The New Way1

A study of the Agenda

Barindranath Chaki

11th August 2007

The  Beginning

[From continuation]

A question has arisen whether the Way shown to us in Mother's Agenda is the New Way or an old one.

A friend has commented as follows:

"Your idea is both Old and New - old to those who have read them and new to those who are new to Sri Aurobindo and Mother's path. The Agenda is the record of the Mother's day to day work on her body, up to the point it served her. Sri Aurobindo and the Mother's other works are to be joined with it to make it a whole. A great hope indeed but it has to be activated and those will be benefitted who do it. The time has not been foretold."

Indeed, all members of the human species belong to the old world, even the devotees and the followers of The Mother and Sri Aurobindo. Simply by reading some of the books written by Them or about Them, or even by writing some books about Them, one does not come over to the New World. Similarly, under the same circumstances, The Mother's Way does not become an old Way to anyone, unless he or she is a part of the New World. It is a misnomer to say that the Way becomes old for those, who know The Mother and Sri Aurobindo or have read from or about Them or even have written about Them. We have a long Way to go, from the state of the human species to the New Species, there has to be the habitation of the New Species on earth.

The Mother has spoken of the New Light, the New World. On 23^rd September 1914, She has written in Prayers and Meditation :

The Lord hast willed, and Thou dost execute;

A new Light shall break upon the earth.

A new world shall be born.

And the things that were promised shall be fulfilled.

The Mother has rewritten the same as follows in 1956, after a lapse of 42 years:

29^th February - 29^th March

Lord, Thou hast willed, and I execute:

A new light breaks upon the earth,

A new world is born.

The things that were promised are fulfilled.

The Mother has spoken of the New World, the New Light, obviously with reference to the Supramental World that began its manifestation through the Supramental Descent on 29-02-1956.

Again in 1962, after a lapse of six years, The Mother says:

May the New Light illumine your thoughts and your lives, govern your hearts and guide your action.

Blessings.

Again, after 7 years, in 1969, The Mother says:

Hail the new light.

That it may grow in all hearts.

Blessings.

Thus, it may be seen that even after a period of fifty-five years, The Mother referred to the New Light as the New Light, and it did not become old to Her!!!

In an article on the Mother published in BookRags.com, we find reference to the words ‘the new race' and ‘the new species':

"From 1960 till her passing in 1973 the Mother had a number of near weekly meetings with one of her closest disciples, Satprem. There she discussed her progress in her physical transformation, world events and her effect on world events, the new workings of the supramental consciousness in the world, her earlier life's experiences including her spiritual experiences, the changes and spiritualisation in the functioning of her physical body, her visions of the new race, and many other topics. These conversations were kept and were published in French and English in the 13-volume set known as The Agenda."

♣♣♣

 

 "She professed that one of the keys to physical transformation was overcoming the effect of the "physical mind" and the subconscious (subconscient). She said that this part of the nature is defeatist, grumbling, filled with inertia, where illness gets reinforced, and perhaps the great physical barrier to the physical transformation. Claiming that this was one of the great impediments to the emergence of the new species, she tried to bring in the higher consciousness into this part of her being."

OOOO

What happened on earth on 29^th February 1956 is an event of the greatest importance for the earth. The Mother describes it as follows:

FIRST SUPRAMENTAL MANIFESTATION

(During the common meditation on Wednesday
The 29th February 1956)

This evening the Divine Presence, concrete and material, was there present amongst you. I had the form of a living gold, bigger than the universe, and I was facing a huge and massive golden door, which separated the world from the Divine.
As I looked at the door, I knew and willed, in a single movement of consciousness, that ‘the time has come', and lifting with both hands a mighty golden hammer I struck one blow on the door and the door was shattered to pieces.
Then the supramental Light and Force and Consciousness rushed down upon earth in an uninterrupted flow.

The Mother has further said in this regard:

"The Manifestation of the Supramental upon earth is no more a promise but a living fact, a reality. It is at work here, and one day will come when the most blind, the most unconscious, even the most unwilling shall be obliged to recognise it."

Let us see the following messages from The Mother, issued thereafter :

To all those who aspire

Open yourself to the New Force. Let it do in you its work of Transformation.

April 1956

♣

Open yourself to the New Light that has dawned upon earth and a luminous path will spread in front of you.

28 May 1956

♣

Let the New Light be spread upon earth and change the conditions of human life.

6 January 1957

♣

A new world is born - all those who want to have a place in it must sincerely prepare themselves for it.

15 August 1957

♣

Heralding the birth of a new world, we invite all those who want to have a place in it to prepare themselves sincerely for it.

15 August 1957

♣

To celebrate the birth of a transitory body can satisfy some faithful feelings.

To celebrate the manifestation of the eternal Consciousness can be done at every moment of the universal history.

But to celebrate the birth of a new world, the supramental world, is a marvelous and  exceptional privilege.

OOOO

The Mother was asked a question on 29 November 1969:

In 1919 Sri Aurobindo wrote that the chaos and the calamities were perhaps the pangs of the birth of a new creation. How long is this going to continue? In the Ashram, in India and eventually in the world?

The Mother answered:

It will continue until the world is ready and willing to receive the new creation; the consciousness if the new creation is already at work upon earth since the beginning of this year. If instead of resisting, people were collaborating, it would be quicker.

But stupidity and ignorance are very obstinate.

Another question The Mother was asked in 1970:

Mother, "The world is preparing for a bid change, will you help?" what is the great change of which you speak?  And how are we to be of help to it?

The Mother answered:

This great change is the appearance upon earth of a new race which will be for man what man is for the animal. The consciousness of this new race is already at work upon earth to enlighten all who are able to receive it and heed it.

The Mother was asked another question:

You have asked us to help you. How can I help you? What am I to do?

The Mother replied:

To concentrate and open to receive the progressive new consciousness, to receive the new things which are coming down.

The Mother has said -

The new world: the result of transformation.

Let us find what the Mother has said about the New Creation:

Realisation of the new creation: it is for this that we must prepare ourselves.

♣

Matter prepares itself to receive the supramental: matter tries to liberate itself from old habits to prepare for the new creation.

♣

Ideal of the new creation: the ideal must be progressive in order to realize itself in the future.

♣

Usefulness of the new creation: a creation which aims at teaching men to surpass themselves.

♣

Charm of the new creation: the new creation is attractive for all those who want to progress.

♣

Beauty of the new creation: the new creation better to manifest the Divine.

♣

The new way is the path that leads us to the new creation. Have we all, or some of us, already reached the New Creation, of which The Mother has spoken? Are we already in the Future, in The New World of which The Mother has spoken? Have we all, who have read or written some books by or about Sri Aurobindo and The Mother, have already made the required progress and surpassed ourselves? Have we manifested the Divine in our lives and in the world? To claim that The Mother and Sri Aurobindo and Their Way have become old for us will really be an error. The Way will remain ever new for the imperfect humans. Only those who surpass manhood can claim the Way to be old. 

The answer can only be, emphatically: no.

And therefore, we can never say or claim that the new way has become old for us. To claim so would mean that we have not understood the true meaning and the purport of the words ‘the new way' and that we are yet to understand The Mother and Sri Aurobindo.

OOOO

The other works of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother are not left out or intended to be left out, when we study the Agenda. The Idea itself is impossible. Sri Aurobindo's Teaching leads us to the Event of the 5^th December 1950. And what happened on the 29^th February 1956 is the consequence thereof, caused by the Tapasya of The Mother.  And then was the New Way gradually opened by The Mother. They do already form a linked whole. They are already one whole : there was no suggestion by me that The Agenda will be separately treated, apart from the Works of The Mother and Sri Aurobindo.

The Agenda is, however, a distinct aspect of the Words that The Mother ever uttered for us, the humans.

M Alan Kazlev has said in this regard in his comment:

It's great that you've posted this, Barin!  I feel the Agenda to be the single most important document ever written; because it so clearly holds the key to the divine transformation of the Earth.

OOOO

It has been stated that "The Agenda is the record of the Mother's day to day work on her body, up to the point it served her." However, that is but one aspect of The Agenda.

The Agenda, simultaneously, has several aspects. On the one hand it is a record or logbook of the Mother's own explorations and work at the transformation and supramentalisation of the physical body, through Her own body. And we also find Her discovery of a deep physical consciousness, which has the capability of restructuring the nature of the physical and the laws of nature in a very radical way.

It also provides, in another aspect, an intimate glimpse of the Mother's personality, of which there are no other records available.

In another aspect, it is a record of Satprem's own spiritual development, including his letters to the Mother. 

On another aspect, the Agenda include the development of the Ideas of Spiritual evolution and of "the new species," of The New World, of The New Creation, The New Consciousness. The Agenda are not limited only to the spiritual progress of The Mother, in the supramental plane, or of Satprem, but the Aim here is also the Total Transformation of the humanity, from manhood to supermanhood, and further even to the Advent of the supramental beings. On the Future of mankind, the Agenda throw a promising Light also.

And inevitably, the Agenda is "a work of literary magic."

OOOO

This study of Mother's Agenda has been named as The New Way, following The Mother. None else has been followed. Let me quote from the Agenda Her words on the 18^th September 1971:

The body feels it no longer belongs to the old way of being, but it knows that it isn't in the new way yet; it is still.... It is no longer mortal and not yet immortal. It's quite strange. Quite strange. And sometimes you go from the most dreadful discomfort to ... the marvel - it's strange. An inexpressible bliss. Things are no longer what they were, and they aren't what they are supposed to be. There it is. Strange.

Further, The Mother has expressed the words even earlier in 1963 [9^th January 1963]:

But it's very difficult for the body to change, because it lives only out of its habit. So every time something of the new way of living slips in, free of thought, free of reasoning, free of anything resembling an idea, almost free of sensation - almost automatically -the newness of it throws the cells into a panic. So, everything has to be changed, you see. It's no longer that the heart must pump the blood or receive the Force; it's no longer the stomach that must digest the food, no longer all that - it must function in another way. The base of it all must be changed, the functioning completely modified - while every single one of all these cells tries to make sure that everything should work as usual!

Terrible. A strange difficulty.

We can also find that The Mother has expressed Herself through these words as early in 1962 [13^th February 1962]:

Take the change of the functioning of the organs, for example. What is the procedure? And both ways are already starting to exist side by side.... What is required for one to disappear and the other to stay all by itself, changed? Changed, because as it is now, it wouldn't be sufficient to make the body function; there are all those functions the body must still perform which it couldn't perform. It would stay in a blissful state, would enjoy its condition, but not for long - for all its needs would still be there! That's the difficulty. Those who come later, in a hundred years, two hundred years; won't have these difficulties. They will just have to choose: no longer to belong to the old system, or to belong to the new. But at present.... A stomach must digest, you see! There has to be a new way of adapting to the forces of Nature, a new functioning.

We may also note what the Mother stated on 4^th April 1970:

When the new way comes in pure, unmixed, the body, the consciousness of the body, still has that reaction of ... (Mother makes a movement of surprise) wonder at something that still seems impossible. 

Thus, we find that the phrase the new way has been used to express what is stated by The Mother. Satprem and his translators, while rendering into English what The Mother stated, have used the words. I have not been influenced by any other writer in this regard.

Zaadster Lori has referred to Patrizia Norelli-Bachelet and her book "The New Way: A Study in the Rise and Establishment of a Gnostic Society" and her blog 'The New Way - The Vision and Application of the Supramental Truth-Consciousness.' I have known Patrizia Norelli-Bachelet from the pages of Mother India, edited by K D Sethna, since 1970's, for her fascinating and interesting writings on spirituality and vedic astrology. I agree with many of her views in vedic astrology. I have heard and read this book of hers, which has been referred to, but due to lack of time and opportunity, I could not as yet read the book. But surely, I will read it.

[Continued]

Barindranath Chaki

11-08-2007

Posted on 11-08-2007.
Posted simultaneously in The New Vision , Zaadz and Sulekha 

The Hope

One hundred thirty-five years ago, on this day, the fifteenth of August, the Supreme answered the human call for several millennia:

Asato maa sad gamaya
Tamaso maa jyotirgamaya
Mŗtyormaamŗtam gamaya.

From the unreal, lead me to the real;
from darkness, lead me to light;
from death, lead me to deathlessness.

The Answer is Sri Aurobindo.
And Sri Aurobindo’s answer to this prayer is: tathaastu.

One hundred thirty-five years ago, there was the beginning of a very Big Change on earth, in our World, the beginning of the Next Evolution, from Man to a new species, beyond this ignorant imperfect death-bound human beings, living with and in Darkness, within and without.
That was the beginning of a Fundamental Change on earth. The seed was sown on that day.
Sri Aurobindo’s birth on earth is the most positive Answer from the Supreme to the humanity that gropes in darkness. He is the Divine Will personified — for an Evolution from Man to Superman and beyond, towards the advent of the supramental beings.

OOOO

The Mother [Mira Alfassa] met Sri Aurobindo on 29th March 1914 for the first time.
She wrote on the next day :

It matters little that there are thousands of beings plunged in the densest ignorance, He whom we saw yesterday is on earth ; his presence is enough to prove that a day will come when darkness shall be transformed into light, and Thy reign shall be indeed established upon earth.

OOOO

The Mother gave us the following message, in 1972:
“Sri Aurobindo came upon earth to announce the manifestation of the supramental world and not merely did he announce this manifestation but embodied also in part the supramental force and showed by example what one must do to prepare oneself for manifesting it. The best thing we can do is to study all that he has told us and endeavour to follow his example and prepare ourselves for the new manifestation…”

The Mother also told us:
“Sri Aurobindo is an emanation of the supreme who came on earth to announce the manifestation of a new race and a new world: the supramental.
“Let us prepare for it in all sincerity and eagerness.”

On 15 August 1972, the Message given by The Mother.
“Sri Aurobindo’s message is an immortal Sunlight radiating over the future.”
And yet another: “Man is the creation of yesterday.”
“Sri Aurobindo came to announce the creation of tomorrow: the coming of the supramental being.”

OOOO

Sri Aurobindo is The Leader of the next evolution.
He was the first Person to know and declare that the humanity must go beyond itself, that Man has to evolve beyond himself towards supermanhood, and then towards becoming a supramental being. That is the Will of the Supreme, that is the design of Nature, rightly speaking, of Supernature.
While Matter is apparently Inconscient, evolution from Matter to Man is through Ignorance. Though Man has been evolved with more consciousness and knowledge in him in comparison with the Ape and other living beings, still he is half-conscious, half-fulfilled, with incomplete, insufficient and inconclusive knowledge, with more or less ineffective and superficial knowledge. Man has been evolved with Mind, is still being evolved with Mind, but what he carries with him as the Mind, is only a very small and miniature fragment the real principle of Mind. The humanity as a whole has not yet evolved or used or even become conscious of the higher and deeper ranges of Mind, which are touched and partly used only by a few. However, these few persons let us believe that transcendence of the present state is possible. Our endeavor for self-discovery and world-discovery is also only half-fulfilled, partial and inconclusive and insufficient. Our previous Leaders have led some, but the mass still gropes in darkness, and the followers have begun clashes, feuds and wars, and have the journey regressive and backward towards the primitive state of mind, though dressed and decorated with ornaments of modern superficialities.

OOOO

This earth is a field of Evolution, and from the scientific viewpoint, now man is at the apex of Evolution. But as we know, Man is not perfect. He lives with ignorance, incapacity, imbalance, disharmony, chaos, disorder, aimlessness, unhappiness, sufferings, diseases and death. However, that is only an aspect of the Truth. Inborn with him is a longing for happiness, joy, for light and knowledge. And always with him there is Hope. Without hope, he cannot be. Hope is an eternal companion of man. The humanity has to evolve into a race of supramental beings, or else he will be replaced by a race of higher beings, in order to give effect to the evolutionary progress: this is the necessity of Evolution. This is what the Mother [Mira Alfassa] has said :
Men, countries, continents!
The choice is imperative:
Truth or the abyss.
A beautiful, joyous, harmonious and luminous Future of divine perfection is waiting for Man as his evolutionary possibility and goal. This is our evolutionary Future. Man cannot continue for ever as he is and has been till now. He has to proceed ahead from the present situation, taking the opportunity given by The New Consciousness and Force that has descended. Or else, the evolutionary forces of Nature - Supernature -will surpass him and choose some other means for fulfilment of the goal : ever-progressive manifestation of Consciousness.
That is our Future, preordained. We shall have to ascend, integrally.

OOOO

The most important and unique Work of Sri Aurobindo and The Mother is leading the humanity and the earth the Next Evolution. They have told of a New and Higher Consciousness, the Supramental Consciousness, and of the Advent of this Higher Consciousness. The Supramental Consciousness is the Next plane of Consciousness that has to be evolved, for that is the Aim of Evolution. Evolution is the Manifestation of All that is ‘involved’ in Matter. And what is involved is nothing less than the Highest Principle of Existence, Existence-Consciousness-Bliss, or in simple language, the Divine.Matter is apparently Inconscient, and evolution from Matter to till the appearance of Man is through Ignorance. Man has evolved with more consciousness and knowledge in him in comparison with the Ape and other living beings. Yet he is only partially conscious, partially fulfilled, with incomplete, insufficient and inconclusive knowledge, with more or less ineffective and superficial knowledge. Man has evolved with Mind, but what he carries with him as the Mind, is only a very small and miniature fragment the real principle of Mind. The humanity as a whole has not yet evolved or used or even become conscious of the higher and deeper ranges of Mind, which are touched and partly used only by a few. However, these few persons have led us to believe that transcendence of the present state is possible. Our endeavor for self-discovery and world-discovery is also only fulfilled in a partial and inconclusive and insufficient manner. Our previous spiritual Leaders have led some, but the mass of the humankind is still groping in darkness. And the followers are busy with clashes, feuds and wars, and have made the situation regressive and backward towards the primitive state of mind, though ornamented with modern superficialities. Man lives with Ignorance in all walks of his life and existence, with an incomplete and imperfect mental consciousness that Nature has bestowed on him. He is ignorant and in dark about the results of his actions or about the certainty of his thoughts, of his future achievements, about his own survival, about his purpose on earth or even about his destiny. The human history is made of stories of our repeated bloodsheds in wars, battles and massacres. And we have divided and sub-divided and further subdivided our earth into smaller and smaller regions and fought against each other. Hatred is our way, and not Love. We are moving backwards to a regression. We are not conscious that there is a higher aim and meaning for our life and existence. We live with our narrow egoistic choices and selfish activities. We fail to know beyond our nose and most often, we shut up our eyes, outer and inner.

OOOO

On this birthday of Sri Aurobindo, let us remember Him and The Mother and also let us remember about our possible participation in the great Work of Transformation, so that the Next Future ushers in. Let us have faith in the Promise and march forward:
To eternal light and knowledge meant to rise,
Up from man’s bare beginning is our climb ;
Out of earth’s heavy smallness we must break,
We must search our nature with spiritual fire :
An insect crawl precludes our glorious flight;
Our human state cradles the future god,
Our mortal frailty an immortal force.
[Savitri]

Sri Aurobindo has also told us that man has to and will transcend himself progressively and march forward towards the advent of a ‘mightier race’ — the race of the supermen, and then of the supramental beings.

This Hope, this Dream inspired within us by Sri Aurobindo, may become as the very Inspiration of our life.

Let us remember what Sri Aurobindo has said:


A mightier race shall inhabit the mortal man’s world.
On Nature’s luminous tops, on the Spirit’s ground,
The superman shall reign king of life,
Make earth almost the mate and peer of heaven
And lead toward God and truth man’s ignorant earth
And lift towards godhead his mortality.
[Savitri]

OOOOOOO

Barindranath Chaki

15-08-2007

Posted simultaneously in The New Vision , Zaadz and Sulekha