93
years ago, on 24th April, The Mother arrived in Pondicherry to
settle permanently and carry out her immense sadhana
alongside Sir Aurobindo.
Last
month, on the 24th
of April, 2013, we commemorated Mother's final arrival in
Pondicherry through a special program.It began with invoking
the power of the Om, through the Om Choir. It was
followed by chanting of mantras
from the Mandukya Upanishad. This is the Upanishad which
explains the universal sound of the Om. Twelve verses from the
Mandukya Upanishad were chanted. The verses essentially
introduced and described the three states of the being
together with a fourth and transcending state of consciousness. OM is
the one word that encapsulates the three states and itself transcends
above the three states into the fourth.
The
second section revolved around the Arts as a means of interpreting
the divine. In this section, scenes of culturally significant
personalities were enacted. In the backdrop, lines from Sri
Aurobindo’s works such as ‘The
Foundations of Indian Culture’,
‘Essays on the Gita’
and ‘The Future Poetry’,
amongst others, were recited. These were in reference to
the personalities and the larger movement they were a part of.
Children dressed up, sang and narratedthe life of each personality in
a beautiful and heart warming manner.
We
began with three stalwarts of Bhakti Yoga, several aspects of
which Sri Aurobindo had high regard for.Our first segment revolved
around the 8th century Alvar saint, Andal. She was the only female
Alvar of the 12 Alvar saints of South India and is credited with the
great Tamil work ‘Thirupavai’.Our
next segment revolved around the 16th century Indian princess Mira.
So lasting was her impact that even today, in many regions of
Rajasthan, bhajans
of Mira are still common in religious night gatherings known as
'Ratijuga’. Post
this, we concentrated on the 13th Century Sanskrit
poet,Jaidev. He is most known for his composition, the epic poem
‘GeetGovinda’.
The next segment revolved around the great Greek epic poet, Homer. He
was the author of the great Greek epics ‘The
Iliad’ and ‘The
Odyssey’. Sri Aurobindo
interpreted the epilogue of ‘The
Iliad’ in his epic, ‘The
Ilion’.We then moved onto Leonardo
da Vinci who was an Italian Renaissance polymath. Sri
Aurobindo was a great admirer of his many talents, stating that
Leonardo was an example of someone who had a higher consciousness.
His genius, perhaps more than that of any other figure,
epitomized the Renaissance humanist ideal.
In
the third and final section, we turned to Mahasaraswati and
invoked her Power. Mahasaraswati is The Mother’s Power of Works.
Sri Aurobindo states that “All
the work of the other Powers leans on her for its completeness; for
she assures the material foundations, elaborates the stuff of detail
and erects and rivets the armour of the structure”.
With
that we came to an end of the day's program. It was a deeply
moving program at the end of which we partook of Mahaprasad.
-
Saurab
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