The Aurobindonian model of Karma

The conventional view of Karma is that of a rigid, ethical, mechanical and almost revengeful law of Nature which brings rewards for good deeds and punishment for evil actions.  We are told that the individual who commits evil today will suffer in some future life while the good person is suffering right now because of some evil act done in a past life.  This definition seems unconvincing at times because it does not explain the many anomalies seen in real life.  In his works, Sri Aurobindo presented a more flexible and panoptic model of Karma.  He observed that Nature is not rigid or revengeful but subtle and liberal in her application of law, working through multi-faceted principles to achieve her aims.  This article is a distillation of his thoughts[1]

The latent Consciousness within Matter

In the Taittiriya Upanishad, Bhrigu is asked by his Guru to (spiritually) realize : “Matter is Conscious!”.   The ancients believed that Matter was also a form of Consciousness and that this fact could be uncovered through Yoga.  This consciousness within Matter discloses itself as the will in the atom, the symmetry of the crystals, the fatigue in metals, etc.  There is an Intuition in Matter which holds the action of the material world from the electron to the sun and planets and their contents.  To the modern rational mind, any such proposition seems preposterous and untenable.  Modern science has found that Matter and Energy are interchangeable but it has not yet been able to resolve the mind-body dichotomy.   On this topic, Sri Aurobindo said, “Only by an extension of the field of our consciousness or an unhoped-for increase in our instruments of knowledge can the ancient quarrel be decided.” The Life Divine – I: The Two Negations: The Refusal of the Ascetic   In the absence of such an advance on either side, all one can do for now is examine and anticipate the possibilities…

Spacetime in occult worlds

Einstein’s theory of relativity in layman terms states that time slows and length contracts with increasing speed of the observer.  At the speed of light, the play of Time is said to stop in subjective terms.  Something similar occurs in the occult worlds which exist hidden behind our physical world.  The Universe with its physical and supraphysical worlds is a manifestation of Consciousness with different orders of Space-Time. The Yogi by shifting the center of his consciousness is able to awaken in these occult worlds.  As one goes higher up the planes of consciousness, the perception of Time changes while Space becomes more flexible and no longer exhibits the fixed physical laws seen here in the material world.