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16. Past Lives of Sadhaks

 

Mother and Sri Aurobindo were on earth at all critical periods of evolution to guide it, said Sri Aurobindo. Answering a question about how long they were on earth, he said since the beginning. Mother always said that all those who are here in the Ashram, those who were here and even those who had left the Ashram, were with them in several previous births. Everyone of them had, in earlier births, prayed to Her for the boon of being with Her at the time of Divine fulfilment. And that is why they are all here, said Mother.

In a certain period, Mother was telling sadhaks about their previous births. To one sadhak she said that she saw an emanation of Vivekananda on him. Another was a Roman general. Commenting on the royal robes of an actor on the Ashram stage, Mother said he looked exactly like his past self as a Roman Emperor. Reincarnations of Hector, Moses, Lalitha [Radha's play mate], a French king and Confucius were found by her among her disciples.

TRANSFORMATION

For human life to be transformed into Divine Life, the ego should be replaced by the soul, the thoughts of mind by the jyothi of the spirit, the attachment of the heart by divine love, the excitement of the vital by the delight of the spirit, the habitual efficiency of the body by the unfettered power of the gods, death by immortality, etc. All expressions of darkness and falsehood must be replaced by expressions of light and truth. Purna yoga's central endeavour is to bring this about.

When we receive blessings from the Mother, when we think of Her and feel we belong to her, when we really see Mother acting in our lives, we see the expressions of such a transformation.

An industrialist devotee came to the Ashram on his usual annual visit, met a visitor who had come there, and discussed his own affairs in his factory. The industrialist was pleased by the half-hour discussion with the visitor and even felt that it might be useful. A week later the visitor received a cheque for Rs.2,000, requesting him to use it for the work he was doing for Mother. The industrialist was known to be a miser of a hard type. Not many people had succeeded with him in matters of money. Everyone who personally knew the industrialist refused to believe the news. Some could not even believe it after seeing the cheque. Misers of reputation have shown the ‘Divine Truth' that misers do have generosity when they relate to Mother and have acted as men of generosity. Whenever you find a man acting exactly opposite to his nature, you can be sure Mother is at work. That is her power of transformation.

The owner of a coconut garden prayed to Mother that the theft of nuts from his garden should stop. It stopped. Two men came to him. They announced that they were the thieves and that they had decided to turn over a new leaf. Theft can stop in response to prayer. The thief changing his ways and announcing it to his victim is unheard of. Wherever it exists, it is transformation. Wherever Mother acts, that touch of transformation is inevitably there.

Mother has named the flower of the Indian Cork tree ‘transformation'. A bank's offering more money than applied for; dishonest villagers returning their loans on their own; an applicant who pleaded for the inclusion of his name in the selection panel, cancelling the previous rejection order, finding his name included, not in the panel, but in the selected list; the aspirant for a bank clerkship being recruited as a bank agent; the buyer of a property offering a higher price than the one quoted by the seller-are not common to human life. They are the experiences of the devotees and expressions of Mother's power of transformation.



book | by Dr. Radut