Chapter 3June 14, 1967

There was a movement of excitement and a stone came from the street and hit the wire screen of my window – only one. I knew why, who it was.

It was quite interesting.

(For the past eight days, Mother has been "ill," just as the conflict between Israel and Egypt was

unfolding.)

A great battle.... I have learned a great many things.

And it's going on.

I've made discoveries.... Diseases, accidents, catastrophes, wars, all of that is because the human material consciousness is so small, so narrow that it has a rabid taste for drama. And of course, there is, behind, the vital being having fun, also influences... anyway all that enjoys an opportunity to delay the divine Work and make things difficult. And all that takes pleasure in that naturally encourages drama. But the seed of the difficulty is that smallness, extreme smallness of the physical consciousness – the material physical consciousness – which has an absolutely perverse taste for drama. Drama – the slightest thing has to make a drama: if you have a toothache, it turns into a drama63 ; if you bang against something, it turns into a drama; if two nations quarrel, it turns into a drama – everything turns into a drama. The taste for drama. If anything in your body is even slightly upset or there is the smallest trouble, which should go completely unnoticed, oh, it makes a big fuss, a drama. The taste for drama. I was deeply disgusted.

Everything, everything... Like the bedlam at a marketplace.

The attack was apparently violent, so violent that after studying and observing it I was forced to think that some people were having fun doing black magic.... Everything took on fantastic proportions. The same teeth I've had for such a long time (in the same state for such a long time, that is!), which for years hadn't given me any trouble, suddenly fancied they too had to make a drama! So, a raging toothache, swelling – absolutely ridiculous, absolutely. And you know, this discovery of drama wasn't thought out, it wasn't an observation: it was an acute experience, caught hold of as you would catch a thief. I caught it. And it's universal, all over the earth.

Because EVERYTHING was creating drama – the roars of a marketplace, bedlam, all of it, a big fuss. Like those people out there when they fought each other, the same fuss (gesture expressing the roaring turmoil of the war). What a to-do they make! What with "rights" and "duties" and "honor," oh!... So then, as things were pretty bad (I was almost completely incapacitated64 ), I asked what it meant (Mother laughs), and he showed me the picture! Then I understood.

It's profoundly ridiculous, and unhealthy, moreover. You understand, once the thing had been seen – seen and felt and lived completely – they started slowing down there. I can't say things are quite all right as yet, far from it, but anyway I think a worse catastrophe has been averted.65

Grotesque. Things are somewhat better. There is still some friction.... "Traitors," "enemies," oh!... Now they say that Indonesia and Pakistan are up to something.... And with EVERYTHING, you know, from the biggest to the smallest, from what seems the most important (what disturbs the most things, at any rate) to the least little physical discomfort, it's like that: a very small, such a very small consciousness, petty and limited and narrow, which makes a mountain out of a molehill.

There you are.

(silence)

Because what took place is nothing new, it has happened so many times before, but the body's experience was different.... Previously, the consciousness of all the other inner beings was there and would happily counterbalance this idiotic tendency: even the vital, the vital being which also loves grand effects, but provided at least they are great, vast, powerful enough to be on a large scale and save it from being ridiculous; and then, positively above all that, all the other beings, with a smile. But this time, this body was left TO ITSELF, so it would learn. And it has learned.

But death, too, is the result of the taste for drama – what a pretty drama, ugh!

(silence)

Well, there you are.

And as, naturally, it became impossible to eat, another consequence was that it became impossible to do any work.... The doctor made me take proteins that don't need to be digested, those that are directly injected into the blood, but he made me swallow them. Then I was able to resume some work – I could no longer speak, no longer eat, no longer...

It went on worsening nicely, till the day (I forget which) when I said with "high indignation" (Mother takes on a dramatic tone), "What is this creation in which..." (I said it in English) "in which living is a suffering, dying is a suffering, everything is a suffering...." (Mother laughs) As soon as that was uttered, it was enough. And the consciousness was there, saying, "There is only one remedy, but the world rejects that remedy." Then I was put in the presence of the fact, face to face with it, the thing staring at me – oh, what a pretty drama!

(silence)

I wondered whether it was peculiar to the earth and if the other planets and suns weren't in this idiotic situation?... On an external level it would be interesting to know. But I am nearly sure that death, for 64For nearly eight days, Mother could not eat or receive the secretaries or anyone else.

exclusively human, because those animals that live with man catch the malady, while those that don't don't have it at all.

(silence)

I saw this child [Sujata] on Sunday; I didn't look too great, did I?

(Sujata:) No, Mother!

I couldn't speak anymore....

Well, that's more or less something of my experience. Oh, it was... a lot, a lot more than that.

For two days the sense of not knowing whether you are alive or dead (but these are words on the surface), of not being very sure of the difference it makes.... And then, the body asking this question: "But everyone has his theory: one says death is like this, another says it's like that, yet another says still something different, but what is our OWN experience like?..." And it was like that (gesture of hanging between two worlds).

Then the body suddenly remembered (that was rather interesting; it's more recent, it was yesterday or the day before), the body suddenly remembered that it had once been brought back to life. It said, "But you knew at that time, you knew since you brought me back to life."66 Then I recollected what I used to know (and had stopped knowing because the knowledge was quite incomplete – it was entirely external and lacked the higher knowledge), I recollected the experience, and the two things joined together [the old knowledge and the new]. "Now," I said, "this is interesting!"

You know, the story of the "soul leaving the body," what childishness! Because I had that experience, too, of leaving (not the soul! It's entirely independent, always and in everyone), of leaving the psychic being, the individual psychic being. When I went away from here in 1915, I left my psychic being here deliberately. I left it here, I didn't take it with me. So the body can live without psychic being (it was rather sick, by the way, but that wasn't the reason – it's again the taste for drama!... Oh, always the taste for drama!).

There we are.

So the problem narrows down more and more.... If your most material vital being goes out, it doesn't make you die – it puts you in catalepsy, but it doesn't make you die. What makes you die?...

There are two things that make you die. One (the one that precedes the dramatic human existence) is wear and tear. What does wear and tear come from? From Ignorance, obviously. Ignorance and incapacity to renew forces; that's how the whole lower life works: it decomposes, recomposes, decomposes again.... But it's only with animality and the beginning of a mental functioning that there arises (Mother takes on a grandiloquent tone) "death," as we conceive it. But that is when the vital element that gives life (what we call "life") breaks down. There are innumerable reasons for that, all of which come from the same source. Of course, looking at it as a whole, it is the incapacity to follow the movement of progress: the need to mix everything together again in order to start all over again. But for those who begin to think, that no longer has any reason to exist.

An accident?... An accident to the material combination. But which accident, since the heart can stop and start again? It's a question of how long the accident lasts.

transformation (not with words – the vibration)... That experience has been given me several times. Suppose something is quite upset, there is a pain somewhere, something disorganized that no longer works properly; if there is the vision and conception in faith (faith and consecration to the Supreme) that it's deliberate, that the Supreme has allowed it to be (how can I express it? All words are meaningless), has allowed or willed it, or wanted it to be, because to Him it was the best way to transform the thing, to have it make the necessary progress, if the cells that are somewhat disorganized and "sick," as they say, are able to feel this... then, instantly, it takes a marvelous turn for the better – instantly, in five minutes, ten minutes. I could give concrete, precise examples, with all the details. So that means bringing the two extremes into contact, I might say. And if that can become the normal life of the elements which make up this outer form, then there is no reason why...

No, there is no need to die, no need whatsoever. There comes a point when death loses all meaning. And in the small detail, in the little cell or the faint sensation (and when you come to feelings, there is some kind of thing which is the embryo of thought – oh, then...), you catch the taste for drama. Ah, then everything is explained.

The taste for drama, the need for catastrophe. That's what was there, pressing and pressing on the earth to bring about all the conditions for a clashing and clangoring grand finale (Mother shrugs her shoulders).

And only one remedy: to broaden into eternal peace... To break limits, become immense.

(long silence)

You said just a while ago that your body remembered an earlier death...

Oh, yes.

But you didn't say what that recollection was.

Yes, everybody knows it: it happened at Tlemcen while I was working with Théon. I had gone out in a wholly material way, the body was in a cataleptic state, and something came, something occurred that cut the link. So the link was cut.

But what was the experience like at that time?

The experience was that... (laughing) impossible to get back in there! But Théon was there (Théon had a bad scare!), and there was at that time the knowledge – a good deal of knowledge! – of the occult. The knowledge was there as well as the will (Mother makes a gesture of pushing to reenter the body), and also an inner faith (but I never used to talk about that), and a concentration. As for him, he was capable, he knew. He was able to "pull." And the body hadn't deteriorated, you see, it wasn't damaged, so it wasn't difficult. It was in a very good condition, but the thread was cut, which means that what gives life had gone out and could not get back in.

I came back in as a result of the power and the will, because... In fact, simply because I still had something to do on earth.

It happened in 1910, I think.

Oh, that's just words!

The soul may very likely make a resolve, noting that the body is either unworthy or unfit or incapable or unwilling or... anything, and the soul may decide that the body should die so it may go; but the soul's going isn't what kills the body. There are innumerable people who are without a soul – they have a soul, but their soul isn't in their body – lots of people. And they go on living quite well.

It's more difficult to live without the psychic being, on the other hand. The psychic being, of course, is the clothing – the individualized clothing – between the eternal soul and the transitory body; and [from life to life] it grows more formed, individualized, more and more individually conscious. When that leaves the body, the rest generally follows. But I had the experience of doing it deliberately, so I KNOW. One has to know how to do it, but it can be done. My psychic being stayed here with Sri Aurobindo, and I left with my mental, vital and physical beings. It was a... slightly precarious condition. But as I also kept the contact quite consciously, it could be done.

What people call "death"... I see loads of people who, to me, are living dead (they are those who are without their psychic being, or even those who have no contact with their soul). But to know that, one must have the inner vision. But what people call "death," that is, the decomposition of the cells and dissolution of the form, is when the most material "vital subdegree," which brings into contact with Life – with vital force, life – goes out. That is how death occurs in animals, for example. And that vital subdegree generally goes away when the external organism is unable to continue – when, for instance, it's cut in two or the heart has been removed, or anyway when something quite radical has happened to it! Because some people have met with accidents and had many parts missing, yet they lived on. But even cardiac arrest, as I said, doesn't necessarily mean death, since after stopping, the heart can start up again. Those who have the material knowledge tell you that for a few... I forget whether a few seconds or a few minutes, the heart can start up again; after that, decomposition sets in. With decomposition it's over, naturally.

So we could correctly say that there are kinds of GRADATIONS in death. Gradations in life and gradations in death: some beings are alive to a greater or lesser degree, or if we want to put it negatively, some beings are dead to a greater or lesser degree. But for those who know, oh, for those who know that this material form can manifest a supramental light, well, those who don't have the supramental light in them are already a little dead. That's how it is. So there are gradations. What people have conventionally called "death" is just a purely external phenomenon, because it's something they can't deny – the body going to pieces.

But I have seen people who were supposedly dead (not many in my family because it wasn't the custom to let the children see them, and once I was grown-up there were only very few opportunities), but I have seen a few here. And they weren't all in the same state at all – far from it.

(silence)

There was the case of Sri Aurobindo. "He is dead," the doctors decided – he was absolutely alive. Absolutely living. And even after five days, when they put him into... it was because of (how should I put it?) the pressure of the outside world, and because it was impossible to preserve him. We had to consent. But I cannot say he was dead! He wasn't at all dead, it was perfectly obvious. The body was already beginning to... (very little, but a little at the end of the fifth day), that is, the skin was losing its color, but... (Mother makes a glorious gesture).

For the first three days, I remained standing there, near his bed, and in an absolutely... well, to me, it Then people say, "He is dead" – that's ignorance.

(silence)

All that supramental power he had attracted into and organized in his body little by little came into me METHODICALLY.

I didn't say anything to anyone because it was nobody's business, nobody's concern. I remained standing there and... (gesture showing the forces passing from Sri Aurobindo into Mother's body).

You know, people revel in high-sounding words and keep talking and talking – they don't even know what they're talking about.

Not very long ago, I saw one or two photographs of someone, then he came to see me. I said, "He is dead, he's a dead man." And I don't mean a dissolution at all (of course not! Since he came in and spoke – he spoke very loudly, thinking himself very alive, in fact): he was dead. So...

(silence)

Some time ago, I said that the cells were wondering, "But what is death?" They kept wondering like that. And just yesterday or the day before, because there came a certain state, the Knowledge that constantly comes from above seemed to be saying to them, "But why do you wonder? You had the experience, you know how it is." Then, to the small central consciousness (there is a small central consciousness,67 which is now gradually growing and taking shape), this Knowledge said, "Don't you remember? You know how it was." Ah, then all the memory of the experience in all its details came back – they did know.

Why are we so ridiculous? We think we are... we think we are so great, so wise, so... Oh, all the virtues we give ourselves! (Mother laughs) So courageous, so enduring, so... An act we put on for ourselves our whole life long.

(silence)

At that time, for a few moments, there was the certitude of such a simplicity!... A simplicity... (how can I put it?) whose immensity made it all-powerful.

That's still literature. It's the mind's playacting: pretty sentences. No words, no sentences, no wonderful gestures, no attitudes...

(Mother goes into a contemplation)

Oh, for those who like definitions, here's another answer to "What is the Divine?" – a smiling and luminous Immensity.

And HERE, you know, it's here. HERE. Ah, shall we work? Enough chattering!

(silence)