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ARTICLE : A Dream Taking Shape
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To: soc-religion-hindu@uunet.uu.net
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Subject: ARTICLE : A Dream Taking Shape
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From: Srinivasa Chakravarthy <srini@monod.neusc.bcm.tmc.edu>
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Date: Fri, 22 Nov 1996 13:05:24 -0600
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Newsgroups: soc.culture.indian, soc.culture.indian.kerala, soc.culture.indian.karnataka, soc.culture.indian.marathi, soc.culture.indian.gujarati, soc.culture.indian.delhi, soc.culture.indian.jammu-kashmir, soc.culture.tamil, soc.culture.bengali, soc.religion.hindu
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Organization: Baylor College of Medicine
"A Dream Taking Shape"
Just found a brief sketch of Sri Aurobindo under this title is put at
a website (http://www.webcom.com). The article talks about
Sri Aurobindo's five mighty dreams and points to recent world events
as signs of realization of those dreams. The same website has
other interesting articles on several Indian issues.
The article:
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A Dream Taking Shape
The Hindu 8/14/1994
Ram Sehgal
Sri Aurobindo was born on August 15, 1872 in Calcutta. His father,
Dr.K.D.Ghose, sent him to
England for education. He studied at St. Paul's in London
and at King's College, Cambridge.
During a brilliant academic career, he mastered not only English,
but also Greek, Latin and French
and became familiar with German. Italilan and Spanish.
In 1893, at 21, Sri Aurobindo returned to India. The moment
he set foot on Indian soil at Apollo
Bunder in Bombay, a vast peace and calm descended upon him.
It was the way Mother India
welcomed Sir Aurobindo with a spiritual experience.
Sir Aurobindo is a rare, multi-faceted personality.
Romain Rolland, an eminent French savant,
thinker and writer, said, "Sri Aurobindo is one of the
greatest thinkers of modern India. He is the
most complete synthesis achieved upon the present
between genius of the West and the East."
Sri Aurobindo led and guided the national revolutionary
movement for Bengal. His revolutionary
writings gave the nationalist movement a spiritual force.
It also exposed him to the wrath of the
British Government. He was implicated in the famous
Alipore bomb blast Case and spent a year in
jail as an undertrial prisoner. He said, after release,
"the only result of the wrath of the British
Government was that I found God." In the jail, he spent
almost all his time in reading, in intensive
meditation and the practice of Yoga.
In 1910, in answer to an inner call, Sri Aurobindo
withdrew from the political field and sailed for
Pondicherry to devote himself entirely to his evolving
spiritual mission. In 1914, after four years
of silent yoga, he started the philosophical monthly
`Arya', through which he revealed his message
for humanity: man's divine destiny (The Life Divine),
the path to its realisation (The Synthesis of
Yoga), the realisation of oneness of mankind
(The Ideal of Human Unity); the inner meaning and
significance of Indian spirituality and civilisation
(The Foundation of Indian Culture) on the Veda,
the Upanishad, essays on the Gita, the future poetry.
His supreme work in poetry is `Savitri', a
legend and a symbol,an epic of nearly 24,000 lines in blank verse.
On the eve of India's Independence, Sri Aurobindo
was requested by All India Radio to broadcast a
message to the nation. Significantly, India attained
her Independence on August 15, 1947 the 75th
birthday of Sri Aurobindo. In a message broadcast on that day,
Sri Aurobindo said, "I take this
coincidence, not as a fortuitous accident, but
as the sanction and seal of the Divine Force that
guides my step on the work with which I began life."
In his prophetic speech, Sri Aurobindo spoke
of his five dreams for India and for the world.
Although, at one time, they were impractical,
looking back he saw all the world movements he had
hoped for were coming to fruition.
The first of these dreams was a revolutionary movement
which would create a free and united
India. "The nationalist movement won us Independence.
But unity seems elusive". He said, "Unity
must and will be achieved, for it is necessary
for the greatness of India's future."
"Another dream was for the resurgence and liberation
of the peoples of Asia and her return to her
great role in the progress of human civilisation."
Since Sri Aurobindo's address to the nation,
Asia has become ever more powerful in the world
order. North and South Korea, Cambodia, Indonesia
and Malaysia are some of the nations which
have attained freedom since 1947. South Korea and Japan
are economic role-models today. The
Middle East too, is flourishing. The power of the vast,
technologically advanced and politically
mature peoples of Asia is being recognised by the world.
"The third dream was a world-union forming the outer basis
of a fairer, brighter and nobler life
for all mankind. That unification of the human world is
under way: there is an imperfect initiation
organised but struggling against tremendous difficulties.
But the momentum is there and it must
inevitably increase and conquer."
The collapse of the Soviet Union means that the world
is no longer divided into two power-blocs:
communist and capitalist. The pressure to hegemony is less.
The chance of world peace greater.
The United Nations in action in Somalia and Ethiopia,
as well as the United Nations conference on
the environment, held at Brazil are signs of change.
Possibilities now exist for the nations of the
world to work together for a better life for all.
The economic and political unification of Europe will be
another step towards a united world. The
Non-aligned Movement is another example of the urge
towards unification that exists today. And
the increasing tendency for South-South cooperation
in economic and sociological matters is a
recognition of the power of solidarity.
Man has seen that well-being is interdependent.
The planet is bound by a common thread -- we
have a common destiny. "For unification is a necessity
of Nature... without it the freedom of the
small nations may be at any moment in peril and
the life even of the large and powerful nations
insecure... A new spirit of oneness will take hold
of the human race."
"Another dream, the spiritual gift of India to the world
has already begun. India's spirituality is
entering Europe and America in a ever-increasing
measure. That movement will grow."
The spirituality that Sri Aurobindo spoke of is
distinct from any organised religion bound in the
narrow limits of a creed, cult or ceremonial ritual.
It is a search for the divine in all of us which
allows infinite freedom, variation and universality.
It is not an ascetic rejection or moving away
from life but a seeking after the eternal,
an attempt to manifest Him or It in all re spects of life.
"The final dream was a step in evolution which would
raise man to a higher and larger
consciousness and begin the solution of the problems
which have perplexed and vexed him."
Although the mind is the highest faculty developed in man,
it has not been able to solve the basic
problems of man. Human nature has not changed.
What is needed is a new step in consciousness, an
ascent to a level beyond the mind into the supermind.
At the Sri Aurobindo Ashram in Pondicherry,
this is the dream which is now taking shape. Here,
the endeavour is to mould the complete man --
the integral development of mind, soul and body.
One who can evolve to greater oneness with the
divine consciousness. One who can raise mankind
along with him and bring a state of grace upon earth.
Sri Aurobindo had a great vision for India --
as a nation that would lead the world towards
spiritualilty. For human destiny, he felt, lay in
the synthesis of spiritual and material life "whether
or how fasr this hope will be justified depends upon
the new and free India."
There is hope that Sri Aurobindo's visions will be proved
completely true. There is hope in the
ending of the Cold War. There is hope in the movements
for unification, there is hope in the
growing power of the Asian nations. Hope in the concern
all over the world for people in a state of
famine or civil war.
But most of all, there is hope within each one of us.
In the children growing up in a world where
the barriers are coming down. In the search for
self-findings and self-realisation that each one of
us goes through. In the increasing opportunity for
self-actualisation.
The road is open for us to travel towards unity
with the Super mind. For the divine life to establish
itself upon earth.
In the words of the Mother, the Spiritual Collaborator
of Sri Aurobindo: "The world is preparing
for epic change. Will you help?"
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