INSPIRING QUOTES : THE CHARIOT OF JAGANNATHA
The Chariot of Jagannatha – by Sri Aurobindo.pdf
“The end of a stage of evolution is usually marked by a powerful recrudescence of all
that has to go out of the evolution.”
Sri Aurobindo, 1909 – 1910, as quoted by The Mother in The Agenda, April 10, 1971
An ideal society is a vehicle of the Divine, the Divine as the inner soul of collective humanity. It is the Chariot of Jagannatha, the Lord of the World, and its four wheels are unity, freedom, knowledge and power.
A society constructed by the mind or created by the impure vital agitations of Prakriti belongs to another order. It is not the Chariot of God, the leader of the community but the vehicle of that other many-faced god, the collective ego, which by concealing the free inner guide distorts the divine inspiration.
Pulled by the imperfect and immature intelligence and the old or new uncontrolled impulses of the lower Prakriti, it moves along the path of varied small satisfactions and activities devoid of any aim. As long as the ego is the true agent it is not possible to know the true goal, – even when it is known, it is beyond one’s capacity to drive the chariot straight towards it.
It is this ego which is the main barrier against divine perfection; this is as true of the collectivity as of the individual.
… until Jagannatha’s Chariot is built, the ideal community will not be created. That is the ideal, the best manifestation and image of the deepest and highest truth.
Mankind tries to build it under the inspiration of the secret cosmic Person. But due to ignorance in its nature, it only succeeds in creating a different likeness – either malformed, unfinished and ugly or possibly half-beautiful or incomplete despite its beauty : a dwarf instead of Shiva, or a Rakshasa, else a half-deity of the intermediate regions.
No one knows the true form or model of the Chariot of Jaganatha, no artist of life, jivan-silpi is able to paint it. The archetypal image resides in the heart of the cosmic Person but is concealed by many veils.
To manifest it gradually through the efforts of many Vibhutis of God, seers, and heroes of action, and to embody it in the physical world is the purpose of the indwelling deity.
The true name of this Chariot of Jagannatha is not society but commune. It is not a many-faced loose-knit human collectivity or crowd but a free indestructible union, a divine commune evolved in joy by the power of the harmonising knowledge of self and God.
The association which is the means of many people working together is known as society, samaja. This meaning is clear from the derivation of the word. The prefix sam denotes ‘together’ , the root aj signifies going, moving, war.
Thousands of people band together for the sake of work and fulfilment of desire, – they work in the same field but reach out for different goals; there is struggle and competition among themselves as well as with other societies as to who should go first and achieve eminence; within this turmoil they establish various relationships, formulate many ideas for the sake of some discipline, mutual help and the satisfaction of varied ambitions.
The result is something incomplete, impermanent and accomplished with great difficulty – this is the picture of a society of the ordinary world, based upon the lower Nature.
This natural society is based upon division. On that separative basis, a fragmented, temporary and incomplete unity is constructed.
The form of the ideal society is exactly the opposite. Unity is its foundation ; there is a play of diversity, not of separativeness, for the sake of the variety of Ananda.
In society there is only a semblance of unity which is physical, mind-constructed and based on work ; the inherent unity in the Soul is the very life of the commune.
There have been many partial and unsuccessful attempts to found communes on narrow foundations, either under the inspiration of rational thought as in the West ; or for the unhindered and free practising of cessation of work for the sake of Nirvana – as that of the Buddhist, or under the impact of Godward emotion – like the first Christian communes. But within a short time all the defects and deficiencies and impulses of a natural society enter the commune and reduce it to its own level.
The ideas of restless reason do not endure but are carried off in the flood of new or old vital impulses. Success in such an endeavour under the stress of emotion is impossible ; emotion exhausts itself by its own momentum.
It is better to seek Nirvana alone, for to create a commune out of love for Nirvana is a contradiction. A commune is in its very nature a field for the play of action, of relationships.
A day will come when inspired by the Will of the World-Spirit, soul-unity will be manifest as the result of the synthesis and unification of knowledge, emotion and work; then will the Chariot of Jagannatha come out on the thoroughfares of the world.
Then shall its light spread in all directions. The Age of Truth will descend on the earth, the world of mortal man become the playground of the Deity, the temple-city of God, the abode of spiritual delight.
(NOTE : Highlighting is not part of the original text was but added by the editor of this newsletter)
