Sri Aurobindo’s Savitri Petals of Lotus

SRI AUROBINDO’S SAVITRI: PETALS OF LOTUS

The Lotus is a symbol of a blossoming consciousness, with each petal emanating a beauty and joy of its own at the touch of the Rays of Light. Sri Aurobindo’s Savitri is such a many ­splendoured epic with an inexhaustible appeal. In his alchemic touch the simple story of Sarvitri-Satyavan in the Mahabharata extolling the virtue of conjugal fidelity has been turned into a prophetic vision of the conquest of Death for man by the Divine Grace.

In this poem running into nearly 24,000 lines - perhaps the longest epic in English literature - Sri Aurobindo lays bare many a mystery that is of moment to all of us. He traces the evolution of the world across long stretches of time, from the most primitive times to the present age of the intellect and draws a graph of the spiritual possibilities of man leading to the advent of a veritable Satya Yuga, the Age of Truth.

He describes how the awakened man is prodded by his higher Nature to discover first the divinity in himself and then extend his consciousness to embrace the whole of the universe. His mind becomes one with the universal Mind, his heart beats in unison with the hearts of his fellowmen. He comes to embody in himself both the static poise of the Self and the dynamic action of divine Power, devatmashakti, and he labours to fashion a new world of beauty and joy for the delectation of the Divine in manifestation. In the process he opens himself to the action of the higher planes of existence, the worlds of Mind, Life, Gods, Self, Light, Sat-Chit­-Ananda and becomes a channel for the overt establishment of their powers on the wondrous soil of Mother Earth.

What is the truth of these higher worlds of which the Upanishad speaks? Are the pranamaya loka, the manomaya, the vijnanamaya, the anandamaya lokas only picturesque imaginations or metaphysical concepts or are they actual worlds as concrete as our material world, the annamaya? Sri Aurobindo devotes a large portion of his epic to present a geography of the occult universe which may not be seen but is nevertheless felt and experienced in its impacts and interventions in our lives. This isthe most authentic exposition of the supra-terrestrial universe, amazing in its detail, that mankind has received so far. Sri Aurobindo keeps close to the traditions of ancient Indian Wisdom and Experience, the Semitic legacy of occult knowledge and practice, in delineating the progress of the Godward pilgrim across the seven worlds hallowed by Revelation and confirmed by the high experience and realisation of the Seers and Adepts across the pages of history. The poet under­lines the precise manner in which these worlds, based on independent principles, are interlinked and focussed in the being of man. He gives an inspiring vision of man as the intended embodiment of the manifesting Godhead in the fullness of time. In this rational presen­tation the occult ceases to be occult; it communicates itself as a fact of verifiable experience and enables man to acquire fuller control over the movements of this own life. The reader realises that all his obvious limitations and imperfections are not permanent features of earthly existence; his liberation and perfection wait upon his choice. He has only to break out of his ego-shell and join in the stream of evolution that is breaking out of the frontiers of the Mind.

A number of profound themes always relevant to practical life are dwelt upon. Why is there pain and suffering in this world? Why do innocent persons have to suffer for no fault of their own? Is it possible to know things beforehand? and if possible, is that advisable? The Seer asks:

What help is in prevision to the driven?
Safe doors cry opening near, the doomed pass on.
A future knowledge is an added pain,
A torturing burden and a fruitless light...

Why do even Messengers of God have to suffer the cross?
He who would save the race must share its pain
The great who came to save this suffering world
Must pass beneath the yoke of grief and pain.

What is Fate?
Fate, child of past energies.
Man can accept his fate, he can refuse.
What is the truth of prayer? Is it effective? Listen:
A prayer, a master act, a king idea
Can link man’s strength to a transcendent Force.

And of course there are telling passages on the Problem of Evil, the truth of Maya, the call of Nirvana. There are helpful descriptions of the states of the soul in its journey to the world of  Peace after leaving the physical scene. All through the community of fellowship between the creatures of earth, pilgrims of the Spirit, the luminous inhabitants of the heavens, is kept to the fore. Highly interesting is the role of the Asuras, Titans, the dark children of the universal Creatrix in the evolution of the world.

In narrating the origins of the universe from different angles of vision and experience, tracing the history of the psychological man from his roots in the dark soil of inconscience to the emerging states of full-fledged consciousness, describing the cycle of the six seasons in Nature, embodying the multiple rasas of life, reflecting the temper and the idiom of the present technological age, Sri Aurobindo fulfills the classic requirements of a Mahakavya, in an eminently pleasing manner.

And what is the message of Savitri to the modern world? to feel love and oneness is to live.