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Eternal India
encyclopedia
RELIGIONS
London, recruited him to his service and Sri Aurobindo reached Baroda
in February 1893.
During his thirteen years of stay at Baroda while he served the
Maharaja’s government in various capacities, but mainly as Professor of
English and French in his college, he mastered Sanskrit and delved deep
into the spiritual heritage of India. The other activities that he carried on
simultaneously were the practice of
Yoga,
creative writing and secretly
organising a nation-wide political movement for overthrowing the
British.
In 1906 he resigned his Baroda job and came to Calcutta at the
request of his compatriots. He headed a national college, but soon the
-editorship of the newspaper, the Bande Mataram, the herald of nationalism,
claimed the greater part of his time.
He was more and more active in politics. In 1907, there took place
a historic split in the Indian National Congress in its conference at Surat,
the nationalists deserting the moderates and meeting in a separate
conference under his Presidentship with Aurobindo along with Bal
Gangadhar Tilak pioneering the cause of Puma Swaraj.
He was prosecuted for sedition in 1907 but was acquitted. Next year
the colonial government arrested him in connection with what is known
as the Alipore Conspiracy Case. A year’s detention in a solitary cell
made him concentrate on his Yoga. He came out of it in 1909, rich with
splendid mystic experiences.
In 1910, while the government was plotting to arrest him once again,
he left for Pondicherry, the
French
colony, obeying his inner inspiration.
In his Yogic vision, he had known India’s freedom as a fait accompli.
Now he devoted himself to exploring the human destiny through his
Integral Yoga and was convinced that a new consciousness, the Supermind,
can transform the present man and usher in the advent of the next phase
in evolution. In 1920 he was joined in his great adventure in consciousness
by Mira Richard, French by birth but of a middle-eastern descent, soon
to be known as the Mother. It was she who formed the Ashram around
the Master at Pondicherry.
Sri Aurobindo visualises man as an evolving being, capable of
transcending his present half-animal state and becoming a gnostic being.
His vision is recorded in his major works such as The Life Divine, The
Synthesis of Yoga, Essays on the Gita and the epic Savitri. His other
works include The Human Cycle, The Ideal of Human Unity and
Foundation of Indian Culture. Sri Aurobindo left his body on 5
December 1950.
RAMANA MAHARISHI (1879-1950)
Born on December 29/30,1879 a little past midnight as Venkataraman
in Tiruthani in Tamil Nadu. He had his early schooling in his native
town and went to Dindigul for middle
school for a year. On the sudden
death of his father in 1892, Ve-
nkataraman and his elder brother were
taken to Madurai by their paternal
uncle where he joined the American
Mission High School.
In July 1896, the boy who was
studying in the 6th form experienced
a sudden and unaccountable fear of death. This vision of death brought
about a radical and permanent transformation in his life. He began
asking: "Who am I?". About six weeks later he left Madurai and his
uncle's home for good. He took a train to Tiruvannamalai (North
Arcot District) which he reached early in the morning of September
1 st and went straight to the temple of Sri Arunachaliswara on the
hilltop. Shiva is believed to have manifested himself hare, the col-
umn of light in which he appeared turning into the hill itself.
For the next 54 years, he remained there teaching
gnana marga
or the path of knowledge. Always easily accessible to everyone, this
simple, humble man came to be known as a maharishi although he
never claimed to be one. He considered no one as his disciple and
said, "If I am an ignorant man, then I am as the rest". His teaching
was invariably practical, personal and direct. To all earnest seekers
he recommended the method of self - enquiry for immediate adop-
tion. The method was not an intellectual exercise but an integration
with
karma
(work for others) as an ancillary discipline and
gnana
(work on Oneself) as the main effort.
He called religion itself a great game of pretending and said that
instead of clarifying matters, it only created endless confusion: "The
aim of all religions is to take us back to our pristine state of being-
awareness-bliss. To teach this simple truth, so many schools, books,
creeds, methods have come into being because people want complex-
ity. They want elaborate and puzzling things that give rise to dispute.
The Kingdom of Heaven is within you, within your grasp, right in
your midst. Instead of being and behaving as the self and beginning
a new life, people want to know all about heaven, hell, reincarnation
and other mysteries and the so-called religions pamper them".
In February 1949, a cancerous growth appeared on the left elbow
and began to spread upward. He wanted to let nature take its course
but was prevailed upon to undergo a series of operations. The end
came on April 14, 1950.
SRI RAJNEESH (1931 - 1990)
Rajneesh was bom in Kuchwaa, a village in Madhya Pradesh, on
December 11, 1931. He studied philosophy and passed his M.A. with
first class honours. In 195 8 he was appointed Professor of Philoso-
phy at the University of Jabalpur. In 1966 he resigned his job and took
to spiritual teaching.
He made Bombay his headquar-
ters and started holding intensive
meditation camps. In 1970 he be-
came Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and
began conducting meditation camps
at Mount Abu in Rajasthan where he
initiated disciples into
neo - Sanyasa.
In 1974 he moved to Pune where he
established an ashram. He conducted
meditation camps and delivered dis-
courses. A large number of Westerners were attracted to his ashram
and to his philosophy of free love and free sex. He said, "You can
make love to some one. It will not be in any way a bondage. It will
be out of your freedom. You can-share.... two persons enjoying each
other's warmth - there is no problem in it."
Rajneesh laid emphasis on five meditation techniques including
the Mystic Rose Meditation which he developed in 1988 and called
it "the greatest breakthrough in meditation in 2500 years, since
Gautama Buddha's Vipasana meditation." In 1981 he left for the
United States where his disciples purchased a ranch in Oregon and
raised a commune on it. It was called Rajneeshpuram. The commune
owned 86 Rolls Royce cars.