AN ANALYSIS OF SRI AUROBINDO'S
'THE LIFE DIVINE' s
"The Divine Life"
(Book 2 Chapter XXVIII)
In this chapter Sri Aurobindo describes a new collective existence where individuals who have attained or have somewhat attained the gnostic, supramental consciousness become the pioneers of the emerging spirit-based, supramentalized gnostic society. This is a vision of a future collective divine life on earth.
Here are the main points in greater detail:
Details of the Gnostic Individual
He begins by describing again the inner life of the new gnostic (supramental) individual.
New Gnostic Society based on Gnostic Individual
He then explains how a new collective existence would be based on such individuals who have moved to this Gnostic individuality.
The Oneness of Our Individual, Universal, and Transcendent Existence
He further explains the relationship between our individual, universal, and transcendent existence, and describes the Oneness we will come to feel between ourselves and other individuals and the world when we attain this gnostic, supramental individuality and develop this gnostic society and divine life on earth.
Limits of Current Collective Existence Compared to New Divine Existence
He then goes on to explain the deficiencies of our current collective existence, and how through the gnostic, spiritualized, supramentalized individual we move towards, enable a gnostic (supramental) collective life and existence.
[DETAILS]
How the Gnostic/Supramental Being Expresses
THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE INNER LIFE
... there is a Being that is becoming, a Reality of existence that is unrolling itself in Time ..."
Our destiny is to be aware of self; i.e. of the Being which is evolving in us. Even what we see as not self must also be self since existence is indivisible and one.
Once we have first created the inner life as the basis (i.e. when we grow and live within; we find the spirit), we connect the outer life based on the power of the inner.
In the spiritual evolution the occult process becomes the entire process.
Soul, mind, life are powers of being.
The being itself can be made to grow if the powers of soul, mind and life are offered to us.How to create the inner life: It is to be and to be fully conscious. How to be fully conscious? There are a number of ways (1) Spiritual Knowledge: To be aware wholly and integrally of oneself and of all the truth of one's being. This is spiritual knowledge. The essence of this spiritual knowledge is an intrinsic self-existent consciousness. (2) Spiritual Force: Since consciousness carries the force of existence, one must have the integral force of self and of all its use. This force must be intrinsic, automatic in its action, self-existent, and self-fulfilling. (3) Delight of Being: To be fully is to have the full delight of being. (4) Universalized: To be fully is to be universally; to be in the being of all, and to include all in one's being; to be integrated with the universal force; to carry all action and experience in one's self and feel it as one's own; to feel all selves as one's own self; to feel all delight of being as one's own. (5) Transcedentalized: To be fully is to have the consciousness of timeless eternal being; to transcend, to exceed the consciousness of the body, life, and mind; to be filled by the self and Spirit, not upon life, not to be identified with life but to transcend it; to transcend even the formula of the universe; to enter the supreme divine Reality, feel oneness with it, to live in it.
The Supernature of the Gnostic individual: He will have the character of a Supernature, which consists of a wholeness of sight and action, a unity of knowledge with knowledge, a reconciliation of all that seems contrary, an identity of Knowledge and Will acting as a single power [fused] in perfect unison with the truth of things.
THE COLLECTIVE LIFE BASED ON INDIVIDUALS LIVING THE INNER LIFE
The gnostic way of life depends on the inner life. The foundation of a perfect life is in the Reality within us. The first occupation of a Divine life is the Spirit within us.
The spiritual evolution and transformation is not just as inner experience of Divinity, but a changing of the inner and outer existence. It takes form not only in the individual, but outside the individual in a collective life.
The Divine life on earth begins with divinized individuals. "... a perfected human world cannot be created by men or composed of men who are themselves imperfect."
In the spiritual evolution the occult process becomes the entire process.
OUR INDIVIDUAL SELF, THE UNIVERSAL, AND THE TRANSCENDENT
One must move away from the external consciousness and live in the depths, find one's true inner existence. Living in the depths enables us to reach the self, to be universalized, and to be transcedentalized. Living within connects us to our own truth, as well as the universal and transcendent truth.
The Transcendent being is our secret self. Our universal being is our secret depth.
Unity is the dynamisation of the consciousness of the being.
Cessation not into the non-existence but into a greater existence is the superconscience of the Absolute.
Oneness: In the divine being there will be a close mutual consciousness, an intimate oneness with others. One is fulfilled when others are fulfilled.
There is no separate ego in him that initiates. Through his universalized individuality the transcendental and Universal move out into the action of the universe.
INDICATORS & ACTIONS OF A DIVINE LIFE
There are three indicators of the Divine Life: (1) Individual Perfection: The inner perfection of the individual. (2) Perfection in Relation with Others: The perfection of the spiritual and pragmatic relation of the individual with all around him. (3) A New Type of Humanity, Species: A new world, a change in the total life of humanity, a new collective life of the earth-nature. This requires many gnostic individuals forming a new kind if beings and a new common life superior to the present individual and common existence.
How individuals in Gnostic collective life would be and act: "All will be united by the evolution of the Truth-Consciousness in them; ... they will feel themselves to be embodiments of a single self, souls of a single Reality; illumined and motivated by a fundamental unity of knowledge; actuated by a fundamental unified will and feeling, a life expressing the spiritual Truth would find through them its own natural forms of becoming. ..." "... there would be no ego-insistence on personal idea and no push or clamor of personal will and interest; there would instead be a common Truth in many forms, a common self in many consciousnesses and bodies; there would be a universality and plasticity which saw and expressed the One in many figures of itself and worked out the oneness in all diversities as the inherent law of the Truth-Consciousness and its truth of nature." A spiritual or gnostic being would feel his harmony with all other truth of being around him, with the whole gnostic life around him. He would know how to lead and rule, how to subordinate himself. Both would be an equal delight.
Unity, mutuality, and harmony are the inescapable laws of collective gnostic life.
There would be a life of unity, mutuality, harmony, a life of true happiness, a harmonious and beautiful life.
Unity in diversity: Harmony is the inherent law and consequence of unity and multiplicity and diversity. In a gnostic unity of multiplicity there would be a spontaneous expression of the unity.
A gnostic community would have gnostic individuals living in such a status of harmony.
To reconcile our individual life and our existence in the collective life, we need to discover a unifying and harmonizing knowledge, which are the principles of oneness and integrality.
The truth of the spiritual Reality is the secret of perfecting the individual life or the communal life.
A greater collectivity is dependent on a greater individual which occurs when he knows himself and comes in contact with the Divine Reality.
A perfect community can exist by the perfection of the individuals.
LIMITATIONS OF LIMITED CURRENT EXISTENCE, & EMERGENCE OF GNOSTIC (SUPRAMENTAL) EXISTENCE
Mind cannot harmonize the complexity of his mental, vital, and physical nature. It is only the intuition and self-knowledge of an awakened Spirit, of an evolved Supramental being that can do this.
The movement of the collectivity is a largely subconscious movement. It needs to formulate and express itself through the individual to become conscious.
Current Basis of Life Inadequate: "Man has created a system of civilization which has become too big for his limited mental capacity and understanding and his still more limited spiritual and moral capacity to utilise and manage, a too dangerous servant of his blundering ego and its appetites."
The blossoming of the world is currently supported by a limiting ego, vital, etc., when it needs a wider, deeper truth -- to enable it to harmonize.
"A life of unity, mutuality and harmony born of a deeper and wider truth of our being is the only truth of life that can successfully replace the imperfect mental constructions of the past ..."
A scientific formula, a perfected economic society, a democratic existence, varying structure of governance is not enough to create a perfected society.
Religion has not changed human life and society.
Only a total spiritual direction can transform the race; only a full emergence of soul, of supramental Supernature can bring about this evolutionary miracle. This can only occur as a result of a radical change in the mature of the individual.
The inner change can take form in a collective life among individuals with the same kind of inner life.
The first step would be a general change of the old consciousness being replaced by the whole life taking up of the spiritual principle.
Since Gnostic beings will live in a consciousness where all contradictions are cancelled or fuse into one another, in a unified self and world-knowledge there will be no conflict between his spiritual individual life and his collective divine life.
Old ways disappear: The old ways of life would disappear, such as mental idols, constructed principles and systems, conflicting ideals. There would be an end of war, political strife and all the negative that issues from it. Life and body would no longer dominate nine tenths of our existence for their satisfaction. There would be the end of the reactions to success and frustration, vital joy and grief, peril and passion, pleasure and pain, the vicissitudes and uncertainties of fate and struggle.
The Spirit within would determine the frame of the gnostic life and its details and circumstances.
Everywhere there would be harmony and truth of order.
The new life would be a constant miracle. There would be a total fullness of life; a Life Divine.
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