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The Avatar
The Avatar is
[the Indian
term for] one who comes to open the Way for humanity to a
higher consciousness.
The Avatar
The Avatar is necessary when a special work
is to be done and in crises of the evolution. (Sri Aurobindo)
The Avatar
An avatar is one who changes
the course of human evolution; such as Buddha, Krishna, and Jesus.
Role
of the Avatar
The avatar comes
to bring new spiritual
insights
to
the world or region
that
was
not there before in
order to bring progress
for the society. Jesus
taught a new level of
universal and divine
Love
that was not there
before, Buddha
for
the first time addressed
the issue of suffering,
death, and impermanence;
and Krishna
presented anew
the nature of
the Soul
and
how it can be a conduit
to the Divine
Reality.
Sri Aurobindo
and the Mother
came
recently to usher
in
the new age of human
progress through
Conscious Evolution,
culminating in a
Divine
Life on earth.
Avatars and
Lesser
Levels
Avatars, vibhutis, minor emanations, geniuses, heroes, leaders seem
to be the order. Avatars are known to be messiahs who come down from
heaven to deliver a message of God to men. They are charged with a
mission by the Godhead. Buddha, Krishna, Rama, and Jesus are called
avatars. Avatars can be major or minor ones. A single aspect of a
godhead entering a human soul makes him a vibhuti. They appear on
earth once in a few centuries. They bring about a revolution in the
ways of human life impacting minds or lives. Shankara, Shivaji,
Caesar, Alexander and Napoleon have been described as vibhutis or
God's emanations. Napoleon said that a man like him appeared once in
three or four hundred years. He came to consolidate the gains of the
French Revolution and offered the rule of law to the whole of
Europe. The legal as well as administrative system of all the
European nations today is what Napoleon originally devised. Even
here, it is customary to speak of major and minor vibhutis or
emanations. (MSS)
Evaluating Great Spiritual
Individuals
Saints, sages, realised souls, vibhutis, and even Avatars are
not recognised in their immediate environment. Usually they are
recognised after their lives. Persecution is the rule, recognition
is the exception. Most of the saints who were exceedingly popular
during their lives are easily forgotten by posterity because their
popularity was due to their personality and not due to their
spirituality. How can we evaluate the spiritual worth of a person?
There are two ways. One is to know them by what they are. The other
is to know how they impact on our own human lives.
(MSS)
The
Avatar Broaches the Subject
The pioneer, the leader, the Avatar, etc., broaches the subject to the world. It
comes to be accepted long after.
(MSS)
The Avatar and Social
Development
The Chosen Few
Q: Why does the divine choose few persons to accomplish its
objective forcefully - e.g. the Mother, Sri Aurobindo, while
others need to force themselves to understand divine?
A: Avatars come to earth to bring about the next stage of
growth or evolution that the society is ready for. For Christ,
the world was ready for divine love. For Buddha, a true
understanding of suffering in the context of spirit or being.
For Sri Aurobindo to bring about human evolution in a mental
age on the way to divine life on earth via knowledge and
supramental power. Mother to enable physical transformation of
body to divine body (amongst others), etc.
We can be instruments of the Avatar's teachings, enabling the
evolution that Personality came to bring the world. We have
travelled with them in past lives. They are very ripe souls.
We are somewhat ripe on the way to becoming ripe. We have
worked with Them through many births, of which there is a
psychic record.
Because we are not realized, we have to force ourselves to
know the Divine. They have already worked this out in past
lives or between lives. We have miles to grow and cannot give
freely of our wisdom because it is not yet mature and full.
And yet we are blessed to be a part of their Mission. What
makes it very compelling is that our collaboration with them
unfolds for us very freshly, novely, as we discover endless
new possibilities in very new social and psychological
contexts in the modern world to apply Their Wisdom, and
thereby experience Bliss (Delight) in making those
discoveries, which uplifts ourselves, others, and the world.
A Visionary We are all a product of our times.
However, a visionary sees beyond his time; into future
times, and all times. At that point, he becomes a sage and
seer.
The pioneer, the leader, the
Avatar,
etc., broaches the subject to the world. It comes to be accepted long
after. Some token experiments succeed. They spread as an initial wave.
Slowly either the government or the society or both take it up, give
life to it, sponsor it, and give support in the form of a new
organisation. That has been the history of any successful social
movement until now. (MSS)
The Philosophical
Basis of the Acts of Avatars
The lives of Avatars are a constant wonder and a source of
inspiration. Each act of theirs is an instruction to mankind. They are
not merely acts to be emulated but contain a rich philosophy behind.
(MSS)
The Avatar
An Avatar is the presiding Deity. (MSS)
The Chosen Few
Q: Why does the divine choose few persons to accomplish its objective forcefully - e.g. the Mother, Sri Aurobindo, while others need to force themselves to understand divine?
A: Avatars come to earth to bring about the next stage of growth or evolution that the society is ready for. For Christ, the world was ready for divine love. For Buddha, a true understanding of suffering in the context of spirit or being. For Sri Aurobindo to bring about human evolution in a mental age on the way to divine life on earth via knowledge and supramental power. Mother to enable physical transformation of body to divine body (amongst others), etc.
We can be instruments of the Avatar's teachings, enabling the evolution that Personality came to bring the world. We have travelled with them in past lives. They are very ripe souls. We are somewhat ripe on the way to becoming ripe. We have worked with Them through many births, of which there is a psychic record.
Because we are not realized, we have to force ourselves to know the Divine. They have already worked this out in past lives or between lives. We have miles to grow and cannot give freely of our wisdom because it is not yet mature and full.
And yet we are blessed to be a part of their Mission. What makes it very compelling is that our collaboration with them unfolds for us very freshly, novely, as we discover endless new possibilities in very new social and psychological contexts in the modern world to apply Their Wisdom, and thereby experience Bliss (Delight) in making those discoveries, which uplifts ourselves, others, and the world.
The Avatar
The Avatar is the ultimate pioneer in that he/she brings out something spiritually new that the world is now ready for.
Krishna as Avatar
Krishna as Embodiment
of Eternal's Personality of Delight Three Levels of
Avatar Levels of Human
Consciousness and the Avatar
The Avatar
has a Certain New, Great Knowledge; Not All of It
Sri Aurobindo, The Mother as
Dual Avatars Sri Aurobindo's Beyond Avatar, the Lord Himself
Status Sri Aurobindo, The Mother as Avatars
and Beyond I and others have therefore put in a great effort over the
last decade or two to truly understand his mind. (For me now it is relatively
easy to understand, though there are endless shadings that are constantly being
revealed to me.) SA's teachings and experiences are so radically different than
anything before it, that even scholars of His teachings are missing its essence;
mainly because they are looking at it from the lens of the tradition of Indian
thought. 90% of what I have read from the followers and disciples of SA have
missed His essential points
In my mind, I am beginning to think of Sri Aurobindo as more
than even what we ordinarily think of as Avatar. He is the direct expression of
the nature of God, the divine Reality transcribed from the Infinite Source. He
intuitived God and the creation. Does that not make him close to the Divine
itself; which is consciousness? He has intuitivized and become the supramental
consciousness he writes about. (His power is now greater than ever. The Mother was an emanation of the Divine Mother and Force
that is the source of all creation in the universe. Her mission as Mother was
that of The Divine Mother coming to see if she could create the supramental
being (of perfection and undying nature) of the Divine Mother in a physical
human body. She succeeded in part in making the supramental physical change. Avatar, the
Divine, and the Vibhuti The Flower of the Avatar
Following the Avatar and Beyond To truly follow Jesus is to know and feel Divine love and express
it to everyone and all
aspects of our lives. It would be a
life of deep spiritual satisfaction and delight.
To truly follow Buddha is to know the things in life that cause
suffering, the attachments and desires that are
impermanent, to reverse their influence
by finding the essence within, and then to feel oneness and compassion
with others and the world. It would likewise
be an ecstatic, spiritually fulfilling
existence. Of course in the modern world we can each find our own path, and find
and express those spiritual qualities that suit our nature and enable
our deep progress and growth.
Beyond the Avatar to Personal
Realization of the Many And yet, we cannot just wait around for great personalities to
forge the path of our future. We must do it ourselves. It is after all
the age of spiritual
experience and realization, not that of merely following the
avatar in the form of religious worship. The 20th century was the age of the common man, where the average
person secured rights once reserved for monarchs and kings. The 21st
century is that of the True Individual, where we become anything we
set our minds to -- unfettered by the opinions of the others and the
culture we belong to. It is also the age of the True Spiritual
Individual, where the person takes his cues from his inner being and
soul, moving through life armed with the deepest and most profound of
practical and cosmic insights. He in turn is able to become the true
spiritual pioneer; perfecting, uplifting, and divinizing life around
him, ushering in a new age of human progress. In the new age, there are fewer and fewer great spiritual
personalities. Instead, the realization moves down into the populace
where there is an explosion of spiritual realization amongst a
considerable number of individuals. The realization of spirit reverses
from top down influence to bottom up experience. There is less
following, and more becoming, allowing for sustained personal
realization. It is a decentralized movement that will lead us to the
next stage of human evolution on earth.
Thoughts on
Buddha
Krishna who was an Avatar guided Time and the destiny of mankind and presided
over the entire course of the epic. (MSS)
Krishna is the Eternal's Personality of Ananda [Bliss/Delight of
being]; because of him all creation is possible, because of his
play, because of his delight, because of his sweetness. (Sri
Aurobindo)
Rama Avatar carried arms and fought the incarnation
of Evil. Krishna Avatar, being an Avatar of a higher order, fought and won the
war without carrying arms. But he was on the battlefield, guiding every movement
personally. The Supramental Avatar had a still higher knowledge. It could act on
the entire world. It could send the Force to the battlefield without Himself
going to the war front. (MSS)
We function from the human mind. Above it is the mind of silence of the Muni; it
is followed by the mind of illumination of the Rishi. The yogi is the next
level. He is of intuition. Beyond that is the world of the Gods, called by Sri
Aurobindo the Overmind. Lord Krishna is an avatar from this plane. (MSS)
An Avatar or Vibhuti have the knowledge that is necessary for their
work, they need not have more. There was absolutely no reason why
Buddha should know what was going on in Rome.
An Avatar even does not manifest all the Divine omniscience and
omnipotence; he has not come for any such unnecessary display; all
that is behind him but not in the front of his consciousness. As for
the Vibhuti, the Vibhuti need not even know that he is a power of
the Divine. Some Vibhutis like Julius Caesar for instance have been
atheists. Buddha himself did not believe in a personal God, only in
some impersonal and indescribable Permanent. (Sri Aurobindo)
Sri Aurobindo and the Mother were dual Avatars who worked together.
Sri Aurobindo is neither a Rishi, nor an Avatar, an emanation of God's vibration
who comes on earth to show men the path of the Lord. He is the Lord Himself; of
course a portion of the Lord. He came down on earth to announce the arrival of
the HOUR. (MSS)
Many CAN understand a Jesus or Buddha now. The teachings are not that
complicated. But few are ready to seriously take up their lessons. Few of us are
SERIOUS in this way. Perhaps it WAS complicated for the people of that time to
pick up that knowledge because it was so new to the world. Certainly Sri
Aurobindo's teachings as expressed in The Life Divine (the essence of his
thought) is very difficult to understand.
The Avatar is a special manifestation while
for the rest of the time it is the Divine working within the
ordinary human limits as a Vibhuti.
In India the most highly revered of flowers are the white Lotus,
flower of "The Divine Consciousness", and the red Lotus, flower of "The
Avatar--The Supreme Manifested on Earth in a Body". (MSS)
If we follow the way and teaching of the
Avatar
-- i.e. the one who brings from the Divine the next
spiritual knowledge for society -- it would be a great
thing. The trouble is that too many follow the form that is created
after, mainly by the religion, or we follow in obedience rather than
perceiving the essence of the teaching.
The avatar comes to bring new spiritual insights to the world or region that was
not there before in order to bring progress for the society. Jesus taught a new
level of universal and divine Love that had not existed before. Buddha for
the first time addressed the issue of suffering, death, and impermanence head
on, and devised a way out. Krishna presented anew the nature of the Soul and how
it can be a conduit to the experience of the Divine Reality. Sri Aurobindo and
the Mother came recently to usher in the new age of human progress through
conscious evolution, culminating in a Divine Life on earth.
-Buddha’s
great intellect that dissolved the mighty construction of the ego by
the Mind went on to say Self too can be so dissolved.
-Buddha and
Shankara were thinkers of immense eminence; Shankara exceled Buddha in
thinking, though Buddha is the greater soul.
Buddha
-Buddha
for the first time addressed the issue of suffering, death, and
impermanence
-B
-Buddha came
along in India and took to a very different path. He abandoned the
aspiration and search for an ultimate Reality, indicating that it
could not be known, and instead focused on the causes of evil and
suffering in the world. He saw that if we move out of ego, all such
negativity ceases. By meditating and reaching the timeless, spaceless
Void one realizes the state of Nirvana, where ego, separation, and
desire ceases, which, in turn, eliminates all suffering. It was a
profound insight and another great development in the history of the
Spirit.
Helpful Lessons from the Life of Jesus
In the East, it is believed that there appears from time to time an individual who has come to usher in the next stage of human progress and evolution. This individual is more familiarly known as the "Avatar". Though that person has some new quality of being that the society is subconsciously ready for, more often than not it is spiritual in nature -- such as profound Wisdom and Knowledge, the expression of spiritual Bliss, a bringer of Silence and spiritual Peace, knowledge of the Soul, and so forth.
Jesus was the avatar who ushered in the spiritual quality of Love. When he arrived on the scene, this was a thing most needed in the world. Other Avatars such as Buddha and Krishna ushered in different dimensions of the spirit that the local society was ripe to acquire (e.g. Buddha – the end of suffering, Silence, and Compassion; Krishna -- Spiritual Bliss and Transcendent Connection to the Divine and within in the Soul). Jesus arrived to bring Love to the world. He did not have Integral Knowledge and Wisdom about the workings of life and other spiritual qualities, but he did feel Love -- for others, for Man, and for the Divine. This was something new and needed in the world. (One could look around at those times and ask why this was the case. E.g., the Romans were great for a thousand years in their organization of society, but had become machine-like, decadent, and even cruel.)
Jesus however actually died because he lacked one other particular aspect of spirit -- strength that is power. If he had this, he would never had died the way he did. He would have had the Power to avoid it. Which leads to the lesson of his death on the cross. This is the point where his message becomes less clear, perhaps even distorted. Whether or not he was crucified is less important than the message derived from that fact. The church decided that his suffering on the cross was the real cause of his divinity, suggesting that one must suffer greatly in life, even cruelly to reach the Divine. This is a distortion of spiritual truth.
It is not a crucified body that we want as the shining example of what we want to become, but a transformed and divinized being and body. We want to evolve not through intense physical or other types of suffering, which is false and morbid, but through personal growth, evolution, and transformation. We come to that by changing our lower nature, feeling the Divine presence, feeling spiritual bliss, acquiring Ultimate Wisdom, and yes by experiencing and embodying universal and Divine Love. Those who seek to play on his suffering, do Jesus' life a great disservice. It is at this point that religion has turned the Love of Jesus into something that can be said to approach Darkness.
Today (Easter week 2006) as Christians and others contemplate the life of Jesus, it is best to remember his message of Love, both mortal and Divine, which expresses through our selflessness and self-givingness, as well as through the highest spiritual values, such as openness, tolerance, and concern and respect for others. It ultimately expresses through our love and adoration of the Divine itself that is the source of all, that is all, and is also everywhere in our midst. Then everywhere we turn in life, we will constantly express love for everyone and everything around us.
Others
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Great Multi-Dimensional Spiritual Genius and Original Thinker
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TO BE CATEGORIZED
The Avatar
The Avatar
The Avatar is the
Supreme manifested in a body on earth.
Spiritual Freedom
The Infinite
Consciousness is free to be anything It
chooses. So too evolved Souls, Avatars
like Krishna or The Mother, Its
representatives on earth, do not insist
on things or set fixed rules, thereby
offering the same divine freedom to Man.
