Supermind in Integral Yoga

Part One

The Veda and the Supermind

It is instructive to observe that in the early stages of Sri Aurobindo's own yogic development, an ascent to the supermind was effected; during that stage of development certain lines of his self-development were spontaneously converging towards the ancient and now unfrequented paths followed by the Vedic Rishis. At that time, there had begun to arise in his consciousness an arrangement of symbolic names attached to certain psychological experiences which had begun to regularize themselves; among them there were experiences of the faculties which the Vedic Rishis had described as supramental in character⁶. Sri Aurobindo, therefore, in order to arrive at a subsidiary description of the supermind, which could serve more accurately to provide precision to its significance, refers to these faculties, and the words connected with those faculties, such as "rta-chit (Truth-Consciousness), "satyam" (Truth), "rtam" (Right), "brhat" (Vast), and "kavi kratu"(Knowledge-Will), were adopted by Sri Aurobindo as expressive of the conception of the Supermind. As a result, Sri Aurobindo describes Supermind "as a vastness beyond the ordinary firmaments of our consciousness in which truth of being is luminously one with all that expresses it and assures inevitably truth of vision, formulation, arrangement, word, act and movement and therefore truth also of result of movement, result of action and expression, infallible ordinance or law".⁷ The essential terms of the Vedic description of the supermind are:

Page 3

Vast all-comprehensiveness, luminous truth and harmony of being in that vastness and not a vague chaos or self-lost obscurity, truth of law and act and knowledge expressive of that harmonious truth of being. The Truth, the Right and the Vast - this is the brief formula of the Supermind.

Two primary faculties of which the Vedic seers speak in regard to the "truth-conscious" soul are Sight and Hearing. These two faculties are known as drśti and śruti; they are not sensuous sight and sensuous hearing but their corresponding supramental faculties of revelation and inspiration. Whereas the human mentality gropes for knowledge, supermind is possessed of knowledge; revelation and inspiration are, according to the Vedic seers, direct operations of inherent Knowledge describable as truth-vision and truth-audition.

Truth-consciousness or supramental consciousness is an intermediate formulation which refers back to a term above it and forward to another below it. Above the Supermind is the Unitarian or indivisible consciousness of pure Sachchi-dananda in which there are no separating distinctions; below the supermind is the analytic or dividing consciousness of Mind which can only know by separation and distinction and has at the most a vague and secondary apprehension of unity and infinity. Supermind occupies the position of a link between these two. The higher term above it is the Sachchidananda consciousness and the term below the supramental consciousness is that of the mental consciousness. The supermind may thus be described with a greater precision as the comprehensive and creative consciousness, which by its power of pervading and comprehending knowledge is the child of that self-awareness by identity which is the poise of the Supreme Brahman, and, which by its power of projecting, confronting, apprehending

Page 4

knowledge is the parent of that awareness by distinction which is the process of the Mind.⁸

The supermind is the consciousness of what can be called Divine Nature, parā prakrti, to use the terminology of the Gita⁹, as distinguished from the lower nature, aparā prakrti, of which our mental nature is the present highest evolute. The mental nature is primarily concerned with particulars rather than with the universals; although universals can be conceived by the mental nature, here they are not experienced concretely. Mental consciousness is normally limited at a given time to one poise or one form of action, and it is difficult for it to hold several poises simultaneously. But the Divine Nature is not so particularized, nor so limited; it can be many things at a time and take more than one enduring poise or status for all time.

Triple status of the Supermind

In the yogic realization of the Supermind, Sri Aurobindo has found that in the principle of Supermind, there are three general poises or sessions of its world-founding consciousness. In the first poise or status, the Supermind founds in its creative expression the inalienable unity of things; it is the status of comprehensiveness in which all the differentiations are united by the predominant power of unity; there is differentiation of forms and lines of knowledge and will, which are united, too, and Knowledge is Action and Action is Knowledge; this status is, however, that of comprehensiveness. The second poise modifies that unity so as to support the manifestation of the Many in the One and the One in the Many; in this status, unity predominates and differentiations, too, are united, but here,

Page 5

the Supreme Transcendental Reality projects its eternal portion, the individual. Thus there comes about the play of the individual with the transcendental and with universal in the supramental unifying consciousness. This is the manifestation of the Many-in-the One, and the One-in-the Many; this status is that of the apprehending consciousness within the overarching unifying comprehensiveness of the Supermind. The third poise further modifies it so as to support the development of a diversified individuality; this is the status of farther predominance of the power of differentiation in which the individual projects itself into the forms, and that results in a richer play permitting prominence of the Many in their relationship with the One. This may be called the status, where projecting operation of consciousness predominates.

The description of these three poises as given by Sri Aurobindo brings out the fullness of the idea of the supermind as also of the relationship between the transcendental, the universal and the individual. We may, therefore, describe these three poises of the supermind in Sri Aurobindo's own words:

"It (supermind) is not the pure unitarian consciousness; for that is a timeless and spaceless concentration of Sachchidananda in itself, in which Conscious Force does not cast itself out into any kind of extension and, if it contains the universe at all, contains it in eternal potentiality and not in temporal actuality. This, (the first status of Supermind), on the contrary, is an equal self-extension of Sachchidananda all-comprehending, all-possessing, all-constituting. But this all is one, not many; there is no individualisation. It is when the reflection of this Supermind falls upon our stilled and purified self that we lose all sense of individuality; for there

Page 6

is no concentration of consciousness there to support an individual development. All is developed in unity and as one; all is held by this Divine Consciousness as forms of its existence, not as in any degree separate existences. Somewhat as the thoughts and images that occur in our mind are not separate existences to us, but forms taken by our consciousness, so are all names and forms to this primary Supermind. It is the pure divine ideation and formation in the Infinite, — only an ideation and formation that is organised not as an unreal play of mental thought, but as a real play of conscious being. The divine soul in this poise would make no difference between Conscious-Soul and Force-Soul, for all force would be action of consciousness, nor between Matter and Spirit since all mould would be simply form of Spirit.

"In the second poise of the Supermind the Divine Consciousness stands back in the idea from the movement which it contains, realising it by a sort of apprehending consciousness, following it, occupying and inhabiting its works, seeming to distribute itself in its forms. In each name and form it would realise itself as the stable Conscious-Self, the same in all; but also it would realise itself as a concentration of Conscious-Self following and supporting the individual play of movement and upholding its differentiation from other play of movement, — the same everywhere in soul-essence, but varying in soul-form. This concentration supporting the soul-form would be the individual Divine or Jivatman as distinguished from the universal Divine or one all-constituting self. There would be no essential difference, but only a practical differentiation for the play which would not abrogate the real unity. The universal Divine would know all soul-forms as itself and yet

Page 7

establish a different relation with each separately and in each with all the others. The individual Divine would envisage its existence as a soul-form and soul-movement of the One and, while by the comprehending action of consciousness it would enjoy its unity with the One and with all soul-forms, it would also by a forward or frontal apprehending action support and enjoy its individual movement and its relations of a free difference in unity both with the One and with all its forms. If our purified mind were to reflect this secondary poise of Supermind, our soul could support and occupy its individual existence and yet even there realise itself as the One that has become all, inhabits all, contains all, enjoying even in its particular modification its unity with God and its fellows. In no other circumstance of the supramental existence would there be any characteristic change; the only change would be this play of the One that has manifested its multiplicity and of the Many that are still one, with all that is necessary to maintain and conduct the play.

"A third poise of the Supermind would be attained if the supporting concentration were no longer to stand at the back, as it were, of the movement, inhabiting it with a certain superiority to it and so following and enjoying, but were to project itself into the movement and to be in a way involved in it. Here, the character of the play would be altered, but only in so far as the individual Divine would so predominantly make the play of relations with the universal and with its other forms the practical field of its conscious experience that the realisation of utter unity with them would be only a supreme accompaniment and constant culmination of all experience; but in the higher poise unity would be the dominant and fundamental experience and variation would be only a play of the unity. This tertiary poise would be

Page 8

therefore that of a sort of fundamental blissful dualism in unity — no longer unity qualified by a subordinate dualism — between the individual Divine and its universal source, with all the consequences that would accrue from the maintenance and operation of such a dualism."¹⁰

The supermind is the consciousness and will of the Supreme; but there is no gulf between the Supreme and the Universal and the Individual; the supreme himself even while being transcendental and supracosmic is also cosmic; and the individual is the individual divine or Jivatman as distinguished from the universal Divine, since the individual is the transcendental itself realizing itself as a concentration of Conscious-Self following and supporting the individual play of movement and upholding its differentiation from other play of movement. The individual is the Supreme supporting the soul-form by means of concentration in the supermind in the second status of the apprehending consciousness. Again, it is the supreme that is itself universal Divine who knows all soul-forms as itself and yet establishes a different relation with each separately and in each with all the others. On the other hand, the individual Divine envisages its existence as a soul-form and soul-movement of the One; it enjoys by the comprehending action of consciousness its unity with the One and with all soul-forms; and by means of apprehending consciousness it supports and enjoys its individual movement and its relations of a free difference in unity both with the One and with all its forms. By means of its projecting and confronting consciousness, which is proper to the third poise of the supermind, the individual Divine is able to alter its relations with the universal and with its other forms; in this altered state, the realization of utter unity with the universal and with its other

Page 9

forms would no more remain dominant; diversity and variation preponderate and the utter unity is only a supreme accompaniment and constant culmination of all experience. The individual or the Jivatman in the supramental consciousness partakes simultaneously in all the experiences and activities of the supreme Divine, and although in all the dynamic activities its individuality is retained and maintained, it would enjoy the divine status of immobility and mobility as also inmost identity with the Supreme. In its relations with its supreme Self, the individual Jivātman will have the sense of oneness of the transcendent and universal Divine with its own being. As Sri Aurobindo points out:

"It will enjoy that oneness of God with itself in its own individuality and with its other selves in the universality. Its relations of knowledge will be the play of the divine omniscience, for God is Knowledge, and what is ignorance with us will be there only the holding back of knowledge in the repose of conscious self-awareness so that certain forms of that self-awareness may be brought forward into activity of Light. Its relations of will will be there the play of the divine omnipotence, for God is Force, Will and Power, and what with us is weakness and incapacity will be the holding back of will in tranquil concentrated force so that certain forms of divine conscious-force may realise themselves brought forward into form of Power. Its relations of love and delight will be the play of the divine ecstasy, for God is Love and Delight, and what with us would be denial of love and delight will be the holding back of joy in the still sea of Bliss so that certain forms of divine union and enjoyment may be brought in front in an active upwelling of waves of the Bliss. So also all its becoming will be formation of the divine being in response to these activities and what is with us cessation,

Page 10

death, annihilation will be only rest, transition or holding back of the joyous creative Maya in the eternal being of Sachchidananda. At the same time this oneness will not preclude relations of the divine soul with God, with its supreme Self, founded on the joy of difference separating itself from unity to enjoy that unity otherwise; it will not annul the possibility of any of those exquisite forms of God-enjoyment which are the highest rapture of the God-lover in his clasp of the Divine."¹¹

Supermind as the Real-Idea

To the supramental consciousness, the world is not a play of cosmic Imagination, a fantasia of the Infinite imposed on the blank indeterminable of his own eternal pure existence. It is imperishably aware that the entire manifestation of the universe is, in its first movement, the manifestation of Sachchidananda through its own powers of the supramental consciousness, — the powers of comprehension, of apprehension and of projection.

This vision is distinguishable from that obtained in the philosophies which recognize Mind alone as the creator of the worlds or accept an original principle with Mind as the only mediator between it and the forms of the universe. These philosophies may be divided, as Sri Aurobindo points out, into the purely noumenal and the idealistic. The purely noumenal recognize in the cosmos only the work of Mind, Thought, Idea: but Idea may be purely arbitrary and have no essential relation to any real Truth of Existence; such Truth, if it exists, may be regarded as a mere Absolute aloof from all relations and irreconcilable with a world of relations. On the other hand, the idealistic interpretation supposes a relation between the Truth behind and the conceptive

Page 11

phenomenon in front, a relation which is not merely that of antimony and opposition. The supramental vision of the world that Sri Aurobindo presents goes farther in idealism; here the manifesting and conceptive Supermind or Supramental Idea is not mental in character; it is neither an abstract idea divided from the Reality, nor is it an imaginative idea that constructs a fiction or illusion or hallucination or distorts the Reality. Supermind is not merely the creative Idea but it is far different from and superior to the mental idea. Supermind is, therefore, what Sri Aurobindo calls, the Real-Idea, that is to say, a power of Conscious-Force expressive of real being, born out of real being and partaking of its nature and neither a child of the Void nor a weaver of fictions. Sri Aurobindo has taken the phrase Real-Idea as description of the supermind from the Rig Vedic phrase "rta cit'' which means the consciousness of essential truth of being (satyam), of ordered truth of active being (rtam) and the vast self-awareness (brhat) in which alone this consciousness is possible. The supermind is thus conscious Reality throwing itself into mutable forms of its own imperishable and immutable substance. The world is, therefore, in the words of Sri Aurobindo, "not a figment of conception in the universal Mind, but a conscious birth of that which is beyond Mind into forms of itself."¹²

The forms and expressions that are being manifested in the world are supported by a Truth of conscious being; that Truth expresses itself in them, and the knowledge corresponding to the truth thus expressed reigns as a supramental Truth-Consciousness or Real-Idea organizing real ideas in a perfect harmony. This is the status of the world in the supramental realm.

It is true that the world of our ordinary experience, the

Page 12

world of Matter, Life and Mind, does not have any explicit supramental organization and harmony; but that world cannot be truly explained or known, if we consider Mind as the creative force of the world and if we do not attempt to understand and know this world as an expression of Truth-Consciousness cast into the mental - vital - material mould through an inferior consciousness and partial expression which strives to arrive in the mould of a various evolution at that superior expression of itself already existent to the Beyond-Mind. That inferior consciousness through which the world of our ordinary experience is expressed can also be understood and explained only if it is derived and derivable from the supramental Truth-Consciousness.

Page 13