Beginnings, – the Dawn

The coming of the Divine Mother and the initiation of the earth

The seers of the Vedas saw in the physical world a reflection and an image of subtle profound truths. They used this imagery with a deftness to convey deeper realities to man’s consciousness still bound to the physical world and its images. Sri Aurobindo, in almost a similar vein opens the first Canto of Savitri with the powerful symbol of Dawn. However, even though this is a symbol of illumination, more specifically, the awakening of man to greater truths and hidden realities of existence, he, with his masterly touch weaves it into the narrative of the epic. Thus, the dawn becomes at once a symbol and a reality. On the physical plane it is the day of destiny when Satyavan must die. But at a deeper level, and almost paradoxically, it is the dawn of creation, the coming of Hope and Light and effort and beauty and joy into the world. The prophesied day of the fatal stroke is described so beautifully because regardless of the dark somber night, the Divine Mother is there bending over earth to bring about the needed change. She is the giver of Hope, of Light, of Beauty, of Strength, of Bliss. Her coming, her Presence is the sure sign that all will turn out to be good for even out of darkness, She can pluck out the Light. Lighting the commonest of objects, even the dust below our feet, She creates shapes of beauty. She is indeed the Creatrix Consciousness, the Power of the Lord of whom the sun is a representative symbol. Even as the sun stays where he is but awakens, illumines and conducts all the operations of creation from its birth until its passing, – or its evolutionary change, through the Rays leaning across the spaces, so too She has come from the land of shadowless Light reaching out to one and all for the enormous task before Her.

But this is not the first time this is happening. Whenever creation has been plunged into darkness, in a state of utter oblivion, loosing al strength and hope, She comes. Listening to the cry of Nature, She arrives from the other side of boundlessness to change all this into Light by Her transfiguring touch. When that happens, then all grows beautiful and joyous, all is uplifted as a sacrament reaching out to the highest abode of Truth. The will and the joy to live is born with Her coming and man once again takes up the journey of Fate whose far ends are not visible to his eyes.

All this is revealed to us at the very opening. It is as if the essence of the story is being given to us. Savitri is after all the story of the Divine Mother’s Advent that will change the tides of Time. It is the story of the conquest over darkness by Her Light and Peace and Love. It is the story of conjugal love conquering death, the conjugal love born of the eternal wedding of the human soul struggling in ignorance with its Divine Beloved. If that can happen, if the human soul can give itself unreservedly to the Divine Mother, surrender itself to Her transfiguring touch, then nothing is impossible. Such is the message of Savitri, the message of hope that comes by the Presence of Divine Love in creation. After all creation is not an accident, it is a divine event. There is a Will and Wisdom working in its heart. True it has plunged into darkness and seems to have lost its aim and direction but She is there to redeem it by Her Love and Light. She is there as an inmost Presence moulding the clay by Her unseen Presence working behind the seemingly mechanical workings of material nature. But more importantly, She descends into our obscure outer fields of Ignorance, dons the terrestrial robe of mortality and death, stands as the leader and queen of the human march, fights for us against inevitable Destiny and the complex workings of blind Fate to win the godlike game for man. Because She is there, the world can hope and dare, because She is there, the world can climb towards the Light, because She is there, the world forgets to die, because She is there man will one day cross the dangerous brink of Death that skirts throughout his journey of life and discover the pathways of Immortality.

She is not only up above but here too, in a human body. Through the toil of the Ages, She labours to mould creation and man into a perfect image of God. But some consent is needed form man for Her workings to have full effect. Even without this consent the Truth hidden behind nature is sure to reveal itself but our consent will make the journey shorter and smoother. Alas! Man prefers the comfort zones of his ignorance rather than the great adventure of Life to discover its own hidden truth. He prefers his routine and accustomed ways rather than the greatest of all adventures that will take him eventually even beyond the gods. He prefers his little comforts and small ephemeral joys rather than be charged with the passion of the Infinite. He repels the Light and prefers to go back to sleep in the night of his ignorance which he mistakenly calls Light. And when the true Light comes into his life, he rejects its divine gifts doubting them and prefers instead the old and ‘seemingly secure’ ways. Nay, he even tries to capture the Splendour that has come from afar and shut it into his little room with locks of creeds and cults. The Light comes for all but he tries to appropriate it for his own personal use, claiming it for himself alone for his egoistic uses. He erects temples and churches and mosques around the Divine Name but refuses to build the one true temple of the Godhead that dwells within his own heart, refuses to participate in the great labour of creation to manifest the Godhead hidden in the depths of creation, refuses to change and be transformed by Her touch of Love.

Such has been the story so far. But the Divine Mother refuses to give up. She knows that it is not man but the Inconscient that holds the human soul captive in its net of ignorance and death. All growth is out of darkness into the Light and darkness does not easily give up its reign. It extracts its price of suffering which is what it knows. It inflicts upon the Light and its messengers the law of misery and pain, it afflicts us with unconsciousness and imprisons it with the deceptive play of falsehood that makes us turn away from Light and Peace and Truth and Love. But She has come and all will surely change. While man can and must collaborate but Her work does not depend upon man. She has been laboring since earth began, nay She has been there even before the elements could emerge. Her Love has plunged into the darkness of Inconscient and fights with doom. That is why in spite of everything slowly the Light grows and man evolves and earth moves further in its tremendous journey towards the Light. It is Her Work and She is bound to succeed but meanwhile man must go through the state of death and darkness knowing that She is here. She is here upon Earth, leaving Her Abode of Truth. She has chosen to make earth our home for whom Heavens was small. She has accepted the burden of human Fate even though man refuses and the abyss denies. She has become the sacrifice so that man may burn in Her purifying Fire and emerge as a new being with a new body and mind and this earthly life become the Life Divine.

This is the great significance of Her coming, Her coming for which seers and sages have waited and aspired for.

Her coming they had asked for earth and men.

 [Savitri: 332]