Works of Sri Aurobindo

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Work and Teaching

 

If it is the Will of the Supreme that those who depend on me should have no faith in me, I have nothing to say. I am responsible only for the absoluteness of my own sincerity.

14 December 1932 

Is there no means of uniting my will with Yours? Perhaps You have no special will, for You want nothing.

 

I know perfectly well what I want or rather what the divine Will is, and it is that which will triumph in time.

11 May 1934 

I hope and believe Your work does not depend upon human beings.

 

No, it does not depend at all upon human beings. What has to be done will be done despite all possible resistances.  

 

There is only one thing of which I am absolutely sure, and that is who I am. Sri Aurobindo also knew it and declared it. Even the doubts of the whole of humanity would change nothing to this fact.

But another fact is not so certain it is the usefulness of my being here in a body, doing the work I am doing. It is not out of any personal urge that I am doing it. Sri Aurobindo told me to do it and that is why I do it as a sacred duty in obedience to the dictates of the Supreme.

 

Time will reveal how far earth has benefited through it.

24 May 1951 

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An objective reply to a letter

 

If the supreme consciousness is incarnated and manifests itself in this body, all the denials in the world cannot prevent it from being so.

And if it is not so, my physical existence can be interesting¹only to those who have faith and who, with the help of this faith, can, through me, enter into contact with the Supreme Consciousness.

 

¹ A different draft has “useful”. 

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The question has importance only for those, and others have no need to be concerned about it. For such a faith, to be sincere and effective, cannot be the object of any propaganda, either for or against it. Its birth must be free and spontaneous. It cannot be obtained through coercion nor destroyed through denial.

He who feels the need to fight violently against conviction or faith, of whatever kind, proves by that very fact that some part of his being, however tiny, is touched by this conviction, while another part of himself, generally more important and external, completely refuses to accept a faith which seems to him the more dangerous because he is more sensitive to it, and his will to deny it forcefully comes from the necessity of convincing himself.

From the subjective point of view, I know what I am. But this knowledge that is lived finds its value only in my sincerity; and of this sincerity the Supreme alone can be the judge.

7 November 1951

  

I know that I cannot do much I cannot satisfy the human desire for wonders and miracles. There was a time when I could and did do it. But for that one must live in the vital consciousness and use vital forces, which is not very recommendable.

23 January 1952

 

It will be said of me: “She was ambitious, she wanted to transform the world.” But the world does not want to be transformed except by a very long and slow process, so slow that the change cannot be perceptible from one generation to the other.

I find that Nature delays and wastes. But she finds that I am too much in a hurry and too troublesome and exacting. 

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Let me write down all I have to say; let me foretell all that will be done, and then, if no one finds that I am doing it properly, then I shall retire and leave the others to do it.

31 March 1953

 

I do not deny that you have got a connection with something of Sri Aurobindo, the something that was interested in you and in what you are doing. This something might have remained with you to inspire and help you in your work in America and elsewhere. But it is only a part, a very, very small part of Sri Aurobindo whom I know and with whom I lived physically for thirty years, and who has not left me, not for a moment for He is still with me, day and night, thinking through my brain, writing through my pen, speaking through my mouth and acting through my organising power.

5 May 1953

 

To believe or not to believe in the possibility of avatarhood can make no difference to the bare fact. If God chooses to manifest in a human body I do not see how any human thought, approval or disapproval can affect in the least His decision; and if He takes birth in a body, the denial of men cannot prevent the fact from being a fact. So what is there to get excited about. It is only in perfect quietness and silence, free from all prejudices and preferences, that the consciousness can perceive the truth.

24 September 1953

 

Concerning my avatarhood, in what way can the opinion of people have any importance?

If I am not [an avatar], the belief of thousands of devotees 

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cannot make that I should be. On the other hand, if I am, the denial of the whole world cannot prevent me from being.

25 September 1953 51

 There is justice ineluctable.

There is here a Consciousness working. Each one when he goes against this divine Consciousness loses something of his consciousness every time he does so. He goes down each time he does something against it. Each one gains in his consciousness every time he acts according to this divine Consciousness.

The world goes on as it is. When there is nothing you or I can do to change it, we can only keep quiet, silent witness like Brahman. As in the world so here also. So many things go on: each one tries to prove his superiority; there is politics of all kinds, propaganda. I only witness like Brahman; I am neither for nor against, neither approve nor condemn.

26 April 1955

 

For me everything in human life is mixed, nothing is completely good, nothing completely bad. I cannot give my entire and exclusive support to this idea or that idea, to one cause or another. The only important thing for me, in action, is Sri Aurobindo’s work, automatically my conscious support is with all that helps that work and in proportion to the help. And for the work to be carried on as it must be I need all collaborations and all helps, I cannot accept only this one or that one and reject the others. I cannot belong to this party or that party. I belong to the Divine alone and my action upon earth is and will always be for the triumph of the Divine, irrespective of all sects and parties. 

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29 February 1956

 

During the Common Meditation on Wednesday

 

This evening the Divine Presence, concrete and material, was there present amongst you. I had a form of living gold, bigger than the universe, and I was facing a huge and massive golden door which separated the world from the Divine.

As I looked at the door, I knew and willed, in a single movement of consciousness, that “the time has come”, and lifting with both hands a mighty golden hammer I struck one blow, one single blow on the door and the door was shattered to pieces.

Then the supramental Light and Force and Consciousness rushed down upon earth in an uninterrupted flow.

1956  

When the Supreme Lord told you to make the world, how did you know what had to be done?

 

I had nothing to learn for that, because the Supreme Lord contains everything in Himself: the whole world, the knowledge of the world and the power to make it. When He decided that there should be a world, He first brought forth the knowledge of the world and the power to make it and that is me, and then He commanded me to make the world.

25 September 1957

Why did you come like us? Why did you not come as you truly are?

 

Because if I did not come like you, I could never be close to  

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you and I would not be able to tell you: “Become what I am.”

27 September 1957

                  Mother, what is your answer to the question: “Are you God?”

 

This question can be asked of any human being. And the answer is: Yes, potentially.

And the task of each one is to make it a real fact.

August 1966

 

I do not know if I am powerful or not (because it is not sure where is the I) but the Lord is all-powerful. Trust is beyond all doubts and the Lord is looking into the matter.

 

You put something in Your words which enables us to see the Truth that words cannot convey. What is it that accompanies Your words?

 

Consciousness.

27 December 1967

  

When I speak, I live what I say and I communicate the experience together with the words no machine can record that. That is why the text seems completely different when it is heard or read, the main thing has gone, for it is beyond all notation. Even when what I have written myself is printed in a book or an article, the intensity of the experience I had while writing it escapes, and the text seems flat, although the words are identical. 

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This is the real reason for the physical Presence, its incontestable importance.

  

Do not take my words for a teaching. Always they are a force in action, uttered with a definite purpose, and they lose their true power when separated from that purpose. 

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