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Sri Aurobindo

Autobiographical Notes

and Other Writings of Historical Interest

Part Two. Letters of Historical Interest

3. Other Letters on Yoga and Practical Life 1921–1938

On Yoga and Fund-raising for the Ashram, 1921–1938

To Durgadas Shett [6]1

9, Rue de la Marine
Pondicherry

July 5, 1929.

To
Durgadas Shett

Hrishikesh has wired on the 2nd from Sherpur (Mymensingh) that he will start in a week and bring you to Pondicherry with him. I do not know if he has written or wired to you, so I write to inform you. Please arrange to come with him, if you are not in a condition to come alone. To bring someone else would be very inconvenient and might lead to awkwardness; for it has been for a long time the rule of the Asram to admit for residence only sadhaks of the Asram itself, disciples who come for a visit or short stay, people who come with special permission for initiation in Yoga, and, in some cases, those who come,– again with special permission,– for darshan on the days in the year on which Sri Aurobindo comes out. Outsiders who do not fall within these classes are not allowed to stay in the Asram, but are supposed to make their own arrangements elsewhere.

There is one thing which I should mention and of which I omitted to write in my last letter. You have written of the work in which you have been recently engaged as if it were part of Sri Aurobindo’s work and of those who are with you in it as if they were among his spiritual followers or disciples. But in matter of fact Sri Aurobindo knows practically nothing about what you are doing and nothing at all about those who are helping you. When you wrote to him about the “Swadeshi Bazaar” you yourself expressed a doubt as to the possibility of this enterprise having any connection with his work and his reply was that there was none. But as he understood that it was to be a weekly review with a special interest in economics and Swadeshi industry and trade, he could make no objection to your taking it up if that took your fancy. He does not interfere as a rule with the external activities of those who are not members of the Asram and therefore self-bound to its spiritual aim and discipline or who have not made a complete surrender of their inner and outer life to his direction and control. Recently, however, since your last letters to him, Sri Aurobindo has been informed that those who are now with you are political workers of a particular school. If that is so, it is rather surprising that you should still think it possible to connect this work of yours with Sri Aurobindo’s. You must surely be aware that he has cut off all connection with politics and that his work is purely spiritual and he does not support or have any kind of connection with any political school or group or party. It is also a rule of the Asram that any one entering it as a member must give up all political connections and cease from any activities of that kind. I write this in order that any misunderstanding there may be should be cleared up, first in your own mind and afterwards here in a complete explanation of all matters when you come.

 

1 A member of a wealthy family of industrialists based in Chandernagore, Durgadas Shett (1895–1958) sent significant amounts of money to Sri Aurobindo through Motilal Roy before 1922. In 1934 his family property was distributed, and he gave most of his share to Sri Aurobindo. Afterwards he lived an austere life; at times he was dependent on Sri Aurobindo for cash for ordinary expenses.

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