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Introduction
Sri Aurobindo is the Seer-Prophet of a life divine upon earth - of a divinised humanity and a transformed earth. Sri Aurobindo is a Seer who
has given us a new vision of Man and Mankind. He is neither a speculative thinker reconstructing the image of Reality in intellectual terms, nor a mystic engrossed in the immediate realisation of a
supra-sensuous Reality and one who is incapable of evaluating the profundities of his own experience. Sri Aurobindo is an intellectual giant who presented to the world in intellectual terms a new vision of the
many-sided movements and potentialities of the evolving consciousness of Reality. He is a sharp critic of the one-sided tendencies in human culture. He is a Seer Poet who has insisted on the dynamic truth-vision of
life as well as a comprehensive and integral transformation of man.
Three Steps of Nature
Translating his comprehending spiritual peak-experiences into intellectual terms, Sri Aurobindo says that this Universe is but the
self-concealing and self-revealing of the Divine Consciousness. This is what he terms as Involution and Evolution respectively. Involution is the Divine Reality’s plunge into the Inconscient, a movement of the
densification of the Spirit into Matter. Evolution is the return to the Superconscient through the process of sublimation and integration.
In this march of evolution, the Divine Consciousness, asleep in the
Inconscient, awakes to itself in Matter, then it becomes semi-conscious in Life – through plants and animals and then, to self-consciousness in Man. The stage is yet to arrive when the Divine Consciousness will be
fully conscious, integrally conscious of itself – and that stage is the next evolutionary step beyond Man – the stage of Superman.
The same evolutionary process is noted in the evolution of man – on the
collective as well as the individual, says Sri Aurobindo. On the collective level, we see Nature moving through three steps or stages.
Bodily Life
‘She has successfully achieved a certain stability of her constant material movement which is at once sufficiently steady and durable … to
provide a fit dwelling place and instrument for the progressively manifesting god in humanity.’ (Sri Aurobindo) This is Nature’s base and first instrument.
Mental Life
Mental life is in the process of being evolved as Nature’s next and superior instrument. And here Man is Nature’s chosen instrument. At
present, the mental life is not a common possession of mankind. It is developed to its fullest only in the individuals. So it is not yet fully firmly founded as a general principle.
Sri Aurobindo further analyses
that through the spread of education, the elevation of depressed classes, ‘advance of backward people by multiplication of labour-saving appliances (machinery, computers, etc.) by the movement towards ideal social
and economic conditions, by the labour of Science towards improved health and its attempts for sufficient ease and equal opportunity -- the whole of mankind and not just in the favoured individuals or groups of
people, Nature is developing the Mind of Man.’
Spiritual Life
The fullness, suppleness, flexibility of the intellect is needed in bringing forth the higher principle – that Principle of the Spirit which
has been pushing itself all along the process of Evolution in order to manifest Itself integrally.
Gains of the three steps…
The intrinsic values of these three stages of collective evolution has been, according to Sri Aurobindo:
Material Life Level:
- To pass from birth to death with as much comfort or enjoyment as maybe on the way, but anyhow to live.
- The reproduction of the individual and the conservation of the type in the family, class or community.
- The importance of such a material life in the economy of Nature is that it assures the safety of the framework and orderly continuance and
conservation of her past gains.
- Its disadvantage is that this resists all changes of the present as it zealously guards the past.
Mental Life Level:
- It concentrates on the aesthetic, the ethical and intellectual activities – seeking essentially after perfection.
- It seeks always new forms or revitalises the old – through social, political and religious forms.
- Its disadvantage is its alienation from life: the poet, the artist, the philosopher, the scientist, the scholar – are the Sannyasins of the intellect.
Spiritual Life Level:
- It is concerned with the Supreme Divine but it is not aloof from the world. Both the immortality of the physical life and the perfection of mental
life get fulfilled in spiritual life.
- The most rapid and sound way to usher in the spiritual evolution is yoga and not morality or religion or philosophy. The generalisation of yoga is
the last victory of Nature over her own delays and concealments, concludes Sri Aurobindo.
What is Yoga?
Etymologically, Yoga is Union and Yoking. In German, it is Joch, in Latin it is jugum, in Sanskrit it is yuj. It is the
Union of human consciousness with the higher – the Superconsciousness. It is the union of the outer Nature of Man with the Divine Nature.
It is a movement of human consciousness to contact the Infinitive by self-transcendence. It is a movement to unite with the Divine Nature by
an integral self-transformation of man.
Individual Level
An individual does not take to yoga immediately or automatically. Each individual follows the same evolutionary process that is seen in
Nature. Each individual ideally goes through the fulfilment of Material Life, then the Vital-mental life and then the Mental Life, ultimately ending in Spiritual life. This was the Dharma of Chaturvarna: Student
days, Life of a householder, Sannyasa, and Moksha. But this is not automatic; one has to consciously make an effort.
The idea behind is that this very ego which emphasises on individuals, on division chooses, after its development is complete, to break down the wall and seek by its willed extinction the expansion and fulfilment of
the spiritual individual. It is at this stage that the individual feels a yearning in himself for the Reunion with the Divine Consciousness. And once this innate call is heard or felt, he seeks a rapid way for
fulfilling his thirst for the Infinite.
At the same time it must be noted that not all can take to yoga – it must be an inner need to seek the Beyond. One can live quite happily – as it is said: like the pig
satisfied or Socrates dissatisfied. Many have been these paths of yoga. Each with a different approach
and aim – all using one part of man as a lever. Their essence has been individualistic and other worldly. But here is wherein comes Sri Aurobindo with his Integral Yoga which has for its aim the Integral Self-Transformation of Man, meant for the pioneers of the Spirit.
Characteristics of Integral Yoga
Aim
Integral yoga is ‘the conversion of the human soul into the divine soul and of natural life into divine living.’ Normally, the old yogas
reject the lower nature, the outer nature, but Integral Yoga wants to transform the lower – a total transformation of our integral being into terms of God-existence.
Method
To put our whole conscient being into relation and contact with the Divine and to call Him to transform our entire being into His so that in
a sense God himself becomes the Sadhaka as well as the Sadhana.
This method translates itself into:
- The attempt of the ego to enter into contact with the Divine: that is the Aspiration.
- The laborious preparation of the lower Nature through Purification: that is Rejection.
- Eventual transformation by the Higher Principle, not by one’s own energy but by the Divine Energy: that involves absolute Surrender.
System
- Integral Yoga has no fixed system and succession, for, otherwise it may turn into an ‘ism’. There is only a free and yet gradually intensive
working.
- It accepts our Nature with its past evolution and without rejecting anything essential, compels all to undergo a divine change.
- This way ‘All life is yoga’: every outer contact with the world and every inner experience becomes a step towards self-perfection.
Results
Just as its method is integral, so are its results integral: One realises Divine as Unity and Multiplicity.
At the same time, one gets, in the terminology of the Gita:
- Sayujyamukthi – contact of the individual in all parts with the Divine
- Salokyamukthi – same status as the Divine
- Sadharmyamukthi – acquisition of Divine Nature
- Samipyamukthi – nearness to the Divine
Integral Perfection and Transformation
Integral yoga is not a combination of knowledge, devotion and works. It is not perfection outside Nature but in Nature, not liberation in heaven but on
earth. So, this integral transformation means the total transformation of the total being of Man. ‘By transformation, I do not mean‘ , writes Sri Aurobindo, ‘some change of the Nature – I do not mean, for instance,
sainthood or ethical perfection of yogic siddhis (like the Tantriks) or a transcendental (cinmaya) body. I use transformation in a special sense… A change of consciousness, radical and complete and a certain
specific kind which is so conceived as to bring about a strong and assured step forward in the spiritual evolution of the being of a greater and higher kind of a larger sweep and completeness than what took place
when a mentalised being first appeared in a vital and material animal world.’
Conclusion
This kind of an attempt at the Integral self-transformation of Man will usher in a new cycle of evolution fulfilling what Man has always dreamt: God,
Light, Joy and Immortality. We shall pave way not only for the spiritual Age but also for the new spaces beyond Man.
Finally, one may ask himself: Is this ideal of Divine Humanity a unique contribution of
Integral Yoga? Did not the Vedic Age speak of the birth of Divine Man? The Puranas, of a Satyayuga? The Gita, of a Dharmarajya or the Reign of Righteousness? Christ, of a Kingdom of Heaven? And the Jewish, of a City
of God?
It is true. But Integral Yoga has brought all these ideals within the range of possibility – it is no more a probability – because Sri Aurobindo and The Mother have brought down the needed Force and
Consciousness – Supermind. It is a thing decreed in the evolutionary endeavour of Nature, and by man’s active participation with her, he can hasten its fuller manifestation.
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