Perhaps you mean divinising the human consciousness or divinising the human nature which is quite different from finding the Divine and growing one with Him in Soul. Divinising, in the context of Sri Aurobindo means not only union of the Soul with God but also of the mind, heart, life and body putting off the mask of lower nature and changing over into the operations of the Divine Supernature.
I am also not sure if it is divinising or cultivating godlike qualities.
In any case it is happy to know of other approaches striving towards a collective transformation of humanity. As many approaches, the better it is.
Divinizing Human idea was also preached by Sri Sathya Sai Baba after Swami Sivananda. Not so technically as Sri Aurobindo but it was combined in the traditional yoga approachΒ
The difference between divinisation and cultivating godlike qualities is in a way the difference between the gods and the God or the Divine. The gods are each an aspect or the power of the One Divine. They inspire men with great human qualities such as compassion, kindness, strength, love, harmony, beauty, courage, truthfulness etc. The Gita describes it in some detail in the Devasuri sampada in chapter 16. It is the cultivation of certain sattwic qualities and virtues. In every age there have been teachers emphasising upon these high sattwic virtues to prepare the human soul for the last ultimate leap into Moksha. This is because the mystics also realise that even these high godlike qualities are still a bondage, the bondage of goodness or righteousness. Hence they speak of it as a step towards plunging and vanishing entirely into the Divine, Mukti.
The Gita however speaks of a Divine Supernature, a state of Divine Perfection, beyond the highest sattwic qualities, beyond even the reach of the gods. This Divine Supernature does not act according to even our highest human standard. For example, Sri Krishna asks Arjuna to fulfil the Divine Will by engaging in a battle that would involve killing of millions. The godlike qualities make us good (which is wonderful) but tied to our goodness we are unable to rise beyond good and evil into something that is still higher, the Omniscience and Omnipotence of God, the Divine Love that can slay with Compassion as we see in the case of fall of Karna and Bheesma.
Divinisation means embodying the Divine Supernature. It means that the mind grows into practical omniscience by evolving new faculties such as revelation, intuition and the capacity of knowledge by identity. It becomes a Mind of Light so to say. It means that the heart is not only full of the divine qualities mentioned above (and many more) but becomes a receptacle of Divine Love and Sweetness and Harmony and Delight. It means that the life energy is transformed into a luminous force moved entirely by the Divine Will, the Divine Impulsion and no more by any human thought or standard, however high. It means that the body itself becomes a transparent and luminous mantle of the Divine Light and Bliss.
While the godlike qualities can no doubt help mankind become better, they cannot transform the fundamental nature of earthly life which remains tied to ignorance. By moksha the soul is set free but nature remains still bound by goodness rather than become an embodiment of the Divine Nature and the Divine Perfection.
Affectionately,
Alok Da
