{"id":1216,"date":"2013-07-13T01:33:20","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:33:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=1216"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:33:20","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:33:20","slug":"10-the-mystery-of-love-vol-21-the-synthesis-of-yoga-volume-21","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/01-sabcl\/21-the-synthesis-of-yoga-volume-21\/10-the-mystery-of-love-vol-21-the-synthesis-of-yoga-volume-21","title":{"rendered":"-10_The Mystery of Love.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
\n
\n


\nChapter VIII<\/span><\/font><\/b> <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/font><\/span>The Mystery
\nof Love<\/span><\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n


\nT<\/font><\/span><\/b>HE<\/span><\/font> adoration of
\nthe impersonal Divine would not be strictly a Yoga of devotion according to the
\ncurrent interpretation; for in the current forms of Yoga it is supposed that the
\nImpersonal can only be sought for a complete unity in which God and our own
\nperson disappear and there is none to adore or to be adored; only the delight of
\nthe experience of oneness and infinity remains. But in truth the miracles of
\nspiritual consciousness are not to be subjected to so rigid a logic. When we
\nfirst come to feel the presence of the infinite, as it is the finite personality
\nin us which is touched by it, that may well answer to the touch and call with a
\nsort of adoration. Secondly, we may regard the Infinite not so much as a
\nspiritual status of oneness and bliss, or that only as its mould and medium of
\nbeing, but rather as the presence of the ineffable Godhead to our consciousness,
\nand then too love and adoration find their place. And even when our personality
\nseems to disappear into unity with it, it may still be \u2013 and really is \u2013 the
\nindividual divine who is melting to the universal or the supreme by a union in
\nwhich love and lover and loved are forgotten in a fusing experience of ecstasy,
\nbut are still there latent in the oneness and subconsciently<\/span> persisting in it. All union of the self by
\nlove must necessarily be of this nature. We may even say, in a sense, that it
\nis to have this joy of union as the ultimate crown of all the varied
\nexperiences of spiritual relation between the individual soul and God that the
\nOne became many in the universe.<\/span><\/p>\n

Still,
\nthe more varied and most intimate experience of divine love cannot come by the
\npursuit of the impersonal Infinite alone; for that the Godhead we adore must
\nbecome near and personal to us. It is \u00a0<\/span>possible
\nfor the Impersonal to reveal within itself all the riches of personality when
\nwe get into its heart, and one who sought only to enter into or to embrace the
\ninfinite Presence <\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span>Page \u2013 573<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

 alone, may
\ndiscover in it things he had not dreamed of; the being of the Divine has
\nsurprises for us which confound the ideas of the limiting intellect. But
\nordinarily the way of devotion begins from the other end; it starts from and it
\nrises and widens to its issue by adoration of the divine Personality. The
\nDivine is a Being and not an abstract existence or a status of pure timeless
\ninfinity; the original and universal existence is He, but that existence is
\ninseparable from consciousness and bliss of being, and an existence conscious
\nof its own being and its own bliss is what we may well call a divine infinite Person,
\n\u2013 Purusha. Moreover all consciousness implies power, Shakti; where there is
\ninfinite consciousness of being, there is infinite power of being, and by that
\npower all exists in the universe. All beings exist by this Being; all things
\nare the faces of God; all thought and action and feeling and love proceed from
\nhim and return to him, all their results have him for source and support and
\nsecret goal. It is to this Godhead, this Being that the Bhakti of an integral
\nYoga will be poured out and uplifted. Transcendent, it will seek him in the
\necstasy of an absolute union; universal, it will seek him in infinite quality
\nand every aspect and in all beings with a universal delight and love;
\nindividual, it will enter into all human relations with him that love creates
\nbetween person and person.<\/span><\/p>\n

It
\nmay not be possible to seize from the beginning on all the complete integrality<\/span> of that which the heart is seeking; in fact, it
\nis only possible if the intelligence, the temperament, the emotional mind have
\nalready been developed into largeness and fineness by the trend of our previous
\nliving. That is what the experience of the normal life is meant to lead to by
\nits widening culture of the intellect, the aesthetic and emotional mind and of
\nour parts too of will and active experience. It widens and refines the normal
\nbeing so that it may open easily to all the truth of That which was preparing
\nit for the temple of its self-manifestation. Ordinarily, man is limited in all
\nthese parts of his being and he can grasp at first only so much of the divine
\ntruth as has some large correspondence to his own nature and its past
\ndevelopment and associations. Therefore God meets us first in different limited
\naffirmations of his divine qualities and nature; he presents himself to the
\nseeker as an absolute of the things he can under-<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span>Page \u2013 574<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

 stand and to
\nwhich his will and heart can respond; he discloses some name and aspect of his
\nGodhead. This is what is called in Yoga the işţa-devatā<\/i><\/span>, the
\nname and form elected by our nature for its worship. In order that the human
\nbeing may embrace this Godhead with every part of himself, it is represented
\nwith a form that answers to its aspects and qualities and which becomes the
\nliving body of God to the adorer. These are those forms of Vishnu, Shiva,
\nKrishna, Kali, Durga, Christ, Buddha, which the mind of man seizes on for
\nadoration. Even the monotheist who worships a formless Godhead, yet gives to
\nhim some form of quality, some mental form or form of Nature by which he
\nenvisages and approaches him. But to be able to see a living form, a mental
\nbody, as it were, of the Divine gives to the approach a greater closeness and
\nsweetness.<\/span><\/p>\n

The
\nway of the integral Yoga of Bhakti will be to universalise this conception of
\nthe Deity, to personalise him intimately by a multiple and an all-embracing
\nrelation, to make him constantly present to all the being and to devote, give
\nup, surrender the whole being to him, so that he shall dwell near to us and in
\nus and we with him and in him. Manana and
\ndarśana<\/span><\/i>, a constant thinking of him in all
\nthings and seeing of him always and everywhere is essential to this way of
\ndevotion. When we look on the things of physical Nature, in them we have to see
\nthe divine object of our love; when we look upon men and beings, we have to see
\nhim in them and in our relation with them to see that we are entering into
\nrelations with forms of him; when breaking beyond the limitation of the
\nmaterial world we know or have relations with the beings of other planes, still
\nthe same thought and vision has to be made real to our minds. The normal habit
\nof our minds which are open only to the material and apparent form and the
\nordinary mutilated relation and ignore the secret Godhead within, has to yield
\nby an unceasing habit of all-embracing love and delight to this deeper and
\nampler comprehension and this greater relation. In all godheads we have to see
\nthis one God whom we worship with our heart and all our being; they are forms
\nof his divinity. So enlarging our spiritual embrace we reach a point at which
\nall is he and the delight of this consciousness becomes to us our normal
\nuninterrupted way of looking at the world. That <\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span>Page \u2013 575<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

 brings us the
\noutward or objective universality of our union with him.<\/span><\/p>\n

Inwardly,
\nthe image of the Beloved has to become visible to the eye within, dwelling in
\nus as in his mansion, informing our hearts with the sweetness of his presence,
\npresiding over all our activities of mind and life as the friend, master and lover
\nfrom the summit of our being, uniting us from above with himself in the
\nuniverse. A constant inner communion is the joy to be made close and permanent
\nand unfailing. This communion is not to be confined to an exceptional nearness
\nand adoration when we retire quite into ourselves away from our normal
\npreoccupations, nor is it to be sought by a putting away of our human
\nactivities. All our thoughts, impulses, feelings, actions have to be referred
\nto him for his sanction or disallowance, or if we cannot yet reach this point,
\nto be offered to him in our sacrifice of aspiration, so that he may more and
\nmore descend into us and be present in them all and pervade them with all his
\nwill and power, his light and knowledge, his love and delight. In the end all
\nour thoughts, feelings, impulses, actions will begin to proceed from him and
\nchange into some divine seed and form of themselves; in our whole inner living
\nwe shall have grown conscious of ourselves as a part of his being till between
\nthe existence of the Divine whom we adore and our own lives there is no longer
\nany division. So too in all happenings we have to come to see the dealings with
\nus of the divine Lover and take such pleasure in them that even grief and
\nsuffering and physical pain become his gifts and turn to delight and disappear
\nfinally into delight, slain by the sense of the divine contact, because the
\ntouch of his hands is the alchemist of a miraculous transformation. Some reject
\nlife because it is tainted with grief and pain, but to the God-lover grief and
\npain become means of meeting with him, imprints of his pressure and finally
\ncease as soon as our union with his nature becomes too complete for these masks
\nof the universal delight at all to conceal it. They change into the Ananda.<\/span><\/p>\n

All
\nthe relations by which this union comes about, become on this path intensely
\nand blissfully personal. That which in the end contains, takes up or unifies
\nthem all, is the relation of lover and beloved, because that is the most
\nintense and blissful of all and <\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span>Page \u2013 576<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

 carries up
\nall the rest into its heights and yet exceeds them. He is the teacher and guide
\nand leads us to knowledge; at every step of the developing inner light and
\nvision, we feel his touch like that of the artist moulding our clay of mind,
\nhis voice revealing the truth and its word, the thought he gives us to which we
\nrespond, the flashing of his spears of lightning which chase the darkness of
\nour ignorance. Especially, in proportion as the partial lights of the mind
\nbecome transformed into lights of gnosis, in whatever slighter or greater
\ndegree that may happen, we feel it as a transformation of our mentality into
\nhis and more and more he becomes the thinker and seer in us. We cease to think
\nand see for ourselves, but think only what he wills to think for us and see
\nonly what he sees for us. And then the teacher is fulfilled in the lover; he lays
\nhands on all our mental being to embrace and possess, to enjoy and use it.<\/span><\/p>\n

He
\nis the Master; but in this way of approach all distance and separation, all awe
\nand fear and mere obedience disappear, because we become too close and united
\nwith him for these things to endure and it is the lover of our being who takes
\nit up and occupies and uses and does with it whatever he wills. Obedience is
\nthe sign of the servant, but that is the lowest stage of this relation, dāsya<\/i><\/span>.
\nAfterwards we do not obey, but move to his will as the string replies to the
\nfinger of the musician. To be the instrument is this higher stage of
\nself-surrender and submission. But this is the living and loving instrument and
\nit ends in the whole nature of our being becoming the slave of God, rejoicing
\nin his possession and its own blissful subjection to the divine grasp and
\nmastery. With a passionate delight it does all he wills it to do without
\nquestioning and bears all he would have it bear, because what it bears is the
\nburden of the beloved being.<\/span><\/p>\n

He
\nis the friend, the adviser, helper, saviour in trouble and distress, the
\ndefender from enemies, the hero who fights our battles for us or under whose
\nshield we fight, the charioteer, the pilot of our ways. And here we come at
\nonce to a closer intimacy; he is the comrade and eternal companion, the
\nplaymate of the game of living. But still there is so far a certain division,
\nhowever pleasant, and friendship is too much limited by the appearance of
\nbeneficence. The lover can wound, abandon, be <\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span>Page \u2013 577<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

 wroth with
\nus, seem to betray, yet our love endures and even grows by these oppositions;
\nthey increase the joy of reunion and the joy of possession; through them the
\nlover remains the friend, and all that he does we find in the end has been done
\nby the lover and helper of our being for our soul’s perfection as well as for
\nhis joy in us. These contradictions lead to a greater intimacy. He is the
\nfather and mother too of our being, its source and protector and its indulgent
\ncherisher and giver of our desires. He is the child born to our desire whom we
\ncherish and rear. All these things the lover takes up; his love in its intimacy
\nand oneness keeps in it the paternal and maternal care and lends itself to our
\ndemands upon it. All is unified in that deepest many-sided relation.<\/span><\/p>\n

From
\nthe beginning even it is possible to have this closest relation of the lover
\nand beloved, but it will not be as exclusive for the integral Yogin as for
\ncertain purely ecstatic ways of Bhakti. It will from the beginning take into
\nitself something of the hues of the other relations, since he follows too
\nknowledge and works and has need of the Divine as teacher, friend and master.
\nThe growing of the love of God must carry with it in him an expansion of the
\nknowledge of God and of the action of the divine Will in his nature and living.
\nThe divine Lover reveals himself; he takes possession of the life. But still
\nthe essential relation will be that of love from which all things flow, love
\npassionate, complete, seeking a hundred ways of fulfilment, every means of
\nmutual possession, a million facets of the joy of union. All the distinctions
\nof the mind, all its barriers and \u201ccannot be\u201d\u2019s<\/span>, all
\nthe cold analyses of the reason are mocked at by this love or they are only
\nused as the tests and fields and gates of union. Love comes to us in many ways;
\nit may come as an awakening to the beauty of the Lover, by the sight of an
\nideal face and image of him, by his mysterious hints to us of himself behind the
\nthousand faces of things in the world, by a slow or sudden need of the heart,
\nby a vague thirst in the soul, by the sense of someone near us drawing us or
\npursuing us with love or of someone blissful and beautiful whom we must
\ndiscover.<\/span><\/p>\n

We
\nmay seek after him passionately and pursue the unseen beloved; but also the lover
\nwhom we think not of, may pursue <\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span>Page \u2013 578<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

 us, may come
\nupon us in the midst of the world and seize on us for his own whether at first
\nwe will or no. Even, he may come to us at first as an enemy, with the wrath of
\nlove, and our earliest relations with him may be those of battle and struggle.
\nWhere first there is love and attraction, the relations between the Divine and
\nthe soul may still for long be chequered with misunderstanding and offence,
\njealousy and wrath, strife and the quarrels of love, hope and despair and the pain
\nof absence and separation. We throw up all the passions of the heart against
\nhim, till they are purified into a sole ecstasy of bliss and oneness. But that
\ntoo is no monotony; it is not possible for the tongue of human speech to tell
\nall the utter unity and all the eternal variety of the Ananda of divine love.
\nOur higher and our lower members are both flooded with it, the mind and life no
\nless than the soul: even the physical body takes its share of the joy, feels
\nthe touch, is filled in all its limbs, veins, nerves with the flowing of the
\nwine of the ecstasy, amŗta<\/i><\/span>.
\nLove and Ananda are the last word of being, the secret of secrets, the mystery
\nof mysteries.<\/span><\/p>\n

Thus
\nuniversalised, personalised, raised to its intensities, made all-occupying,
\nall-embracing, all-fulfilling, the way of love and delight gives the supreme
\nliberation. Its highest crest is a supracosmic<\/span> union.
\nBut for love complete union is mukti; liberation has to it no other sense; and
\nit includes all kinds of mukti together, nor are they in the end, as some would
\nhave it, merely successive to each other and therefore mutually exclusive. We
\nhave the absolute union of the divine with the human spirit, sāyujya<\/i><\/span>; in
\nthat reveals itself a content of all that depends here upon difference, \u2013 but
\nthere the difference is only a form of oneness, \u2013 Ananda too of nearness and contact
\nand mutual presence, sāmīpya<\/i><\/span>, sālokya<\/span><\/i>,
\nAnanda of mutual reflection, the thing that we call likeness, sādŗśya<\/i><\/span>,
\nand other wonderful things too for which language has as yet no name. There is
\nnothing which is beyond the reach of the God-lover or denied to him; for he is
\nthe favourite of the divine Lover and the self of the Beloved.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/span>Page \u2013 579<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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