The Mother : Contact
THEME/S
The Mother, on hearing the name of Sri Aurobindo in a chant, entered a state of samadhi-like trance.
It is said that the divine name is divine power.
Sri Ram Thakur [a well-known yogi of Bengal] always told his followers:
“Repeat the name, just go on repeating the name. There is nothing more you need to do in life.”
One day when he wanted to give us, the little ones, a name-mantra, I told him:
“No, I don’t want to accept a name-mantra. I won’t be able to close my eyes every morning and evening, and meditate like father and mother. If you can so arrange it that I am able to do this anytime I want, then I will accept a name-mantra from you.”
All those who were sitting in the room started laughing. Oh, how old must I have been at the time? Nine or ten at the most.
Sri Ram Thakur, however, did not laugh but replied: “That’s fine. You can repeat the name whenever you feel
like. You can do it while playing, you can do it while eating, even while studying, if you wish.”
After he had spoken, I felt it was all so simple. One needn’t sit down to do this. There was no need to do proper japa. So he gave to all of us girls a different mantra each. And we never revealed our mantra to anyone. I adored repeating the name.
One Name there is, hid deep within.
A number of festivals were celebrated in Feni. For three or four days and nights people would do the name-kirtan. During those days when I looked at people’s faces, I felt a great purity in their expression.
When I came here that name-mantra of childhood blended with the names of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother. When I showed the Mother a photograph of Sri Ram Thakur, She looked at it for a long time and then remarked:
“He is with me always.”
The Mother Herself used to tell us:
“Keep calling ‘Mother’. You will see all obstacles vanish.” Such is the divine power in a name.
*
Minnie-di, Smriti and Manoj’s sweet voices waft in…
Sri Aravindah sharanam mama.
Om namo bhagavate Sri Aravindaya.
Om namo namah Sri Mirambikayai.
In the Playground the Ashramites are listening to this chanting. Everybody is sitting still, silent.
Whenever I read poetry at college the following lines would set me thinking:
Friend, who has whispered the name of Shyam?
Through the ear into my inmost heart?
With fervour my life now overspills!
I always doubted if this was possible. Somehow Sri Radha’s love and self-offering at Sri Krishna’s feet would fill us with sadness. We did not know then that like Sri Radha, the Mother too would fall into a samadhi-like trance on hearing the name of Sri Aurobindo. And what is more, we would get a darshan of the Mother in this state. It was in this very Playground that we were witness to this unimaginable happening.
Minnie-di, Smriti and Manoj’s sweet voices are wafting in the air….
What an enthralling hush reigns in the Playground as those assembled there listen to this chant of the Mother’s and Sri Aurobindo’s names.
That day the deeper significance of this line entered our hearts with such simplicity as we sat around the Mother and watched this change come over Her. This same fervour of self-offering began to rise within us too.
I suddenly remembered how Sahana-di had told me about the Mother teaching her Radha’s dance. Sahana-di even showed us a little of this dance. The Mother kept showing Sahana-di how to express this kind of self-offering in a dance movement. It was actually for this dance that the Mother had written Radha’s Prayer.
My God! All this happened so long ago.
In this context let me tell you something that happened in my life.
I had settled down here for good. One day very hesitatingly I asked the Mother:
“Mother, how does one surrender?” The Mother laughed and said:
“When you offer flowers to me, it is, I suppose, with devotion and love. You offer yourself completely, exactly in that same way. Physically offer yourself completely to me, every part and limb. That is how you surrender.”
Taking the flowers from me in Her hands the Mother raised them high in a gesture of offering. Her eyes had an extraordinary look. It is impossible to describe that gesture of the Mother’s self-offering. She had lifted Her body high above, very high above while I just kept staring at Her.
I remembered two lines from a poem:
This body of mine, uplift,
O Lord, In thy temple to be a lamp of God.
At that moment I felt offering oneself was so very simple! I felt
I had understood everything.
The Mother continued:
“Every cell, every atom of your body, every worry and feeling of your heart, offer them all to me in this way.”
Seeing the Mother in the Playground in that state of selfoffering awakened that same longing for this self-offering within us. Every heart in the ground that day was steeped in that longing.
This mantra kept echoing in me.
The Mother was sitting still, upright, listening to that chant of Sri Aurobindo. Every cell, every atom of Her body was thrilled with the name of Sri Aurobindo. That is how we all felt. Never had I dreamed that I would get to see such a sight.
Everyone in the ground kept staring at the Mother with tear-filled eyes even as they quietly listened to the names of the Mother and Sri Aurobindo:
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