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The New Spirituality

Georges Van Vrekhem, a Flemish Belgian, lived in Auroville from 1978 until his passing on 31st August, 2012.

In that period he published a number of highly seminal books on Sri Aurobindo and the Mother such as Beyond Man, the Life and Work of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother (1997); The Mother, the Story of Her Life (2000); Overman: The Intermediary between the Human and the Supramental Being (2001); Patterns of the Present, from the Perspective of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother (2002);  Hitler and His God, the Background to the Nazi Phenomenon (2006); Evolution, Religion and the Unknown God (2011), and Preparing for the Miraculous (2012), containing the eleven lectures Georges had given in 2010-2011 at Auroville’s Savitri Bhavan and Town Hall.

In 2006 he was awarded the Sri Aurobindo Puraskar by the Government of Bengal.

At his passing Georges left a number of unpublished essays behind. Some of them were based on his talks in Auroville at the end of 2011, when he embarked on a second series of lectures on a wide variety of topics related to Sri Aurobindo and the Mother. However, first Cyclone Thane and later his deteriorating health disrupted these lectures.

This book, which contains his unpublished essays as well as some of his articles and interviews that have been published in the magazines Auroville Today, Mother India, and The Advent, and in the book The Journeying Years, is published to honour Georges Van Vrekhem in recognition of his immense work in helping to understand the life and work of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother.

Overman

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Overman

The Intermediary between the Human and the Supramental Being

Sri Aurobindo and the Mother wrote and spoke at a time before the awareness of “gender specific language”. Yet, they more than anybody else stood for the importance and dignity of the individual in all its aspects, male and female. For those who are not familiar with their personalities and their work, it may suffice to say that they admitted in their Ashram sadhaks and sadhikas on an equal footing at a time when this was most unusual.

When writing on subjects in connection with Sri Aurobindo and the Mother it is not always possible, however hard one tries, to adapt one’s language to the present sensibilities.

The book before you offers an important new presentation of an aspect of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother ’s vision and yogic development. The Mother ’s French term surhomme, meaning the intermediary between the human and the supramental being, has until now been wrongly translated as “superman”, the word which in Sri Aurobindo and the Mother’s work stands throughout for the supramental being. To end this confusion and to clearly indicate the place the intermediary being occupies in the ongoing evolution beyond humankind, I find it essential to translate surhomme as “overman”.

“We start from the idea that humanity is moving to a great change of its life which will even lead to a new life of the race, – in all countries where men think, there is now in various forms that idea and that hope, – and our aim has been to search for the spiritual, religious and other truth which can enlighten and guide the race in this movement and endeavour. …”
“As man arose out of animal, so out of man superman shall come,” said Sri Aurobindo. Overman is a metaphysical book which dwells upon the concept of the ultimate progression of man into a highly enlightened species called the supramental being, towards which, the author says, the intermediary stage (the Overman) has already been reached.

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Hitler and his God

The Background to the Nazi Phenomenon

Hitler remains an enigma in spite of everything that has been written about him. Historians like Alan Bullock, Ian Kershaw and H.R. Trevor-Roper confess their perplexity openly. How was it possible that an unknown, solitary and future-less front-soldier in 1918 became, some years later, the Leader and Messiah of the German people? How could a nullity unleash the most destructive and deadliest war humanity has ever known? Academic historians give countless reasons because the essential reason keeps escaping them; fantasy writers find the most bizarre occult explanations, disregarding the historical facts.

Georges Van Vrekhem has studied the literature in German, English, French, Dutch and Italian for several years. His conclusion is clear: in Hitler there must have been a cause equivalent to the effects of his actions. Van Vrekhem gives a revealing picture of the rise of the unknown Austrian corporal and brings to life the people who helped him in the saddle: Dietrich Eckart, Captain Mayr, General von Mohl, and many others. The author analyses Mein Kampf, the book in which Hitler laid bare his thoughts and intentions without being believed. And he shows how this “man from nowhere”, driven by the obsession of his mission and helped by incredible luck, managed to become the Führer.

To explain the foundations of a people who made Hitler possible, Van Vrekhem undertakes, in the book’s second part, a deep-probing analysis of the historical background. In this he gives a surprisingly clear picture of the German ambition, the racism which supported it, and the romantic youth movements which incorporated the racism. In a memorable chapter he sketches the history of the German Jews. And he shows another side of the German people: their longing for a better world, although vitiated by their sense of superiority.

All this brings Georges Van Vrekhem to his central theme: Hitler’s possession by the “god” who inspired him, guided him, brought him to power – and dropped him when no longer needed. This leads the author, in the third part of the book, to the unexpected but well-documented role of the Indian philosopher and sage Sri Aurobindo in the action against Hitler before and during the Second World War. While Hitler wanted to bring humanity back to a state of barbarism, Sri Aurobindo stood for the progress of humanity and a future in which a new evolutionary being, beyond humanity, might at last create the world humanity has never ceased to long for. In this view of history, many worlds interact and all facts fit into the big picture.

The Two Sources of Morality and Religion

In the spirit of Darwinian evolution, Henri Bergson, with this volume, makes the philosophical argument that morality and religion are the “natural” and necessary products of man’s evolution. With a look which extends back some 2,400 years to the ancient Greek philosophers, Bergson traces the evolution of man’s instinct, intelligence and intuition and shows how necessary their interactions were in the development of human societies, morality and religion and he looks ahead to the shapes they must take if man is to survive himself.

The Philosophy of Evolution

As presented here, The Philosophy of Evolution, is a compendium of lectures presented by Rod Hemsell at the University of Human Unity in Auroville in 2008, 2009 and 2012. The main thrust of Sri Aurobindo’s yoga has always been toward an active participation in the human evolution and this is the defining concept which set Sri Aurobindo and the Mother apart from all others in the very beginning. With his extensive knowledge of philosophy and numerous philosophers and his familiarity with current science, Rod is able to guide the reader through the development of thought in these disciplines and shows us the place that Sri Aurobindo has staked out for us as the enlightened forerunner he was. These lectures are not a difficult or tedious ascent to airless heights, rather, they are instructive explorations of the broader base camps surrounding the mount; it is left to Sri Aurobindo and the Mother to guide us in our ascent. However, with this exploration of the terra firma, we become ever more confident that our guides to the snow capped peaks actually do know whereof they speak.

La Madre (Italian)

La Madre

Questi illuminanti saggi di Sri Aurobindo formano una potente affermazione ed indicazione sul vero atteggiamento che deve essere adottato da un sadhak dello Yoga Integrale: quello di un completo e dinamico surrender alla Madre. Questi saggi descrivono il triplo movimento di aspirazione, rigetto e surrender, le condizioni fondamentali per una vera fede e sincerità; la forza irresistibile della Grazia della Madre, la necessità di riconquistare la forza-denaro per il lavoro della Madre, e la gioia di essere un Suo perfetto strumento attraverso il lavoro disinteressato, superando le richieste dell’ego. Lo scritto finale descrive i quattro grandi Poteri e Personalità della Madre Divina.

Creative Evolution

Philosophers are thinkers of a different order than ordinary folks and Henri Bergson is no exception to that rule. In the spirit of, and yet not in lock step with, Darwinian evolutionism, Bergson makes here his philosophical argument for a continuous, creative evolution. Invoking the ancient philosophers, drawing on metaphysical precepts and enlisting the aid of an interested Nature, Bergson describes a view of evolution which would be summarily rejected by the pure materialist camp. Although the language is somewhat quaint, being translated from the French of 100 years ago, and not altogether easy to read, the reader is ultimately lead to conclude that Bergson’s intuition has indeed taken him to a perch that gives him a broader view of our reality.

La Madre por Sri Aurobindo (eBook Español)

La Madre

Estos ensayos esclarecedores por Sri Aurobindo forman una declaración de gran alcance y la indicación de la verdadera actitud que debe adoptar un sadhaka del Yoga Integral: el de una entrega completa y dinámica a la Madre. Estos ensayos describen el triple movimiento de aspiración, rechazo y entrega, las condiciones básicas para una verdadera fe y sinceridad, la fuerza irresistible de Gracia de la Madre, la necesidad de recuperar la fuerza – dinero para la obra de la Madre, y la alegría de ser un perfecto instrumento Suyo a través del trabajo desinteresado, superando las exigencias del ego. El documento final describe los cuatro grandes Poderes y Personalidad de la Madre Divina.

The Philosophy of Religion

The material in this book is a transcription of a series of twelve lectures presented by Rod Hemsell at Savitri Bhavan in Auroville, India. With broad brush strokes highlighted with interesting and intricate detail, Rod paints a rich historical portrait illustrating the evolution of philosophical thought and its impact on religious doctrine which extends over a twenty-four hundred year span. The underlying theme, of course, is the slow and steady evolution of human consciousness flowing along many separate streams of thought springing forth from the fount of human experience while growing in knowledge. The depth of this discourse is not at all overwhelming; however, we are no longer wading in the kiddie pool here. In these lectures, Rod has introduced a number of familiar characters and ideas and he has also introduced several others who may not be so well known, all of which invites the reader to follow up with investigations of their own. Rod’s treks along ancient pathways draw us along to discover the great, underlying similarities between the major religions of today that might otherwise go unnoticed and he convinces us that such was always inevitable since we have been dealing with universal truths all along.

The Yoga and its Objects

This is a very early essay written by Sri Aurobindo no later than 1912 and it was first published as a booklet in 1921 under the title “The Yoga and Its Object”. In a letter written in 1934, Sri Aurobindo wrote: “But the book represents an early stage of Sri Aurobindo’s sadhana and only a part of it is applicable to the Yoga as it has at present taken form after a lapse of more than twenty years.” However, this should not be construed to mean that the information in this book is useless or somehow outdated. In the very same letter, apparently in reference to Lights on Yoga first published in 1935, Sri Aurobindo went on to say: “A book giving some hints about the Yoga compiled from letters to the sadhaks is about to be published, but it cannot be said to be complete. There is no complete book on the subject; for even The Synthesis of Yoga, published in the Arya but not yet republished in book form, gives only the theory of different components of the Yoga (Knowledge, Works, Devotion) and remains besides unfinished; it does not cover the more recent developments of the Yoga.” Clearly, these comments come from an ever evolving yoga; a yoga which, with Sri Aurobindo, began with a major step forward and moved beyond the stalled, stale practices of the nineteenth century. Perhaps the greatest difficulty of this short essay is the plethora of Sanskrit terms and that has been largely ameliorated with the inclusion of a glossary.