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Mental Consciousness Cannot Directly Comprehend Spiritual Forces at Work · Sri Aurobindo Studies

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  In order to know something, we need to utilize the tools and
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  methods appropriate to whatever form or energetic action we are
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  trying to know. Those things which rely on
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  emotion, for instance, cannot be fully understood by the logical
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  intellect. Similarly, the strict step by
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  step process of mathematics is not something that the vital
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  nature or the emotions in general can comprehend.
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  This is actually one serious cause of misunderstanding
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  between people as they try to communicate with one another
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  from vastly different perspectives and starting
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  points. How much more difficult it is,
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  therefore, to understand an entirely different order of
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  consciousness using powers and methods proper to a preceding
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  order. The logical intellect, while it
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  has its powerful capacities and benefits in its own field of
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  action, is not competent to judge spiritual experience or
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  the expression of spiritual force in action.
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  This implies that the normal standards of determining what is
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  valid or real used by the mind are unable to make a similar
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  judgment. The spiritual consciousness can
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  only be understood by someone who is capable of experiencing
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  that consciousness, who has the receptivity and intuitive
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  understanding needed to comprehend its action.
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  The mind may be able to infer the existence of a spiritual
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  force through various effects that it cannot otherwise
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  explain, particularly if these effects are reported by those
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  who actually have experienced the spiritual consciousness
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  directly, and thus a correlation can be established.
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  The failure of the mind to comprehend spiritual experience
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  with the tools of analysis, logic and reason leads many who
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  are rooted in the consciousness of the external body, life mind
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  complex to simply deny the existence of the spiritual
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  reality or to treat it as some kind of result of the play of
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  the material elements and powers that are the first basis of the
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  material life. It is impossible to convince
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  someone who has not had the actual experience and who
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  demands proof of the existence or action of the spiritual
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  consciousness, just as it is equally impossible to convince
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  someone who has never experienced concentrated thought
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  that such a power of insight and action may actually exist.
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  Many things that are the result of mental efforts look simply
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  like miracles to those who do not have the current capacity
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  for serious, organized, systematic thought and the
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  results that come from that process.
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  Similarly, those with the power of thought but without spiritual
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  insight or experience may tend to deny or explain away
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  spiritual forces at work. When the being is ready, the
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  capacity for the next phase of development of consciousness
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  opens up on its own and at that time, without argument or
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  denial, the understanding comes. Sri Aurobindo observes quote.
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  Even in ordinary non spiritual things, the action of invisible
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  or subjective forces is open to doubt and discussion in which
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  there could be no material certitude, while the spiritual
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  force is invisible in itself and also invisible in its action.
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  So it is idle to try to prove that such and such a result was
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  the effect of spiritual force. Each must form his own idea
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  about that, for if it is accepted, it cannot be as a
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  result of proof and argument, but only as a result of
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  experience of faith, or of that insight into the deeper heart or
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  the deeper intelligence which looks behind appearances and
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  sees what is behind them. The spiritual consciousness does
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  not claim in that way. It can state the truth about
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  itself, but not fight for a personal acceptance.
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  A general and impersonal truth about spiritual force is another
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  matter, but I doubt whether the time has come for it or whether
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  it could be understood by mere reasoning, intelligence, and
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  quote reference. Srioro Bindo and the mother, The
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  hidden forces of life, Chapter 7.
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  Spiritual Forces of Help and Succor, page 159.