Nirodbaran

Talks with Sri Aurobindo

Volume 1

10 December 1938 – 14 January 1941

20 December 1939

Purani: It seems Sarkar has resigned on the minority question. He objected to the last clause of the Government resolution which says that no further political development should be made without the full consent of the minorities. Nehru and Sir Stafford Cripps say that the British Government is not trying for democracy.

Sri Aurobindo: Then for what?

Purani: For its own self-interest.

Sri Aurobindo: That is ancient history.

Nirodbaran: Cripps seems to justify Russia’s claim on Finland because Finland once belonged to Russia, though he doesn’t approve of the method.

Sri Aurobindo: In that case England can claim Ireland because it was once under its rule and now establish naval bases there. The Finnish people are not Russian in origin nor were they ruled by their willing consent. These people say whatever they like.

Nirodbaran: Rajendra Prasad has said that the communal problem must be solved in any way possible.

Sri Aurobindo: In anyway? Then it is very easy. All Hindus can turn Mohammedans. Jinnah would like nothing better.

Satyendra: Yes, and then they can again become Hindus by Shuddhi. Rajendra Prasad also says that if it can’t be solved it must be given up once for all.

Purani: Hasrat Mohani has turned against the Congress and become a Muslim Leaguer. I don’t know why.

If these Muslims could be made to contact Muslims of other countries, they would then realise who is closer to them – the Hindus or their co-religionists in other lands. Turkey and Egypt do not care for these Indian Muslims. Azad realised from his bitter experience in Mecca that his religious brothers there were eager to exploit him.

Sri Aurobindo (after a lull): Kant’s idea of freedom is said to be that one is free if one’s actions are determined by oneself and not by others. But then what about the laws of morality? They are made by others. And if one is supposed to act according to oneself and thus be free, one may disobey them.

Purani: Kant speaks also of heteronomy and gives the maxim that one must follow only that rule which one can make a universal law.

Sri Aurobindo: His idea of freedom is like the Sanskrit sloka: “Everything under one’s control is happiness, everything under another’s control is sorrow.” But the Gita’s idea is to go beyond oneself and one’s own freedom.

Purani: Yes. Sisir Maitra concludes in his article that the Gita preaches: “Leaving all other dharmas, take refuge in Me.” I don’t see then why there should be any controversy between Anilbaran and him. I was wondering if this sloka, “Be my-minded, my devotee,” would do for a quotation for your chapter “The Triple Transformation”. Though it is more related to Bhakti, I thought it could as well be applied to psychic transformation because Bhakti may lead to it.

Sri Aurobindo: Yes, but Bhakti is only one aspect of the psychic. One can go to the psychic through the mind also, not only through the heart.

Nirodbaran: Through the mind also?

Sri Aurobindo: Yes, the psychic produces the mental transformation too.

As soon as the word “psychic” was heard, Satyendra began to smile to himself. “What’s the matter?” we asked him. He didn’t reply but continued to smile.

Purani: Perhaps you are thinking, “Where is this psychic gentleman hiding?”

Nirodbaran: That would be more in Dr. Manilal’s vein.

Sri Aurobindo (laughing): Dr. Manilal’s psychic gentleman is too apt to take medicines for coming forth.

Satyendra (After a while): The psychic or the Divine is like a dictator.

Purani: How?

Sri Aurobindo: It is more like a constitutional monarch who allows you to do whatever you like.

Satyendra: But it doesn’t come out.

Sri Aurobindo: Because it waits for the consent of all the members of the Cabinet. (Laughter)

Satyendra: God is very difficult to get.

Nirodbaran: He is also very clever in argument!

Evening

Purani had given Sri Aurobindo Sisir Maitra’s article on Kant and the Gita. Later he asked Sri Aurobindo how he found it.

Sri Aurobindo: He has overstressed the ethical part and left out the spiritual and explained the spiritual idea from the ethical standpoint. For instance, he has interpreted the Gita’s idea of doing work as duty for duty’s sake – an ethical view. Doing work from any other motive and without desire for its fruit is too subtle for the mind to understand.

In the West, they don’t make much distinction between the true self and the separative ego. If the separative ego is acting, why shouldn’t one desire the fruit?

Satyendra: The idea of doing work for duty’s sake may be an influence of the Christian idea of service.

Sri Aurobindo: But the Christian idea is quite different from that. The Christians want to do what is God’s will. That is a sort of religious law to them, while here it is a moral law, seen from the standpoint of Reason.

Satyendra: Christians have the idea of going to heaven by doing their duty.

Sri Aurobindo: Their idea is more than that. They want to do what bears the seal of God’s will on it, as they say. A religious law is there. When Reason got the upper hand on religion it began to question religion’s foundations, and the rationalists advocated the doing of duty from the ethical, the moral point of view, as a social demand. The rationalists have very fragmentary notions of what is involved.