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Date Posted: 14:38:47 09/26/05 Mon
Author: H - 12 Aug 2005
Subject: Re: Purana Purusha excerpt
In reply to: m - 12 Aug 2005 's message, "Re: Purana Purusha excerpt" on 14:37:21 09/26/05 Mon


I will leave it open.

These are merely notebook entries, covering the formative years of LM's sadhana, and Ashoke has arranged them in a way that makes interpretation a difficult task.

I have a complete set of Sri Aurobindo's notebooks, written in English, and they are largely unintelligible; moreover even in his letters when he speaks of e.g. "spiritual mind" and "spiritualised mind" these refer to two different things although they almost sound alike. One needs a certain background knowledge beforehand in order to notice the difference.

Now LM even wrote in Bengali. One mistranslated syllable or letter can change the meaning of a whole passage. Perhaps you know the debate about Ramakrishna's famous phrase "Woman and Gold" as the root evil for sadhaks. After his death one party claimed that he never used the term "kamini (or kamani) kanchana", but "kama kanchana" -- "Lust and Gold". This is of course a grave difference, and the latter interpretation is the one most widely accepted today.

As you say, one cannot trust the accuracy of Ashoke's translations. Although in this special case - Bengali being his mother tongue and mention of three states later in the same passage - he should have been right in his choice of words.

However in the Glossary, he arbitrarily equates LM's use of phrases like sunya, surya, asman, akas, gagan, and even prana. This interpretation is disputable. Surya means sun, akas ether, asman sky etc. LM was possibly the most educated man of Benares at his time, in the late 19th century, and I doubt that he will have made use of so much symbols if there was no difference in meaning.

My guess is that 'sunya' here means the absence of a certain field of experience, for instance being in the astral the experience of body drops off, being in the causal the experience of astral drops off etc. Something like this maybe, a gradual refinement of perception or awareness. Who knows how many such "voids" there are, and if there is a fixed number of them?

I don't think there will ever by clarity about the details of LM's perceptions - his books were actually talks arbitrarily jotted down by several disciples; then there are a number of letters but these are only excerpts and the context is missing; finally the diaries, but they are diaries, edited by Ashok in a poor manner, and the originals are apparently getting lost anyway (there was again mention of this somewhere on the Web).

What I found really interesting is studying the details of LM's life. The various recent books show a very interesting man.

I think it possible that he did some sadhana already in his younger years, but started in earnest only after his meeting with the sadhu. That he attained Nirvikalpa Samadhi in merely five years or so in spite of leading a family life is a rare achievement, if I compare this to the endless efforts many other yogis have to undergo.

H

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