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Bypaths of Soul's Journey
A POPULAR conundrum. Are the souls finite or infinite in number? Supposing they are finite, then a time is sure to come when there will be no more souls upon earth; for, as it is said, all souls are evolving and in the end will pass out of earthly life and get merged in their source, the Brahman, the absolute Reality. On the other hand, if they are infinite, then, since all of them cannot appear on earth at the same time, the number of human bodies that house the souls being limited (at the most, a few thousand millions, according to statisticians), what happens to those that are not embodied, where do they wait or what do they do in that period? Do all come down or embody in course of time? Will all have the chance, will it be needed for all to take a body and sojourn on earth? No doubt, there is a continual increase of population upon earth, does that mean that new souls are slowly coming away from the waiting list? Even then, the list cannot be exhausted, since it is infinite; so there is bound to be a very large number who would not get the chance of visiting the earth. For, however much the population increases, it cannot increase to infinity. It can do so only if the world continues to exist eternally and humanity too. But both science and religion say that the world will come to an end sometime. There is a pralaya – an extinction – although it may be followed by a new creation and a new cycle of growth and evolution, but of a different kind and constituting quite other elements.
I have put the popular case in figures of popular
mentality; – almost foolish and childish on the face of it, as it
would appear; but if one "tries to answer, one finds it is not
easy, children's questions are always so. Let us then try to be wise
and face the problem squarely. The whole difficulty comes from the
popular,
Page – 287 perhaps normal human conception of the soul; it is considered almost something like the physical body (even as Virochana of old did in the Upanishadic days), namely, it has a definite form and figure, even perhaps a definite mass: each is an isolated entity shut out from everyone else by a fixed contour within which each one is housed. In fact, however, it is not so. The soul is an individual, no doubt, it has even a kind of recognisable form, but nothing of the kind by which matter or a material body is characterised. It is an essential form, form of the form, swarūpa; it is a basic or typal individuality, the individual seated within the 'individual. The characteristic of material individuality is, as I have said, exclusiveness, where -as the soul individuality is characterised by a comprehensiveness which does not diminish but gives a special mode and movement to that individuality. In the growth of life-forms, we know how a single unit, a cell, divides and subdivides itself and each division grows into a whole, a complete life-form. But the process is not reversible. Developed forms, coming out of a single parent cannot be resolved back into the original unit. Organisms do not combine to form a single unitary organism, although one or more may be taken up and assimilated into another: for this is not combination, but practically the annihilation of one into another. The second law of thermodynamics seems to hold good even in the biological field. On a still higher or deeper level, in the psychological and spiritual realm, such combinations or resolutions are however possible and form a characteristic movement of the occult world.
Let us repeat here what we have often said elsewhere.
The creation and development of souls is a twofold process. First,
there is the process of growth from below, and secondly there is the
process of manifestation or expression from above, the movements of
ascent and descent, as spoken of by Sri Aurobindo. The souls start on
their evolutionary journey on the material plane as infinitesimal
specks of consciousness imbedded in the vast expanse of the
Inconscient; but they are parts and parcels of a homogeneous mass: in
fact they are not distinguishable from each other at that level.
There is as it were a secret vibration of consciousness with which
the material infinity all around is shot through. With evolution,
that is to
Page – 288 say, with the growth and coming forward of the consciousness, there arise sparks, glowing centres here and there, forms shape and isolate themselves in the bosom of the original formless mass; they rise and they subside, others rise, coalesce, separate – some grow, others disappear. These sparks or centres, as they develop or evolve, slowly assume definiteness, – of form and function, – attain an individuality and finally a personality. Looked at from below there is no counting of these sparks or rudimentary souls; they are innumerable and infinitely variable. It is something like the nebula out of which the galaxies are supposed to be formed. The line of descent, however, presents a different aspect. Looked from above, at the summit there is the infinite supreme Being and Consciousness and Bliss (Sachchidananda) and in it too there cannot be a limit to the number of Jivatmas that are its formulations, like the waves in the bosom of the sea, according to the familiar figure. This is the counterpart of the infinity at the other end, where also the rudimentary souls or potential individualities are infinite. Moving down along the line of descent at a certain stage, under a certain modality of the creative process, certain types or fundamental formations are put forward that give the ground-plan, embody the matrix of the subsequent creation or manifestation. The Four Great Personalities (Chaturvyuha), the Seven Seers, the Fourteen Manus or Human Ancestors point to the truth of a fixed number of archetypes that are the source and origin of emanations forming in the end the texture of earthly lives and existences. The number and scheme depends upon a given purpose in view and is not an eternal constant. The types and archetypes with which we, human beings, are concerned in the present cycle of evolution belong to the supramental and overmental planes of consciousness; they are the beings known familiarly as gods and presiding deities. They too have emanations, each one of them, and these emanations multiply as they come down the scale of manifestation to lower and lower levels, the mental, the vital and the physical, for example. And they enter into human embodiments, the souls evolving and ascending from the lower end; they may even take upon themselves human character and shape.
There are thus chains linking the typal beings in the
world
Page – 289 above with their human embodiments in the physical world; an archetype in the series of emanations branches out, as it were, into its commensurables and cognates in human bodies. Hence it is quite natural that many persons, human embodiments, may have so to say one common ancestor in the typal being (that gives their spiritual gotra); they all belong to the same geneological tree. Souls aspiring and ascending to the higher and fuller consciousness, because of their affinity, because together they have to fulfil a special role, serve a particular purpose in the cosmic plan, because of their spiritual consanguinity, call on the same godhead as their Master-soul or Over-soul, the Soul of their souls. Their growth and development are along similar or parallel lines, they are moulded and shaped in the pattern set by the original being. This must not be understood to mean that a soul is bound exclusively to its own family and cannot step out of its geneological system. As I have said in the beginning, souls are not material particles hard and rigid and shut out from each other, they are not obliged to obey the law of impenetrability that two bodies cannot occupy the same place at the same time. They meet, touch, interchange, interpenetrate, even coalesce, although they may not belong to the same family but follow different lines of, evolution. Apart from the fact that in the ultimate reality each is in all and all is in each, not only so, each is all and all is each-thus beings on no account can be kept in water-tight compartments-apart from this spiritual truth, there is also a more normal and apparent give and take between souls. The phenomenon known as "possession", for example, is a case in point. "Possession", however, need not be always a ghostly possession in the modern sense of the possession by evil spirits, it may be also in a good sense, the sense that the word carried among mediaeval mystics, viz., spiritual.
We say commonly souls are immortal. But in an occult
sense souls are or may be mortal too. When the Vedantin speaks of
laya or the Buddhist of Śūnya,
what else is it? It is nothing but the annihilation of the soul,
even if it is in the Brahman or some Absolute. But we are not
referring to that here. There is a merger of souls, and a dissolution
of souls in a somewhat different manner, not on the highest
metaphysical heights, but even here below among the growing
developing
Page – 290 souls embodied upon earth. That is to say, one soul may unite with another and both form one single entity and embodiment. This perhaps is not the general rule, especially on the higher levels, where the beings possess well developed and well organised individual personalities. It is more common in the earlier stages when the souls are just developing and are pliant and supple and can easily intermingle. But even on the higher reaches a merger is possible and does happen, when some special work has to be done. A god sometimes literally descends into a man, takes up the human soul within himself and becomes the man, transformed and transfigured, even as an Asura also may do the same thing. And human beings too on high altitudes of spiritual growth, major souls, can combine and fuse together to form a single soul-such may be the demand of their individual lines of growth or the demand of a Higher Will and Purpose. Reverting to the original question with which we started, we can say now that the birth of a soul is not like the birth of a living being or organism, that is to say, it does not happen at a given point of time. A soul is truly aja, unborn; it was always there imbedded as the element of secret consciousness in the bosom of the inconscient material Nature. Only it grew out, manifested itself, attaining gradually an individuality and an integrated personality. Neither can it be said that all souls originally, that is to say, at the very beginning of their evolutionary course, were of the same magnitude, equal in all respects. As we know the ultimate material particles – the atoms of the different elements or their constituents, protons, etc. - have not all the same mass or charge, even so the spiritual elements too have not the same potency or vibration: they are of varying sizes and strengths. The stress of the evolutionary urge in life expressed itself in multiple and varied figures and dispositions, variation being an inherent virtue of the stress. And the development too follows a chequered line: the direction, the tempo, the degree, the manner of the march all differ according to the case, each spark is or tends to be unique and sui generis-and even erratic perhaps – in its behaviour, like its physical counterpart, the indeterminate and indeterminable material particle. And yet all page – 291 move towards a heightening, enlarging, deepening of the consciousness – rivers flowing and broadening out in their meandering course to the sea: what was unformed, rudimentary, scarcely distinguishable from out of a homogeneous mass, detaches itself gradually, shapes itself into an organised individual entity and finally the fully conscious personality. But, as I have said, the growth does not follow a single one-track straight line: there can be a fusion of souls, the descent and integration of a being or soul from another level of consciousness into a developing soul or psychic element from out of Nature. In this sense then there can be a birth of souls too. The astronomers speak of novae, new stars that suddenly flare out in the sky, as if from nowhere – even though they or their elements were existent before the phenomenon happened. Souls too can come to birth in an analogous way. That is to say, it is due to a special descent of a formed being or consciousness into the human vehicle. The conception of the "twice-born caste" may be remembered in this connection. There is a physical birth and there is a spiritual birth: the latter takes place when the being on the physical plane, yet wholly belonging to evolving Nature, suddenly (it usually happens suddenly) opens and receives into itself a higher principle and becomes a conscious personality.
The soul in Nature grows along a definite line and the
descent also of higher principles overarching that soul happens also
in the same line connecting it with its archetype in the supreme
status. This we may call the major line of development through
various avataras one after another: but apart from this there may
also be subsidiary formations that are its emanations or are added to
it from elsewhere either temporarily or even permanently. The soul
can put out derivative or ancillary emanations, parts of its being
and consciousness, a mental or vital or even a subtle physical
movement or formation which can take a body creating a temporary, a
transient personality or enter into another's body and another
personality in order to go through a necessary experience and gather
an element needed for the growth of its being and consciousness. One
can recall here the famous story of Shankaracharya ! Who entered into
the body of a king (just dead, made him alive and lead the life of
the king) in order
Page – 292 to experience love and enjoyment, things of which, being a Sannyasi, he was innocent. Similarly one can take into one-self such parts and elements from others which he wishes to utilise for his growth and evolution. It is said that a man with low carnal instincts and impulses becomes an animal of that type in his next life. But perhaps it is truer to say that a part only-the vital part of animal appetite-enters into or takes shape in an animal: the soul itself, the true or the whole being of the person, once become human, does not revert to animalhood. The animal portion in man that refuses to be taken up and integrated, sublimated into the higher human consciousness has to be satisfied and exhausted, as much as possible, in the animal way.
There is also the other question asked very often
whether men and women always follow different lines of growth or
whether there may be intermixture of the lines. Although the soul is
sexless, still it may be said that on the whole there are these two
lines, masculine and feminine; and generally a soul follows the same
line in its incarnations. The soul difference is not in the sex as we
know it; but there is a disposition and character that mark the
difference and each type, masculine or feminine, is that because of
some special role to fulfil, a particular kind of work to be done in
a particular way. The difference is difficult to define exactly; but
one may say, in the language of the mystics, that it "is the
difference between the left hand and the right hand. The mystics
refer to the two sides of consciousness, that of light and that of
force (chit-tapas), that is to say, knowledge and power. It is
not that the two are quite separate entities, they are together and
grow together; but in actuality one aspect is more in front than the
other. The masculine aspect is often termed as the right hand and the
feminine as the left hand of the conscious being. And in a general
way man represents the knowledge aspect – the conceptual dynamism –
and woman represents the executive dynamism. This definition however
should not be taken absolutely or rigidly. So it can be said that a
woman generally remains a woman in all her births. and man like-wise
remains a man. Here too, although there may not be a central
metamorphosis, there may be a partial change: that is to say a part
of a man – too womanish, so to say – may
Page – 293 enter a woman and live and fulfil itself or exhaust there; and the masculine part of a woman also can identify itself with its type and pattern in a man. The difference, however, between Purusha and Prakriti, philosophically, seems to be very definite and clear; but in actuality, when they take form and embodiment, it is not easy to define the principles or qualities that mark out the two. At the source when the difference starts, it is a matter of stress and temper and not any so-called division of labour as human mind ordinarily understands it. The soul in its inner consciousness knows all its evolutionary formations, remembers those of the past and foresees those of the future, when needed, and even determines them essentially. The mind ruling one incarnation cannot recall other incarnations, for it is a product of that incarnation and is meant to guide and control it; physical memory is a function of the brain in the particular body that the soul inhabits for the time. The soul carries a deeper reminiscence which is part and parcel of the self-consciousness inherent in its nature. The physical memory too can partake of this inner reminiscence if it is purified, illumined and organised around the soul as its instrument of expression. Indeed, although the journey of the soul essentially and originally is the flight of
the spirit to the Spirit, yet the final consummation is
towards an increasing integration of all the external instruments
from the highest to the lowest, from the subtlest to the grossest
into a harmonised organised whole, reflecting and embodying the
Spirit in its purity and totality. The mind, the life and the body
too attain a perfectly unified individuality that is the expression
of the soul's truth-consciousness and escaping disruption and
dissolution partake ultimately of the inherent immortality of the
spiritual being. Page – 294
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