Gifts of Grace

Glossary of Names, Sanskrit Terms, and Special Terms

The philosophical and psychological terms in this glossary are defined mostly in the words of Sri Aurobindo.

adverse forces - see hostile forces

Agni - the godhead of fire; the fire of aspiration, purification, transfor- mation.

Ananda - delight, beatitude, bliss.

anumanta - giver of the sanction.

aspiration - the call of the being for higher things, for the Divine, for all that belongs to the higher or divine consciousness.

Asura - a hostile, anti-divine being, in revolt against the Divine, against the Light and the Truth.

asuya- envy, carping.

Atma(n) - the Self; the Spirit; the original and essential nature of our existence; the spiritual being above the mind. In its nature the At­ man is transcendent or universal (Paramatma, Atma); when it indi­ vidualises and becomes a central being, it is then the Jivatman.

Bhakti - love for the Divine; devotion to the Divine.

Brahmananda, Swami - (1863-1922), the first president of the Sri Ramakrishna Mission.

calm - a still, unmoved condition which no disturbance can affect; a strong and positive quietude, firm and solid.

central being - the term is generally applied to the portion of the Di­ vine in us which supports all the rest and survives through death and birth. It has two forms: the Jivatman, which is above the manifesta­ tion in life and presides over it; and the psychic being which stands behind mind, life and body in the manifestation and uses them as its instruments.

consciousness - the self-aware force of existence. The essence of con­ sciousness is the power to be aware of itself and its objects; but it is not only power of awareness of self and things, it is or has a dynamic and creative energy.

conversion - a turning away of the being from lower things towards the Divine.

Coue, Emile - (1857-1926). French pharmacist and psychotherapist. He is remembered for his formula for curing by optimistic autosug­ gestion: "Day by day, in every way, I am getting better and better."

Dhammapada, the - probably the best known book in the Pali Buddhist canon and the most-quoted in other Buddhist writings.

Divine, the - the Supreme Being from which all comes and in which all lives. In its supreme Truth, the Divine is absolute and infinite peace, c0nsciousness, existence, power and delight.

Divine Force - the Force, the one Energy that alone exists and alone makes universal or individual action possible, for this Force is the Divine itself in the body of its power. In the individual, it is a Force for purification, illumination, transformation.

Divine spark - see Soul

ego - the separative sense of individuality which makes each being con­ ceive of itself as an independent personality. Ego implies the identi­ fication of one's existence with the outer mental, vital and physical self.

evolution - the progressive unfolding of Spirit out of the density of material consciousness; the method by which the One Being and Consciousness, involved here in Matter, liberates itself from matter into life, from life into mind, from mind into the Spirit.

faith - a dynamic intuitive conviction in the inner being of the truth of supersensible things which cannot be proved by any physical evi­ dence but which are a subject of experience; the soul's witness to something not yet manifested, achieved or realised, but which yet the Knower within us feels to be true or supremely worth follow­ ing or achieving; the soul's belief in the Divine's existence, wisdom, power, love and grace.

Gita, the - short form of Bhagavad Gita, "the Song of the Blessed Lord", being the spiritual teachings of Sri Krishna spoken to Arjuna on the battlefield of Kurukshetra; it occurs as an episode in the Mahabha­ rata.

God - the Absolute, the Spirit, the Self spaceless and timeless, the Self manifest in the Cosmos and Lord of Nature. God is the All and that which transcends the All.

Grace, the (Divine Grace) - 1. the constant action of the Divine Will due to which everything happens for the best, so that every event and circumstance leads us towards the final Realisation. 2. the help of a higher Divine Force other than the force of Karma, which can lift the sadhak beyond the present possibilities of his nature.

Guru - spiritual teacher; the Guide in the Yoga; one who has realised the Truth and himself possesses and is able to communicate the light, the experience.

hostile forces - anti-divine, not merely undivine, forces that are in revolt against the Divine, against the Light and Truth, and opposed to the Yoga.

Hridaya - nephew of Sri Ramakrishna.

Ignorance, the - the ignorance of oneness; the separative consciousness and the egoistic mind and life that flow from it and all that is natural to them.

inconscience, the - the most involved state of the Superconscience; all powers of the Superconscience progressively evolve and emerge out of the Inconscient, the first emergence being Matter.

Integral Yoga - a union (yoga) in all the parts of our being with the Divine and a consequent transmutation of all their now jarring ele­ ments into the harmony of a higher divine consciousness and existence; this yoga implies not only the realisation of God but the entire consecration and change of the inner and outer life till it is fit to manifest a divine consciousness and become part of a divine work.

intuition - 1. insight without conscious reasoning; 2. one of the planes of spiritualised mind above the ordinary mind.

Ishwara (isvara) - Lord, Master, the Divine, God.

Jiva (jiva) - the spirit individualized and upholding the living being in its evolution from birth to birth. The full term is jiviitman.

Jivatma(n) - see Atman and Jiva

Karma - action, work; the work or function of a man; action entailing its consequences, the chain of act and consequence.

Life - Being at labour in Matter to express itself in terms of Conscious Force; an energy of Spirit subordinated to action of mind and body, which fulfils itself through mentality and physicality and acts as a link between them.

Light - primarily a spiritual manifestation of the Divine Reality illu­ minative and creative; spiritual Light is not knowledge, but the il­ lumination that comes from above and liberates the being from obscurity and darkness.

manomaya purusha - mental Person; the mental being.

Mara - in Buddhism, the Destroyer, the Evil One who tempts men to indulge their passions and is the great enemy of the Buddha and Buddhist bhikkhus.

mental, the (being) - see mind

mind - the part of the nature which has to do with cognition and intel­ ligence, with ideas, with mental or thought perceptions, the reactions of thought to things, with the truly mental thoughts and formations, mental vision and will, etc. that are part of man's intelligence. The ordinary mind has three main parts: mind proper, vital mind and physical mind.

Mother, the - the Divine Mother, the consciousness and force of the Divine, which is the Mother of all things; the Divine in its conscious­ ness force. The Mother is the divine Conscious Force that dominates all existence, upholding us and the universe.

Nature - the outer or executive force of the Conscious Force which forms and moves the worlds; a mechanism of active Force put out for the working of the evolutionary Ignorance. See also Prakriti.

nayam atma balahinena labhyah - this spirit iatman] is not to be won by the weak.

Parameshwara - supreme Lord.

peace - a deep quietude bringing not merely a release but a certain hap­ piness or Ananda of itself, a harmony that gives a feeling of libera­ tion and full satisfaction.

physical, the (being) - the physical conscious being; the physical self. physical consciousness - the physical mind and the physical vital as well as the body consciousness proper.

physical mind - the part of the mind which is concerned with physical things only; limited by the physical view and experience of things, it mentalises the experience brought by the contact of outward life and things, but does not go beyond that.

Prakriti - Nature; Nature-Force, the Lord's executive force; the outer or executive side of the Conscious Force which forms and moves the worlds. See also Nature.

psychic - of or relating to the soul (as distinguished from the mind and the vital). Used in the sense of the Greek word "psukhe", meaning "soul", the term "psychic" refers to all the movements and experi­ ences of the soul, those which rise from or directly touch the psychic being; it does not refer to all the more inward and all the abnormal experiences in which the mind and vital predominate.

psychic, the (being) - the evolving of the individual, the divine portion in him which evolves from life to life, growing by its experiences until it becomes a fully conscious being. From its place behind the heart centre, the psychic being supports the mind, life and body, aid­ ing their growth and development.

purity - freedom from soil or mixture. The divine purity is that in which there is no mixture of the turbid ignorant movements of the lower nature.

Purusha - Conscious Being; Conscious-Soul; essential being supporting the play of Prakriti (Nature); a Consciousness behind that is the lord, witness, enjoyer, upholder and source of sanction for Nature's works; the Purusha represents the true being on whatever plane it manifests-physical, vital, mental, psychic.

quiet - absence of restlessness or disturbance.

Radha - in Hindu religion, the chief of the Gopis or milkmaids, the favourite of Krishna while he lived among the cowherds in Vrinda­ vana. She is a symbolic figure, a personification of absolute love for the Divine, total and integral in all parts of the being, representing the nature-soul in man seeking the Divine Soul (Krishna) through love.

Ramakrishna (Paramahansa) - Sri Ramakrishna Paramahansa (1836-1886), a spiritual teacher of modern India.

rajas - the quality that energises and drives to action; the quality of action and passion and struggle impelled by desire and instinct; the force of kinesis. Rajas is one of the three Gunas or modes of Nature.

rajasic - pertaining to the quality of rajas.

realisation - the reception in the consciousness and the establishment there of the fundamental truths of the Divine; the making real to ourselves and in ourselves of the Self, the transcendent and universal Divine.

receptivity - the power to receive the Divine Force and to feel its pres­ ence and allow it to work, guiding one's sight and will and action; the capacity of admitting and retaining the divine workings.

rejection - rejection of the falsehood of the mental, vital and physical Powers and Appearances that still rule the earth-Nature.

saksi - witness.

sadhak - one who practises a spiritual discipline; one who is getting or trying to get spiritual realisation.

sadhana - spiritual practice or discipline; the practice of Yoga.

Samadhi - 1. inner or yogic trance. 2. the sanctuary or tomb of a saint.

Samrajya - empire; mastery of one's environment and circumstances.

Shakti - Force, Power; the Divine Power; the consciousness and force of the Divine.

Self, the - the universal Spirit, the self-existent Being, the conscious essential Existence one in all.

Siddhi - perfection, accomplishment of the aims of Yoga.

soul - the psychic essence; the divine element in the individual; a spark of the Divine that comes down into the manifestation to support the evolution of the individual. In the course of the evolution, the soul grows and evolves in the form of a soul-personality, the psychic be­ ing. The term "soul" is often used as a synonym for "psychic being".

Spirit - the Consciousness above mind; the Self which is always in one­ ness with the Divine.

spiritual - of the Spirit. All contacts with the Self, the Higher Con­ sciousness, the Divine above are spiritual.

sraddha - faith.

subconscient, the - a nether diminished consciousness which lies be­ tween the lnconscient and the conscious mind, life and body; it is an automatic, obscure, incoherent, half-unconscious realm in which light and consciousness can with difficulty come. The subconscient is not to be confused with the subliminal; the subconscient is that which is below the ordinary physical consciousness, the subliminal that which is behind and supports it.

Supermind - see Supramental, the

Supramental, the - the Supermind, the Truth-Consciousness, the highest divine consciousness and force operative in the universe. A principle of consciousness superior to mentality, it exists, acts and proceeds in the fundamental truth and unity of things and not like the mind in their appearances and phenomenal divisions. Its fun­ damental character is knowledge by identity, by which the Self is known, the Divine Sachchidananda is known, but also the truth of manifestation is known because this too is that.

surrender - to consecrate everything in oneself to the Divine, to offer all one is and has, not to insist on one's ideas, desires, habits, etc. but to allow the divine Truth to replace them by its knowledge, will and action everywhere.

Tamas - the quality that hides or darkens; the quality of ignorance, in­ ertia and obscurity, of incapacity and inaction; the force of incon­ science. Tamas is one of the three Cunas or modes of Nature.

Tantra - a yogic system based on the principle of Consciousness-Power (conceived of as the Divine Mother) as the Supreme Reality; its method of discipline is to raise Nature in man into manifest power of Spirit.

Tantric - relating to Tantra.

Tapasya - effort, energism, austerity of the personal will; concentration of the will and energy to control the mind, vital and physical and to change them or to bring down the higher consciousness or for any other yogic or high purpose.

transformation - not just a change of consciousness, but the bringing down of the higher, divine consciousness and nature into the lower nature of mind, life and body, and the replacement of the lower by the higher.

Trust - confidence in the Divine's Love, Wisdom and Omnipotence.

Veda - a generic name for the most ancient Indian sacred literature; the term "Veda" is sometimes reserved for the mantras or metrical hymns of the Rig-veda.

Vedic - pertaining to the Veda.

vital, the - the life-nature made up of desires, sensations, feelings, pas­ sions, energies of action, will of desire, reactions of the desire-soul of man and all that play of possessive and other related instincts, anger, greed, lust, etc. that belong to this field of nature.

vital being - the vital conscious being, the vital self.

Vivekananda, Swami - monastic name of Narendranath Dutta (1863-1902), the most famous disciple of Sri Ramakrishna and one of the great spiritual teachers of modern India.

will - a force put upon a thing to be changed.

Will, Divine - something that has descended here into the evolutionary world of Ignorance, standing at the back of things, pressing on the Darkness with its Light, leading things presently towards the best possible in the conditions of a world of Ignorance.

Yoga - 1. union with the Divine and the conscious seeking for this un­ ion. Yoga is in essence the union of the soul with the immortal being and consciousness and bliss of the Divine, effected through the hu­ man nature with a result of development into the divine nature of being. 2. Yoga is a generic name for any discipline by which one at­ tempts to pass out of the limits of one's ordinary mental conscious­ ness into a greater spiritual consciousness.

Yoga-Shakti - yoga-force, spiritual force.

yo yacchraddhah sa eva sah - Whatever is a man's faith, that he is. [ Gita 17.3I