September 24, 1969
So did you see this healer?
Yes, I saw him.
Page 345
Tell me.
I am very much struck, I must say. First of all, to put things
physically, the first time I saw him, I remained with him for
three and a half hours-he didn’t stop talking ….
Oh!
But the extraordinary thing is that usually, when I am with
people, after half an hour I am exhausted – after three and a half
hours (I didn’t budge, didn’t stop looking at him), I was as fresh
as a daisy! And so full of energy that I didn’t sleep the whole
night! And I spent three and a half hours listening to this man ….
Yesterday evening (I was tired, Id had a rather heavy day), I
spent only half an hour chatting with him – I was as fresh as a
daisy.
Oh, but he’s first-rate!
I was quite fresh, as I am not after resting …. But Id like to men
tion one thing: I saw him BEFORE he came to Pondicherry. The
day he reached Bombay, I had a sort of vision I didn’t under
stand: I saw an enormous white horse, huge, but massive, like
an enormous plough horse: not beautiful, but with an awesome
massive power. A huge white horse. And when I saw him here,
I thought, "But here’s my white horse!"
Yes, surely.
A plough animal, you know, not beautiful but awesome.
And what does he say?
He’s come here with a question-not a mental one …. But I
should perhaps tell you the stages of his discovery. As you know,
he discovered experimentally on himself what was going on. So
he sought to understand: he bought books, went to see so-called
"healers." The first people who taught him were "Spiritualists."
They told him, "Use a pendulum." He used a pendulum to detect
diseases, and it worked very well. Then, after a time, he thought,
"But this isn’t reality." And then his Pendulum stopped working!
Afterwards, he went to see someone else, who told him, "But you
Page 346
should do magnetic passes." He was taught how to do it, and it
worked very well: with his fingers he could feel the organs that
were out of harmony (because, for him, the key word is "Har
mony" or "disharmony"). Then, after a while, he said to himself,
"But this isn’t reality either." And nothing worked anymore.
Oh, it’s very interesting!
He thought, "But I have nothing left, neither a pendulum nor my
hands nor anything …." And all of a sudden he had a revelation:
"You have nothing left because you no longer need anything!"
Then he began, and he noticed that when his thought met with
someone’s thought or call, it was done in a split second. For
instance, one day a woman sent him a wire in Paris: she had
given birth and had a torn perineum. He got the wire, thought,
and said, "She’s cured." The next morning he went and saw her:
the perineum had healed …. Another extraordinary case: a woman
was dying in the fifth month of her pregnancy, dying of menin
geal tuberculosis. The hospital was helpless, they brought her
home. In reality, she didn’t want her child. He went and saw her
several times, and one day, she had terrible convulsions and died
in his arms. Then, he says, "I had a sort of prayer at the bottom
of my heart, I said, ‘But this woman hasn’t followed the law of
love, it’s right that she should die, but why should this child in
her die? … ‘" He had a sort of prayer. And five minutes later, the
woman came back to life in his arms. She opened her eyes and
said, "I am cured." She was indeed cured, but unable to move
anymore. Two weeks later, she gave birth to a child, who was not
only normal but viable and full-grown, which means that in
those fifteen days, the gestation had accelerated and the child
was just as full-grown as a nine-month-old child ….
Five months old …
Yes. Then the woman died the day after giving birth, and the
child is now seventeen, I think …. He told me, "That’s how it is:
there is NO’ power,’ it doesn’t exist – there is That, the Harmony;
everyone has the capacity to call this Harmony, and It acts. And
It acts in a second, instantly …. But then, he told me, "Here is
my question" (as far as I can express what he said) …. Basically,
he is aware of quite an extraordinary Power-though I should
say I didn’t feel a shadow of ego in this man, there’s no trace of
Page 347
ego …. He read my book, but that didn’t teach him things, it only
confirmed some experiences …. This man spoke to me for more
than three hours, and apart from you and Sri Aurobindo, I have
heard no one speak like him. It was a sage who spoke, a living
experience that sprang forth, there wasn’t one thing he said you
wouldn’t subscribe to: those "great Forces of Harmony" that must
be embodied on earth, brought down on earth … It was really a
sage who spoke, and those were your words, Sri Aurobindo’s words.
That’s what A. told me; the first day when he received him, he told me, "I thought I was listening to you or to Sri Aurobindo!"
But the surprising thing is that when he spoke to me, it wasn’t
his mind that spoke: it was a living experience that sprang forth,
that’s what was extraordinary! … He said, "I have the experience
of the transformation, the experience of cellular regeneration ….
I know from experience that there is intelligence, there is divin
ity deep down in the cells – I know all that, but it has to be
embodied. Something has to be done." So here’s his question ….
What does he want to know?
He is conscious of this Power, but he says one needs to have the
TOTAL vision, the vision of TOTAL Harmony. Because, he says, it’s
all an equilibrium, a wonderful harmony, and we mustn’t cause
any disequilibrium, we must obey the Law, follow the Law of
Harmony, but it’s a TOTAL Law, of course, and we mustn’t make
any mistake. "I need the total vision," he says. "Take the Ashram:
it’s a center of light where there is total harmony; then there’s a
circle around it, Pondicherry, which is already darker …
Very dark!
" … and less receptive; so you can’t bring the Ashram’s law into
that obscurity without causing a disequilibrium; you can only
bring part of it, or something that can be adapted to that dark
ness. Then there is a third, still darker circle, to which it’s still
harder to apply the law of total Harmony-so how to find out
what one has to do depending on the particular point? How to
know the right law, the total law? …" He says, "I don’t want to
cause any disequilibrium, I want to obey the Law …..
Page 348
A. told me you asked to come with him on Saturday?
It’s not that I asked, I just thought it might be interesting for him
to try and put himself his question to you.
The interesting thing would be to know what he feels when he sees me. [[This is precisely what was going to be a revelation for Satprem and a decisive turning point in his own understanding of Mother. ]] That would be interesting …. I’ll see him tomorrow the first time, but it would be good if you brought him on Saturday. I don’t think he’ll speak tomorrow.
I told him, "Mother doesn’t speak." He said, "But of course! It’s
not words I need, expressing is useless; what I want is the vibra
tion, the experience." He understands silence very well.
Then we’ll see. In that case the result might come on Saturday.
Because it would be interesting if in front of you he tried to
formulate his question outwardly … He understands quite well
that evolution has reached a point where things must accelerate
and those Forces of Harmony must be brought into the world,
but basically, he feels such a power in him that he wouldn’t want
to act arbitrarily: he wouldn’t want to "break the equilibrium,"
but to "follow the Law." And for that, total vision is needed ….
He told me, "The miracles Christ worked, for instance (there is
no such thing as ‘miracles,’ by the way), all that I can do, but if
I did it, with the means of communication of modern science,
it would immediately be known the world over, and something
of that sort could strike a ‘great blow’ to the ordinary mind which
only believes in the truths of matter." He asks, "That would be a
means of action, but should I do that? …" His problem is one
of action ….
What is he doing now?
Right now, for three days he has been fasting; he’s stopped ea
ting. He said, "I’ll go and see Mother like this, without having
taken any food." So for three days he has been taking nothing but
water … The wonderful thing is that there isn’t an atom of men
talization, it’s all an experience that springs forth. And all that
you’ve said, all that Sri Aurobindo said, he has experienced ….
Page 349
He is conscious of the "Moment" in the History of the earth, he
feels all that. So he wants to participate in the Work.
(after a silence)
What is it that speaks in him, then? Is it his mind or his physical mind?
I think he’s inspired. Because the first day, when I spent three
hours and a half with him, the first hour (he’s very slow to get
started), it took a long time, he was groping for words, trying to
express himself clearly. Later on, I tried to drive him into his
experience, and it started flowing. What he said was beautiful,
it sprang forth like that, spontaneously. It was really inspired ….
And at the same time, so moved, because for the first time in his
life he can talk about these things with people who understand
him. He told me, "No one understands me – but here, everyone
understands me." So it comes out, it springs forth.
I’ll see him tomorrow. But I think it would be better to tell him it’s only a first contact and won’t last long, because tomorrow I have a list long like this – every day it’s the same! And on Saturday he’ll come back with you, he’ll stay for some more time.
(long silence)
How old is he? Do you know the year of his birth?
No, Mother, he must be about sixty-five. [[He was born in April, 1904. ]]
How old was he when he noticed that?
He noticed it when he very nearly died, that is when he was about forty-five.
Oh, as late as that!
When he was at a complete loss, he was cured in twenty
minutes; so that suddenly started him off in quest of the True
Thing.
Page 350
So some twenty years ago ….
Did he tell you in which year it happened?
No, but I can ask him.
Ask him. [[In fact this power had been there ever since he was born, for his diseased mother noticed that her suffering increased when he was not present, and decreased when he was at home. He is the thirteenth child in a family of peasants. ]]
So, to sum up his question: "To accelerate the movement with
out causing any disequilibrium," and "to apply the Law without
making any mistake" – that’s what he wants.
Page 351