... Religion has admitted an occult element in its ritual, ceremony, sacraments; it has leaned upon spiritual thinking, deriving from it sometimes a creed or theology, sometimes its supporting spiritual philosophy,—the former, ordinarily, is the occidental method, the latter the oriental: but spiritual experience is the final aim and achievement of religion, its sky and summit. But also religion has sometimes... mystic philosophy: but more often it has confined itself to occult knowledge and practice without any spiritual vistas; it has turned to thaumaturgy or mere magic or even deviated into diabolism. Spiritual philosophy has very usually leaned on religion as its support or its way to experience; it has been the outcome of realisation and experience or built its structures as an approach to it: but it has also... it, to correlate it with the principle of things and the observed truth of the universe: this is the work of philosophy, and in the field of the truth of the spirit it can only be done by a spiritual philosophy, whether intellectual in its method or intuitive. But all knowledge and endeavour can reach its fruition only if it is turned into experience and has become a part of the consciousness and its ...
... Religion has admitted an occult element in its ritual, ceremony, sacraments; it has leaned upon spiritual thinking, deriving from it sometimes a creed or theology, sometimes its supporting spiritual philosophy,—the former, ordinarily, is the occidental method, the latter the oriental: but spiritual experience is the final aim and achievement of religion, its sky and summit. But also religion has sometimes... mystic philosophy: but more often it has confined itself to occult knowledge and practice without any spiritual vistas; it has turned to thaumaturgy or mere magic or even deviated into diabolism. Spiritual philosophy has very usually leaned on religion as its support or its way to experience; it has been the outcome of realisation and experience or built its structures as Page 341 an approach... it, to correlate it with the principle of things and the observed truth of the universe: this is the work of philosophy, and in the field of the truth of the spirit it can only be done by a spiritual philosophy, whether intellectual in its method or intuitive. But all knowledge and endeavour can reach its fruition only if it is turned into experience and has become a part of the consciousness and its ...
... The Secret of the Veda had, however, a different purpose altogether; it was meant to explore and locate the remotest origins of this Yoga, the roots of the aswatha-like magnificence of the spiritual philosophy of The Life Divine, the ancient corroborations (or, rather, seminal anticipations) of this Supramental Manifesto. Other sequences - notably Essays on the Gita, The Psychology of Social D... of realisation. Every chapter of The Life Divine was headed by one or more - sometimes as many as six or more - epigraphs, culled from ancient Indian scripture or the classics of spiritual philosophy. The main authorities are the Vedas, the Upanishads and the Gita. In the revised definitive edition of The Life Divine, out of a total of about 165 epigraphs distributed between fifty-six... and discoverer to guide him through the present circuits and the possible steeper ascent of his life up to the luminous heights of his spirit". 46 If the Gita is a great manual of spiritual philosophy, it is also philosophy with a difference: the teacher is a divine personality, the pupil is his comrade and kinsman, and the occasion is the moment of a sanguinary clash of arms. Arjuna and ...
... Sri Aurobindo - The Poet "SWAN OF THE SUPREME AND SPACELESS ETHER... AN APPROACH THROUGH SPIRITUAL PHILOSOPHY TO A POETIC VISION Have we here a contradiction in terms or a suprarational truth? What point is made by the words "spaceless ether"? Nineteenth-century physics accustomed us to the ether as a medium permeating space and transmitting elect... right. But the challenging concepts and adventurous images of the preceding poetry are not effaced: they play their subsidiary roles and waft to us, like background music, the atmosphere of spiritual philosophy. And the burst of pure sight is mediated, so to speak, by the lines: One with the Eternal, live in his infinity, Drowned in the Absolute, found in the Godhead... Here the... in the light of a supramental Truth and the pulse of a spiritual Bliss will be to us our internal fulfilment of the Divine in a complete cosmic consciousness." 1 Our approach through spiritual philosophy to Sri Aurobindo's poetic vision is now complete. As "Overhead poetry" is at work here, the canons of the ordinary poetic imagination, no less than those of theoretical physics, are surpassed ...
... always hoped for. Page 571 The Ashram principle is also behind the age-old concept of guru-kula-vāsa, or learning by living with the Guru. Whether one desires initiation into spiritual philosophy or into the mystic folds of music or into the mystery of any of the arts and sciences, the best way of achieving mastery was to live with the Guru, to observe him, serve him and obey him, though... accounted for nearly twenty Nobel laureates. There is thus a whole Guru-Sishya linked sequence which is as significant in the secular arts and sciences as it certainly is in the art and science of spiritual philosophy. The sense of the Divine Presence and the feeling of Divine Guidance and Divine Protection are, however, the indispensable élan in all Gurukulas and Ashrams. When young men were... educational or political organisation. It is not a "public body". It is not a corporation. It is not a caravanserai. In physical terms, an Ashram is the house or houses of a Guru or Master of spiritual philosophy in which he lives with the pupils who have come to him for instruction. The tradition of retirement from the world for study and meditation in an Page 579 Ashram was already ...
... the Brahmanas and turning them in such a way as to bring out an inner and a mystic sense which will serve as a sort of psychical starting-point for its own more highly evolved and more purely spiritual philosophy. There are a number of passages especially in the prose Upanishads which are entirely of this kind and deal, in a manner recondite, obscure Page 334 and even unintelligible to the... without smoke; he is the Lord of what was and what shall be; it is he that is today and it is he that shall be tomorrow. The Upanishads abound with passages which are at once poetry and spiritual philosophy, of an absolute clarity and beauty, but no translation empty of the suggestions and the grave and subtle and luminous sense echoes of the original words and rhythms can give any idea of their ...
... best it can, in its own language and to the rational and intellectual parts of man, the truths, the experiences, the laws of our suprarational and spiritual existence. That has been the work of spiritual philosophy in the East and—much more crudely and imperfectly done—of theology in the West, a work of great importance at moments like the present when the intellect of mankind after a long wandering is... knowledge of the apparent facts of existence, appeals even to the physical truths of science, all the apparatus of the intelligent mind in its ordinary workings. But this is the weakest part of spiritual philosophy. It convinces the rational mind only where the intellect is already predisposed to belief, and even if it convinces, it cannot give the true knowledge. Reason is safest when it is content to ...
... be dealt with in a short space. I have confined myself to pointing out that this article is a quite inadequate and superficial criticism. A case can be made against spiritual experience and spiritual philosophy and its positions, but to deserve a serious reply it must be put forward by a better advocate and it must touch the real centre of the problem which Page 327 lies here. As there... line is one of them and man tries to satisfy it in various ways, by superstitions of all kinds, by ignorant religionism, by spiritism, demonism and what not, in his more enlightened parts by spiritual philosophy, the higher occultism and the rest, at his highest by the union with the All, the Eternal or the Divine. The tendency towards the search for spirituality began in Europe with a recoil from the ...
... Aurobindo is not standing on a universal or transcendent height which corrects our human outlook. Now his earlier treatment of the problem of waste becomes no more than half the answer of his spiritual philosophy. That half is part of the vision of the world as perfect from the standpoint of the Supreme Consciousness, the vision that all is Brahman. There is another vision which is more typically... for suffering and falsehood, a formula that would make it possible in God's universe without impugning God's supreme Intelligence. The required ground and formula in Sri Aurobindo's spiritual philosophy is God's "involution". Out of the infinite possibilities of manifestation the possibility that has been made the key-note of the present manifestation is that a sovereign Consciousness ...
... Sight was a flame-throw from identity. All this is pure spiritual vision which seems to have made little impression on Mr. Lal during his reading of Savitri. But Savitri is spiritual philosophy as well as spiritual vision, and Mr. Lal is equally at sea with a poetry that fuses the philosophical concept with mystic symbolism and revelation. Else how could he miss the concreteness and... purple adjectives, or weak-spined greasiness, or loose emotion loosely expressed, in the profound-sighted and high-thoughted slokas of the Gita. Transposed to the plane of spiritual vision and spiritual philosophy, illumined and enlarged in the consciousness of a seer-sage, all that Mr. Lal demands of a true poem is here in abundance: "a choreographical pattern within a state of tension produced in a ...
... ultimately you will join her and be lost to us." A little later when he found that his grandson was doing some very peculiar things like meditation in a particular pose and was interested in spiritual philosophy he feared that he might lose his grandson completely that way. So, one day he suggested to Sethna: "Why don't you go to Oxford ?" Evidently according to the grandfather an English wife... y; for how long could this town prove "picturesque" ? When the stay ran into its sixth month, there was a sharp inquiry from home. Then it proved necessary to say that he was studying spiritual philosophy at the Ashram of Sri Aurobindo. The work done by the Ashram greatly interested him - Yogic work and other work too. It was not a passive kind of Yoga...in a way it was Karma Yoga ...
... effort to reach the goal that has been set for her. But the aspect of the Divine's involvement is always there and at every crucial evolutionary stage he comes here as a special Avatar. There spiritual philosophy goes beyond all metaphysical theses. That also makes the language of a symbol more revealing, rich in its suggestions and subtleties. No wonder Sri Aurobindo chose for his epic... urge, have received that call, and rarer still who will practise its Yoga. In the meanwhile, however, we can live in its presence in several expectant ways. In Savitri there is spiritual philosophy put in the revealing language of a poet, its expression carrying the inspired and inevitable Word. We have in it mysticism, occult knowledge, religion, metaphysics, art, science, literature ...
... Milton's greatness will endure—that cannot be said certainly of Kipling's ballads. The problem therefore remains where it was. Spiritual poetry also needs the vital force for expression; mere spiritual philosophy without the uplifting poetic force in its expression (which needs the vital energy for its action) cannot appeal to anybody. But all the same in spiritual poetry the vital element takes a form... a very fine one. It reminds one of the "meta- physical" poets somewhat, but without the defect of their manner. The other poem [Sura-ashi] is exceedingly beautiful. If they call that spiritual philosophy and not poetry, they must be dull of heart and blunt of wit. November 25, 1936 (12.30 p.m.) This poem I wrote yesterday morning: the whole thing came like lightning—probably ...
... and it has laid down suprareligious paths that lead to the sheer contact of the spiritual reality. As stated earlier, spirituality has also acknowledged philosophy or spiritual philosophy as a starting-point, and spiritual philosophy has, in its turn, Page 23 acknowledged as its source, spiritual experience and realization or built its structures as an approach to it. On the other hand ...
... it, to correlate it with the principle of things and the observed truth of the universe: this is the work of philosophy, and in the field of the truth of the spirit it can only be done by a spiritual philosophy, whether intellectual in its method or intuitive. But all knowledge and endeavour can reach its fruition only if it is turned into experience and has become a part of the consciousness and its... Ibid ., p. 878. Page 381 "The means by which this need can be satisfied and with which our nature of mind has provided us is philosophy, and in this field it must be a spiritual philosophy. Such systems have arisen in numbers in the East; for almost always, wherever there has been a considerable spiritual development, there has arisen from it a philosophy justifying it to the ...
... lore are fulfilled. In whatsoever a way one may look at it, whatever is the call, it has the merit of answering it. The sky has no bounds and unplumbable are the depths of the sea; so are the spiritual philosophy and poetry in this creation of Jnaneshwar, bottomless and without limit, agadha-ananta . In one word: Jnaneshwari is the work of a Yogi-Poet. Page 131 Our approach towards... our misplaced enthusiasm to call him a philosopher. It is through the poetry of his creation that one can really meet him and be one with him. Jnaneshwari is not a treatise on metaphysics or spiritual philosophy or a tract of yogic practices though all these abound in it in their functional richnesses. After all it has a far greater appeal to our inner being than his deeply philosophical Amritanubhava ...
... identity... [p. 301] Page 129 All this is pure spiritual vision which seems to have made little impression on Mr. Lai during his reading of Savitri. But Savitri is spiritual philosophy as well as spiritual vision, and Mr. Lai is equally at sea with poetry that fuses the philosophical concept with mystic symbolism and revelation. Else how could he miss the concreteness and... adjectives, or weak-spined greasiness, or loose emotion loosely expressed, in the profound-sighted and high-thoughted slokas of the Gita. Transposed to the plane of spiritual vision and spiritual philosophy, illumined and enlarged in the consciousness of a seer-sage, all that Mr. Lai demands of a true poem is here in abundance: "a choreographical pattern within a state of tension produced in ...
... win the peace of Spirit. This is the sense. February 1929 James Cousins on In the Moonlight and The Rishi I hear that James Cousins said about your poem The Rishi that it was only spiritual philosophy, not poetry. I never heard that. If I had I would have noted that Cousins had no capacity for appreciating intellectual poetry. But that I knew already—just as he had no liking for epic... Lost and still more of Paradise Regained "This is not poetry, this is theology." Note that I don't mean to say that The Rishi is anywhere near Paradise Lost , but it is poetry as well as spiritual philosophy. 13 November 1936 Page 230 ...
... existence.... " The means by which this need [of intellectual understanding] can be satisfied and with which our nature of mind has provided us is philosophy, and in this field it must be a spiritual philosophy. Such systems have arisen in numbers in the East; for almost always, wherever there has been a considerable spiritual development, there has arisen from it a philosophy justifying it to the... the metaphysical idea can impress on life and action by an abstract and secondary influence. Religion has supported itself in the West not by philosophy but by a credal theology; sometimes a spiritual philosophy emerges by sheer force of individual genius, but it has not been as in the East a necessary adjunct to every considerable line of spiritual experience and endeavour. It is true that a philosophic ...
... here we have not only the element of spiritual autobiography that, in a non-personal narrative shape, is found worked into that poem in detailed abundant vividness. We have also the element of spiritual philosophy found there in the form of general ideas set shining through the Yogi's silent mind by what arrives from overhead—a thought-structure expressing a mystical vision and contact and knowledge which... resolving movement of three lines, tend by themselves to introduce something of the graver, more strongly cut and more marshalled power of epic construction, even when the poised element of spiritual philosophy and the dynamic element of spiritual autobiography are not together directly in front to contribute an epic tone affined to that of Savitri. 1 This line would scan differently if ...
... Sight was a flame-throw from identity. All this is pure spiritual vision which seems to have made little impression on Mr. Lal during his reading of Savitri. But Savitri is spiritual philosophy as well as spiritual vision, and Mr. Lal is equally at sea with a poetry that fuses the philosophical mind with mystic symbolism and revelation. Else how could he miss the concreteness and vividness... purple adjectives, or weak-spined greasiness, or loose emotion loosely expressed, in the profound sighted and high-thoughted slokas of the Gita. Transposed to the plane of spiritual vision and spiritual philosophy, illumined and enlarged in the consciousness of a seer-sage, all that Mr. Lal demands of a true poem is here in abundance: "a choreographical pattern within a state of tension produced in a ...
... Lawrence goes red etc. It's the mark of the tribe. What about yourself in your pre-yogic days? I hear that James Cousins said about your poem "The Rishi" that it was not poetry at all, only spiritual philosophy. I wonder what your poetic reaction was! James Cousins does not date from my pre-yogic days. I never heard that. If I had, I would have noted that Cousins had no capacity for appreciating... Paradise Lost and still more of Paradise Regained "This is not poetry, this is theology". Note that I don't mean to say that "Rishi" is anywhere near "Paradise Lost", but it is poetry as well as spiritual philosophy. November 13, 1936 You surprise me very much, Guru, by this "volcanic anger" of yours. People say that they never heard a single harsh, rude, angry word from your mouth here in ...
... chapter how, in the course of his letter to Barindra in 1920, Sri Aurobindo remarked that the "Guru of the world" had given him "the ten limbs of the body of this Yoga". This was presented as a spiritual philosophy in The Life Divine and, more particularly, as a practical treatise in The Synthesis of Yoga. The latter was begun as a serial in the first (August 1914) issue of the Arya - and although... newness and integrality of Sri Aurobindo's Page 564 Yoga. It professedly aims at taking up all sides of the Truth - for example, Veda and Vedanta providing the core of the spiritual philosophy of The Life Divine and of The Synthesis of Yoga, and the Tantric process of the waking up of the Kundalini to pass through the purified centres suggesting the ascending and descending stair ...
... intellectual theory of the intuitive ordering perception of all that is the soul, the thought, the dynamic truth, the heart of feeling and power of Indian religion. Indian religion is Indian spiritual philosophy put into action and experience. Whatever in the religious thought and practice of that vast, rich, thousand-sided, infinitely pliable, yet very firmly structured system we call Hinduism, does ...
... author and give its full importance to this recurrent preoccupation of the Teacher and the disciple. The teaching of the Gita must therefore be regarded not merely in the light of a general spiritual philosophy or ethical doctrine, but as bearing upon a practical crisis in the application of ethics and spirituality to human life. For what that crisis stands, what is the significance of the battle of ...
... as the sole means of realisation. I am only giving it its due place. You will excuse the vein of irony or satire in all this—but really when I am told that my own case disproves my whole spiritual philosophy and accumulated knowledge and experience, a little liveliness in answer is permissible. 16 December 1934 A sense was coming down from above that I belong to the Above, but have come down ...
... Milton's greatness will endure—that cannot be said certainly of Kipling's ballads. The problem therefore remains where it was. Spiritual poetry also needs the vital force for expression; mere spiritual philosophy without the uplifting poetic force in its expression (which needs the vital energy for its action) cannot appeal to anybody. But all the same in spiritual poetry the vital element adopts a turn ...
... of man and woman because it has been the habit for centuries to make every novel turn around that—except in the few which deal with history or adventure or similar things. In a novel based on spiritual philosophy should not the man and woman idea go into the background or disappear, the spiritual love not having anything based at all on sex, but on the relation between soul and soul? It is not ...
... of "fusionism". The truth of the integral mystical life is many-faceted. Sri Aurobindo has refused to make water-tight compartments and brought all the three great systems of Indian spiritual philosophy together in experiential terms. His words 52 are worth attending to: "God is the All and that which exceeds, transcends the All; there is nothing in existence which is not God but ...
... and the will required for the discovery of our supra-mental Self with its masterful ability to perfect by its highest law our entire earth-life — this indeed is the practical outcome of all spiritual philosophy. It is what Sri Aurobindo calls the Integral Yoga. The Integral Yoga is the methodised effort towards perfection by a constant urge towards the Divine as a Presence and Power capable of ...
... rational mind,—for true rationalism, real free thought need no longer be identified, as it was for some time too hastily and intolerantly, with a denial of the soul and a scouting of the truths of spiritual philosophy and religion,—there is nothing to prevent us from proceeding firmly upon whatever certitudes of spiritual experience have become to us the soil of our inner growth or the pillars on our road ...
... Amal-Kiran - Poet and Critic The Locus of K.D. Sethna's Poetry IN 1927 a young Indo-Anglian poet drawn by the new spiritual philosophy of Sri Aurobindo came to his Ashram in Pondicherry. The name of the young man was K.D. Sethna. He was twenty-three and two years earlier had published a book of poems. He was not happy with the life he had ...
... eternity. Lay stretched immobile upon Silence' marge. The common impression is that the very beginning of the universal manifestation is spoken of. According to Sri Aurobindo's spiritual philosophy, the manifestation, of which earth's history is a part, begins with a stark Inconscience in which all that we understand by the Supreme Divine is submerged and concealed. From the total Involution ...
... line is one of them and man tries to satisfy it in various ways, by superstitions of all kinds, by ignorant religionism, by spiritism, demonism and what not, in his more enlightened parts by spiritual philosophy, the higher occultism and the rest, at his highest by the union with the All, the Eternal or the Divine. The tendency towards the search of spirituality began in Europe with a recoil from the ...
... the The Life Divine. Both the books have been planned on a cyclopean scale. Savitri has a mould equally massive and multiform as The Life Divine. The latter deals with every aspect of spiritual philosophy in prolific detail and is comprehensively illustrative of what Shelley has termed "a mind grown bright, gazing at many truths". In Savitri as in The Life Divine, "length", as Sri Aurobindo ...
... Ashram I have sought to quicken to the presence of Sri Page 171 Aurobindo and the Mother from the core of my heart. Although I came to them with a mind keenly interested in spiritual philosophy what had brought me was an inner urge I hardly understood and only knew as something strange within my chest which yearned for an Unknown surpassing every object of my sense and my thought and ...
... universal manifestation is spoken of. According to _____________ 1 [Originally published in Mother India, August and September 1975.] Page 246 Sri Aurobindo's spiritual philosophy, the manifestation, of which earth's history is a part, begins with a stark Inconscience in which all that we understand by the Supreme Divine is submerged and concealed. From the total ...
... Mother's experiences in 330 new dimension of poetic expression 367 original form 287, 328 parallels with poems 98 philosophy and 220,321,342 revision of 320 spiritual philosophy and vision 130 spiritual revelatory literature 286 Sri Aurobindo on 58,147,200, 255, 283,288,289,320,323,327 style of 242 support in sadhana 342,345 technique of 61 ...
... shimmering ridge. ² These lines are unique in Sri Aurobindo's writings - and more than anything else from his hand they can serve as the packed nucleus of a whole revolution in spiritual philosophy, an astonishing reversal in the final vision of reality. For, they posit a "night" between the Overmind and the Supramental Truth-World, and so vast, so deep is it that the latter appears ...
... in the teachings of Eckhart and Sri Aurobindo, 81-84, 154 D Darshanas, 68 dispersion, state of, 118, 119 the Divine, 5,6, 71,72,79,105,106,150 E Eastern spiritual philosophy, 4, 5 Eckhart's viewpoints, see also teachings concept of enlightenment portals, 17, 18 dealing with negative reactions, 48-50 the Divine, 6, 151 false ...
... relationship of “the sky in the sky”, gagani gagan laya jaye . ( Jnaneshwari : 6.310) What this means is that Jnaneshwar is not exactly working out a comprehensive thesis or disposition of spiritual philosophy, but is only offering comments apropos of each shloka in the immediate context. This also he is doing in the light of the tradition which he has inherited. It is in this tradition that we should ...
... lyrically sweet and enchanting without becoming metaphysically irrelevant; in the process, in that joyous expansive mood, least does it suffer distortion. Not only do we have the substance of spiritual philosophy in its trueness; there is throughout the authenticity of overhead poetry with its genuine power of revelation coming from beyond the mental consciousness. Let us have a quick look at this Ashwattha ...
... vernacular, even that of a Scripture. The composition is not exactly a commentary, but it takes the Gita only as a precious occasion to create poetic magnificence in yet another medium. Profound spiritual philosophy based on spiritual experiences are described in the language of a mystic and not that of a metaphysician. Seven hundred shlokas of the Scripture have been rendered into nine-thousand owis ...
... later periods as the Indian idea of Dharma. The Upanishads constitute a continuation and development of the Vedic system of yoga. There are a number of passages which are at once poetry and spiritual philosophy of an absolute clarity and beauty. There are others in which subtlest psychological and philosophical truths are expressed with an entire sufficiency without falling short of a perfect beauty ...
... devout poets of the religion of Chaitanya. All the spiritual experience that lay behind the symbol was embodied in that inspired prophet and incarnation of the ecstasy of divine love and its spiritual philosophy put into clear form in his teaching. His followers continued the poetic tradition of the earlier singers and though they fall below them in genius, yet left behind a great mass of this kind ...
... in childhood. And see the trick of Fate, it is such things now that I am called upon to do. You are justly punished—but what is Yog-biyog? I thought that had to do with mathematics, not spiritual philosophy. Is it for nothing that I see the Red Light burning in the subtle worlds, as the outcome of my misadventure? Take courage. Say Tut tut tut to the misadventure and go ahead. April ...
... consciousness" in yesterday's poem, nor how you make "magic bars separate" them... I don't get these things anywhere "in" the poem—naturally, because the poem is not a treatise on metaphysics or spiritual philosophy, but only a series of mystic images, but I get it "from" the poem. You asked what was the meaning and I gave you what I gathered from it or, if you like, what it would have meant if I had written ...
... as the sole means of realisation. I am only giving it its due place. You will excuse the vein of irony or satire in all this—but really when I am told that my own case disproves my whole spiritual philosophy and accumulated knowledge and experience, a little liveliness in answer is permissible. December 16, 1934 I had expected the blows and enjoyed them. Only one blow I did not expect ...
... 1908 Mar Separation from Henri Morisset. Later moves to 49, rue de Levis, Paris. 1908-1909 Sri Aurobindo realises 'in full two of the four great realisations on which his yoga and his spiritual philosophy are founded': of the silent spaceless and timeless Brahman, and of the cosmic consciousness - the Divine as all beings and all that is. To the other two, 'that of the supreme Reality with the ...
... shrine. 26 VI Since 1910 Sri Aurobindo had completely surrendered himself to Yoga. He bad "already realised in full two of the four great realisations on which his Yoga and his spiritual philosophy are founded". 27 In Pondicherry he had received a "programme" for his own Yoga which he described as SaptaChatushtaya. 28 But self-realisation was not the only aim: "A distinct and central ...
... Yoga of Sri Aurobindo CHAPTER XXII KNOWLEDGE—THE LIGHT THAT FULFILS PART I WHAT IS KNOWLEDGE IN yogic parlance and spiritual philosophy knowledge does not mean mental knowledge. Mental knowledge is a knowledge of objects taken as separate integers or aspects, and not viewed as indivisible parts of a universal whole. Even when ...
... understands by Manifestation and the Divine Life. There are two important elements which give a distinctive character to the above terms and mark them out as the most creative concepts in spiritual philosophy. The first is the evolutionary and the second the collective element. Manifestation is, according to Sri Aurobindo, the very purpose and goal of evolution. All creation is, in a sense, the ...
... highest value and which have been the supreme endeavour of her greatest spirits, are not sane, not virile. 8 Archer is allergic to philosophy, and particularly to India's inward-looking spiritual philosophy. Measuring the creations of Indian art and literature with a yard-stick fashioned by Mammon in Science's forge and on Moloch's anvil. Archer finds everything Indian a negation of culture and ...
... in my being accepted the suggestion and there was no fever !" There was the second prediction. "Another indicated very precisely that one of my future activities would be to found a new spiritual philosophy and its discipline; at that time I had no knowledge of philosophy or Yoga and no turn or inclination in my mind which could make the realisation of this prediction at all probable. These are ...
... was no sign at the time, but long afterwards they put in their unexpected appearance and persisted. Another indicated very precisely that one of my future activities would be to found a new spiritual philosophy and its discipline; at that time I had no knowledge of philosophy or Yoga and no turn or inclination in my mind which could make the realisation of this prediction at all probable. These are ...
... away from physical nature. It was part of a general cessation of new intellectual activity, for philosophy too ceased to develop almost at the same time. The last great original attempts at spiritual philosophy are dated only a century or two later than the names of the last great original scientists. It is true also that Indian metaphysics did not attempt, as modern philosophy has attempted without ...
... the experience of it and the right way to a spiritual existence; its single aim coincides with the highest significance of religion. Indian religion draws all its characteristic value from the spiritual philosophy which illumines its supreme aspiration and colours even most of what is drawn from an inferior range of religious experience. But what are Mr. Archer's objections, first to Indian philosophy ...
... The idea is clear but the rhythm that raises the idea to spiritual heights and makes verse aglow with immensity is missing here. Page 356 But there is a spiritual philosophy that can use the language of the mind by infusing in it a clarity that is foreign to its ordinary nature: All is abolished but the mute Alone. (Sri Aurobindo, "Nirvana") ...
... the physical or religious level which lends itself to expressions of devotion through certain movements of the body; the vital corresponding to the level of occultism; the mental to that of spiritual philosophy and understanding; and the ultimate level of pure spiritual experience. From the time she withdrew from her body, it has been clear to me that for Auroville, and perhaps for the earth also ...
... places. In it there is no hesitation in speaking of “oversight” on part of the Author himself or in seeing his “final intentions”. The worse is, he at times making slips and forgetting his own spiritual philosophy or poetic art. Such ideas are not only tawdry; they lack the simplest yogic etiquettes. The current work is just a brief attempt in indicating the flaws that have crept in the official p ...
... previously that tended to stress the differences rather than the similarities among the various religions. Theosophy also served to introduce me to certain fundamental doctrines of Eastern spiritual philosophy, Page 4 such as karma, rebirth, and spiritual evolution—tenets that were quite alien to my early beliefs about the afterlife. Sri Aurobindo and the Mother seemed ...
... in a fury I attacked his Yoga — "Karmayoga is all bosh," etc. He wrote: "You will excuse the vein of irony or satire in all this — but really, when I am told that my own case disproves my own spiritual philosophy and accumulated knowledge and experience, a little liveliness in answer is permissible." I often corresponded with him on the subject of poetry. Here is one occasion: ...
... young Aurobindo, just turned 20, was not only oriented towards India's cause of freedom by joining the clandestine "Lotus and Dagger" Society but also had, through an "empathic" study of Indian spiritual philosophy in the pages of Max Muller, his first experience which may be situated on the threshold of Yoga, as it were: by an intense effort of mental concentration he had a distant imaginative sense of ...
... of the Arya. To continue quoting from the booklet: "Before coming to Pondicherry, Sri Aurobindo had already realised in full two of the four great realisations on which his Yoga and his spiritual philosophy are founded. The first... in January 1908... was the realisation of the silent spaceless and timeless Brahman gained after a complete and abiding stillness of the whole consciousness and attended ...
... Somebody put me the question: "Where in your being is the centre of your sadhana?" As I write on various subjects and read also a lot and have been a frequent expositor of Sri Aurobindo's spiritual philosophy, the expectation seemed to be that I would point to my head. It appeared to be a surprise when I put my hand on the middle of my chest. But ever since I came to the Ashram it has been my aspiration ...
... Artist Love (1925) was followed by The Secret Splendour (1941) and The Adventure of the Apocalypse (1949). Like Nirodbaran, Sethna too has been profoundly influenced by the poetry and spiritual philosophy of Sri Aurobindo, and, besides, Sethna has drunk deep in the springs of English and European poetry. Grace could be cited as an example of his earlier work, fancy-fed and neatly-turned ...
... y, for how long could this little town prove "picturesque"? When the stay ran into its sixth month, there was a sharp inquiry from home. Then it proved necessary to say that he was studying spiritual philosophy at the Ashram of Sri Aurobindo. The work done by the Ashram greatly interested him -Yogic work and other work too. It was not a passive kind of Yoga... in a way it was Karma Yoga.. ...
... Roman Catholicism and Pantheism The Roman Catholic Church has shown deep concern over the real religion behind the scientific-spiritual philosophy of the Jesuit priest and palaeontologist Teilhard de Chardin. Apropos of some declarations of his, a very disturbing question has arisen for it: "Was Teilhard a pantheist?" According ...
... development. (K.D.S.) Page 76 for the satisfaction of the ego and for the works of the ignorance and darkness." Like pantheism the ancient Vedanta is monistic, a spiritual philosophy of the One, an Adwaita - to use the Indian term meaning "Non-dualism" - but it does not overlook the Many. Only, "the Many exist in the One and by the One, the differences are variations in ...
... concept. It is true that certain religions seem to suppose an extracosmic Deity who has created a world outside and apart from his own existence; but when they come to construct a theology or spiritual philosophy, these too admit omnipresence or immanence,—for this omnipresence imposes itself, is a necessity of spiritual thinking. If there is such a Divinity, Self or Reality, it must be everywhere, one ...
... given to the hymns in the actual interpretations we possess. With those interpretations, we cannot use the Rig Veda as a whole, as the Upanishads can be used as a whole, as the basis of a high spiritual philosophy. Now, it is to the interpretation of the Veda as a whole and to its general character that I have addressed myself. I quite acknowledge that there has always been a side-stream of tendency ...
... not a spiritual novice or in need of any initiation or spiritual direction by anybody. Sri Aurobindo had already realised in full two of the four great realisations on which his yoga and his spiritual philosophy are founded. The first he had gained while meditating with the Maharashtrian Yogi Vishnu Bhaskar Lele, at Baroda in January 1908; it was the realisation of the silent spaceless and timeless ...
... as an illusion, but rather as a Lila. He is still more than his Lila, but He is in it and it is in Him; it is not an illusion. 16 October 1931 The Arya The Arya 8 is a work of spiritual philosophy founded on personal realisation; it is obviously not meant for minds that do not think out spiritual things in all their aspects. For understanding Arya one must have a sufficiently ...
... much tied to a half-spiritualised vital movement. Christianity seems to me to have never clarified its intelligence by the spiritual light in the higher reaches of the mind; it is lacking in a spiritual philosophy and never really went beyond theology—in spite of one or two large thinkers who were the exception rather than the rule. One has to pass beyond even the higher mind, but not to have developed ...
... grown up about his Asram in Pondicherry Sri Aurobindo considers it necessary to issue the following explicit statement. 1 An Asram means the house or houses of a Teacher or Master of spiritual philosophy in which he receives and lodges those who come to him for the teaching and practice. An Asram is not an association or a religious body or a monastery—it is only what has been indicated above ...
... line is one of them and man tries to satisfy it in various ways, by superstitions of all kinds, by ignorant religionist, by spiritism, demonism and what not, in his more enlightened parts by spiritual philosophy, the higher occultism and the rest, at his highest by the union with the All, the Eternal or the Divine----With the deeper minds the dissatisfaction with the ideals of the past or ...
... Alone would not be so great and the concept of the absorption of the soul into the One would not be so extreme — at least in appearance. The same problem has lain heavy on the mind of Indian spiritual philosophy and has led to uncompromising Monism at the end, to utter a-cosmism, with whatever head-ache and heart-ache accompanying it. The whole work of Sri Aurobindo, on the conceptual level, is occupied ...
... have grown up about his Asram in Pondicherry Sri Aurobindo considers it necessary to issue the following explicit statement: "An Asram means the house or houses of a Teacher or Master of spiritual philosophy in which he receives and lodges those who come to him for the teaching and practice. An Asram is not an association or a religious body or a monastery—it is only what has been indicated above ...
... is not to be a poet; as I understand it. But I am glad to have been made by you and my other Indian friends to read the letters on poetry, and other of Sri Aurobindo's writings on philosophy -spiritual philosophy that is - which have all the beautiful clarity his poetry seems to me to lack. The fact still remains that but for a line here and there I don't respond to it at all. No, I have not ...
... but I have no particular attachment to it and I do not think there is anything reprehensible in the use simply of "Aurobindo" by European and American admirers and interpreters of his spiritual philosophy. Indeed, originally his name was just this and so there is no illogic in employing it even now. Moreover, the adjective formed by the Master from the name is without the "Sri". If he had ...
... introduces the students to the broad sweep of general knowledge in the most important fields of human learning and then helps him to integrate this knowledge with the basic human values and the spiritual philosophy. The students are exposed to great literature, fine arts, social sciences and the cultural history of the world from the Page 439 human and value-oriented perspective. It is a ...
... brought out by Sri Aurobindo among the modern spiritual thinkers and writers. According to him, religion is only one of the three approaches to spirituality, the other two being occultism and spiritual philosophy. Each of these three may lead separately or together or in varying collaboration to direct spiritual experience and realisation which constitute real spirituality. "Spirituality", ...
... version of the booklet L'Enseignement et I'Ashram de Sri Aurobindo issued on 16-2-36 Sri Aurobindo wrote inter alia: "An Ashram means the house or houses of a Teacher or Master of spiritual philosophy in which he receives and lodges those who come to him for the teaching and practice. ... An Ashram is not an association or a religious body or a monastery - it is only what has been indicated ...
... that is, Vasudevah sarvamiti, and it was the second of the four great realisations (of the first — the experience of Brahma-Nirvana at Baroda — I have already spoken) on which his yoga and spiritual philosophy are founded. After sometime Sri Aurobindo was transferred from the solitary cell to a large hall in the jail where he lived with the other undertrial prisoners. Sri Aurobindo was then so ...
... political activities, although he was involved in these, but because of a tremendous spiritual experience which, in his own words, was the first of the four great realisations on which his Yoga and spiritual philosophy are founded. I shall now try and give you an account of this, relying largely on his own words. You know that from the year 1904 Sri Aurobindo was deeply engaged in the practice of yoga but ...
... day in a fury I attacked his Yoga—"Karmayoga is all bosh," etc. He wrote: "You will excuse the vein of irony or satire in all this—but really, when I am told that my own case disproves my own spiritual philosophy and accumulated knowledge and experience, a little liveliness in answer is permissible." I often corresponded with him on the subject of poetry. Here is one occasion. QUESTION: ...
... see the trick of Fate, it is such things now that I am called upon to do. SRI AUROBINDO: You are justly punished—but what is Yog-biyog? I thought that had to do with mathematics, not spiritual philosophy. MYSELF: Is it for nothing that I see the Red Light as the outcome of my misadventure? SRI AUROBINDO: Take courage. Say Tut tut tut to the misadventure and go ahead. MYSELF: ...
... of the Upanishads have time and again cited the Vedic mantras while expounding their own philosophical truths. So it is quite reasonable if we place the Veda on the same footing with their spiritual philosophy and do not consider the former as something exclusively dealing with Nature and ceremonies. For example, dva suparna... ("Two birds, beautiful of wing, close companions, cling to one common ...
... it was actually Sri Aurobindo's work. While describing an Ashram, Sri Aurobindo explained: "An Ashram means the house or houses of a Teacher Page 308 or Master of spiritual philosophy in which he receives and lodges those who come to him for the teaching and practice. An Ashram is not an association or a religious body or a monastery—it is only what has been indicated ...
... understands by Manifestation and the Divine Life. There are two important elements which give a distinctive character to the above terms and mark them out as the most creative concepts in spiritual philosophy. The first is the evolutionary and the second the collective element. Manifestation is, according to Sri Aurobindo, the very purpose and goal of evolution. All creation is, in a sense the ...
... Poems and Plays. Page 67 and the most complete and creative embodiment of the descending Love, Light and beatific Force of Sachchidananda upon earth. It is a commonplace of spiritual philosophy that God is the ultimate goal of life, and it has also been an experience of countless men, purchased at the cost of many a cruel pang and bitter remorse and cheerless roving in the wilderness ...
... achieve both self-realisation and world-redemption. It would be unwise to tear the Gita from its Kurukshetra context, for the Gita is not only a wide-ranging treatise on ethical doctrine and spiritual philosophy but also — and no less pointedly — a complete (and apparently convincing) answer to the problem of facing an acute crisis in human life. The crisis recurs from time to time, for we too find ...
... and packed in its every rift with the ore of his own spiritual experiences, made the poem important enough. Some had a shrewd notion that Savitri as yogic poetry was complementary to the spiritual philosophy of The Life Divine and the practical spirituality of The Synthesis of Yoga in the other harmony of prose; and in 1963, the Mother was to write on the top of a diary containing quotations ...
... busy with politics - for that was the ostensible reason for his coming - but be also kept in the forefront his inner quest, and in fact he was more at home with intellectuals and students of spiritual philosophy than with politicians and electioneering strategists. Soon after his arrival, Richard made inquiries: was there any great spiritual adept at Pondicherry? People shook their heads at first, for ...
... Matter, or else, if Matter and the world built on it were an illusion, they would be rejected as nought by the sole existent Spirit. It is true, he may find that a number of religions, spiritual philosophies and systems of Yoga have attempted to build some meaningful relationship between the material world and God, whether conceived in deistic, pantheistic, theistic or in some primitive or ultra-modern... A Philosophy of Evolution for the Contemporary Man Discontent of the Contemporary Man The contemporary man, who has attempted to go beyond superficialities in order to think, live and act at deeper and higher levels, finds himself in a state of discontent. He has witnessed the triumphs of science and technology; he feels satiated but not satisfied. As for his internal... psychology. He may hear the categorical imperative, practise the austerities of morals, and knock at the doors of churches, temples and mosques. He may endeavour to set his feet on the paths of spiritual experience. He may imitate or live with Agni, Indra, Shiva, Krishna and Christ, sit at the feet of Agastya, Yajnavalkya, Aruni and Buddha, laugh with the sanyasin at the snaring net of Maya and meditate ...
... pressure [ of the supramental descent ] when they are satisfied with the realisation they have? They live in the spiritual mind and the nature of the mind is to separate—here to separate some high aspect or state of the Divine and seek that to the exclusion of all else. All the spiritual philosophies and schools of Yoga do that. If they go beyond, it is to the Absolute and mind cannot conceive of the Absolute... divine realisation is meant the spiritual realisation—the realisation of Self, Bhagavan or Brahman on the mental-spiritual plane or else the overmental plane. That is a thing (at any rate the mental-spiritual) which thousands have done. So it is obviously easier to do than the supramental. Also nobody can have the supramental realisation who has not had the spiritual. It is true that neither can... Secondly, the supramental transformation is not the same as the spiritual-mental. It is a change of mind, life and body which the mental or overmental-spiritual cannot achieve. All whom you mention were spirituals, but in different ways. Krishna's mind, for instance, was overmentalised, Ramakrishna's intuitive, Chaitanya's spiritual-psychic, Buddha's illumined higher mental. I don't know about B. ...
... the la e range of facts. But it may be mentioned that even the non Page 160 materialistic view can be of several kinds, as is obvious from the host of idealist, religious and spiritual philosophies. The A which is perhaps most in tune with- the starting-point in one's own consciousness is that which Molds the involuntariness sufferance and given-ness noticeable in perception to due... certain kind of contents of consciousness and that we have no notion of outside our consciousness makes the contents such and land such. Here we go clean beyond scientific imagism and land in sheer philosophy, with three further steps to consider. Page 159 These steps are: (1) solipsism, the belief in the existence nothing except oneself, because everything and everyone figuring in perception... same hidden reality is presented to them and, on the other, ^e same supreme Consciousness is their secret self of selves. Commencing with consciousness we can arrive at a non- materialistic philosophy in which the living core of solipsism is combined both with pluralism of beings and with objectivism This way of thinking, however, simply ignores science as a starting-point, though by granting ...
... at the educational changes across the world, we see a curious mix of education based on ancient cultures and folk traditions, on colonial legacies, on educational theories, on religious and spiritual philosophies, and on government policies of economic growth. Yet, all share a common concern - the growth of the individual and society. Add to this the growing endeavour to make education more relevant... which are not dependent on structures but can determine the structures as well as operate through diverse structures. The Gnostic Centre too is based on Sri Aurobindo and the Mother's philosophy, just as SAICE is. Outwardly the two are very different expressions, but at the core it is the same principles informing both the experiments - freedom, individuality, perfection, integrality. ... first focus is on the training of the outer being (physical, vital and mental) - carried out in an environment that acknowledges, subtly calls forth and nurtures the inner being, the psychic and the spiritual in the child. Perfection of the mind, the emotional being and character of the student, as well as of the physical being, are the legitimate aims of Integral Education - the study of subjects ...
... the Eternal. In our times, philosophies which regard mind to be the original principle of existence are called variations of idealism, since they all regard Idea to be the formative and creative principle of universe. In the history of thought, most of the philosophies have moved between materialism, vitalism and idealism. Certain religious or spiritual philosophies have gone one step farther... of Matter, as the Upanishad declares: "Thou shalt not reject food; for that too is the vow of thy labour.ˮ It may, indeed, be said that the Taittiriya Upanishad is the foundation of the philosophy of total affirmation and synthesis, — synthesis of the Divine Bliss and Matter, what may properly be called Divine Materialism. Page 25 III We have briefly touched upon two ...
... possible ideals and no mean practice of knowledge and culture, of arduous greatness and heroism, of kindness, philanthropy and human sympathy and oneness; it laid the inspired basis of wonderful spiritual philosophies; it examined the secrets of external nature and discovered and lived the boundless and miraculous truths of the inner being; it fathomed self and understood and possessed the world. As the... spirit and discern the thing it eventually realised as the basic rhythm of its life, we must look with an observing eye at the later middle period of the Shastras and the classic writings, the age of philosophy and science, legislation and political and social theory and many-sided critical thought, religious fixation, art, sculpture, painting, architecture. If we would discover the limitations, the points... its well-ordered division of economic function; its true originality and permanent value was in the ethical and spiritual content which the thinkers and builders of the society poured into these forms. This inner content started with the idea that the intellectual, ethical and spiritual growth of the individual is the central need of the race. Society itself is only the necessary framework for this ...
... is our true aim and the one perfection to which we must aspire. It is then in the way of the spiritual philosophies and religions, not in that of any earth-bound materialistic doctrine, that the seeker of the highest knowledge has to walk, even if with enriched aims and a more comprehensive spiritual purpose. But how far has he to proceed in the elimination of the ego? In the ancient way of knowledge... limiting mental and vital ego, we command a wider life, a larger existence, a higher consciousness, a happier soul-state, even a greater knowledge, power and scope. Even the aim which the most mundane philosophy pursues, the fulfilment, perfection, satisfaction of the individual, is best assured not by satisfying the narrow ego but by finding freedom in a higher and larger self. There is no happiness in... is a shadow; the shadow has to disappear and by its disappearance reveal the spirit's unclouded substance. That substance is the self of the man called in European thought the Monad, in Indian philosophy, Jiva or Jivatman, the living entity, the self of the living creature. This Jiva is not the Page 360 mental ego-sense constructed by the workings of Nature for her temporary purpose. ...
... ahead of us. Will you pardon my daring to suspect that the "critical intellect", which keeps you dissatisfied and which you wish to keep in action, omits to criticise certain magnificent spiritual philosophies of the past sufficiently and fails to interpret Sri Aurobindo with the requisite piercing through from words to their meaning? How else am I to understand the overweight you give to p... premiss - "matter exists wholly as a percept of our consciousness" - and that in the second place, the term "mentalism" or "idealism" is mal à propos in science as in philosophy. On page 203 of Physics and Philosophy Jeans says that before mentalism "can be seriously considered some answer must be found to the problem of how objects can continue to exist when they are not being perceived... activity but also through mystical experience. Your faith in it seems to be strengthened by Sir James Jeans's exposition of modern physics in his most important book so far, Physics and Philosophy. According to you, Berkeley's view of mentalism was a limited and imperfect one, only a beginning in fact, but a beginning in the right direction, which agrees with the trend of present-day ...
... physical part to grow into the full light of a spiritual perfected being. It would reveal itself as the process of an evolutionary manifestation; there would be no need to bring in the fiat of an arbitrary Omnipotence or a cosmic Illusion, a phantasy of meaningless Maya. Page 434 But there is too a higher mental and spiritual basis for the philosophy of world-negation and here we are on more... and value by two of the greatest of her thinkers, Buddha and Shankara. There have been, intermediate or later in time, other philosophies of considerable importance, some of them widely accepted, formulated with much acumen of thought by men of genius and spiritual insight, which disputed with more or less force and success the conclusions of these two great metaphysical systems, but none has been... been put forward with an equal force of presentation or drive of personality or had a similar massive effect. The spirit of these two remarkable spiritual philosophies—for Shankara in the historical process of India's philosophical mind takes up, completes and replaces Buddha,—has weighed with a tremendous power on her thought, religion and general mentality: everywhere broods its mighty shadow, everywhere ...
... Aurobindo and the Mother, the otherworldly mentality propagated by Buddhism and illusionism. “In India the philosophy of world-negation has been given formulations of supreme power and value by two of the greatest of her thinkers, Buddha and Shankara … The spirit of these two remarkable spiritual philosophies, – for Shankara in the historical process of India’s philosophical mind takes up, completes and replaces... and, passing itself off as the exclusive intermediary, demanded that everybody use its hierarchy to address God. Real spirituality and spiritual experience were mostly foreign to it – and have remained foreign to the West ever since, so much so that Western philosophy and psychology hardly have an inkling of them. But, by reason of the fact that every human being has a soul, spirituality is potentially... religion; it tended towards that sharp division between philosophy and science on one side and religion on the other which has been so peculiar a characteristic of the European mind”, wrote Sri Aurobindo in his essay on Heraclitus. 13 “… Heraclitus prepares the way for the destruction of the old religion [by the sophists], the reign of pure philosophy and reason and the void which was filled up by ...
... ce combined with the rational, ethical, and aesthetic mind, — these three created the harmony of a great part of the unbroken history of Indian culture. If India's spiritual disciplines, philosophies and her long list of great spiritual personalities, thinkers, founders, saints are her greatest glory, they are by no means her sole-glories. It is now proved that India had gone farther than any other... knowledge that sought to express through spiritual and social symbolism. In this light, we seem to understand better the educational system which was envisaged by the Upanishads in India and it is in that light that we can understand properly what we can call distinctly Indian pedagogy. And while recovering it and expressing it in the context of the latest philosophies of education and the modern march of... development of republic, kingdoms and empires, philosophies and cosmogonies and sciences and creeds and arts and poems and all kinds of monuments, palaces, temples and public works, communities and societies and religious orders, laws and codes and rituals, physical sciences, psychic sciences, systems of yoga, systems of politics and administration, arts spiritual, arts worldly, trades, industries and fine ...
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