Sri Aurobindo

Letters on Himself and the Ashram

The Complete Works of Sri Aurobindo. Volume 35

The Leader and the Guide

Fallibility of Avatars

How is it that later Avatars often find fault with the actions and movements of their predecessors?

Who finds fault with whom? I have not found fault with any Avatar. To discern what they expressed and what they did not express, is not to find fault.

Avatars are supposed to be infallible, they are supposed to have Knowledge directly from Above!

What is infallible? I invite your attention again to Rama and the Golden Deer. The Avatar need have no theoretical “Knowledge” from above — he acts and thinks whatever the Divine within him intends that he should act and think for the work. Was everything that Ramakrishna said or thought infallible?

22 April 1935