Sri Aurobindo Institute of Indian Culture. (SAIIC) Shillong workshop, 26,Oct -7 Nov, 2006 - 10. Avatarhood: The Four Asuras and World War II

And went to Hitler at the time when he was in that condition and told him to attack Russia. Historically, today if you look at the history one does not know why Hitler attacked Russia, Russia was an ally but he was following the orders of the asura all the time and he did not know that this is that one. Actually Mother says the story, but when she came out after giving this order to Hitler when she came out, that asura had rushed to contradict the Mother. And then asura said to the Mother: I know, I will be defeated now. But then he made a very important statement, but I will see to it before I am destroyed, I will break your work to pieces. So it is there actually, you can see therefore, the work that Sri Aurobindo and the Mother had to do on the earth is not something which miraculously can be accomplished. It is neck to neck, as it were in the most difficult terrain, how to penetrate through that resistance, which is going to break to pieces the Divine work. It is in that condition that Mother worked out. At least the Second World War was averted because Russia finished him, it was the end of Hitler. And this asura knew that if he now goes and tells him that that was not true, he will not believe because he doesn't know what was right and was wrong, so he knew that now he won't be able to work. So that was the defeat of that asura.

This is the whole mystery of world history that is why I am saying we must know how the Avatar works in the world. How does God work in the world? This process is a mysterious process in the world. Why? Why Durga has to come and destroy every year ‒ Asuras, it's a fact! No? Why why? The story, Durga’s story, is a true story. Mother herself has said: it is true that Durga comes every year, and that is the period of victory, but after the destruction of the asuras, because asuras have the habit of creating themselves, multiplying themselves. Chandipath itself says that from every blood cell, a new asura can be created, such is the possibility. Therefore, the divine power, the divine work is not a very easy task. Why should it happen? Is another question which we can discuss later on but this is the mechanism of it and this is the battle, unless that battle was broken imagine that if Hitler was to win the war what would have happened to the earth? Imagine that possibility? Because it has not happened so we don't even take care of it. It doesn't mean, therefore, that the world is going to move smoothly, because that which has not happened radically is even now happening I mean in a certain way, because even while withdrawing the powers of that asura are not completely gone. As he said, I will break your work to pieces; he is doing that all the time that much at least he is still continuing, it is not completely destroyed. The world of falsehood, Mother has said, is not yet destroyed. In 1973, 1972 and the end of December Mother had given a message, and when I went to her, she gave me a copy of that message and it was written there, ‘Before dying, falsehood rises in full swing’. It’s a 1972 story, ‘Before dying, falsehood rises in full swing’. People ought to know, (I am not quoting now). This first sentence I'd quote, but rather I’m not quoting in her own words, ‘People ought to know there is a choice between abyss and Truth. Will catastrophe have to happen before men open their eyes?’

This is her question, so everyone in 1972 this was therefore when the Dalai Lama came (I had the privilege of being with the Dalai Lama) and we were alone with the Mother at that time. When Mother was there, I walked the Dalai Lama to the Mother and then I sat down and the Dalai Lama was there and then the Dalai Lama asked some questions to the Mother. That interview also is given in the Agenda of the Mother. But after he left, he had given me some questions to ask them to the Mother. And then I had a talk with the Mother on these questions, his questions which I asked the Mother and at one point Dalai Lama’s question was: I have a conception of an ideal in which Buddhistic compassion and communistic way of welfare of all can be combined, is it that which will happen? So Mother’s answer which she gave me to tell him ‒ it will surely happen. This is what Mother said and this is what Sri Aurobindo means by the Supermind, ‒ combination of social welfare with divine compassion. The synthesis of the two is what you mean by the supramental world, it is bound to happen but how soon it will happen, if more and more people understand this, if more and more people are working for it, it will become quicker. It is the only question, will it become quicker or not but this is bound to happen. But when she gave his answer then I put my own question to the Mother and interpolated my question. I said Mother, but now supermind is working so powerfully in the world. I was so enthusiastic. I said now you know after 56, supermind has already come down, so now, where is the problem? So, I said Mother Supermind is working so powerfully isn’t and she said: Yes but I have said in the message she said: You remember that message? She said: Yes, Mother. So she said there is a problem, ‒ ‘falsehood rises in full swing before dying.’ Falsehood will die but today the condition of the world is such that it is rising in full swing, so today we are in that condition.

So when Dr Dutta says that he has called this workshop he feels very happy because this is the time when all of us should understand the depth of the matter. She said the more the people understand it, the quicker it will be. If you understand therefore the depth of what is an Avatar, what is Avtaric work? What has been happening? What is his method of work, if you know this in depth? What is Sri Aurobindo as an Avatar? What is Mother as an Avatar, what is their work, how can we collaborate, how can we move forward? How does this work? It’s like an army; it’s an army of truth against the army of falsehood. In this world there is no neutrality, even those who call themselves neutral they somehow are sworn into one field or the other. This world is so created that nobody can be neutral. This is the only two camps in the world, one camp or the other. So we have to decide that’s why Mother said: ‘abyss or truth’, you have to choose, man has only one function he has to choose, once he chooses that this is my work ‒ I belong to the Divine. That is why Mother has said in a very important conversation of that essay ‒ ‘If the humanity consents to be spiritualized’, and that's all, consents ‒‘If the humanity consents to be spiritualized’ supramental world will be come, you don’t need to spiritualize. You just consent to be spiritualised and the work will be done, you’ve to tell the Divine, ‒ ‘yes’ put your hand on me. I am yours and the moment that happens, something will vibrate in you. You will be open and the work will be done.

Paul Richard, with whom Mother got married ‒ was an emanation of the lord of the Asura of falsehood. She herself has said I am not quoting on my own. It is written in the Agenda also, so we have to understand this very well, Paul Richard. Mother, as I said, had an encounter with all the four Asuras and she said two asuras have been converted ‒ the Lord of Sorrow, and the Lord of Darkness both have been converted. That is her Avtaric work on the earth, this has been done. But the Lord of Falsehood and the Lord of Death are still to be conquered. Therefore, she established a special connection with two beings on the earth who represented these two powers. Out of them the Lord of Falsehood had an emanation of him in Paul Richard, now how to convert him? It’s a kind of a holocaust of the avatar; therefore she agreed to be with him. There is a beautiful prayer of the Mother to the Supreme Lord, I prepared a feast for you by hand which has been rejected by man, therefore I offered to Thee, O Lord.

Lord of falsehood could not be won and therefore the World War the second had to be a big arena. So it is not that anything other than this is the occult reason and as a result of this what was the demand of Paul Richard on the Mother? Why had he chosen Sri Aurobindo because he knew the powers of the Mother? Actually Mother has said that Paul Richard was my disciple and that relationship was understood, it wasn’t an ordinary marriage. Under the circumstances it was necessary to declare a kind of a marriage but the relationship was of a teacher, and a disciple. And Paul Richard had come to the Mother because he wanted himself to be chosen by her and ultimately it is he who brought the Mother to Pondicherry. And Mother saw Sri Aurobindo and found he is the Lord. She recognized him. This is the supreme glory of the Avatar, and then they became one.

In some other talk we shall see what exactly transpired between the two and then the Mother declared that he is the Avatar, so he thought that she had selected him. That's why she is the Avatar so Mother said it is not like that, if I select anybody and he will become an Avatar. For anybody to be an Avatar the Lord has to come down but Asura doesn't know all this. So he thinks that it is up to you, you choose, so why don't you choose me? So that was the real conflict between the two and ultimately one day Paul Richard wanted to kill the Mother by strangling her and Mother said that Sri Aurobindo protected her, and that is how Paul Richard of course, ultimately left in a very violent anger. So this is the story.

The Mother came to Pondicherry for the first time in 1914. Sri Aurobindo had come to Pondicherry in 1910. On 4th of April 1910, Sri Aurobindo landed on the coast of Pondicherry by a boat which came via Chandannagar straight to Pondicherry. Sri Aurobindo was already for four years in Pondicherry 1894. His contact with the Mother began in 1904, how did that contact come about? When I spoke of the Mother this morning quite a lot but then it was a great deal to learn about the Mother's life and the most important thing to learn about her life was that right from her early childhood she used to have experiences, and these experiences had gradually developed. Some of these experiences Mother has narrated herself and they're all extremely interesting, it will take a long time to narrate all these experiences and if I do that what I am asked to do will be left, so I’m passing over all those things and coming straight to 1904.

This is the time when she had already begun to enter into deeper layers of consciousness and in one of her experiences she saw exactly the vision of Sri Aurobindo, without knowing that it was Sri Aurobindo; she identified only in 1914. But from 1904 up to 1914, she used to have these experiences frequently, ‒ same one. She used to see Sri Aurobindo exactly as she saw him in 1914. She saw Sri Aurobindo seated, (she did not know at that time what was dhoti? It is a fact.) As Mother says: She knew nothing about India, she had only heard about India with strange people, having hazy stories of history and something about some people gaining extraordinary heights but what is the dress of Indians, or what is the life of India, she knew nothing at all. So she says when she saw Sri Aurobindo in her vision, she saw him in a dhoti and exactly with one plait thrown over his shoulders and with bare chest and also she said unruly beard and long hair, golden bronze colour of the body, she said exact, precise vision of Sri Aurobindo she had in 1904. So you can imagine her own internal development, she saw Sri Aurobindo as she would see him in 1914; this vision she had in 1904. And probably Sri Aurobindo at that time himself did not have that kind of a dress because he was at that time still in Baroda in 1904 and still a long period was to pass. So she saw Sri Aurobindo as he would be in 1914. This is one of the most striking experiences that one can have, a premonitory experience of Sri Aurobindo and that being very interesting; I would like to read out to you in her own words about this experience. She says: When I had a series of visions, I knew nothing about India, nothing. Just as most Europeans know nothing about it, a country full of people with certain customs and religions, a confused and hazy history, where a lot of extraordinary things are said to have happened, I knew nothing. Whereas in several of these visions I saw Sri Aurobindo just as he looked physically but glorified that is the same man I would see on my first visit almost thin with a golden bronze hue and rather sharp profile and unruly beard and long hair, dressed in a dhoti with one end of it thrown over his shoulder, arms and chest bear and bare feet. At the time I thought it was vision….. I really mean, I knew nothing about India. I’ve never seen Indians dressed in the Indian way. When I saw him I experienced what were at once symbolic visions and spiritual facts, absolutely decisive spiritual experiences and facts of meeting and having a united perception of the work to be accomplished. And in these visions I did something I had never done physically. I prostrated before him in the Hindu manner, all this without any comprehension in the brain, I mean I didn’t really know what I was doing and how I was doing it, nothing at all. I did it and at the same time, the outer being was asking: what is all this? I wrote the vision down or perhaps this was later on, but I never spoke of it to anyone. One doesn't talk about such things naturally, but my impression was that it was premonetary that one day something like it would happen, and it remained in the background of the consciousness not active but constantly present; this was around 1904.

So when you said to speak about Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, I thought I must speak about this because the first time when Mother herself saw Sri Aurobindo in her vision and it was an exact vision, actually she says she continued to have this vision from 1904 to 1920. In 1920, she came back again, permanently. So right from 1904 to 1920 she continuously had the same vision ‒ same prostrating at the feet of Sri Aurobindo and she used to wonder what this prostration is because in the west people don't understand the prostration at the feet of the master but this was her experience. But it also shows as I said to what extent she had already reached at what high level. Now when she came to Pondicherry four years earlier, Paul Richard had come to Pondicherry in 1910. And Paul Richard himself was a seeker and he had actually come for political election. You know in France at that time it was democracy and India had no democracy at that time. But in France it was a democratic country so periodically elections used to take place and Pondicherry was a territory of France, so there used to be some person elected from Pondicherry to sit in the Parliament of France. So, in order to contest election, he had come down to Pondicherry with the hope that he might get elected. So when he came to Pondicherry he was asking if there were any yogi in Pondicherry and Sri Aurobindo had just come at that time in 1910. So somebody must have said that there is one yogi who has recently come, so he went to see Sri Aurobindo and Sri Aurobindo met him at that time and they had some talk at that time. That was the physical link with somebody connected with the Mother and at that time he had taken a photograph of Sri Aurobindo with him and he had shown it to the Mother and Mother had made a remark that when she saw that picture it made no impression on her but something very nice but nothing extraordinary. She could not identify this picture with that vision. So she used to feel that there is somebody, somewhere on the earth with whom she is missioned to work but who that person is she did not know and she did not know that........