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I
TO READ SRI AUROBINDO
I learned that you want to know something about Sri Aurobindo and the Mother from me. But then there are three lines of approach: you may want to know about them, know of them or know them. Of course the last is the best. Indeed if you want to know truly something you have to become it. Becoming gives the real knowledge. But becoming Sri Aurobindo and the Mother means what? Becoming a portion of them, a part and parcel of their consciousness — that is what we are here for. And if you can do that, you know enough.... Once I told you, I think, how to study or approach Sri Aurobindo and the Mother in order to read them or understand their writings. There are two things: studying and reading; I made a distinction between the two. To study Sri Aurobindo is — I won't say fruitless, that is too strong a word, but it can only be an aid or a supplementary way. Study means: you take the text, you understand mentally each word and phrase, if you don't understand, you take a dictionary and try to catch the external meaning expressed by the words. That may be necessary but it is not the way to approach their works. Simply to read them in the right way is sufficient. Read, it does not matter what you understand and what page-1 you do not, simply read and wait in an expectant silence. In studying you approach them with your external mind, your external intelligence. But what is there in the text is beyond your mind, beyond your intelligence. And to understand mentally means you drive your intellect forward into the thing. It is an effort and takes you only to the outside of the thing. It is an exercise of your brain, developed in that way, but it doesn't take you very far. Instead of that, suppose you could keep quiet, silence your mind, and only read, without unduly trying to understand, and wait for what is there in the text to enter into you. Instead of your intelligence driving forward, pushing forward and trying to catch the thing, let the thing come into you, for what is there in their writings is not words and phrases, dead material, it is something very living, something conscious, that they have expressed in the words, phrases and the sound and rhythm. And I may tell you that each sentence anywhere, not to speak of Savitri, is a living being with whom you have to make acquaintance — not that you understand or are able to explain, but it is a living being, an entity, a friend, even a Lover whom you have to know. And your attempt in that way will be rewarded. You will enjoy much more. You may ask: "Just because I open a book and read, how can what are in the lines come to me?" But I say they are living entities — if you approach in the right spirit, they come into you. The consciousness, the being in each line comes to you. And you find how beautiful it is. This is Page- 2 an approach of love, not of the intellect to understand and explain. Take for example, the very first verse of Savitri:
"It was the hour before the Gods awake."
It is a Mantra, a living person, how beautiful it is, you needn't understand much — and a whole world is there. Or, take the opening sentence of The Life Divine — the rolling cadence of the vast ocean is there. It brings you a sense of vastness, a sense of Infinity and takes you there. And, as I said, it is a very living entity and personality.
Here is the whole passage:
"The earliest preoccupation of man in his awakened thoughts and, as it seems, his inevitable and ultimate preoccupation, — for it survives the longest periods of scepticism and returns after every banishment, — is also the highest which his thought can envisage. It manifests itself in the divination of Godhead, the impulse towards perfection, the search after pure Truth and unmixed Bliss, the sense of a secret immortality. The ancient dawns of human knowledge have left us their witness to this constant aspiration; today we see a humanity satiated but not satisfied by victorious analysis of the externalities of Nature preparing to return to its primeval longings. The earliest formula of Wisdom promises to be its last, — God, Light, Freedom, Immortality." Page- 3 There is indeed a personality behind it and you have to make acquaintance with that personality. That is what I meant when I said: become it, by an approach through love, an approach through your soul. Even in studies you shouldn't approach with the mere intellect, mere mental understanding; however fine an understanding or intellect you may have, it won't lead you very far. Only through your soul you can go far. Even intellectual things can be approached through your soul — because the soul is the very essence of all your faculties and being. The soul is not mere consciousness, mere being, it gathers in all the elements of your personality. The seeds of your mind, your vital, even of the physical personality, the true physical personality, are there in your soul, and you can establish a true relation with things and persons through that part of your being — your soul. And remember the soul is not very far from you because you are that—rather your mind, your vital, your physical are away from you; they are not your true personality. It is your soul that is nearest to you. In this connection you may remember what the Mother has said more than once: what is one here for? What are the children here for? And what is she giving here in the school, in the playground, in all the activities? It is not simple efficiency in the outer activities that is given here, or meant to be given here. For such things one can get outside in a more successful way — external efficiency of your intellect, of your mind, of your vital Page- 4 capacity and your physical strength—the Russian or the German type. Our records don't match theirs, do they? But we don't aspire for those records. For, as the Mother has said: "I am giving here something which you won't get anywhere else in the world — nowhere except here." In your external expression you may cut a very poor figure: low marks — but that is not the sign of the Truth that we acquire here. You acquire it even without your knowing it. When you are in the swimming pool you are soaked all through, aren't you? You can't help it; so here also; even without your knowing it you are soaked with the inner consciousness of your soul. It is a very precious thing — I should say, the only precious thing in the world. And through that, if you study, you learn — if you approach that way, you will get another taste, another interest in things. When I was reading with Sri Aurobindo, he didn't lay much stress upon the grammar or the language — just the most elementary grammar that was necessary. He used to put me in contact with the life, the living personality of the poet — what he was, what he represented in his consciousness. That was the central theme, because a truly great poet means a status of consciousness; in order to understand his consciousness you must become identified with his being. Amrita also used to say the same thing, because he was learning the Gita from Sri Aurobindo. He could feel the spirit of Krishna and the spirit of Arjuna throughout Page- 5 —their relations and the atmosphere they created. It is not the mere lesson, the teaching, that is important — that is secondary. The person is the primary thing. And the person in the book or outside, you can approach only through your soul, through love. The soul alone can love.
I think I told you that once somebody asked me: "You speak of the soul but where is it?"
I said: "It is very near you; still you don't believe. If you see into yourself quietly, you will find that there are very many good things in you, not only bad things — bits perhaps, shades or shadows perhaps, but you know this is a good thought in you, this is a noble impulse, a sweet feeling. Each one has all these things, you have only to recognise them. All this is the expression of the soul in you. The beautiful, the luminous, the noble things that appear to you, in your consciousness, from time to time, all come from your soul." Even the greatest villain has such moments. You remember Lady Macbeth — known as the cruellest woman, well, she said about Duncan, "I would have killed him myself but he looked like my father" — well, that is the feeling even she had. So let us not despair, even the weakest among us should not despair. First of all, each one has a soul, and secondly, we have the luminously strong support of the Mother. It is the nature of the Divine that even if you don't think of Him He thinks of you. It is true, very true; because you are part of the Divine. Only you have to concentrate Page- 6 consciously on that part, that portion; then gradually it will increase.
Question: What is the distinction you make between "to know about Sri Aurobindo and the Mother," and "to know of them" ?
ANSWER: "About" means what a man does, what his profession is, his occupation — kimāsita vrajeta kim and "of " means his personality, his character, nature. Page- 7 |