Sri Aurobindo : conversations
Talks with Sri Aurobindo is a thousand-page record of Sri Aurobindo's conversations with the disciples who attended to him during the last twelve years of his life. The talks are informal and open-ended, for the attendants were free to ask whatever questions came to mind. Sri Aurobindo speaks of his own life and work, of the Mother and the Ashram, of his path of Yoga and other paths, of India's social, cultural and spiritual life, of the country's struggle for political independence, of Hitler and the Second World War, of modern science, art and poetry, and of many other things that arose in the course of conversation. Serious discussion is balanced with light-hearted banter and humour. By recording these human touches, Nirodbaran has brought out the warm and intimate atmosphere of the talks.
THEME/S
NIRODBARAN: I have a few more questions on yesterday's topic. First, it seems that so long as love can be kept more or less psychic and mental it tends to remain high, noble and constant. But if it is brought down to the physical it tends to be vitiated and gets lost. So the physical relation seems to be predominantly responsible for the breaking of the union.
SRI AUROBINDO: The vital can also be responsible for it without any physical element. You can't say the physical is predominantly so. Blake and others actually say that spiritual love should be sanctified by vital and physical action. They are part of divine love.
NIRODBARAN: In woman, people say, a moment comes when she surrenders everything to the beloved. The physical being is a part of that surrender.
SRI AUROBINDO: That is the attitude of submission of the female to the male. Real surrender is a different thing, more psychic in character.
NIRODBARAN: In a psychic relation, when sex action takes place, is it only for procreation?
SRI AUROBINDO: The psychic element may be extended into the physical.
NIRODBARAN: But is there not a danger of the psychic element being lost?
SRI AUROBINDO: That depends on the strength of the psychic. The psychic relation is itself very rare, but it can get overclouded.
NIRODBARAN: If a person has been disappointed in love in the world and that element is not satisfied, and after turning to the Divine he finds somebody whom he loves and adores, can it be called a need or necessity of the being?
SRI AUROBINDO: Not need or necessity. All depends on the particular case. If there is the psychic element in it, it can help. The Vaishnavas brought even sexual relations into their Yoga in order to sublimate them. The result in their case was a failure.
NIRODBARAN: But in spite of the psychic element, there is a risk. The "thing" may be lost.
SRI AUROBINDO: I don't know what this "thing" is as I don't know the case.
SATYENDRA: Nirod is speaking very guardedly!
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