It was great to re-experience eating in the Dining Hall of Sri Aurobindo Ashram after decades. It is not just the food, which is mostly made with organically grown cereals and vegetables and cooked hygienically, but there is something indescribable in it that fills one with a subtle and peaceful energy that I haven't felt in the dining halls of other Ashrams or Auroville. As it was before, rice was there at the counter, but this time I took only a few slices of brown bread and a bowl of vegetable curry along with a bowl of curd and a couple of bananas. I think, as it was before now too, the curd is made from cow milk of the Ashram dairy and vegetables and bananas from the Ashram's farms.
Had the food at the first floor dining hall having a lot of natural light and furnished with tables and seats. The Dining Hall serves food for Ashramites, guesthouse residents and special guests and the guests are charged only Rs. 50/- for 3 meals a day whereas the lunch alone is worth a few times more than that.
(Images from the Internet)
I knew of course Sri Aurobindo's words about the Dining Room food from the first time I had it as it is permanently displayed there. Apparently, it holds true even today, about a century later. Posted below are the words from the Complete Works of Sri Aurobindo, Volume 35 titled Letters on Himself and the Ashram. I have used an old typewriter font and paper image background to evoke the sense of the time, 1927 when it was written.
(Eating at the Dining Hall was not on my to-do list and was a pleasant surprise for me during my visit to meet a few long-time friends on Friday, 6th December.)
The Mother with inmates of Sri Aurobindo Ashram, Pondicherry
[Words of the Mother:]
Indeed, is it not in India that we find the most intense adoration,the most complete veneration of the Supreme Mother,creatrix of the universe, conqueror of all enemies, mother of allthe gods and all the worlds, dispenser of all boons?
And is it not in India too that we find the most radical condemnation,the uttermost contempt for the feminine principle,Prakriti,Maya, corrupting illusion, cause of every fall and everymisery, Nature that deceives and defiles and lures away from theDivine?
The whole life of India is shot through with this contradiction;she suffers from it in both mind and heart. Everywherefeminine deities are erected on her altars; the children of Indiaawait salvation and liberation from their Mother Durga.And yet is it not one of her children who said that the Avatarwould never incarnate in the body of a woman, because no rightmindedHindu would recognise him! Fortunately, the Divine isnot affected by such a narrow sectarian spirit or moved by suchpetty considerations. And when it pleases him to manifest in aterrestrial body, he cares very little whether or not he is recognisedby men. Besides, in all his incarnations, he seems alwaysto have preferred children and simple hearts to the learned.
In any case, until the manifestation of a new conception andconsciousness compels Nature to create a new species whichwould no longer have to yield to the necessity of animal procreationand thus be under the obligation of dividing into twocomplementary sexes, the best that can be done for the progressof the present human race is to treat both sexes on a footing ofperfect equality, to give them the same education and trainingand to teach them to find, through a constant contact with a Divine Reality that is above all sexual differentiation, the sourceof all possibilities and harmonies.
And it may be that India, the land of contrasts, will also bethe land of new realisations, even as she was the cradle of theirconception.
The Mother
Bulletin, April 1955
[Title added, On Education, Collected Works of The Mother, Vol 12, Pg 105]
“There is no need to accumulate crores of rupees for the future of your children. We have to leave them in good health. It is enough to give them life education; they will do well in life. I left a job paying Rs. 90,000 per month and have been doing natural farming and promoting traditional seeds for the past three years", says Tirupur Priya. Born into a farmer family in Dindigul district of Tamil Nadu, she has preserved about 600 varieties of traditional seeds and has been distributing them free of charge to thousands of people by post and several hundred in person. Excerpts from a recent video of hers:
“Those involved in farming nowadays are wanting to shift to money making vocations. Please don’t do that. Once you get into that, it is very difficult to leave all that and the associated lifestyle and return. If you have even a small piece of land, give life to traditional seeds and make traditional seed banks in your areas. Don’t leave it to an individual alone, but involve many people. We have had in Tirupur a seed bank for the past 10 years, and there are 16 teams of women.
“Don’t spend money and time travelling elsewhere searching for traditional seeds; search in your own region. They are most important for natural farming. The land has to be fertile for healthy plants and protection from insects. Insects attack the weak plants and also those grown well with a lot of nutrition. I am saying this from my observation for the past 16 years. You can also barter the seeds. There is no need for any employee to do this. Please understand that traditional seeds have no corporate owners. They belong to the farmers”.
A short video on Tirupur Priya and her work (3min 30 sec) is at the link below: (For my English transcript of the voiceover - if it is not automatically displayed, - click on the subtitles button.)
The phenomenon of the government arming itself with more and more powers to control the people is not of recent origin but began long back, in the second year itself after India's Constitution was adopted on 26th January 1950. The following excerpts from a recent report on The New Indian Express shows what actually caused the first amendment bill and the profound words of Syama Prasad Mookerjee who opposed the Bill. Shri Mookerjee founded Jana Sangh the predecessor of BJP who died later on 23rd June 1953 in Kashmir during imprisonment for defying the order banning entry into the State without 'permission'. The govt. claimed that he died due to heart attack but there were widespread suspicion about the actual cause of his death. The Mother, may years later, said he was assassinated (vide Agenda of the Supramental Action on Earth).
The Constitution of India - Preamble & Fundamental Rights
The Prime Minister of India Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru, while moving the First Amendment Bill, stated that Fundamental Rights were relics of a static age trying to preserve the status quo and social inequalities; whereas Directive Principles were dynamic ideas of social reform and social engineering. The Amendment was conceived to circumvent some verdicts of the judiciary which was vigorously upholding civil liberties. Nehru asserted that "Parliament, representing the will of people, decides on certain social reforms. These are then, by process of interpretation of the Constitution, held up by the judiciary...If the Constitution itself comes in our way, then surely it is time to change the Constitution to that extent."
On 12 May 1951, Nehru introduced the Constitution (First Amendment) Bill in Parliament without any prior notice, and on 16 May, the Bill was referred to a Select Committee. There began the first battle of Indian liberalism and Mookejee emerged as a chivalrous defender of Fundamental Rights. He was undeniably a giant in the Indian political landscape. He assailed the First Amendment Bill by calling it ‘the beginning of the encroachment of the liberty of the people of Free India’.
“What he [Nehru] is going to do is nothing short of cutting at the very root of the fundamental principles of the Constitution which he helped, more than anybody else, to pass only about a year and a half ago. This is the challenge he has deliberately thrown at the people of India...is it due to fear? Does he feel that he is incapable today of carrying on the administration of the country unless he is clothed with more and more powers to be arbitrarily utilized so that his will may be the last word on the subject? Or is it his doubt in the wisdom of the people whose champion he has been all his life? Does he feel that people of India have run amuck and cannot be trusted with the freedom that has been given to them?” Mookerjee thundered in Parliament. He criticized further restrictions on free speech and called it a ploy to penalize the government’s political opponents. He argued that democratic freedom necessarily implied that any viewpoint be allowed to circulate in the country so long as it did not advocate violence and chaos.
(Excerpts from "Syama Prasad Mookerjee and the first battle of Indian liberalism, Faisal C.K, The New Indian Express", 6th July 2024)
There are places that bring us in closer touch with the essence of life and remind us that we are part of nature. Mountains, forests, rivers and seashores appeal to something deep within us. As I walked along the seashore today, I felt a communion with the surroundings – the gentle wind, the roar of the waves, and the immense expanse of water. It was a meditative experience.
Smt Murmu at the beach of Puri, Odisha
It brought to me a profound inner peace that I had also felt when I had a darshan of Mahaprabhu Shri Jagannathji yesterday. And I am not alone in having such an experience; all of us can feel that way when we encounter something that is far larger than us, that sustains us and that makes our lives meaningful.
In the hustle and bustle of the daily grind, we lose this connection with Mother Nature. Humankind believes it has mastered nature and is exploiting it for its own short-term benefits. The result is for all to see. This summer, many parts of India suffered a terrible series of heatwaves. Extreme weather events have become more frequent around the globe in recent years. The situation is projected to be far worse in the decades to come.
More than seventy percent of the surface of the earth is made up of oceans, and global warming is leading to a rise in global sea levels, threatening to submerge coastal areas. The oceans and the rich variety of flora and fauna found there have suffered heavily due to different kinds of pollution.
Fortunately, people living in nature’s lap have sustained traditions that can show us the way. Inhabitants of coastal areas, for example, know the language of the winds and waves of the sea. Following our ancestors, they worship the sea as God.
There are two ways, I believe, to meet the challenge of protection and conservation of the environment; broader steps that can come from governments and international organisations, and smaller, local steps that we can take as citizens. The two are, of course, complementary. Let us pledge to do what we can do – individually, locally – for the sake of a better tomorrow. We owe it to our children.
- President Murmu
President Murmu witnessed the Puri Jagannath Rath Yatra yesterday and joined the devotees in the centuries old tradition of pulling the chariot of Jagannath
She said in a message on Twitter: "For me, it was one of those blessed moments that make us aware of the presence of the Supreme Being. May there be peace and prosperity around the world by the grace of Mahaprabhu Jagannath!".
‘Sri Aurobindo Integral Life Centre’ at Surat, Gujarat designed by Mona Doctor-Pingel, a long-time resident of Auroville and was inaugurated last year was covered by the Royal Institute of British Architects Journal (RJ) on 26th June 2024.
The Centre is a part of Auro University started in 2011 by Shri H.P. Rama who resides in the U.S. and is also its Founder-President (He is a current member of the International Advisory Council of Auroville Foundation.) and is built on 2.5 acres plot located in the enclave named 'Earthspace'. The 47-ha enclave is meant for mixed-use development where the project seems to have succeeded well in materialising the design brief that was given to the architect in 2010: “to create a space compelling visitors to delve within themselves”.
Dhyana Shala (Meditation Hall)
Man-made crystal at the centre of the Dhyanashala (Image source: RJ)
It "is a global spiritual hub for the study, research, and dissemination of the principles and vision of spiritual visionaries Sri Aurobindo Ghosh and the Mother". The building complex integrates the five elements of nature according to Indian tradition through structures built with Kota, concrete, brickwork, glass, and wood. The built-up and landscape areas have been given a nearly equal share of the plot where some of the characteristic features of prominent buildings in Auroville including the Matrimandir have come up. It has a Dhyana Shala (meditation hall) in a waterbody with a man-made crystal at its centre which also reflects the surroundings as the one in Matrimandir does. The complex includes two apartments and the client's residence and office on the first floor, accessed through a lift and ramp.
The construction by Bhoomi Constructions, Ahmedabad, and M/S DH Patel, Surat began in 2019 and was completed in 4 years. The architect said she visited the site 12 times and was so grateful for the assistance received from her team that she felt she shouldn’t take the credit for it.
A view of the building (Image source: RJ)
A view of the buildings (Image source: Screen grab, Sri Aurobindo Integral Life Centre, Surat, YouTube)
To my mail congratulating her - after reading about the project from the journal - Mona replied, "I was fortunate to have good clients and the Grace to be able to complete the project in a harmonious manner".
The project, on the whole, as Mona herself said in a talk at the Centre last year, "is beautiful but not shouting for attention". Those familiar with the architecture of medieval and ancient India may perceive a quiet but firm turn towards the essentials of that spirit - peace, strength, beauty and eternity. It has the potential to be a cornerstone in the evolution of Indian architecture in new forms expressive of the New Age that is dawning.
Click on the link below the image to a walk-through video of the Centre by Studio Naqshabandi, Auroville (4 min: 9 sec).
An article in Smithsonian Magazine by Kate McMohan dated 3rd April 2024 stated that the "world's earliest known system of taxation emerged in Egypt at the dawn of civilization itself, around 3000 B.C.E. (1)" There are findings of independent researchers that indicate that taxation might have existed in India earlier to Egypt. Also, taxation was regarded as a Rajdharma (Dharma of the ruler) to ensure Yogakshema (Yoga + Kshema) of the people (spiritual and prosperous life) rather than as a means for building monumental temples and colossal pyramids or to engage in wars within and with other countries as in Egypt. “Unlike Egyptians or Mesopotamians, Indus people did not build unnecessarily extravagant monuments. They loved intricately made miniature objects of art, and intelligently constructed and controlled urban settlements (2)”
A screengrab from Harappan Civilization History in Hindi, Historic Hindi, YouTube, April 27, 2020
A screengrabs from Harappan Civilization History in Hindi, Historic Hindi, YouTube, April 27, 2020
Jonathan Mark Kenoyer, Professor of Anthropology at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, in his article ‘Cultures and Societies of the Indus Tradition’ (2006) wrote:
The Indus Tradition begins around 10,000 BCE during the interface of the Foraging Era with the transition to domestication of plants and animals, but it is important to understand that the roots of this tradition may extend back even further into the early Palaeolithic period, more than 2 million years ago (3).
From 5500 to 2600 BCE numerous regional cultures emerged throughout the greater Indus region and represent the Regionalization Era (Kenoyer 1998).
During this Era, “extensive trade networks were established along the major river routes and across mountain passes to connect settlements to each other and facilitate the movement of goods and raw materials. The Early Phase of Indus Valley Civilisation began in the later part of the Regionalization Era and “represents a phase of formative urbanism. The building of walled settlements… the emergence of complex chiefdoms and incipient urbanism” (Kenoyer 2006).
A screengrab from Harappan Civilization History in Hindi, Historic Hindi, YouTube,
April 27, 2020
“In this period (3300 to 2800), the Mahabharata war had taken place in 3136 BCE — the year derived from the Kali Yuga computation — a time scale that is followed uninterruptedly till date in India”, wrote Dr. Jayasree Saranathan, author of ‘Mahabharata 3136 BCE: Validation of the Traditional Date’ in First Post, January 2022 (4).
The following are excerpts from her article validating the year of the Mahabharata war:
The early Harappan Indus region shows sparse growth of settlements, indicating lack of migration from mainland regions of the Mahabharata events.In fact, not many preferred to move to those regions even during the Mahabharata time, as known from Karna’s version that the people of that region lost the wisdom of the Vedas by having lived away from the Himavat, Ganga, Saraswati, Yamuna, etc.
It [Indus Valley Civilisation] is aptly post-Mahabharata culture.The advanced city planning and material culture detected in Harappa could not have been sudden but a continuation of a pre-existing civilisation. The Mahabharata offers a link to that pre-history.
The broken parts [of Comet Atlas, as an event of 3136 BCE reported on the NASA website] could have been hurled towards the earth — which was reported as rain of meteors over 13 days starting from the time of Krishna’s peace mission with the major fragment falling on the 9th day disrupting the plans of Duryodhana to start his army on that day….
Hastinapura received the major hit while another piece impacted the Lower Town of Mohenjo-Daro making it the “Mound of the Dead” which was wrongly articulated as evidence of Aryan Invasion by colonial archaeologists. Mohenjo-Daro was part of the Sindhu kingdom under Jayadratha at that time.
The already-discovered scientific evidence about a cosmic impact in the year 3136 BCE is supported by the historical evidence provided by the Mahabharata, making the text a true historical document.
Subsequent to archaeological excavations in Sinauli (Western Uttar Pradesh, 2006 & 2018) which unearthed burials with the Ochre Coloured Pottery (OCP), Gupta (Archaeological Survey of India) and Mani (National Museum, New Delhi) stated in their article ‘Painted Grey Ware Culture: Changing Perspectives’ (January 2017) that in the present state of archaeological evidence, OCP seems to be a stronger contender for the Mahabharata association and the time period of 3700‐3000 BCE proposed by Prof. Sahi also supports such a contention (5).
A Sanskrit inscription at a Jain temple at Aihole, Karnataka State of India from 634 CE states that 3,735 years had elapsed since the Bhārata war. (Indian Saka year also has 365 days, same as the Gregorian year.) Thus, it is held by many scholars that the Mahābhārata war took place in 3735 - 634 = 3101 BCE (6).
A screengrab from The Kurukshetra War: Day 1 of the Mahabharata Epic, YouTube, Oct 1, 2023
According to mainstream historians, the Mahabharata War (also called Kurukshetra War named so after the place where it happened, in the present Haryana, State of India) was fought in the 1st or 2nd millennium BCE. While they considered the composition of Rig Veda as subsequent to the war, the epic Mahabharata mentions of a golden age (Vedic age) in the past implying that the Vedas were written before, perhaps long before, the war. The mainstream historians also regard the Mahabharata as a small battle that was blown out of proportion by poets of later times. They don’t consider the present text of the epic as a document of history and claim that it was modified by various poets in later times. It may be of interest to read the following quotes from Sri Aurobindo's (1872 - 1950) on Mahabharata and Vyasa, who is widely acknowledged as its original author:
Valmiki, Vyasa and Kalidasa are the essence of the history of ancient India; if all else were lost, they would still be its sole and sufficient cultural history (7).
It should be remembered, that the Kurukshetra war took place five thousand years ago, it was after two thousand five hundred years had elapsed that the first successful invasion of barbarians could reach up to the other side of the Indus (8).
His [Vyasa's] very subject [Mahabharata] is one of practical ethics, the establishment of a Dharmyarajya, an empire of the just, by which is meant no millennium of the saints but the practical ideal of a government with righteousness, purity and unselfish toil for the common good as its saving principles (9).
The Mahabharata of Vyasa, originally an epic of 24,000 verses, afterwards enlarged by a redacting poet, was finally submerged in a vast mass of inferior accretions, the work often of a tasteless age and unskilful hands (10).
Extensive quotes (translations) from the Mahabharata on the origin of state in India and dharmic governance and taxation are found in the book ‘Taxation and Revenue Collection in Ancient India: Reflections on Mahabharata, Manusmriti, Arthasastra and Shukranitisar’ by Sanjeev Kumar Sharma, 2016, Cambridge Scholars Publishing (11). The following are a selection from the book. Those quotes that appeared to lack the dharmic spirit and idealism of the original poet and reflect the more materialistic tendency of subsequent period or the ascetic tendency of the post Buddhist millennia have been excluded.
In the twelfth book of Mahabharata, on Yudhisthira’s enquiry on the origin of the state, Bhishma replies: “Certainly, O Best among the men! Do you listen to everything in its entirety, – how kingship originated first during the golden age. Neither kingship nor the king was there in the beginning, neither scepter (Danda) nor the bearer of a scepter (Dandik). All people protected one another by means of righteous conduct Dharma. O Bharata! Men eventually fell into a state of spiritual lassitude. Then delusion overcame them. Men were thus overpowered by infatuation. O leader of men! On account of the delusion of understanding, their senses of righteous conduct was lost. ……Then, the gods approached Vishnu, the lord of creatures and said, ‘Indicate to us that one person among mortals who is alone worthy of highest eminence.’ Then blessed lord God Narayana reflected and brought forth an illustrious mind-born son called Virajas (who became the first king).
Mahabharata declares: ‘Righteousness is called Dharma. The sages, O King!, have declared that Dharma restrains and sets bounds for all evil acts of men. The lord created Dharma for the advancement and growth of the creatures. For this reason, a king should act according to the dictates of Dharma for benefiting his subjects. Disregarding lust and wrath, observe then the dictates of righteousness. Among all the things that conduce to the prosperity of the kings, righteousness is the foremost.
Again, underlining the essentiality of the sensitivity of taxation, Mahabharata prescribes that ‘O King! You become like a gardener. Do not become like a coal maker. A gardener takes care of the trees, irrigates them, protects them from human and other possible dangers, and then receives the fruits and the flowers which reach him almost naturally. But the coal maker will destroy the tree, ignite it and make coal out of the ruins of the tree. Thus, you must also become like the gardener and protect the garden of the state by putting in your all efforts and receive taxes from the protected populace as fruits and flowers coming naturally to you. You should not destroy the state and the subjects by barbaric and brutal taxation like a coal maker. Thus this way you can enjoy your authority in the state for a longer period by engaging yourself in the enrichment of the lives of the citizens.
In fact, the author of Mahabharata, while overviewing different aspects of statecraft, enumerates certain basic principles of the tax system. It has been prescribed that the king must levy taxes necessarily after giving proper consideration to the sale and purchase of raw material, the expenses incurred on transportation and import, the wages of the personnel involved, the savings, profit and sustenance of the people engaged in the trade, and overall the Yogakshema of the subjects. In the same manner, the manufacturing cost of the product, the preparations, the consumption, the standards of handicrafts maintained and ensured through regular and continuous vigilance and the inspection by the officers, etc. are the points to be taken into account while levying taxes on the handicrafts, artisans and on the people performing these works.
Mahabharata, while explaining the principles of the taxation system in ancient India, prescribes that the king should desire to collect the finances through legitimate and acceptable means like the sixth portion of the income of the subjects, levying and collecting reasonable taxes, giving financial punishment to criminals and law breakers, providing protection to the traders and producers, and receiving fixed salaries for all these jobs.
It has also been prescribed that the state should provide additional help in the forms of cash or kindness to the people who have problems and need special assistance. The state must be compassionate and empathetic towards the people who are aggrieved or deprived.
The author of Mahabharata is very clear in his approach in Shantiparvam and, therefore, transmits a clear message that none of the rich people of the state should have any cynicism or apprehension that the state intends to exploit them by heavy taxation because of their good fortunes. Taxation patterns should never be assumed to be a punishment of owing more than anybody in the state. Therefore, it has been advised to the king that he should give due welcome and hospitality to the affluent and wealthy people whenever they approach him. The king should benevolently appeal to them to be philanthropic and to assist the state in the material growth of the people. The king has been advised to recognize the fact that these rich people are an integral part of the state. Their economic possessions and financial progress are not at all against the interests of the state. Their richness is a virtue, not a demerit. Therefore, only due taxes should be collected from them. Anyone who collects more than the due taxes should also be punished as per the rules.
Postscript: Underwater excavations of modern day Dwarka (Sanskrit, meaning ‘Gateway to heaven’) in Gujarat have revealed structures and artifacts, lending some credence of a submerged city. Carbon dating methods applied to submerged materials indicate that the underwater ruins may date back as far back as 9,000 years (about 7000 BCE) (12).
The town has association with Lord Krishna, who is believed to be the founder of this town by reclaiming 12 yojana (1 yojana = 3.5 to 15 km) land from the sea (Vishnu Puran, 5.2.13). The town consisted of beautiful gardens, deep moats, several ponds and palaces (Vishnu Puran, 5.2.14).The glorious town of Dwarka was submerged by the sea just after the death of Lord Krishna (Mahabharata, Mausalparva 7.41-42) (13).
Krishna was the master strategist and charioteer of Arjuna who led the Pandavas to victory against the Kauravas in the Mahabharata war.
According to another interpretation of the Aihole inscription, the Mahabharata war took place in 5376 BCE (about 7400 BCE) (6).
A screengrab from The Lost City of Dwarka - History & the Remarkable Discovery of an Underwater City | StudyIQ IAS, YouTube, Nov 3, 2023
If further research confirms the above findings, that would mean dharmic taxation might have existed in India thousands of years before it appeared in any other ancient civilisation.
Rajiv Malhotra talks about Artificial Intelligence, how it may help the material progress of the society but also create a society of morons. Click on the image to watch 'AI may help create happy morons' (7:41) video excerpts from ‘AI and Sri Aurobindo’s Consciousness Theory’. Transcript of the video is given below.
Radhe, Integral Life Center: We are extremely honored to have with us today our esteemed speaker Rajiv mahotra. Welcome Rajiv. Thank you! He is the author of the well-known book Artificial Intelligence and the Future of Power. Artificial Intelligence is only partially visible just like an iceberg and to understand it fully we must look beneath the surface. Artificial Intelligence and the Future of Power is a wake up call to action compelling public intellectuals to be better informed and more engaged. We certainly would encourage all of you to read his book if you have not to date. With that we'd like to go ahead and hand it over to you [Rajiv].
Rajiv Malhotra: Namaste everybody. Thank you for inviting me. Vladimir and I have known each other since I think late 90s. My Foundation did a lot of projects in Pondicherry and Auroville on many fronts and Vladimir and I have collaborated on some of the works that we did. So I'm delighted when he called me some couple of years ago that he's moved to South Carolina and we discussed ways of staying in touch more closely and I'm very glad that he invited me to share my perspective on Artificial Intelligence.
This book Artificial Intelligence and the future of power - Five Battlegrounds, this came out a few years ago and at that time people were not ready but I started talking about it in 2015, 2016, so about 10 years ago. Battleground Four is where I think the Sri Aurobindo people and the Integral Yoga, Integral Psychology people will be most interested. I call it the battle for self. Who am I am and in what ways I am autonomous, in what ways I am my own adhyatma, my own inner being versus being controlled and giving up that control because it's very tempting, it's very exciting. Now you see, we talked a little bit already about the control the algorithms and AI systems exert upon you from the outside but these are still external devices like I'm sitting in front of a laptop. When I start wearing goggles [Virtual Reality Headset] now it's even more close to me, now I'm immersed. Now I'm moving around thinking that this guy is here I'm talking to him I'm touching I'm picking up this thing from the shelf in a store, I'm really in involved. I'm immersed and this world is a direct encounter between me and my environment so I'm actually living a whole life in a metaverse okay and I could be living in it all the time or much of my time. I could get entertainment, I could do my banking, I could do my shopping, I could have holidays, I could imagine I'm going to such and such place, having a holiday because I paid and bought it but actually it's a virtual immersion experience.
So that's the next level but that's not enough, that's not close enough for them. Implants in the brain which is real which is coming - it's not just Elon Musk's company but the Chinese are doing it, the Pentagon is doing it. There are just three or four major organizations again it's a concentration of power that are developing these such that the the the implant is able to recognize a burst of neurons and say this burst is happiness for this guy, this burst is sadness, this burst means he is angry, this pattern of neurons means he's likely to get violent, this burst means that the idea I gave he is happy with or not happy with. So being able to correlate the pattern of neuron with what are your emotions, what are your thoughts, what's likely to be happening gives this ability not only to read what's happening but also to influence it. Now how will this be sold? It will be sold very nicely. It will get FDA approval and government approval and popular approval because the first application will be for your good. It will be able to look at patterns that predict heart attack. So, it'll be good because, wow!, we can tell if you're going to have a heart attack or if you're going to have a stroke or something like that and health issue and we're going to alert and get an ambulance and maybe you know inform your loved [ones], your near and dear, a doctor. So we're going to save lives. And who would mind it? Everybody would like it. Another application maybe controlling violent behavior. So there is a criminal and he's released now and one condition of being released is he has to wear this thing so that if he if he's about to get violent or about to rape somebody or something this thing will predict and alert and maybe get some help. It could also be for mental health. If somebody has a bipolar then you know wearing this could be a good solution because if you are about to have a fit and about to do something wrong maybe commit suicide this thing will stop you. So, medically it could be very useful in terms of crime control and behavior control and violence control. It could be very useful in Mental Health Management. These are the kind of applications which are good for everybody under which the whole implanting technology will become popular and who would not want it? Government might even require it that you If you are a violent person and we want to release you on condition that we have to monitor you so this is how we're going to monitor you.
So, once the technology becomes accepted then then other applications come. We can sell you entertainment, fantasy. You could have fantasy sex by having this kind of experience inside you. You could have a holiday, you could imagine that you're going down the Niagara Falls and there's all this water this mist coming at you, and this wind, and it's so exciting. It's like the real stuff or you are falling, you're coming down on a parachute or something and you're having that experience virtually. So this business of faking your senses, giving your senses an experience which is not actual stimulation from the external indiriyas. It is like artificial indiriyas, they are giving you this experience so this will be a great entertainment and on and on, you could end up creating a generation where you can decide how happy they are, how sad they are, who gets pushed… You push a button and keep him happy all the time. So you will be able to create happy morons and I use that I explained that in this book. Happy morons which means the person is really not that smart not that knowledgeable not that involved in all these things but he's full of himself. They've beefed up his ego and he thinks a lot about himself and they're keeping him happy. So this kind of a society. I predict a stage after that - which I don't want to get into - you need to read it for yourself but I'm predicting what will this happy moron state of affairs lead to, what kind of a society are we heading toward.
Image for representative purpose: Screengrab from a Sanskrit movie Shakuntalam by Dushyanth Sridhar, YouTube
Dr. Shonaleeka Kaul, Associate Professor, Centre for Historical Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi gave the Keynote Address titled "Sanskrit and the Society: Beyond the Politics of Language" on the inaugural day 7th February 2024 at Savitri Bhavan as part of a two-day Sanskrit Litfest in Auroville. The following is a report based on her address which included quotes from the original Sanskrit texts.
Dr Shonaleeka Kaul speaking on "Sanskrit and the Society: Beyond the Politics of Language"
The speaker began by questioning the idea that Sanskrit was a language of the powerful classes of people and said it was also used to speak truth to the power and gave the example of a poet telling a King that as a Kavi (seer-poet) the poet was superior to the King.
Srimad Bhagavad Gita is nothing but engaging with profound individual and social dilemmas. The epics Ramayana and Mahabharata were classified as ithihasas meaning “thus it was”. They were history according to Indian tradition which defined them as tales of the past containing instructions on the four stages of life - dharma, artha, kama, moksha - pious, power, pleasure, and liberation. This is one of the earliest explicit definitions of history and is at variance with Western empiricist notions of history. The cultural specificity and virtuosity of India’s definition of history need to be recognized and respected rather than dismissed simply because it is different from the Western terminology and definition. “What I am saying is that if history is not precise being Sanskrit poetry, it is [precise] because of it.”
According to tradition, the poet was a seer, sage, a rishi who possessed divine sight, divya drishti, much like Sri Aurobindo.
Natyashastra tells us that Sanskrit dramas were played at temples and city squares, which were public locales, and not only at royal courts as it is claimed. They were sponsored by small groups of people for mahajanasamaja, a huge social gathering of people at big festivals. The people were from the high and low classes - Arya and UnArya. [Ed- Aryan people were those who practiced high self-culture in the Vedic times and in later times the word Arya expressed a particular social and ethical ideal, according to Sri Aurobindo] Natyashastra described the drama as the fifth Veda, for all classes of society. The audience entertained included idiots and children but the shastra says the play should not have obscure, unintelligible words and must be intelligible to cultured people. The drama culture was inclusive as the audience consisted of both men and women and young and old who were of superior or inferior types and of different dispositions. Learning was not a prerequisite for enjoying Sanskrit drama. The natas and natis - actors and actresses - traditionally belonged to low classes.
Mainstream historians claim that Sanskrit was spoken only by men of high status and the rest spoke only in Prakrit. According to this theory, there was a linguistic hierarchy correlated to socioeconomic hierarchy. The role of Vidhushaka, the jester, was played by Brahmin class actors but he spoke in Prakrit. Marchants and courtiers also spoke in Prakrit. Women may speak in Sanskrit and children, even of the high-class families, spoke in Prakrit. So, the allocation of tongues to actors and actresses in the dramas did not correlate to their socio-economic status.
Dr. Kaul concluded by suggesting that Sanskrit knowledge may have been more common (in ancient and medieval India) than we imagined. Natyashastra described Sanskrit and Prakrit as two ways of interaction among the four castes. She hoped that her talk would lead to questioning the rigid views about India’s languages.
Sri Aurobindo and the Mother saw behind the Hitler-led Axis nations Asuric forces that wanted to block the spiritual progress of humanity by conquering the world and taking it back to a barbaric age. They declared publicly their support for the Allied Nations which fought against Nazi Germany and the countries colluding with it during World War II. Throughout the war, Sri Aurobindo and the Mother used their spiritual forces and powers to back the Allied forces. Whenever there was a call of distress to the Divine during the war the Mother helped by occult means and there were innumerable such instances till the war ended. One of those helped right on the battlefield was an American soldier John Kelly who called Sri Aurobindo'Great Sir' and the Mother as 'Heavenly Lady'. He later recognised from photos published in books their true names. He came to Sri Aurobindo Ashram, Pondicherry, India, 20 years after the war and met the Mother. This is an account of his experiences with Sri Aurobindo and the Mother from an interview by Gordon Korstange, published in 1984.
"I had no knowledge of yoga. I quit high school in my second year after the football season to earn money… the family was in poor circumstances. When I became 18, I was drafted into the army. In a very short period of time I was in France in the infantry, and we went into the attack, surprisingly, I found out later, on Mother’s birthday in February of 1945, the closing months of WWII. France was still occupied by Germany, and this was the time of the Battle of the Bulge and Bastogne. We were replacements for a lot of people who had fallen in those battles. So we were in this town of Faubourg. After fierce fighting in the town, I don’t know if it was one or two days into the battle, day and night, hit by rockets from 15-20 miles called “screaming meemies” … all sorts of terrible noise … Anyway, because of one of those rockets that could flip you up in the air and toss you like a flapjack, I must have opened up. The head must have opened to these frequencies … That might be one possible explanation.
John Kelly
John Kelly in uniform
We were in a zigzag trench down this mountain which was a graveyard from the first World War, I had heard that from the Napoleonic wars there were people buried there … There were crosses. We were near a wood road up in the forest. The original company had been wiped out almost to a man … as far as I know. There were German and American bodies lying on the field amid the pine trees. It was a big jungle of torn-up trees and earth.
I had the first vision there. You know, they say there’s no atheist in a foxhole, well, I wanted to see… I thought I was going to be on the other side any minute. So I said,”Let’s get there first!” It was about the only thing worth trying for. I had heard from my childhood brought up in a Catholic school of people who had some kind of transformation vision and experience. God or the angels could descend and enlighten you, you see. So here’s the situation: a cemetery, all these dead from past wars, I in another ‘plot’, alive…they haven’t thrown the dirt in on top of me – that’s the only difference between me and these fellows. I said, “What the hell is this all about?” I’m a person a little thick. To bring something home to me you practically have to hit me on the head, and this was that type of situation …and I found out in India that experiences happen in graveyards. So I was in a psychological state. Believe me. Desperation.
After some time, one day, two days, god knows, it was freezing up there, the middle of winter. Time stood still.
Finally one night late there was nobody near me… I saw a wisp of white smoke in front of me, a little whiff of smoke, like cigarette smoke. Little sparks of light started to emanate out of that little wisp. It was moving to my right from ‘noman’s land’ . my eyes were fastened on it like a rabbit’s. The smoke kept growing and turned into a haze, and the sparks coming out of it were enormous. My mind was working feverishly, very rapid … so … out of that came a bubbling laughter, gentle laughter of a wise old man. It came out like champagne, and actually I heard the ‘ppp’ of a bottle and the fizz. That effervescent sound with the light in front of me became a delightful fascination. And frightening. The laughter kept getting louder, in my head perhaps. I don’t know. But it was very gentle and very wise, and suddenly I see a mouth and a beard start to form, then the eyes, and the eyes sent out this light that hit me, and I fell back in the hole. I said, “Oh god. I think I struck pay dirt here.”
Sri Aurobindo, 1950, Pondicherry, India
The laughter continued. I felt a bubbling in my stomach. A buoying of my spirits, you see. Suddenly the voice says (low), “What is it you wish, my child?” It had the accent of a high Englishman. Here I am from Brooklyn. I said, “Oh my god (my father was a rebel) … God is an Englishman.” I thought, “What am I gonna say to God?” I pinched myself. I said, “Jesus, I’m making this up in my head.” No, it was real. I’m awake and this is happening.
So the first thing I thought of was, “Get me the hell out of here … take me to Paris where I can sit down, drink some wine, and dance with the girls.” This is a serious situation, but at the same time I was completely delirious. There was some kind of spirit there. I wasn’t lonely, if I got killed now I didn’t give a damn. There was a certain inner delight about the whole relationship that occurred. So I said, “I’ve got to think of something sensible to say, so I said, “‘Great Sir,” that’s what I called him because everyone’s Sir in the army. So I said,”O great Sir, all I really wish is … to know.” So he laughed, and I ducked down because I didn’t want to get hit with that light in the head. I wouldn’t look at his eyes because of the force that came emanating out.
The laughter was one of the most incredible things of tone value that I had ever heard. What I felt was that the laughter itself was talking to me. Now, you see, there is such a thing as mocking laughter, hilarious laughter, you can laugh every way. You can laugh, you know, for all kinds of reasons. There’s a whole vocabulary of laughter that I became attuned to and the nuances of the laughter. There was a whole thing we were going through as if this wasn’t the first time it had happened.
I thought, “I’d better not say anything more or I’ll get in trouble.” So he said, “If my help you choose then your religion you will lose.” I thought, “Aha, I’ve got the devil!” But then I didn’t care at this point about religion or whether it was hell or heaven I was going to as long as I went. I mean, I was brought up a Catholic, but I never really had Christ in me. I was given a label like a Democrat or Republican. It was on the surface of my being. So I said to him, “You know, I don’t have a religion in that sense, the true sense of having the founding force of a religion. You have to give it to me.” I was begging for spirit. And I was putting the ball in his court . . . I got the ball across the net, you see. That’s all it amounted to for me. Like a pingpong game. I ducked down waiting for his reply and suddenly the laughter stops. “Oh, oh,” I thought, “I said the wrong thing.” But then I looked up and standing there in front of me, on the battlefield, was the full figure, a man with a white beard and white hair hanging down in a sheet like a Roman emperor. He’s leaning against this tree a little bit, and he’s signing to my left. I don’t know if the moon was out that night, but the light on his face was golden. You could see a certain kind of refinement in this being that was extraordinary, an aesthetic face that really doesn’t show up in his photographs at all. There was suffering and the conquering of suffering. All of that was there.
So as I look to the left, out of the forest I see a waffling motion and something moving down like a big platform zipping in, like a UFO long before I ever heard of those things. It moved and set itself. It was a Greek temple like those small Parthenon-type things with four columns. People sit on them in wicker chairs and have tea. That kind of set-up. And there was a lady lying down! I said, “Oh, this is a fairy tale. This is ridiculous, delightful.” She’s on a big divan with a black housecoat of velvet. The columns of this thing are like luminescent light, like a very high quality neon light . . . it reminded me of alabaster, radiant soft light . . . indirect lighting . . . the supreme in indirect lighting
I look, and there she is sitting in a pose exactly as we see her in those old photographs of 1914. I came to learn over the years that this pose was like the mudra of the Greek goddess of wisdom. So I’m in this trench, and it seemed like I was on the steps of the temple looking up at her. Her face changed . . . it was a long nose. . . very much Mother. And then that same face said, “I am Mother, Mother, Mother, Mother. I am all Mothers.” The face kept changing like a strobe light effect. That face changed and changed constantly and then would come back and rest at that face again.
The Mother, Tokyo, 1918
I was absolutely enchanted. It was extraordinary. With that it’s getting very heavy on my head. My head is really singing. I said, “Listen, sweetheart, you’d better remove that thing, that temple, from the field of battle because we’re having a hell of a time here.” She didn’t want to go. I said, “If you don’t go soon I won’t have anything in my head. I’ll be insane . . . with delight.” So reluctantly it faded away into the gloom. Then I was so happy I did a somersault or maybe I fainted, I don’t know. I collapsed. The next thing I recall is a soldier saying, “Hey, Kelly, get up. Wake up. We’re going off of this hill. We’ve been relieved.” This was dawn, I think. The place was always so overhung with clouds you didn’t know what it was.
As we go down I start to recall what happened, and I hear two guys talking behind me. One says to the other, “Did you see the light on the hill last night?” “Yeah, wasn’t that something.” They saw it too! That thing was like a 3-D manifestation. It kept growing from those wisps of smoke. I thought, “I’ve got to forget this.” But everytime there was a bombardment all I did was think about her, sitting in that temple. And I said, “Gee, I wonder who she is.”
Another day goes by, and suddenly I hear the old man in the sky. You see, I used to walk behind my men-they made me a sergeant for a few days because all the others were sick or wounded or whatever. Anyway, the old man says to me, “That underpass is gonna be hit.” There was a train overpass that we had to go under, and he almost gives me the picture of the bombardment occurring. So I ran down to the Lieutenant and said, “Where are we going?” I was stalling. He showed me the map and a German headquarters building on the other side of the underpass. That’s where we were going. I tried to convince him to go another way but he wouldn’t listen.
So I went back to my men, and then the old man in the sky says, “Take your men and go first.” I said, “What? Now you want me to go first?” There I was, cringing and cowardly, trying to find another way out. Anyway he convinced me to go first and quickly. So I went and told the Lieutenant that we would go first. He says, “You will?”
We ran down the hill like a track team through the underpass and the idea was not to stop until we got to the building. And we did. They shot at us. We shot back. As soon as we closed the door the whole goddam place exploded. But they didn’t hit that building. It was their own building. There was nobody in it, thank god. When the smoke cleared we looked, and there was nobody back there. The whole platoon was gone. Well, they had gone around just like I thought we should.
Anyway, the contact was constant. He was giving directions, and I was always refusing to accept them. And he was like a periscope. He could look around. He could see in the distance where it was safe and where we should go. That was very beneficial to me. But still, you can have your father take you by the hand and lead you into the candy store, and still you’re gonna be disgruntled. I was disgruntled. Though I was in a very advantageous position with having such a guide. Still, the gloom. At least I had somebody to complain to!
Well, the war ended. We got through the Siegfried line and through the concentration camps. Eventually we got up along the border with the Russians. We were now the occupation army. Anyway, I was trying to figure all this out. I didn’t know about bi-location you see, that masters do exist and have existed through the ages, and that he and she were of that class, that order of beings. I had put them in the class of god, the devil, and the holy ghost, beings of another world, when, in fact, they were living beings on our own earth. That’s the real significance of this story.
I asked Mother these things specifically later on when I got to India. She said that it was as if the day the World War started the telephone exchange slowly and invisibly-like an enormous box-came down slowly and settled on her. And with that box, it made all kinds of sounds like “tu-tu-tu-tu”, like a telephone exchange, that’s the word she used. She was, in a sense, plugged into all these distress calls from all over the battlefields of the world. Anybody that was in jeopardy or peril ..would be calling, and sometimes she would faint, in the schoolyard, the playground, or she would go into a trance and there was no stopping it or controlling it. And there was no remembering it because it was constant. She was part of that hookup. Higher emanations were going out of her in all directions-that was what was given to her as a work, and she said the happiest day of her life was the day the war ended, and the box went back up again.
So, after a while I came back from the line, and I was in this building. Now the tension from all this had built up in my body, all the confusion and craziness and these visions. I was like a taut wire, but it was occult-I had no control over it. That wire was so high strung-I thought that I was insane, you know. I was out in no-man’s -land and no-mind’s land. That’s a strange place, not knowing that there is such a place and that you can get accustomed to it.
I had other visions. I saw an old guy with a pipe who I later thought must have been Carl Jung. I saw a priest, a big tough looking guy, big black beard, pirate eyebrows, but very sweet, and I told him I wanted to see that woman again, and he said that he would speak to her.
It just kept building up and up, and finally I dropped dead right on the bed. The heart stopped, and I go out of my head. All of this force goes right out of the top of my head, but I was still coherent and the Sri Aurobindo came. There was a flame shot around the room-it was the psychic plane, that dimension. That was a magic circle or something, and up through the magic circle we go. He tells me to stay on his heels and not to look right or left. Out we go into the night sky over Germany, headed towards Switzerland, out towards Italy, down towards Rome. At the same time, there are all sorts of besieging entities on all sides trying to come at us in this plane. Ghosts and otherworldly beings trying to make contact and send messages to this world. But I was told not to look right or left. Finally we broke out of that world, that gloom world, into the night sky. It seemed to be the physical night sky-I can’t tell you for sure. We headed out over the Mediterranean Sea and got to Egypt and saw the sands of Egypt turning to dawn. By the time we hit the coast of India it was daylight, and I’m in the Ashram on the floor and there are these chintzy pink clouds on the floor! (note: this is a description of John’s out-of-body experience; the subtle body exited out of the head as he entered a cataleptic trance.)
He’s sitting in his chair. Mother’s over there. But these clouds! I was hitting the floor. What are they doing there? He was smiling and laughing. “Do you know what an ashram is?” he says. I didn’t know, but I bluffed. So we’re in the Ashram and talking, and I found out I could go over … to past lives, and I found out I’d been in ashrams before, in past lives. Then he told me certain things, and we had a whole series of visionary experiences in other planes as he mentions in Savitri. Finally I came back to the bed, the heart started up and the cataleptic trance left-that’s actually what I was in, a cataleptic trance.
I’m so deliriously happy when I wake up. I remember looking out the window-there was a drunken soldier coming up the road with a bottle of wine in his hand singing a dirty song, and that was spiritual! It was under the haze of dawn light, and this debauched guy was some part of this spiritual atmosphere in some mysterious manner.
I wake up. I get dressed and a hush falls on the room. I knew the old man was back, and, there, coming through the wall, there he is sitting in the chair, and the Mother is with him but less visible. So I stand straight like a soldier. He’s very benevolent. There’s wonderful force, emanation, and circles radiating out, seas of bliss and light and joy all coming out. And this enormous benevolence.
I had said I wonder who he is, this wonderful being who had helped me through the war all this time to get me through these states and give me these experiences and he moves his head he picked it right up and he says to me (hardly audible), “Sri Aurobindo” I said, “Auro?” He says, “Au .. ro .. bin .. do.” He’s smiling, almost ready to burst out laughing. He can hardly contain himself. He’s breaking up.
I said, “OK, Aurobindo. What is that? Is that a password? You and me got a password?” Basically he says yes. I never heard a word like that. Then Mother said to me, “Come to Pondicherry.” I thought, “I’m supposed to go to a place very far away?” It was much farther than today everybody still went by ship then – I wasn’t that clear. Bringing it over to the physical mind, when there wasn’t that much there, wasn’t an easy choice. My associations and relationships took half a lifetime … truly.
It wasn’t meant to be either. I told them I had to help my mother. She was sick, and the old man’s a bum and he’s drinking, and I’ve got to stay to take care of the family. He understood and said he understood. “You will come in twenty years,” he said.
I went back to America, became a fireman in New York City retired from that after my mother passed away. She died in 1965. A year later I went off to India and saw Mother. She was very happy. We had a lovely relationship. I met other people who had seen Sri Aurobindo like I had, in the war or someplace in the world. That was a big boost. As long as someone else had seen him then I knew I was in the right group. I got there too late to see Sri Aurobindo in the body .. but his darshan is always there."
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