Nirodbaran

Talks with Sri Aurobindo

Volume 1

10 December 1938 – 14 January 1941

26 September 1940

The radio announced the cessation of fighting by de Gaulle at Dakar.

Sri Aurobindo: Queer end of the expedition. He shouldn’t have undertaken it.

Nirodbaran: He wants to spare French blood.

Sri Aurobindo: But the French at Dakar didn’t spare it. (The French fired at De Gaulle’s forces when they tried to land.) Neither will the British.

Nirodbaran: De Gaulle still has some sentiment left.

Sri Aurobindo: Gandhian sentiment of non-violence?

Purani: Mrs. M.N. Roy has written an article in support of the war. There she says that people consider Hitler great because he is a vegetarian and because he is a bachelor. “But there may be medical reasons for it,” she says. (Laughter)

Sri Aurobindo: Any vegetarian who murders people will be great then?

Nirodbaran: That is what the Jains seem to have thought. Plenty of Jain kings, while being strict vegetarians, had no hesitation in killing others.

Sri Aurobindo: You know the story of the two Jain brothers during the invasion by Mahmud of Gazni? The brother who was the king was defeated and taken prisoner. The other brother was then made king by Gazni and his brother was handed over to him. He didn’t know how to dispose of his brother. At last he found a way.

He made a pit below his throne and put his brother there. If he died, it was not his fault. (Laughter) It is a fact of history, not a mere story!