earth. He has to surpass himself and grow and become a higher being. This is the message of Sri Aurobindo and The Mother.

Sri Aurobindo has said:
Man is a transitional being; he is not final….The Step from man to superman is the next approaching achievement in earth’s evolution. It is inevitable because it is at once the intention of the inner Spirit and the logic of Nature’s process. [The Hour of God, page 7]

So far, the earth has been a vale of tears, a vale of owes and sorrows and sufferings, and also a vale of bloodshed and cruelty, of destructions and devastations and Death, of falls and failures and frustrations, of fights and feuds, of fears and foes. We are all sitting upon a heap of bombs — atomic or non-atomic, real or virtual. Human beings have become absolutely selfish and egoistic. Religions have turned into the reasons for battles, group-wars and terrorism. Political institutions and activities are grossly infected by crimes and corruptions. Love is lost. Truth is lost and hidden. Light is engulfed in Darkness.

This cannot be the Earth that the Divine, the Supreme, has designed and dreamed to manifest. The earth can be and has to be transformed into Abode of God. Man has to change himself and the earth atmosphere. Man has to change this world, in all aspects, in totality, integrally.

Sri Aurobindo has said:
Man in himself a little more than an ambitious nothing. He is a littleness that reaches to a wideness and grandeur that are beyond him, a dwarf enamoured of the heights. His mind is a dark ray in the splendours of the Universal Mind. His life is a striving, exulting, suffering, an eager passion-tossed and sorrow-stricken or a blindly and dumbly longing petty moment of the universal Life. His body is labouring perishable speck in the material universe. This cannot be the mysterious upward surge of Nature.[The Hour of God, page 8]

The base of this worldly manifestation, as we know, is Matter, which appears to us to be inconscient, gross, inert, without Life or Mind. However, Matter, as Sri Aurobindo has stated, is the self-willed involution of the Existence-Consciousness-Bliss, the Superconscient Spirit, the Supreme. The Divine has Himself become Matter, as the ultimate process of an Involution. Evolution is the urge, ‘the upward surge’ of the involved Divinity in Nature — to express and manifest Itself in this and as this evolving world.

Sri Aurobindo has further said:
In every particle, atom, molecule, cell of Matter there lives hidden and works unknown all the Omniscience of the Eternal and all the Omnipotence of the Infinite.[The Hour of God, page 14]

He has also said:
Involution of a Superconscient Spirit in inconscient Matter is the secret of this visible and apparent world and the evolution of this Superconscient out of inconscient Nature is the key-world of the earth’s riddle. Earth-life is the self-chosen habitation of a great divinity and his aeonic will is to change it from a blind prison into his splendid mansion and high heaven-reaching temple.[The Hour of God, page 17]

Thus, it is an inevitable conclusion that the earth-nature and the circumstances on earth must change. Evolution cannot stop and be finalized after creating a being, the human being, whose nature is quite insufficient and insignificant and contrary to what is involved: the Superconscient. So, Man has to grow as an expression of the Divine. Man has to grow into something that is beyond his present state : half-conscious, ignorant, mortal and enslaved to the lower nature.

Sri Aurobindo has again said :
There is something beyond, something that mankind shall be; it is seen now only in broken glimpses through rifts in the broken walls of limitations that deny its possibility and existence. An immortal soul is there somewhere within him and upholds the soul-continuity if his nature. But this greater Spirit is obstructed from descent by the hard lid of his constructed personality; and that inner luminous soul is wrapped, stifled, oppressed in dense outer coatings.[The Hour of God, page 8]

Sri Aurobindo has further said:
The earth-law has to be changed and a new atmosphere has to be created.
[Evenings talks with Sri Aurobindo by A B Purani, page 148]

Body has been seen, almost always, as a barrier for spiritual sadhana and progress. Sri Aurobindo has spoken of this as follows:
In the past, the body was regarded by the spiritual seekers rather as an obstacle, as something to be overcome as discarded, than as an instrument of spiritual perfection and a field of spiritual change. It has been condemned as a grossness of Matter, as an insuperable impediment, and the limitations of the body as something unchangeable, making transformation impossible.[The Supramental Manifestation, page 7]

But now, in the New Way of the Supramental Transformation, the role of the body is essential and of high importance. The secret of the Change lies here, in the body. Man has to surpass all his imperfections and shortcomings and become the supramental being. The earth shall grow into an abode of the supramental consciousness. That way only, the humankind can conquer all his sufferings, fears and shortcomings, all his imperfections, inconscience and ignorance, and even Death. That is the Task ahead. That is the Work to be done. Conquest of Death — that is the Aim. “Even the body shall remember God,” said Sri Aurobindo [in Savitri], and thus shall body conquer Death and Darkness and Ignorance.

OOOO

The term ‘the Agenda’ definitely means The Mother’s Agenda. The reference is to the thirteen volumes of Mother’s Agenda, and it also includes in it scope the very central Idea of that has been the Aim and Goal and Purpose of all the endeavours of The Mother: the terrestrial transformation and the Advent of the supramental beings — the Supramental Transformation. It was destined that the 13 volumes of the Agenda would be published, the main contents of which put forth the Message of the Mother to the humanity, to the world, through Her words and sayings and conversations. Some persons perhaps did not desire that these Words should not se the daylight, but the Divine Will prevailed. Satprem came out to the world with these Words. In fulfillment of the Divine Will, Satprem was The Mother’s instrument.

The Mother’s Words in these volumes of the Agenda are essentially important, as they form the New Truth, create the New Vision that will lead and guide the humanity, the world, to The New Horizon, The New World, of the supramental manifestation. These words show us The New Way.

Should we continue for ever to be as imperfect and ignorant and mortal as we are now? Should we ever remain enslaved to Tamas and Darkness and Inconscience, to Death, to division and disorder and chaos? Should our existence for ever be meaningless, purposeless? Should our cycles of birth and death be aimless, meaningless? Should our existence remain for ever subject to sorrow and sufferings? Should always there be the continuance of the problems of warfare and battle, terrorism and bloodshed, of the innocent killings of the religious intolerance and atrocities, of the false and narrow and ignorant social rules, regulations, thoughts and ideologies on earth?

Sri Aurobindo and The Mother have answered with an emphatic no. There shall come a change — as certain as the sunrise. And there is a Way — as true as the sunlight. And there is a Hope — as sure as the Dawn — for all of us who are willing to collaborate and cooperate with the Divine, with Truth.

As we know, Sri Aurobindo departed after effecting the Descent of the supramental consciousness and force on and in His Person. The Mother took up the thread by bringing down the supramental consciousness on earth. She continued with after the Descent on earth for a progressive realization of the supramentalized manhood — supermanhood — by Man.

I hope the fellow seekers will be delighted to walk on The New Way.

[Continued]

Barindranath Chaki
21-07-2007

On Satprem

Satprem: Life without Death

From Sandra ►

Sandra says :

I'm a bit stunned as I write this. I'm not an obituary writer, but here I am, for the third time in the past month-and-a-bit, writing about someone who died recently. I was just looking online for a link to Satprem 's book The Mind of the Cells for a girlfriend of mine who I chatted with today in the sunny garden here in Bonn. Another friend overheard us, and told us about his experience of being with Satprem in 1973, just after the death of Mirra Alfassa, The Mother.

And now, a few hours later, I read that Satprem died on the 9th of April this year.
I know virtually nothing about Satprem, other than he wrote The Mind of the Cells and other books ( e.g. Life Without Death, on my 'to read' list…) and that he was one of the few people who understood what The Mother was doing. What he shared in The Mind of the Cells lives in my own cells…. in my heart and mind and soul and body, always there, reminding me of so something rare and often forgotten – unseen or unknown even – & not only forgotten in my own consciousness, but in the thoughts and consciousness and life of so many of those around me.

OOOO

The Mind of the Cells is about The Mother's extraordinary 'experiments' in transformation and evolution through the body. What Satprem and the Mother explored has stayed with me like a light in the darkest tunnels of my own journey. I believe I 'left' my body (as much as was possible without actually going insane or dying) when I was seven, - and that my life from that point onwards has been a path of reconnecting to this body. I deeply sense and experience that this reconnection is not simply a 'getting back in'- it's wider than that, part of my own evolution – and because I'm in the middle of this journey ( or somewhere along a spectrum that may not be vertical), I can't quite express what is actually happening.I've always felt that I am here in a 'body' for a reason, that the wild and often extremely uncomfortable physical ride this body is on is not a 'mistake' or a problem. I believe that the evolution of consciousness, of being human - of becoming - is through this body; I believe that 'enlightenment' is not a process of disconnecting from the physical into some 'higher' more ethereal realm, rather it is a fully physical and felt experience (I have to say that this is more than a belief, it's a kind of knowing that is not about being 'right'). Reading The Mind of the Cells washed over me like a wave of warm ocean, curling me into its heart, saying Yes, what you experience is absolutely precise and on track.

OOOO

Thank you Satprem, thank you Mother Mirra.
I had the same thoughts about Satprem that I had about U.G. Krishnamurti - I hoped that 'one day' I would meet him. Both lived quite reclusively, out of the public eye, and I'm sad that I did not make a greater effort to sit with them in this life. I'm reminded to never take for granted what is here, and to reach out to all who have touched me, supported me, encouraged me, and tell them how grateful I am.

And, I loved what Barindranath Chaki wrote on his Satprem blog: “Satprem cannot die…He will be there, till the Work he has undertaken is done”. Perhaps this is why I'm writing this - so that the flame of Sri Aurobindo, The Mother and Satprem can be passed along - to anyone who is touched by anything I've written, to anyone who feels that the physical experience is absolutely integral to consciousness, then please, read these extraordinary people's books, share the flame. Let's live in the fire of life, exploring all its corridors and pathways, let us – hand-in-hand – walk where there are no roads, no maps, on and into this great adventure of the unknown.

OOOO

Added later:

“It happened in the deserted canyons near Pondicherry. I was sitting there quietly, when out of a hollow came three men. Instantly I knew: “They're coming to kill me.” I stayed where I was, without moving. And strangely without any effort or concentration, I suddenly felt as if emptied of myself, without any reaction, without fear, without anything, like a stone, but a conscious stone looking unconcerned at some kind of show, just as one can be both witness and actor in a dream. Except for its neutrality, the feeling was not really that of a rock, but rather that of a body, my body, as something utterly transparent and null, and a little indistinct. Nothing moved, there was not a quiver or a throb - and I had nothing to do with it, there was no “self-control” involved, no effort. Something had taken hold of me in a transparent immobility The three men were there: two in front, one behind. I didn't move. they talked amongst themselves. Then a kind of voice in me said, “Get up.” I rose, with my back to the canyon. One of them took off my watch, no doubt to simulate a robbery. The man behind came in front of me. I saw the killer raise his arm to push me into the canyon. I followed the movement of that arm, my eyes met the gold-coloured eyed of the killer. he lowered his arm, hesitated a moment as if he was not sure what to do , or exactly why he was there. It seemed that he too now watched the scene as if it did not make any sense, or as if he had forgotten what he had come for. He turned around, the others turned, around, and they left. Then they started to run as if panic stricken. And my heart suddenly remembered that it should have been frightened, that they had wanted to kill me.. and it started pounding like mad.The only thing I know is that had there been the slightest effort on my part, the slightest contraction or reaction to push those men back, even an inner refusal, a mere “no” inside, they would have killed me instantly: the opposition thus raised would have met and challenged their vibration and the reaction would have touched off the whole process. But there was nothing, not even a breath of reaction; I was like thin air, as it wore: the others vibration passed through me like a breeze, unobstructed. Can you kill a breeze? Some kind of contact is necessary in order to kill, you have to have a handle - here, there was no handle, for the was nothing, and since there was nothing, there was nothing!”

[ From Satprem: The mind of the cells ]

Sandra Jensen

[http://sandrajensen.zaadz.com/]

[As a comment on my blog Satprem, simultaneously published in Zaadz, Sandra says :
Thank you so much for this, dear Barindranath. I was just writing my own Satprem blog, only having discovered today that he died, and while I was researching him I found you here, what a gift.
Love,
Sandra]
~Barin Chaki~