Sri Aurobindo

Letters on Himself and the Ashram

The Complete Works of Sri Aurobindo. Volume 35

His Life and Attempts to Write about It
The Terminology of His Writings

Overmind [4]

Judging from your description of Overmind [in the preceding letter], it would seem that what the Vedantins (especially of the Mayavada School) call kāraṇa is Overmind, īśvara is the cosmic spirit in Overmind, and prājña is individualised being in the Overmind. Supermind would be in turīya and mahākāraṇa, about which they had only a few glimpses. In kāraṇa and īśvara, they must have found something wanting of the Highest Truth.

That is evidently what they meant. But they had no clear perception of these things because they lived at the highest in the spiritualised higher mind, and for the rest could only receive things from even the Overmind — they could not enter it except by deep samadhi (सुषुप्ति). Prajna and Ishwara were for them Lord of the suṣupti.

20 November 1933