Reading of the Foreword

I

There are six chapters in this book. The first was an essay written during the early months of World War 1, two others when it was nearly on the verge of closure and the fourth during the formation and operations of the much maligned League of Nations. Two other chapters were subsequently added.

Though the essays were written at different points in time, they form "a single general standpoint" (SABCL 15, pg.575)- that the destiny of mankind depends "more on the spirit which we are than on the machinery we shall use" (Ibid). For we are supported by the immortal spirit through its deputy, the psychic being which takes part in the evolutionary schemata.

We have been living in a period of rapid and swift changes that started a century back with World War 1 when Sri Aurobindo pointed this and it still remains, albeit increasingly so. "The ideals of the future, especially the ideals of freedom, equality, commonality, unity, are demanding to be brought out from their limited field in the spiritual life or the idealism of the few and to be given some beginning of a true soul of action and bodily shape in the life of the race." (Ibid) Even now the world continues to be burdened by wars. The Russia-Ukraine War began in February 2022 and shows no sign of ending. So also the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in Gaza, fueled by the Hamas-led attack has repercussions all over the world ranging from financial curbs on Harvard by President Trump and the refusal to accept Israeli passports by at least thirteen Islamic nations.

But Sri Aurobindo explains that the most powerful resistance to the professed ideals of the future that include freedom, equality and unity comes not from outside, but from within. What are apparently social issues have their origin in the psyche of the human race. The old and obstinate resurgences from the past and the subjection of the self to the egoistic and vital interests do not promote unity but strife and discord. One had great hopes on rationality but that focuses more on the here and now situation instead of the future. A voluntary self-deception coupled with the diplomatic hypocrisy of the politicians camouflage all idealisms. Finally an inrush of darkened inconscient forces rush up to engulf mankind. (Ibid, pg.575-576)

The solution provided by the West to the modern mind influenced by Science is that of salvation by machinery. Sri Aurobindo wrote a century back, "But the destinies of mankind cannot be turned out to order in an American factory". (Ibid, pg.576) Notwithstanding the Elon Musks, the AI, the ChatGPT. The actual problem is more subtle to be handled by scientific tools, the solution is subtler.

Sri Aurobindo explains, "..if the spirit of the things we profess is absent or falsified, no method or machinery can turn them out for us or deliver the promised goods. That is the one truth which the scientific and industrialized modern mind forgets always, because it looks at process and commodity and production and ignores the spirit in man and the deeper inner law of his being." (Ibid)

Date of Update: 28-Apr-25