See also
Wikiquote has quotations related to Intermediate zone .
- Barzakh, the intermediate zone in Islam.
- Spiritual bypass
In Sri Aurobindo's philosophy, the Intermediate zone refers to a dangerous and misleading transitional spiritual state between the ordinary consciousness and true spiritual realisation. [1]
Similar notions can be found in mystical literature, such as "the astral plane" and "the hall of illusion." [2] The Theosophist W. Q. Judge used the similar notion of "astral intoxication". [3]
The Intermediate Zone is first described in a letter to a disciple in the early 1930s. It was then published in 1933 in The Riddle of this World , a small booklet that includes several essays. The letter later appeared in Letters on Yoga . [4] More recently, a number of copies have been posted on the Internet. [1] [5] A shorter but similar reference to a misleading intermediate consciousness, but without the distinguishing qualifier "zone", is also found in some of the later strata of The Synthesis of Yoga which dates to the early 1940s. [6]
Aurobindo asserted that spiritual aspirants may pass through an intermediate zone where experiences of force, inspiration, illumination, light, joy, expansion, power, and freedom from normal limits are possible. These can become associated with personal aspirations, ambitions, notions of spiritual fulfilment and yogic siddhi, and even be falsely interpreted as full spiritual realisation. One can pass through this zone, and the associated spiritual dangers, without harm by perceiving its real nature, and seeing through the misleading experiences. Those who go astray in it may end in a spiritual disaster, or may remain stuck there and adopt some half-truth as the whole truth, or become an instrument of lesser powers of these transitional planes. According to Aurobindo, this happens to many sadhaks and yogis. [1] [5]
In his posthumously published book, Vernal Blooms, Theosophist William Quan Judge (1851-1896) describes the dangers of "astral intoxication". He asserts that the astral plane, which is the same as that of our psychic senses, has endless powers of delusion. It has to be well understood before the student can stay there long without danger. He states that phenomena, such as astral lights, moments of peace and revelation, do not indicate spiritual advancement. To regard every picture seen in the astral light as a spiritual experience is like becoming drunk. Such indulgence only results in becoming satiated with a store of illusory appearances. True progress is dependent upon purity of motive, and conquest of known or ascertainable defects. [3]
The dangers of astral intoxication or delusion are greatest for the person who revolves selfishly around himself. This may happen when one lacks the support and company of other sincere seekers. One
...must first dispel the inner darkness before trying to see into the darkness without; we must know ourselves before knowing things extraneous to ourselves. [3]
Paul Brunton included Sri Aurobindo's term of the "Intermediate Zone" as a name for a psychological and immature mystical level of delusion and subtle ego. [7]
Brunton uses several terms, such as astral plane, the intermediate zone, the hall of illusion. Once there, egoism becomes stimulated by the subtle forces they have evoked, the emotional nature becomes more sensitive and more fluid, the imaginative power becomes more active and is less restrained. If a person then falls victim to spiritual error regarding this state, the result is swollen vanity, superstitious credulity, emotions run riot, and wild imagination. Brunton considered this a major factor in explaining the human wreckage found on the spiritual path. [8]
Astral projection is a term used in esotericism to describe an intentional out-of-body experience (OBE) that assumes the existence of a subtle body called an "astral body" through which consciousness can function separately from the physical body and travel throughout the astral plane.
Mother Meera, born Kamala Reddy is believed by her devotees to be an embodiment (Avatar) of the Divine Mother.
In esoteric cosmology, a plane is conceived as a subtle state, level, or region of reality, each plane corresponding to some type, kind, or category of being.
The term involution refers to different things depending on the writer. In some instances it refers to a process that occurs prior to evolution and gives rise to the cosmos, in others an aspect of evolution, and still others a process that follows the completion of evolution in the human form.
Satprem was a French author and a disciple of Mirra Alfassa.
Paul Brunton is the pen name of Raphael Hurst, a British author of spiritual books. He is best known as one of the early popularizers of Neo-Hindu spiritualism in western esotericism, notably via his bestselling A Search in Secret India (1934) which has been translated into over 20 languages.
Integral yoga, sometimes also called supramental yoga, is the yoga-based philosophy and practice of Sri Aurobindo and The Mother. Central to Integral yoga is the idea that Spirit manifests itself in a process of involution, meanwhile forgetting its origins. The reverse process of evolution is driven toward a complete manifestation of spirit.
The mental plane, or world of thought, in Hermeticism, Theosophical, Rosicrucian, Aurobindonian, and New Age thought refers to the macrocosmic or universal plane or reality that is made up purely of thought or mindstuff. In contrast to Western secular modernist and post-modern thought, in occult and esoteric cosmology, thoughts and consciousness are not just a byproduct of brain functioning, but have their own objective and universal reality quite independent of the physical. This reality itself constitutes only one gradation in a whole series of planes of existence. In most such cosmologies and explanations of reality, the mental plane is located between, and hence is intermediate between, the astral plane below and the higher spiritual realms of existence above.
Kaikhosru Danjibuoy Sethna was an Indian poet, scholar, writer, philosopher, and cultural critic. He published more than 50 books. He was also known as Amal Kiran.
Nirodbaran or "Nirod" for short, was the literary secretary and personal physician to Sri Aurobindo and scribe for Savitri: A Legend and a Symbol and senior member of the Sri Aurobindo Ashram.
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 Sri Aurobindo Ashram is a spiritual community (ashram) located in Pondicherry, in the Indian territory of Puducherry. The ashram grew out of a small community of disciples who had gathered around Sri Aurobindo after he retired from politics and settled in Pondicherry in 1910. On 24 November 1926, after a major spiritual realization, Sri Aurobindo withdrew from public view in order to continue his spiritual work. At this time he handed over the full responsibility for the inner and outer lives of the sadhaks and the ashram to his spiritual collaborator, "The Mother", earlier known as Mirra Alfassa. This date is therefore generally known as the founding-day of the ashram, though, as Sri Aurobindo himself wrote, it had "less been created than grown around him as its centre."
Indra Sen was a devotee of Sri Aurobindo and The Mother, psychologist, author, and educator, and the founder of Integral psychology as an academic discipline.
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.
Mirra Alfassa, known to her followers as The Mother, was a spiritual guru, occultist and yoga teacher, and a collaborator of Sri Aurobindo, who considered her to be of equal yogic stature to him and called her by the name "The Mother". She founded the Sri Aurobindo Ashram and established the town of Auroville; she was influential on the subject of Integral Yoga.
Sri Aurobindo was an Indian philosopher, yoga guru, maharishi, poet, and Indian nationalist. He was also a journalist, editing newspapers such as Vande 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.
Supermind, in Sri Aurobindo's philosophy of integral yoga, is the dynamic manifestation of the Absolute, and the intermediary between Spirit and the manifest world, which enables the transformation of common being into Divine being.
Sri Aurobindo Ashram is a temple of Sri Aurobindo and The Mother of Sri Aurobindo Ashram Pondicherry. It is situated on National Highway No.7 only 16 km from Rewa near Allahabad in Madhya Pradesh (India). Sri Aurobindo's sacred relics were installed here on 31.11.1975 on the auspicious day of Deepawali. Since then, Sri Aurobindo Bal Vidya Mandir, Mira Aditi Shishu Chhatrawas, Sri Aurobindo Library, Aradhana and Sadhana have evolved as component parts of Ma Mandir. President or Adhyaksh of this Asharam was Dr. KN verma .He is dead (Mahasamadhi) on 24 July 2022 at 11:00am.(ekadashi day which is very auspicious day for Hindus)
According to Sarira Traya, the Doctrine of the Three bodies in Hinduism, the human being is composed of three shariras or "bodies" emanating from Brahman by avidya, "ignorance" or "nescience". They are often equated with the five koshas (sheaths), which cover the atman. The Three Bodies Doctrine is an essential doctrine in Indian philosophy and religion, especially Yoga, Advaita Vedanta, Tantra and Shaivism.
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.
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