Sri Aurobindo
Letters of Sri Aurobindo
Forth Series
Fragment ID: 21161
(this fragment is largest or earliest found passage)
Sri Aurobindo — Unknown addressee
February 8, 1934
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The Isha Upanishad passage1 is of course a much larger statement of the nature of universal existence than the Einstein theory which is confined to the physical universe. You can deduce too a much larger law of relativity from the statement in the verse. What it means from this point of view – for it contains much more in it – is that the absolute Reality exists, but it is immovable and always the same, the universal movement is a motion of consciousness in this Reality of which only the Transcendent itself can seize the truth, which is self-evident to It, while the apprehension of it by the Gods (the mind, senses, etc.) must necessarily be imperfect and relative, since they can try to follow but none can really overtake (apprehend or seize) that Truth, each being limited by its own view-point2, lesser instrumentality or capacity of consciousness, etc. This is the familiar attitude of the Indian or at least the Vedantic mind which held that our knowledge, perception and experience of things in the world and of the world itself must be vyāvahārika, relative, practical or pragmatic only,– so declared Shankara,– it is in fact an illusory knowledge, the real Truth of things lying beyond our mental and sensory consciousness. Einstein’s relativity is a scientific, not a metaphysical statement. The form and field of it are different – but, I suppose, if one goes back from it and beyond it to its essential significance, the real reason for its being so, one can connect it with the Vedantic conclusion. But to justify that to the intellect, you would have to go through a whole process to show how the connection comes – it does not self-evidently follow.
As for Jeans, many would say that his conclusions are not at all legitimate. Einstein’s law is a scientific generalisation based upon certain relations proper to the domain of physics and, if valid, valid there in the limits of that domain, or, if you like, in the general domain of scientific observation and measurement of physical processes and motions, but how can you transform that at once into a metaphysical generalisation? It is a jump over a considerable gulf – or a forceful transformation of one thing into another, of a limited physical result into an unlimited all-embracing formula. I don’t quite know what Einstein’s law really amounts to – but does it amount to more than this that our scientific measurements of time and other things are, in the conditions under which they have to be made, relative because subject to the unavoidable drawback of these conditions? What metaphysically follows from that – if anything at all does follow – it is for the metaphysicians, not the scientists to determine. The Vedantic position was that the Mind itself (as well as the senses) is a limited power making its own representation
, constructions, formations and imposing them on the Reality. That is a much bigger and more intricate affair shooting down into the very roots of our existence. I think myself there are many positions taken by modern Science which tend to be helpful to that view – though in the nature of things they cannot be sufficient to prove it.
I state the objections only; I myself see certain fundamental truths underlying all the domains and the one Reality everywhere. But there is also a
great difference in the instruments used and the ways of research followed by the seekers in these different ways (the physical, the occult and the spiritual) and for the intellect at least the bridge between them has still to be built. One can point out analogies, but it can be maintained very well that Science cannot be used for yielding or buttressing results of spiritual knowledge. The other side can be maintained also and it is best that both should be stated – so this is not meant to discourage your thesis.
1 “One unmoving that is swifter than Mind, That the Gods reach not, for It progresses ever in front. That, standing, passes beyond others as they run.” Isha Upanishad, Verse 4. Sri Aurobindo’s translation. See Sri Aurobindo, Eight Upanishads (1965 Edition), p.5.
2 The Gods besides are in and subject to Space and Time, part of the motion in Space and Time, not superior to it.
3 SABCL, volume 22; CWSA, volume 28: representations
4 CWSA, volume 28: is a
Current publication:
[Largest or earliest found passage: ] Sri Aurobindo. Letters of Sri Aurobindo: In 4 Series.- Forth Series [On Yoga].- Bombay: Sri Aurobindo Sircle, 1951.- 652 p.
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