Among the Not So Great

Letters to Yogananda from Sri Aurobindo

Have you a photograph of your former guru? If there is one, the Mother would like to see it.

Yogananda,

What you wanted to know was about your Guru being here or not or being one of those in contact with the Mother. For that the photo was necessary as it is by the appearance, not the name, that the Mother identifies those who came here to her — as she did from the photo of his Guru [Loknath Brahmachari].

May 1933

(Yogananda had great difficulty getting a photo of his Guru. He was considered a renegade by his old co-disciples. Finally he did procure one.)

The Mother saw with interest the photograph of your Gurudev. She had seen Loknath Brahmachari very often, but your Gurudev has always been near her for many years, long before you came, probably before his death even. When she saw the photograph a wonderful light appeared through it. And through his face is expressed a remarkable soul of aspiration, vision, faith and bhakti.

2.6.1934

In the following letters I quote only relevant portions from what Sri Aurobindo says about Bharat Brahmachari and his Yoga.

Your Guru’s teaching and that of this Yoga are essentially the same; what he called ‘chittasuddhi’ is what we mean by the psychic change. The teaching here is more developed because it includes the Supramental means of creating the divine life….

19.6.35

...As to the details he gave from time to time, in all these prophecies of what is to come the main fact can be accepted but this or that detail may point to something that is trying to be but may take place with a slightly different turn to what the mind expected….

17.9.34

…I do not gather from what is quoted as said by your Guru that he claimed to be the Avatar. It seems to me that he claimed to be a Power preparing the way for the work of the Divine Mother....

Sri Aurobindo, Letters on Himself and the Ashram: The Guru and the Avatar

25.8.1935

Bharat Brahmachari got an adesh in 1925-26 to go to Brindavan to invoke the Mother. He of his own volition never went anywhere, but since it was Her adesh, he went. He reached a lonely place and prayed and practised austerities. The Mother gave him Darshan. She was not the usual traditional Kali — black, naked and many-armed. She was a resplendent white form, sari-clad, the head covered by the anchal and wearing a golden diadem. She was two-armed, sitting on a lion. She told him that She would manifest on Earth with all Her Divya-Shakti. He called this form of the Mother “Bharateshwari”.

To us here the date 1926 evokes special memories. The 24th of November 1926 is the day of Siddhi — Descent of the Overmind in the physical. The beautiful sari-clad figure evokes even more special, near and fonder memories — we see our Mother on Darshan and Blessing Days. Are all these mere coincidences?

Bharat Brahmachari had a murti (idol) made, replicating this vision of the Mother. He installed this murti in the precincts of his Chitradham Ashram (another of his Ashrams). A reproduction of a painting of the murti is printed in Yogananda’s book titled Mahabirbhab — The Great Manifestation. Much of what I have written and all that I have quoted are from this interesting book.

Yogananda more than once asked Sri Aurobindo: “Is she, our Mother, the same Great Universal Mother of Bharat Brahmachari’s vision?” At first Sri Aurobindo, though he replied to more than a hundred letters in a single night, did not reply to this question — or later, replied in vague terms. But Yogananda persisted. He said to me: “Ami chhadbar lok noyi.” (I don’t quit easily.) Finally, he got what he wanted. Each one has to draw one’s own conclusions from all the material presented. The mystery deepens or the mystery stands revealed.

Later I got some information that could be a confirmation of the identity of Bharat Brahmachari’s vision.

Yogananda had described all that he knew and had seen (the Murti at Chitradhama Ashram) to late Sanjiban-da, one of the artists of our Ashram (Pondicherry). The latter made a painting based on that description and it was shown to our Mother. She said, “Yes, this is Kali who has come down on Earth amongst men to do Her work, down here, to uplift and enlighten them. And that is why She is seen with two arms and not the usual four.”

The original is now somewhere here. I had seen it in Yogananda’s room often enough. I for one think the picture and the symbol are clear — and Yogananda’s question is answered.

Yogananda and others sometimes talked to Bharat Brahmachari about Sri Aurobindo. What he (Bharat Brahmachari) had to say about Sri Aurobindo is also significantly revelatory. Even before they brought in the name of Sri Aurobindo, the Brahmachari used to talk of a Mahapurush on some seashore. He did not mention the name of the Mahapurush or the place. When Sri Aurobindo the freedom fighter left Calcutta, many hoped he would come back and lead the nation. But Bharat Brahmachari shook his head and said: “From what I can see, this is not to be. Anyone who has reached the Upper World, He (Sri Aurobindo) is in, does not come back.”

Sometime in 1920 Bharat Brahmachari said that the VishnuShakti had gone from Badrinath (the deity at Badrinath is Badrinarayan, a form of Vishnu) to settle in Gandhi. But two years later he said that the Vishnu-Shakti had retreated from Gandhi.

He added that Gandhi would not be able to bring about the freedom of India. A Mahapurush settled on some seashore would free India.

Bharat Brahmachari also asserted that there was no greater yogi than Sri Aurobindo this side of the Himalayas, so to say, and that Sri Aurobindo was the “elder” of Swami Vivekananda. Sri Aurobindo explained this last utterance: “No, certainly no physical relation. What he must have meant was a superior in knowledge or power or generally greater than Vivekananda.”(8.7.1937)

After this talk on Swami Vivekananda, Dhirananda brought out from somewhere a picture of Sri Aurobindo and showed it to Bharat Brahmachari who said: “Yes, this is Sri Aurobindo. If any of you see Him you will leave me, love me no more.”

Bharat Brahmachari once told Yogananda that one day he (Yogananda) was destined to meet this Mahapurush living on the seashore. As for himself, the Mother had granted him the inner vision; so he did not need to go to anyone. But IF for Her work She asked him to go — he surely would. And the one person She might ask him to go to was Sri Aurobindo. There were in this period quite a number of sadhus, sannyasis and gurus. Each guru’s disciples hoped and claimed that their guru was an Avatar. One such guru was Prabhu Jagatbandhu of Faridpur. After his passing away, the disciples preserved his body, firmly believing that his soul would re-enter the body and he would live again. Yogananda and others talked or questioned Bharat Brahmachari about these claims. An hour or two after one such causerie, Bharat Brahmachari came out on to the verandah and said: “Mayer khata dekhechhi. Oi khataye kono nam nayi — ek Sri Aurobindo chhada.” (I have seen the Mother’s book. There no name was written but that of Sri Aurobindo.)

Bharat Brahmachari passed away in 1928. His guru Loknath Brahmachari passed away earlier. Now the Gauri Ashram hardly exists. Parul, Badol and their father Jogendra (Yogananda’s brother) visited the Ashram in l980. What they saw brought tears to Jogendra who had seen it in its pristine days. One old man was somehow carrying on as caretaker. There was nothing much to take care of. Before leaving the Kutir, Parul asked the old man if she could place a photograph of the Mother and Sri Aurobindo on the dais. The old man was overjoyed. He had heard much about the Mother and Sri Aurobindo, but never seen their photograph. Many of the Ashramites had been taken to a nearby river and mowed down in the name of religion.

Empires have come and gone — but Bharat Brahmachari lives on. He did not care as to who cared for him, knew of him, or who followed him. He lived in the Mother’s Light and Love. He did what She willed him to do. That was all he cared for. That was his mission — THAT goes on. As Sri Aurobindo assured Yogananda in this context on 19.6.1935: “Nothing true in a mission can fail, either it persists or takes another form.”