Sri Aurobindo did not use the word Hindutva. The term has been coined more recently by Veer Savarkar ji. However everybody seems to put their own meaning into it to suit certain political purposes. Well, Sri Aurobindo did speak a lot about the Hindu often he referring to it as also as the Aryan race that was rooted in Dharma and upheld high and noble values in every sphere of life. The characteristic part of the Aryan / Hindu culture is that they are inward looking and engage in self mastery and self conquest as a way of life. To the Hindu inner motives are as important as outer action. In fact the value of an action depends upon the idea it expresses and the force that is manifesting through it. He was neither an apologist for non-violence nor an advocate of violence. According to him the land of India was meant for Sanatan Dharma and it has indeed been the guardian of Sanatan Dharma since the Ages. The destiny of India and Sanatan Dharma are intricately linked together. In his now famous Uttarpara speech, he spoke thus.
‘The second message came and it said, “Something has been shown to you in this year of seclusion, something about which you had your doubts and it is the truth of the Hindu religion. It is this religion that I am raising up before the world, it is this that I have perfected and developed through the rishis, saints and avatars, and now it is going forth to do my work among the nations. I am raising up this nation to send forth my word. This is the Sanatana Dharma, this is the eternal religion which you did not really know before, but which I have now revealed to you. The agnostic and the sceptic in you have been answered, for I have given you proofs within and without you, physical and subjective, which have satisfied you. When you go forth, speak to your nation always this word that it is for the Sanatana Dharma that they arise, it is for the world and not for themselves that they arise. I am giving them freedom for the service of the world. When therefore it is said that India shall rise, it is the Sanatana Dharma that shall rise. When it is said that India shall be great, it is the Sanatana Dharma that shall be great. When it is said that India shall expand and extend herself, it is the Sanatana Dharma that shall expand and extend itself over the world. It is for the dharma and by the dharma that India exists. To magnify the religion means to magnify the country. I have shown you that I am everywhere and in all men and in all things, that I am in this movement and I am not only working in those who are striving for the country but I am working also in those who oppose them and stand in their path. I am working in everybody and whatever men may think or do they can do nothing but help on my purpose. They also are doing my work; they are not my enemies but my instruments. In all your actions you are moving forward without knowing which way you move. You mean to do one thing and you do another. You aim at a result and your efforts subserve one that is different or contrary. It is Shakti that has gone forth and entered into the people. Since long ago I have been preparing this uprising and now the time has come and it is I who will lead it to its fulfillment.”
This then is what I have to say to you. The name of your society is “Society for the Protection of Religion”. Well, the protection of the religion, the protection and upraising before the world of the Hindu religion, that is the work before us. But what is the Hindu religion? What is this religion which we call Sanatana, eternal? It is the Hindu religion only because the Hindu nation has kept it, because in this peninsula it grew up in the seclusion of the sea and the Himalayas, because in this sacred and ancient land it was given as a charge to the Aryan race to preserve through the ages. But it is not circumscribed by the confines of a single country, it does not belong peculiarly and for ever to a bounded part of the world. That which we call the Hindu religion is really the eternal religion, because it is the universal religion which embraces all others. If a religion is not universal, it cannot be eternal. A narrow religion, a sectarian religion, an exclusive religion can live only for a limited time and a limited purpose. This is the one religion that can triumph over materialism by including and anticipating the discoveries of science and the speculations of philosophy. It is the one religion which impresses on mankind the closeness of God to us and embraces in its compass all the possible means by which man can approach God. It is the one religion which insists every moment on the truth which all religions acknowledge, that He is in all men and all things and that in Him we move and have our being. It is the one religion which enables us not only to understand and believe this truth but to realise it with every part of our being. It is the one religion which shows the world what the world is, that it is the lila of Vasudeva. It is the one religion which shows us how we can best play our part in that lila, its subtlest laws and its noblest rules. It is the one religion which does not separate life in any smallest detail from religion, which knows what immortality is and has utterly removed from us the reality of death.’
-Sri Aurobindo
We could say therefore that a person does become a Hindu simply by birth. To be truly a Hindu one should acquire a second birth, a birth in the Spirit or a spiritual birth. Being born a Hindu is like inheriting a vast treasure of the soul but without realising its deep truth or living it is like holding a false passport. Therefore he urged the Hindus to first recover their lost Aryan spirit. He wrote:
‘We say to the individual and especially to the young who are now arising to do India’s work, the world’s work, God’s work, “You cannot cherish these ideals, still less can you fulfill them if you subject your minds to European ideas or look at life from the material standpoint. Materially you are nothing, spiritually you are everything. It is only the Indian who can believe everything, dare everything, sacrifice everything. First therefore become Indians. Recover the patrimony of your fore-fathers. Recover the Aryan thought, the Aryan discipline, the Aryan character, the Aryan life. Recover the Vedanta, the Gita, the Yoga. Recover them not only in intellect or sentiment but in your lives. Live them and you will be great and strong, mighty, invincible and fearless. Neither life nor death will have any terrors for you. Difficulty and impossibility will vanish from your vocabularies. For it is in the spirit that strength is eternal and you must win back the kingdom of yourselves, the inner Swaraj, before you can win back your outer empire. There the Mother dwells and She waits for worship that She may give strength. Believe in Her, serve Her, lose your wills in Hers, your egoism in the greater ego of the country, your separate selfishness in the service of humanity. Recover the source of all strength in yourselves and all else will be added to you, social soundness, intellectual pre-eminence, political freedom, the mastery of human thought, the hegemony of the world.”‘
He worked for both political as well as cultural freedom of India. The first proponent of poorna swaraj, he meant by it both complete political freedom as well as freedom of the spirit. The first was needed for the second to be useful for the good of the world. He wanted India to develop along the lines of Sanatana Dharma and not become another imitation of the West. Modern and scientific, military and industrial progress are needed but what is needed much more is that we be ‘ourselves’. He defended the Hindu culture in response to an ill-begotten critique but also spoke about the reforms needed within us to make India great and strong.
The average modern Hindu is far from understanding these high and noble thoughts. Much of what goes in the name of Hindu culture is often a blind adherence to custom and tradition. Here again he was neither a conservative nor a blind modernist. He knew and saw that a new age was dawning upon mankind in which India had to play a central role. But for that India and Indians must rediscover themselves and use the glorious past as a spring board towards a yet greater and glorious future. Let me close with one of the closing remarks of Sri Aurobindo in a speech. Addressing the children of Mother India he spoke.
“They must have the firm faith that India must rise and be great and that everything that happened, every difficulty, every reverse must help and further their end. The trend was upward and the time of decline was over. The morning was at hand and once the light had shown itself, it could never be night again. The dawn would soon be complete and the sun rise over the horizon. The sun of India’s destiny would rise and fill all India with its light and overflow India and overflow Asia and overflow the world. Every hour, every moment could only bring them nearer to the brightness of the day that God had decreed.”
Sri Aurobindo
