The Mother
with Letters on the Mother

  Integral Yoga

Sri Aurobindo symbol
Sri Aurobindo

This volume consists of two separate but related works: 'The Mother', a collection of short prose pieces on the Mother, and 'Letters on the Mother', a selection of letters by Sri Aurobindo in which he referred to the Mother in her transcendent, universal and individual aspects. In addition, the volume contains Sri Aurobindo's translations of selections from the Mother's 'Prières et Méditations' as well as his translation of 'Radha's Prayer'.

The Complete Works of Sri Aurobindo (CWSA) The Mother with Letters on the Mother Vol. 32 662 pages 2012 Edition
English
 PDF     Integral Yoga

Reading of 'The Mother'

  English|  8 tracks
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Reading of 'The Mother'

  English|  8 tracks

Part II

Letters on the Mother




Incarnation and Evolution




Carrying on the Evolution

It is said that you and the Mother have been on the earth since its creation. But what have you been doing for so many millions of years in disguise? I say "disguise" because it is only now that you are showing yourselves to the world in your real nature.

Carrying on the evolution.

I fail to understand what you mean by "Carrying on the evolution." Could you explain this more fully?

That would mean writing the whole of human history. I can only say that as there are special descents to carry on the evolution to a farther stage, so also something of the Divine is always there to help through each stage itself in one direction or another.

Page 88

I can understand how ordinary people in the past may not have recognised your presence, especially when you lived outwardly like human beings. But how is it that even Sri Krishna, Buddha or Christ could not recognise your presence in this world?

Presence where and in whom? If they did not meet, they would not recognise, and even if they met there is no reason why the Mother and I should cast off the veil which hung over these personalities and reveal the Divine behind them. Those lives were not meant for any such purpose.

If you and the Mother were on earth all the time, it would mean that you were here when those great beings descended. Then whatever your external cloak, how could you hide your inner self—the true divinity—from them?

But why cannot the inner self be hidden from all in such lives? Your reasoning would only have some force if the presence on earth then were as the Avatar, but not if it was only as a Vibhuti.

So, in answer to the question, "Presence where and in whom?" I would say, "Presence in this world and in Thyself and the Mother."

"Presence in Thyself" means nothing. It is "presence" in or behind some body and behind some outer personality. Also "presence" in what part of the world? If Mother were in Rome at the time of Buddha, how could Buddha know as he did not even know the existence of Rome?

I did not mean that you or the Mother needed to cast off your veil. It is those great men who should have recognised you in spite of the veil.

One can be a great man without knowing such things as that. Great men or even great Vibhutis need not be omniscient or know things which it was not useful for them to know.

Page 89

You write: "But why cannot the inner self be hidden from all in such lives?" I fail to understand how anyone could hide one's inner self from Avatars and Vibhutis.

An Avatar or Vibhuti have the knowledge that is necessary for their work; they need not have more. There was absolutely no reason why Buddha should know what was going on in Rome. An Avatar even does not manifest all the Divine omniscience and omnipotence; he has not come for any such unnecessary display; all that is behind him but not in the front of his consciousness. As for the Vibhuti, the Vibhuti need not even know that he is a power of the Divine. Some Vibhutis, like Julius Caesar for instance, have been atheists. Buddha himself did not believe in a personal God, only in some impersonal and indescribable Permanent.

Still I can't understand one thing: even though you did not cast off your veil, how could Krishna, Buddha and Christ not help casting off their veil in order to recognise you?

Why should they? The veil was there necessary for their work. Why should it be thrown off? So if the Mother was present in the life of Christ, she was there not as the Divine Manifestation but as one altogether human. For her to be recognised as the Divine would have created a tremendous disorder and frustrated the work Christ came to do by breaking its proper limits.

Moreover, you must have heard that just before Christ was born some Rishis from India knew of the divine Descent and set out for Jerusalem merely by their inspiration, though they had not known what and where Jerusalem was.

I never heard of Rishis from India going there. There is a legend of some Mages getting an intimation that a divine Birth was there on earth and following a star that led them to the stable in which Christ was born. But this is a legend, not history.

Page 90

Since you and the Mother were on earth constantly from the beginning what was the need for Avataras coming down here one after another?

We were not on earth as Avataras.

You say that you both were not on earth as Avatars and yet you were carrying on the evolution. Since the Divine Himself was on the earth carrying on the evolution, what was the necessity for the coming down of the Avatars who are portions of Himself?

The Avatar is necessary when a special work is to be done and in crises of the evolution. The Avatar is a special manifestation, while for the rest of the time it is the Divine working within the ordinary human limits as a Vibhuti.









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