| Sri Aurobindo |
|---|
 |
Arya: A Philosophical Review was a 64-page monthly periodical written by Sri Aurobindo and published in India between 1914 and 1921. The majority of the material which initially appeared in the Arya was later edited and published in book-form as The Life Divine, The Synthesis of Yoga, The Secret of the Veda, The Foundations of Indian Culture and The Ideal of Human Unity as well as a number of translations of Vedic literature.
The Arya was conceived as a joint venture of Sri Aurobindo and Paul Richard, a French national residing at Pondicherry, in the spring of 1914. Sri Aurobindo remarked on more than one occasion that, though he was not averse to the idea, it was Richard who initially proposed the project of publishing a journal. In a letter to Dilip Kumar Roy dated 4 September 1934, he wrote:
I knew precious little about philosophy before I did the Yoga and came to Pondicherry — I was a poet and a politician, not a philosopher! How I managed to do it? First, because Richard proposed to me to co-operate in a philosophical review — and as my theory was that a Yogi ought to be able to turn his hand to anything, I could not very well refuse.... [1]
It was clear to Sri Aurobindo that the proposed journal would represent a medium through which he could give voice to his still-emerging philosophy – both in India and abroad. In a letter to Motilal Roy from June 1914, he wrote:
[This] attempt takes the form of a new philosophical review with Richard and myself as Editors — the Arya, which is to be brought out in French and English, two separate editions, — one for France, one for India, England and America. In this Review my new theory of the Veda will appear as also translation and explanation of the Upanishads, a series of essays giving my system of Yoga and a book of Vedantic philosophy (not Shankara's but Vedic Vedanta) giving the Upanishadic foundations of my theory of the ideal life towards which humanity must move. You will see so far as my share is concerned, it will be the intellectual side of my work for the world. [2]
Although it is unknown who was responsible for the choice of Arya as the title of the journal, Sri Aurobindo explained what he understood the term to represent. In the second issue (September 1914), he composed an article entitled Arya: Its Significance in which he set forth the meaning of the term as he intended it. He wrote:
Intrinsically, in its most fundamental sense, arya means an effort or an uprising and overcoming. The Aryan is he who strives and overcomes all outside him and within him that stands opposed to the human advance. Self-conquest is the first law of his nature. He overcomes earth and the body and does not consent like ordinary men to their dullness, inertia, dead routine and tamasic limitations. He overcomes life and its energies and refuses to be dominated by their hungers and cravings or enslaved by their rajasic passions. He overcomes the mind and its habits, he does not live in a shell of ignorance, inherited prejudices, customary ideas, pleasant opinions, but knows how to seek and choose, to be large and flexible in intelligence even as he is firm and strong in his will. For in everything he seeks truth, in everything right, in everything height and freedom. [3]
The Arya was advertised as "a review of pure philosophy" [4] with a twofold object:
The method of the review was described as one of "realism, at once rational and transcendental; a realism consisting in the unification of intellectual and scientific discipline with those of intuitive experimentation." [4]
The material appearing in the Arya was organized under four main headings:
Although Sri Aurobindo and Richard had planned to share the work of writing and editing the material which was to appear in the journal, Richard was ordered by the French Government to leave Pondicherry and return to France in the middle of 1915. [2] As a result, the French edition of the journal (Revue de Grande Synthèse) was discontinued after only seven issues. [5] Subscriptions for Arya had been sold prior to publication, and Sri Aurobindo was left with the task of completing the outstanding issues. As he remarked in 1934:
[...] And then he [Richard] had to go to the war and left me in the lurch with 64 pages a month of philosophy all to write by my lonely self... [1]
Excepting the three contributions made by Richard to the journal (The Wherefore of the Worlds, The Eternal Wisdom and the short Sons of Heaven; see below), the bulk of the remainder was composed by Sri Aurobindo himself.
In 1921, after six and a half years of uninterrupted publication, Sri Aurobindo discontinued the Arya. In a private discussion in 1926, he gave his reasons for this decision:
I stopped the Arya when I found that I had to put myself out to much — so to say, externalized too much. The second reason was that I required to be drawn within myself in order to develop certain experiences, so that the energy might be used for inward work. [6]
Although Sri Aurobindo had discontinued its publication, there was an increasing demand for back issues of the Arya after 1921. This led him to have the Arya reprinted in seven volumes, preserving the order in which the articles had originally appeared. The contents of these seven volumes are as follows: [7]
Yoga is a group of physical, mental, and spiritual practices or disciplines which originated in ancient India and aim to control (yoke) and still the mind, recognizing a detached witness-consciousness untouched by the mind (Citta) and mundane suffering (Duḥkha). There is a wide variety of schools of yoga, practices, and goals in Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism, and traditional and modern yoga is practiced worldwide.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to Hinduism:
The Gāyatrī Mantra, also known as the Sāvitri Mantra, is a highly revered mantra from the Rig Veda, dedicated to the Vedic deity Savitr. Gāyatrī is the name of the Goddess of the Vedic Mantra in which the verse is composed. Its recitation is traditionally preceded by oṃ and the formula bhūr bhuvaḥ svaḥ, known as the mahāvyāhṛti, or "great (mystical) utterance". The Gayatri mantra is cited widely in Vedic and post-Vedic texts, such as the mantra listings of the Śrauta liturgy, and classical Hindu texts such as the Bhagavad Gita, Harivamsa, and Manusmṛti. The mantra and its associated metric form was known by the Buddha, and in one sutra the Buddha is described as "expressing their appreciation" for the mantra. The mantra is an important part of the upanayana ceremony for young males in Hinduism, and has long been recited by dvija men as part of their daily rituals. Modern Hindu reform movements spread the practice of the mantra to include women and all castes and its use is now very widespread. It is considered one of the most important and powerful Vedic mantras.
Nolini Kanta Gupta was a revolutionary, linguist, scholar, critic, poet, philosopher and yogi, and the most senior of Sri Aurobindo's disciples. He was born in Faridpur, East Bengal, to a cultured and prosperous Vaidya-Brahmin family. While in his teens, he came under the influence of Sri Aurobindo, then a well known revolutionary fighting for independence against the British. When in his fourth year at Presidency College, Calcutta, he left a promising academic career and rejected a lucrative government job to join a small revolutionary group under Sri Aurobindo. In May 1908 he was among those arrested for conspiracy in the Alipore bomb case. Acquitted a year later, after having spent a year in jail, he worked as a sub-editor for the Dharma and the Karmayogin, two of Sri Aurobindo's Nationalist newspapers, in 1909 and 1910.
M. P. Pandit was a spiritual author, teacher and Sanskrit scholar. For several decades, he was a secretary of the Mother of the Sri Aurobindo Ashram. He wrote numerous books and articles on the yoga of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, on social and political thought, science, philosophy, religion, mysticism, and the classical texts and spiritual traditions of India.
The Isha Upanishad is one of the shortest Upanishads, embedded as the final chapter (adhyāya) of the Shukla Yajurveda. It is a Mukhya Upanishad, and is known in two recensions, called Kanva (VSK) and Madhyandina (VSM). The Upanishad is a brief poem, consisting of 17 or 18 verses, depending on the recension.
The Aitareya Upanishad is a Mukhya Upanishad, associated with the Rigveda. It comprises the fourth, fifth and sixth chapters of the second book of Aitareya Aranyaka, which is one of the four layers of Rig vedic text.
The Kaushitaki Upanishad is an ancient Sanskrit text contained inside the Rigveda. It is associated with the Kaushitaki shakha, but a Sāmānya Upanishad, meaning that it is "common" to all schools of Vedanta. It was included in Robert Hume's list of 13 Principal Upanishads, and lists as number 25 in the Muktika canon of 108 Upanishads.
The Advent is a quarterly magazine produced by the Sri Aurobindo Ashram, and is "Dedicated to the Exposition of Sri Aurobindo's Vision of the Future".
Svādhyāya is a Sanskrit term which means self-study and especially the recitation of the Vedas and other sacred texts. It is also a broader concept with several meanings. In various schools of Hinduism, Svadhyaya is a Niyama connoting introspection and "study of self".
Sri Anirvan, born Narendra Chandra Dhar, was an Indian Hindu monk, writer and philosopher. Widely known as a scholar, his principal works were a Bengali translation of Sri Aurobindo's The Life Divine and the three-volume treatise Veda Mimamsa.
The Shrimad Bhagavad Gita, often referred to as the Gita, is a 700-verse Hindu scripture that is part of the epic Mahabharata, dated to the second half of the first millennium BCE and is typical of the Hindu synthesis. It is considered to be one of the holy scriptures for Hinduism.
Sri Aurobindo was an Indian philosopher, yoga guru, maharishi, poet, and Indian nationalist. He was also a journalist, editing newspapers such as Bande Mataram. He joined the Indian movement for independence from British colonial rule, until 1910 was one of its influential leaders and then became a spiritual reformer, introducing his visions on human progress and spiritual evolution.
The Kena Upanishad is a Vedic Sanskrit text classified as one of the primary or Mukhya Upanishads that is embedded inside the last section of the Talavakara Brahmanam of the Samaveda. It is listed as number 2 in the Muktikā, the canon of the 108 Upanishads of Hinduism.
Ānanda literally means bliss or happiness. In the Hindu Vedas, Upanishads and Bhagavad gita, ānanda signifies eternal bliss which accompanies the ending of the rebirth cycle. Those who renounce the fruits of their actions and submit themselves completely to the divine will, arrive at the final termination of the cyclical life process (saṃsāra) to enjoy eternal bliss (ānanda) in perfect union with the godhead. The tradition of seeking union with God through loving commitment is referred to as bhakti, or devotion.
Chaitanya refers variously to 'awareness', 'consciousness', 'Conscious Self', 'intelligence' or 'Pure Consciousness'. It can also mean energy or enthusiasm.
Prajña or Pragya as प्रज्ञा, प्राज्ञ and प्राज्ञा is used to refer to the highest and purest form of wisdom, intelligence and understanding. Pragya is the state of wisdom which is higher than the knowledge obtained by reasoning and inference.
Judith Tyberg (1902–1980) was an American yogi ("Jyotipriya") and a renowned Sanskrit scholar and orientalist. Author of The Language of the Gods and two other reputed texts on Sanskrit, she was the founder and guiding spirit of the East-West Cultural Center in Los Angeles, California, a major pioneering door through which now-celebrated Indian yogis and spiritual teachers of many Eastern and mystical traditions were first introduced to America and the West.
Vibhu (Sanskrit:विभु) means – 'mighty', 'powerful', 'eminent', 'supreme', 'able to', 'capable of', 'self-subdued', 'firm' or 'self-controlled'; in Nyaya philosophy, it means – 'eternal', 'existing everywhere', 'all-pervading', 'pervading all material things'. This word also refers to manas or mind. This word has its root in the term, bhū ( भू), meaning – 'become', 'arise', 'come into existence'; thus vibhu means – 'expand', 'become manifest', 'appear', 'pervade'.
Sushrut Badhe is an Indian author, researcher on Sanskrit scripture and manufacturer of Ayurvedic products. He has rewritten the Sanskrit scriptures Bhagavad Gita and three Upanishads, Isha, Kena and Mandukya in rhymed English.