Sri Aurobindo

 

Sri Aurobindo and The Mother believed that the present world is a creation of the Divine and is not illusion. This world was not built by  a random play of chance. The Divine that has carved out the destiny is not blind. Whatever happens in the life of the world and the human being has been going on as per the divine plan. as stated In his monumental epic Savitri. His written works encompass many areas, from the political and spiritual renaissance of modern India to the intricacies of  yoga and the descent of what he called the "Supramental Consciousness”. This western-educated visionary and yogi attempted to create a synthesis of various yoga traditions and ideas of social and spiritual evolution. Integral education refers to the educational thoughts of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother. The thoughts on Integral Education are being tried out at the Sri Aurobindo International Centre of Education at Pondichery has been declared by the Government of India as one of the five institutions of higher learning of all India importance.

Sri Aurobindo came to tell us: "One need not leave the earth to find the Truth, one need not leave the life to find his soul, one need not abandon the world or have only limited beliefs to enter into relation with the Divine. The Divine is everywhere, in everything and if He is hidden, it is because we do not take the trouble to discover Him." - The Mother 
 

For the last 40 years of his life in Pondicherry Sri Aurobindo worked tirelessly for the realisation of his vision of a divine life upon earth. He revealed his new message for humanity and its glorious future primarily through his writings which reflect unerringly his genius as a scholar, writer, poet, literary critic, philosopher, social thinker, revolutionary, patriot, visionary and yogi. His masterful command over the English language, his infallible power of expression, his sharp intellect, his poetic genius, and above all his yogic insight and his love for humanity make it a veritable experience reading his works.

Sri Aurobindo was born on the 15th of August 1872, in Calcutta. As a child of 7 years he was sent to England for his education where he studied at St. Paul's in London and at King's College, Cambridge. During a brilliant academic career he mastered not only English but also Greek, Latin and French and became familiar with German, Italian and Spanish.

At a very young age Sri Aurobindo had begun to feel strongly that a period of great revolutionary changes was emerging in the world and in India and that he was destined to play a part in it.

On his return to India at the age of 21, he plunged whole-heartedly in the study of Indian culture. He spent 13 years in Baroda in the administrative and educational services of that State under the Gaekwad of Baroda. These were years of self-culture and literary activity. Gradually his silent political activity turned into active participation in India's struggle for freedom. He became a leader of the nationalist party and his editorials in the daily `Bande Mataram', at once made him an All-India figure. While the then Viceroy of India, Lord Minto, considered him to be "the most dangerous man we now have to reckon with", Dushbandhu Chittaranjan Das hailed him as "the poet of patriotism, the prophet of nationalism and a lover of humanity."

From 1908 to 1909 Sri Aurobindo was kept under detention by the British Government. During this one year of seclusion Sri Aurobindo underwent a series of decisive spiritual experiences which determined the course of his future life. He said after his release: The only result of the wrath of the British Government was that I found God.

In 1910, in answer to an inner calls Sri Aurobindo withdrew from the political field and sailed for Pondicherry to devote himself entirely to his evolving spiritual mission. He knew that India's freedom was certain. But now he had to work for an inner awakening and a change of conciousness, in India and the world, without which there could be no lasting progress and no solution to the pressing and formidable problems which beset mankind.

Sri Aurobindo's spiritual collaborator known as the Mother, joined him in 1920. With the Mother and Sri Aurobindo at its centre emerged the Sri Aurobindo Ashram - not a retreat for ascetics and retired men but the seat of an enduring spiritual experiment which works for the transformation and perfection of life instead of its rejection. Sri Aurobindo affirms that all life is Yoga, that man has a greater destiny awaiting him, and through a conscious aspiration he can evolve into a higher being and open himself to a new consciousness which he called the Supramental.

Sri Aurobindo left his body in 1950 but his vision and ideals continue to inspire thousands of people all over the world.

 Georg Feuerstein:

"Sri Aurobindo...whose integral philosophy is today recognised and appreciated as a monumental synthesis of the highest cultural values of East and West. ...There is an immense wealth of outstanding psychological and spiritual discoveries embedded in his voluminous writings, which stand at the watershed of a new era of yogic culture."

Michael Murphy, Founder, Esalen Institute, author of The Future of the Body:

"Sri Aurobindo's yoga points the way toward the kind of transformative practice we need to realize our greatest potentials. No philosopher or contemplative of modern times has done more to reveal our possibilities for extraordinary life."

Ninian Smart, author of numerous books on religion and philosophy:

"It is Sri Aurobindo's genius that he has provided a framework of thought which, while it grows out of such ancient concepts as Brahman, purusa, prakrti, prana, etc., yet does not have merely a static view of things, but absorbs the sense, gained from both science and history, of the unfolding of man's spirit."

The Mother

"I belong to no nation, no civilization, no society, no race, but to the Divine.
I obey no master, no rules, no law, no social convention, but the Divine.
To Him I have surrendered all, will, life and self; for Him I am ready to give all my blood, drop by drop, if such is His will, with complete joy, and nothing in his service can be sacrifice, for all is perfect delight." - The Mother

Originally named Mirra Alfassa, the Mother was born in Paris on 21 February 1878. She was the daughter of Maurice Alfassa, a banker (born in Adrianople, Turkey in 1843) and Mathidle Ismaloun (born in Alexandria, Egypt in 1857). Maurice, his wife and his son, Matteo (born in Alexandria in 1876), emigrated from Egypt to France in 1877, one year before Mirra's birth. Her early education was given at home. Around 1892 she attended a studio to learn drawing and painting, and later studied at the Paris Salon.

Concerning her early spiritual life, the Mother has written: "Between 11 and 13 a series of psychic and spiritual experiences revealed to me not only the existence of God but man's possibility of uniting with Him, of realising Him integrally in consciousness and action, of manifesting Him upon earth in a life divine." In her late twenties the Mother voyaged to Tlemcen, Algeria, where she studied occultism for two years with a Polish adept, Max Theon, and his wife. Returning to Paris in 1906, she founded her first group of spiritual seekers. She gave many talks to various groups in Paris between 1911 and 1913.

At the age of thirty-six the Mother journeyed to Pondicherry, India, to meet Sri Aurobindo. She saw him on 29 March 1914 and at once recognised him as the one who for many years had inwardly been guiding her spiritual development. Staying for eleven months, she was obliged to return to France because of the First World War. She lived in France for about a year and then in Japan for almost four years. On 24 April 1920 she returned to Pondicherry to resume her collaboration with Sri Aurobindo, and remained here for the rest of her life.

At that time a small group of disciples had gathered around Sri Aurobindo. The increase of disciples led to the founding of the Sri Aurobindo Ashram on the 24th Nov, 1926. From the beginning Sri Aurobindo entrusted the Mother with full material and spiritual charge of the Ashram. After almost 50 years of work at every level, the Mother left her body on 17th Nov. 1973, at the age of ninety five.