Talks by Nirodbaran

27 October 1969

Well, friends, today is our last-but-one sitting - our swan song for this term will be on Wednesday. I am very grateful to you, first of all, for giving me some respite, some breathing space. To speak for three consecutive days, for a man who is not used to doing so, and particularly on a subject that is very high and sublime, is not easy. I am not at all reluctant to speak to you about our beloved Lord, about whom you are so eager to know something. Out of the four or five of us who came into close contact with Him, only two or three are still alive, and of these few, I am taking the burden of speaking to you. My friend Champaklal doesn't believe in talking; my other friend, Dr. Satyendra, I don't know what he believes in! (Laughter) So, forced by circumstances, I am the only one who has been given this task of saying something about the Lord. You know very well that to speak of the Divine is not a very easy job. There is no human being, however great he may be, about whom one can speak at length, with or without preparation. But one needs some inner preparation too before one can speak about the Divine, which is why I'd hesitated. My hesitation had no other reason. Otherwise, as I said, it is a joy, almost my duty.

As the days pass, I realise more and more how kind He has been to me and how He bestowed His special favours upon me. Once, when I asked Him why I was the fortunate recipient of his special favours, he replied cryptically: "Find out for yourself." Perhaps, as time unfolds the secret, more and more meaning will emerge. Perhaps one of the tasks I have to do is this, to speak about Him. He has left me to do

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this, and I am trying my best to do justice to Him, as you can see, with whatever necessary qualifications He has given me. Mr. Nirad²⁸⁴ is slowly, gradually being transformed into Narad,²⁸⁵ as I told you. 'i' is being changed into 'a' but 'I' doesn't go so easily, as you know (Laughter), though it is a small 'i' here!²⁸⁶

However, I feel, as I've told you before, more than once, that there is a Divine Compassion, a Divine Grace acting upon your class. And I have ample proof of this. Even yesterday, on the eve of the class, as it has happened before, a visitor rushed into my room: "Are you so and so ?" "Yes," and I said, silently, inwardly, "your humble servant." He said, "I've come from such and such a place, I wanted very much to see you. I've read and liked your books, your Correspondence, your talks, and most of all, the articles you write; they are simply elevating, ravishing..." All high superlatives! I was pleased (Laughter) - who is above praise and flattery? He continued, "You see, what I feel in your writing is a sort of closeness that you have felt the Lord has given you. I feel the same closeness with Sri Aurobindo. That is why I like it so much. I feel as if there is an affinity between you and me."

Then he narrated the account of his life, which was strangely thrilling. I will tell it to you one day, as it is very interesting. But one thing I can tell you about right now: how Sri Aurobindo, or the Divine, is acting outside the Ashram. This gentleman didn't know anything about Sri Aurobindo or the Ashram (I gave you a similar example the other day.) This man had just graduated from college with an M.A. degree, but he didn't know what to do after college. "Then suddenly an old man appeared to me. I began feeling that he was directing me and leading me, till at last I came to know that this old man was no other than Sri Aurobindo." So you see how the Divine is acting throughout the world, sometimes in these occult ways.

Remember The Lost Footsteps, written in Rumania?²⁸⁷ I don't think

284'Nirod' is the Bengali version of 'Nirad', so the speaker is referring to his own name here.

285The heavenly sage, the God-man who mediates between men and the gods.

286Witty play of words: 'i' represents the alphabet as well as the ego. 'Small': he implies that he is a 'small' person.

287The book The Lost Footsteps was written by a Rumanian who had been a political

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even the Lord Himself knew how He was acting outside in that case (Laughter), because it was His emanation that was acting. I'm sure that if I had asked Him about any such incident in the world outside our Ashram, "Do you know about it ?" He would have said, "I know nothing!" So His physical consciousness did not know it, but His Divine Consciousness was acting everywhere and this is how even today He is pulling people here. "Go to Pondicherry," He said to a doctor who was practising in Burma. The man was surprised for he had never even heard of Pondicherry. "What is Pondicherry?" he wondered.²⁸⁸

Then I'll tell you another instance where my 'I-ness' will flourish a little, please don't mind. It is concerning our Laljibhai.²⁸⁹ He was in Africa, you know, before he came here. There, he had organized a meeting at a small Centre²⁹⁰ in a very affluent manner. He had invited many guests. Then, as he was struggling to manage all the arrangements, he suddenly heard a voice telling him: "If Nirod were here, he would have organised everything well." (Laughter) It was a bolt from the blue. "Who is Nirod? I've never heard of any Nirod!" he wondered. Then, when he came over to the Ashram, he enquired, "Is there anybody by the name of Nirod?" They said, "Yes, yes," and they showed him my room. He came to me and recounted to me that he had heard Sri Aurobindo telling him to come here. This was the story of a man who is now connected with the Ashram. But various are the ways of the Divine even in the outside world.

So, many people come and tell us, "Come and talk to us of Mother and Sri Aurobindo, otherwise how can we know about Them?"

prisoner in Communist Rumania and suffered rigorous tortures there. When he was contemplating suicide, Sri Aurobindo came to him in a subtle form and encouraged him to face life courageously. He acknowledged this fact in the book that he later wrote, but, not knowing who Sri Aurobindo was, referred to Him as 'Aurobin Dogos'.

288This is the case of Dr. Sircar, who came from Burma to Pondicherry in the 1960s along with his sisters.

289Lalji Hindocha, a wealthy Gujarati from Africa, who was advised by the Mother to leave Africa and come to India, because She foresaw the troubles in East Africa, when all the Indians there had to leave and go to UK or Canada or India.

290An establishment where disciples and followers of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother can congregate, study, and attend lectures.

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But they forget that this is the realm of the spirit; we don't want mass propaganda. Those who are chosen for this path will come by themselves. One day or the other, they are bound to come. Either through straight or roundabout ways, from the front or through the back door, but they are bound to come. And one of the ways is what I have been talking to you about. He is Himself taking interest in His work: He is guiding people in His way, and that is why He has said, "A new Light, a new Spirit is working." More and more people will come. I have just given you examples of this guidance of the action of the Lord and the Mother. When I speak of the Lord, I've told you again and again, I speak of the Mother as well. I make no distinction between the two, neither should you.

So this was one instance. Again, why should he have come just yesterday? And that lady also came just that day on the eve of our class and has not shown me her face again! (Laughter) So you come to believe, willy-nilly, that there is some Will, some Intelligence directing everything. Then, again, another little bit of digression before I come to our proper subject. Last time, I gave you some examples of how the Divine Hand is behind everything. This instance also illustrates it. But I emphasized the fact that, even in our small, material life, the Hand is always present. I'll give you another example of Their influence, but this one is in the psychological field, not the material one.

Some days ago, I was subject to some abhimaan,²⁹¹ for some reason or another. Now, this abhimaan was against the Mother. I was saying to myself, while trying to meditate - "Mother, You don't love me; for that matter, You don't love anybody except a few persons: x, y, z (I named them in my mind). Yes, You have some sort of love for us, which is an impersonal love, not personal." Then my inner, better self tried to argue with my outer nature or ego: "Don't be foolish," etc. etc. But the abhimaan wouldn't be consoled so easily. Then I went to bed at night (everything seems to happen for me in sleep!) and I had a dream in which I saw the hand of the Mother placed upon my forehead and She kept it there for a long, long time. And the surprise

291 Pride - in this case, wounded pride.

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of surprises is that She took the name of one of the persons whom I had mentioned in my mind, and said, "I pay special attention to him for such and such reason." Now what have you to say about it? How did it reach Her at once, and in such detail, including the very name which She picked up and used for explaining why She had taken up that person. How did my thought communicate itself to Her? And I am sure it is not because She has given me any special attention; the attention is there for all of you too, you must have felt some such close response at times. Only, like a foolish wise man, I speak about it, and you wise people keep quiet. (Laughter)

So that is what surprises me. The response is so close, so near, and communicated at once; in a split second of time, my thought went to Her and the response came back. And would you believe it, the feeling of Her touch remained with me for quite a number of days. Even now, when I concentrate, I feel Her touch here on the forehead. So here is the psychological help I mentioned. The prayer was sent to the Mother, and the response given, all in the occult world. There are many other instances; I know one which I won't tell you today. Perhaps you would have been very much thrilled to hear it as it is a love story, but I'll tell you the next time we meet. I know you are fond of love stories, personal or impersonal, but I'll tell you later on, for you are surely curious or eager to pursue the subject of the Lord.

Let me go back a little in time - back to our flashback! So when Sri Aurobindo had broken his leg bone in that accident in 1938, the specialists were summoned. Now the consultant doctors had come and were holding a conference. Sri Aurobindo was sitting, impassive as a child, unconcerned about everything, looking now this way, now that, as if we were discussing somebody else! And His whole body was glowing with a light which is not found on land or sea! A Golden Child! Some of you are familiar with the golden moments when Sri Ramakrishna would behave like a child. Those who have read his Kathamrito²⁹² have found how he too, in one of those childlike moods,

292 A book in Bengali, now translated into English, describing Sri Ramakrishna's talks and behaviour with his visitors.

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used to sit on the laps of his disciples or even on their shoulders. Sri Aurobindo didn't go so far. Had He sat on our shoulders, it would have been difficult to carry the burden! (Laughter) Neither was He so dramatic. There was nothing of drama in Him. All movements were under perfect control. It was not a moral control; it was an automatic, spontaneous mastery of nature. Was it arrived at by some discipline that He had practised or was it His inborn nature, I don't know. But what we have seen is that all His movements, all His gestures were under control: His eating, drinking, speaking, walking, everything was at a measured pace, in a measured quantity, and with a measured manner. To use our Sanskrit terms, His ideal in His physical life was the Aryan ideal of dhira and sthira - still and steady, and so, no dramatisation at all. About that we'll speak more as we go along.

So that vision of Sri Aurobindo was the most unforgettable picture for me. Even now, two or three pictures are always floating before my eyes, and one of them is this: The Divine Child, the Golden Child, sitting at the foot of the bed like this, most innocently [enacting the expression]. You remember Mother made these remarks upon seeing the photograph of Him as a child: "Here He is innocent and ignorant of this world; He knows nothing of this world" - not her exact words perhaps. It was something of that sort. But just such a bonny baby He was now, a Golden Child. I am sure that some of you would have felt like embracing Him. That reminds me of my friend, Dr. Becharlal, who was a devotee. You know how devotees are very emotional sometimes. More than once we saw him look at Sri Aurobindo, particularly after the accident, start weeping and run away from the room. Poor fellow couldn't control himself. He used to be so moved, especially when understanding the Lord's suffering. His grief was genuine; it wasn't at all a show. And Sri Aurobindo Himself remarked, "Here is a true bhakta?

Then the next scene was, as we have seen, of Mother thundering at Dr. Manilal. Poor fellow, I told you his face grew small. Then I told you also what Mother did next. I had modified the scene a bit, for some reason, but today I can tell you the whole truth; you will understand.

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We were standing on one side, and Sri Aurobindo was stretched in the bed with His hands under His head. All was quiet. Mother lay prostrate on the floor, near His bed, in an attitude of prayer, with no words. She had prostrated Herself full-length, and Sri Aurobindo was calm. That is another unforgettable moment, friends. From that gesture, we came to realise how grievous, how grave the accident was, and that it involved His life. The Mother prayed that He should save Himself and save the world. There were many complications, and we had to face many difficult times. But one after the other, they were eventually over. So there we saw the Mother's wrath, Her rudraroop.²⁹³ As we say in Sanskrit:

vajradapi kathorani

mriduni kusumadapi

That is, She was hard like a diamond, yet soft like a flower. Friends, I can tell you that we have seen even harsher, even more thunderous aspects of the Mother. You can have no conception at all of how hard She can be when needed. With all of you, She is as soft as butter and as sweet as honey. But, in other circumstances, God knows! But I shouldn't frighten you: We have seen Her softness earlier too, with which we are familiar today. She has told us, "Those who want to do sadhana, I am very strict with them, very, very strict." She had said it, with measured words and measured gesture, in the class held in the Playground, if some of you remember. One or two examples of Her strictest hardness we had the chance to see, but it is not for you young children.

So, after this interlude, we will now resume our story: Champaklal, as you know, was His attendant from a long time ago. He came here as a young boy and he told the Mother one day, long ago, before Sri Aurobindo was accepted as an Avatar and a Guru, "Mother, I would like to wash Sri Aurobindo's clothes." "Would you like to wash?" "Yes, Mother." "But do you know what people will say about you?" "What will they say?" "They will talk against you because you are

293 Aspect of Divine anger, in which there is no personally motivated disturbance, no ill-feeling, no agitation or hatred.

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doing some menial work." "Ah, that doesn't matter, Mother. I don't care for these people, I shall do the work." So, from that day onwards, he started becoming the personal attendant of the Master and he was the only one who had access to Him at all times. So we were the two persons, as a matter of fact, who were constantly with Him. The others did attendance duty in their own time slots, which they had decided among themselves. Purani, as I said, chose the oddest hours: he came on duty at two o'clock, early in the morning, but it was very convenient for us!

That reminds me of something - again, a personal reference, and I hope that you will not mind. Before His passing, when the situation took a very bad turn, Dr. Sanyal had to be called in. We sent him a telegram. He came on leave and stayed for some days. Just before he left, he said to Sri Aurobindo, "I am going, but Dr. Nirod is here." Then Sri Aurobindo said, "He is no doctor to me, he has come to serve me." Well, so we were constantly in attendance upon Him, we had the good fortune to be almost like His shadow. We had to only sit idly and watch and wait for a call and to attend to it.

Dr. Manilal was our chief, our boss in all our medical duties and, if there was anything at all to do, it was his privilege to attend to it. In his absence, I had to! (Laughter) But as I have said, there was very, very little to do at the beginning. He was lying flat and his manner was like Lord Shiva's through the whole day: calm, quiet, composed, and most impersonal. Dr. Manilal, looking well-shaved and well-dressed, would come in the morning, after his breakfast, and, before doing anything else, he would bow down and put his head on the left side of Sri Aurobindo's bed; and He would bless the doctor with His left hand on his head. Then came Dr. Manilal's usual question, "How are you, Sir?" "All right," He would reply with one or two words and a little smile - now He had begun smiling a little!

The air of reserve, of aloofness and resoluteness that surrounded Him in the beginning, as I'd said, began to give way to a little bit of familiarity - the snow, the frost had begun to thaw. It was manifested by a little smile and one or two talks for which Dr. Manilal is to be

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thanked, because he was the spearhead of our attack at the fortress of His remoteness (Laughter) and he had the privilege of his age, the privilege of his position and the privilege of his experience. Before he came here, he was for some time the personal attendant of the Maharaja of Baroda. So he knew the ways and means of dealing with great people: his personality was not obtrusive. He did not try to push himself in front. Such an unobtrusive personality, and at the same time, a devotional ardour - the combination of these two made him a very fine instrument. Because he had been a disciple for a long time, he had accepted Sri Aurobindo as the Guru and the Divine. So both these attitudes were integrated in him in a very fine way. When he used to come, I would run behind him, for so far I had not dared to come alone in front of the Master; I was a bit shy! (Laughter) So abhimaan and shyness were the two qualities I had. I used to peep from behind, to see Him, to hear His voice, to see His smile. That is how we started.

Then, after two or three days, Mother had a dinner table prepared for Him. It was portable - with wheels - and could be pushed. It would be pushed beside His bed and Sri Aurobindo would sit up and take His food. Mother Herself used to push it to Sri Aurobindo's bed, and later pull it out and keep it back in its place. Some of you have noticed perhaps a long mirror in Sri Aurobindo's room - the table used to be kept in front of it. Even now, the table is there, but it is used for Champaklal's things. One day, a funny thing happened. Mother came in the morning to give Him breakfast. We didn't know Mother's ways then, but Champaklal should have known better! Both of us rushed to help Mother, while She was trying to pull up the table and we pulled it right out of Her hands! Then She complained to Sri Aurobindo, smiling, "They are taking away my work!" Sri Aurobindo also smiled. But we understood that it is not good to be too forward. (Laughter) So one lesson we learned that day was that Mother also finds joy in serving Sri Aurobindo, in serving the Lord: it is a joy, it is a dedication, it is an offering.

So that was about the breakfast. There were three meals. Breakfast

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at eight o'clock or so, very sparse - bananas, some bread and butter, and no milk. You will be surprised to hear that He never touched milk. I'm sure He used to drink milk when He was in Calcutta, but not here. The reason was because Mother doesn't take milk, and why doesn't Mother take it? Perhaps because the Japanese don't take it! (Laughter) So Sri Aurobindo also did not have milk, and I can sympathise with that because I don't like milk! I am not a milk baby at all!

Another interesting thing that came to my notice was ... of course, everything was interesting, but I had a particular interest in this. I had heard that He was very fond of tea. And during those three or four days, we were so busy with other things that none of us thought of tea, not even Mother. Then Manilal thought of giving Him some substantial drink. He said, "Sir, it would be good for you to take some drink." "What drink?" asked the Lord. "Marmite," said Manilal. "Marmite? What is it?" He had not even heard of it and had no idea of what it was like. Dr. Manilal explained that it was a vitamin product, a very good drink and health food. He took it, though He didn't like it very much. He was an ideal patient.

Then we thought of tea, and Dr. Manilal told the Guru: "You can have a cup of tea and a cup of Marmite." Sri Aurobindo said, "I can't take both." But somehow Dr. Manilal persuaded Him to take both, each at its respective time. So tea was brought and I was very watchful (Laughter). But I saw that tea was brought in a feeding cup because He was lying down in bed after His sponging. I felt so disgusted, and said to myself: "What is this, a tea-lover drinking tea in this way? Is it glaxo food?" But after two or three days, all of a sudden, He declared, "From tomorrow, I won't take tea!" So at one stroke, a habit of so many years was given up. I am still trying hard to give up the habit of tea-drinking! My friends, wherever I go, I have to think of two things: 10 a.m. and 4 p.m. (Laughter). At these two hours, I must have some tea, anyhow and anywhere. It is my weakness. The Lord gave up His habit in one stroke, while the disciple is struggling hard.

Oh, I was talking about His food: in the morning, the food was very spartan, and around noon, He had a good meal. In the afternoon,

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He had nothing, and at night, at about eight o'clock or so, He had dinner. But his special meal was at noon. You may like to know what this principal meal was like, what it consisted of. Well, there was everything, from savouries to sweets, and there would be Indian as well as European dishes. Fruits, sweets, vegetables, bread, butter, sandwich, etc. And Mother used to set the table, first putting three clean, white, linen tablecloths: the first one a little thick, the second a little thinner, and then the thinnest on top. How beautifully She did everything! If you had seen Her do it, you would have admired Her work - so flawless! Then She would bring the table and arrange all the dishes along the border and on the left side would be a drink - a glass of orange juice. Dr. Satyendra stood on the right side of Sri Aurobindo and used to fan Him lightly. Mother used to give the dishes one by one, placing them before Him, and He used to take whatever was given with a passive obedience. He took whatever Mother placed in front of him. Mother used to do full justice to all the food items. He never questioned, never asked for anything more. Mother sometimes used to say, "This has been cooked by so and so, how do you find it?" "Good. All right." Nothing more. He would eat slowly, like this [demonstrating], as though offering each morsel to the Divinity within. He took a long time, about an hour, for His meal.

At the end, as I said, He usually drank a glass of orange juice. He would sip it slowly - one sip, and He would look at the glass, another sip, again He would look at the glass, as though to see how much He had sipped each time. And when a little remained at the end, He would leave it, and we used to eagerly wait till He finished His meal. We would wait for that moment, and we would rush to Champaklal, who was the custodian of all the prasad, and he would give one or two drops of the leftover juice in each of our cupped palms, and how we relished it! All this we did behind His back, mind you, not in front! One day, He took only a sip and left it because it was fermented. And we were very happy and were eagerly waiting to take a bit more of the Divine drink. Then He looked at us and said, to our utter surprise: "Don't drink it today!" (Laughter) How did He come to know about

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it? He must have known from within, for He had not been otherwise informed about our enjoying the prasad.

Then there is another interesting thing that you may like to hear. Mother used to come in to comb Sri Aurobindo's hair. At times, She was in a trance, walking with unsteady steps, and we were afraid that She would fall. But never did She knock against anything, never. Then She would begin combing the Lord's hair, and would leave the comb stuck there. Then She would plait the hair and tie - what do you call them ... yes, ribbons. If She were still in a trance, the ribbons would not be tightly tied and they'd fall off. And believe it or not, my friends, I re-tied them properly afterwards! (Laughter) I soon learned the trick! And while Mother was busy combing the Master's hair, we naughty fellows used to have a jolly good time behind Her back, a lot of fun, laughing and joking around amongst ourselves. And one day, She remarked: "I have eyes at the back!"

Oh yes, I forgot to mention that Champaklal and I used to wash the Lord's hands in a bowl of water. Champaklal washed them before the meal, and I, after.