{"id":1607,"date":"2013-07-13T01:35:59","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:35:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=1607"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:35:59","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:35:59","slug":"01-the-ideal-of-the-karmayogin-vol-13-essays-in-philosophy-and-yoga","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/03-cwsa\/13-essays-in-philosophy-and-yoga\/01-the-ideal-of-the-karmayogin-vol-13-essays-in-philosophy-and-yoga","title":{"rendered":"-01_The Ideal of the Karmayogin.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n\n\n
\n

\n
\nPart One
\n<\/font><\/b> <\/p>\n

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

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\nEssays from the Karmayogin <\/i><\/font><\/b> <\/p>\n

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

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\n1909 \u2013 1910 <\/font> <\/b> <\/span> <\/p>\n

\n

\n

\n

\n

 <\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

<\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n<\/p>\n

\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\nSri Aurobindo in Pondicherry<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

\n

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

<\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nThe Ideal of the Karmayogin <\/i><\/font><\/b> <\/span> <\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\nA<\/font> NATION<\/b> The Ideal of the Karmayogin <\/i>is building in India today before the eyes of
\nthe world so swiftly, so palpably that all can watch the
\nprocess and those who have sympathy and intuition distinguish
\nthe forces at work, the materials in use, the lines of
\nthe divine architecture This nation is not a new race raw from
\nthe workshop of Nature or created by modern circumstances
\nOne of the oldest races and greatest civilisations on this earth,
\nthe most indomitable in vitality, the most fecund in greatness,
\nthe deepest in life, the most wonderful in potentiality, after
\ntaking into itself numerous sources of strength from foreign
\nstrains of blood and other types of human civilisation, is now
\nseeking to lift itself for good into an organised national unity
\nFormerly a congeries of kindred nations with a single life and
\na single culture, always by the law of this essential oneness
\ntending to unity, always by its excess of fecundity engendering
\nfresh diversities and divisions, it has never yet been able
\nto overcome permanently the almost insuperable obstacles to
\nthe organisation of a continent The time has now come when
\nthose obstacles can be overcome The attempt which our race
\nhas been making throughout its long history, it will now make
\nunder entirely new circumstances A keen observer would predict
\nits success because the only important obstacles have been
\nor are in the process of being removed But we go farther and
\nbelieve that it is sure to succeed because the freedom, unity and
\ngreatness of India have now become necessary to the world
\nThis is the faith in which the Karmayogin <\/i>puts its hand to
\nthe work and will persist in it, refusing to be discouraged by
\ndifficulties however immense and apparently insuperable We
\nbelieve that God is with us and in that faith we shall conquer
\nWe believe that humanity needs us and it is the love
\nand service of humanity, of our country, of the race, of our <\/span> <\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\n
\nPage\u2013 3<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/font><\/p>\n

\nreligion that will purify our heart and inspire our action in
\nthe struggle<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe task we set before ourselves is not mechanical but moral
\nand spiritual We aim not at the alteration of a form of government
\nbut at the building up of a nation Of that task politics
\nis a part, but only a part We shall devote ourselves not to
\npolitics alone, nor to social questions alone, nor to theology or
\nphilosophy or literature or science by themselves, but we include
\nall these in one entity which we believe to be all-important,
\nthe dharma<\/i>, the national religion which we also believe to be
\nuniversal There is a mighty law of life, a great principle of
\nhuman evolution, a body of spiritual knowledge and experience
\nof which India has always been destined to be guardian, exemplar
\nand missionary This is the sanā<\/font>tana<\/i>
\ndharma<\/i>, the eternal
\nreligion Under the stress of alien impacts she has largely lost
\nhold not of the structure of that dharma<\/i>, but of its living reality
\nFor the religion of India is nothing if it is not lived It has to be
\napplied not only to life, but to the whole of life; its spirit has
\nto enter into and mould our society, our politics, our literature,
\nour science, our individual character, affections and aspirations
\nTo understand the heart of this dharma<\/i>, to experience it as a
\ntruth, to feel the high emotions to which it rises and to express
\nand execute it in life is what we understand by Karmayoga We
\nbelieve that it is to make the yoga the ideal of human life that
\nIndia rises today; by the yoga she will get the strength to realise
\nher freedom, unity and greatness, by the yoga she will keep the
\nstrength to preserve it . It is a spiritual revolution we foresee and the material
\nis only its shadow and reflex <\/span> <\/p>\n

\nThe European sets great store by machinery He seeks to
\nrenovate humanity by schemes of society and systems of government;
\nhe hopes to bring about the millennium by an act of
\nParliament Machinery is of great importance, but only as a
\nworking means for the spirit within, the force behind The nineteenth
\ncentury in India aspired to political emancipation, social
\nrenovation, religious vision and rebirth, but it failed because
\nit adopted Western motives and methods, ignored the spirit,
\nhistory and destiny of our race and thought that by taking over <\/span> <\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n


\nPage\u2013
\n4<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/font><\/p>\n

\nEuropean education, European machinery, European organisation
\nand equipment we should reproduce in ourselves European
\nprosperity, energy and progress We of the twentieth century
\nreject the aims, ideals and methods of the Anglicised nineteenth
\nprecisely because we accept its experience We refuse to make an idol of the
\npresent; we look before and after, backward to the mighty history of our race,
\nforward to the grandiose destiny for which that history has prepared it <\/span> <\/p>\n

\nWe do not believe that our political salvation can be attained
\nby enlargement of Councils, introduction of the elective principle,
\ncolonial self-government or any other formula of European
\npolitics We do not deny the use of some of these things as
\ninstruments, as weapons in a political struggle, but we deny
\ntheir sufficiency whether as instruments or ideals and look beyond
\nto an end which they do not serve except in a trifling
\ndegree They might be sufficient if it were our ultimate destiny
\nto be an outlying province of the British Empire or a dependent
\nadjunct of European civilisation That is a future which
\nwe do not think it worth making any sacrifice to accomplish
\nWe believe on the other hand that India is destined to work
\nout her own independent life and civilisation, to stand in the
\nforefront of the world and solve the political, social, economical
\nand moral problems which Europe has failed to solve, yet the
\npursuit of whose solution and the feverish passage in that pursuit
\nfrom experiment to experiment, from failure to failure she calls
\nher progress Our means must be as great as our ends and the strength to discover
\nand use the means so as to attain the end can only be found by seeking the
\neternal source of strength in ourselves <\/span> <\/p>\n

\nWe do not believe that by changing the machinery so as to
\nmake our society the ape of Europe we shall effect social renovation
\nWidow-remarriage, substitution of class for caste, adult
\nmarriage, intermarriages, interdining and the other nostrums
\nof the social reformer are mechanical changes which, whatever
\ntheir merits or demerits, cannot by themselves save the soul of
\nthe nation alive or stay the course of degradation and decline
\nIt is the spirit alone that saves, and only by becoming great and <\/span> <\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013<\/font>
\n5<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/font><\/p>\n

\nfree in heart can we become socially and politically great
\nand free<\/span><\/p>\n

\nWe do not believe that by multiplying new sects limited
\nwithin the narrower and inferior ideas of religion imported from
\nthe West or by creating organisations for the perpetuation of the
\nmere dress and body of Hinduism we can recover our spiritual
\nhealth, energy and greatness The world moves through an indispensable
\ninterregnum of free thought and materialism to a new
\nsynthesis of religious thought and experience, a new religious
\nworld-life free from intolerance, yet full of faith and fervour,
\naccepting all forms of religion because it has an unshakable
\nfaith in the One The religion which embraces Science and faith,
\nTheism, Christianity, Mahomedanism and Buddhism and yet is
\nnone of these, is that to which the World-Spirit moves In our
\nown, which is the most sceptical and the most believing of all,
\nthe most sceptical because it has questioned and experimented
\nthe most, the most believing because it has the deepest experience
\nand the most varied and positive spiritual knowledge, \u2014
\nthat wider Hinduism which is not a dogma or combination of
\ndogmas but a law of life, which is not a social framework but
\nthe spirit of a past and future social evolution, which rejects
\nnothing but insists on testing and experiencing everything and
\nwhen tested and experienced turning it to the soul\u2019s uses, in this
\nHinduism we find the basis of the future world-religion This sanā<\/font>tana<\/i>
\ndharma <\/i>has many scriptures, Veda, Vedanta, Gita,
\nUpanishad, Darshana, Purana, Tantra, nor could it reject the
\nBible or the Koran; but its real, most authoritative scripture is in
\nthe heart in which the Eternal has His dwelling It is in our inner spiritual
\nexperiences that we shall find the proof and source of the world\u2019s Scriptures,
\nthe law of knowledge, love and conduct, the basis and inspiration of Karmayoga <\/span> <\/p>\n

\nOur aim will therefore be to help in building up India for the
\nsake of humanity \u2014 this is the spirit of the Nationalism which
\nwe profess and follow We say to humanity, \u201cThe time has come
\nwhen you must take the great step and rise out of a material
\nexistence into the higher, deeper and wider life towards which
\nhumanity moves The problems which have troubled mankind <\/span> <\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n


\nPage\u2013
\n6<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/font><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tcan only be solved by conquering the kingdom within, not by harnessing the forces of Nature to the service of comfort and luxury, but by mastering the forces of the intellect and the spirit, by vindicating the freedom of man within as well as without and by conquering from within external Nature For that work the resurgence of Asia is necessary, therefore Asia rises For that work the freedom and greatness of India is essential, therefore she claims her destined freedom and greatness, and it is to the interest of all humanity, not excluding England, that she should wholly establish her claim"
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWe say to the nation, “It is God’s will that we should be ourselves and not Europe We have sought to regain life by following the law of another being than our own We must return and seek the sources of life and strength within ourselves We must know our past and recover it for the purposes of our future Our business is to realise ourselves first and to mould everything to the law of India’s eternal life and nature It will therefore be the object of the
\nKarmayogin <\/i>to read the heart of our religion, our society, our philosophy, politics, literature, art, jurisprudence, science, thought, everything that was and is ours, so that we may be able to say to ourselves and our nation, `This is our dharma<\/i>‘ We shall review European civilisation entirely from the standpoint of Indian thought and knowledge and seek to throw off from us the dominating stamp of the Occident; what we have to take from the West we shall take as Indians And the dharma
\n<\/i>once discovered we shall strive our utmost not only to profess but to live, in our individual actions, in our social life, in our political endeavours"
\n\t\t\t<\/span> <\/p>\n

\nWe 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 fulfil 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 forefathers Recover the Aryan thought, the Aryan discipline, the  
\n<\/span> <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nPage –
\n7<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/font><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAryan 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,
\n\tbefore you can win back your outer empire There the Mother dwells and She
\n\twaits 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
\n\t\t\tpre-eminence, political freedom, the mastery of human thought, the hegemony of the world”  
\n\t\t\t<\/span> <\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage – 8<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/font><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Part One   Essays from the Karmayogin   1909 \u2013 1910     Sri Aurobindo in Pondicherry The Ideal of the Karmayogin   A NATION…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1607","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-13-essays-in-philosophy-and-yoga","wpcat-36-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1607","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1607"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1607\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1607"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1607"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1607"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}