{"id":140,"date":"2013-07-13T01:26:10","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:26:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=140"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:26:10","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:26:10","slug":"07-supermind-and-humanity-vol-16-the-supramental-manifestation-volume-16","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/01-sabcl\/16-the-supramental-manifestation-volume-16\/07-supermind-and-humanity-vol-16-the-supramental-manifestation-volume-16","title":{"rendered":"-07_Supermind and Humanity.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
\n

\n
\nSupermind
\nand Humanity<\/font> <\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\n
\n <\/span>                              
\n<\/span>W<\/span>HAT
\nthen would be the consequence for humanity of the descent of Supermind into our
\nearthly existence, its consequence for this race born into a world of ignorance
\nand inconscience but capable of an upward evolution of its consciousness and an
\nascent into the light and power and bliss of a spiritual being and spiritual
\nnature? The descent into the earth-life of so supreme a creative power as the
\nSupermind and its truth-consciousness could not be merely a new feature or
\nfactor added to that life or put in its front but without any other importance
\nor only a restricted importance carrying with it no results profoundly affecting
\nthe rest of earth-nature. Especially it could not fail to exercise an immense
\ninfluence on mankind as a whole, even a radical change in the aspect and
\nprospect of its existence here, even if this power had no other capital result
\non the material world in which it had come down to intervene. One cannot but
\nconclude that the influence, the change made would be far reaching, even
\nenormous: it would not only establish the Supermind and a supramental race of
\nbeings upon the earth, it could bring about an uplifting and transforming change
\nin mind itself and as an inevitable consequence in the consciousness of man, the
\nmental being and would equally bring about a radical and transforming change in
\nthe principles and forms of his living, his ways of action and the whole build
\nand tenor of his life. It would certainly open to man the access to the
\nsupramental consciousness and the supramental life; for we must suppose that it
\nis by such a transformation that a race of supramental beings would be created,
\neven as the human race itself has arisen by a less radical but still a
\nconsiderable uplifting and enlargement of consciousness and conversion of the
\nbody’s instrumentation and its indwelling and evolving mental and spiritual
\ncapacities and powers out of a first animal state. But even without any such
\ncomplete transformation the truth-principle might so far replace the principle
\nwe see here of an original igno-<\/p>\n

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\n\u2013 50<\/p>\n

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\n
\n<\/div>\n

rance
\nseeking for knowledge and arriving only at a partial knowledge that the human
\nmind could become a power of light, of knowledge finding itself, not the denizen
\nof a half-way twilight or a servant and helper of the ignorance, a purveyor of
\nmingled truth and error. Mind might even become in man, what it is in
\nfundamental origin, a subordinate, limited and special action the Supermind, a
\nsufficiently luminous receptacle of truth, d at least all falsity in its works
\nmight cease.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

         
\nIt
\ncould at once be objected that this would alter the whole evolutionary order and
\nits balance and leave an incurable gap its completeness: there would be an
\nunbridged gulf between in and the animal and no way for the evolutionary nisus
\nto a journey over it in the progress of the consciousness from animality to
\ndivinity; for, some kind of divinity would be involved in the suggested
\nmetamorphosis. It might be contended that the le process of evolution is to add
\na new principle, degree or stage to the already existing order and not to make
\nany alteration in any previously established feature. Man came into being but
\nthe animal remained the animal and made no progress towards the half-humanity:
\nall slight modifications of consciousness, capacities or habits in domestic
\nanimals produced by the association with man or by his training of them are only
\nslight rations of the animal intelligence. Still less can the plants move
\ntowards animal consciousness or brute Matter become in the slightest degree,
\neven subconsciously or half subconsciously, aware of itself or responsive or
\nreactive. The fundamental distinctions remain and must remain unaltered in the
\ncosmic order. But this objection presumes that the new humanity must be all of
\none level; there may well be gradations of consciousness in it which would
\nbridge the distance between its least developed elements and the higher animals
\nwho, although they cannot pass
\na semi-human kind, might still progress towards a higher animal intelligence:
\nfor, certain experiments show that these are not at all entirely unprogressive.
\nThese gradations would serve the purpose of the transition quite as well as the
\nleast developed humans in the present scale without leaving a gap so wide as to
\ndisturb the evolutionary order of the universe. A considerable saltus can, as it
\nis, be observed separating the different<\/p>\n

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\n
\n<\/div>\n

orders,
\nMatter and the plant, the plant and the lower animals, one species of animals
\nand another, as well as that always existing and large enough between the
\nhighest animal and man. There would therefore be no incurable breach in the
\nevolutionary order, no such distance between human mind and animal mind, between
\nthe new type of human being and the old animal level as could not be overleaped
\nor would create an unbridgeable gulf for the most developed animal soul in its
\npassage to the least developed type of the new humanity. A leap, a saltus, there
\nwould be, as there is now; but it would not be between animality and divinity,
\nfrom animal mind to Supermind: it would be between a most highly developed
\nanimal mind turning towards human possibilities \u2013 for without that the passage
\nfrom animal to man could not be achieved<\/span> \u2013<\/span>
\nand a human mind waking to the
\npossibility, not yet the full achievement, of its own higher yet unattained
\ncapacities.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

         
\nOne
\nresult of the intervention of Supermind in the earth-nature, the descent of the
\nsupreme creative Truth-Power, might well be a change in the law of evolution,
\nits method and its arrangement: a larger element of the principle of evolution
\nthrough knowledge might enter into the forces of the material universe. This
\nmight extend itself from a first beginning in the new creation and produce
\nincreasing effects in the order which is now wholly an evolution in the
\nignorance and indeed starts from the complete nescience of the Inconscient and
\nproceeds towards what can be regarded even in its highest attainment of
\nknowledge as a lesser ignorance, since it is more a representation than a direct
\nand complete possession of knowledge. If man began to develop the powers and
\nmeans of a higher knowledge in some- thing like fullness, if the developing
\nanimal opened the door of his mentality to beginnings of conscious thought and
\neven a rudimentary reason, \u2013 at his highest he is not so irrevocably far from
\nthat even now,
\n<\/span> \u2013<\/span> if the plant
\ndeveloped its first subconscient reactions and attained to some kind of primary
\nnervous sensitiveness, if Matter which is a blind form of the Spirit were to
\nbecome more alive with the hidden power within it and to offer more readily the
\nsecret sense of things, the occult realities it covers, as for instance, the
\nrecord of the past it always preserves<\/p>\n

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\n\u2013 52<\/p>\n

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\n
\n<\/div>\n

even
\nin its dumb inconscience or the working of its involved tees and invisible
\nmovements revealing veiled powers in material nature to a subtler generalised
\nperception of the new human intelligence, this would be an immense change
\npromising greater changes in the future, but it would mean only an uplifting and
\nnot a disturbance of the universal order. Evolution would itself evolve, but it
\nwould not be perturbed or founder.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

         
\nIt
\nis difficult for us to conceive in theory or admit as a practical possibility
\nthe transformation of the human mentality I have suggested as a change that
\nwould naturally take place under the lead of the supramental
\ntruth-consciousness, because our notions about mind are rooted in an experience
\nof human mentality in a world which starts from inconscience and proceeds
\nthrough a first almost complete nescience and a slowly lessening ignorance
\ntowards a high degree but always incomplete scope and imperfect method of only
\npartially equipped knowledge which does not serve fully the needs of a
\nconsciousness always pushing towards its own still immeasurably distant
\nabsolute. The visible imperfections and limitations of mind in the present stage
\nits evolution here we take as part of its very nature; in fact the boundaries in
\nwhich it is still penned are only temporary limits and measures of its still
\nincomplete evolutionary advance; its defects of methods and means are faults of
\nits immaturity and not proper to the constitution of its being; its achievement
\nalthough extraordinary under the hampering conditions of the mental being
\nweighed down by its instrumentation in an earthly body is far below and not
\nbeyond what will be possible to it in its illumined future. For mind is not in
\nits very nature an inventor of errors, a father of lies bound down to a capacity
\nof falsehood, wedded to its own mistakes and the let of a stumbling life as it
\ntoo largely is at present owing to our human shortcomings: it is in its origin a
\nprinciple of light, an instrument put forth from the Supermind and, though set
\nto work within limits and even set to create limits, yet the limits are luminous
\nborders for a special working, voluntary and purposive bounds, a service of the
\nfinite ever extending itself under the eye of infinity. It is this character of
\nMind that will reveal itself under the touch of Supermind and make human
\nmentality<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

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\n53<\/p>\n

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\n
\n<\/div>\n

an
\nadjunct and a minor instrumentation of the supramental knowledge. It will even
\nbe possible for the mind no longer limited by the intellect to become capable of
\na sort of mental gnosis, a luminous reproduction of the Truth in a diminished
\nworking extending the power of the Light not only to its own but to lower levels
\nof consciousness in their climb towards self-transcendence. Overmind, Intuition,
\nIllumined Mind and what I have called Higher Mind, these and other levels of a
\nspiritualised and liberated mentality, will be able to reflect in the uplifted
\nhuman mind and its purified and exalted feeling and force of life and action
\nsomething of their powers and prepare the ascent of the soul to their own
\nplateaus and peaks of an ascending existence. This is essentially the change
\nwhich can be contemplated as a result of the new evolutionary order and it would
\nmean a considerable extension of the evolutionary field itself and will answer
\nthe question as to the result on humanity of the advent of Supermind into the
\nearth-nature.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

         
\nIf
\nmind in its origin from Supermind is itself a power of Supermind, a principle of
\nLight and a power of Light or a force for Knowledge specialised in its action
\nfor a subordinate purpose, yet it assumes a different aspect when in the working
\nout of this purpose it separates itself more and more from the supramental
\nlight, from the immediate power and supporting illumination of the supramental
\nprinciple. It is as it departs more and more in this direction from its own
\nhighest truth that it becomes a creator or parent of ignorance and is or seems
\nto be the highest power in a world of ignorance; it becomes itself subject to
\nignorance and seems only to arrive at a partial and imperfect knowledge. The
\nreason of this decline is that it is used by the Supermind principally for the
\nwork of differentiation which is necessary if there is to be a creation and a
\nuniverse. In the Supermind itself, in all its creation there is this
\ndifferentiating power, the manifestation of the One in the Many and the Many in
\nthe One; but the One is never forgotten or lost in its multiplicity which always
\nconsciously depends upon and never takes precedence over the eternal oneness. In
\nthe mind, on the contrary, the differentiation, the multiplicity does take
\nprecedence and the conscious sense of the universal oneness is lost and the
\nseparated unit<\/p>\n

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\n
\n<\/div>\n

seems
\nto exist for itself and by itself as a sufficient self-conscious integer or in
\ninanimate objects as the inconscient integer. It should be noted, however, that
\na world or plane of mind need tie a reign of ignorance where falsity, error or
\nnescience must have a place; it may be only a voluntary self-limitation of
\nknowledge. It could be a world where all possibilities capable being determined
\nby mind could manifest themselves in the successions of Time and find a true
\nform and field of their action, expressive figure of themselves, their capacity
\nof self-development, self-realisation of a kind, self-discovery. This is
\nactually what we meet when we follow in psychic experience the line of cent by
\nwhich the involution takes place which ends in Matter the creation of the
\nmaterial universe. What we see here is not planes or worlds of the descent in
\nwhich mind and life can keep something of their truth and something of the light
\nof the spirit, something of their true and real being; here we see an original
\ninconscience and a struggle of life and mind and spirit to evolve out of the
\nmaterial inconscience and in a resultant ignorance to find themselves and grow
\ntowards their full capacity and highest existence. If mind succeeds in that
\nendeavour there is no reason why it should not recover its true character and be
\nonce a principle and power of Light and even in its own way aid in the workings
\nof a true and complete knowledge. At its highest it might pass out of its
\nlimitations into the supramental truth and me part and function of the
\nsupramental knowledge or at least serve for a minor work of differentiation in
\nthe consensus of that knowledge: in the lower degree below Supermind it might be
\na mental gnosis, a spiritual or spiritualised perception, feeling, activity,
\nsense which could do the works of knowledge and not of ignorance. Even at a
\nstill lower level it could be an increasingly luminous passage leading from
\nlight to light, from truth to truth and no longer a circling in the mazes of
\nhalf-truth half-nescience. This would not be possible in a world where
\nuntransformed mind or human mind burdened with its hampering disabilities, as it
\nnow is, will still be the leader or the evolution’s highest achievement, but
\nwith Supermind for the leading dominant power this might well happen, and might
\neven be regarded as one result and an almost inevitable result of its<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

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\n\u2013 55<\/p>\n

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\n
\n<\/div>\n

 descent
\ninto the human world and its touch on the mind of humanity.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

         
\nHow
\nfar this would go, whether the whole of humanity would be touched or only a part
\nof it ready for the change would depend on what was intended or possible in the
\ncontinued order of the universe. If the old evolutionary principle and order
\nmust be preserved, then only a section of the race would pass onward, the rest
\nwould keep the old human position, level and function in the ascending order.
\nBut even so there must be a passage or bridge between the two levels or orders
\nof being by which the evolution would make its transition from one to the other;
\nthe mind would there be capable of contact with and modification by the
\nsupramental truth and thus would be the means of the soul’s passing on upward:
\nthere must be a status of mind capable of receiving and growing in the Light
\ntowards Supermind though not reaching it: through that, as even now happens in a
\nlesser degree through a dimmer medium, the lustre of a greater truth would send
\ndown its rays for the liberation and uplift of the soul in the ignorance.
\nSupermind is here veiled behind a curtain and, though not organised for its own
\ncharacteristic action, it is the true cause of all creation here, the power for
\nthe growth of truth and knowledge and the ascension of the soul towards the
\nhidden Reality. But in a world where Supermind has made its appearance, it could
\nhardly be a separate factor isolated from the rest, it would inevitably not only
\ncreate superman but change and up-lift man. A total change of the mental
\nprinciple, such as has been suggested, cannot be ruled out as impossible.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

 
\n Mind,
\nas we know it, has a power of consciousness quite distinct from Supermind, no
\nlonger a power devolved from it, connected with it and dependent upon it, but
\npractically divorced from its luminous origin, is marked by several
\ncharacteristics which we conceive to be the very signs of its nature: but some
\nof these belong to Supermind also and the difference is in the way and scope of
\ntheir action, not in their stuff or in their principle. The difference is that
\nmind is not a power of whole knowledge and only when it begins to pass beyond
\nitself, a power of direct knowledge: it receives rays of the truth but does not
\nlive in the sun: it sees as through glasses and its knowledge is<\/p>\n

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\n\u2013 56<\/p>\n

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\n
\n<\/div>\n

coloured
\nby its instruments, it cannot see with the naked eye or ,.ok straight at the
\nsun. It is not possible for mind to take its and in the solar centre or anywhere
\nin the radiant body or even the shining circumference of the orb of perfect
\ntruth and acquire or share in its privilege of infallible or absolute knowledge.
\nwould be only if it had already drawn near to the light of Supermind that it
\ncould live anywhere near this sun in the fun splendour of its rays, in something
\nof the fun and direct blaze of Truth and the human mind even at its highest is
\nfar from that, it can only live at most in a limited circle, in some narrow
\nbeginnings of pure insight, a direct vision and it would take long for it, even
\nsurpassing itself, to reach to an imitative and fragmentary reflection of a
\ndream of the limited omniscience and omnipotence which is the privilege of a
\ndelegated divinity, of the god, of a demiurge. It is a power for creation, but
\neither tentative and uncertain and succeeding by good chance or the favour of
\ncircumstance or else, if assured by some force of practical ability or genius,
\nsubject to flaw or pent within unescapable limits. Its highest knowledge is
\noften abstract, lacking in a concrete grasp; it has to use expedients and unsure
\nmeans of arrival, to rely upon reasoning, argumentation and debate, inferences,
\ndivinations, set methods of inductive or deductive logic, succeeding only if it
\nis given correct and complete data and even then liable to reach on the same
\ndata different results and varying consequences; it has to use means and accept
\nresults of a method which is hazardous even when making a claim to certitude and
\nof which there would be no need if it had a direct or a supra-intellectual
\nknowledge. It is not necessary to push the description further; all this is the
\nvery nature of our terrestrial ignorance and its shadow hangs on even to the
\nthought and vision of the sage and the seer and can be escaped only if the
\nprinciple of a truth-conscious supramental knowledge descends and takes up the
\ngovernance of the earth-nature.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

         
\nIt
\nshould be noted, however, that even at the bottom of the involutionary descent,
\nin the blind eclipse of consciousness in Matter, in the very field of the
\nworking of the Inconscient there signs of the labour of an infallible force, the
\ndrive of a secrect consciousness and its promptings, as if the Inconscient
\nitself were<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPage
\n57<\/p>\n

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\n
\n<\/div>\n

secretly
\ninformed or impelled by a Power with a direct and absolute knowledge; its acts
\nof creation are infinitely surer than the workings of our human consciousness at
\nits best or the normal workings of the Life-power. Matter, or rather the Energy
\nin Matter seems to have a more certain knowledge, a more infallible operation of
\nits own and its mechanism once set going can be trusted for the most part to do
\nits work accurately and well. It is so that man is able, taking hold of a
\nmaterial energy, to mechanise it for his own ends and trust it under proper
\nconditions to do for him his work. The self-creating life-power, amazingly
\nabundant in its invention and fantasy, yet seems to be more capable of flaw,
\naberration and failure; it is as if its greater consciousness carried in it a
\ngreater capacity for error. Yet it is sure enough ordinarily in its workings:
\nbut as consciousness increases in the forms and operations of life, and most
\nwhen mind enters in, disturbances also increase as if the increase of
\nconsciousness brought with it not only richer possibilities but more
\npossibilities of stumbling, error, flaw and failure. In mind, in man, we seem to
\nreach the height of this antinomy, the greatest, highest, widest reach and
\nachievements of consciousness, the greatest amount of uncertainty, defect,
\nfailure and error. This, we may conjecture, may be because in inconscient Nature
\nthere is a truth of energy at work which follows infallibly its own law, an
\nenergy which can walk blindfold without stumbling because the automatic law of
\nthe truth is within it operating surely without swerving or mistake when there
\nis no external intervention or interference. But in all normally automatic
\nprocesses of existence there is this law: even the body has an unexpressed
\nknowledge of its own, a just instinct in its action within certain limits and
\nthis when not interfered with by life’s desires and mind’s errors can work with
\na certain accuracy and sureness. But Supermind alone has the truth-consciousness
\nin full and, if this comes down and intervenes, mind, life and body too can
\nattain to the full power of the truth in them and their full possibility of
\nperfection. This, no doubt, would not take place at once, but an evolutionary
\nprogress towards it could begin and grow with increasing rapidity towards its
\nfullness. All men might not reach that fullness till a later time, but still the
\nhuman mind could come<\/p>\n

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\n\u2013 58<\/p>\n

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\n
\n<\/div>\n

to
\nstand perfected in the Light and a new humanity take its place as part of the
\nnew order.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

This
\nis the possibility we have to examine. If it is destined to fulfil itself, if
\nman is not doomed to remain always as a vassal of the Ignorance, the
\ndisabilities of the human mind on which we have dwelt are not such as must
\nremain irredeemably in possession and binding for ever. It could develop higher
\nmeans and instrumentalities, pass over the last borders of the Ignorance into a
\nhigher knowledge, grow too strong to be held back by the animal nature. There
\nwould be a liberated mind escaping from ignorance into light, aware of its
\naffiliation’ to Supermind, a natural agent of Supermind and capable of bringing
\ndown the supramental influence into the lower reaches of being, a creator in the
\nlight, a discoverer in the depths, an illuminant in the darkness, helping
\nperhaps to penetrate even the Inconscient with the rays of a secret
\nSuperconscience. There would be a new mental being not only capable of standing
\nenlightened in the radiance of the Supermind but able to climb consciously
\ntowards it and into it training life and body to reflect and hold something of
\nthe supramental light, power and bliss, aspiring to release the secret divinity
\ninto self-finding and self-fulfilment and self-poise, aspiring towards the
\nascension to the divine consciousness, able to receive and bear the descent of
\nthe divine light and power, fitting itself to be a vessel of the divine Life.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPage \u201359<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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