The first thing that we need to understand is that the Supramental does not work in the human way, its action is not based on how the human being limited to its little immediate concerns will see its workings. Being the Truth consciousness it is not moved by what humanity claims to be on the surface but looks at deeper forces, hidden possibilities, motives that human beings have learnt to hide even from themselves. It is in fact the Divine Omniscience and the Divine Omnipotence moved by the power of Divine Love. Can man ever understand its workings with our limited mind that is preoccupied with food, shelter, lust, ambitions, fear and greed. It is only as grow in wideness and surrender, equanimity and peace that the Divine Working can be understood. We have our own expectations from the Divine. For example we imagine that there would be no wars anymore once the Supermind is established. But Sri Aurobindo clearly said that though we do not want or expect a Third World War the New Creation will pass through doors of War as indeed it has been so always with the previous Avatars. This is so because there is a strong resistance in the human being that wants to continue with its own comfort zones. A good and happy family life, a certain amount of comfort and a reasonable bank balance for posterity, topped up with a little bit of religious beliefs and practice or some kind of an intellectualism with Science and Philosophy to support our egoistic life is all that an average human being wants and expects the Divine to secure. But the Divine Will does not work according to these human conceptions because it sees much far ahead and addresses the roots of the problem for which our human hearts have no patience. The question we need to ask is whether humanity is ready to receive the Supermind. All that we can say is that at least there is a small group of humanity that is getting ready to cross over from the old to the new species.
Here is what The Mother said in 1929
‘Is the Yoga for the sake of humanity?
No, it is for the sake of Divinity. It is not the welfare of humanity that we seek but the manifestation of the Divine. We are here to work out the Divine Will, more truly, to be worked upon by the Divine Will so that we may be its instruments for the progressive incorporation of the Supreme and the establishment of His reign upon earth. Only that portion of humanity which will respond to the Divine Call shall receive its Grace.
Whether humanity as a whole will be benefited, if not directly, at least, in an indirect way, will depend upon the condition of humanity itself. If one is to judge from the present conditions, there is not much hope. What is the attitude today of the average man—the representative humanity? Does he not rise in anger and revolt directly he meets something that partakes of the genuinely divine? Does he not feel that the Divine means the destruction of his cherished possessions? Is he not continually yelling out the most categorical negative to everything that the Divine intends and wills? Humanity will have to change much before it can hope to gain anything by the advent of the Divine.’
This is before the Supramental Manifestation. In 1958, after the Supramental Manifestation began, The Mother remarked again.
‘Its action will be somewhat similar to what is described in the Last Judgment, which is an entirely symbolic expression of something that makes us discern between what belongs to the world of falsehood which is destined to disappear and what belongs to this same world of ignorance and inertia but is transformable. One will go to one side and the other to the other side. All that is transformable will be permeated more and more with this new substance and this new consciousness to such an extent that it will rise towards it and serve as a link between the two but all that belongs incorrigibly to falsehood and ignorance will disappear. This was also prophesied in the Gita: among what we call the hostile or anti-divine forces, those capable of being transformed will be uplifted and go off towards the new consciousness, whereas all that is irrevocably in darkness or belongs to an evil will shall be destroyed and vanish from the Universe. And a whole part of humanity that has responded to these forces rather too … zealously will certainly vanish with them. And this is what was expressed in this concept of the Last Judgment.’
Do we see this happening? To an extent we see the beginning of the destruction of humanity and the world its hunger had made. Look at the US – Iran War, the two worlds that represents a kind of ideological antithesis to each other. Just a few decades back both were hand in gloves together minting money. Today they are busy destroying each other economically. We could multiply the examples of destruction that is also taking a toll on our comforts. It is pushing us out of our comfort zones perhaps as a goad to change, to new create. This is the other side of the supramental action that we see. But to notice it we have to step out of our psychological comfort zones and stock ideas of good and bad. Let me give a few examples below.
Yes the action is very much evident. How else can we explain the impeachment of the most powerful President in 1999, the world wide exposure of all the false things that several Ministers in India have been indulging in. There is also the rise of the Millenials and the Gen Z, breakdown of the family system and the rigid barriers and boundaries leading to a freer mixing of mankind, the rise and greater freedom for women, changes in the Schooling system towards a greater freedom. In fact women have now entered every sphere of life including politics, a thing that was impossible less than a hundred years back. Black money is on its way out and digital money is fast replacing it. Plenty of new and unconventional job trends are coming up. There is a great rise in number of spiritual movements, a much greater interest in Sanatana Dharma, an increasing recognition of India as a superpower within seven decades of independence with a fast growing economy, breaking up of Pakistan, a demand for freedom in Iran and the Muslim world. I could go on. But there are many many indications that mankind has entered a new evolutionary phase in the earthly life. Even the average lifespan has increased. There are many other things including the Hippie movement and the breakdown of all conventions so that a new subjective age can set in. If we read Sri Aurobindo and The Mother we can see plenty of things that are moving in the direction of a new world. I have given a talk on it.
What about poverty etc. The Supramental is not working to eliminate poverty but to eliminate greed and fear that are its breeding grounds. It is working to change the roots of the problem that is ego and desire which are born from the womb of ignorance and fed on the sap of falsehood. Being rich and poor are both having their own problems. Capitalism and Communism are both no solution because the problem lies in the roots of the human consciousness. It is this that that the Supermind is busy tackling. As long as human beings are busy with sex, money and ambition there will be fear and falsehood. To destroy it by force will mean destroying humanity.
The Mother foresaw all this. That is why She revealed that at first we will see an increasing confusion upsetting the entire old world. It is like the dismantling of an old worn out car and replacing its parts. That is what the Supermind is busy doing instead of denting and painting. She mentioned that the good will become better and the bad will become worse.
Let me leave with one of Her last conversations on the subject of what is happening in the world. We can read, reflect and meditate upon it.
‘I believe I already told you that there is as though a golden Force which is pressing down (gesture of pressing) that has no material consistence and yet seems to be tremendously heavy…
Yes, yes.
… and which is pressing upon Matter, thus, to compel it to turn towards the Divine inwardly—not an outward escape (gesture upward), but inwardly to turn to the Divine. And so the apparent result is as though catastrophes were inevitable. And yet along with this perception of inevitable catastrophe, there are at the same time solutions to the situation, events which come about that are by themselves altogether miraculous. It is as though the two extremes were becoming more extreme, as though what is good was becoming better and what is bad becoming worse. It is like that. With the formidable Power that is pressing upon the world—that was my impression.
Yes, it is perceptible.
Yes, it is felt like that (Mother fingers the air). And then in the circumstances, many things that happen generally in an indifferent way become acute; situations, differences become acute; bad wills become acute; and, at the same time, extraordinary miracles—extraordinary! People are saved who were about to die, things that were inextricable all of a sudden get sorted out.
And then, for individuals also, it is the same thing.
They who know how to turn towards… (how to say it?) who sincerely call the Divine, who feel that it is the only salvation, the only way out, and who sincerely give themselves, then (gesture of breaking through) in a few minutes it becomes wonderful. For the smallest things—there is nothing small or big, important or unimportant—it is all the same.
The values change.
It is as though the vision of the world changes.
(Silence)
It is, as it were, to give an idea of the change in the world by the descent of the Supramental. Truly things that were neutral become absolute: a little error becomes categorical in its consequences, and a little sincerity, a little true aspiration becomes miraculous in its result. The values have intensified in people, and even from the material point of view the smallest fault, the very smallest, has big consequences, and the least sincerity in the aspiration has wonderful results. The values have intensified, become precise.
Mother, you speak of fault, error—I do not know if it is an aberration, but I am having a more and more precise impression that fault, error, all that is not true. It is not like that. It is a means… how to say? Yes, it is a means for widening the field of aspiration.
Yes, yes, perfectly so.
The perception of the whole is that everything is… everything is willed with a view to the conscious ascent of the world. The consciousness is preparing to become divine. And it is perfectly true:
what we consider as faults are altogether part of the ordinary human conception, altogether, altogether.
The only fault—if there is any—is not to want the other thing. But from the time one wants the other thing…
But it is not a fault, it is an imbecility!
Well, it is very simple. The whole creation must want nothing but the Divine, nothing but to manifest the Divine. And all that it does, even all its so-called errors, are only means towards making it inevitable for the whole creation to manifest the Divine—but not the “Divine” as man conceives him to be, “this and not that”, with all kinds of restrictions: a Totality of tremendous power and light. It is truly the Power in the world, a new and tremendous Power that has come into the world and must manifest itself and must make “manifestable” (if one may so put it) this Divine All-Power.
I have come to this conclusion. I have looked, I have observed and I have seen that what we call “supramental”, lacking a better word, this Supramental makes the creation more sensitive to the higher Power; we call that “divine” because we… It is divine in relation to what we are, but… It is something (gesture of descent and pressure) which must make Matter more sensitive and more… “responsive” to the Force. How to say it? At present whatever is invisible or insensible is unreal for us (I mean to say for the human being in general). We say that there are “concrete” things and things that are not so; yet this Puissance, this Power that is not material, becomes more concretely powerful upon earth than earthly material things. Yes, it is that.
This is the protection and the means of defence for supramental beings. It will be a thing which is not material in appearance but which has a greater power over Matter than material things. This is becoming more and more true from day to day, from hour to hour—the feeling that this Force, when it is directed by what we call “the Divine”, it can, truly it can—you understand—it has the power to move Matter, it can produce a material accident; and it can efface the consequences of an absolutely material thing—it is stronger than… Matter. This is what is altogether new and incomprehensible; and therefore it produces a kind of panic in the ordinary consciousness of people. Yes, it is that. It seems… it is no more what it was. And truly there is something new—it is no more as it was.
All our common sense, all our logic, all our practical sense is dashed to the ground! Useless! It has no force any more, no reality any more; it no longer corresponds to what is. It is truly a new world.
(Silence)
It is this in the body which finds it difficult to adapt itself to this new Power and creates the disorder and difficulties, the illnesses. But all of a sudden one feels that if one were wholly receptive, one would become formidable. That is the impression—the impression I am having more and more, that if the whole consciousness (the whole of the most material consciousness—the most material) were receptive to this new Power… one would become for-mi-da-ble.
(Mother closes her eyes.)
But one essential condition: the reign of the ego must be ended. The ego is now the obstacle. The ego must be replaced by the divine consciousness—Sri Aurobindo himself called it “supramental”; we can call it supramental so that there might not be any misunderstanding, because when one speaks of “the Divine”, immediately people think of a “God”, and that spoils everything. It is not that. No, it is not that. (Mother slowly brings down her closed fists) It is the descent of the supramental world, which is not a purely imaginative thing (gesture upward), it is an absolutely material Power. But (Mother smiles) it has no need of material means.
A world which wants to take a body in the world.
(Silence)
Several times there have been moments when my body felt a kind of new unease and anxiety; and there was as though something which was not a voice, but which translated itself in words in my consciousness: “Why are you afraid? It is the new consciousness.” It came several times. And then I understood.
(Silence)
You understand; it is this which in the human common sense says: “It is impossible, that has never been”; it is this which has come to an end. It is finished, it is foolish. It has become a stupidity. One might say: it is possible because it has never been. It is the new world and it is the new consciousness and it is the new Power, it is possible, and this is and will be more and more manifested because it is the new world, because it has never been.
It will be because it has never been.
(Silence)
It is beautiful: it will be because it has never been—because it has never been.
(Mother enters into a long contemplation.)
It is not material and it is more concrete than Matter!
Yes. It is crushing almost.
Crushing, yes, it is that…. Oh! It is…
All that is not receptive feels the crushing, but whatever is receptive feels on the contrary something like a… powerful widening.
Yes, but it is very strange, it is both!
Both at the same time.
Yes, one feels something like a swelling, as though the whole thing is going to explode, and at the same time there is something that is crushed.
Yes, but that which is crushed is the thing that resists, that is not receptive. It has only to open itself. And then the thing becomes as though… a formidable thing…. It is extraordinary. It is our habit of centuries, is it not, which resists and gives this impression; but whatever opens out… one feels as though one became large, large, large…. It is magnificent. Oh! It is…’
Affectionately,
Alok Da
