i

The Integral Philosophy of Aurobindo

Sri Aurobindo was an Indian nationalist, philosopher, yogi, guru, and poet.
This book is an enquiry into the integral philosophy of Aurobindo and its
contemporary relevance. It offers a reading of Aurobindo’s key texts by bring-
ing them into conversation with religious studies and the hermeneutical tra-
ditions. The central argument is that Aurobindo’s integral philosophy is best
understood as a hermeneutical philosophy of religion.
Such an understanding of Aurobindo’s philosophy, offering both substan-
tive and methodological insights for the academic study of religion, subdi-
vides into three interrelated aims. The first is to demonstrate that the power
of the Aurobindonian vision lies in its self-​conception as a traditionary-​
hermeneutical enquiry into religion; the second, to draw substantive insights
from Aurobindo’s enquiry to envision a way beyond the impasse within the
current religious–​secular debate in the academic study of religion. Working
out of the condition of secularism, the dominant secularists demand the
abandonment of the category ‘religion’ and the dismantling of the academic
discipline of religious studies. Aurobindo’s integral work on ‘religion’, aris-
ing out of the Vedānta tradition, critiques the condition of secularity that
undergirds the religious–​secular debate. Finally, informed by the hermeneuti-
cal tradition and building on the methodological insights from Aurobindo’s
integral method, the book explores a hermeneutical approach for the study of
religion which is dialogical in nature.
This book will be of interest to academics studying Religious Studies,
Philosophy of Religion, Continental Hermeneutics, Modern India, Modern
Hinduism as well as South Asian Studies.

Brainerd Prince is a Visiting Research Tutor at the Oxford Centre for Mission
Studies, UK. He is also a Research Fellow at the Oxford Centre for Hindu
Studies, a Recognized Independent Centre of Oxford University, UK, and the
Founding Director of the Samvada Centre for Research Resources, India.
ii

Routledge Hindu Studies Series

Series Editor: Gavin Flood, Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies

The Routledge Hindu Studies Series, in association with the Oxford Centre
for Hindu Studies, intends the publication of constructive Hindu theological,
philosophical and ethical projects aimed at bringing Hindu traditions into
dialogue with contemporary trends in scholarship and contemporary society.
The series invites original, high-​quality, research-​level work on the religion,
culture and society of Hindus living in India and abroad. Proposals for anno-
tated translations of important primary sources and studies in the history of
the Hindu religious traditions will also be considered.

Bhakti and Embodiment

Fashioning divine bodies and devotional bodies in Kṛṣṇa Bhakti
Barbara A. Holdrege

Textual Authority in Classical Hindu Thought

Rāmānuja and the Viṣṇu Purāṇa
Sucharita Adluri

Indian Thought and Western Theism

The Vedānta of Rāmānuja
Martin Ganeri

Debating ‘Conversion’ in Hinduism and Christianity

Ankur Barua

Non​violence in the Mahabharata

Siva’s Summa on Rishidharma and the Gleaners of Kurukshetra
Alf Hiltebeitel

The Other Ramayana Women

Regional rejection and response
Edited by John Brockington and Mary Brockington

The Integral Philosophy of Aurobindo

Hermeneutics and the study of religion
Brainerd Prince
  iii

The Integral Philosophy

of Aurobindo
Hermeneutics and the Study of Religion

Brainerd Prince
iv

First published 2017
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge
711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2017 Brainerd Prince
The right of Brainerd Prince to be identified as the author of this work has been
asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright,
Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised
in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or
hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information
storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered
trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent
to infringe.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloguing in Publication Data
Names: Prince, Brainerd, author.
Title: The integral philosophy of Aurobindo: hermeneutics and
the study of religion / Brainerd Prince.
Description: 1 [edition]. | New York : Routledge, 2016. |
Series: Routledge Hindu studies series |
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2016028557 | ISBN 9781138677968 (hardback) |
ISBN 9781315559216 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Ghose, Aurobindo, 1872–1950. | Hermeneutics. |
Religion–Philosophy.
Classification: LCC B5134.G424 P75 2016 | DDC 181/.4–dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016028557
ISBN: 978-​1-​138-​67796-​8 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-​1-​315-​55921-​6 (ebk)
Typeset in Times New Roman
by Out of House Publishing
  v

Contents

Foreword vi
Preface vii

1 Introduction: mapping the journey 1

2 Conceptual groundwork: Aurobindo, hermeneutics

and religion 14

3 The Life Divine –​I: whose tradition? Which rationality? 37

4 The Life Divine –​II: transcendence and the sevenfold being 81

5 The Human Cycle: articulation as narrative 128

6 The Synthesis of Yoga: action, yoga, and tradition 162

7 Conclusion: the journey and beyond 212

Glossary of important terms 233

Index 242
vi

Foreword

Aurobindo in some ways has been India’s forgotten philosopher and yet he
was an important figure in the independence movement before his move to
Pondicherry, and once there became a highly original thinker and prolific
writer. Aurobindo’s concerns about the nature of human life were drawn
from his Indian philosophical heritage and his solution, a fusion of that her-
itage with European philosophical ideas. That solution is the divine life that
resolves the paradox or contradiction of spirit–​matter through divine embod-
iment. That is, for Aurobindo the universe is the external form of the divine
being who becomes embodied. Matter is infused with spirit and life itself the
spirit emergent. There are echoes here not only of Advaita Vedanta but of
European Romanticism too.
In his fine study Dr Prince explains the complex thinking of Aurobindo,
relating his ideas to his sources of inspiration, and furthermore shows how
Aurobindo should not be forgotten but is relevant to contemporary concerns
in philosophy and the study of religions about transcendence, rationality, and
secularism. The critical study of religions has neglected the idea of transcend-
ence and Aurobindo has significant things to say about it that make sense
when translated into the context of the study of religions. Not only is this a
very good book about Aurobindo but it is a contribution to debates about the
nature of religion and culture in the contemporary world and how Aurobindo
can still contribute to that discussion. Dr Prince shows us how.
Professor Gavin Flood FBA
Oxford, March 2016
  vii

Preface

This book is an enquiry into the integral philosophy of Aurobindo and

explores its contemporary relevance, particularly for the academic study of
religion. As such, it offers a reading of Aurobindo’s key texts by bringing them
into conversation with both the religious studies and the hermeneutical intel-
lectual traditions. The central argument advanced here is that Aurobindo’s
integral philosophy is best understood as a hermeneutical philosophy of reli-
gion. The book works primarily with Aurobindo’s three key texts: The Life
Divine, The Human Cycle, and The Synthesis of Yoga on metaphysics, history,
and action respectively.
Although this work is on Aurobindo’s integral philosophy, the focus has
been on how it makes a contribution to the contemporary debates in religious
studies, particularly to various aspects of the overarching religious–​secular
debate. Apart from interrogating the idea of religion itself, some of the key
questions addressed have to do with religion’s relationship with the secular,
representation of religious action, rationality of religious traditions, and the
question of ‘God’. While the journey of writing this book enabled me to
engage with these critical questions that are central to religious studies, what
came to the fore in this engagement was the importance of one’s methodology
and approach, a subject to which I started to become deeply attached. So even
as I began to ‘converse about religion’, I was reflexively always forced to ask
about ‘how to converse’ about religion. This introduced me to the discourse
on hermeneutics which not only provided the conceptual framework for this
work but also enabled an exploration of dialogical hermeneutics or Samvāda
hermeneutics as a research approach and methodology not only for the study
of religion but also broadly for the Human Sciences.
I found the image of Raphael’s famous fresco The School of Athens (1509–​
1511) to be appropriate for the front cover as it aptly represents, albeit visually,
much of what Aurobindo had to say and who he was. While the prominent
figure of Heraclitus looming large is a reminder of Aurobindo’s pre-​Socratic
influence, the coming together of the central figures, Plato and Aristotle,
with their rhetorical gestures, each pointing to the spiritual and material
realm respectively, is an exceptional visual representation of Aurobindo’s
viii

viii Preface
project –​the bringing together of spirit and matter, and the spiritual and the
material as embodied spirit.
Written originally as a doctoral thesis, this book owes much to many peo-
ple. ‘Research is re-​search’, as my doctoral supervisor once told me, referring
to the work of research as a ‘searching again’, in the traces and fragments left
behind by earlier searches. Those words have often reminded me that ‘research
is a community activity’, jointly done, in dialogue with earlier researchers
and ‘contemporaneous others’, and made possible only with the support and
encouragement of many more. To all, I offer my thanks and deep apprecia-
tion. The following individuals and institutions deserve special mention.
All the faculty members, staff, and colleagues at OCMS, for their sup-
port and friendship, particularly, David Singh, in-​house mentor, and second
supervisor, who not only got me started on this journey but whose constant
encouragement and support kept the project going. Bernard Farr, who got
me thinking, and ‘thinking about thinking’, and Ben Knighton for provok-
ing me to think ‘outside the box’ while enforcing meticulous standards for
what is within. Wonsuk Ma and Julie Ma, for leadership, love, wisdom and
friendship, and Tom Harvey for reading Gadamer’s Truth and Method with
me, and for the many wise conversations either at a pub or in his office. Ralph
Bates, librarian, for all his help with locating resources, for loaning books
from his personal collection, and for doing the final proofreading of the doc-
toral dissertation.
Thanks to all the members and staff at OCHS, RIC of Oxford University,
for their support and encouragement throughout this journey. In particular
to Shaunaka Rishi Das, for wise counsel, inspiration, and pastoral support,
Judit Bajusz for encouragement and constant reassurances, and Rembert
Lutjeharms, particularly for his course on the Īśā Upaniṣad, and for the many
insightful conversations.
Sri Aurobindo Ashram, Pondicherry, for all their support and help. Vijay
Bhai for making arrangements for classes on Aurobindo’s works and friend-
ship over the years, Peter Heehs for sharing his wealth of knowledge about
Aurobindo in our meetings and via emails, and Richard Hartz from the Sri
Aurobindo Ashram Archives for copies of articles published in the Arya.
All the Board members, colleagues, and friends of Touch India Trust for
granting me leave to pursue this research, and particularly colleagues and
friends at the Samvada Centre for Research Resources for support and encour-
agement. Special thanks to Samuel Ngaihte for sorting the glossary and the
Sanskrit diacritical marks, Deborah Rosario for doing the final proofreading
and formatting, and Benrilo Kikon for friendship and support. Montagu and
Rosemary Barker for their love –​to ‘Uncle’ particularly for the ‘40 minute’
phone call in 2006 which gave me the resolve to continue this research journey,
and to ‘Auntie’ for enabling the resolve in many ways and for her constant love
and care through these years.
I also take this opportunity to thank my parents  –​Seeli and Prince  –​
for continually keeping religion within our family horizon and generously
newgenprepdf
  ix

Preface ix
offering space for critique and mutual learning, as well as my sisters –​Mercia
and Gracia –​for their love and support. Thanks to Atula for friendship and
encouragement during the PhD journey. Dr Kethoser Kevichusa (Aniu) for
friendship and conversations over many years, encouragement, critique, and
for arousing my interest in non-​fiction texts.
Professor Gavin Flood, Supervisor and Director of Studies, to whom this
book owes its existence in every aspect, for weaning me into the world of reli-
gious studies, through his texts, courses on religion and readings in phenom-
enology, Sanskrit classes, many stimulating conversations, and for being the
perfect ‘guru’, whose marks are found on every page of this book. Langham
Partnership UK & Ireland for their generous financial grant that enabled me
to work on the PhD project. I would also like to thank Dulce Estévez López
at the international sales department of Age Fotstock Spain S.L., for helping
me procure the cover image. Finally, I would like to thank the two anonymous
reviewers from Routledge, Dorothea Schaefter, the commissioning editor at
Routledge, Rebecca Lawrence, the editorial assistant for Asian Studies, Lindsey
Hall, production editor at Routledge and Emma Hart, project manager at Out
of House Publishing for all their help and support in getting this work ready
for publishing.
x
  1

1 
Introduction
Mapping the journey

Joining the conversation

It would not be wise to begin a book with a controversy. However, controver-
sies have the power of distilling the counter-​positions of a debate in a lucid
manner, not only because there is much at stake in real-​time for the disput-
ers as controversies happen in the public square, but also because the incom-
mensurability between the opposing positions is painstakingly crystallized
in order to establish the validity of the controversy and dispute itself. Thus,
the ensuing controversy becomes an opposition between two ideal positions,
which reveals more about the logical opposing ends of the conflicting binary
rather than the actual held positions of the two parties, which are much more
nuanced and mixed. Furthermore, controversies provide an opening into an
already existing conversation; or, in McKeon’s vivid language –​controversies
enable one to ‘[burst] into the conversation’.1
The controversy over Peter Heehs’ book The Lives of Sri Aurobindo (2008),
between the author and his supporters (including the scholarly world and
the Trustees of the Aurobindo Ashram) on the one hand and a section of
the Ashram inmates (henceforth, Ashramites) on the other, is no exception.
Our main aim here is neither to reconstruct the controversy by going into its
historical details, as its development is well documented in the public space of
the internet, nor to engage the controversy with a view to taking sides in the
dispute. However, what is of significance to us is how this controversy articu-
lates the problematic addressed in this book. Heehs, renowned historian and
possibly the foremost academic authority on Aurobindo, in the Preface to his
biography, gives two characteristics of his work, in terms of his methodol-
ogy and the subject of his biography –​Aurobindo. Methodologically, Heehs
defines his biography in opposition to hagiography with a clearly stated pur-
pose to rescue Aurobindo from the hagiographers. Heehs proposes that this
can be done if (a)  historical documents are taken as they are found with-
out being retouched, (b) all sorts of material about the subject are examined,
including those of the subject’s enemies, and one is ‘not giving special treat-
ment even to the subject’s own version of events’, and (c) the ‘accounts by the
subject’ are compared with ‘other narrative accounts’, especially those that
2

2 Introduction
‘do not reflect a particular point of view’. Thus, the book, choosing not to
reflect any particular point of view, claims to be an objective and dispassion-
ate biography of Aurobindo. The second characteristic is about Heehs’ posi-
tion on Aurobindo’s ‘mystical experiences’. The tension that is visible in the
Preface concerns how an objective critical biography should express ‘mystical
experiences’. Heehs meticulously demonstrates how he applies the method of
critical biography to his account of Aurobindo’s mystical experiences: first,
by using ‘the subject’s diaries, letters, and retrospective accounts’, and second,
by comparing other accounts of similar mystical experiences. However, after
stating this, Heehs immediately draws a conclusion about ‘mystical experi-
ence’ that reveals his personal position as a critical scholar on mystical experi-
ence. Heehs states that ‘in the end, such experiences remain subjective’, and
ventures to claim that perhaps ‘they are only hallucinations or signs of psy-
chotic breakdown’. Finally, even if they are not any of these, Heehs questions
their relevance by asking, ‘do they have any value to anyone but the subject?’2
While this scientific and ‘objective spirit’ sets the tone for Heehs’ biography,
a section of the inmates of the Aurobindo Ashram reacted strongly against
this portrayal.
The opposing Ashramites responded by starting a blog site ‘dedicated to
a critique of the book The Lives of Sri Aurobindo by Peter Heehs’ which, as
the sub-​title of the website reveals, is also ‘committed to objective, academic,
respectful and honest discussions’.3 The critique has been offered in three direc-
tions: first, in line with the goal of the website itself, it has tried to ‘identify and
expose’ the ‘errors, distortions and misrepresentations’ in Heehs’ biography
with a view to ‘set[ting] the record straight in academic discourse’. The second
direction of the critique has been against the representation of Aurobindo’s
mystical experience by Heehs. An example is found in the critique put forward
by the ‘Devotees and Disciples of Sri Aurobindo in Gujarat’ whose letter to the
Trustees of the Ashram reads, ‘We are deeply disturbed by his presentations
of our hallowed Lord. An inflicted physical injury can be seen and eventu-
ally heals, but an insult to the kernel of our faith, our Avatar, has profoundly
pained us.’4 The third direction of the critique questions Heehs’ viewpoint on
the basis of his belonging to the Aurobindonian tradition. An example of the
third direction of the critique is found in the leading article under the main
menu heading ‘Errors and Their Refutation’ entitled ‘Objective Research or
Research with an Objective’ by Saurabh Somani,5 who states that his own ‘lack
of belief in divinity’ welcomes Heehs’ attempt to ‘humanise’ Aurobindo by
analysing ‘him from an objective, non-​devotional viewpoint’. Somani points
out that many Ashram residents who ‘regard Sri Aurobindo as an incarnation
of the Divine’ will be ‘unable to view his [Heehs’] work objectively’, because
they are ‘believers in his divinity’. However, Somani’s critique is based on
Heehs’ writing as an inmate of the Ashram:

The most serious objection I have to the book though is not that facts are
presented selectively or out of context…. If Peter had written the book
  3

Introduction 3
as a scholar, as a follower of Sri Aurobindo, it would have been fine. But
he has written it as an inmate of the Sri Aurobindo Ashram –​and he has
abused the trust that the community had placed on him.6

The critique here is directed against how Heehs should conduct his scholar-
ship, in light of his belonging to the Aurobindonian tradition and being an
insider to it.
In response, Heehs’ supporters have begun another website to highlight the
critical acclaim the book has received within scholarly circles. Notable among
these are leading historians and scholars such as Ramakrishna Puligandla,
Antony Copley, Amiya P.  Sen, Robert McDermott, Michael Ashcraft and
Ramachandra Guha.7 For Guha, this book is a ‘product of a lifetime of
scholarship, [and] its empirical depth and analytical sharpness is unlikely to
be surpassed’.8 Ashcraft, in his review, laments that Heehs was attacked by
Aurobindo followers ‘who interpret their tradition rigorously’ and believe that
‘Aurobindo’s truth was expressed in a set of philosophical, cultural, and lit-
erary conventions, and that any attempt to express that truth in other ways
distorts it, and must be condemned’.9
The three critical issues that arise out of this controversy vividly capture
the three strands of enquiry advanced in this book. The first has to do with
the nature of enquiry. Both parties in the controversy have defined their posi-
tions in accordance to ‘standards of objectivity’. While Heehs seeks to give
a dispassionate and critical biography as opposed to hagiography, in order
to represent the ‘real’ Aurobindo on the basis of historical scholarship, the
Ashramites, on the same basis of objectivity, seek to falsify Heehs’ account
claiming that while it has ‘an appearance of balance and objectivity’, a
‘deeper’ study reveals that he has used quotations ‘out of context’ and, there-
fore, ‘misrepresent[s]‌his message, his work, and his teaching’. If both par-
ties in their affirmation and refutation uphold their positions on the basis of
objectivism, then ‘objectivism’ itself becomes suspect. The debate between
objectivism and relativism has been raging in the human sciences within the
Western academy for over a century and within the academic study of religion
since the critical turn from the 1960s onwards beginning with W.C. Smith’s
Meaning and End of Religion. What makes this controversy on Aurobindo
interesting is that while both parties in the controversy claim objectivity to
be their standard for representing Aurobindo’s religion, Aurobindo’s own
enquiry into religion entailed a stringent critique of objectivism. This raises
questions about the nature of Aurobindo’s enquiry into religion and Somani’s
critique of Heehs based on ‘belongingness to tradition’ provides a clue for a
way beyond objectivism.
The second issue in the controversy is about Aurobindo’s spiritual status
and his mystical experiences. In the controversy, there is a plurality of voices
ranging from the questioning of Aurobindo’s sanity to revering him as a deity.
The tension, as reflected in Heehs’ Preface as well as in Somani’s critique
of Heehs, is in finding an appropriate language to articulate Aurobindo’s
4

4 Introduction
religious experiences. Both Heehs and Somani, while being on opposite ends
in the debate, explicitly underplay the mystical and ‘humanise’ Aurobindo
with a view to being objective and thus arguing for their case to be accept-
able within the larger secular ‘academia’. This reflects a wider problem within
the contemporary academic study of religion, which, dominated by the secu-
larists, does not possess a language to talk about transcendence or religious
experiences. The debate between religionists, who seek to represent religion on
its own basis, and the secularists, who use naturalist and reductionist frame-
works to represent religion, constitutes the broader religious–​secular debate
within the academic study of religion. Aurobindo’s philosophy of religion,
as a precursor to the contemporary religious–​secular debate, has addressed
many aspects put forward by this debate, with a focus on offering a critique
particularly on the condition of secularity undergirding this debate.
Finally, the controversy has not only led to a ban on the book in India, but
also led to Heehs being relieved of his responsibilities in the Ashram and the
Ashramites seeking a cancellation of Heehs’ Indian visa, even after his asso-
ciation with the Ashram for over four decades since 1971. Although the web-
site of the Ashramites, in the spirit of dialogue, invited ‘free participation in
all the discussions’ and requested to ‘respect others and their freedom’, this is
precisely what has broken down in the dialogue between the Ashramites and
Heehs. While this is not to begrudge the complexity of the matter, I argue that
it is the difference in viewpoints about religious knowledge, particularly about
Aurobindo, that lies at the heart of the controversy. This raises an important
question about the role of dialogue between different and even opposing view-
points within the study of religion. Conflicting viewpoints can arise within the
religious studies tradition, such as the one between the religionists and secu-
larists, or it can arise between the religious studies tradition and other tradi-
tions either within the academy or between living religious traditions. How
should such differences and incommensurabilities, both intra-​tradition and
inter-​traditions, be addressed? I  will argue that both Aurobindo’s integral-
ism and the hermeneutical methodology this book develops offer resources to
address differences and incommensurabilities.
Thus the three critical issues are: the nature of Aurobindonian enquiry into
religion, the status of religion within the academy, and the dialogue between
conflicting viewpoints within the study of religion. While these three issues
lie at the heart of the Heehs’ controversy, these are precisely the central issues
addressed in this book. Therefore, we need to now move beyond the Heehs
controversy to articulate these issues within academic discourse.

The estuary: convergence of three streams

The three issues arising out of the Heehs’ controversy can be stated as: ​(a) the
nature of the Aurobindonian enquiry into religion, (b) the religious–​secular
debate within the study of religion, and (c) the role of dialogue between tradi-
tions in the study of religion. Thus, this reading of Aurobindo’s texts brings
  5

Introduction 5
together three traditions of thought: the Aurobindonian tradition represented
by its texts, the religious studies tradition with its discourse on the religious–​
secular debate, and the hermeneutical tradition that focuses on dialogue. In
other words, this reading of the Aurobindonian texts is simultaneously con-
ditioned and constrained by both the religious studies tradition and the her-
meneutical tradition.
But how do they mutually condition each other? Bakhtin writes, ‘Even
past meanings, that is, those born in the dialogue of past centuries, can never
be stable (finalised, ended once and for all)  –​they will always change (be
renewed) in the process of subsequent, future development of the dialogue.’10
Two questions arise out of Bakhtin’s passage that help articulate the three
aims to be addressed in this work: (a) With what ‘past meanings’ is this book
seeking to engage? (b)  With what will they enter into dialogue in order to
bring about a ‘renewal’? This book is focused primarily on the ‘past mean-
ings’ of Aurobindo’s integral philosophy as it is contained in his three key
texts examined here. These texts are brought into dialogue with both the reli-
gious studies and the hermeneutical traditions. The renewal of meanings hap-
pens in three ways: first, Aurobindonian enquiry into religion is demonstrated
as possessing a traditionary-​ hermeneutical structure; second, engaging
Aurobindonian insights with the religious–​secular debate offers the religious
studies tradition a possibility to move beyond its present impasse; and finally,
a key problematic of religious studies, the problem of approach, is addressed
by contributing to the development of a hermeneutics of tradition approach
for religious studies on the basis of insights from both Aurobindonian inte-
gralism and the hermeneutical tradition. In light of this, the three aims of this
book can be stated as: first, to argue that Aurobindo’s critique of objectivism
and his reflexive location of his work within the Vedānta tradition points to
the traditionary-​hermeneutical nature of the Aurobindonian enquiry; second,
to disclose that the substantive themes addressed by Aurobindo in the three
texts address key aspects of the contemporary religious–​secular debate within
the religious studies tradition; and finally to contend that Aurobindo’s inte-
gralism offers methodological insights for engagement between differing and
conflicting traditions of enquiry.
With regard to the nature of Aurobindo’s enquiry into religion, the imme-
diate questions that follow are about his methodological approach. How did
Aurobindo understand enquiry? What were his epistemological presupposi-
tions? Was he a phenomenologist, an encyclopaedist, or a deconstruction-
ist? In short, what philosophical presuppositions undergirded his enquiry
into religion? Although, as a child of his epoch his work bore the marks of
the encyclopaedic universalism of the Enlightenment (Aufklärung), he was
also equally influenced by the Counter-​ Enlightenment (Gegenaufklärung)
ideas of Nietzsche that strove to deconstruct universalism by arguing for
perspectivalism, giving rise to Aurobindo’s critique of scientific objectivity.
However, more importantly, he locates his work within the Vedānta tradition
and explicitly states that ‘we start from the Vedantic position’.11 Thus, while
6

6 Introduction
we find a vehement critique of ‘universal rationalism’ and of the ‘scientific
objective method’, his proposal argues for the existence of ‘truth’ and ‘reality’
according to Vedānta. However, his appropriation of Vedānta was through a
critique of the predominant position of ‘denial of life’ of Śaṇkara’s Advaita,
the most prominent school of Vedānta during Aurobindo’s time. Aurobindo
was careful not to claim universality for his own work. Aurobindo possessed
a reflexive understanding of the limits of his own work, true to a hermeneu-
tics of tradition, that even his own ‘construction’ could equally end up being
just one among others and ‘will go the way of all ideas’ unless it is the ‘truth
of our being’.12 Therefore, Aurobindo’s critique of scientific objectivity, that
equally entailed a possibility of truth, located itself within the Vedānta tradi-
tion and this is characteristic of a traditionary-​hermeneutical enquiry or a
hermeneutics of tradition. Thus, the first aim of this work is to demonstrate
that Aurobindo’s enquiry into religion possesses the internal structure of a
traditionary-​hermeneutical enquiry.
For Aurobindo, the dominant characteristic of the Western and Indian
intellectual traditions was ‘rationalistic materialism’ and ‘Advaitic spiritual-
ism’ respectively. Aurobindo identifies the incommensurability between these
two traditions in their exclusive focus on the materialistic and spiritualistic
worldviews respectively. Put broadly, for Aurobindo, the European tradi-
tion was materialistic and reduced all existence to matter and proclaimed
‘God is dead’, while the Indian Advaitins reduced existence to Brahman or
spirit and regarded the world as an illusion. Thus the oppositional relation-
ship between ‘transcendence and immanence’ or ‘spirit and matter’ was the
central problematic upon which the entire Aurobindonian project hinged.
While this opposition between spirit and matter is seen as one of the dichoto-
mies of enlightenment thought, Aurobindo’s critique of the opposition of
these two ‘monisms’ as a false dichotomy can be equally seen as a critique of
enlightenment thought. The spirit–​matter binary has several correlates such
as spiritual–​material, mind–​body, transcendence–​immanence, and religious–​
secular. King calls them ‘dichotomies of enlightenment thought’ and lists sev-
eral others.13 Of all these binaries, the religious–​secular binary has become
most prominent and has subsumed the others within its conceptual horizon.
Aurobindo, long before King, not only acknowledged these enlightenment
binaries but also argued that the religious–​secular divide is peculiar to the
West and that the Indian view of religion and life are ordered differently.
Aurobindo writes, ‘Modern Europe separated religion from life, from phi-
losophy, from art and science, from politics, from the greater part of social
action and social existence.’14 In contrast, referring to the Indian under-
standing of religion, Aurobindo states, ‘instead of putting religion into an
unobtrusive and ineffective corner, the Indian mind has the pretension the
preposterous pretension which rational man has outgrown for ever, of filling
with it the whole of life’.15 Thus, it is clear that not only can the spirit–​matter
dichotomy be clearly mapped as a religious–​secular binary for Aurobindo,
but also that its reconciliation, by going beyond the binary, was central to
  7

Introduction 7
his project. Aurobindo did not make a difference between the secular and the
sacred. He stated in a letter to Baptista, ‘my idea of spirituality has nothing
to do with ascetic withdrawal or contempt or disgust of secular things. There
is to me nothing secular, all human activity is for me a thing to be included
in a complete spiritual life.’16 His proposal of ‘embodied spirit’ that overcame
the spirit–​matter binary, according to which the material and the spiritual are
always already conjoined, can be read as a way forward beyond enlightenment
dichotomies. Aurobindo’s central texts The Life Divine, The Human Cycle,
and The Synthesis of Yoga, which respectively focus on religion and meta-
physics, religion and history, and religion and action, can be seen as a working
out of this proposal of ‘embodied spirit’ in the fields of metaphysics, history,
and action respectively. In this respect, Aurobindo’s work can be seen pri-
marily as a hermeneutical philosophy of religion. These substantive themes,
addressed by Aurobindo in his texts, are equally central to the contemporary
religious–​secular debate within the study of religion.
Finally if Aurobindo’s integral philosophy was an attempt to bring together
two intellectual traditions –​European and Vedānta, then it implicitly means
that Aurobindo was bringing these traditions into dialogue and conversation.
This raises several questions about the nature of dialogue that Aurobindo’s
work entailed. Although Aurobindo is reflexively intentional about his dia-
logical project, he does not explicitly theorize his dialogical method:

Our original intention was to approach the synthesis from the starting-​
point of the two lines of culture … the knowledge of the West and the
knowledge of the East; but owing to the exigencies of the war this could
not be fulfilled. The ‘Arya’ … has been an approach to the highest rec-
onciling truth from the point of view of the Indian mentality and Indian
spiritual experience, and Western knowledge has been viewed from that
standpoint.17

The dialogical dimension of Aurobindo’s enquiry is a natural corollary to his

traditionary-​hermeneutics. In other words, if a traditionary enquiry reflex-
ively locates itself within a particular tradition, then it recognizes that any
enquiry of a non-​self or an ‘other’, while being located within one’s own
tradition, necessitates a dialogue with the other. Aurobindo’s assertion that
‘Western knowledge has been viewed from that [Indian] standpoint’ reveals
the self-​understanding of the Aurobindonian enquiry as being dialogical.
Thus, the question that requires addressing is  –​how dialogical was the
Aurobindonian enquiry? However, an immediate objection could be raised –​
is it even valid to evaluate the early twentieth-​century Aurobindonian enquiry
according to the demands of a contemporary hermeneutically-​informed dia-
logical enquiry? My answer, arguing for an affirmative, is twofold:  first, as
I  have already demonstrated, the Aurobindonian enquiry has the structure
of a traditionary enquiry and, therefore, is already a hermeneutics of tra-
dition. So, it is not completely illegitimate to evaluate the Aurobindonian
8

8 Introduction
enquiry within a hermeneutical framework. Second, as I  have shown, the
Aurobindonian enquiry into religion constructs its own rationality through
the integration of two traditions of enquiry –​European materialistic ration-
alism and Indian Advaitic spiritualism. Therefore, Aurobindo’s integralism
conceptually lies within the ambit of a dialogical-​hermeneutical enquiry. But
what is the structure of a dialogical-​hermeneutical approach for the study of
religion? This gives rise to the third aim of this book. Building on insights
from Aurobindo’s integralism and informed by the hermeneutics of tradition,
the final aim is to explore a dialogical hermeneutics approach for the study
of religion.

Three aims and the central argument

In the above section, I explored how the three issues around which the Heehs
controversy revolved –​(a) the nature of the Aurobindonian enquiry into reli-
gion, (b) the religious–​secular debate within the study of religion, and (c) the
role of dialogue in the study of religion –​converged in Aurobindo’s integral-
ism to provide the three aims that will guide this work. With regard to the
nature of Aurobindo’s enquiry into religion, his critique of scientific objectiv-
ity and his location of the project within the Vedānta tradition are character-
istic of a traditionary-​hermeneutical enquiry or hermeneutics of tradition.
Thus, the first aim of this work is to demonstrate that Aurobindo’s enquiry
into religion possesses the internal structure of a traditionary-​hermeneutical
enquiry. If Aurobindo’s integral philosophy of religion seeks to go beyond the
spirit–​matter and religious–​secular binaries through his proposal of ‘embod-
ied spirit’, and his central texts, The Life Divine, The Human Cycle, and The
Synthesis of Yoga are a working out of this proposal of ‘embodied spirit’ in
the fields of metaphysics, history, and action respectively, then the second aim
of this work is to draw out implications from the Aurobindonian texts for
various aspects of the contemporary religious–​secular debate within the study
of religion. Building on insights from Aurobindo’s integralism that connects
European materialism with Vedantic spiritualism, and informed by the her-
meneutics of tradition, the third aim of this book is to contribute towards the
development of a dialogical hermeneutics approach for the study of religion.
I can now state the central argument of this book and the aims that flow
from it. This work, as an enquiry into the integral philosophy of Aurobindo
and its contemporary relevance, offers a critical reading of Aurobindo’s key
texts by bringing them into conversation with both religious studies and her-
meneutical traditions. The central argument advanced in this work is that
Aurobindo’s integral philosophy is best understood as a hermeneutical phi-
losophy of religion. Such an understanding of his philosophy, offering both
substantive and methodological insights for the academic study of religion,
subdivides into three interrelated aims: first, to demonstrate that the power
of the Aurobindonian vision lies in its self-​conception as a traditionary-​
hermeneutical enquiry into religion. Here I argue that, when explicated, the
  9

Introduction 9
structure of the Aurobindonian enquiry into religion reveals the structure
of a traditionary-​hermeneutical enquiry. Second, I aim to draw substantive
insights from Aurobindo’s enquiry into religion to envision a way beyond the
impasse within the current religious–​secular debate in the academic study of
religion. Working out of the condition of secularity, the dominant secularists
are demanding the abandonment of the category ‘religion’ and the disman-
tling of the academic discipline of religious studies. Aurobindo’s integral work
on ‘religion’, arising out of the Vedānta tradition, critiques this condition of
secularity that undergirds the religious–​secular debate. His three key texts –​
The Life Divine, The Human Cycle, and The Synthesis of Yoga on metaphys-
ics, history, and yoga respectively –​while building up an integral philosophy,
can be used to contribute to various aspects of this debate. Finally, informed
by the hermeneutical tradition and building on the methodological insights
from Aurobindo’s work, I explore a hermeneutical approach for the study of
religion, according to which, if religious studies can be reflexively understood
as a tradition-​ constituted hermeneutical enquiry that hosts multiple and
conflicting viewpoints (religionists and secularists), then, while the internal
dialogue between these viewpoints can be seen as developing the tradition-​
constituted enquiry of religion, its unique contribution to wider academia
can be seen in its external dialogue with other traditions, both religious and
secular. I call this the dialogical hermeneutics of religion. The pursuit of this
threefold aim develops my central argument through the chapters.

The journey forward

The central argument of this book is developed through the following six
chapters with each chapter contributing to the threefold aim that guides this
work. The Aurobindonian texts are thus read with one eye on religious studies
and the other on the hermeneutics of tradition.
Chapter  2 offers an introduction to the three strands of this enquiry.
I begin with a brief introduction to Aurobindo and his texts. Then I explicate
the four-​part structure of a tradition-​constituted hermeneutical enquiry  –​
rationality, textuality, narrative, and action –​each of which, while guiding my
reading of the Aurobindonian texts respectively in the following chapters, will
inversely enable me to argue that Aurobindo’s enquiry into religion possessed
the internal structure of a traditionary-​hermeneutical enquiry. I will then map
the religious–​secular debate with a view to showing that it is constitutive of
four critical debates about reductionism, transcendence, explanation, and
representation. My reading of the Aurobindonian texts in the following chap-
ters will address each of these debates that stem from the religious–​secular
debate. Finally, I will end with a brief overview of dialogical hermeneutics,
the methodological approach I aim to develop for the study of religion.
In Chapter 3, I investigate the first part of The Life Divine in light of the
debate on reductionism within the study of religion. With respect to the first
aim, I argue that reductionist enquiry propelled by universal rationality has
10

10 Introduction
the conceptual structure of (a)  subject–​object distinctions or attunement,
(b)  logico-​nomological reasoning, and (c)  logical consistency through the
classical laws of logic. I  demonstrate Aurobindo’s critique of these as evi-
dence for his rejection of universal rationality, particularly for an enquiry
into the Absolute. With regard to the second aim for the study of religion,
I demonstrate that Aurobindo’s three negations reject all forms of reduction-
ism and his proposal of ‘embodied spirit’ offers a way beyond reductionism.
Finally I claim that the rejection of universal rationality immediately opens
the doors for multiple rationalities, beginning with the problem of incommen-
surability and difference, which can be seen as the foundation of dialogical
hermeneutics.
In Chapter  4, I  read the second part of The Life Divine in light of the
debate on transcendence, to reveal that Aurobindo understood three modes of
transcendence, each of which can be profitably gleaned for the threefold aim
of this work. Towards the aim of demonstrating that Aurobindo’s enquiry is
traditionary-​hermeneutics, I argue that if tradition is constituted by a chain of
textual interpretations, then not only does Aurobindo explicitly align his own
interpretation within the chain of interpretations constitutive of the Vedantic
tradition, but also that his theory of interpretation, in light of transcend-
ence1, points to the mechanism that enables the act of textual interpretations
constitutive of tradition. With regard to the religious–​secular debate, I argue
that if the post-​Heideggerian critique of onto-​theo-​logy has brought about
the demise of the study of transcendence within the study of religion, then
Aurobindo’s conception of transcendence2 not only offers a way beyond onto-​
theo-​logy, thus rehabilitating the study of transcendence within the study of
religion, but also the envisioning of transcendence2 as ‘embodied spirit’ offers
a way beyond ontological reductionism within the study of religion. Finally,
with regard to insights for a dialogical-​hermeneutic approach for the study of
religion, I argue that Aurobindo’s transcendence3 is constitutive of the self as
imagination and provides the ontological ground for the self’s dialogue with
the other which, while maintaining the alterity of the other, enables a leaping
that is able to surpass the incommensurability and difference.
In Chapter 5, I offer a reading of The Human Cycle as Aurobindo’s phi-
losophy of history, which I argue provides the larger narrative that supplies
meaning for Aurobindo’s project. With respect to traditionary enquiry, I argue
that while the horizon of traditionary enquiry is constituted by the efficacy
of history, tradition progresses by the act of appropriating ‘past meanings’,
which is precisely what Aurobindo does in his appropriation of the Vedantic
texts. With regard to the study of religion, I argue that narratives as interpre-
tations articulate meanings. The debate between explanation and understand-
ing, within the study of religion, can be overcome by appropriating them both
as constitutive moments of religion as interpretative-​narratives. Finally with
regard to dialogical hermeneutics, I  argue, when opposing interpretations
and proposals of meaning encounter each other in dialogue, there is mutual
appropriation through the act of interrogation.
  11

Introduction 11
In Chapter  6, I  read The Synthesis of Yoga in light of the relationship
between action and tradition. With regard to traditionary enquiry, I argue
that yogic action prefigured by structures of tradition, in relationship with
text, intentionality, and passion, and inscribed onto the body, uses the
embodied traditionary self as a vehicle of tradition. With respect to the
study of religion, this implies that the main contention regarding ‘what is
religion –​essence or category?’ is circumvented by positing religion as prac-
tices or action –​action prefigured by structures of tradition through which
texts are inscribed onto the body. Thus, what separates religion from non-​
religion is not primarily the language of representation, but the tradition-​
informed action that is represented by language. Religious action contains
a pre-​understanding that constrains and delimits its representation and sets
it apart from non-​religious actions. With regard to dialogical hermeneutics,
the appropriation begins with interrogation, and it can only be completed by
an embodied inhabitation, which I argue is a pre-​requisite before any inves-
tigation and judgement about truth-​claims can be made between traditions.
Finally, in Chapter 7, I draw together my conclusions in light of the three-
fold aim that has been addressed in the above chapters. I bring together the
contributions of each chapter with regard to (a) the nature of Aurobindo’s
enquiry into religion, (b)  implications from this study of Aurobindo’s texts
for the religious–​secular debate in the study of religion, and (c) the dialogical
hermeneutic approach that has been developed through this work.

Summary
In this opening chapter, I began with a current controversy faced within the
Aurobindo Ashram with regard to Heehs’ The Lives of Sri Aurobindo that high-
lights three interrelated issues that are addressed by this work. I then restated
the three issues around which Heehs’ controversy revolved as (a)  the nature
of the Aurobindonian enquiry into religion, (b) the religious–​secular debate
within the study of religion, and (c) the role of dialogue between traditions in
the study of religion and showed how they were interrelated. Finally, the three
issues were stated as the three aims that guide this work and I mapped how the
central argument is developed through the following six chapters.

Notes
1 Richard McKeon, “Dialogue and Controversy in Philosophy,” Philosophy and
Phenomenological Research 17, no. 2 (1956): 143.
2 Peter Heehs, The Lives of Sri Aurobindo (New  York:  Columbia University Press,
2008), ix–​xiv.
3 General Editor, “Introduction to This Site,” www.thelivesofsriaurobindo.com/​2008/​
10/​introduction.html (accessed on 01/08/2012).
4 Devotees and Disciples of Sri Aurobindo in Gujarat, “Letter to the Trustees,” www.
thelivesofsriaurobindo.com/​2012/​06/​letter-​to-​trustees-​from-​devotees-​of-​sri.html
(accessed on 01/08/2012).
12

12 Introduction
5 Somani is not part of the Ashram but attended schools from ‘kindergarten through
college –​at the Sri Aurobindo International Centre of Education’ in Pondicherry.
6 Saurabh Somani, “Letter to the Trustees,” www.thelivesofsriaurobindo.com/​2011/​
07/​objective-​research-​or-​research-​with.html (accessed on 01/08/2012).
7 Peter Heehs, “Extracts from Reviews of ‘The Lives of Sri Aurobindo’,” www.
peterheehs.com/​books/​the-​lives-​of-​sri-​aurobindo/​review-​extracts/​ (accessed on
01/08/2012).
8 Ramachandra Guha, “Ban the Ban:  The Republic of India Bans Books with a
Depressing Frequency,” The Telegraph (2011), www.telegraphindia.com/​1110730/​
jsp/​opinion/​story_​14295812.jsp (accessed on 01/08/2012).
9 W.  Michael Ashcraft, “Review:  Lives of Sri Aurobindo by Peter Heehs,” Nova
Religio: The Journal of Alternative and Emergent Religions 14, no. 2 (2010): 123.
10 Mikhail M. Bakhtin, “Methodology for the Human Sciences,” in Speech Genres and
Other Late Essays, ed. Caryl Emerson and Michael Holquist (Austin, TX: University
of Texas Press, 1986), 170.
11 Sri Aurobindo, Essays in Philosophy and Yoga, vol. 13, The Complete Works of Sri
Aurobindo (Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram, 1998 (1910–​1950)), 107.
12 Sri Aurobindo, “The Ideal of Human Unity,” in The Human Cycle, the Ideal of
Human Unity, War and Self-​Determination (Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram
Publication Department, 1962 (1949)), 578.
13 King in his oppositional model gives a list of enlightenment dichotomies at
work:  public–​private, society–​individual, science–​religion, institutional–​personal
religion, secular–​sacred, rational–​irrational, and male–​female.
14 Sri Aurobindo, The Renaissance in India and Other Essays on Indian Culture
(Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust, 1997 (1918)), 140–​41.
15 Ibid., 146.
16 Sri Aurobindo, “Letter to Joseph Baptista,” in The Essential Writings of Sri
Aurobindo, ed. Peter Heehs (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1999 (1920)), 48.
17 Aurobindo, Essays in Philosophy and Yoga, 106.

Bibliography
Ashcraft, W. Michael. “Review: Lives of Sri Aurobindo by Peter Heehs.” Nova Religio:
The Journal of Alternative and Emergent Religions 14, no. 2 (2010): 120–​23.
Aurobindo, Sri. Essays in Philosophy and Yoga. Vol. 13, The Complete Works of Sri
Aurobindo. Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram, 1998 (1910–​1950).
Aurobindo, Sri. “The Ideal of Human Unity.” In The Human Cycle, the Ideal of
Human Unity, War and Self-​Determination, 271–​595. Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo
Ashram Publication Department, 1962 (1949).
Aurobindo, Sri. “Letter to Joseph Baptista.” In The Essential Writings of Sri Aurobindo,
edited by Peter Heehs, 47–​50. New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1999 (1920).
Aurobindo, Sri. The Renaissance in India and Other Essays on Indian Culture. Pondicherry:
Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust, 1997 (1918).
Bakhtin, Mikhail M. “Methodology for the Human Sciences.” In Speech Genres and
Other Late Essays, edited by Caryl Emerson and Michael Holquist, 159–​72. Austin,
TX: University of Texas Press, 1986.
Editor, General. “Introduction to This Site.” www.thelivesofsriaurobindo.com/​2008/​
10/​introduction.html (accessed on 01/08/2012).
Guha, Ramachandra. “Ban the Ban: The Republic of India Bans Books with a Depressing
Frequency.” The Telegraph (2011), www.telegraphindia.com/​1110730/​jsp/​opinion/​story_​
14295812.jsp (accessed on 01/08/2012).
  13

Introduction 13
Gujarat, Devotees and Disciples of Sri Aurobindo in. “Letter to the Trustees.” www.
thelivesofsriaurobindo.com/​2012/​06/​letter-​to-​trustees-​from-​devotees-​of-​sri.html
(accessed on 01/08/2012).
Heehs, Peter. “Extracts from Reviews of ‘The Lives of Sri Aurobindo’.” www.peterheehs.
com/​books/​the-​lives-​of-​sri-​aurobindo/​review-​extracts/​ (accessed on 01/08/2012).
Heehs, Peter. The Lives of Sri Aurobindo. New York: Columbia University Press, 2008.
McKeon, Richard. “Dialogue and Controversy in Philosophy.” Philosophy and
Phenomenological Research 17, no. 2 (1956): 143–​63.
Somani, Saurabh. “Letter to the Trustees.” www.thelivesofsriaurobindo.com/​2011/​07/​
objective-​research-​or-​research-​with.html (accessed on 01/08/2012).
14

2 
Conceptual groundwork
Aurobindo, hermeneutics and religion

Introduction
In this chapter, I provide the conceptual groundwork for this book. As men-
tioned above, the central argument advanced in this work is that Aurobindo’s
integral philosophy is best understood as a hermeneutical philosophy of
religion. I make this argument by fulfilling three aims: first, I read three key
Aurobindonian texts with a view to arguing that Aurobindo’s enquiry into
religion possesses the structure of traditionary-​hermeneutics. However, in
order to do this, we need to have a background understanding of Aurobindo
and his texts. The intention here is not to give an intellectual biography or
even a historical background, although a bit of both will be given, but pri-
marily to inform our understanding of his integral philosophy. Since all his
key texts are introduced in the chapters they are engaged with respectively,
only a brief introduction about the Aurobindonian corpus is given here.
However in order to argue that Aurobindo’s enquiry possesses the structure
of traditionary-​hermeneutics, we will need to get a grasp of traditionary-​
hermeneutics and its fourfold conceptual structure. This exploration into
traditionary-​hermeneutics will in turn provide the required conceptual tools
for our reading of the Aurobindonian texts.
The second aim is to draw insights from the Aurobindonian enquiry into
religion for the contemporary study of religion, particularly to move beyond
the impasse experienced within the current religious–​secular debate. In other
words, the Aurobindonian texts are read with a view to seek for ‘answers’ to
the ‘questions’ posed to it by the contemporary study of religion. However,
the danger to be avoided is not to make superficial connections between the
Aurobindonian and religious studies intellectual traditions. Thus the task is
to ensure that the ‘answers’ from the Aurobindonian texts effectively respond
to questions raised by religious studies. Bakhtin touches upon the problem-
atic of ‘answerability’ in his brief essay Art and Answerability. He describes
the ordinary life of an artist (life) and her art life (art) as mechanically and
externally connected within the artist. He argues that the ‘inner connection’
is possible only through ‘mutual answerability’ –​‘I have to answer with my
own life for what I have experienced and understood in art, so that everything
  15

Aurobindo, hermeneutics and religion 15

I  have experienced and understood would not remain ineffectual in my
life.’1 In other words, there is an ‘inner interpenetration’ between these two
domains: ‘life’ responds to ‘art’ which in turn is effectual in ‘life’. If we trans-
pose Aurobindonian texts and religious studies in the place of Bakhtin’s ‘life’
and ‘art’ then we could conclude that, according to Bakhtin, externality and
superficiality can be avoided through ‘mutual answerability’, which in turn
is developed through ‘inner interpenetration’ between these two discourses
and thought traditions. Therefore, the religious–​secular debate needs to be
analysed to identify the ‘inner’ issues, upon which the debate is sustained,
and it is the questions concerning these ‘inner’ issues that are posed to the
Aurobindonian texts in order to achieve an ‘inner interpenetration’.
Building on Aurobindo’s integral method and the hermeneutical tradi-
tion, the final aim is to develop dialogical hermeneutics as an approach for
the study of religion. While the dialogical approach will develop through the
chapters in light of the insights gleaned in the discussions, a brief overview
of dialogical hermeneutics will serve as a helpful introduction. Therefore,
the tasks for this groundwork are (a) to offer a background of Aurobindo’s
integral philosophy, (b) to present a brief introduction to the Aurobindonian
corpus, (c) to explicate the conceptual structure of traditionary-​hermeneutics,
(d) to identify the key components of the religious–​secular debate, and (e) to
give an overview of dialogical hermeneutics.

Background of Aurobindo’s integral philosophy

The Neo-​Vedānta tradition, beginning with Rammohan Roy and reaching
its crescendo in Aurobindo and Radhakrishnan, can be seen as using an
‘integral’ philosophical approach. The Neo-​Vedantins engaged the received
European traditions with their own inherited traditions to produce an inte-
gral intellectual tradition. Their inherited traditions included the Sufi Islamic
tradition, the Vaiṣṇava Bhakti tradition, the Tantric tradition, the different
schools of Yoga and the Vedantic tradition. They primarily used a Vedantic
conceptual framework, which was modified by their encounter with different
strands of European and Christian thought. They wrote in English, but their
primary sources were the Vedas and the Upaniṣads and thus they wrote from
an Indian standpoint. They used categories that were borrowed from both
their inherited and received traditions. Their works were a result of trying to
make sense of both Indian and Western thought that converged within them.
Aurobindo was the first to give a philosophical understanding of the integral
approach, although the Neo-​Vedantins before him embodied this approach in
their works. Aurobindo’s metaphysics usually known as ‘Integral Philosophy’
has also been referred to as Integral Vedānta or Integral Non-​Dualism (purna-​
advaita) or Integral Idealism (purna-​vijñāna), or just Integralism (purnavada).2
Although he has written voluminously on different subjects, it is his ‘integralism’3
that stands out as the central pillar holding his entire thought-​edifice together.
16

16  Aurobindo, hermeneutics and religion

‘Integralism’ best defines both his philosophical method as well as the central
subject of his philosophy.
So how did Aurobindo develop his integral philosophy? For Aurobindo,
integralism was not merely a philosophical method, for it grew out of his
inhabitation of two distinct historical traditions  –​European secularism
and Indian spiritualism (Vedānta) –​the exclusive claims of each he sought
to integrate through his philosophical project. Engaging Vedānta with
European thought was the central preoccupation of the nineteenth-​century
Neo-​Vedantins. However, there is a crucial difference between Aurobindo
and the other Neo-​Vedantins, in that, while all the other Neo-​Vedantins,
from Rammohan Roy onwards, grew up in India and their introduction to
European thought was either through their personal readings, or attendance
of education institutions in India that taught it and then only at a later stage
in their life did they travel to Europe or America for a first-​hand experi-
ence of the West. However, Aurobindo, from the age of seven, grew up in
England. He was an exceptional student both in school (St Paul’s, London)
and University (King’s College, Cambridge). Therefore, for all practical pur-
poses, his own self was constructed primarily by European thought, as taught
in the best of institutions in England. His personal encounter with India hap-
pened only upon his return to India at the age of 21 (1893). This distinction
between Aurobindo and the other Neo-​Vedantins is crucial, because unlike
the others, his encounter with Europe was not merely through school texts
but rather through an inscribing of the European life on his self. However,
before he began writing his main works (1914), he had by then spent over
twenty years studying, translating, and writing commentaries on the main
texts of the Vedas and the Vedānta tradition, apart from becoming a keen
practitioner of yoga. Thus, his work was a result of many years of immersion
in both the Western and the Indian intellectual traditions whose ‘integration’
and ‘synthesis’ defined his work. This curious chronological combination of
the Western and Vedānta traditions of thought was responsible for the deep
reflexivity with which he composed his integral philosophy that acknowl-
edged ‘difference’ between the traditions even as it sought for their integra-
tion. Referring to Aurobindo’s philosophical project, Chatterjee observes that
he brings together ‘divergent currents of thought –​Vedic, Tantric, Buddhist,
Sankhya, Yoga, Visistadvaita and Advaita, and modern Western science and
philosophy –​and welds them into a synthetic philosophy’.4 Therefore, while
Aurobindo’s integralism can be argued to embody Homi Bhabha’s ‘hybrid-
ity’, he can also be said to possess ‘second first languages’ in MacIntyrean
terms or be truly ‘polyglossic’ à la Bakhtin.

The Aurobindonian corpus
Aurobindo wrote voluminously over a period of 56 years (1893–​1950) on a
variety of subjects, as one of India’s leading philosophers, poets, thinkers, and
spiritual leaders.5 Aurobindo began his official writing career in 1893, four
  17

Aurobindo, hermeneutics and religion 17

months after his return to India, when he contributed his first political article
to Indu Prakash, an English-​Marathi newspaper of Bombay. In August 1914,
Aurobindo, along with Paul Richard and Mirra Richard, began a journal
called Arya and, over the next seven years, published most of his major prose
works in monthly series. Between 1914 and 1921, he published an equivalent
of a dozen books, which were later published as separate books. His main
works were: The Life Divine, The Synthesis of Yoga, The Secret of the Veda,
Essays on the Gita, The Human Cycle, The Ideal of Human Unity, Savitri, and
The Future Poetry. Aurobindo revised his major prose works after an acci-
dent in November 1938 and they were published as books. The Life Divine
(1939–​1940), a part of The Synthesis of Yoga (1948), and The Human Cycle
(1949) were published just before his death in 1950.6 From the end of 1926
until his death in 1950, Aurobindo stopped meeting with anyone except Mirra
Alfassa (aka The Mother) and a select few, although during the 1930s, he was
in constant touch with a wide range of people, especially the members of the
Ashram, through letters and consultations.
I offer a brief overview of the secondary literature, which maps the field of
studies on Aurobindo. The scholarship on Aurobindo can be broadly catego-
rized into three kinds. The first kind consists of those works by followers of
Sri Aurobindo, who are either full-​time members of the Aurobindo Ashram
(Ashramites) or those who do not live in the Ashram but would consider them-
selves followers. They are sympathetic insiders to Aurobindo’s project and
mostly write expositions of his works bordering on hagiography. Examples
are the works of K.D. Sethna, M.P. Pandit, A.  B Purani, and Satyajyoti
Chakravarty. Haridas Chaudhuri’s The Philosophy of Integralism, published
in 1954, is the most critical. Most of these works are published either by the
Ashram itself or by other publishers within India. It was in opposition to
this genre of work that Heehs wrote The Lives of Sri Aurobindo. The second
kind belongs to postgraduate or post-​doctoral works published within India,
such as L.G. Chincholkar and V. Madhusudan Reddy.7 While Ram Shankar
Misra’s The Integral Advaitism of Sri Aurobindo, S.K Maitra’s The Meeting
of the East and the West in Sri Aurobindo’s Philosophy follow a philosophical
enquiry, Chattopadihyaya’s comparative work Sri Aurobindo and Karl Marx
focuses on the social philosophy of Aurobindo.8 The third kind of scholar-
ship on Aurobindo is the academic work done on Aurobindo in universities
outside India. Apart from Stephen Phillips’ dissertation on Aurobindo at
Harvard and Yvonne Williams’ at Oxford, other examples include publica-
tions by Morwenna Donnelly, R.C. Zaehner, Robert Charles Bristow, and
Rhoda Priscella Le Cocq.9 While J.N. Mohanty’s Essays on Indian Philosophy
contains a few important essays on Aurobindo’s integral philosophy, a key
compilation of thirty articles is found in the commemorative symposium, The
Integral Philosophy of Sri Aurobindo published in 1960.10
However, as Mohanty rightly observes, while Aurobindo’s reputation as a
‘mystic and a spiritualist’ has spread, ‘he has remained somewhat marginal-
ized in the academia’ and has ‘not found a similar acceptance in the University
18

18  Aurobindo, hermeneutics and religion

system’.11 I claim that a possible reason for this lack of interest in Aurobindo
within the academy is the inability to clearly locate his work within academic
disciplinary lines. However, if Aurobindo’s project was an enquiry into the
matter–​spirit or material–​spiritual dichotomy, and the contemporary study
of religion revolves around the religious–​secular binary, which is another way
of talking about the material–​spiritual binary, then Aurobindo’s work can be
boldly claimed to be part of the academic study of religion.
But the academic study of religion within the West has a long history in
the modern era along with the human sciences, which is well documented,
for example, in Capps’ mapping of the discipline beginning with Descartes.12
With the progress of natural sciences and the focus on objective truth, religion
was initially relegated to the private sphere as ‘divine sciences’ but from the
eighteenth century onwards it was objectified and its study was located within
the human sciences as opposed to theology.13 Thus, the Enlightenment mode
of enquiry with the scientific temper that objectified and essentialized religion
was dominant at the turn of the twentieth century. An example is Müller’s
creation of the scientific study of religion, which can be explicitly seen in his
Introduction to the Science of Religion (1863).14 If this was the intellectual
milieu in which Aurobindo wrote, then what kind of enquiry was Aurobindo’s
study of religion? I argue that Aurobindo’s enquiry is not only a reaction to
this dominant scientific temper, but is also one of the first attempts to enquire
into religion in a systematic manner from a non-​Western perspective. In this
book, my first aim is to argue that Aurobindo’s approach to religion pos-
sessing the structure of tradition can be seen as a traditionary-​hermeneutical
approach to religion. But then, what is traditionary-​hermeneutics?

The traditionary-​hermeneutics approach

Within enquiry in Human Sciences, if post-​Kantian Enlightenment thought
promoted a universal human rationality, then post-​ Nietzschean counter-​
Enlightenment thought has vehemently denied it. It could even be argued
that from the time of Hume’s scepticism that woke Kant from his dogmatic
slumber, the history of Western thought has been a multifaceted debate that
sought to establish standards of rationality. Within the contemporary study of
religion, especially in light of the plurality of religious traditions, this debate
on rationality has taken centre-​stage. In the twentieth century, the claim of
universal rationality was challenged from the 1960s onwards within the phi-
losophy of science in the works of Kuhn, Feyerabend, and Lakatos, and par-
ticularly by Peter Winch within the social sciences. In the 1970s, the volume
entitled Rationality (1970) edited by Bryan Wilson came out, and twelve years
later a new volume Rationality and Relativism (1982), edited by Martin Hollis
and Steven Lukes, containing some of the contributors from the earlier vol-
ume, appeared. Two more key texts appeared in the last decades of the twen-
tieth century capturing the central contentions of the debate  –​Bernstein’s
Beyond Objectivism and Relativism (1983) and MacIntyre’s Gifford lectures
  19

Aurobindo, hermeneutics and religion 19

Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry (1992), both probing a way beyond
these rival modes of enquiry. While the former position is termed ‘objectiv-
ism’ by Bernstein or ‘encyclopaedic’ by MacIntyre, the latter is termed ‘rela-
tivism’ or ‘genealogy’ by both respectively. Traditionary-​hermeneutics is the
name I give to what has been developed as a way forward, beyond objectivism
and relativism.

The three senses of ‘tradition’

Josef Pieper in the beginning of Tradition: Concept and Claim complains that
the category ‘tradition’ does not even have an entry in the standard German
philosophical dictionaries.15 Equally, Halpin, Power and Fitz argue that ‘con-
siderable ambiguity surrounds the notion of tradition’ and that it has received
little systematic attention in cultural and social theory.16 However, Pelikan has
counter-​argued that in the last few decades, humanistic scholarship has been
rediscovering ‘tradition’ and this rediscovery involves the concept of tradition
itself both as a category and method of research, as well as the content of
various specific traditions.17
The word is argued to have come into the English language from the
French tradicion and the Latin verb tradere in the fourteenth century with the
meaning of ‘hand over’ or ‘deliver’.18 The Latin etymological roots of ‘tradi-
tion’ suggest two dominant senses, which are historically contained within
the English term: first, the noun form traditio (handing over), which closely
corresponds to the Greek paradosis, refers literally to the ‘content’ of what is
being handed over.19 As Morris would say, ‘each generation has handed on
something to the next and that something is –​Tradition’.20 I will later argue
that it is texts and practices (or actions) that are ‘handed on’ by each gen-
eration. Thus, textuality or ‘theory of text’ and philosophy of action provide
insights on how texts and practices function in the progression of tradition.
Second, although tradition does not have a verb form in the English language,
the Latin verb form tradere refers to the process of ‘delivering’ or ‘passing
on’ and ‘handing down’, and it has the idea of ‘transmission’. Pieper argues
that the Latin preposition trans is hidden in ‘tradition’ and calls it the ‘act
of tradition’, which is described in French as transmettre, thereby suggesting
the notion of tradition as an act of transmission. Pieper further argues that
the preposition trans, when joined to a verb, expresses movement with refer-
ence to three different places. He gives the example of the term ‘transport-
ing’ and states that it means ‘not only that something has been conveyed to
somewhere or other, but also that something has been moved from a place
where the transporter himself is not now located, to another, therefore to a
third place’.21 If this three-​part movement is seen in temporal terms, it refers
to a movement from the past through the present to a future. This historical
transmission of tradition is captured by narratives that interpret the histori-
cal transmission. The relationship between ‘time’ and ‘narrative’ is central to
Ricoeur’s project:  ‘the world unfolded by every narrative work is always a
20

20  Aurobindo, hermeneutics and religion

temporal world’.22 It is the narrative’s ability to map the three-​part temporal
movement that enables it to capture the historical movement of tradition.
As we saw above in Morris, each generation hands on something to the next.
Thus, tradition is ‘socially embodied’ and ‘historically extended’.23 Finally,
tradition acquired a third sense that is epistemic in nature, according to which
traditions circumscribe ‘rationality’ as we find in MacIntyre’s ‘Rationality of
Tradition’.24 Tradition as a mode of knowing and as a form of enquiry, albeit
in a derivative manner, has been brought into philosophical centre-​stage in
the twentieth century within the hermeneutical tradition, particularly in the
works of Gadamer and MacIntyre.

Structure of traditionary-​hermeneutics
Thus, the three senses contained in ‘tradition’ can be seen as contributing to
a four-​part structure of a traditionary-​hermeneutical enquiry  –​rationality,
textuality, narrative, and action. The post-​Heideggerian hermeneutical tradi-
tion, especially in the works of Gadamer, Ricoeur, MacIntyre, and Taylor,
has contributed to the development of these various aspects of tradition as a
mode of enquiry.25 In MacIntyre’s work on traditionary-​hermeneutics, we are
able to find these four elements being brought together.
MacIntyre has developed the notion of tradition as an enquiry most clearly
in his mature work Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry (1992), which has
been developed through his previous works Whose Justice? Which Rationality?
(1989) and After Virtue (1981) as an alternative to both Enlightenment foun-
dationalism and postmodern perspectivalism. Although MacIntyre’s work
is within the discourse of moral philosophy, as Porter argues, he moves
between a wider concept of tradition as a moral orientation and a narrower
understanding of tradition as an enquiry.26 For MacIntyre, in the realm of
enquiries, tradition is a third possibility, distinct from the genealogical and
encyclopaedic forms of enquiry. He argues, for reasons to be genuinely univer-
sal and impersonal, it has to be ‘neither neutral nor disinterested’ and mem-
bership to a traditionary-​community is a condition for a genuinely rational,
especially for theological (and also religious) enquiry.27 Thus, the key argu-
ment advanced by MacIntyre is that enquiry is always tradition-​dependent
or tradition-​constituted. He writes, ‘there is no standing ground, no place for
enquiry, no way to engage in the practices of advancing, evaluating, accept-
ing, and rejecting reasoned argument apart from that which is provided by
some particular tradition or other’.28
MacIntyre’s description of a traditionary enquiry entails the four-​part
structure that we extrapolated from the three senses of tradition. He argues
that ‘the rationality of a tradition-​constituted and tradition-​constitutive
enquiry … begins in and from some condition of pure historical contin-
gency, from the beliefs, institutions, and practices … [with] authority …
conferred upon certain texts and certain voices’.29 To explicate the four
components of traditionary-​hermeneutics:  first, all reasoning takes place
  21

Aurobindo, hermeneutics and religion 21

within the context of a tradition, therefore, tradition is itself a presentation
of an argument with its own rationality. Second, the authority of tradi-
tion is derived from central texts and voices that are taken as authoritative.
Third, tradition is historically contingent in that each tradition ‘pursue[s]‌
its own specific historical path’ that is captured in a narrative. And finally,
tradition consists of embodied practices that are transmitted and reshaped
by larger social traditions.30 Thus the four-​part structure of a tradition-​
constituted hermeneutical enquiry are rationality, textuality, narrative, and
action, each of which, while guiding my reading of the Aurobindonian
texts respectively in the following chapters, will inversely enable me to argue
that Aurobindo’s enquiry into religion possessed the internal structure of a
traditionary-​hermeneutical enquiry. Therefore the first aim of this work is
to argue that the Aurobindonian enquiry into religion possesses this four-​
fold structure of traditionary-​hermeneutics. With this we begin to make a
transition to the second aim of the book that has to do with Aurobindo’s
contribution to the contemporary debates in the study of religion.

The religious–​secular debate
The second aim of this book is to get ‘answers’ from the Aurobindonian texts
for ‘questions’ raised by the contemporary debates in the study of religion.
The questions I take to the text alter the way I represent the Aurobindonian
texts, even as their representation is both conditioned and limited by the ques-
tions I ask of them. This is what Bakhtin means by ‘renewal’ of ‘past mean-
ings’ in subsequent dialogues. An aspect responsible for ‘renewal’ has to do
with the ‘outsideness’ of the enquirer –​

creative understanding does not renounce itself, its own place in time,
its own culture; and it forgets nothing. In order to understand, it is
immensely important for the person, who understands, to be located out-
side the object of his or her creative understanding –​in time, in space, in
culture.31

This reflexively refers to the ‘situatedness’ of this enquiry, which in this

case has primarily been within the contemporary academic study of reli-
gion. It is the horizon of this discourse that frames the enquiry into the
Aurobindonian texts. Thus, questions regarding the nature of religion
and its relationship to the secular (subsumed under the religious–​secular
debate) have defined the necessary ‘outsideness’ of this enquiry to under-
stand the Aurobindonian other. As Bakhtin argues, ‘without one’s own
questions one cannot creatively understand anything other or foreign’.32
It is the dialogue of the ‘questions’ from the study of religion with the
Aurobindonian texts in order to get ‘answers’ which would bring about the
‘creativity’ in the understanding and ‘renewal’ of the Aurobindonian texts
in this presentation.
22

22  Aurobindo, hermeneutics and religion

Historical origins of the religious–​secular debate
The questions put forward by the contemporary study of religion have
come to be known as the religious–​secular debate. The origins of this debate
can be traced back to the classical theorists of the nineteenth century,
between the ‘idealists’ and ‘realists’ within the academic study of religion.33
Waardenburg argues that the debate within this newly emerging academic
study of religion, between idealists and realists, was due to the extreme dif-
ference in motivations for the study of religion. He argues that the idealists
had a ‘positive appreciation of religion’ and against the background of
secularization at home, they wanted to discover the ‘truths, norms and val-
ues’ of other religions and went about actively constructing the spirituality
of other religions, which was instrumental in ‘other’ societies and cultures
being dominated by the imposition of these Western constructs within the
colonial project. The other extreme motivation was represented by the real-
ists, who were ‘suspicious’ of religion as a phenomenon and denied the
truth claims of both the religious traditions and the idealists. They attrib-
uted religion to impersonal social, political, or psychological forces or as
the ‘wilful manipulation’ of the powerful. They subjected both religious
traditions and idealist imaginations to the ‘methodological and theoreti-
cal constructs of Western scholarship’. However, Waardenburg’s critique
of the classical theorists is that while the debate between the idealists and
realists concerned the existence or non-​existence of transcendent ‘objects’,
in keeping with the governing European imaginaire of their time, ‘they did
not really examine and problematize the notion of religion itself ’.34 They
were unable to see that ‘religion’ both in the academy as well as in cultures
and societies is ‘continuously constructed’. Thus, both groups worked with
a ‘realistic’ concept of religion, supported by a phenomenological method,
which accorded a sui generis status to religion.
While the debate on the status of ‘religion’ has progressively evolved within
sociology, including the sociology of religion and anthropology, in what has
come to be known as the ‘secularisation thesis’35 it has only in the last few dec-
ades come to academic attention among religious studies scholars.36 It is the
‘realistic’ notion of religion, invisible to the classical scholars, that has come
under critique in the works of a dominant section of contemporary schol-
ars of religion such as Fitzgerald, McCutcheon, King, and Balagangadhara,
whom we will henceforth call the ‘critical school’ and the critique has come
to be known as the religious–​secular debate. It demands an abandonment of
the category ‘religion’ as well as the dismantling of the academic discipline of
‘religious studies’. On the other hand, there has been a response to the criti-
cal school by a group of scholars, who can be termed ‘post-​critical’ scholars
of religion such as Lorenzen, Sweetman, Pennington, Flood, and McKinnon
who, while accepting the critique of ‘religion’ offered by the critical school,
continue to argue for the retention of both the category ‘religion’ and the
discipline of ‘religious studies’. It is this debate that forms the ground of this
  23

Aurobindo, hermeneutics and religion 23

enquiry, which locates its own position as one of the voices within the post-​
critical school and attempts to take the conversation forward.

Religious–​secular debate in the contemporary study of religion

I will outline the imaginaire which forms the background against which the
religious–​secular debate is being conducted, before outlining the key elements
of the debate that are addressed in this work. If Waardenburg’s work sur-
veyed the development of the study of religion among the classical theorists
until the year 1945, then claiming to be a ‘sequel’ and a ‘worthy companion’
to it, Whaling has picked up the story since 1945 up until the mid-​1990s in
his Theory and Method in Religious Studies: Contemporary Approaches to the
Study of Religion (1995). While the Religion–​Secular conference held in 2003
explicitly echoed many of these theoretical assumptions, the critical school
scholars holding on to these positions have been publishing from the 1980s,
embodying the imaginaire that Whaling seeks to uncover.
Whaling puts forward nine points that differentiate Waardenburg’s clas-
sical (1850–​1945) period from his contemporary (1945–​1995) period in the
study of religion. It can be clearly demonstrated that the contemporary
period is the background out of which the critical school scholars function.
Of these nine points, there are five that are directly relevant to this work. The
first is the increasing influence of the social sciences on the study of religion.
Although the social scientific approach to religion was there right from the
beginning with the classical theorists like Marx, Weber, Durkheim, Whaling
argues that in the contemporary situation, ‘any theory or method of inves-
tigation in any of the humane or social sciences is or may be applied to the
study of specific sets of religious data’.37 In other words, the study of religion
was being invented within the framework of the social sciences, which itself
has been modelled after the methods and presuppositions of the natural sci-
ences. Second, Whaling characterizes the contemporary study of religion as
reacting to the ‘Western nature of much past research’ in the study of reli-
gion. However, in spite of this awareness, he wonders if the pre-​1945 Western
attitude of ‘unconscious superiority’, accompanying the study of religions
originating outside the West, has actually been superseded in contemporary
studies. Third, Whaling argues that a key factor that differentiates the contem-
porary scholars from the classical is the role played by ‘secular religions’ such
as Marxism, secular humanism, nationalism, and civil religion in the study
of religion. He gives the example of ‘Marxist studies of religion’. Fourthly,
he points out that the raison d’être of the phenomenology of religion, which
had distinguished itself from both theology and the social sciences as the
legitimate study of religion in the classical era, has been questioned within the
contemporary study of religion. Whaling argues that Segal and Wiebe (both
belonging to the critical school) have accused it of religionism –​upholding
the truth of religion against the natural sciences and philosophy and defend-
ing it against the social sciences. Furthermore, they have critiqued Eliade and
24

24  Aurobindo, hermeneutics and religion

Smith for taking the believer’s (insider’s) viewpoint seriously and the phe-
nomenology of religion’s serious acceptance of Otto’s ‘the holy’, Eliade’s ‘the
sacred’, and Smart’s ‘the focus of faith’. They argue, on one hand, that taking
these ideas seriously is to transgress into theology; on the other hand, that
there is no ‘irreducible religious factor’ that justifies the independent study
of religion; and finally, that the contemporary study of religion is faced with
the elusive definition of ‘religion’ and is still unable to come to any universal
understanding. Whaling argues that while this has kept the Western philoso-
phy of religion away from the study of religion, religious studies’ hesitancy
‘to settle upon an agreed set of given data which would constitute it as a rigid
discipline’ has kept it from becoming important as a discipline. If this forms
the imaginaire of contemporary scholarship of religion, then what are the key
elements of the religious–​secular debate?
A recent institutional investigation into the religious–​secular debate was
undertaken by the conference entitled The Religion–​ Secular Dichotomy:
Historical Formations in Colonial Contexts organized by the Department of
Religious Studies, Stirling University, in July 2003 that brought together a
group of religious studies scholars (mostly belonging to the critical school).
The papers presented have been published as the book Religion and the
Secular:  Historical and Colonial Formations (2007) edited by Timothy
Fitzgerald. Fitzgerald argues in the ‘Introduction’ that the ‘general theo-
retical concern’ of the conference was the ‘ideological function of the pri-
vatization of religion and its separation from politics and the other forms
of secular discourse’ and, thus, a central aim was to ‘theorize the religion–​
secular dichotomy’.38 He puts forth five sets of theoretical assumptions, which
are interestingly analogous to Whaling’s imaginaire, that not only motivated
the conference and the book but which, in turn, became ‘generalizations’
to be substantiated:  (a)  the problematic usage of the English-​language cat-
egory ‘religion’ especially in the colonial contexts, (b)  the specific ‘histori-
cal conditions’ for the emergence of ‘religion’ as a modern category, (c) the
conceptualization of ‘religion’ in conjunction with other categories such as
‘the secular’ (also ‘non-​religious’, which could also be termed as ‘politics’ or
‘political economy’ and ‘the crucial logic is separation into two essentially
different domains’), so that the secular was seen as non-​religious and, hence,
the oppositional binary of religious–​secular, (d) the consideration of domains
such as politics, economics and capitalist markets as ‘universally rational’ led
to the assumption that ‘religion’ and ‘religions’ can be ‘researched, analysed
and compared scientifically’ as species of a genus, and finally (e) that while
the processes of colonialism were the ground for the construction of the
religious–​secular binary, it was not just a one-​way Euro-​American imposi-
tion, but equally an appropriation by the colonized societies.39
These five generalizations, set forth in the ‘Introduction’, claimed to be
substantiated by the papers of the conference with a view to put forward the
fundamental ‘relationship between categories’. Therefore, they can be restated
as ‘contentions’ that the conference and the publication sought to address.
  25

Aurobindo, hermeneutics and religion 25

These five generalizations, not in any particular order, thus restated can be
seen as the critical contentions giving shape to the religious–​secular debate:

(a) The problematic nature of the English-​language category ‘religion’ par-

ticularly to represent what is found in the world as religions, religious
traditions, and religious experience. What is being questioned here is the
analytical power of the category ‘religion’ to represent any action or expe-
rience as distinctively ‘religious’. Let us call this the debate about religious
‘action’ and its representation.
(b) The modern category ‘religion’ as distinct from the secular emerged from
particular ‘historical conditions’ and ‘secular narration’ since the six-
teenth century to form ‘modern Western ideology’. While the focus of the
contention here is about the genealogy of religion, it inadvertently brings
to light the deeper contention that religion can be ‘talk[ed] about’. How
is one to sensibly articulate religion? Is religion a ‘category’, a ‘concept’
or a historical narrative? Is it only an ‘ideology’ in the Marxian sense, as
it is being termed here, or is there something more to it? Let us term this
contention the ‘articulation’ debate.
(c) This next contention is about the nature of enquiry into religion. The
argument presented here is that in order to emphasise the universal
rationality of modern politics, economics, and capitalist markets, religion
as the ‘other half’ of the social sphere had to be researched, analysed,
and classified as well. What is being flagged as a problem is ‘universal
rationality’ that not only objectifies religion but also treats ‘religions’ as
species of the genus ‘religion’. Let us term this as the contention about
‘rationality’.
(d) Fourth, the contention about the ground that conditioned the birth of the
religious–​secular binary. It is strongly argued here that it was completely
a consequence of the colonial processes. But as all classifications, while
they reveal what they highlight, they equally eclipse issues that are invis-
ible to their imaginaire. In both Whaling’s painting of the imaginaire, as
well as in the work of the critical school, what was eclipsed was their
focus on their own naturalism and secularity, even as they were enquir-
ing into the religious–​secular binary.40 The issue of ‘transcendence’ was
completely eclipsed in the 2003 conference on Religion and the Secular.
It neither had a mention in the list of ‘theoretical assumptions’ in the
‘Introduction’, nor does it even have an entry in the index. This has to do
with the reductionist approach of the already secularized critical school,
which was reducing religion to colonial processes. While not denying
the role played by colonialism, what is made invisible by this is the rela-
tionship between religion and transcendence, a relationship which some
would take as natural was completely eclipsed here. We can term this as
the contention about ‘transcendence’.
(e) The final debate is about the emergence of religion. It is claimed here
that it is always in conjunction with categories such as ‘secular’, ‘politics’,
26

26  Aurobindo, hermeneutics and religion

‘political economy’. The social sphere is divided into two realms  –​
religious–​political or religious–​secular, which can be seen as being hostile
to each other. It is being advocated that religion as ‘private faith’ and
‘adherence to a soteriological doctrine of God’ was necessary to repre-
sent the world as secular and non-​religious. This is at the heart of the
religious–​secular debate: the contention that religion and the secular or
religion and politics are an oppositional binary, and this can be termed
as the secularization debate. It is towards the critique of this notion of
secularization that this entire work will be directed.

To summarize, the religious–​secular debate is broken down into four criti-

cal debates that we have termed as contentions about action, articulation,
rationality, and transcendence respectively, with the fifth, on secularization,
as the larger debate, within which these critical debates find their place. Thus
to engage with the religious–​secular debate is to engage with these critical
debates. Therefore, in the following four main chapters, I  will be engaging
the Aurobindonian texts with these four contentions. I have divided The Life
Divine into two parts, with the third chapter addressing ‘rationality’ and the
fourth chapter addressing ‘transcendence’. The fifth chapter on The Human
Cycle deals with the contention about ‘articulation’ of religion and the sixth
chapter on The Synthesis of Yoga engages the contention of religious ‘action’
and its representation. Finally, in the conclusion, the seventh chapter, even as
I bring my findings together, I will address ‘secularization’.

Overview of dialogical hermeneutics

If the first aim of this work has been to argue that Aurobindo’s enquiry
into religion possessed the structure of traditionary-​hermeneutics, then the
second aim was to investigate the substantive contributions made by the
Aurobindonian texts to the study of religion in light of the religious–​secular
debate. Finally, it is observed that Aurobindo’s integral approach was evi-
dent in bringing into dialogue two distinct intellectual traditions –​European
secularism and Vedānta spiritualism. Therefore, the third aim of this work is
to glean insights from Aurobindo’s ‘integral approach’ of enquiry towards
developing a dialogical hermeneutics for the study of religion, whose
methodology primarily involves bringing into dialogue a plurality of tra-
ditions. This builds upon the work we have done towards our first aim on
traditionary-​hermeneutics.
In the construction of traditionary-​hermeneutics, apart from Gadamer and
Ricoeur, we also depended on MacIntyre’s work on tradition as an appropriate
form of enquiry in opposition to both encyclopaedic and genealogical forms
of enquiry. The primary critique of MacIntyre is an interrogation of his own
position with respect to the three rival versions of enquiry that he advances. His
‘tradition-​dependent rationality’ has been accused of being either relativist or,
on the contrary, universalist, for example, by Kuna, who calls him a ‘consistent
  27

Aurobindo, hermeneutics and religion 27

universalist’.41 In other words, what sort of an enquiry is MacIntyre’s and to
which tradition of enquiry does it belong? Among others, this critique has
been advanced by Jon P. Gunneman, Max Stackhouse, Jeffrey Stout, and Peter
J. Mehl. Gregory Jones best articulates this critique:

MacIntyre’s formal claim about the narrative quality of human life qua
human life is at odds with his claim about tradition/​community. That
is, he makes a formal claim that (at least in its explicit formulation) is
not specific to any tradition; yet he wants to claim that epistemology is
tradition-​specific…. Thus it is not clear that he can know in principle that
human life qua human life is narrative in form.42

For Gunneman, MacIntyre appears to be offering a ‘meta-​narrative’, a larger

narrative which encompasses all the other narrative traditions; however, that
he does not give a systematic account of how this meta-​narrative is integrated
within his particular tradition.43 There have been different proposals to rem-
edy these ‘defects’ in the MacIntyrean thesis. For example, Herdt argues that
‘the best way to resolve these contradictions is to move beyond the dichot-
omy between tradition-​dependent and tradition-​independent norms’ and he
introduces the notion of ‘tradition-​transcendental norms’, which is built into
the structure of tradition itself and constitutive of them, thus becoming the
conditions for the possibility of traditions.44 However, it is Allen’s appraisal
of MacIntyre and proposal for remedying him that serve as our point of
departure. She begins by arguing that MacIntyre’s account of traditionalism
is deeply problematic and can only be remedied if understood in one of these
three ways:

first, he can embrace perspectivism, a view which he argues against; sec-

ond, he can adopt universalism, a view which he explicitly denies is even
possible; and third, he can admit that what he is describing is not several
discrete traditions, but instead a grand metatradition, the tradition of the
West.45

She questions, ‘has MacIntyre managed to answer the relativist and perspec-
tivist challenges while steering clear of universal, tradition-​independent stand-
ards?’ and responds saying, ‘I contend that he has not managed to do so, and
that in his attempt to answer these challenges, MacIntyre has actually brought
in a tradition-​neutral standpoint with universalist aspirations through the
back door.’ She argues for this position by stating that what is universal in
MacIntyre is his ‘substantive conception of rationality’ that is shared by all
traditions and the content of this rationality are: the principle of progress, a
standard for truth, and a criterion to judge human rationality. Furthermore,
that this substance of the MacIntyrean rationality are in fact identical to that
of Enlightenment rationality, which MacIntyre wants to refute. Therefore, she
argues that the only way to bring coherence to the MacIntyrean project is to
28

28  Aurobindo, hermeneutics and religion

collapse the boundaries between these traditions and to see them broadly as
the metatradition of the West. She argues for this position on the basis that all
the traditions that MacIntyre deals with stem from a single Homeric source
and that they all share a common substantive rationality.
While Allen’s critique has touched upon a valid question regarding
MacIntyre’s position, I argue that because her own work is conditioned by
the dichotomy of objectivism and relativism, she is unable to see a possible
third way that MacIntyre is negotiating ‘beyond objectivism and relativism’,
à la Bernstein. For one, it can be claimed that she fails to take into account
MacIntyre’s philosophy of the mind, which explicitly argues for a conception
of the mind, which is in opposition to both Descartes and Hegel as it neither
begins with ‘unassailable evident truths’ nor ends with a ‘final rational state’,
which is shared by all movements of thought.46 Her analysis of MacIntyre
also misses out the larger context, within which MacIntyre’s work is situated.
It is primarily a work on the nature of a traditionary enquiry broadly situated
within a hermeneutical tradition that takes a position in opposition to both
enlightenment and relativist rationality. Finally, I challenge Allen’s conclusion
on the MacIntyrean project on the grounds that she does not take into account
the two orders of enquiry that frame the MacIntyrean project and thus is
unable to locate precisely MacIntyre’s position. MacIntyre’s first order usage,
as discussed above, is to look at ‘tradition as enquiry’. However, he moves
on from that to problematize ‘tradition as enquiry’ in the larger context of a
plurality of traditions and thus introduces a second-​order enquiry. However,
this order of enquiry is not about what is internal to traditions, but about
the relationship between different and even conflicting traditions of enquiry,
even while the enquiry continues to be located within a first-​order tradition
of enquiry. To my knowledge, in the secondary literature on MacIntyre, it is
this distinction of orders that has not been detected leading to a less complete
understanding of his project.
In the chapter, Rationality of Traditions, MacIntyre lists three stages in
his account of the development of rationality. However, he refers to them
as the three stages of the ‘initial development of a tradition’ and ‘the very
earliest stages in the development of anything worth calling a tradition of
enquiry’.47 Furthermore, there appears to be a natural conclusion to these
‘initial’ and ‘earliest stages’ of ‘tradition as enquiry’ when, after his dis-
cussion of the three stages of development of traditionary rationality, he
says: ‘a tradition which reaches this point of development will have become
to greater or lesser degree a form of enquiry….’48 However, a few sentences
later, he proposes another stage in the development of the traditionary
enquiry; however, this stage is no longer concerned primarily about a ration-
ality internal to tradition but one that is defined in the context of a plurality
of traditions. He argues that, ‘at some point it may be discovered within
some developing tradition that some of the same problems and issues …
are being debated within some other tradition’ leading to both agreements
and disagreements with other traditions. I argue that it is this enquiry into
  29

Aurobindo, hermeneutics and religion 29

the relationship between multiple traditions that can be captured as dialogi-
cal hermeneutics and MacIntyre is precisely located within the hermeneuti-
cal tradition while talking about the plurality of traditions.
If the study of religion, as Flood argues, is to be a ‘field of inquiry that
gives hospitality to traditions and their self-​representations’,49 then dialogi-
cal hermeneutics becomes central to its project. Therefore, this work, as its
third aim, from its study of Aurobindo’s traditionary-​hermeneutical enquiry
into religion, will seek to propose a dialogical hermeneutics approach for the
study of religion. However, I do not begin with a clearly laid out structure
of dialogical hermeneutics, rather I will develop a theory of dialogical her-
meneutics from the work on Aurobindo’s integral approach as well as the
post-​Heideggerian hermeneutical approach that is being employed to read
Aurobindo’s texts.

Summary
In this background chapter, I have provided the conceptual groundwork for
the three aims to be pursued in this work. The groundwork with regard to
the first aim of arguing that Aurobindo’s integral philosophy is best under-
stood as hermeneutical philosophy began by locating Aurobindo within the
Neo-​Vedantic tradition. I argue that while the approach of the Neo-​Vedānta
tradition of enquiry was ‘integral’ in nature, the approach itself was explicitly
stated and developed only in the work of Aurobindo. In providing an over-
view of the Aurobindonian corpus and the mapping of its secondary litera-
ture, I  argued that Aurobindo was marginalized within the academy as his
work could not be clearly located within academic disciplinary lines. I have
then provided a historical background to traditionary-​hermeneutics, even
as I explicated its four-​fold structure as rationality, textuality, narrative, and
action. With regard to the second aim, I offered a historical background to
the religious–​secular debate, even as I  teased out its four main contentions
within the larger debate on secularization, which could be stated as  –​the
problem of universal rationality, reference to transcendence, articulation of
religion, and representation of religious action. The background work to the
final aim consisted of an overview of dialogical hermeneutics as negotiating
a path beyond objectivism and relativism. With this, I move on to the four
main chapters that are based on the three key texts of Aurobindo. The next
chapter begins with The Life Divine, which will be read in light of the debates
on reductionism and rationality.

Notes
1 Mikhail M. Bakhtin, “Art and Answerability,” in Art and Answerability:  Early
Philosophical Essays, ed. Michael Holquist and Vadim Liapunov (Austin, TX:
University of Texas Press, 1990), 1.
2 Haridas Chaudhuri, The Philosophy of Integralism (Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram
Press, 1954), iv; Haridas Chaudhuri, “The Integral Philosophy of Sri Aurobindo,”
30

30  Aurobindo, hermeneutics and religion

in The Integral Philosophy of Sri Aurobindo: A Commemorative Symposium, ed.
Haridas Chaudhuri and Frederic Spiegelberg (London: George Allen & Unwin,
1960), 19. According to A Sanskrit–​English Dictionary the word ‘purna’ means
‘filled’, ‘full’, ‘complete’, or ‘entire’ and one could say analogous in meaning to
‘integral’. Sir Monier Monier-​Williams, “Purna,” in A Sanskrit–​English Dictionary
(Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1899).
3 Aurobindo used the term ‘integral’ as an adjective for different categories that were
central to his project: ‘integral human existence’: Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine
(Pondicherry:  Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust, 2006 (1914–​ 1919)), 11; ‘integral
Brahman and Being’: ibid., 42, 67; ‘integral experience’: ibid., 84; ‘integral view of
life’: ibid., 111; ‘integral knowledge’: ibid., 339; ‘integral consciousness’: ibid., 357;
‘integral reality’: ibid., 487; ‘integral tapas’: ibid., 592.
4 Satischandra Chatterjee, “Mind and Supermind in Sri Aurobindo’s Integralism,”
in The Integral Philosophy of Sri Aurobindo: A Commemorative Symposium, ed.
Haridas Chaudhuri and Frederic Spiegelberg (London: George Allen & Unwin,
1960), 36–​37.
5 Many attempts have been made to organize his writings by categorizing them
either chronologically following his life trajectory or thematically with a view
to interpreting him on a variety of subjects. The largest compilations are the Sri
Aurobindo Birth Centenary Library (30 volumes) published in 1972 and Major
Works of Sri Aurobindo (22 volumes) published in 1992 apart from many single
volume compilations of his works by the Aurobindo Ashram. The latest compila-
tion, which has been used by this work, is The Complete Works of Sri Aurobindo
(CWSA, in 37 volumes), in a uniform library edition by the Sri Aurobindo Ashram
to commemorate in 1997 the 125th anniversary of Aurobindo’s birth.
6 Peter Heehs, ed., The Essential Writings of Sri Aurobindo (New Delhi:  Oxford
University Press, 1999), xvii.
7 Laxman Ganpatrao Chincholkar, A Critical Study of Aurobindo, with Special Reference
to His Concept of Spiritual Evolution (Nagpur, 1966); V. Madhusudan Reddy, Sri
Aurobindo, the Supramental Avatar (Hyderabad:  Institute of Human Study, 1972);
V. Madhusudan Reddy, Sri Aurobindo’s Philosophy of Evolution (Hyderabad: Institute
of Human Study, 1966).
8 Ram Shankar Misra, The Integral Advaitism of Sri Aurobindo (Delhi:  Motilal
Banarsidass, 1998 (1957)); Haridas Chaudhuri, Integral Yoga (London:  George
Allen & Unwin, 1965); S.K. Maitra, The Meeting of the East and the West in
Sri Aurobindo’s Philosophy (Pondicherry:  Sri Aurobindo Ashram, 1956); D.P.
Chattopadhyaya, Sri Aurobindo and Karl Marx: Integral Sociology and Dialectical
Sociology (Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1988 (1976)).
9 Stephen H. Phillips, Aurobindo’s Philosophy of Brahman (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1986);
Yvonne Williams, “A Critical Examination of Aurobindo’s Contribution to the
Tradition of Vedanta” (Oxford University, 1986); Morwenna Donnelly, Founding
the Life Divine: An Introduction to the Integral Yoga of Sri Aurobindo (London:
Rider and Company, 1955); R.C. Zaehner, Evolution in Religion: A Study in Sri
Aurobindo and Pierre Teilhard De Chardin (Oxford:  Clarendon Press, 1971); Sir
Robert Bristow, Sri Aurobindo:  Mystic, Metaphysician, Poet (Paignton, UK:
Horshams Printers (Reprinted from ‘The Modern Churchman’), 1952); Rhoda P.
Le Cocq, The Radical Thinkers: Heidegger and Sri Aurobindo (San Francisco, CA:
California Institute of Asian Studies, 1969).
10 J.N. Mohanty, Essays on Indian Philosophy (New Delhi:  Oxford University Press,
1993); Haridas Chaudhuri and Frederic Spiegelberg, eds, The Integral Philosophy of Sri
Aurobindo: A Commemorative Symposium (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1960).
11 Sachidananda Mohanty, ed., Sri Aurobindo:  A  Contemporary Reader (London:
Routledge, 2008), 18–​19.
  31

Aurobindo, hermeneutics and religion 31

12 Walter H. Capps, Religious Studies:  The Making of a Discipline (Minneapolis,
MN: Fortress Press, 1995).
13 The study of religion as a scientific study, and different from theology, is best sym-
bolized by the Dutch Universities Act of 1876, according to which the religious
sciences were kept in the university while theology was relegated to denominational
seminaries. Sheila Greeve Davaney, “Rethinking Theology and Religious Studies,”
in Religious Studies, Theology and the University:  Conflicting Maps, Changing
Terrain, ed. Linell E. Cady and Delwin Brown (Albany, NY: State University of
New York Press, 2002), 144–​46.
14 Capps, Religious Studies: The Making of a Discipline, 68–​71.
15 Josef Pieper, Tradition:  Concept and Claim, trans. E. Christian Kopff (South
Bend, IN: St. Augustine’s Press, 2010), 6.
16 Sally Power, David Halpin, and John Fitz, “In the Grip of the Past? Tradition,
Traditionalism and Contemporary Schooling,” International Studies in Sociology
of Education 7, no. 1 (1997): 4.
17 Jaroslav Pelikan, The Vindication of Tradition (New Haven, CT: Yale University
Press, 1984), 5.
18 Raymond Williams, “Tradition,” in Keywords: A Vocabulary of Culture and Society
(London: Fontana, 1976), 268.
19 Paul Valliere, “Tradition,” in Encyclopedia of Religion Second Edition, ed. Lindsay
Jones (New York: Thomson Gale, 2005), 9267.
20 E. Herbert Morris, Tradition (London: George Pulman & Sons, 1940), 3.
21 Pieper, Tradition: Concept and Claim, 13.
22 Paul Ricoeur, Time and Narrative, trans. Kathleen Blamey and David Pellauer,
vol. 1 (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1984), 3.
23 Alasdair MacIntyre, After Virtue (London: Duckworth, 1981 (2007)), 222.
24 Alasdair MacIntyre, Whose Justice? Which Rationality? (London:  Duckworth,
1988), 349–​70.
25 Smith, in locating Charles Taylor, differentiates post-​Heideggerian hermeneu-
tics from post-​Heideggerian existential phenomenology. He categorizes Taylor,
Gadamer, and Ricoeur in the former category while clubbing Sartre and Merleau-​
Ponty under the latter. Smith on one hand questions if Taylor is legitimately a
part of this group, however, I have taken MacIntyre as part of this group, as his
thought appears more closely linked to Gadamer’s and Ricoeur’s work. Nicholas
H. Smith, “Taylor and the Hermeneutic Tradition,” in Charles Taylor, ed. Ruth
Abbey (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 31–​32.
26 Jean Porter, “Tradition in the Recent Work of Alasdair Macintyre,” in Alasdair
Macintyre, ed. Mark C. Murphy (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press,
2003), 38–​39.
27 Alasdair MacIntyre, Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry: Encyclopaedia, Genealogy,
and Tradition (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1991), 60.
28 MacIntyre, Whose Justice? Which Rationality?, 350.
29 Ibid., 354.
30 Ibid., 126.
31 Mikhail M. Bakhtin, “Response to a Question from Novy Mir,” in Speech
Genres and Other Late Essays, ed. Caryl Emerson and Michael Holquist (Austin,
TX: University of Texas Press, 1986), 7.
32 Ibid.
33 Waardenburg characterizes nineteenth-​century Europe to have undergone (a) tre-
mendous technological, social and political changes, (b)  with the double move-
ments of emancipation and restoration, (c) accompanied by strong nationalistic
sentiments, and (d)  a powerful imperialistic drive, all of which led to both sec-
ularization and enquiries into religion. Waardenburg argues that against this
32

32  Aurobindo, hermeneutics and religion

background, scholars of religion, both Christians and humanists, carried out their
researches on religion. The general features characterizing their work were (a) a
quest for ‘truth’ with intent to ‘unmask’ mistakes and prejudices, (b) an objecti-
fication of ‘religious data, whole religions, and even religion as such’, which then
could be known through rational and empirical approaches, and (c) resulting in
the development of the institutional study of religion –​religionswissenshaft or the
science of religion which set out to develop a scientific approach for the study of
religion and religions. Jacques Waardenburg, Classical Approaches to the Study of
Religion (New York: Walter de Gruyter, 1999), vii.
34 Ibid., x–​xi.
35 Although the origins of this theory goes back to the classical theorists of secu-
larization –​Marx, Weber, Durkheim, and Freud in the nineteenth century –​its
articulation as a theory was the working out of sociologists like Wallace, Berger,
and Luckmann in the 1960s. Since then it has had many reversals and revisions
within sociologist theories of secularization, especially Berger’s famous ‘recanta-
tion’ in the 1990s. Schultz has mapped the development of this debate in sociology,
beginning with the classical theorists of secularization, and included the relevant
bibliographic references with each stage of its development. Kevin M. Schultz,
“Secularization:  A  Bibliographic Review,” The Hedgehog Review:  Critical
Reflections on Contemporary Culture 8, no. 1–​2 (2006).
36 This needs to be nuanced because religious studies are inter-​disciplinary, therefore,
all the work under sociology of religion could be subsumed under it. However, the
distinction I am making is while the sociologists’ focus was on the process of secu-
larization and its effect on religion, religious studies tends to reverse the focus –​
that is while focusing on religion, it has looked to analyse its impact or a decline in
its impact in society, which has generally come to be known as secularization.
37 Frank Whaling, “Introduction,” in Theory and Method in Religious Studies:
Contemporary Approaches to the Study of Religion, ed. Frank Whaling (New York:
Mouton de Gruyter, 1995), 15.
38 Timothy Fitzgerald, “Introduction,” in Religion and the Secular:  Historical and
Colonial Formations, ed. Timothy Fitzgerald (London: Equinox, 2007), 5.
39 Ibid., 6–​7.
40 The academic study of religion being situated within the secular academy explic-
itly claims to be a secular study of religion. In this light, almost all the scholars
within the academic study of religion, both critical and post-​critical, share secular
presuppositions. However, when we use the language of imaginaire, then all we
are talking about is a worldview that is either open or closed to transcendence, a
beyond to this material world. Furthermore, irrespective of their own personal
positions in the debate, the question significant for the study of religion is whether
they are able to give space to an account of traditions that presupposes transcend-
ence, without attempting to explain it away either sociologically or in any other
manner. I argue that this is possible within a hermeneutical framework, as in the
work of Gavin Flood.
41 M. Kuna, “Macintyre on Tradition, Rationality, and Relativism,” Res Publica 11
(2005): 251.
42 L. Gregory Jones, “Alasdair Macintyre on Narrative, Community, and the Moral
Life,” Modern Theology 4, no. 1 (1987): 58.
43 Jon P. Gunneman, “Habermas and Macintyre on Moral Learning,” Annual of the
Society of Christian Ethics (1994): 93.
44 Jennifer A. Herdt, “Alasdair Macintyre’s ‘Rationality of Traditions’ and Tradition-​
Transcendental Standards of Justification,” The Journal of Religion 78, no. 4
(1998): 525–​26.
45 Amy Allen, “Macintyre’s Traditionalism,” The Journal of Value Inquiry 31 (1997): 511.
  33

Aurobindo, hermeneutics and religion 33

46 MacIntyre, Whose Justice? Which Rationality?, 361.
47 Ibid., 355–​56.
48 Ibid., 358.
49 Gavin Flood, “Reflections on Tradition and Inquiry in the Study of Religions,”
Journal of the American Academy of Religion 74, no. 1 (2006): 48.

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Kuna, M. “Macintyre on Tradition, Rationality, and Relativism.” Res Publica 11
(2005): 251–​73.
MacIntyre, Alasdair. After Virtue. London: Duckworth, 1981 (2007).
MacIntyre, Alasdair. Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry: Encyclopaedia, Genealogy,
and Tradition. Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1991.
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Aurobindo, hermeneutics and religion 35

MacIntyre, Alasdair. Whose Justice? Which Rationality? London: Duckworth, 1988.
Madhusudan Reddy, V. Sri Aurobindo’s Philosophy of Evolution. Hyderabad: Institute
of Human Study, 1966.
Madhusudan Reddy, V. Sri Aurobindo, the Supramental Avatar. Hyderabad: Institute
of Human Study, 1972.
Maitra, S.K. The Meeting of the East and the West in Sri Aurobindo’s Philosophy.
Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram, 1956.
Misra, Ram Shankar. The Integral Advaitism of Sri Aurobindo. Delhi:  Motilal
Banarsidass, 1998 (1957).
Mohanty, J.N. Essays on Indian Philosophy. New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1993.
Mohanty, Sachidananda, ed. Sri Aurobindo:  A  Contemporary Reader. London:
Routledge, 2008.
Monier-​ Williams, Sir Monier. “Purna.” In A Sanskrit–​ English Dictionary, 642.
Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1899.
Morris, E. Herbert. Tradition. London: George Pulman & Sons, 1940.
Muldoon, Mark. On Ricoeur. Belmont, CA; London: Wadsworth/​Thomson Learning,
2002.
Murray, James A.H., Henry Bradley, W.A. Craigie, and C.T. Onions. “Integral.” In
The Oxford English Dictionary, 366–​67. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1933.
Ochs, Peter. “Introduction.” In Textual Reasonings, edited by Peter Ochs and Nancy
Levene, 2–​14. London: SCM Press, 2002.
Pelikan, Jaroslav. The Vindication of Tradition. New Haven, CT:  Yale University
Press, 1984.
Phillips, Stephen H. Aurobindo’s Philosophy of Brahman. Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1986.
Pieper, Josef. Tradition: Concept and Claim. Translated by E. Christian Kopff. South
Bend, IN: St. Augustine’s Press, 2010.
Porter, Jean. “Tradition in the Recent Work of Alasdair Macintyre.” In Alasdair
Macintyre, edited by Mark C. Murphy, 38–​69. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University
Press, 2003.
Ricoeur, Paul. “Appropriation.” In Hermeneutics and the Human Sciences, 182–​93.
Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1981.
Ricoeur, Paul. Figuring the Sacred: Religion, Narrative, and Imagination. Translated by
Mark I. Wallace. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 1995.
Ricoeur, Paul. “The Model of the Text:  Meaningful Action Considered as a Text.”
In Hermeneutics and the Human Sciences, edited by John B. Thompson, 197–​221.
Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1981.
Ricoeur, Paul. “The Narrative Function.” In Hermeneutics and the Human Sciences,
274–​96. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1981.
Ricoeur, Paul. “The Task of Hermeneutics.” In Hermeneutics and the Human Sciences,
edited by John B. Thompson, 43–​ 62. Cambridge, UK:  Cambridge University
Press, 1981.
Ricoeur, Paul. Time and Narrative. Translated by Kathleen Blamey and David Pellauer.
Vol. 1. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1984.
Ricoeur, Paul. Time and Narrative. Translated by Kathleen Blamey and David Pellauer.
Vol. 3. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1988.
Ricoeur, Paul. “What Is a Text? Explanation and Understanding.” In From Text to
Action: Essays in Hermeneutics, vol. 2, 101–​20. London: Continuum, 1991.
Ricoeur, Paul. “What Is a Text? Explanation and Understanding.” In Hermeneutics and
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36  Aurobindo, hermeneutics and religion

Schultz, Kevin M. “Secularization:  A  Bibliographic Review.” The Hedgehog
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Sedgwick, M. “Rene Guenon: Les enjeux d’une lecture.” Aries 9, no. 1 (2009): 120.
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by Ruth Abbey, 29–​51. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2004.
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to the Great Religious Traditions. New York: Harper & Row, 1962.
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Philosophy of Sri Aurobindo:  A  Commemorative Symposium, edited by Haridas
Chaudhuri and Frederic Spiegelberg, 205–​12. London: George Allen & Unwin, 1960.
Sorokin, Pitirim. Social and Cultural Dynamics: A Study of Change in Major Systems
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Sorokin, Pitirim. Sociological Theories of Today. New York: Harper & Row, 1966.
Spiegelberg, Frederic, and Haridas Chaudhuri, eds. The Integral Philosophy of Sri
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Chardin. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1971.
  37

3 
The Life Divine –​ I
Whose tradition? Which rationality?

Introduction
The enquiries ‘about’ religion and ‘what’ constitutes religion, while being
central to the religious–​secular debate, are conceptually inseparable. Ricoeur
states that a debate ‘begins as the simple analysis of our manner of think-
ing and talking about things but, through the very progress of the argument,
addresses the things themselves and the requirements they place on our con-
ceptions about them’.1 In other words, within the academic study of religion,
how we think and talk about religion (epistemology) and what ‘thing’ is reli-
gion (ontology) are two interrelated central issues of contention. Both these
contentions have been articulated within the study of religion as epistemo-
logical and ontological reductionism respectively. However, as Ricoeur has
shown, these are not two disparate domains of enquiry, but rather possess
significant overlaps. These have been captured by Heidegger, in his descrip-
tion of Hegel’s call for philosophy ‘to the things themselves’ in ‘the idea’, as a
presentation in which ‘theme and method coincide’.2 Aurobindo’s metaphysi-
cal proposal, particularly in The Life Divine, similarly puts forward both a
theory of knowledge (epistemology) as well as a theory of being (ontology) in
an interrelated fashion. However, for the sake of doing justice to both these
themes in Aurobindo and to sufficiently treat their complexities, I will engage
with them separately, in light of the debate on reductionism within the study
of religion. In this chapter, I will engage with ‘epistemology’ and, in the next
(Chapter 4), ‘ontology’.
The validity of religious knowledge has been influenced by the larger
debate between ‘explanation’ of the natural sciences (Naturwissenschaften)
and ‘understanding’ of the human sciences (Geisteswissenschaften) begin-
ning with the work of Wilhelm Dilthey. On the one hand, religion was
being ‘explained’ by external reductionist explanations, while on the other
hand, it was being ‘described’ through non-​reductionist phenomenologi-
cal and historical accounts. However, both accounts distanced themselves
from theological accounts which in fulfilling Anselm’s ‘faith seeking
understanding’ worked within the presuppositions of theological beliefs.
38

38  Whose tradition? Which rationality?

So broadly put, historically, the academic study of religion appears to
have two camps with respect to its methods of enquiry and ontological
presuppositions. On the one hand, the social scientists working out of a
naturalist ontology offered reductionist explanations while, on the other
hand, the religionists holding on to a metaphysical ontology offered non-​
reductionist accounts. Among the classical theorists of religion, if Marx,
Freud, Durkheim, and James are representative of scientific reductionism,
then Otto, van der Leeuw, and Eliade can be seen as representing religionist
non-​reductionism.3 Within the contemporary study of religion, the debate
has continued as the ‘religion and reductionism’ debate, which is directly
connected to the larger religious–​secular debate. This connection is made
explicit in Segal, who declares that reductionism ‘refers to an analysis of
religion in secular rather than religious terms’.4
Aurobindo’s metaphysical enquiry into religion, I argue, stemming out of
Vedānta as well as influenced by the above-​mentioned classical theorists of
religion, precisely addressed these debates. Both in this and the next chapter,
I offer a reading of Aurobindo’s magnum opus, The Life Divine, which con-
tains the most comprehensive expression of his metaphysics. This reading,
however, is both guided and constrained by the threefold aim of this work. To
recapitulate the three aims: the first aim is to offer a hermeneutical reading
of the Aurobindonian texts with a view to demonstrating that the power of
the Aurobindonian vision lies in its self-​conception as a traditionary enquiry
into religion. The second aim is, therefore, inversely to get ‘answers’ from
the Aurobindonian texts to ‘substantive questions’ raised by the contempo-
rary academic study of religion, in other words, drawing implications from
Aurobindonian texts for the contemporary study of religion. Finally, inspired
by Aurobindo’s integral method and drawing on the hermeneutical approach
used in this work, the third aim is to develop a dialogical-​hermeneutical
approach for the study of religion.
Since the ‘religion and reductionism’ debate in the study of religion is
the point of departure in this chapter, I  will begin with the second aim, to
argue that Aurobindo’s integral philosophy offers a possibility to enquire into
religion beyond reductionist accounts. Second, with relation to the nature
of Aurobindo’s enquiry, I  contend that if Aurobindo’s critique of scientific
rationality is put forward from the point of view of Vedānta, and he explic-
itly disassociated his work from ‘irrational mysticism’, then the rationality in
operation in Aurobindo’s work, constrained by the Vedānta tradition, is nec-
essarily traditionary rationality. Finally, with respect to dialogical hermeneu-
tics, once it is agreed that rationality is conditioned by tradition then, I argue,
it is legitimate to talk about the existence of a plurality of rationalities. This
recognition of the radical ‘otherness’ of the other and the incommensurability
between them is the first step in developing dialogical hermeneutics. However,
I begin with two preliminaries by: (a) offering a critical introduction to The
Life Divine that explores its low academic reception, and (b)  mapping the
debate on reductionism within the study of religion.
  39

Whose tradition? Which rationality? 39

The Life Divine: clearing the ground
What could be the reason for the low reception of The Life Divine and for its
subsequent neglect within mainstream academia? Although The Life Divine
has been acclaimed to be ‘a major work of metaphysics’ even by critical schol-
ars such as Stephen Phillips,5 paradoxically there is not yet a single full-​length
book on it and subsequently its imprints in the literature on the study of reli-
gion is sparse, if not non-​existent. Johnson’s use of the adjective ‘ponderous’
for the text is telling, in that it has often been considered inaccessible. Not
only does the sheer variety and complexity of the themes addressed in it make
it so, but also the serial format, in which it was originally written, as acknowl-
edged by Aurobindo himself, contributes to the immense difficulty in getting
a comprehensive view of it. As characteristic of all his other major works,
The Life Divine first appeared as a monthly contribution to the philosophical
review Arya from August 1914 to January 1919.6 Aurobindo revised The Life
Divine (1939–​1940) after an accident in November 1938.7
Aurobindo comments on the complexities of the themes addressed and the
modus operandi of the conception of The Life Divine:

A continuous thinking, a high and subtle and difficult thinking on sev-

eral lines, and this strain, which we had to impose on ourselves, we were
obliged to impose also on our readers. This too is the reason why we have
adopted the serial form which in a subject like philosophy has its very
obvious disadvantages, but was the only one possible.8

Here, Aurobindo gives three reasons why this text imposes a ‘strain’ on its
readers: first, the thoughts contained by it are ‘subtle and difficult’, second,
that the thinking is on ‘several lines’ bringing with it complexities, and finally
the ‘obvious’ problem of discontinuity between sections brought about by the
‘serial form’ adopted in the production of the text. Smart acknowledges the
complexity of this text when he contends that, ‘a paragraph, a sentence even,
may contain within itself a vast range of thought … in manner of a painting’,
which makes it ‘hard to deal briefly even with what at first seems a small frag-
ment’.9 Bristow reiterates the same difficulty when he points out that

his great work, The Life Divine … seems at first to give the impression one
receives in turning a large globe in all directions, trying to find a begin-
ning and an end; and though there is a pattern and a sequence, there is
not, as in other surveys, a datum line, a measured base from which to start
a trigonometrical survey by astronomic triangulation.10

In other words, it is difficult to navigate through the text in a sequential man-

ner, but notwithstanding this, there is a general direction and movement
in the text from a description of ‘reality’ or ‘existence’ in part one to the
mechanism of knowledge in the evolutionary process in part two. However,
40

40  Whose tradition? Which rationality?

in spite of Aurobindo’s self-​acknowledgement, the above-​mentioned dif-
ficulties are not extraordinary, but rather to be expected within the genre
of philosophical writings, particularly of metaphysical thought. Heidegger
affirms Aurobindo’s ‘several lines’ present at once in a metaphysical enquiry
when he writes that ‘every metaphysical question always encompasses the
whole range of metaphysical problems’11 and so in that sense, it is not a linear
line of enquiry, but encompassing many lines at once. Therefore, Bristow’s
‘datum line’ or ‘measured base’ may not be found in the metaphysical works
of Hegel and Leibniz as well, with whom Aurobindo is often compared.
So, the question of its reception or rather the lack of it persists, even as we
move beyond the style and manner of its composition to its content. I argue
that this ‘neglect’ within the academia is primarily due to the failure to see
Aurobindo as a religious philosopher who addresses themes that are central
to the academic study of religion. In both this and the next chapter, I will
demonstrate how Aurobindo makes a contribution to the raging debate of
reductionism within the contemporary study of religion. This brings us to
the issue of reductionism within the study of religion, which is the point of
departure of this reading.

Reductionism in the study of religion

Reductionism or the reductive method adapted from the natural sciences is
applied to the human sciences, including the study of religion, with a view
to answering questions about what kind of ‘object’ is religion and how it can
be explained. Pals defines reductionists in the study of religion as ‘those who
insist that religion is best understood by going outside religion to explain
it’ and reductionism as theories or explanations ‘show that a religious phe-
nomenon –​let us say, belief in God, or an act of ritual –​owes its existence
to nonreligious causes’.12 Naturalist or materialist reductionism, that gives
natural causal explanations for religion, such as biological, sociological, and
psychological, is advocated, at the present time, by scholars such as Segal,
Wiebe, and Slingerland. Although this is an old debate, it came to academic
centre-​stage in the 1990s with the conference Religion and Reductionism
(1990) at Miami University, out of which grew a volume entitled Religion and
Reductionism: Essays on Eliade, Segal, and the Challenge of the Social Sciences
for the Study of Religion (1994). More recently, it has come yet again to the
fore with the extended dialogue between Edward Slingerland and Francisca
Cho and Richard K.  Squier in the Journal of the American Academy of
Religion (2008).13 While the older explanations depend on nineteenth-​century
theories which put forward certain causes as explanations for religion such
as ‘the urges of the body, the needs of the psyche, the pressures of nature or
society’,14 as in Freud’s psychology, Durkheim’s sociology, Haeckel and Marx’s
materialism, and the evolutionary rationalism of Comte and Feuerbach,
the newer explanations arise out of the cognitive sciences and evolutionary
psychology.
  41

Whose tradition? Which rationality? 41

The dominant twentieth-​century critique of reductionist explanations came
from the phenomenology of religion, according to which religion and religious
life is unique and possesses an irreducible entity, sui generis. Phenomenology
has been thoroughly critiqued by the contemporary critical school within reli-
gious studies. A good example can be Segal’s defence of reductionism through
his critique of Eliade’s essentialist view.15 While Eliade’s view is an example of
the strong twentieth-​century opposition to nineteenth-​century reductionism,
characteristic of the phenomenological approach, in repudiating all forms of
reductionism, it reduces religion to a sui generis essence. This paradox is best
expressed in Bellah: ‘I am prepared to claim that as Durkheim said of society,
religion is a reality sui generis. To put it bluntly, religion is true … but it does
mean that … all reductionism must be abandoned.’16 Phenomenology of reli-
gion, while it opposes naturalist reductionism, itself reduces religion to a set
of essences. Otto calls that ‘Unnamed Something’ numinous and Eliade refers
to it as the sacred. Otto says of the numinous that ‘this mental state is per-
fectly sui generis and irreducible to any other’.17 Otto argues for the universal-
ity of the numinous that is definitive of religion: ‘there is no religion in which
it does not live as the real inner-​most core, and without it no religion would be
worthy of the name’.18 Thus, for the phenomenologists, these essences could
be located either as an irreducible mental state within human consciousness
like Schleiermacher’s ‘feeling of dependence’ or like Eliade’s archetypes that
‘exist somewhere in the heavens’.19
But what precisely does it mean to say that religion is irreducible? Simply
put, what is reductionism? Is reduction in religion its causal explanation or does
it point to an irreducible entity as its ‘signified’? We will take a brief detour into
how reductionism is understood within the natural sciences where the concept
originated. The idea of the irreducible, or that a complex phenomenon can
be understood by explicating its parts, forms the basis of reductionism. The
natural sciences, and especially evolutionary biology, could be said to be based
on such a form of thinking. Caplan, with reference to biology, talks about two
kinds of reductionism –​epistemological reductionism that deals with explana-
tions and ontological reductionism that deals with what constitutes entities.
Epistemologically, he contends that there are three possible positions: first, the
mechanistic view that takes into account only immediate proximal causes as
explanations. Second, the monistic view that takes all phenomena as ultimately
the products of a single set of explanatory causes, and finally, the standard
view that all laws and generalizations can be translated or derived from chem-
istry and physics. Ontological reductionism entails two views:

(a) The entities constituting the world are composed of a single type of
matter (atoms for some of the ancient Greeks), or, if different types of
matter exist, then the forms are evenly and uniformly distributed through-
out the composition of all things  –​organic and inorganic, (b)  Wholes
are not more than the additive sums of their parts –​emergent properties
simply do not exist.20
42

42  Whose tradition? Which rationality?

Caplan’s classification of reductionism is helpful to map out the different
positions on reductionism in the study of religion. Flood offers a comprehen-
sive view of the problem of reductionism within the study of religion. Flood
uses two sets of approaches which are similar and yet highlight these differ-
ent aspects –​(a) reductionism and non-​reductionism which could be equated
with Caplan’s epistemological reductionism that problematizes ‘explanations’
of religion, and (b) naturalism and non-​naturalism, which could be equated
with Caplan’s ontological reductionism that deals with the reduction of phe-
nomena to the irreducible or the ontology that is presupposed by explana-
tions. Pals too, recognizing this distinction between explanation and ontology,
states that ‘an explanation is one thing; a reduction, or reductive explanation,
is another’.21 His schema of theoretical and ontological reductionism coin-
cides with the maps of Caplan and Flood. In this chapter, I analyse epistemo-
logical reductionism and Aurobindo’s engagement with it.

Epistemological reductionism and integralism

How are we to understand epistemological reductionism in the study of reli-
gion? Although there are many models that explain the nature of epistemolog-
ical reductionism,22 for our purposes its three main characteristics will suffice,
as identified by Flood in the study of religion: first, there is an objectification
of the phenomena that is studied. Second, a causal explanation is offered
for the phenomena, that answers the ‘why-​question’. Finally, the ‘whole’ phe-
nomenon is explained by explicating and reducing it to its ‘parts’.23 Thus,
Flood understands reductionism in the study of religion to entail objectifica-
tion, naturalist causal explanations and whole-​part driven universalism. So,
in what way did Aurobindo critique reductionism? I claim that Aurobindo’s
three negations are critiques of reductionist explanations.

The three negations

Flood has put forward three types of reductionist explanations, each uni-
versalizing their claim, in the study of religion  –​materialist reductionism
offering biological, sociological and psychological explanations, phenomeno-
logical reductionism of universal essences, and theological reductionism that
subscribes to a ‘single, totalizing, theological truth’.24 Analogous to Flood,
Aurobindo too puts forward three kinds of epistemological reductionism,
which he critiques –​materialistic, Advaitic, and theological –​each offering
an explanation that reduces existence to either a ‘monism of matter or force’,
‘monism of spirit’, or a revelation entailing a ‘dualism of God and Universe’
respectively. In a key passage towards the end of The Life Divine, Aurobindo
recapitulates these three negations:

Our existence here may indeed be an inconsequential freak of Matter

itself or of some Energy building up Matter, or it may be an inexplicable
  43

Whose tradition? Which rationality? 43

freak of the Spirit. Or, again, our existence here may be an arbitrary fan-
tasy of a supracosmic Creator. In that case it has no essential signifi-
cance, –​no significance at all if Matter or an inconscient Energy is the
fantasy builder, for then it is at best the stray description of a wandering
spiral of Chance or the hard curve of a blind Necessity; it can have only
an illusory significance which vanishes into nothingness if it is an error of
the Spirit. A conscious Creator may indeed have put a meaning into our
existence, but it must be discovered by a revelation of his will and is not
self-​implied in the self-​nature of things and discoverable there.25

Here, we have a rejection of three kinds of reductive explanations that strove

to provide the significance of human existence in the material universe  –​a
material (scientific) explanation, a spiritual (Advaitic) explanation, and a the-
ological (theistic) explanation.
However, we need to understand these rejections in the larger context of
Aurobindo’s project. Aurobindo begins The Life Divine with a paradox, the
reconciliation of which guides his entire project. Describing the paradox he
writes:

The eternal paradox and eternal truth of a divine life in an animal body, an
immortal aspiration or reality inhabiting a mortal tenement, a single and
universal consciousness representing itself in limited minds and divided
egos, a transcendent, indefinable, timeless and spaceless Being who alone
renders time and space and cosmos possible, and in all these the higher
truth realisable by the lower term, justify themselves to the deliberate rea-
son as well as to the persistent instinct or intuition of mankind.26

For Aurobindo, the paradox is both epistemological and ontological in that it

is not just a paradox in the accounts of existence, but also in existence itself.
What is the paradox? For Aurobindo, it is the first terms of the above binaries,
existing and inhabiting the second terms in a very realist sense. The primary
binary upon which these above binaries are contingent is the spirit–​matter
binary  –​where ‘divine life’, ‘immortal aspiration’, ‘universal conscious-
ness’, and ‘transcendent, indefinable, timeless and spaceless being’ represent
the higher term ‘spirit’, while ‘mortal tenement’, ‘limited minds and divided
egos’, and ‘cosmos’, represent the lower term ‘matter’. Aurobindo finds the
co-​habitation of these two terms paradoxical. Epistemologically, he argues
that the ‘earliest preoccupation’, ‘constant aspiration’, and ‘persistent ideals’
from the ‘ancient dawns of human knowledge’ of mortal humanity have been
‘the divination of Godhead, the impulse towards perfection, the search after
pure Truth and unmixed Bliss, the sense of a secret immortality’.27 Simply put,
how is it possible to have immortal ideals within mortal existence? It is this
apparent impossibility that provides the point of departure for his project. He
states his main thesis about how this paradox could possibly be resolved. For
Aurobindo, it is only possible if
44

44  Whose tradition? Which rationality?

we recognise not only eternal Spirit as the inhabitant of this bodily man-
sion, the wearer of this mutable robe, but accept the matter of which it is
made, as a fit and noble material out of which He weaves constantly His
garbs, builds recurrently the unending series of His mansions [in other
words], the physical universe is described as the external body of the
Divine Being.28

If this is the nature of existence, as an integral reality, then how is one able to
reduce it either to material processes or to a spirit? Having stated his thesis,
the rest of The Life Divine is an argument to show how this is so.
Therefore, Aurobindo begins by critiquing the exclusivist claims of the
­theses that offer reductionist explanations of this integral vision. The second
and third chapters of The Life Divine are entitled The Two Negations:  The
Materialist Denial, and The Two Negations: The Refusal of the Ascetic, and
contain the critique and dismissal of both materialist and idealist explana-
tions of reality. According to Chaudhuri, ‘while at one extreme there has
been the tendency to stigmatise the sensible world as a mere illusion or false
appearance, at the other extreme there has been the tendency to acclaim it as
the only reality’. He calls these two extremes acosmism and illusionism on one
hand and materialism and positivism on the other.29 Aurobindo states,

thought comes to deny the one as an illusion of the imagination or the

other as an illusion of the sense; Life comes to fix on the immaterial and
flees from itself in a disgust or a self-​forgetting ecstasy, or else to deny its
own immortality and take its orientation away from God and towards
the animal.30

The third negation that Aurobindo deals with is that of a dualistic theistic
explanation that presupposes a creator God or a transcendent equivalent that
brings this world of matter into being ex nihilo. I will demonstrate that his
negations are primarily a critique of reductionism.

Critique of the materialist denial

The materialist explanation, upheld by physicalism, posits matter to be the
ultimate reality. While Aurobindo calls it the ‘monism of matter’, in the
West, as we saw above, it has come to be called naturalism. Chaudhuri
defines naturalism as a view that ‘designates the essence of reality as Nature
with her unconscious physical energy and blind mechanical causation, and
seeks to explain mind, spirit, value, etc., as accidental by-​products of the
interaction of physical forces’.31 Chatterjee calls thinkers who hold to this
view materialists, physicalists, naturalists, panhylists, panobjectivists, and
positivists and says that while they ‘base their metaphysics on sense experi-
ence and accepted the physical world as the only real world, and regarded
matter as the only ultimate reality’ they negate the reality of mind, soul,
  45

Whose tradition? Which rationality? 45

spirit, or God.32 The materialist explanation, Aurobindo argues, is built on
the following premise:

The physical senses are our sole means of knowledge and that reason,
therefore, even in its most extended and vigorous flights, cannot escape
beyond their domain; it must deal always and solely with the facts which
they provide or suggest; and the suggestions themselves must always be
kept tied to their origins; we cannot go beyond, we cannot use them as
a bridge leading us into a domain where more powerful and less lim-
ited faculties come into play and another kind of enquiry has to be
instituted.33

Therefore, for Aurobindo, materialist reductionism not only (a)  considers

physical senses or an empirical enquiry as the sole means of valid knowledge,
but also (b) asserts that what is rational is limited to what can be verified by
empirical facts, furthermore, (c)  the suggestions or explanations given are
tied to their causal origins, or to a reductive strategy with any ‘going beyond’
termed illegitimate, thus, (d) an overruling of any claim to emergence or holis-
tic accounts. Hence, materialist-​reductionist explanations will either ignore or
explain away evidence and experience that contradict it because it works with
a ‘prejudgement’ that sees all phenomena as a ‘subordinate term of matter’.34
Furthermore, it is unable to make any significant contribution to ‘the value of
life’. Aurobindo is not completely dismissive of materialist explanations in that
he recognizes the ‘enormous’ and ‘indispensable’ contribution made by ‘ration-
alistic materialism’ especially as by it ‘the intellect has been severely trained to
a clear austerity’, however, he finds it insufficient to describe existence.35

Critique of the ascetic refusal

The second reductionism critiqued by Aurobindo is the negation of the
physical world of matter and a reduction of all existence to ‘spirit’. There
are different versions of this view in both the West as well as the East.
According to Chaudhuri, in the West, they exist as either voluntarism,
which considers a universal will as the ultimate unifying principle, or vital-
ism, for which the cosmic life force is the ultimate or absolute idealism,
which reduces all of reality to a cosmic mind or unified thought structure.36
Aurobindo was particularly targeting the claims of the Indian Advaitins or
idealists whom Chatterjee calls spiritualists, panpsychists, and subjectivists
‘who look upon mind, soul or spirit as the only reality, and negate matter
and physical reality’.37 Aurobindo’s critique is against a particular brand of
Advaita Vedānta, of Śaṇkara’s version, that ultimately reduces existence to
Absolute consciousness or Brahman.
But Aurobindo begins by positively building a case for the possibility of
Advaitic ontology on the basis of material existence, building on his critique of
materialist reductionism. He argues that if existence is more than materiality
46

46  Whose tradition? Which rationality?

perceptible by physical senses, then not only is there a possibility of supra-
sensible physical realities, but also of supraphysical senses. Following largely
Sāṃkhya cosmology, he gives the example of the subtle organs (sūkṣma indri-
yas) existing in the subtle body (sūkṣma deha) with the subtle means of vision
and experience (sūkṣma dṛṣṭi), which are beyond the gross or physical world.38
According to the glossary meaning of Aurobindonian terminology, sūkṣma
(subtle) means ‘non-​material, not belonging to the physical world perceived
by the outer mind and senses’.39 On the basis of the existence of non-​material
worlds, Aurobindo argues for the Advaitic position that ‘consciousness is the
great underlying fact’ of both the physical and the supraphysical worlds, and
it is the universal witness (sākṣin) for whom not only the ‘world is a field, the
senses instruments’, but also it is only to this witness that all phenomena, eve-
rything physical and supraphysical ‘appeal for their reality’.40 His argument
for this claim is from everyday phenomenology, in which ‘all phenomenal
existence consists of an observing consciousness and an active objectivity’.
Similarly, he argues that ‘the universe exists only in or for the consciousness
that observes and has no independent reality’.41
The materialist conclusion reduces all phenomena to the objective uni-
verse, denying the observing consciousness and claiming that the ‘material
universe enjoys an eternal self-​existence’. Aurobindo, critiquing the materi-
alist reduction, furthermore says that this conclusion questions the ‘value of
human life’ and determines ‘the whole outlook of man upon life, the goal
that he shall assign for his efforts and the field in which he shall circum-
scribe his energies’.42 On the other hand, the cosmic consciousness (sākṣin)
can be seen as the only reality and the objective universe dismissed as an
illusion (māyā). For the Advaitin in his experience of the cosmic conscious-
ness, there is a sense of ‘the unreality of the world’. Aurobindo calls this
the ‘refusal of the ascetic’, whose tenets are –​(a) renunciation as the sole
path of knowledge, (b) acceptance of physical life as the act of the ignorant,
(c)  cessation from birth as the right use of human birth, and (d)  a recoil
from matter.43 Aurobindo blames Buddhism with its theory of the chain of
karma and liberation from its bondage as the source of cosmic illusion in
Indian thought.44 However, while he affirms the role asceticism played in
sustaining the pure spiritual impulse, he critiques this form of idealism as
being unable to articulate the meaning of human existence as it considers
this entire world as māyā. Purani argues that the limitation of this view lies
in its inability to give meaning to life in this world.45 Aurobindo points out
the result of an idealist view:

If we stress too much the unreality of the objective world, we arrive by a

different road at similar but still more trenchant conclusions –​the ficti-
tious character of the individual ego, the unreality and purposelessness
of human existence, the return into the Non-​Being of the relationless
Absolute as the sole rational escape from the meaningless tangle of phe-
nomenal life.46
  47

Whose tradition? Which rationality? 47

Thus, for Aurobindo, the Advaitic reductionism, similar to the materialist
reductionism, does not contribute to the question of the ‘value of human life’
and is insufficient to account for existence as a whole.

Critique of theistic dualism

Finally, there is a negation of a dualistic theistic worldview. Theism, states
Aurobindo, argues for an extra-​cosmic creator who is radically different from
existence and, hence, there is a need for a ‘revelation’ to bridge God and the
Universe. Therefore, here the reduction can be said to be the extra-​cosmic
‘revelation’ that contains a dualism of God-​Universe. Aurobindo does not
deny the possibility of a consciousness or an extra-​cosmic divinity to be the
creator of this world. According to this explanation:

All these things we see around us are then the thoughts of an extra-​cosmic
divinity, a Being with an omnipotent and omniscient Mind and Will, who
is responsible for the mathematical law of the physical universe, for its
artistry of beauty, for its strange play of samenesses and variations, of
concordances and discords, of combining and intermingling opposites,
for the drama of consciences struggling to exist and seeking to affirm
itself in an inconscient universal order.47

However, for Aurobindo, there are several problems with this explana-
tion: first, the arbitrary nature of this world and how one is unable to discover
its purpose within it, is a reference to indeterminacy. Second, if the creation is
the thought of God, then how does one account for the non-​divine elements
and evil in this world? Aurobindo argues:

The arbitrary nature of the creation, the incomprehensibility of its

purpose, the crude meaninglessness of its law of unnecessary igno-
rance, strife and suffering, its ending without a denouement or issue ….
All theistic explanations of existence starting from an extra-​cosmic
deity stumble over this difficulty and can only evade it; it would disap-
pear only if the Creator were, even though exceeding the creation, yet
immanent in it, himself in some sort both the player and the play, an
Infinite casting infinite possibilities into the form of an evolutionary
cosmic order.48

Thus, Aurobindo uses the necessity for an unexplained ‘reductive revelation’

entailing the theistic explanation and the argument of theodicy, as evidence
against the existence of an extra-​cosmic creator put forward by a theological
or theistic explanation.
We have seen how Aurobindo, working out of a Vedantic cosmology, cri-
tiques the three forms of reductionism and demonstrates how these explana-
tions do not sufficiently explain existence. However, Aurobindo’s rejection is
48

48  Whose tradition? Which rationality?

not primarily against the content-​claims of these reductionist explanations,
that is, in the existence of material processes, spiritual forces or even deities,
but against the reductionism that is at work in these explanations that seeks to
reduce the integral whole of existence to a singularity. In the context of spirit
and matter, the two extreme terms of existence, a reductionist explanation is
‘to represent each in the terms of the other’ or in other words, ‘reducing all
ruthlessly to the terms of one’. According to Aurobindo:

For by its very nature, served by a sense that can perceive with distinct-
ness only the parts of existence and by a speech that, also, can achieve dis-
tinctness only when it carefully divides and limits, the intellect is driven,
having before it this multiplicity of elemental principles, to seek unity by
reducing all ruthlessly to the terms of one. It attempts practically, in order
to assert this one, to get rid of the others.49

Thus, we can conclude that Aurobindo’s critique was directed against reduc-
tionist explanations that did not take into consideration the complexity of
existence and reduced all to the terms of one. But the question for us is what
exactly is Aurobindo rejecting in his negation of reductionism? I argue that he
is primarily critiquing a form of universal rationality that undergirds reduc-
tionist explanations.

From reductionism to rationality

If Aurobindo’s quarrel was not primarily with the content of these different
explanations that have been offered, each of which had their validity and
contributed to knowledge, then what was it that was unacceptable in these
reductionist explanations? I argue that Aurobindo’s critique of reductionism
is precisely a critique of a form of reasoning and rationality that undergirds
reductionist explanations, which universalized their positions and negated
every other. This universalizing tendency has been shown as constitutive of
‘thinking’ or ‘rationalizing’, in which the object represented to thinking is
universalized into a concept.50 This can be broadly termed as constitutive of
scientific or encyclopaedic rationality, which became the dominant form of
enquiry during the modern European Enlightenment era. Capps has clearly
drawn the connection between reductionism and Enlightenment rationality
in the works of Descartes and Kant. Capps terms thinkers before Descartes,
from Plato onwards, as ‘constructivist thinkers’, whose intention was ‘to
create a comprehensive picture of the world’, in which ‘elements could be
understood to relate to each other’, rather than indulge in ‘epistemological
budget-​cutting’.51 However, for Descartes, to fulfil his aim of establishing an
‘unimpeachable basis of certitude’, ‘complex entities had to be broken down
into simple ones’, in order to identify ‘reality’s underlying and fundamental
first principles’. Capps argues that ‘intelligence’ or knowledge moved from
an identification of first principles (reductio) to an enumeration of necessary
  49

Whose tradition? Which rationality? 49

and constituent components (enumeratio)’. With Kant, Capps argues, the
‘first principles’ for religion were situated within ‘human powers and facul-
ties’ and ‘explained on the basis of human nature’ or natural grounds. These
human faculties for Kant, as Capps points out, constituted ‘human rational-
ity’ which was ‘uniform the world over’ and could be applied universally.52
It was this form of universal rationality that was subjected to Aurobindo’s
critique.
Thus, the question that faces us is: is there a universal rationality that is
common to all? With this, the debate shifts from reductionism to the nature
of rationality. Again, this is an old debate that can be historically traced back
to the Enlightenment in Western academia. It could even be argued that from
the time of Hume’s scepticism that woke Kant from his dogmatic slumber,
the history of Western thought has been a multifaceted debate that sought
to establish standards of rationality. Within the study of religion, especially
in light of a plurality of religious traditions, this debate on rationality has
recently taken centre-​stage. In the twentieth century, the claim of universal
rationality was challenged from the 1960s onwards within the philosophy of
science in the works of Kuhn, Feyerabend and Lakatos and Winch within the
social sciences.
I claim that the debate on ‘common rationality’ is treated most explicitly
and sufficiently only within the study of religion. Within the contemporary
study of religion, Flood makes the connection between reductionist explana-
tions and rationality. Flood argues that reductionist explanations, standing
outside religious traditions, are unable to ‘provide an adequate account of
interiority and subjectivity formed by religions’, in that they ‘must bypass
tradition-​internal concerns and forms of reasoning that make claims upon the
world and human experience’ (italics mine).53 It is this relationship between
‘explanation’ and ‘forms of reasoning’ that makes the debate on rationality
intrinsic to the reductionist debate.
But what exactly is rationality? Flood replies with a two-​part answer: first,
‘knowledge of truth through inference from valid premises’ and second, ‘the
development of logic from Aristotle and the two rules of logic’.54 This can
be linked to the useful distinction made by Epstein between reasoning and
rationality. For Epstein, reasoning is to ‘draw inferences’, while rationality is
a broader notion with regard to validity of belief or action with regard to a
standard(s).55 Reasoning can be said to refer primarily to syllogistic forms of
thinking that infer conclusions from premises either deductively or inductively,
as illustrated in Hempel’s logico-​nomological model of scientific explanation
applied in the social sciences. With regard to rationality, as acknowledged
by both Epstein and Flood, it is difficult to pin down its central constituting
idea because, as Epstein elucidates, the term ‘rational’ is polysemous and has
a variety of meanings with different standards being suggested by different
theorists. However, for all of them (a) logical consistency through adherence
to the three classical laws of logic, (b) intelligible articulation, and (c) subject–​
object distinctions are central to the understanding of rationality.56
50

50  Whose tradition? Which rationality?

If we consider ‘articulation’ to lie within the domain of language and dis-
course and keep it aside for now, then by bringing reasoning and rationality
together, the conceptual structure of rationality can be argued to consist of
(a) attunement or subject–​object distinctions, (b) logico-​nomological reason-
ing, and (c) logical consistency with laws of logic. A scientific rationality that
claims universal validity of its knowledge can generally be then reconstructed
as a form of thinking, which representing the object to itself, asserts its uni-
versality by following a syllogistic form of reasoning claiming logical consist-
ency in accordance with its classical laws. Now, my claim is that Aurobindo’s
critique of reductionism in the study of religion is a critique precisely of this
form of universal rationality that undergirds reductionist explanations of
religion. Even as I  outline Aurobindo’s critique, it will be noticed that the
critique stems out of his Vedānta, thus demonstrating his own brand of
rationality which, coming out of the Vedānta tradition, could be termed as
Vedānta rationality. Once this is established and if I can further demonstrate
that Aurobindo was not proposing either an irrational mysticism or relativism
then it clears the path for my larger argument that Aurobindo was implicitly
following a traditionary rationality, which in his case was Vedānta rationality.
So, with this we turn to Aurobindo’s engagement with the above-​mentioned
three constituting elements of rationality.

Attunement: subject–​object distinctions
Reductionist explanations objectify the phenomenon under study and treat
the object as a ‘coherent whole’, which then is explained by explicating its
parts with a view to getting a universal concept corresponding to it. However,
what precedes this objectification is a form of thinking that divides the enquir-
ing subject from the object. While this has been a dominant way of rationaliz-
ing since Plato, particularly within the natural sciences, there has been a revolt
against this form of thinking especially in the human sciences. According to
Gadamer, ‘in history we are no longer concerned with coherent wholes that
are experienced as such by the individual or are re-​experienced as such by oth-
ers’ and that experience can no longer be divided into an act of knowing and
content of knowing.57
Heidegger sought to bridge this subject–​object distinction through his onto-
logical definition of being as Dasein or ‘being-​in-​the-​world’. However, particu-
larly if ‘being-​in’ is to be the theme of enquiry, then Heidegger argues that the
existential equiprimordiality of this phenomenon (the being and the being-​in-​
there) must be taken into account and being-​in should be seen as ‘being-​there’.
However, Heidegger argues that this equiprimordiality has been ‘disregarded
in ontology, because of a methodologically unrestrained tendency to derive
everything and anything from some simple “primal ground” ’. This methodol-
ogy, which Heidegger is calling to question, characterizes well the reduction-
ist method, which ignores the equiprimordiality of subject and object. He
argues that in the phenomenon, what is presented is the ‘commercium which
  51

Whose tradition? Which rationality? 51

is present-​at-​hand between a subject present-​at-​hand and an object present-​
at-​hand’ and what is decisive is to ‘prevent the splitting of the phenomenon’.58
Positively, Heidegger explicates ‘being-​there’ in its existential constitution of
(a) ‘understanding’, (b) ‘state-​of-​mind’, and (c) characterized by ‘discourse’,
which he argues, as going beyond the subject–​object distinctions.59 While all
these three ideas will be useful, in this section we will restrict ourselves to ‘state-​
of-​mind’, which Heidegger sees as a fundamental existentiale and describes
as ‘having a mood’ or ‘being-​attuned’ or attunement.60 Heidegger lists three
characteristics of attunement:  first, it discloses Dasein in its thrownness that
can be understood as being-​in-​the-​world, which is prior to cognition. Second,
this disclosure of being-​in-​the-​world is always as a whole (surpassing subject–​
object distinctions), which in turn provides the possibility of directing oneself
to something in particular. Finally, the worldhood of the world is already con-
stitutive of attunement, which, therefore, enables the encounter of something
‘within-​the-​world’.61
Both Taylor and Flood use the Heideggerian concept of attunement in
their works on rationality in different ways. Taylor’s understanding of attune-
ment, at first glance, appears very Heideggerian. He understands attunement
as understanding the meaningful order in the universe. Linking understand-
ing to attunement, he argues, ‘we don’t understand the order of things with-
out understanding our place in it, because we are part of this order’. To that
he adds, ‘and we cannot understand the order and our place in it without lov-
ing it, without seeing its goodness, which is what I want to call being in attune-
ment with it’. Therefore, while attunement for Taylor provides the ground for
understanding, attunement is defined as ‘loving’ and ‘seeing the goodness’ of
the ‘meaningful order’ of the universe. He traces his understanding of attune-
ment to Plato, according to whom, man being rational possesses rationality,
which is to grasp the meaningful order exhibited in the universe (broadly, the
theory of forms); while this is the goal and telos, achieving this understanding
attains happiness and well-​being.62
However, Taylor argues that this view of attunement and its inseparabil-
ity from understanding is characteristic of pre-​modern societies (pre-​Galileo)
and primitive societies, such as the Azande, which he terms atheoretical com-
pared with theoretical societies such as the modern scientific Western society,
which is characterized by a separation of attunement and understanding. He
argues for the superiority of theoretical societies in which science, by disso-
ciating understanding and attunement, ‘achieves greater understanding at
least of physical nature’.63 He further argues that the technological advance
of modern science is the self-​evident proof for this superiority; although
he is willing to acknowledge that this has been disastrous for the purposes
of attunement to the world. However, in spite of this acknowledgement, in
conclusion, Taylor argues for the overall superiority of theoretical cultures
such as ‘our’ modern scientific one, which can lay claim to ‘a higher, or fuller,
or more effective rationality’, over atheoretical cultures on the basis of the
immense trans-​cultural success of modern technology.64
52

52  Whose tradition? Which rationality?

A critical appraisal of Taylor’s use of attunement will serve us in two
ways:  first, it will outline the conceptual structure of the subject–​ object
relationship constitutive of scientific rationality and second, it will create a
legitimate space for an Aurobindonian understanding of Vedānta rationality,
although arising out of, in Taylorian terminology, an atheoretical pre-​scientific
tradition. There is a vast difference in Taylor’s understanding of attunement
from that of Heidegger, although he preserves the constitutive elements of
Heideggerian attunement. First, for Heidegger, attunement (as ‘state of
mind’) and ‘understanding’ are equiprimordial and fundamental existentiales
of the Dasein’s being-​in-​the-​world and, therefore, are existentially insepara-
ble. Heidegger argues that ‘state-​of-​mind always has its understanding’ and
‘understanding always has its mood [attunement]’. However, Taylor makes
attunement a characteristic of atheoretical societies and argues for their sepa-
ration from understanding in theoretical and scientific societies. In making
the separation, for Taylor, the ‘world’ becomes an object for understand-
ing and scientific enquiry. While this is to misunderstand the Heideggerian
understanding of ‘world’, whose ‘worldhood’ is already always constitutive
of attunement, the Taylorian view rightly describes the subject–​object rela-
tionship presupposed by scientific rationality. However, for Heidegger, no
theoretical superiority can get rid of the worldhood that is already a part
of all theorizing. Heidegger makes an interesting comment to this effect. He
states that it would be to ‘misunderstand the ontologico-​existential structure
of falling’ (as possessing worldhood), if it is seen as something which ‘more
advanced stages of human culture might be able to rid themselves’.65
Second, Taylor’s definition of attunement as ‘loving’ and ‘seeing goodness’
of the order in the universe, while it again misses the Heideggerian view, asserts
rationality to be theoretical as opposed to ‘loving’ which can be seen as a mode
of feeling. There is a distinction that is being drawn here between romantic
psychologism and theoretical rationality. However, Heidegger explicitly warns
against precisely this form of interpretation of attunement. Heidegger, on the
contrary, argues that ‘even the purest theory has not left all moods behind’
and that all ‘cognitive determining has its existential-​ontological constitution
in the state-​of-​mind of Being-​in-​the-​world’ and that pointing this out is ‘not
to be confused with attempting to surrender science ontically to “feeling” ’.
Thus, for Heidegger, attunement precedes psychology as well as cognition or
rationality. But Taylor’s reading of attunement as psychology, characteristic
of ‘atheoretical’ societies, inversely appropriates rationality to ‘theoretical’
societies. The problem with this reading is that while it eclipses the attune-
ment of theoretical societies, whose worldhood enables its world to be viewed
as objects, or ‘entities’ in Heideggerian terms,66 it also equally eclipses the
rationality of Taylor’s ‘atheoretical’ societies.
Finally, Taylor’s article on rationality is written as a response to Winch’s
celebrated work arguing for a plurality of standards of rationality. Taylor’s
disagreement with Winch’s ‘plurality of standards of rationality’ based on
the notion of context-​defined-​rationality,67 lies in his claim that he is happy
  53

Whose tradition? Which rationality? 53

to grant the existence of plurality only if ‘claiming that plurality doesn’t
rule out judgements of superiority’. Therefore, pre-​scientific societies such
as the Azande’s, characterized as atheoretical due to their attunement, are
judged to be rationally inferior. The basis of this judgement is primarily upon
the assumption of the superiority of modern science and its technological
advancements, which has subsequently become universalized as the standard
for rationality. It is precisely this pre-​given granting of universal standard to
scientific rationality which is at once its chief characteristic.
In line with the above discussion, Heidegger’s summary of ‘thinking’ that
entails a scientific rationality captures three characteristics constitutive of
it. He argues that the division between ‘being’ and ‘thinking’ has been domi-
nant in ‘western Dasein’ and calls it the ‘fundamental orientation of the
spirit of the west’ beginning with Plato and Aristotle. He writes, ‘thinking
sets itself against Being in such a way that Being is re-​presented to thinking,
and consequently stands against thinking like an object (Gegen-​stand, that
which stands against)’. Once the object of thinking is identified, Heidegger
argues that what is represented is analysed by ‘cutting it apart’ and finally it
is reassembled as a concept which is ‘the representational comprehension of
the universal’.68 Thus, Heidegger’s three characteristics of this form of cog-
nitive thinking, which he critiques, can be summed up as, (a) representing as
object, (b) analysing by cutting apart, and (c) comprehending as universal
concept.
Similar to Heidegger, it is precisely these characteristics of scientific rational-
ity that Aurobindo rejects although on the basis of a Vedantic ontology. If the
similarity between Aurobindo and Heidegger lies in their critique of the separa-
tion of thinking from being (subject–​object distinction), then it can be argued
that it is also because both of them took their inspiration from the ancient
Greek philosophers, especially Heraclitus, and from whose point of view they
critiqued the rationalism of Western philosophy from Plato onwards.69
Aurobindo’s critique of scientific rationality entails a rejection of this three-​
part structure of cognitive thinking, which is so characteristic of scientific
rationality. Although Heidegger critiques scientific rationality through the idea
of attunement of the Dasein stemming from his existential phenomenology,
Aurobindo’s critique of scientific rationality stems from a Vedantic epistemol-
ogy of ‘knowledge by identity’. Forman makes a distinction between ‘knowl-
edge by identity’ and ‘intentional knowledge’. In intentional knowledge, there
are three distinct elements in knowing, ‘the knower, the object known, and
the epistemological process(es) involved’, where ‘the object is clearly distinct
from the subject’. However, Forman argues that in knowledge by identity,
the ‘subject knows something by virtue of being it’, unmediated through any
‘conceptual knowledge’.70 So, how does Aurobindo understand knowledge by
identity? How does it offer a critique of the subject–​object distinctions of sci-
entific rationality? And in what way does it resemble Heidegger’s attunement?
I will offer a brief summary of how Aurobindo understands ‘knowledge by
identity’.
54

54  Whose tradition? Which rationality?

If the evidence of the ‘senses’ reveals only the material world, then the
faculty of ‘reason’ (buddhi) enables conceptions beyond sense perceptions.
Within the Sāṃkhya cosmology of Īśvarakṛṣṇa, King notes, buddhi or intel-
ligence is the first evolute of prakṛti and which, as the ‘mirror-​reflection of
the consciousness of the purusha’, is a product of prakṛti and not to be con-
fused with purusha.71 Aurobindo made many attempts at cosmologies and
has many schemes without any final one to which he ultimately subscribed.72
Aurobindo uses the term buddhi in two forms  –​lower buddhi equivalent to
reason in the human being, and higher buddhi or vijñāna equivalent to intui-
tion that ‘involves’ or ‘descends’ from the divine. So, we will use buddhi for
reason and vijñāna for intuition.73 Buddhi has two kinds of actions: (a) mixed
action –​while it confines to the ‘circle of our sensible experience’ and studies
only the ‘appearance of things in their relations, processes and utilities’, it is
also incapable of knowing ‘what is’ and is able to know only ‘what appears
to be’; (b) on the other hand, pure action or reason beginning with sensible
experience goes behind, judges and arrives at ‘general and unalterable con-
cepts’, which attach themselves not to the appearance of things but to what
stands behind it. Thus, it is a result of sensible experience and perception of
reason. Pure reason is also able to leave behind sense-​experience and arrive at
a conclusion that is not connected with sense-​experience. These two actions –​
mixed and pure –​of the buddhi are a good description of the second and third
characteristic of ‘thinking’, according to Heidegger, as analysing into parts
and comprehending the universal.
Aurobindo has a two-​fold critique of reason or buddhi:  first, against its
mixed action of analysis of an object through explication of its parts, and
second, the non-​experiential nature of pure action. In his critique against its
mixed action he argues:

Mind is an instrument of analysis and synthesis, but not of essential

knowledge. Its function is to cut out something vaguely from the unknown
Thing in itself and call this measurement or delimitation of it the whole,
and again to analyse the whole into its parts which it regards as separate
mental objects. It is only the parts and accidents that the mind can see
definitely and, after its own fashion, know. Of the whole its only definite
idea is an assemblage of parts or a totality of properties and accidents.74

The pure action of buddhi is able to transition from physical to metaphysical

knowledge. However, metaphysical knowledge does not satisfy our integral
being as it is a pure concept that is not united with experience. But these
metaphysical truths are not of an order subject to normal experiences and
are ‘beyond the perception of the senses’, therefore, while they are ‘seizable by
the perception of the reason’, buddhi is unable to unite it with experience and
hence is insufficient.75
Therefore, there is a demand for another faculty of experience, which
for Aurobindo is an extension of psychological experience. Interestingly, he
  55

Whose tradition? Which rationality? 55

argues, in one perspective all sense-​experience is psychological to some degree,
as what we gather from our senses has no meaning unless it is ‘translated into
the terms of the sense-​mind’, which is termed manas, a sixth sense, in Indian
philosophical terminology.76 King notes that ‘in Indian culture manas is often
classified as a sixth sense organ’. The manas is part of the Sāṃkhya cosmology
of Īśvarakṛṣṇa that functions as the ‘centralizing organ which co-​ordinates
all of our sensory perceptions, thoughts and actions’.77 All the other senses
are subsumed by manas, which both exceeds them and is capable of a direct
experience. Psychological experiences like rational cognitions are capable of
two actions, mixed and pure; mixed when the mind seeks to become aware
of the external world, the object, and pure when it seeks to become aware of
itself, the subject. In the former, it depends on the senses and forms its percep-
tions on the basis of their evidence, while in the latter ‘it acts in itself and is
aware of things directly by a sort of identity with them’, like being aware of
our emotions or existence.78 For example, we are aware of anger because we
become angry. Thus, all experience is:

In its secret nature knowledge by identity; but its true nature is hidden
from us because we have separated ourselves from the rest of the world
by exclusion, by the distinction of ourself as subject and everything else
as object, and we are compelled to develop processes and organs by which
we may again enter into communion with all that we have excluded.79

It is possible for the mind to take direct cognisance of the objects of sense
without the aid of the sense-​organs. Thus, it is through the idea of manas,
the sense-​mind, that Aurobindo is able to bridge the subject–​object distinc-
tion, which is affirmed by pure reason. King too notes on manas that ‘this
intriguing notion might provide interesting new ways of circumventing the
problems of Cartesian dualism and the separation of the mind and body’.80
In other words, in the pure action of the manas, by which there is knowledge
of identity, the material sense-​mind, being material and sensing itself (mind),
has already circumvented the subject–​object duality in that what is known
and the knower are both material and mind. And the subject–​object distinc-
tion is totally overcome when the manas takes cognisance of other objects
through identity. Manas is then able to assert its true character as the one
and all-​sufficient sense, and is free to apply to the objects of sense its pure
and sovereign action, instead of its mixed and dependent action. The sense-​
mind (manas) uses the sense-​experience as a mere first point and then becomes
aware of the content of external objects through identity. But what is the
mechanism that makes this happen?
Aurobindo shifts the focus from experiencing the world of objects to expe-
riencing truths about what is beyond the sensory that is perceived only by rea-
son (buddhi). Therefore, he surmises, none of the above enables us to have the
psychological experience of those truths that are ‘beyond perception by the
sense but seizable by the perceptions of the reason’ buddhigrāhyam atīndriyam
56

56  Whose tradition? Which rationality?

(Gītā vi.21). However, he asserts that a sound rule of universal existence is
that ‘where there are truths attainable by the buddhi, there must be somewhere
in the organism possessed of that buddhi a means of arriving at or verifying
them by experience’. However, this is not a blind assertion but is an explora-
tion into resolving the initial paradox, with which he began about how there
are immortal ideals in a material being. He claims that this experience is pos-
sible through ‘an extension of that form of knowledge by identity which gives
us the awareness of our own existence’.81 But how is this possible? Aurobindo
describes what really happens when there is self-​awareness through the manas.
He argues,

it is really upon self-​awareness more or less conscient, more or less pre-

sent to our conception that the knowledge of the contents of our self is
based. Or to put it in a more general formula, the knowledge of the con-
tents is contained in the knowledge of the continent.82

This is the central mechanism operative in knowledge by identity. It is here

that the conscient experiencing of the manas overlaps with reason’s concep-
tion of the self, and in that overlap, the contents of the self are experienced-​
known. Now, if this self-​knowledge through identity is already an existential
reality, or in Heideggerian terms an existentiale, then it is possible to extend
this faculty of ‘mental self-​awareness to awareness of the Self beyond and
outside us, Ātman, or Brahman of the Upanishads’, and, in so doing, ‘we may
become possessors in experience of the truths which form the contents of the
Ātman of Brahman in the universe’. He points out that this method of know-
ing is unique to Vedānta, in that ‘it is on this possibility that Indian Vedānta
has based itself. It has sought through knowledge of the Self the knowledge
of the universe’. If Aurobindo’s ‘continent’ can be correlated with Heidegger’s
‘worldhood’, then it appears to me that both attunement and knowledge by
identity are closely related, so much so, that while knowledge by identity can
be seen to be the mechanism at work in attunement, a self-​conscious attune-
ment is the necessary state-​of-​mind that constitutes knowledge by identity.83
Thus, we find Aurobindo offering a critique of the limits of scientific
rationality from a Vedantic understanding of rationality. Although Taylor’s
two examples of atheoretical cultures were Azande and pre-​modern Europe
and he makes no reference to either Indian societies or Vedānta as atheo-
retical, however, within his schema Vedānta would necessarily fall under the
atheoretical and yes, he would be right to judge it as inferior on the basis of
Vedānta not having technological success. However, we have just seen how
Aurobindo’s Vedānta offers a critique of scientific rationality that underlies
technology and its successes. So, this questions the validity of the theoretical–​
atheoretical distinction, which itself is a product of scientific rationality.
Flood, recognizes the ‘controversial’ nature of this distinction and questions –​
‘Is this not simply a covert colonialism or way of claiming the superiority of
the west over the third world?’ Flood is quick to point out that the histories of
  57

Whose tradition? Which rationality? 57

civilizations in Asia, Europe, and the Middle East –​and to this I would add, all
human civilizations throughout history in differing degrees –​have developed
‘sophisticated accounts of their cultural and religious practices and a range
of theoretical reflection on the human encounter with mystery’.84 In this light,
the Taylorian claim for a universal notion of rationality, which by default is
scientific rationality, cannot be taken to be on unquestionable firm ground.
In this section, I demonstrated how Aurobindo overcomes the subject–​object
distinction constitutive of scientific rationality through his exposition of the
manas-​buddhi structure of rationality.

Deductive-​nomological model and generalizations

The goal in this section is to evaluate Aurobindo’s critique of the ‘form of
reasoning’ associated with reductionist explanations in religion. Dawson
has problematized the form of reasoning that undergirds ‘explanation’ in
his critique of Segal’s reductionism in the study of religion. Dawson makes
a difference between co-​variations (essence of Humean causality) of physi-
cal phenomena and of phenomena mediated by human consciousness and
argues that explanations of the latter are subject to ‘processes of reasoned
determination’ through the exercise of reflexivity. Therefore, he prescribes
that until the degree of reflexivity is determined to describe and understand
the reasoning processes applied for religious meanings, ‘no sets of meanings
(i.e. no terms of explanatory reference) can be denied potential explanatory
status, including those entailing references to a culturally postulated trans-
cendent order or dimension of reality’.85 Dawson is drawing on the old dis-
tinction between ‘explanation’ (Erklären) of the natural sciences, which has
been historically contrasted with ‘understanding’ (Verstehen) of the human
sciences.86 His argument is that religious knowledge has explanatory power
not on the basis of ‘causes’ but on the basis of ‘reasoning processes’ based on
the delineation of ‘meanings’. He is against reducing ‘meanings’ to ‘mental
causes’ and proposes that the debate needs to be drawn between two kinds
of explanations  –​‘explanations based on reasons and explanations based
on causes’. Dawson concludes that explanations of human action, including
religious, must consider (a)  the a priori nature and sufficiency of rational-
ity to explain any generalization and (b)  that this rationality is a second-​
order human disposition.87 After establishing the equi-​validity of causal and
rational explanations, Dawson goes on the offensive and attacks the con-
clusive claims of ‘causal explanations’ and exposes its limitations by criti-
quing Hempel and Nagel’s deductive-​nomological model. He argues that it
is a meagre Humean understanding of causality, which is unable to justify
logically any ‘unrestricted general claim about the character of the world’
or empirical generalization from any amount of inductive argumentation,
that undergirds neo-​positivist views of causal explanations. Furthermore, he
argues that the deductive-​nomological model, with a view to overcome naive
inductivist views, stipulated that ‘scientific explanations should be conceived
58

58  Whose tradition? Which rationality?

as a form of logical argument’, in which if the conclusion is the statement
describing the event to be explained, then the two premises are (a) statement
of empirical laws, and (b)  statements of antecedent conditions. In a bril-
liant move, Dawson shows that while the link is deductive, the major prem-
ise consisting of the ‘empirical law’ is but an ‘empirical generalization’ of
the Humean kind, where it is ‘assumed’, rather than demonstrated, ‘how an
empirical generalization can become an empirical law’. Dawson concludes
his critique by stating that science too is guided by interpretative principles,
in the practice of which ‘ “causes” are no more separate from their “effects”
than “meanings” (i.e., reasons)’. Upon this critique, Dawson builds a posi-
tive argument for the validity of explanations based on reason or meaning.
He works within a Rescherian definition of rationality, which is: ‘to behave
rationally is to make use of one’s intelligence to figure out the best thing to do
in the circumstances…. Optimizing in what one thinks, does and values is the
crux of rationality.’88 But how do we judge ‘optimization’? Dawson answers
that in order to identify an act as rational, the social scientist links ‘judge-
ments of optimization to subject-​specific frameworks and to their appropri-
ate empirical indicators’. These ‘subject-​specific conceptions of rationality
are anchored in some formal and universal model of rational action’ and,
without this ‘common foundation’, they could do little explanatory work.
He concludes that ‘understanding’ necessitates the ‘actual existence’ of such
a universal model of rational action, which alone by ‘imputing a certain fun-
damental consistency to our views of the world and those of others’, ena-
bles the drawing of ‘inferences about people’s beliefs from their actions or
to translate ideas from one language and culture to another’. Simply put, if
we are to identify irrationalities and inconsistencies, then we must attribute a
‘common rationality to the thought of ourselves and others’.89
But what Dawson fails to recognize is that his critique of the law-​like valid-
ity of ‘empirical generalizations’ of the deductive-​nomological model can be
precisely applied to the claim to universality of the ‘subject-​specific frame-
works’ of his interpretative model. On what basis can the subject-​specific
frameworks have law-​like stature? His answer is ‘common rationality’, a
term which is asserted by Dawson merely as synonymous to ‘subject-​specific
frameworks’ and its law-​like stature is not questioned. Thus, contrary to
Dawson’s view, we can conclude that both kinds of explanations, causal and
rational, ultimately depend on generalizations and these generalizations are
based on what Dawson calls ‘common rationality’, which he claims is not
only necessary for all understanding, but also is universal across cultures and
languages.
Thus, for a deductive-​nomological form of reasoning to do explanatory
work, within the study of religion, either its empirical generalizations or
subject-​specific frameworks must have a universal law-​like stature. What
did Aurobindo have to say about this? First, since empirical generaliza-
tions are based on sensory data, which have to be ‘material’ in order to
be perceptible and from which generalizations can be drawn, the problem
  59

Whose tradition? Which rationality? 59

lies in the identification of the ‘real with the materially perceptible’ and a
denial of anything beyond the ‘sensible’. Aurobindo counter-​argues that
the denial of the ‘suprasensible’ as necessarily an illusion is based on the
‘constant sensuous association of the real with the materially percepti-
ble’, which he claims is itself a hallucination and concludes that this has
‘the vice of the argument in a circle and can have no validity’.90 In other
words, the empirical argument that rejects religious claims is based on the
conflation of the real with the material, which, however, limits the real
to the material and is unable to account even for the material let  alone
the immaterial. Aurobindo writing in the early twentieth century, offered
telepathy, a term coined by the classicist Fredrick W.H. Meyers in 1882,
as evidence for ‘cognisance of the realities of the material world without
the aid of the corporeal sense-​organs’, which due to a lack of scientific
confirmation has subsequently fallen to disrepute.91 However, a parallel
can be seen in the discoveries of ‘mirror neurons’ and ‘phantom limbs’
from neuroscience put forward by the 2012 Gifford lecturer (University of
Glasgow), V.S. Ramachandran, who argues for precisely the same kind of
cognisance of the other through empathy, adaptation of another’s point
of view, and even feeling the sensation of touch without being touched,
through the existence of ‘mirror neurons’, which were first discovered by
the Italian neurophysiologist Giacomo Rizzolatti along with his team, in
the frontal and parietal cortex of the Macaque monkey.92 This is an impor-
tant finding for the study of religion, since the primary ‘object’ of religious
studies is transcendence, which by definition is beyond being objectified.
Thus, Aurobindo offers a critique of objectivism, similar to that extended
by Flood on the basis of indeterminacy, which positively opens further
possibilities of enquiry.93
Second, Aurobindo questions the validity of the ‘generalizations’ both
empirical and rational à la Dawson, about the sensible world. Are we able to
make universal generalizations with law-​like stature to statements and con-
ceptions even about the world? And if the answer is negative, then how can
we make law-​like generalizations about religious realities or transcendence?
Aurobindo argues that ‘self-​existence and the world that has appeared in it
are, each of them and both together, a suprarational mystery’ in themselves,
but because

our reasoning is based upon our experience of the finite operations of

physical Nature, on an incomplete observation and uncertain under-
standing of something that acts within limits; it has organised on that
basis certain conceptions which it seeks to make general and universal.94

The evidence he offers has to do with the existence of indeterminacy at

the micro-​level and speculation at the macro-​understanding of the sensible
universe:
60

60  Whose tradition? Which rationality?

There seems to us to be a reason in things because the processes of the
physical finite are consistent to our view and their law determinable, but
this reason in things, when closely examined, seems to stumble at every
moment against the irrational or infrarational and the suprarational: the
consistency, the determinability of process seems to lessen rather than
increase as we pass from matter to life and from life to mentality; if the
finite consents to some extent to look as if it were rational, the infinitesi-
mal refuses to be bound by the same laws and the infinite is unseizable. As
for the action of the universe and its significance, it escapes us altogether;
if Self, God or Spirit there be, his dealings with the world and us are
incomprehensible, offer no clue that we can follow. God and Nature and
even ourselves move in a mysterious way which is only partially and at
points intelligible, but as a whole escapes our comprehension.95

Flood too argues for the impossibility of making law-​like generalizations

about the human world that it is ‘impossible to establish general laws that
would account for’ human behaviour, particularly religious behaviour because
as social actions they are, ‘characterised by indeterminacy and to date there
has been no successful formulation of general, predictive laws regarding social
action’.96 Therefore, although ‘our finite knowledge, conceptions, standards
may be valid within their limits, they are incomplete and relative’ with respect
to anything infinite, especially about transcendence:

A law founded upon an observation of what is divided in Space and Time

cannot be confidently applied to the being and action of the Indivisible;
not only it cannot [sic] be applied to the spaceless and timeless Infinite,
but it cannot be applied even to a Time Infinite or a Space Infinite. A law
and process binding for our superficial being need not be binding on what
is occult within us. Again our intellect, founding itself on reason, finds
it difficult to deal with what is infrarational; life is infrarational and we
find that our intellectual reason applying itself to life is constantly forc-
ing upon it a control, a measure, an artificial procrustean rule that either
succeeds in killing or petrifying life or constrains it into rigid forms and
conventions that lame and imprison its capacity or ends by a bungle, a
revolt of life, a decay or disruption of the systems and superstructures
built upon it by our intelligence.97

Third, Aurobindo critiques Dawson’s empirical generalizations and subject-​

specific frameworks that have law-​like stature, anticipating Kuhn, on the basis
of changing scientific revolutions. Aurobindo argues that material explana-
tions as scientific generalizations are short-​lived  –​‘it holds them for some
decades or some centuries, then passes to another generalization, another
theory of things’.98 Thus, Aurobindo challenges the universal claims of sci-
entific generalizations. This view is analogous to the ideas of the contextual
nature of scientific enquiry and is not dissimilar to the ideas of ‘scientific
  61

Whose tradition? Which rationality? 61

paradigms’ put forward by Kuhn (1962), or the contextually located ‘research
programme’ by Lakatos and the ‘theoretical anarchism’ of Feyerabend.99
However, after Kuhn, Lakatos, and Feyerabend, this critique of objectivist
scientific enquiry does not seem to have anything novel for us today, as it did
in the early twentieth century, about fifty years earlier than Kuhn, when it was
indeed a revolutionary critique of the objectivist presuppositions of scientific
enquiry.
Finally, Aurobindo argues that a materialist explanation carries within
itself its own cure  –​its agnostic stance regarding the ‘unknowable’ behind
all phenomena is already an indication of what lies beyond materiality.100 He
argues that ‘methodological agnosticism’ entails within itself a sign of what
lies beyond.

Logical consistency and the classical laws of logic

Flood also associates rationality with the two laws of Aristotelian logic –​the
law of non-​contradiction and the law of the excluded middle. Although he
asserts that ‘we cannot restrict the range of rationality to logical rules’, Flood
does not provide any arguments for this, but rather shifts his enquiry to under-
stand ‘rationality in terms of human practices’.101 The exploration of the laws
of logic as a standard of rationality in the human sciences, including for the
study of religion, has a long history and, in modern times, can be traced back
to J.S. Mill, who advocated that these laws can be applied to human sciences
just as they are in the natural sciences. The debate has become multifaceted
but can be broadly divided into two questions –​(a) do the laws of logic work
for human sciences that study human beliefs and actions, and (b) is there a
single standard of logical rules for all human societies, irrespective of context?
These questions have taken on immense importance within the social sciences
especially after Peter Winch’s The Idea of a Social Science (1958).
The first question has to do with whether laws of logic characteristic of
Erklären (mechanistic explanation) rather than Verstehen (understanding)
are applicable at all to humans analysing other humans. The question cuts
both ways into the indeterminacy of both the enquirer (human) and the
enquiree (human action, beliefs, society) that disallows objectification and
empirical enquiry. The force of the second question is on commensurability
between knowledge claims in language(s) that arise out of different socie-
ties. While these two questions with their myriad complexities have been
used as a conceptual map to analyse the epistemology of different disci-
plines of the human sciences, including the study of religion, this schema
is insufficient for evaluating the knowledge claims of religious studies. Put
simply, to either understand or explain human knowledge within religious
studies is to already work within a naturalist framework, which has shifted
the focus from the ‘true object’ of the study of religion –​transcendence –​
to the human world. There is already an anti-​transcendence prejudice that
precludes the question  –​are laws of logic able to determine knowledge
62

62  Whose tradition? Which rationality?

about transcendence? Therefore, there is a third question, particularly for
the study of religion, where the object of study is transcendence, that has
seldom been asked, which is –​are we able to intelligently make conclusions
about transcendence using our laws of logic? While the answer to this ques-
tion, regardless of what it is, will subsequently be subjected to the two prior
questions regarding its validity as opposed to scientific knowledge as well
as its universality across cultures, and equally the very asking of the ques-
tion too, will have to take the prior questions into account, the question
about the logical knowledge of transcendence cannot be reduced to the
former questions but will have to be dealt with on its own merit –​in other
words, transcendence cannot be subsumed under immanence and needs to
hold its ground. Traditionally, this question has been answered with an
affirmative in both metaphysics and onto-​theo-​logy, but since the ‘end of
metaphysics’ this question has not been given much space within the study
of religion. However, it is this question that Aurobindo addresses in The
Life Divine and his answer is in the negative, in that adherence to the laws
of logic constrain rather than reveal knowledge about the divine. This low-​
view of logic, Ganeri argues, is characteristic of nineteenth-​century Indian
intellectual life. His argument is that the ‘spiritual, Vedantic, past was not
there for the taking’ but was ‘constructed and imposed’ by (twentieth-​
century) neo-​Hindus such as Vivekananda and Radhakrishanan. Ganeri
points out that ‘for Vivekananda, as later for Radhakrishnan, the study
of logic is of no help in that spiritual renaissance which would rejuvenate
India’. Thus, the existing Indian intellectual culture, ‘grounded in India’s
logical and grammatical traditions’, was usurped by Vedantic culture pro-
moted by the vision of neo-​Hindus.102 While Ganeri’s analysis would hold
true for Aurobindo as well in that, following Vivekananda, Aurobindo too
promoted Vedānta, Aurobindo’s critique of logic must be unlinked from
his promotion of Vedānta, and in no way associated with any rejection of
Nyāya or other Indian philosophical schools per se, in that, as I will demon-
strate, his critique of logic, similar to the Heideggerian critique, stems from
a critique of the Western intellectual tradition from Plato and Aristotle
onwards, launched from the perspective of the pre-​Socratics extending
back to Heraclitus, who understood logos differently.
The three Aristotelian laws of logic are known as the classical laws of
logic, which as ‘first principles’ have been argued to set the framework for
intelligible articulation. They are the laws of identity, non-​contradiction and
excluded middle. To quickly state them: first, according to the law of identity,
an object is identical with itself and different from another, or if any state-
ment is true, then it is true and it can be represented as P → P or P is P and
P is not ~P. According to the law of non-​contradiction, no proposition can
be both true and false given the same parameters, or it can be said as, it can-
not be both P and not P or P and ~P. Finally, according to the law of the
excluded middle, a proposition must be either true or false, or it can be stated
as ‘either P or not P’ in other words P or ~P. These formal laws of logic have
  63

Whose tradition? Which rationality? 63

been argued to ‘constitute the universal and necessary conditions of all valid
reasoning’.103
Metaphysics, as the discourse about transcendence, has been in line with
‘valid reasoning’ using the method of ‘logical and rational understanding’,
and, therefore, the ‘end of metaphysics’ and the death of the ‘metaphysical
God’ had less to do with the death of ‘God’ per se but more to do with the end
of ‘logical and rational understanding’ of transcendence rather than ‘tran-
scendence itself’. Mysticism is another discourse that describes transcend-
ence, and compared to both scientific knowledge and rational metaphysics, it
has been often termed as irrational. With the demise of metaphysics and the
rejection of mysticism, the study of religion itself passed into secular natural-
ist hands, which, operating out of a scientific framework of objectivity, estab-
lished the ‘laws of logic’ as the watchman at the gates of legitimate knowledge,
determining what is or is not knowledge. Although within the social sciences
since Winch, the laws of logic have been questioned, the questioning has
not occurred as vehemently within the study of religion. Winch, reacting to
Pareto’s claim that ‘science itself is a form of logical behaviour’ and religion
non-​logical, counter-​argues that central to his claim is that laws of logic are
not to be taken as unquestionable givens:

Criteria of logic are not a direct gift of God, but arise out of, and are
only intelligible in the context of, ways of living or modes of social life. It
follows that one cannot apply criteria of logic to modes of social life as
such. For instance, science is one such mode and religion is another; and
each has criteria of intelligibility peculiar to itself.104

His argument is primarily targeted against the universality given to a set of

laws of logic for all discourses. He gives the example of how different ‘logic’
is at work in science and religion: ‘in science, for example, it would be illogical
to refuse to be bound by the results of a properly carried out experiment; in
religion it would be illogical to suppose that one could pit one’s own strength
against God’s.’ While this passage has subsequently received critiques result-
ing in Winch admitting in the Preface to the second edition (1990) that there
were ‘several things wrong with that way of putting the matter’, he does not
retract his main thesis of ‘different intelligibilities’, even if he does admit that
these social domains, unlike Gould’s NOMA (Non-​Overlapping Magisteria),
not only ‘overlap’ but are ‘internally related’.105 Winch’s critique is against
‘setting up scientific intelligibility … as the norm for intelligibility in general’
and against the claim that ‘science possesses the key to reality’.106
Aurobindo’s critique of the laws of logic lies precisely on the same lines
as Winch, albeit a few decades earlier. Furthermore, Aurobindo works out
why there are different intelligibilities between scientific and religious enquir-
ies and how scientific ideas of logic are not applicable to discourses about
transcendence. In other words, Aurobindo is claiming that religious enquiry
is ‘differently rational’ and not irrational or non-​rational. We will particularly
64

64  Whose tradition? Which rationality?

tease out how Aurobindo argues for the insufficiency of a rational and logi-
cal enquiry for enquiry into transcendence and explicate his conception of an
alternative intelligibility in his ‘logic of the infinite’. He begins with a critique
of metaphysics as a rational enterprise:

In the ordinary tongue of metaphysical thought we have to be content

with a distant indication, an approximation by abstractions, which may
still be of some service to our intellect, for it is this kind of speech which
suits our method of logical and rational understanding; but if it is to be
of real service, the intellect must consent to pass out of the bounds of a
finite logic and accustom itself to the logic of the Infinite.107

But what does it mean to ‘pass out of the bounds of a finite logic’ and how is
that even possible? He begins by stating that to speak of transcendence is para-
doxical. If the supreme reality is ‘eternal, absolute and infinite’, then it is not
only indeterminable but also ‘indefinable and inconceivable by finite and defin-
ing mind’, which cannot be described by either negations (neti neti) or affirma-
tions (iti iti).108 Therefore, to ‘insist on applying a finite logic to the infinite’
will only result in an ‘abstract shadow’, which may speak of the absolute but
not express it.109 Thus, to make logically tenable statements about the absolute,
logical consistency is maintained by ‘an arbitrary sectioning of the complex
truth of things’ with the erection of a logical system. However, the indetermina-
ble and the immutable defy such descriptions and explanations, since it admits
within itself ‘constant mutability and endless differences’.110 So, how should we
break out of this paradox?
His immediate response is that the paradox is a logical necessity, or in
other words, it is logical to assert that logic is insufficient to describe the
absolute. Put another way, Aurobindo argues, ‘it is irrational to suppose
that a finite consciousness and reason can be a measure of the infinite’.111
He asserts that laws, conceptions, and standards founded upon obser-
vations of what is divided in space and time cannot be applied to the
‘being and action’ of what is indivisible. He immediately clarifies that just
because our rational logic is unable to ‘measure’ the infinite, it should not
be supposed that it is magic, devoid of all reason. With that he states those
famous words, ‘what is magic to our finite reason is the logic of the infi-
nite’. So, there is both reason and logic, although of a different kind, as
here too there are ‘relations and connections infallibly seen and executed’.
However, this reasoning and logic, because it comprehends data which
our observation fails to see, is able to ‘deduce’ results, ‘which neither our
deduction nor induction can anticipate’, because our present conclusions
and inferences having a meagre foundation are fallible and brittle. But
why are our present conclusions and inferences fallible? He answers that
our judging and explaining of an observed happening is on the basis of
its ‘most external constituents, circumstances or causes’, and the ‘com-
plex nexus of forces’, which are not available for observation, is eclipsed.
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Whose tradition? Which rationality? 65

Furthermore, out of this complex nexus of forces ‘different results are
possible’, in other words, from our point of view, they are indeterminable.
Finally, if this infinite has a will, then it ‘need not act in harmony with the
conclusions of our limited reason or according to a procedure familiar to
it and approved of by our constructed motions’. Therefore, it does admit
what is ‘necessary for the final and total good and for the working out of
a cosmic purpose’, even if what it admits may be deemed by our reason as
‘irrational and unethical’.112
How does this logic of the infinite relate to the classical laws of logic?
Misra argues that ‘it does not in any way come in conflict with them’, rather
it shows the limitations of their abstract and formal nature particularly with
respect to ‘their application to statements or propositions which express the
nature of the absolute or of the things of the world’.113 Aurobindo is clear that
‘logic consists in the right perceptions of relations’ and he does not reject this
basic view of logic.114 However, the relations that are set by the classical laws
of logic, such as relations of identity, non-​contradiction and excluded middle,
he calls into question, especially when they are applied to transcendence or
the Absolute.

Rationality and irrational mysticism

I have argued above that Aurobindo was rejecting the universality of scientific
or enlightenment rationality, which he deemed as naturalistic and insufficient
for articulating existence, particularly about the Absolute. Any critique of
universal rationality will have to defend itself from two counter-​charges: the
charge of relativism and the charge of irrationality. It is clear that Aurobindo
could not be accused of relativism or any form of scepticism, as his work not
only presupposes truth but makes its quest the primary goal of his integral
philosophy: ‘our aim has been to search for the spiritual, religious and other
truth…. The spiritual experience and the general truths … were already pre-
sent to us … but the complete intellectual statement of them … had to be
found.’115 However, I will take up this charge of relativism in the next section
in light of drawing insights from Aurobindo for dialogical hermeneutics.
The charge of ‘irrationalism’ has been levelled against Aurobindo in light
of the importance he gives to ‘mystical experiences’ and needs to be addressed.
We saw in the Introduction how even a sympathetic scholar such as Heehs
struggled to make sense of Aurobindo’s mystical experiences. Phillips refers
to Aurobindo as a ‘mystic empiricist’ and writes, ‘I call Aurobindo a “mystic
empiricist” in that he would count particular extraordinary experiences as
providing important data for his metaphysical theory-​building’.116 For Philips,
Aurobindo’s concept of Brahman is an ‘experience concept’, implying that it
was his mystic experiences that provided the necessary experiential grounding
for his central claims.117 Likewise, Sethna argues for Aurobindo’s philosophy
as mystical (yogic experience being taken as analogous to mystical experi-
ence), in that
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66  Whose tradition? Which rationality?

his is not an integral philosophy for the sake of philosophy, his is an inte-
gral yoga, and all his philosophising is a statement in mental terms of
what he has realised. The Life Divine expresses nothing except his experi-
ence, his realisation.118

We can see in both Phillips and Sethna the argument that since Aurobindo’s
experiences are mystical, the ensuing writings too are mystical. Certeau’s la
mystique or mystics119 captures this double meaning of the term, mystical.
Certeau states that, ‘they are accounts of “passions” of and in history’.120
Kessler and Sheppard elaborate on Certeau’s double use of mystics as refer-
ring to both historical persons having divine experiences as well as it being a
science, ‘a way of describing and explaining such confessed experiences’. In
other words, mystics include not only mystical personages and mystical expe-
riences, but also ‘the many ways of critically reflecting’ on mystical theology,
negative theology, mystical union, and so on and this double-​meaning was
preserved in Mystics, the name of the 1999 Chicago conference.121
The double-​meaning entailed in the term ‘mystics’ suggests a causal rela-
tionship between the mystical experience and the mystical texts that are
thereby produced. This is most clearly seen in Aurobindo’s own account of
the relationship between his experience and his philosophy when he states,
‘I was never satisfied till experience came and it was on this experience that
later on I founded my philosophy, not on ideas by themselves’.122 In this sense,
both Aurobindo’s yogic experience that ‘came’ to him and his philosophy
founded on it, could be termed as la mystique in the Certeauan double sense.
Although we are not investigating Aurobindo’s mystical experiences per se
in this work but only his integral philosophy, particularly contained in The
Life Divine, the relationship between the text and mystical experience suggests
that the text be seen as mystical or ‘irrational’, which, therefore, needs to be
addressed. However, the issue is deeper and what needs to be questioned is the
terming of mystical and religious experiences as irrational.
Not only does mysticism suffer from the same problems of definition as the
term ‘religion’, as King has pointed out,123 but the modern academic study of
mysticism can be mapped very similarly to the academic study of religion,124
although mysticism’s relationship with religion itself has a history, where it
has come to denote the extreme case of religious irrationality as opposed to
rational religion.125 Genealogies of the term, as well as the academic study of
mysticism, have established that its history has its share of encyclopaedists
and genealogists, deftly traced by Schmidt, among others such as Certeau,
Staal, and King, in his scintillating survey of the modern study of mysticism.126
Certeau argues that a new epistemological and literary form termed ‘mys-
tic’ appears with the ‘dawn of enlightenment’ and that a mystic tradition is
‘fabricated’, complete with past and contemporary texts.127 The basis of this
‘fabrication’, King tells us, was the ‘process of secularization’, through which
mysticism came to represent everything that was antithetical and in direct
opposition to secular rationality or, in other words, that ‘mysticism, mystics
  67

Whose tradition? Which rationality? 67

or the mystical is essentially irrational’ or non-​rational.128 A consequence of
terming religion and mysticism irrational was that all philosophies coming
from the East (including India) were wholesale termed irrational, and, as
Staal points out, ‘oriental philosophies tend[ed] to be approached in a reli-
gious spirit’ and, hence, are ‘generally regarded as falling squarely within the
realm of the irrational’.129
Aurobindo was ambivalent in his use of the term ‘mysticism’ as he used
adjectives for it that termed it both positively and negatively. On the one hand,
Aurobindo argues for a ‘true mysticism’ based on intuition, while on the
other hand, he offers a stringent critique of ‘shadowy mysticism’ and ‘mysti-
cal irrationalism’.130 So, a study of Aurobindo’s understanding of mysticism
reveals that the gravity of these distinctions is in his problematizing of the
‘rationality’ of ‘intellectualism’ and the ‘theory of knowledge’ it presupposes.
His critique is against the intellectualism that was dominant in nineteenth-​
century Europe and later discredited with the rise of intuitionalism especially
with Nietzsche.131 He declares, ‘I owed nothing in my philosophy to intellec-
tual abstractions, ratiocination or dialectics’.132 According to Varma, in his
comparison of Aurobindo’s work with those of other Western philosophers,
‘Aristotle, Leibniz, and Hegel also attempted such a synthesis, but Aurobindo
would say that their synthesis is merely intellectual’.133 We can find a similar
critique of intellectualism in Heidegger, characterized by Aristotelian ‘tra-
ditional logic’ that is pervasive in the history of ‘Western metaphysics’.134
Aurobindo’s critique of intellectualism cannot be taken as an argument for
irrationalism, rather as I have been arguing above, for a different conception
of rationality.

Rationality of tradition
In light of Aurobindo’s critique of universal rationality, and his disassocia-
tion from relativism and mystical irrationalism, the question to be asked is –​
how are we to understand the rationality that undergirded his work? I have
already demonstrated that Aurobindo’s critique came from the point of view
of Vedānta and his ‘knowledge by identity’ and ‘logic of the infinite’ point to a
conception of rationality that is constrained by his interpretation of Vedānta.
I  claim that this is a good example of traditionary rationality, which truly
enables a going beyond Bernstein’s objectivism and relativism which Flood,
following MacIntyre, terms as ‘tradition-​internal reasoning’, which ‘Religious
Studies needs to take very seriously’.135 Although Aurobindo does not use
the language of traditionary rationality, I have been able to demonstrate that
Aurobindo’s work indeed entails a rationality of tradition.
‘Traditionary rationality’, or as MacIntyre would say, ‘the rationality of
traditions’, is opposed to both Enlightenment and postmodern (relativist or
perspectivalist) rationalities. MacIntyre provides a four-​part conceptual struc-
ture for a traditionary rationality: first of all, ‘justification’ is done by narrat-
ing the development of the argument so far in the tradition by demonstrating
68

68  Whose tradition? Which rationality?

the superiority of its ‘first principles’ to previous articulations within the his-
tory of the tradition. Second, the claims of theses and arguments have to be
understood within the specificities of their ‘historical context’ and ‘linguistic
particularities’, thus resulting in a plurality of rationalities as compared to
the enlightenment claim of a single universal rationality. Third, the concep-
tion of ‘final truth’ is conditional on the future development of the argument
and, therefore, contains and is arrived at through intra-​tradition judgement
or dialectics, a process that MacIntyre terms as a ‘correspondence theory of
falsity’, an idea, which resembles Popper and Bartley’s ‘critical’ or ‘pancriti-
cal’ rationality respectively.136 Finally, elucidation of traditionary rationality
is through ‘exemplifications’ and not in ahistorical abstractions.137

Difference, incommensurability, dialogical hermeneutics

Traditionary-​hermeneutics, being contingent on traditions, necessarily pro-
gresses into dialogical hermeneutics, as it grants the reality of the plurality
of traditions. In this chapter, I want to establish that the critique of universal
rationality is the condition for the existence of multiple traditions of enquiry.
This precondition of plurality of traditions is important in that no true dia-
logue can take place if there is no real difference and that dialogue presup-
poses difference. However, a focus on difference is liable to raise problems of
scepticism that precludes any form of dialogue. The first goal for dialogical
hermeneutics is to establish both the authenticity of otherness and the pos-
sibility of dialogue.
But the question at this point for us is  –​do genuine ‘others’ exist, with
whom one is able to dialogue? More specifically, does Aurobindo, with his
rejection of universal rationality and yet working out of a largely Advaita
Vedantic tradition, acknowledge the presence of the ‘other’? In a previous
work on the Īśā Upaniṣad, entitled The Life Divine [Draft C], written in 1914,
Aurobindo seriously engages with the reality of ‘difference’ with relation to
the philosophy and interpretation of Vedānta. He begins by reiterating how
‘the method of intellectual reasoning’ and its ‘processes of logic’ are inap-
plicable to ‘entities which are beyond the grasp of logic’. However, when they
are applied to such entities, they produce knowledge that is not only limited,
but also different from other schools of thought. He gives the example of
the different interpretations of his own central thesis: ‘We find, as a matter
of experience that existence is one and yet existence is multiple.’ For logic, ‘it
cannot be’ for ‘two opposites [to] really coexist & coincide as the nature of
Being’ and so it is ‘illogical & irrational’ –​‘unintelligible & contradictory to
the view of logic & reason’. However, Aurobindo argues that both Buddhism
and Advaita, in trying to reconcile this paradox, end with different positions –​
‘Buddhism dismisses the Many as phenomena of sensation, the One as an
ideative illusion of sensation’ and ends with a kind of nihilism, while ‘Advaita
asserts the One on the ground of ultimate experience; it dismisses the Many as
an illusion’. So, why is there a difference? Aurobindo points out that each one
  69

Whose tradition? Which rationality? 69

comes to the subject with a certain ‘predisposition’ that is formed by ‘previous
education & formed ways of thinking’ or due to difference in ‘temperament
& very cast of character’, which makes us ‘select deliberately & reasonably
the arguments that favour our conclusion’ and reject arguments that would
shake our predisposition. In all this, Aurobindo contends that, ‘Logic, a mal-
leable & pliant servitor’ is entirely satisfied as long as it is ‘provided with suit-
able premises, unsuitable premises excluded or explained away’. The result is
that these different systems of knowledge do not provide ‘final expressions of
truth’ as they entail ‘the mould of the philosopher’s personality, the stamp of
his temperament and type of intellect’. Thus, for Aurobindo, ‘the difference
here [is] a difference of education; the education of each had trained his mind
to look only at a certain set of considerations, to move only in a certain way
of thinking & reasoning’ (italics mine).138
It is a natural consequence of Aurobindo’s traditionary rationality to
acknowledge difference on the basis of one’s prior education (paramparā, tra-
dition) and predisposition, which gives rise to ‘a certain way of thinking &
reasoning’. And for Aurobindo, none of them are irrational, rather logical
and rational within their own rights, and because the nature of existence is
paradoxical, no rationality is able to capture it exclusively. The ‘difference’
that is identified has to be now questioned, as to whether the differences are
incommensurable and/​or incompatible with each other. The incommensura-
bility thesis can be traced back to the works of Kuhn and Feyerabend, in the
philosophy of science in the 1950s, when fine distinctions were made between
incommensurability and incompatibility as observed by Bernstein, who exten-
sively reported the debate.139 However, for our purposes, the differences can
be both incommensurable and incompatible, but what is important is what we
have learnt from Aurobindo, which is the incapacity of universal rationality
and laws of logic to arbitrate the differences. Although Aurobindo does not
extend this line of thinking further, what is being claimed here is that there is
neither a neutral ground outside of tradition, nor a common ground of uni-
versal rationality where incommensurabilities and incompatibilities may be
observed and arbitrated. The incommensurable other is always observed from
the vantage point of one’s own tradition and this observation of the other
itself is the beginning of dialogical hermeneutics.

Summary
As the problem of reductionism was the point of departure for this chapter,
I began with the second aim to draw implications for the study of religion.
I demonstrated how the three forms of epistemological reductionism in the
study of religion, namely, materialism, spiritualism, and theologism have been
addressed by Aurobindo’s integral philosophy of religion. However, I argued
that reductionism is fuelled by the notion of universal rationality, which
brought us to the first aim of this work, that is to demonstrate that Aurobindo’s
work possesses the structure of traditionary-​hermeneutics. I argued that the
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70  Whose tradition? Which rationality?

idea of universal rationality was built on attunement or subject–​object distinc-
tions, law-​like generalizations of the deductive-​nomological model, and the
classical laws of logic. I then outlined the Aurobindonian critique of universal
rationality. I further demonstrated that Aurobindo’s work was averse to irra-
tional mysticism and relativism and, in light of this, I argued that Aurobindo’s
work, situated within the Vedānta tradition, subscribes to a ‘rationality of
tradition’ characteristic of traditionary-​hermeneutics. Finally, with regard to
the third aim, I argued that incommensurability that acknowledged authentic
difference was the first step for a dialogical hermeneutics. While my focus will
continue to be on The Life Divine in the next chapter, I will shift from episte-
mology to ontology and ontological reductionism in the study of religion will
be my point of departure.

Notes
1 Paul Ricoeur, “Explanation and Understanding,” in From Text to Action: Essays
in Hermeneutics, vol. 2 (London: Continuum, 1991), 121.
2 Martin Heidegger, Basic Writings:  From Being and Time (1927) to the Task of
Thinking (1964), ed. David Farrell Krell (London: Routledge, 1993), 438.
3 Lorne Dawson, “Human Reflexivity and the Nonreductive Explanation of
Religious Action,” in Religion and Reductionism: Essays on Eliade, Segal, and the
Challenge of the Social Sciences for the Study of Religion, ed. Thomas A. Idinopulos
and Edward A. Yonan (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1994), 145–​46.
4 Robert A. Segal, “Reductionism in the Study of Religion,” in Religion and
Reductionism: Essays on Eliade, Segal, and the Challenge of the Social Sciences for
the Study of Religion, ed. Thomas A. Idinopulos and Edward A. Yonan (Leiden:
E.J. Brill, 1994), 4.
5 Stephen H. Phillips, Aurobindo’s Philosophy of Brahman (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1986).
6 See the Publisher’s Note at the beginning of the book for more details on the his-
tory of publishing of the text Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine (Pondicherry:  Sri
Aurobindo Ashram Trust, 2006 (1914–​1919)).
7 Peter Heehs, ed., The Essential Writings of Sri Aurobindo (New Delhi:  Oxford
University Press, 1999), xvii. His revised version is in a single volume constituting
two books –​the first book contains twenty-​eight chapters while the second book
contains two parts with fourteen chapters each, thus finally resulting in a total of
fifty-​six chapters in over a thousand pages of text.
8 Sri Aurobindo, Essays in Philosophy and Yoga, vol. 13, The Complete Works of Sri
Aurobindo (Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram, 1998 (1910–​1950)), 106.
9 Ninian Smart, “Integral Knowledge and the Four Theories of Existence,” in The
Integral Philosophy of Sri Aurobindo: A Commemorative Symposium, ed. Haridas
Chaudhuri and Frederic Spiegelberg (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1960), 167.
10 Sir Robert Bristow, Sri Aurobindo:  Mystic, Metaphysician, Poet (Paignton,
UK: Horshams Printers (Reprinted from ‘The Modern Churchman’), 1952), 2.
11 Heidegger, Basic Writings: From Being and Time (1927) to the Task of Thinking
(1964), 93.
12 Daniel Pals, “Reductionism and Belief: An Appraisal of Recent Attacks on the
Doctrine of Irreducible Religion,” The Journal of Religion 66, no. 1 (1986): 18.
13 Edward Slingerland, “Who’s Afraid of Reductionism? The Study of Religion in the
Age of Cognitive Science,” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 76, no. 2
(2008). Francisca Cho and Richard K. Squier, “Reductionism: Be Afraid, Be Very
Afraid,” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 76, no. 2 (2008). Edward
  71

Whose tradition? Which rationality? 71

Slingerland, “Reply to Cho and Squier,” Journal of the American Academy of
Religion 76, no. 2 (2008). Francisca Cho and Richard K. Squier, “‘He Blinded Me
with Science’: Science Chauvinism in the Study of Religion,” Journal of the American
Academy of Religion 76, no. 2 (2008). Edward Slingerland, “Response to Cho and
Squier,” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 76, no. 2 (2008). Francisca Cho
and Richard K. Squier, “Reply to Slingerland,” Journal of the American Academy of
Religion 76, no. 2 (2008).
14 Pals, “Reductionism and Belief: An Appraisal of Recent Attacks on the Doctrine
of Irreducible Religion,” 18.
15 Robert A. Segal, “In Defense of Reductionism,” Journal of the American Academy
of Religion 51, no. 1 (1983).
16 Robert Bellah, Beyond Belief:  Essays on Religion in a Post-​Traditional World
(New York: Harper & Row, 1970), 253.
17 Rudolf Otto, The Idea of the Holy, trans. John W. Harvey (London:  Oxford
University Press, 1923 (1917)), 7.
18 Ibid., 6.
19 Segal, “In Defense of Reductionism,” 103.
20 Arthur L. Caplan, “Rehabilitating Reductionism,” American Zoologist 28, no. 1
(1988):  195. He also refers to three kinds of epistemological and two types of
ontological or constitutive reductionism.
21 Pals, “Reductionism and Belief: An Appraisal of Recent Attacks on the Doctrine
of Irreducible Religion,” 21.
22 Yonan does a survey of different kinds of epistemological reductionism. For Arthur
Peacocke, epistemological reductionism, borrowed from the biologist Francisco
Ayala, is of theories and laws from one discipline like biology, psychology, or
sociology being reduced to another field like physics or chemistry. For Sahotra
Sarkar, epistemological reductionism, which he terms explanatory reduction,
has three types  –​Wimsatt’s Causal Relevance, Kauffman’s ‘articulation of parts
explanation’, and Sarkar’s own model of ‘explanatory reductionism’. Edward A.
Yonan, “Clarifying the Strengths and Limits of Reductionism in the Discipline of
Religion,” in Religion and Reductionism: Essays on Eliade, Segal, and the Challenge
of the Social Sciences for the Study of Religion, ed. Thomas A. Idinopulos and
Edward A. Yonan (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1994), 45–​47.
23 Gavin Flood, Beyond Phenomenology:  Rethinking the Study of Religion
(London: Cassell, 1999), 66–​67.
24 Ibid., 67.
25 Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 1051.
26 Ibid., 6.
27 Ibid., 3.
28 Ibid., 8.
29 Haridas Chaudhuri, The Philosophy of Integralism (Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo
Ashram Press, 1954), 126.
30 Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 9.
31 Haridas Chaudhuri, “The Integral Philosophy of Sri Aurobindo,” in The
Integral Philosophy of Sri Aurobindo:  A  Commemorative Symposium, ed.
Haridas Chaudhuri and Frederic Spiegelberg (London: George Allen & Unwin,
1960), 26.
32 Satischandra Chatterjee, “Mind and Supermind in Sri Aurobindo’s Integralism,”
in The Integral Philosophy of Sri Aurobindo: A Commemorative Symposium, ed.
Haridas Chaudhuri and Frederic Spiegelberg (London: George Allen & Unwin,
1960), 36.
33 Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 11.
34 Ibid., 12.
35 Ibid., 13.
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72  Whose tradition? Which rationality?

36 Chaudhuri, “The Integral Philosophy of Sri Aurobindo,” 26.
37 Chatterjee, “Mind and Supermind in Sri Aurobindo’s Integralism,” 36.
38 Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 21.
39 Sri Aurobindo, Glossary to the Record of Yoga (Pondicherry:  Sri Aurobindo
Ashram, (Unpublished)), 176. The distinction between ‘gross’ and ‘subtle’ ele-
ments and organs is made in different Indian philosophical traditions. For exam-
ple, Sāṃkhya’s evolutionary schema of twenty-​five principles or tattva consists of
five subtle material elements called the tanmātras, which are sound, touch, form,
taste, smell. According to Nicholson in Sāṃkhya cosmology, the gross or material
elements have their origin in subtle elements, which are ‘too small for the human
sense organ to perceive’. Not dissimilar to sub-​atomic particles like bosons that
are postulated but not seen. Andrew J. Nicholson, “Reconciling Dualism and
Non-​Dualism: Three Arguments in Vijnanabhiksu Bhedabheda Vedanta,” Journal
of Indian Philosophy 35, no. 4 (2007): 395.
40 Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 22. The idea of sākṣin, the witness-​consciousness, is
characteristic of the Sāṃkhya cosmology of Īśvarakṛṣṇa, which promotes a funda-
mental dualism between pure spirit or consciousness (puruṣa) and primal material-
ity or nature (prakṛti). In this system the puruṣa is merely a witness-​consciousness
(sākṣin) and not an agent of creation. Richard King, Indian Philosophy:  An
Introduction to Hindu and Buddhist Thought (Edinburgh:  Edinburgh University
Press, 1999), 64–​65.
41 Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 23.
42 Ibid.
43 Ibid., 26.
44 This critique of Buddhist influence on Advaita goes all the way back to Rāmānuja,
who accused Shankara of being a crypto-​ Buddhist (pracchana bauddha) for
understanding the world as somehow unreal. One of the founding texts of the
Advaitic tradition, the Gauḍapādīya Kārikā attributed to Gauḍapāda the teacher
(paramaguru) of Śaṅkara, as King argues, is infused with the philosophical termi-
nology of Mahāyāna Buddhism, especially in its fourth chapter, so much so that
Gauḍapāda has been argued was a Buddhist. King has further argued, that the
Gauḍapādīya Kārikā is an example of a Vedantic text utilizing Buddhist argu-
ments and analogies for its own ends. King, Indian Philosophy: An Introduction
to Hindu and Buddhist Thought, 54, 56; Richard King, Early Advaita Vedānta and
Buddhism: The Mahāyāna Context of the Gauḍapādīya-​Kārikā (Albany, NY: State
University of New York Press, 1995).
45 A.B. Purani, Sri Aurobindo’s Life Divine (Pondicherry:  Sri Aurobindo Ashram
Trust, 1966), 35.
46 Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 23.
47 Ibid., 316.
48 Ibid.
49 Ibid., 10.
50 Martin Heidegger, Introduction to Metaphysics (New Haven, CT: Yale University
Press, 2000), 125–​26.
51 Walter H. Capps, Religious Studies:  The Making of a Discipline (Minneapolis,
MN: Fortress Press, 1995), 2–​3.
52 Ibid., 19.
53 Gavin Flood, “Reflections on Tradition and Inquiry in the Study of Religions,”
Journal of the American Academy of Religion 74, no. 1 (2006): 50.
54 Gavin Flood, The Importance of Religion:  Meaning and Action in Our Strange
World (Oxford: Wiley-​Blackwell, 2012), 131.
55 Brian Epstein, “The Diviner and the Scientist: Revisiting the Question of Alternative
Standards of Rationality,” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 78, no.
4: 1051.
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Whose tradition? Which rationality? 73

56 For example, Eisen lists six elements of Weberian rationality, namely, (a) purpose,
(b) calculability, (c) control, (d) logical coherence, (e) universality, and (f) whole-​
part systematic organization. Arnold Eisen, “The Meanings and Confusions of
Weberian ‘Rationality’,” The British Journal of Sociology 29, no. 1 (1978):  58–​
60. Taylor and Flood list similar elements central to their visions of rational-
ity:  (a)  logical consistency or intelligibility, (b)  articulation, and (c)  attunement
or coherence of action and meaning. See the chapter “Religion and Rationality”
in Flood, The Importance of Religion: Meaning and Action in Our Strange World.
Also see Charles Taylor, “Rationality,” in Rationality and Relativism, ed. Martin
Hollis and Steven Lukes (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1982).
57 Hans-​Georg Gadamer, Truth and Method, trans. Joel Weinsheimer and Donald G.
Marshall (London: Continuum, 1975), 217–​19.
58 Martin Heidegger, Being and Time, trans. John Macquarrie and Edward Robinson
(New York: Harper & Row, 1962 (1926)), 170.
59 The argument for a strong affinity between the Heideggerian and Aurobindonian
projects, particularly in their understanding of metaphysics, not only enables a
fruitful dialogue between them where relevant, but also entails a deep significance
particularly for my claim that Aurobindo is a proto-​hermeneutical thinker, in that
the very resemblance between their projects is evidence to my claim, as Heidegger
is unanimously seen as the founder of hermeneutical phenomenology. The affin-
ity between Heidegger and Aurobindo is well captured in Rhoda P. Le Cocq, The
Radical Thinkers:  Heidegger and Sri Aurobindo (San Francisco, CA:  California
Institute of Asian Studies, 1969). McDermott draws the similarity not just in their
philosophical comprehensiveness, but also in the ‘spiritual and autobiographic
quality’ of their philosophical systems. Robert A. McDermott, “Introduction,” in
The Essential Aurobindo (Great Barrington, MA: Lindisfarne Books, 2001), 23.
60 In Macquarrie and Robinson’s translation, there is a footnote comment on this
translation. They translate ‘… die stimmung, das Gestimmstein’ in which the noun
stimmung originally refers to ‘tuning of a musical instrument’ and is translated
by them as ‘mood’ and Gestimmstein as ‘having a mood’ or ‘Being-​attuned’. See
footnote no. 3 in Heidegger, Being and Time, 172.
61 Ibid., 175–​77.
62 Taylor, “Rationality,” 97–​98.
63 Ibid., 103.
64 Ibid., 104.
65 Heidegger, Being and Time, 220.
66 Heidegger critiques the theoretical attitude and states that in ‘looking at the world
theoretically, we have already dimmed it down to the uniformity of what is purely
present-​at-​hand’. Ibid., 177–​78.
67 Peter Winch, “Understanding a Primitive Society,” in Rationality, ed. Bryan R.
Wilson (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1970).
68 Heidegger, Introduction to Metaphysics, 123–​26.
69 This similarity in both of them in going back to the ancients and especially in the
similarity of their interpretation of Heraclitus is observed by Cocq in Cocq, The
Radical Thinkers: Heidegger and Sri Aurobindo, 35. Aurobindo, in the beginning
of his work on Heraclitus, offers a comparative outline of the history of ancient
Greek and Indian thought in which he argues for the mystical thought to be the
most originary:
To ignore the influence of the mystic thought and its methods of self-​
expression on the intellectual thinking of the Greeks from Pythagoras
to Plato is to falsify the historical procession of the human mind. It was
enveloped at first in the symbolic, intuitive, esoteric style and discipline of
the Mystics, —​Vedic and Vedantic seers, Orphic secret teachers, Egyptian
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74  Whose tradition? Which rationality?

priests. From that veil it emerged along the path of a metaphysical phi-
losophy still related to the Mystics by the source of its fundamental ideas,
its first aphoristic and cryptic style, its attempt to seize directly upon truth
by intellectual vision rather than arrive at it by careful ratiocination, but
nevertheless intellectual in its method and aim. This is the first period
of the Darshanas in India, in Greece of the early intellectual thinkers.
Afterwards came the full tide of philosophic rationalism, Buddha or the
Buddhists and the logical philosophers in India, in Greece the Sophists
and Socrates with all their splendid progeny; with them the intellectual
method did not indeed begin, but came to its own and grew to its fullness.
(Aurobindo, Essays in Philosophy and Yoga, 219–​20)
Heidegger notes this in Heidegger, Introduction to Metaphysics, 100.
70 Robert K.C. Forman, “Mystical Knowledge: Knowledge by Identity,” Journal of
the American Academy of Religion 61, no. 4 (1993): 726.
71 King, Indian Philosophy: An Introduction to Hindu and Buddhist Thought, 65.
72 This is a common cosmological schema that describes how Aurobindo under-
stood the subtle body of the universe in 1914. Sri Aurobindo, Record of Yoga
(Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust, 2001 (1909–​1927)), 1457.

Sukshma: —
Atman
Sukshma
Sat
Chit{
Ananda
Satyam
Tapas
Jana
Karana in Sukshma
or Divya Ketu Divine Higher Buddhi or Intuitive Reason

{
Perception

Sukshma proper
Reason
Understanding –​
manas in buddhi
}
(Lower
Buddhi)
Manas Sensational Mind
Manas Chitta or Emotional Mind
Chitta Passive Consciousness or Passive Memory

73 This is Aurobindo’s definition of these terms taken from his Record of Yoga written
in 1914. Ibid., 1461. Vijñāna is supramental knowledge or the Causal Idea, which,
by supporting and secretly guiding the confused activities of Mind, Life, and Body,
ensures and compels the right arrangement of the Universe. Buddhi is the lower
divided intelligence as opposed to Vijñāna. Manas-chitta is the life of sensations
and emotions which are at the mercy of the outward touches of life and matter and
their positive or negative reactions, joy and grief, pleasure and pain.
74 Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 135–​36.
75 Ibid., 67–​68.
76 Ibid., 68.
77 King, Indian Philosophy: An Introduction to Hindu and Buddhist Thought, 38, 65.
78 Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 68.
79 Ibid.
80 King, Indian Philosophy: An Introduction to Hindu and Buddhist Thought, 38.
81 Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 71.
82 Ibid.
83 Ibid.
84 Flood, The Importance of Religion:  Meaning and Action in Our Strange
World, 137.
  75

Whose tradition? Which rationality? 75

85 Dawson, “Human Reflexivity and the Nonreductive Explanation of Religious
Action,” 147.
86 Although Ricoeur has argued that understanding and explanation cannot be
taken as ‘two distinct epistemological fields, referred respectively to two irreduc-
ible modalities of being’. Ricoeur, “Explanation and Understanding,” 122.
87 Dawson, “Human Reflexivity and the Nonreductive Explanation of Religious
Action,” 149.
88 Nicholas Rescher, Rationality:  A  Philosophical Inquiry into the Nature and the
Rationale of Reason (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1988), 1–​2.
89 Dawson, “Human Reflexivity and the Nonreductive Explanation of Religious
Action,” 151–​58.
90 Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 21.
91 Ibid.
92 For more details see chapter four, “The Neurons that Shaped Civilization,” in
V.S. Ramachandran, The Tell-​Tale Brain:  Unlocking the Mystery of Human
Nature (London: Windmill Books, 2012), 117–​35.
93 Flood, Beyond Phenomenology: Rethinking the Study of Religion, 68.
94 Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 345.
95 Ibid., 341.
96 Flood, Beyond Phenomenology: Rethinking the Study of Religion, 75.
97 Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 343.
98 Ibid., 860.
99 Thomas Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (Chicago, IL: University
of Chicago Press, 1962); Imre Lakatos, “Falsification and the Methodology of
Scientific Research Programmes,” in Criticism and the Growth of Knowledge,
ed. Imre Lakatos and Alan Musgrave (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University
Press, 1970); Paul Feyerabend, Against Method (London: Verso, 1975).
100 Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 12.
101 Flood, The Importance of Religion: Meaning and Action in Our Strange World, 131.
102 Jonardon Ganeri, “Introduction: Indian Logic and the Colonization of Reason,”
in Indian Logic:  A  Reader, ed. Jonardon Ganeri (Richmond, Surrey:  Curzon,
2001), 1–​4.
103 Ram Shankar Misra, The Integral Advaitism of Sri Aurobindo (Delhi:  Motilal
Banarsidass, 1998 (1957)), 35.
104 Peter Winch, The Idea of a Social Science and Its Relation to Philosophy
(London: Routledge, 1990 (1958)), 100.
105 Ibid., 15.
106 Ibid., 102.
107 Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 337.
108 Ibid., 336.
109 Ibid., 337.
110 Ibid., 340.
111 Ibid., 342.
112 Ibid., 343–​45.
113 Misra, The Integral Advaitism of Sri Aurobindo, 79.
114 Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 355.
115 Aurobindo, Essays in Philosophy and Yoga, 105–​06.
116 Phillips, Aurobindo’s Philosophy of Brahman, 3.
117 Ibid.
118 K.D. Sethna, The Vision and Work of Sri Aurobindo (Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo
Ashram Press, 1992), 13.
119 Smith does not translate la mystique with ‘mysticism’ but rather invents a new
English term ‘mystics’ (always in italics, to distinguish it from the plural of ‘mys-
tic’) to denote this field of study similar to mathematics or physics. Michael B.
76

76  Whose tradition? Which rationality?

Smith, “Translator’s Note,” in The Mystic Fable: The Sixteenth and Seventeenth
Centuries, ed. Michel de Certeau (Chicago, IL:  University of Chicago Press,
1995), x.
120 Michel de Certeau, The Mystic Fable: The Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries,
trans. Michael B. Smith (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1995), 14.
121 M. Kessler and C. Sheppard, Mystics:  Presence and Aporia (Chicago,
IL: University of Chicago Press, 2003), vii.
122 Sri Aurobindo, Autobiographical Notes and Other Writings of Historical Interest
(Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram, 2006), 113.
123 Richard King, Orientalism and Religion:  Postcolonial Theory, India and ‘the
Mystic East’ (Abingdon, UK: Routledge, 1999), 8.
124 Staal, in his mapping of the study of mysticism, talks about methods such as
phenomenological, philological, historical, sociological, psychological, which
have been seen as methods for the study of religion as well. F. Staal, Exploring
Mysticism:  A  Methodological Essay (Berkeley, CA:  University of California
Press, 1975).
125 An apt example could be of Henry Coventry in the eighteenth century, who,
although was responsible for ushering the term mysticism into the English
language, pitted the ‘deluded votaries’ of mysticism against ‘a liberal, manly,
rational, and social institution’ of ‘acceptable religion’. Coventry writes of the
mystics (Quakers and Methodists) that, ‘instead of speaking a language of a
serious, rational, unaffected piety, they abound wholly with rapturous flights
of unhallowed love and strains of mystical dissoluteness’. Henry Coventry,
Philemon to Hydaspes: Or, the History of False Religion 1761 in the Earlier Pagan
World, Related in a Series of Conversations (Glasgow: Urie, 1761), 55.
126 Leigh Eric Schmidt, “The Making of Modern ‘Mysticism’,” Journal of the
American Academy of Religion 71, no. 2 (2003).
127 Michel de Certeau, The Certeau Reader, ed. Graham Ward (Oxford: Blackwell
Publishers, 2000), 190.
128 King, Orientalism and Religion: Postcolonial Theory, India and ‘the Mystic East’,
17, 25.
129 Staal, Exploring Mysticism: A Methodological Essay, 27.
130 He mentions ‘true mysticism’ in Sri Aurobindo, The Future Poetry
(Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust, 1997 (1917–​1920)), 120, ‘shadowy
mysticism’ in Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 916, and ‘mystical irrationalism’ in The
Life Divine, 9.
131 Sri Aurobindo, “The Human Cycle,” in The Human Cycle, the Ideal of Human
Unity, War and Self-​ Determination (Pondicherry:  Sri Aurobindo Ashram
Publication Department, 1962 (1949)), 206. Cunningham agrees with Aurobindo
about Nietzsche’s denouncement of intellectualism; however, he is quick to point
out that Nietzsche promoted intellectualism as well, because of his insistence on
the superiority of the aristocratic morality. However, Cunningham understands
intellectualism in terms of the relationship between ‘thinking and valuing’.
G. Watts Cunningham, “Nietzsche on the Philosopher,” The Philosophical Review
54, no. 2 (1945): 165.
132 Aurobindo, Autobiographical Notes and Other Writings of Historical Interest, 113.
133 Vishwanath Prasad Varma, “East and West in Aurobindo’s Political Thought,”
Philosophy East and West 5, no. 3 (October 1995): 237.
134 Heidegger, Introduction to Metaphysics, 129–​30.
135 Flood, “Reflections on Tradition and Inquiry in the Study of Religions,” 49–​50.
136 W.W. Bartley III, “Theories of Rationality,” in Evolutionary Epistemology,
Rationality, and the Sociology of Knowledge, ed. Gerard Radnitzky and W.W.
Bartley III (Peru, IL: Open Court, 1987), 211.
  77

Whose tradition? Which rationality? 77

137 Alasdair MacIntyre, Whose Justice? Which Rationality? (London:  Duckworth,
1988), 349–​69.
138 Sri Aurobindo, The Isha Upanishads (Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram, 2003
(1900–​1915)), 575–​82.
139 Richard J. Bernstein, Beyond Objectivism and Relativism: Science, Hermeneutics,
and Praxis (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1983), 78 ff.

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Bristow, Sir Robert. Sri Aurobindo:  Mystic, Metaphysician, Poet. Paignton,
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Caplan, Arthur L. “Rehabilitating Reductionism.” American Zoologist 28, no. 1 (1988):
193–​203.
Capps, Walter H. Religious Studies:  The Making of a Discipline. Minneapolis,
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Certeau, Michel de. The Certeau Reader. Edited by Graham Ward. Oxford: Blackwell
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Certeau, Michel de. The Mystic Fable:  The Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries.
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Chatterjee, Satischandra. “Mind and Supermind in Sri Aurobindo’s Integralism.” In The
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Chaudhuri, Haridas. The Philosophy of Integralism. Pondicherry:  Sri Aurobindo
Ashram Press, 1954.
Cho, Francisca, and Richard K. Squier. “ ‘He Blinded Me with Science’:  Science
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Cocq, Rhoda P. Le. The Radical Thinkers: Heidegger and Sri Aurobindo. San Francisco,
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Coventry, Henry. Philemon to Hydaspes: Or, the History of False Religion 1761 in the
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Cunningham, G. Watts. “Nietzsche on the Philosopher.” The Philosophical Review 54,
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Heidegger, Martin. Basic Writings:  From Being and Time (1927) to the Task of
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Chicago Press, 1962.
Lakatos, Imre. “Falsification and the Methodology of Scientific Research
Programmes.” In Criticism and the Growth of Knowledge, edited by Imre Lakatos
and Alan Musgrave. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1970.
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Seventeenth Centuries, edited by Michel de Certeau, ix–​x. Chicago, IL: University
of Chicago Press, 1995.
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  81

4 
The Life Divine –​ II
Transcendence and the sevenfold being

Introduction
In the last chapter, if our reading of The Life Divine was directed by the
debates on epistemological reductionism in the study of religion, then in this
chapter I focus on Aurobindo’s ontology in light of ontological reductionism
within the study of religion. If the focus of ontological reductionism is on
the ‘irreducible’, then what irreducible thing-​in-​itself does religion represent?
As I will demonstrate, this question lies at the heart of the religious–​secular
debate  –​naturalism denies transcendence and reduces religion to material
processes while non-​naturalism equates religion to some form of transcend-
ence. Therefore, the religious–​secular debate can be seen as being centred on
the different positions on ‘transcendence’. The two opposing positions of
the debate are:  first, the secularist position that denies transcendence and,
therefore, denies the legitimacy of any enquiry into transcendence, resulting
in a rejection of not only transcendence studies, but also the study of religion
itself. Second, the religionist position, equating the study of transcendence
with the study of religion, argues for the legitimacy of both the study of tran-
scendence and religion. While these two positions reveal the two opposing
poles of the religious–​secular debate, both either reject or affirm a particular
sense of transcendence, a theological/​metaphysical sense, which equates tran-
scendence with a divine being or God.
Since the secularist position is in vogue within current academia, one could
argue that there is a need to defend the religionist position and the legiti-
macy of the study of transcendence in the sense of a ‘God’. However, this
defence of transcendence, although it will be appreciated by the religionists,
will continue to have no relevance for the secularists, the human sciences,
and even the academia at large. Therefore, the very binary of transcendence–​
immanence needs to be interrogated and a fuller understanding of transcend-
ence needs to be explored. I  argue that the idea of ‘transcendence’ plays a
central role in Aurobindo’s ontology in The Life Divine as the mechanism
that holds together his ontology of the ‘sevenfold being’ as ‘embodied spirit’.
The mechanism in operation in the ‘sevenfold’ entails three modes of tran-
scendence: (a) transcendence1 in operation within the self, (b) transcendence2
82

82  Transcendence and the sevenfold being

between self and the absolute, and (c) transcendence3 between the self and the
world. Therefore, I argue, following Aurobindo, Heidegger, and Taylor, that
transcendence, in Heideggerian language, as a human existentiale is primordi-
ally constitutive of humans-​in-​the-​world. Thus, the study of transcendence is
important not just for the study of religion, but for the human sciences and
academia at large. This not only validates the study of religion within the
academy, but also reveals the important role it plays within the larger acad-
emy, with its specialized studies on transcendence. In our age of disciplinary
specializations, religious studies having historically specialized in the study of
transcendence, plays a crucial role by bringing its specialization on transcend-
ence to the larger academy.
Each mode of Aurobindonian transcendence can be profitably gleaned
for the three strands of this enquiry to fulfil the larger threefold aim of this
work. To review the three aims:  first, to offer a hermeneutical reading of
the Aurobindonian texts with a view to demonstrating that the power of the
Aurobindonian vision lies in its self-​conception as a traditionary enquiry into
religion. Here, I  argue that if tradition is constituted by a chain of textual
interpretations then not only does Aurobindo explicitly align his own inter-
pretation within the Vedantic tradition but his theory of interpretation in
light of transcendence1 points to the mechanism that enables the chain of tex-
tual interpretations that is constitutive of tradition. The second aim has been
to appropriate Aurobindo’s philosophy of religion from the Aurobindonian
texts to the debates within contemporary academic study of religion, in
other words, drawing implications from Aurobindonian texts for the contem-
porary study of religion  –​in this chapter, for the debate on transcendence.
Here, I  argue that if the post-​Heideggerian critique of onto-​theo-​logy has
brought about the demise of the study of transcendence within the study of
religion, then not only does Aurobindo’s conception of trancendence2 offer
a way beyond onto-​theo-​logy, thus rehabilitating the study of transcendence
within the study of religion, but also envisioning transcendence2 as ‘embod-
ied spirit’ offers a way beyond ontological reductionism within the study of
religion. Finally, inspired by Aurobindo’s integral method and drawing on
the hermeneutical-​phenomenological tradition engaged with in this work,
the third aim has been to develop a dialogical-​hermeneutics approach for the
study of religion. Building on Aurobindo’s conception of trancendence3 in
operation between self–​world, I argue that transcendence as imagination pro-
vides the ontological ground for dialogue with the other. I argue that the study
of transcendence is central not just for the study of ‘God’ in religion but also
for the study of the nature of ‘being human’ who also ‘live with other humans’
in their world. The three main sections of this chapter follow the explication
of these three aims in line with an exposition of Aurobindo’s three modes of
transcendence. However, before that, two preliminary questions need to be
addressed  –​(a)  how is ontological reductionism a conflict over transcend-
ence? And (b) why is transcendence not given importance in the contempo-
rary study of religion?
  83

Transcendence and the sevenfold being 83

Ontological reductionism as a conflict over transcendence
Drees states that ‘with respect to ontology, naturalism is the view that assumes
that all objects around us, including ourselves, consist of the stuff described by
chemists in the periodic table of the elements’. The physicists understand these
elements to further consist of ‘elementary particles and forces and beyond
that is assumed to consist of quantum fields, superstrings, or whatever’.1 In
this view, both social and mental life and phenomena, including religious hab-
its and traditions, are consequences of the evolutionary process.2 Therefore,
within a naturalist understanding, it can be asked, to what is religion reduced?
Benavides both raises this question and answers it as being reduced to ‘social,
psychological, neurological, biological, chemical, physical processes and struc-
tures’.3 Therefore, naturalism, holding on to a materialist or immanent view of
the universe, not only assigns causes to material processes for human life but
also does not ontologically see anything else beyond what is ultimately mate-
rial in nature. Within the study of religion, naturalism offers a critique of both
phenomenology and theology for their non-​naturalism; for example, it cri-
tiques Otto’s numinous and Eliade’s sacred in the phenomenology of religion’s
reference to the divine, and wholesale dismisses theology’s claims about God
in any form. Non-​naturalism on the other hand, in the study of religion, opens
a way beyond material naturalism to admit forms of transcendence, which, as
Flood points out, are denied by naturalism.4 Thus, ontological reductionism,
naturalist or non-​naturalist, according to the kind of referent to which their
explanations point, can be divided into three kinds  –​naturalist or material,
phenomenological, and theological, each referring to matter, essences, and
God as the irreducible respectively.5
I claim that the conflict within the study of religion, between naturalism
and non-​naturalism, is precisely over a transcendent referent as the irreduc-
ible. This is best illustrated in Segal’s critique of Eliade. While Pals offers a
‘careful scrutiny’ of Segal’s ‘renunciation of Eliade’ and a ‘direct and wide-​
ranging assault on the doctrine of irreducible religion’, it will suffice for our
purposes to outline the main points of Segal’s critique. Pals identifies three
charges that Segal makes against Eliade: first, Eliade is accused of confusing
his own stand with that of the believers he places under study. Second, that
Eliade simply asserts without proving the case about reductionist interpreta-
tions being irrelevant and endorses the believer’s claim that religious phenom-
ena are irreducible. Finally, Segal argues that irreducible religion is a disguise
under which scholars such as Eliade smuggle their beliefs on God into their
work.6 This charge against Eliade clearly explicates what lies at the heart of
Segal’s critique of Eliade. It is worthwhile to quote Segal in full:

If Eliade is wrong to oppose reductionistic interpretations of religion on

the grounds that they misinterpret religion, he is right to oppose them on
the grounds that they threaten, or may threaten, it. For what underlies, if
hardly justifies, his abhorrence of reductionistic interpretations is his fear
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84  Transcendence and the sevenfold being

that they reduce God to a delusion. Eliade insists on a nonreductionistic
interpretation of religion in order to preserve the reality of God.7

And again:

Where God is the explanation offered by nonreductionists, nature, soci-

ety, and the psyche are among the explanations offered by social scientific
reductionists. Those explanations, as rival ones to God, do challenge the
reality of God, so that Eliade is justified in fearing them, even if he is not
justified in rejecting them. These explanations may not refute the exist-
ence of God, but, if accepted, they may well render his existence superflu-
ous –​and in that sense threaten the reality of God.8

This lays bare the deep conflict within ontological reductionism, between nat-
uralism and non-​naturalism: as much as non-​naturalism seeks to ‘preserve the
reality of God’, naturalism renders his existence superfluous and threatens the
‘reality of God’. Thus, the conflict is about ‘God’ or to use non-​theological
language, about forms of transcendence –​each trying to preserve or threaten
it respectively. Wiebe, in his endorsement of Segal’s critique of Eliade, makes
this point further explicit.

There is no question in my mind that Segal is right to attack the uncriti-

cal assumption of the existence (not merely ‘reality’) of the transcendent
referents of religious discourse (belief)…. Such accounts of religion quite
obviously adopt the stance of the devotee as over against the sceptic on
the metaphysical issue, for example, of the existence of the gods.9

In other words, to use Taylorian language, this can be seen as a critique from
immanence against transcendence, which I  argue to be at the heart of the
wider religious–​secular debate within the study of religion. In The Life Divine,
Aurobindo explicates this debate at its extreme case where the naturalist or the
secularist asserts pure ‘matter’ as ultimate existence and the non-​naturalist
or the religionist goes to the other extreme of affirming only the reality of
the ‘spirit’ at the expense of the material world. It is to this conflict that
Aurobindonian metaphysics seeks to make a contribution. However, before
that, we need to explicate the debate on ‘transcendence’ in the study of reli-
gion, with a view to outlining its various points of contention.

Absence of ‘transcendence’ within the study of religion

The issue of ‘transcendence’ was completely eclipsed in the 2003 conference on
Religion and the Secular. There is neither a mention of it in the list of ‘theoret-
ical assumptions’ in the Introduction nor does the term even have an entry in
the index. The dominant view of the critical school on the issue of transcend-
ence is best illustrated in the chapter on Otto and ‘the holy’. Although Alles’
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Transcendence and the sevenfold being 85

article is well-​researched on the primary sources of Otto’s life, methodologi-
cally, it offers a postcolonial and secularist reading of Otto’s mysterium. The
main aim of his article is to argue that Otto’s ‘strategic use’ of the holy was
for ‘a variety of political purposes, including colonial ones’.10 While not deny-
ing this critique of Otto, it is clear that this account deftly reduces Otto’s ‘the
holy’ to either a sociological or a colonial substratum and, thus, nullifies the
main contribution made by Otto to the study of religion, which was to revive
the idea of transcendence within the predominantly materialistic worldview
of late nineteenth-​and early twentieth-​century Europe. This sidestepping of
‘transcendence’ within the study of religion has been intentional among the
critical school. Fitzgerald, in an earlier work, argues that the concept of tran-
scendence has to be ‘transformed from a theological to a sociological concept’
and that this alone will provide ‘a genuine non-​theological focus for a human-
istic study’ like religious studies.11 McCutcheon too, following a Durkheimian
functional view, argues that ‘sacredness [or transcendence] is a contingent
attribute that results from actors choosing to implement sets of negotiable
social rules’.12
These positions reveal that the critical school within religious studies under-
stands itself in humanist and sociological terms. However, this is to already
locate oneself within the domain of Taylorian secularity3 –​the condition of
immanence.13 Thus, conditioned by secularity, it is reflexively unable to accept
any form of transcendence. Otto’s ‘the holy’ was opposing precisely this secu-
lar view. For Otto, transcendence was not merely a subjective ‘state of mind’,
emotion, or feeling, but unlike Schleiermacher’s ‘feeling of dependence’ which
could only via inference talk about God, Otto’s ‘creature-​consciousness’ was
a response to ‘the numinous’, which he argued was ‘objective and outside the
self’.14 It was the impinging of ‘the numinous’ or ‘transcendence’ that was
central to Otto’s project which was not only a critique of Enlightenment secu-
larist rationalism, but also of a Schleiermacherian Counter-​Enlightenment
Romanticism.
Thus, the critical school within religious studies, steeped in ‘exclusive
humanism’, does not possess a language to articulate this strategic contri-
bution of Otto. In other words, the contemporary critical school within the
study of religion, shaped by a secularist and humanist tradition, is closed
to any conversation that presupposes transcendence and is willing to con-
verse only if transcendence is explained in a neo-​Durkheimian functionalist
manner. Every enquiry into transcendence that is open to transcendence is
dismissed as a theological enquiry, as working out of an Anselm-​framework
of ‘faith seeking understanding’, which, therefore, is dismissed as not having
legitimacy within the academy. Therefore, while there is a need to rehabilitate
transcendence in the sense of Otto’s mysterium, there is a need also to rethink
transcendence itself in its other senses.
Flood argues that the academic study of religions implies a theoreti-
cal and empirical discourse that concerns ‘the relationship between “self ”,
“body”, “culture” and “transcendence” ’.15 According to Flood, the enquiry
86

86  Transcendence and the sevenfold being

into transcendence is central to the study of religion, thus problematizing the
position of the critical school. Within the sociology of religion, a discipline
focused on empirical studies, Berger’s move from a position of methodologi-
cal atheism to methodological agnosticism, creating valid space for ‘signals of
transcendence’, was one way to bring transcendence back within the human
sciences.16 Garrett, in the insightful essay ‘Troublesome Transcendence’,
maps three ways ‘transcendence’ has been studied within the sociology of
religion, namely, (a) scientific reductionism, (b) symbolic functionalism, and
(c)  phenomenological numinalism, and argues that ‘only the phenomeno-
logical school appropriated a theoretical orientation, which neither vitiated
the numinal reality of religion nor compromised the objective posture of the
sociologist’.17 However, while Berger has been more than once accused of
bringing theological presuppositions into his sociology, equally phenom-
enology as a discipline has fallen into disrepute for being a handmaiden of
Christian theology.
How shall we move forward in talking about ‘transcendence’ within the
academic study of religion which will not be given to the criticism of being
either theology or phenomenology while still seeking to do justice to the dif-
ferent conceptions of ‘transcendence’ within different traditions? As we have
noted, the discipline of the study of religion, and its dominant critical school
located within the secular university, has pre-​judged against transcendence
and precluded it from discussion except in reductionist or functionalist terms.
Thus, a question worthy of our pursuit is –​how can enquiry into transcend-
ence be argued to be a valid enterprise within the study of religion?
A way forward could be to demonstrate that in their preclusion, the sec-
ularists (the critical school) unwittingly affirm that the study of religion is
nothing but the study of transcendence. The critical school’s demand for
the abandonment of the category religion and for the discipline of religious
studies to be assimilated into sociology or cultural studies, on the basis that
the study of religion does not have an ‘object of study’ or methodology
unique to it, appears legitimate, except that this demand is made by the
very same critical scholarship that precludes enquiry into transcendence
within religious studies on the basis that its legitimate academic domain is
theology or sociology. The logic at work is (a) transcendence should only
be studied either sociologically or theologically, (b)  and there are sociol-
ogy and theology departments that do the same, (c) therefore, religion as a
category should be dropped and religious studies departments made redun-
dant. While the logic is impeccable, what it hides is the critical school’s
presupposition of a direct correlation of religion with transcendence. This
is evident in that the reduction or explaining away of transcendence is
directly related to the call for the abandonment of religion. This argument
about the correlation of religion with transcendence is made by McKinnon
in his critique of Fitzgerald. He writes, ‘some of his [Fitzgerald’s] discus-
sion of language of “transcendence” (albeit properly de-​ontologised) …
refers (even if it does not refer) to “religion” ’.18 Therefore, we can conclude,
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Transcendence and the sevenfold being 87

both positively and negatively, that the religionists and the secularists (the
critical school), both correlate religion with transcendence. Therefore, we
can agree with Taylor that ‘ “religion” for our purposes can be defined in
terms of “transcendence” ’.19 So, I argue, on the basis of taking the critical
school’s critique to its logical conclusion, that the study of religion is neces-
sarily a study of transcendence.
While this correlation of religion with transcendence legitimizes the study
of transcendence within religious studies, it is unable to guard against the rejec-
tion of both religion and transcendence, which is precisely the position of the
secularists. At most, this will keep the significance of transcendence limited to
the study of religion, with its status being contingent on the larger issues of
funding, and the politics of discourse within the university, however without
much significance for the academia at large. Therefore, in order to establish
the legitimate relevance of transcendence, the transcendence–​ immanence,
spirit–​matter, and religious–​secular binaries needs to be exploded with a view
to apprehending the existential nature of transcendence and its importance in
a variety of senses for the human sciences at large, among which an important
sense is the idea of ‘great transcendence’ or God, the study of which lies at the
heart of religious studies. So, how shall we understand transcendence? It is
with this question that we turn to Aurobindo’s The Life Divine. Although this
entails a slight repetition of the previous chapter in the setting up of the prob-
lematic, it is worthwhile repeating it, as it lays the foundation for overcoming
ontological reductionism even as it did for epistemological reductionism.

Aurobindo’s sevenfold being and transcendence

Flood locates three kinds of reductionism in his section on naturalism and
non-​naturalism within the academic study of religion –​materialist, phenom-
enological, and theological  –​each reducing phenomena to matter, universal
essences, and God respectively.20 Analogous to Flood, Aurobindo too identifies
three possible kinds of ontological reductionisms –​materialist, Advaitic, and
theological – which reduce existence to matter, spirit, and a creator–​creation
duality respectively:

Our existence here may indeed be an inconsequential freak of Matter

itself or of some Energy building up Matter, or it may be an in explicable
freak of the Spirit. Or, again, our existence here may be an arbitrary fan-
tasy of a supracosmic Creator. (Italics mine.)21

Aurobindo critiques all three reductionisms as insufficient by contending that

(a) there is no ‘essential significance’ of human life in materialism, (b) exist-
ence ultimately has ‘illusory significance’ for the Advaitins, and (c) for a theist,
one needs to rely on ‘revelation’, which is ‘not self-​implied in the self-​nature’ of
existence. Building on his rejection of these three reductionisms, Aurobindo
sets forth his metaphysical proposal of ‘embodied spirit’ upon an existential
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88  Transcendence and the sevenfold being

paradox. Aurobindo begins The Life Divine with a paradox whose reconcilia-
tion guides his entire project:

The eternal paradox and eternal truth of a divine life in an animal body, an
immortal aspiration or reality inhabiting a mortal tenement, a single and
universal consciousness representing itself in limited minds and divided
egos, a transcendent, indefinable, timeless and spaceless Being who alone
renders time and space and cosmos possible, and in all these the higher
truth realisable by the lower term, justify themselves to the deliberate rea-
son as well as to the persistent instinct or intuition of mankind.22

For Aurobindo, the paradox is both epistemological and ontological in that

it is not just a paradox in accounts of existence, but also in existence itself.
So, what is the paradox? According to Aurobindo, it is the first terms of the
above binaries, existing and inhabiting the second terms in a realist sense.
The primary binary, upon which these above binaries are contingent, is the
spirit–​matter binary; ‘divine life’, ‘immortal aspiration’, ‘universal conscious-
ness’, and ‘transcendent, indefinable, timeless and spaceless being’ represent
the higher term ‘spirit’, while ‘mortal tenement’, ‘limited minds and divided
egos’, and ‘cosmos’ represent the lower term ‘matter’. Aurobindo finds the co-​
habitation of these two terms paradoxical. Aurobindo asks how it is possible
for immortal ideals to dwell within mortal existence and it is this apparent
impossibility that provides the point of departure for his project. He states
upfront his main thesis about how this paradox could possibly be resolved.
For Aurobindo, the resolution is possible only if:

We recognise not only eternal spirit as the inhabitant of this bodily man-
sion, the wearer of this mutable robe, but accept matter of which it is
made, as a fit and noble material out of which He weaves constantly His
garbs, builds recurrently the unending series of His mansions.23

In other words, Aurobindo envisions existence as ‘embodied spirit’ where ‘the

physical universe is described as the external body of the Divine Being’.24
Having stated his thesis, the rest of The Life Divine is an argument to show
how this is so. But what is the structure of the ‘embodied spirit’? Aurobindo
proposes a ‘sevenfold mode of all cosmic existence’25 as the structure of exist-
ence as ‘embodied spirit’, based on his symbolic-​psychological interpretation
of the Vedas and Upaniṣads.
Although Aurobindo’s first works on hermeneutics began with his early
work on Vedānta (1902), it began to take shape in the article he wrote in
1912 entitled The Interpretation of Scripture and then was formulated in
a series of articles on the Ṛg Veda published from August 1914 onwards.
These were later collected as The Secret of the Veda, of which the first five
articles explicitly put forth his theory of symbolic-​psychological interpreta-
tion, particularly for the interpretation of the Ṛg Veda. This situatedness
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Transcendence and the sevenfold being 89

of Aurobindo’s hermeneutical theory within the Vedānta tradition rather
than being limiting, reveals the ‘traditionary’ nature of his hermeneutics,
which is precisely the larger argument advanced in fulfilling the first aim of
this work.
What is Aurobindo’s symbolic-​ psychological interpretation? Aurobindo
develops the symbolic-​psychological theory of interpretation from his study
of the Vedānta tradition, in light of its history of interpretations. His theory
emerges as a means to resolve the problem associated with a low-​view of the
claims of the Vedas in their interpretative history. Aurobindo’s question is if
the Vedic hymns are nothing but sacrificial compositions of a primitive and still
barbarous race written around a system of ceremonial and propitiatory rites,
addressed to personified Powers of Nature and replete with a confused mass of
half-​formed myth and crude astronomical allegories yet in the making,26 then
how is it possible that they have been considered as the ‘reputed source’ and the
‘origin and standard’ of the highest thinking of many rich traditions and their
philosophies arising out of the Indian sub-​continent:

Authoritative and true in Brahmana and Upanishad, in Tantra and

Purana, in the doctrines of great philosophical schools and in the teach-
ings of famous saints and sages not only of some of the world’s rich-
est and profoundest religions, but of some of its subtlest metaphysical
philosophies?27

This question guides both his ‘destruction’ and ‘construction’ of the Vedantic
tradition with a view to arguing that the Vedic rṣis (seers) through the use of
a ‘system of parallelism’ and śleṣa (rhetorical figure of double entendre) com-
posed the Vedic texts in a language, in which ‘the same deities were at once
internal and external Powers of Universal Nature’. Thus, the same texts had a
dual significance both for external worship as well as for ‘spiritual enlighten-
ment and self-​culture’, which for Aurobindo is the primary intention of the
Veda. Aurobindo points out that the Vedas are from the same period of the
‘historic Eleusinian and Orphic mysteries’, when the ‘spiritual and psycho-
logical knowledge of the race was concealed’ behind a ‘veil of concrete and
material figures and symbols which protected the sense from the profane and
revealed it to the initiated’. In this light, both the ‘ritual system’ recognized by
Sayana as well as the ‘naturalistic sense’ discovered by European scholarship
can be accepted but behind them there is a ‘hidden secret of the Veda’, which
needs to be interpreted. It is towards this task that Aurobindo considered
his translations and work as a preparation.28 This view defined Aurobindo’s
symbolic-​psychological theory of interpretation of the Veda. Olivelle is very
Aurobindonian in his view, when he argues that Vedic thinkers and Upaniṣadic
authors assumed that (a) the universe is constituted of a ‘web of relations’ and
things that appear to stand alone and apart but are in fact connected to other
things, and (b) this knowledge about the inter-​connectedness of the universe
is ‘hidden from the view of ordinary people’ and (c) ‘discovering’ the ‘hidden
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90  Transcendence and the sevenfold being

connections’ is knowledge, which gives among other things immortality to the
knower.29
It is keeping in line with this symbolic-​psychological theory of interpreta-
tion that Aurobindo interprets the sevenfold being of the Veda as both psy-
chological principles and states of existence. In the chapter entitled ‘Saraswati
and Her Consorts’, Aurobindo provides a Vedic rationale for his understand-
ing of the sevenfold being of existence: first, he argues that the number seven
is important in the Vedic system as it re-​occurs in different forms30 throughout
the Vedas. Second, he interprets these different ‘sets of seven’ to be contingent
on a primordial ‘Vedic classification of the fundamental principles, the tat-
tvas, of existence’.31 He interprets these tattvas as ‘psychological principles’
because in his psychological interpretation of the Vedas, the Vedic rṣis are
seen as conceiving ‘existence’ as a ‘movement of conscious being’, which pro-
vided the ‘thought-​basis’ for their ‘living psychological practice’, although he
acknowledges that modern interpretations view these classifications as ‘dry
metaphysical distinctions’. Third, he deconstructs the sevenfold existence
into three different groups, in which they are stated in the Vedas –​singular,
dual, and triple. The singular ‘one’ he argues is recognized as the ‘basis and
continent’ of all existence. The ‘one’ contains two kinds of dual, signifying
(a) ‘divine and human’ that refers to ‘mortal and immortal’ and (b) ‘heaven
and earth’ that symbolize the ‘father and mother of all beings’ or ‘two forms
of natural energy’. Then there are two sets of the trinity, signifying (a) ‘the
threefold divine principle answering to the later sachchidananda, the divine
existence, consciousness and bliss’ and (b) ‘the threefold mundane principle,
mind, life, body’. Finally, he puts together the sevenfold by ‘adding the three
divine principles to the three mundane and interpolating a seventh, or link-​
principle, which is precisely that of the Truth-​consciousness, Ṛtaṃ Bṛhat,
afterwards known as vijñāna or mahas’ or the Supermind, where mahas mean-
ing ‘large’ is seen as an equivalent of Bṛhat.32 However, does this mean that
Aurobindo’s interpretation reduces all of existence to psychology, in other
words, merely to levels of consciousness? Aurobindo unites the sevenfold psy-
chological principles of existence with the ‘system of worlds’ in the Veda to
arrive at his conception of existence as ‘embodied spirit’. Although it is long,
I quote Aurobindo in full to show how he makes this connection:

Another all-​important feature of Vedic symbolism is the system of the

worlds and the functions of the gods. I found the clue to the symbolism
of the worlds in the Vedic conception of the vyāhṛtis, the three symbolic
words of the mantra, ‘OM Bhur Bhuvah Swah’, and in the connection
of the fourth Vyahriti, Mahas, with the psychological term ‘Ritam’. The
Rishis speak of three cosmic divisions, Earth, the Antariksha or middle
region and Heaven (Dyaus); but there is also a greater Heaven (Brihad
Dyau) called also the Wide World, the Vast (Brihat), and typified some-
times as the Great Water, Maho Arnas. This ‘Brihat’ is again described as
‘Ritam Brihat’ or in a triple term ‘Satyam Ritam Brihat’. And as the three
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Transcendence and the sevenfold being 91

worlds correspond to the Vyahritis, so this fourth world of the Vastness
and the Truth seems to correspond to the fourth Vyahriti mentioned in
the Upanishads, Mahas. In the Puranic formula the four are completed
by three others, Jana, Tapas and Satya, the three supreme worlds of the
Hindu cosmology. In the Veda also we have three supreme worlds whose
names are not given. But in the Vedantic and Puranic system the seven
worlds correspond to seven psychological principles or forms of existence,
Sat, Chit, Ananda, Vijnana, Manas, Prana and Anna. Now Vijnana, the
central principle, the principle of Mahas, the great world, is the Truth of
things, identical with the Vedic Ritam which is the principle of Brihat, the
Vast, and while in the Puranic system Mahas is followed in the ascend-
ing order by Jana, the world of Ananda, of the divine Bliss, in the Veda
also Ritam, the Truth, leads upward to Mayas, Bliss. We may, therefore,
be fairly sure that the two systems are identical and that both depend
on the same idea of seven principles of subjective consciousness formu-
lating themselves in seven objective worlds. On this principle I was able
to identify the Vedic worlds with the corresponding psychological planes
of consciousness and the whole Vedic system became clear to my mind.
(Italics mine.)33

Olivelle documents the shift from a three-​world cosmology of the early Vedic
period to the seven-​world cosmology of the late Vedic period precisely on
the same lines of exposition as Aurobindo’s.34 Furthermore, Olivelle acknowl-
edges that Sanskrit terms have a double meaning in that the same term is
used for both ‘ritual and moral action’, for example, the term karman, which
is both ‘ritual’ and ‘action’.35 However, Olivelle does not think in terms of
psychological meanings. Yet again, similar to Aurobindo, he argues for the
Vedic thinkers to have three inter-​connected areas of concern –​rituals, cosmic
realities, and human body/​person. He contends that, ‘The central concern of
all Vedic thinkers, including the authors of the Upaniṣads, is to discover the
connections that bind elements of these three spheres to each other.’36 He
argues that the debate in scholarship is between ‘identity’ and ‘resemblance’
of these different spheres, which is pointed out by these connections. Above,
I have demonstrated that Aurobindo too was arguing for ‘identity’. Olivelle
also contends that those who notice the connection also ‘seek to establish a
hierarchy of connected things’, which is the basis for the unity of the diverse
thoughts of the Upaniṣads.37 For example, Brereton points out that the there
is an ‘integrative vision’ in the Upaniṣads which ‘draws together the separate
elements of the world and of human experience and compresses them into a
single form’.38 This is precisely what Aurobindo proposes with his sevenfold
being of existence. It brings both psychological terms and the world together
into a single whole of the ‘embodied spirit’. This has strong resemblance
to Ramanuja’s Viśiṣṭādvaita that describes the world as the body of God.
It could also be compared, as Maitra has done, with the double trinity of
Plotinus, for whom the first trinity consists of Absolute, Spirit, and Soul and
92

92  Transcendence and the sevenfold being

the second trinity of Spirit, Soul, and Body.39 It is interesting to note that the
later Heidegger has a fourfold das Geviert, consisting of two dualities –​earth,
sky, mortals, and divinities dwelling in a ‘primal oneness’ –​‘By a primal one-
ness the four –​earth and sky, divinities and mortals –​belong together in one.’40
One immediate conclusion we can draw from Aurobindo’s Vedānta is that this
integrative sevenfold being side-​steps the problem of ontological reductionism
by conjoining the opposing binaries of matter–​spirit and creator–​creation.
However, our particular focus is to tease out the role played by ‘transcend-
ence’ in Aurobindo’s sevenfold. If this sevenfold being consisting of Truth,
Consciousness, Bliss, Supermind, Mind, Life, and Matter, is Aurobindo’s
statement of existence, then what role does ‘transcendence’ play within this
conception of existence? But for that, we need to understand the different
senses of the term ‘transcendence’.
How should we understand transcendence? Once again with the lack
of effort within religious studies dominated by the critical school, it is the
philosophers and the theologians who have problematized ‘transcendence’,
particularly in the conference Religion and Postmodernism 4: Transcendence
and Beyond, which was supported by Villanova University in 2003, result-
ing in the edited volume Transcendence and Beyond: A Postmodern Enquiry
(2007).41 The intention was to discover how the classical idea of transcend-
ence plays out in the postmodern context. But I  begin with the etymologi-
cal meaning of transcendence. If transcendence from the Latin transcendere
means to surpass, step over, to cross over to, or to go beyond, then, according
to Heidegger, it can be understood in three senses: (a) transcendence as the
‘activity’ of ‘the surpassing’ or ‘the going beyond’; (b) the transcendent is a
‘relation’ in the formal sense –​‘the crossing over to X from Y’ or it is ‘that
toward which the surpassing takes place’, or ‘that which requires surpass-
ing in order to be accessible and attainable, the beyond, that which is over
against’; and (c) finally ‘that which does the transcending is what carries out
the stepping-​over’, it itself is a ‘limit’ or ‘restriction’ or a ‘gap’ that needs to
be surpassed.42 The idea of transcendence as ‘going beyond’ is central to the
Aurobindonian project as the mechanism that holds together the sevenfold.
However, transcendence is used by Aurobindo in three distinct senses –​tran-
scendence1, transcendence2, and transcendence3 –​that can be seen as analo-
gous to the Heideggerian schema.
Transcendence1, equivalent to the Heideggerian (a)  as the ‘activity’ of
‘going beyond’, takes a two-​ fold process of involution–​ evolution in the
Aurobindonian schema. While Heidegger refers to this as ‘epistemological
transcendence’, for Aurobindo it is the central mechanism that holds the sev-
enfold together as ‘embodied spirit’. There is an intensification of this ‘activ-
ity’ in Aurobindo’s ‘link-​principle’ or the seventh term of existence called Ṛtaṃ
Bṛhat, or later known as vijñāna or mahas, referring to the ‘intuitive realm’,
which enjoins the double trinity of existence. Central to this activity is the role
played by the Vedantic texts, which for Aurobindo are ‘earlier results of intui-
tion’ and the history of its interpretations, in short, the Vedānta tradition. In
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Transcendence and the sevenfold being 93

this light, Aurobindo proposes the symbolic-​psychological theory of interpre-
tation. In this section, I want to argue that while the role of transcendence1
as vijñāna in the act of interpretation is observed by Aurobindo as playing
a central role in his ontological proposal, what has not been given enough
emphasis is the role played by transcendence1 as vijñāna in the act of inter-
pretation, which not only reiterates Aurobindo’s traditionary-​hermeneutics,
but also reveals the role of transcendence within hermeneutical enquiry.
Transcendence2, similar to the Heideggerian (b), refers to ‘the beyond’ or the
‘over against’ or the transcendent Being. This refers to Aurobindo’s Parātpara
Brahman or the Absolute, who is both unknowable and ineffable. Heidegger
critiques this as theological transcendence, which is seen in contradistinction
to contingency. Transcendence in this sense is a being, which lies beyond con-
ditioned beings. When theological transcendence is conjoined with epistemo-
logical transcendence, then one gets the metaphysical God or onto-​theo-​logy.
Here, I want to argue that Aurobindo’s Parātpara Brahman, in escaping the
charge of onto-​theo-​logy, offers a way forward for the study of ‘religion
after metaphysics’, particularly by bringing transcendence to the academic
centre-​stage. Transcendence3, resonating with the Heideggerian (c), refers to
the ‘boundary’ or ‘limit’ that needs to be surpassed by the one transcending.
Heidegger, while rejecting the conception of a ‘box-​like’ self, which has an
interior and exterior and walls that act as boundary or limit needing to be
surpassed, proposes Dasein as being-​in-​the-​world, in which transcendence is
‘the primordial constitution of the subjectivity of a subject’. For Heidegger,
the ‘subject transcends qua subject’, so that it can be said that ‘to be a subject
means to transcend’.43 Aurobindo’s conception of the self as ‘embodied spirit’
can be seen as analogous to the Heideggerian Dasein, particularly because of
the similarity in their understanding of the ‘world’. By positing transcend-
ence as constitutive of the self, the ‘boundary’ between the self and the world
is obliterated, both in Aurobindo and Heidegger. If the boundary that cir-
cumscribes the selfhood of a self is obliterated, then how do we understand
‘other-​self’ or another Dasein? If transcendence3 is internal to the self, then is
the other also subsumed within the self ? Here, I want to argue that while the
other is the limiting case of self-​transcendence, transcendence as imagination
is the ontological ground for dialogue between self and other.

Transcendence1 as vijñāna and textuality

In this section, instead of giving a complete description of Aurobindonian
hermeneutics, I will describe the role played by transcendence1 as vijñāna in
Aurobindo’s theory of symbolic-​psychological interpretation with a view to
arguing that vijñāna as the ‘act of understanding’ is the mechanism of tran-
scendence active in the faculty of understanding, progressing the self from
buddhi (reason) to vijñāna (intuition). But how does this ‘transcending’ take
place? For Aurobindo, the site of transcending is in the ‘act of interpretation’
of the Vedic texts so that ‘transcending’ psychologically is the mechanism
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94  Transcendence and the sevenfold being

operational in the interpretation of text. This refers to the psychological
aspect of his theory of interpretation. But Aurobindo also considers the
text as a symbol that can be accessed through philological work informed by
the history of interpretations of the text, which plays a key role in achieving
the goal of psychological interpretation. While this symbolic-​psychological
theory has focused on the psychological ‘transcending’ or ‘travelling’ of the
intra-​self from buddhi to vijñāna, what has been eclipsed, or rather not made
explicit, is the mechanism of transcendence1 as vijñāna in operation in the his-
torical chain of interpretations of the symbol of the Vedic texts, which is the
same mechanism that progresses tradition through a chain of interpretations.
Therefore, in Aurobindo’s psychological-​symbolic theory of interpretation,
transcendence1 as vijñāna is in operation in two ways:  first, psychologically
within the interpreting self; and second, in the historical chain of interpreta-
tions as tradition. Finally, not only does this understanding make Aurobindo
a hermeneutical thinker, but also firmly locates him through his interpreta-
tion of the Vedic texts within the Vedantic tradition. Thus, the argument pro-
gresses through three stages: first, I will demonstrate that vijñāna, as the act
of understanding, is ontologically the mechanism of transcendence active in
the faculty of understanding. Second, I point out how vijñāna, as transcend-
ence within understanding, takes place in the interpretation of texts. Finally,
I  contend that the mechanism of vijñāna, as transcendence through the
chain of interpretations, constitutes precisely the structure of a traditionary-​
hermeneutical enquiry. In light of this, I conclude that not only is Aurobindo
a traditionary-​hermeneutical thinker, but also that through his interpretation
of the Vedic texts, he locates himself firmly within the Vedantic tradition.

Vijñāna as transcendence1 in self-​understanding

Aurobindo’s entire edifice is held together within the schema of involution–​
evolution or ascent–​descent, whereby, on one hand, the ‘Divine descends from
pure existence to Supermind [vijñāna] to cast itself into cosmic existence’,
while, on the other hand, ‘the creature ascends from Matter to Mind towards
the Divine’ and the meeting point is ‘where mind and Supermind meet with
a veil between them’.44 For Aurobindo, while buddhi is the reason-​mind and
vijñāna the Supermind, it is vijñāna that is both the link term that conjoins
both the lower and higher trinities in their meeting and also the destination,
to which buddhi is transformed. Aurobindo translates vijñāna as ‘intuition’,
although he finds this translation inadequate to represent its dual import.45
So, what is vijñāna? Aurobindo traces vijñāna to Īśā 7  –​ yasmin sarvani
bhutanyatmaivabhud vijanatah –​which he translates as ‘in whom the Self (of
him) verily knowing by vijñāna has become all creatures, there what delusion,
what grief, of him seeing wherever he looks (anu) oneness’.46 While Olivelle
translates ‘vijanatah’ as ‘discerning’ Aurobindo translates it as (a)  ‘know-
ing by vijñāna’, or as (b) ‘when he knows’, where vijñāna is seen to be a cer-
tain kind of knowing that is differentiated from the normal knowing of the
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Transcendence and the sevenfold being 95

mind.47 When Aurobindo asks ‘What is this vijñāna?’, he replies that while
it has been taken by Vedantic commentators as identical to buddhi, as ‘the
discriminating intellect or the pure reason’, he points out that in the ‘psycho-
logical system of the Veda’ the ‘intellectual vicāra, reason, even pure reason’
is not the highest and that ‘real buddhi is not in mind’, rather it is ‘above
mind’ and ‘beyond & behind this intellect’.48 Thus, Aurobindo understands
vijñāna as a psychological-​existential concept in two senses:  (a)  as a higher
faculty of the mind as ‘real buddhi’ (similar to the Heideggerian existentiale
of understanding), in which the subject–​object and self–​world distinctions
are obliterated and (b) as a ‘passage way’ (transcending) within the self from
the lower mind (buddhi) to vijñāna (faculty of understanding) and thus trans-
forms itself. Transcendence1 is the movement within the self from buddhi to
vijñāna.49 Simply put, if buddhi is seen as the ‘reasoning mind’, then vijñāna
can be seen as both the act and faculty of understanding, through which rea-
son is transformed into understanding, although this mechanism primarily
has ontological significance in Aurobindo’s sevenfold schema. This view is
endorsed by Monier-​Williams, who saw vijñāna as both ‘the act of distin-
guishing or discerning, understanding, comprehending, recognizing, intel-
ligence, knowledge’ and also as a ‘thought-​faculty’.50 Farquhar points out
that vijñāna as vijñānamaya is also seen as one of the five sheaths (kośa) that
describe the soul’s ascent –​annamaya or sheath of food, prāṇamaya or sheath
of breath, manomaya or sheath of empirical sense-​mind, vijñānamaya or
sheath of reason and understanding, and ānandamaya or sheath of bliss.51 In
Monier-​Williams’ view, the sheath of vijñānamaya is one of the three sheaths
of the body that envelop the soul and it can be equated with both prāṇamaya
and manomaya.52 However, in Aurobindo’s sevenfold, while a clear distinction
is made between vijñāna, prāṇa (vital energy), manas (sense-​mind), and buddhi
(reason), in which the latter three are seen as part of the lower trinity, vijñāna
is taken as the link term that unites this lower trinity with the higher.
But how does this ‘transcending’ take place, especially if within the ‘oneness’
of the Aurobindonian sevenfold there is no separation between the starting-​
point (buddhi) and the destiny (vijñāna)? Aurobindo’s response is that vijñāna
in a ‘rudimentary form’ is already established within man, as it is ‘already
involved in matter, life and mind’.53 This rudimentary form is already found as
an ‘illegitimate form’ of vijñāna in the intellect or the ‘mental buddhi’ (human
reason); however, since it limits itself to the ‘province of the senses’, it is una-
ble to arrive at its proper function.54 Hence, this ‘travelling’ is vijñāna’s ‘own
release out of the limitations of sensational mentality’ (buddhi) to vijñāna-​
buddhi.55 So, this ‘releasing’ is the ‘transcending’. But how should this ‘release’
take place? Aurobindo’s answer is through ‘evolution’ or ‘ascension’ of the
buddhi. Explicating the process further, Aurobindo argues that ‘releasing’
takes place when ‘sight replaces mental thought’ and ‘Veda, drishti, replaces
the fragmentary mental activity’; then ‘True Buddhi (Vijñāna) emerges from
the dissipated action of the Buddhi’.56 Thus, the ‘transcending’ of rudimen-
tary vijñāna of buddhi to true vijñāna-​buddhi is made possible through ‘dṛṣṭi’
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96  Transcendence and the sevenfold being

or ‘sight’ of the ‘Veda’.57 Thus, the ‘seeing’ (dṛṣṭi) of the Vedic text becomes
central to the ‘releasing’ or ‘transcending’ of vijñāna-​buddhi from buddhi.
To summarize, the vijñāna-​buddhi is both the faculty that does the ‘tran-
scending’ or ‘releasing’ and also the act of ‘transcending’ and ‘travelling’
between buddhi and vijñāna-​buddhi through intuitive ‘sight’. This has close
parallels with the Heideggerian ‘Understanding’, which is distinguished from
any kind of cognizing. For Heidegger, as an existentiale, ‘understanding is
the existential Being of Dasein’s own potentiality-​for-​Being; and it is so in
such a way that this Being discloses in itself what its Being is capable of’.
Understanding possesses the existential structure of ‘projecting’ because of
which it always ‘press[es] forward into possibilities’. As Dasein is constituted
by the existentiale of projection, ‘Dasein is constantly “more” than it fac-
tually is’ possessing a ‘potentiality-​for-​Being’, in which it is ‘not-​yet’. This
‘projective character’ of understanding makes up Dasein’s ‘sight’ (Sicht). The
sight, which is upon the ‘whole of existence’, is designated as ‘knowledge of
Self’, which for Heidegger, is a ‘full and sophisticated knowledge of the Self
in all its implications’.58 Thus, the Aurobindonian vijñāna-​buddhi and the
Heideggerian ‘Understanding-​Projection’ are contrasted with ‘cognizing’ but
possess a similar internal structure of ‘travelling’ or ‘projection’, which can
be equated with the act of transcending. They also both ‘travel’ and ‘pro-
ject’ themselves through ‘sight’ respectively. In light of this, we could confi-
dently translate Aurobindonian vijñāna-​buddhi as both the faculty and act of
understanding.
The question for us now is, if vijñāna as transcendence1, is both the faculty
of understanding and the ‘travelling’ act of understanding, then how does this
‘travelling’ from buddhi to vijñāna take place? It is in answer to this question
that we find Aurobindonian hermeneutics coming to force, with Aurobindo
claiming that the ‘travelling’ is made possible in the act of interpretation of
the Vedic texts.

Vijñāna as transcendence1 and the interpretation of Vedic texts

We have established that vijñāna plays a double role: as the act of understand-
ing it is the ‘passageway’ that transcends buddhi to vijñāna, which as the exis-
tentiale psychological faculty of understanding is also its destiny. However,
this ‘transcending’ happens through dṛṣṭi of the Veda. Aurobindo defines dṛṣṭi
as ‘the faculty by which the ancient rṣis saw the truth of Veda, the direct
vision of the truth without the need of observation of the object, reasoning,
evidence, imagination, memory or any other of the faculties of the intellect’.59
So for the seer, ‘Veda is dṛṣṭi’, but for others after him, to whom it is spoken,
they see ‘indirectly, through the medium of the word what the seer has seen
by the self-​vision’.60 Therefore, Aurobindo refers to all the later indirect ‘dṛṣṭi’
as interpretations.
If interpretation of the Veda is central, then Aurobindo asks, ‘What then
are the standards of truth in the interpretation of the Scripture?’, to which he
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Transcendence and the sevenfold being 97

replies that there are three –​‘the knower, knowledge and the known’.61 The
‘known’ is the ‘text itself that we seek to interpret’.62 As ‘guides to knowl-
edge’, these texts are śábdam Brahma (Word of God). Śábdam has three ele-
ments  –​‘the word, the meaning and the spirit’. The ‘word’ (vāk) as name
(nāma) is a symbol. The meaning (artha) is the form (rūpa) of thought the
symbol indicates. This ‘concrete or abstract form of knowledge’ as a form
(rūpa) of knowledge is still a symbol of knowledge. Thus, there is the name
(nāma) and the form (rūpa) or meaning, but beyond these two is the ‘svarupa,
the essential figure of Truth, which we cannot know with the intellect’. But
even the svarūpa (figure of truth) is itself a ‘symbol of the one essential exist-
ence’, which ‘can only be known by its symbols because in its ultimate reality
it defies logic and exceeds perception, –​God’.63
Second, the knower is two:  first it is the ‘original draṣṭā or seer’, who
acquired the ‘contents of inspiration’, not through ‘the miraculous or the
supernatural’ but by ‘a progressive self-​culture’. The second knower is the
‘interpreter’, who interprets these texts. Aurobindo contends that the inter-
preter cannot be either ‘too careful’ or ‘too perfectly trained’, because while
the training can get the ‘thought-​symbol or … the logical implications of the
idea’ it cannot necessarily get what is ‘beyond’. Therefore, the interpreter in
the act of interpretation must go ‘beyond the external meaning’ of the text to
the ‘knowledge behind’. To do that, ‘one must transgress limits & penetrate’
for ‘realisation in the self of things is the only knowledge’. Thus, we see that
in the act of interpretation there is a ‘transgressing’ or a ‘penetrating’ and
a going beyond, which is a ‘realizing’ within the self the text that contains
knowledge.64
Finally, ‘knowledge’ is the ‘eternal truth’ or the vijñāna, part of which the
scripture-​text expresses. He contends that, ‘I am not limited by the Scriptures;
on the contrary I must exceed them in order to be master of their knowledge’.
Through the ‘part’ that is expressed by the text, ‘we must travel to the whole’.
But what does it mean to travel to the whole? The answer to this question
reveals the crux of what ‘transcending’ means from buddhi to vijñāna, and
Aurobindo says it is to ‘get rid of ahankara’.65 Ahaṃkāra, as King points out, is
the ‘ego’ or the ‘feeling of “I am” ’ with the sense of ‘ego individuality’, which
is contained within the buddhi.66 This getting rid of the ‘I am’ (ahaṃkāra) of
the interpreter is made possible by transcending it to the ‘Infinite’ subject of the
Vedic text. However, this is only possible in the act of interpretation of
the Vedic text by seeing what the ‘draṣṭā [seer] saw’ through one’s own dṛṣṭi
(sight) –​‘To know what the draṣṭā saw one must oneself have drishti, sight’.67
It is in this dialogue between the text and the interpreter, through the her-
meneutical circle of ‘part–​whole’, that the dṛṣṭi (sight) of the Veda becomes
the dṛṣṭi (sight) of the interpreter, in which the ‘travelling’ and ‘transcending’
takes place. Aurobindo concludes with Muṇḍaka 1.1.3 Tasmin vijnate sarvam
vijnatam, which he translates as, ‘He being known, all can be known’, which
is the reaching of the destiny of vijñāna. Here we see that both the psycho-
logical and the symbolic senses of interpretation overlap, in that the symbolic
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98  Transcendence and the sevenfold being

interpretation of the text gives dṛṣṭi (sight), which enables the psychological
‘travelling’ and ‘transcending’ from buddhi to vijñāna.
This has resonance with Ricoeur’s proposal of a ‘new concept of interpre-
tation’. Ricoeur, in his article ‘What Is a Text?’, explicates a theory of inter-
pretation that possesses a similar double sense. Although the aim of Ricoeur’s
article is to reconcile ‘explanation’ and ‘understanding’ in the act of ‘inter-
pretation’, his view of ‘understanding’ in a psychological sense, building on
Schleiermacher and Dilthey, and of ‘explanation’ on the basis of linguistics,
semiology, and Levi-​Strauss’ structural anthropology, offers a parallel to the
Aurobindonian theory, although they work towards completely different
ends. It is the first psychological sense of Ricoeur’s theory of interpretation
that offers a close comparison. For Ricoeur, interpretation retains the feature
of ‘appropriation’, in which

the interpretation of a subject culminates in the self-​interpretation of a

subject, who thenceforth understands herself better, understands herself
differently, or simply begins to understand herself. This culmination of
the understanding of a text in self-​understanding is characteristic of …
[what] I have called ‘concrete reflection’.

The understanding of the text ‘mediates the relation to himself of a subject’.68

Vijñāna as transcendence1, chain of interpretations, and tradition

In this section, I  contend that the mechanism of vijñāna as transcendence
through the historical chain of interpretations is precisely the mechanism
that constitutes tradition and a traditionary-​hermeneutical enquiry and that
although Aurobindo did not use the language of traditionary-​hermeneutics,
his psychological-​symbolic theory of interpretation and its application to
the Vedantic historical tradition is evidence for locating his work within the
framework of traditionary enquiry, and by positioning himself within the his-
tory of Vedic interpretations, he firmly locates himself within the Vedānta
tradition.
However, before I analyse the Aurobindonian enquiry, I need to conceptu-
ally establish the link between transcendence, ‘chain of interpretations’, and
tradition. Ricoeur contends that discourse or speech has a double ‘transcend-
ent aim’, in its being open even as it is addressed ‘to someone about some-
thing’. However, in the ‘constitution of text as text and of the body of texts as
literature’, this ‘double transcendence’ of discourse is intercepted so that ‘the
text has no outside but only an inside’. However, transcendence is restored
through ‘reading’, in which the text is converted back into discourse in the
act of interpretation. Ricoeur understands every ‘reading’ as to ‘conjoin a
new discourse to the discourse of the text’, which reveals the ‘original capac-
ity for renewal’ in the very constitution of the text. Thus, interpretation is
both conjunction and renewal. The interpreted text, which becomes the new
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Transcendence and the sevenfold being 99

text, contains both the past text as well as the renewal that the interpretation
brought about. The ‘past text’ Ricoeur terms tradition and, therefore, tradi-
tion and interpretation co-​exist within the text. In the history of interpreta-
tion of a text, there is a ‘chain of interpretations’, and ‘within this chain,
the first interpretants serve as tradition for the final interpretants’. Ricoeur
transforms Pierce’s model of ‘object-​sign-​interpretant’ in the context of text-​
interpretation as a triangular relation between text-​tradition-​interpretant,
where Pierce’s object is seen as text and his sign (seen as tradition) is referred
to as the ‘prior interpretations’ in the chain of interpretations.69 What is pre-
supposed here is that all texts and interpretations as texts are always symbols
that require further interpretation and earlier interpretations serve as tradi-
tion for the later ones.
In order to demonstrate that Aurobindo’s psychological-​symbolic theory
was indeed traditionary-​hermeneutics, I will have to show that he was aware
of the historical chain of interpretations of the Veda and also that he under-
stood the latter interpretations, including his own, as a ‘renewal’ of the earlier
interpretations.
Aurobindo not only had a clear conception of the history of interpreta-
tions of the Vedic texts, but also considered his own work to be a ‘latter inter-
pretation’ in this chain. He divided the chain of interpretation broadly into
three stages, which he considered were different attempts to ‘fix the sense’ of
the Vedas: (a) in the ‘fragments in the Brāhmaṇas and Upaniṣads’, (b) in the
‘traditional interpretation of the Indian scholar Sayana’ and Yaska the lexi-
cographer, and (c) in the ‘interpretation constructed after an immense labour
of comparison and conjecture by modern European scholarship’ through
comparative mythology and comparative philology.70 He adds a fourth stage
in the attempt in modern Indian scholarship and takes the example of three
scholars, Aiyar, Tilak, and Dayanand Saraswati, of whom the former two he
links with modern European scholarship and takes Saraswati’s interpretation
as a possible starting point for his own work. He admits that his own work
(translation) of the Veda ‘would be an interpretation rather than a translation’
as ‘to translate the Veda is to border upon an attempt at the impossible’.71
With regard to his translation of the Upaniṣads, he argues that not only will
his translation ‘not convey a precise, full and categorical knowledge of the
truths which underlie the Upaniṣads’ but that to convey such knowledge was
not ‘the object of the Upaniṣads themselves’.72
How did Aurobindo understand ‘past interpretations’ and the relationship
between the past and the latter interpretations? Was he able to identify a chain-​
like link between these various interpretants? With regard to the relationship
of his work to past interpretations, this is what he had to say: ‘to this task
each of the ancient and modern systems of interpretation brings an indispen-
sable assistance’, and goes on to list in what way they offer assistance.73 With
regard to the relationship between the Vedas and the Upaniṣads, Aurobindo
considered the latter to be a ‘renewed’ statement of the former, especially in
light of the division made between these two texts. This understanding of
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100  Transcendence and the sevenfold being

the relationship between past and present knowledge appears identical to
Ricoeur’s view:  ‘[the] human mind in its progress marches from knowledge
to knowledge, or it renews and enlarges previous knowledge that has been
obscured and overlaid, or it seizes on old imperfect clues and is led by them
to new discoveries’.74 Here, one can find both ‘renewal’ and ‘conjunction’ in
operation in Aurobindo’s later knowledge. Olivelle too acknowledges that the
‘Upaniṣads seek to explain the hidden meanings and connections of ritual
actions and words’ of Vedic rituals.75 With regard to Sayana’s work, although
Aurobindo disagreed with its ‘inner sense of the Veda’, he says that it is ‘indis-
pensable’ for Vedic learning.
There still remains one question to be answered concerning the role of
transcendence in traditionary-​ hermeneutics. In Ricoeur, we saw that the
double-​transcendence of a text ‘to someone about something’ was eclipsed
in the constitution of the text as a text and becomes operational only when
text becomes discourse through the act of reading or interpreting through
appropriation. Seen in this light, if tradition is the ‘past interpretations’,
which is the ‘text’ for later interpretations, then in the act of interpretation of
the text of past interpretations (tradition), transcendence is at work through
appropriation. The tradition is appropriated by the interpreter, which informs
the interpreter’s self-​understanding, which then is recast into a new interpre-
tation, a text waiting to be appropriated by a later interpreter. This is the
mechanism for the progression of tradition, through the interplay between
interpreters and interpretants in a great chain of being. Aurobindo was aware
of this mechanism, although he did not use the language of traditionary-​
hermeneutics. He writes, ‘With so much help from the intermediate past we
may yet succeed in reconstituting this remoter antiquity and enter by the
gate of the Veda into the thoughts and realities of a prehistoric wisdom.’76
Aurobindo illustrates this beautifully when he talks about his ‘appropriation’
of the past interpretation of Sayana of the Vedas. Aurobindo describes his
process of ‘appropriating’ Sayana’s work as a ‘springing-​board’ and a ‘stair’,
which must then be left behind after its utility:

At every step we are obliged to differ from it, but at every step we are
obliged to use it. It is a necessary springing-​board, or a stair that we have
to use for entrance, though we must leave it behind if we wish to pass
forwards into the penetralia.77

With this, I conclude that not only Aurobindo’s symbolic-​psychological the-

ory of interpretation belongs to traditionary-​hermeneutics, but also that he
was firmly located within the Vedānta tradition. Locating Aurobindo firmly
within the Vedānta tradition, Williams argues that Aurobindo’s ‘contribution’
was defined by issues internal to the tradition. For her,

Aurobindo’s contribution lies, like the Vedantic philosopher-​commenta-

tors before him, with an original collation of his own ideas with those of
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Transcendence and the sevenfold being 101

the Vedantic texts. If a Vedantin is to be understood as one who interprets
the Vedānta texts, that is to say, the Upaniṣads, then he is legitimately a
Vedantin.78

Transcendence2 as Parātpara Brahman

Aurobindonian transcendence2, similar to the Heideggerian (b), refers to ‘the
beyond’ or the ‘over against’ or the transcendent Being. Heidegger critiques
this as theological transcendence, which is seen in contradistinction to contin-
gency. Transcendence in this sense is a being, which lies beyond conditioned
beings. The dominant position within the contemporary study of religion,
particularly held by the critical school, is the rejection of this sense of tran-
scendence2 as ‘great transcendence’.
This rejection of transcendence, I claim, is premised on a deeper problem –​
the demise of metaphysics. If the rational study of transcendence was within
the purview of metaphysics, then it met its end with the Nietzschean ‘death
of God’ that culminated in the mid-​twentieth century Heideggerian ‘end of
metaphysics’. It is this ‘disrepute’ of metaphysics among the secularists that
has driven transcendence out of the academia. Although this is not explic-
itly claimed, it is betrayed by their response to the question, ‘how should we
understand religion, and what place should it hold, in an age in which meta-
physics has come into disrepute?’79
The works of the scholars of the contemporary academic study of reli-
gion, especially those belonging to the critical school and operating under
the aegis of ‘end of metaphysics’, do not contain any form of re-​thinking
of transcendence, let  alone a systematic engagement with it  –​a rethink-
ing of transcendence would have been the appropriate response to explor-
ing religion after metaphysics. For example, in the main works on religion
by Balagangadhar, McCutcheon, Masuzawa, and King, there is not even
an index entry for metaphysics. Even Fitzgerald, although he does briefly
engage, albeit negatively, with the idea of ‘transcendence’, does not deal with
metaphysics as such. However, ‘God’s death’ and ‘metaphysics’ end’ are not
conclusively decided yet, and what exactly Nietzsche and Heidegger respec-
tively meant by them is still debatable. Although the critical school has done
very little to follow this line of enquiry, in the twentieth century, philosophers
and theologians, following Heidegger, have continued to engage with meta-
physics and even ventured to propose ‘religion after metaphysics’. One such
effort is the edited volume Religion after Metaphysics, which grew out of
a conference of philosophers and theologians, entitled Religion after Onto-​
Theo-​logy held at Sundance, Utah in July 2001.80 The main line of inter-
pretation sustained in the volume is that Nietzsche and Heidegger were not
offering a summary dismissal of all proposals of transcendence, but rather
they were critiquing a certain kind of metaphysics and transcendence –​onto-​
theo-​logical metaphysics. Therefore, Wrathall, the editor of this volume, con-
tends that the challenge facing religion after metaphysics is ‘of reviving the
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102  Transcendence and the sevenfold being

possibility of having a direct relation to the divine’ and exploring the ‘vision
of a non-​onto-​theo-​logical God’.81
This is a worthy line of enquiry for the academic study of religion
instead of the one followed by the critical school, which, under the domi-
nance of secularity or Taylorian ‘closed world structures’, has tried to
‘blank out the transcendent’.82 I argue that Aurobindo’s work, contempo-
raneous to Heidegger’s, can be seen to contribute as a precursor to this
tradition of post-​Heideggerian metaphysics that seeks to explore a post-​
onto-​theo-​ logical understanding of transcendence that is intrinsically
central to the study of religion. Reflecting on the conference on Religion
and Reductionism, Benavides laments that ‘contributions of scholars who
do not work in either the United States or Canada are almost entirely
absent’83 and, therefore, this exploration of Aurobindonian metaphysics,
hopefully offers a small remedy. Here, I argue that Aurobindo’s conception
of Parātpara Brahman, in escaping the charge of onto-​theo-​logy, offers a
way forward for the study of ‘religion after metaphysics’. I  will take this
argument forward in three stages:  first, to map out the critique of onto-​
theo-​logy. Second, to demonstrate how Aurobindo’s Parātpara Brahman
overcomes onto-​ theo-​
logy. Finally, in light of Aurobindo’s ‘embodied
spirit’, to show how metaphysics continues to be valid within the study of
religion in spite of the onto-​theo-​logical critique.

Critique of onto-​theo-​logy and beyond

What exactly is onto-​theo-​logy? Why has it come under ‘disrepute’? How
has it brought about the ‘end of metaphysics’? And, is the critique of onto-​
theo-​ logy valid? Although the term ‘onto-​ theo-​
logy’ was introduced by
Kant, it came to prominence beginning with the Heideggerian critique of
it in the 1957 lecture The Onto-​theo-​logical Constitution of Metaphysics.84
I will generally follow Marion’s interpretation of the Heideggerian critique.
Marion begins by stating that the ‘most perfect misinterpretation’ of the
Heideggerian ‘end of metaphysics’ is if it is taken to mean ‘metaphysics has
already disappeared, or will surely disappear soon, or again should have dis-
appeared, or in any case has no right to continue, to the point, finally, where
it must be gotten rid of’. Moreover, he points out that, for Heidegger, this
‘overcoming of metaphysics’ does not abolish metaphysics but only prepares
for a ‘revival of thinking’.85
If that be the case, then what exactly does ‘end of metaphysics’ mean and
what precisely ended in this end? Marion gives three insights through his read-
ing of Heidegger: first, ‘end’ here is understood as ‘completion’, and, there-
fore, the end of metaphysics is the completion of Western metaphysics with all
its essential possibilities exhausted –​‘metaphysics has played all of its cards
and has finally fulfilled its contract’.86 In Nietzsche’s ‘God is dead’, Western
metaphysics reached a stage where it ‘divested itself of its own essential pos-
sibility, other possibilities of metaphysics can no longer appear’.87
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Transcendence and the sevenfold being 103

Second, ‘end’ is taken as ‘destruction’, which while denying the negation
of metaphysics, ‘uncovers a covering’ –​‘it attempts to make visible, to draw
into the light as a rightful phenomenon, what metaphysics has made invis-
ible’. This brings us to the heart of the problem –​what has metaphysics made
invisible? For Heidegger, in Marion’s words, it is the ‘being as being’, which
has been ‘hidden by the science of beings in their being and by the domination
of beings’. This is where onto-​theo-​logy comes to the fore. Heidegger under-
stands onto-​theo-​logy as the scientific representation or thinking (logos) of
being as both the origin of all beings, causa prima (first cause) corresponding
to the ultima ratio (final accounting), which is the metaphysical God (Theo),
and as the most general ground-​giving unity of all beings, which is univer-
sally valid everywhere (onto).88 In light of our mapping of transcendence,
it is the ‘entanglement’ of both ontological and epistemological transcend-
ence, which Heidegger calls ‘theological metaphysics’.89 Heidegger’s critique
of metaphysics as onto-​theo-​logy is, simply put, a critique of metaphysics
as a scientific and rational explanation of the being of beings –​metaphys-
ics offers an explanation of being in terms of beings, and, thus, in this very
explanation of being, while beings are revealed, being is made invisible. In
representing beings as either ‘spirit after the fashion of spiritualism, or as
matter and force after the fashion of materialism, or as becoming and life,
or as representation, will, substance, subject or energia’, beings appear in
the ‘light of being’. However, being itself remains veiled and un-​thought. In
Marion’s words, ‘being that presents beings never presents itself as part of
beings; never presenting itself, by definition it escapes representation’.90 In
speaking of beings, metaphysics, operating with this prior representation of
being, ‘does not induce being itself to speak’. In ‘being’ thought in this man-
ner, metaphysics offers a ‘derivative form of the truth of cognitive knowledge
and the truth of propositions that formulate such knowledge’ of beings and
being as such is eclipsed.91
Finally, Marion argues that studying the history of metaphysics must be
done on two levels, (a) to find ‘what it shows –​beings in their being; and [b]‌
for what it does not show –​being as such’.92 The former has to do with onto-​
theo-​logy and the latter with ‘beyond’ onto-​theo-​logy. Being does not reveal
itself because not only is it ‘not reducible to beings’, but since it ‘establishes
presence’ it does not ‘establish itself in presence’. Therefore, the challenge is
to go beyond metaphysics and to ‘think being without regard to metaphysics’
or to ‘think being without beings’.93 For Heidegger, this leads to understand-
ing being as the ‘There is’ and the ‘It gives’ respectively.94 Marion points out
that ‘It gives’, ‘affords the possibility of accessing, on this side of [or beyond]
beings, what precedes it’.95
To summarize these three points before presenting Aurobindo’s meta-
physics as a possible way forward: first, Western metaphysics as a rational
enterprise has exhausted its possibilities and has ended with Nietzsche’s
‘death of God’. Second, if metaphysics is about ‘being as beings’, then
‘thinking’ about being is a going beyond metaphysics taken as a rational
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104  Transcendence and the sevenfold being

science of being because rational metaphysics can only offer a presentation
of beings and not being. Finally, in light of this, being must be seen beyond
metaphysics as an ‘It gives’, which cannot be bounded by the language of
rational explanations.
With regard to the first point, if the Heideggerian critique of onto-​
theo-​logy is a critique of Western metaphysics and its limits, then the
tradition of Western metaphysics can be said to have reached an ‘episte-
mological crisis’ à la MacIntyre,96 which is reflected in its rejection within
the contemporary study of religion. According to MacIntyre, the way out
of an epistemological crisis is in having a dialogue (samvāda) with another
tradition, where the resources will enable an overcoming of the crisis –​it
is ‘from the standpoint of their own tradition [resource tradition] that the
difficulties of that rival tradition [Western metaphysics] can be adequately
understood and overcome’.97 I  claim that Aurobindonian metaphysics is
capable of making precisely that contribution. However, for it to do so, it
must critique in Heideggerian terms the onto-​theo-​logy of Western meta-
physics and then propose a way forward. The second and third points,
while critiquing metaphysics as ‘being as beings’ or onto-​theo-​logy, seek
for a post-​onto-​theo-​logical metaphysics in the ‘It gives’.
While this Heideggerian critique of metaphysics is accepted for the
understanding of the absolute ‘otherness’ of being, in doing so, it contin-
ues the division between ‘absolute transcendence’ and Dasein or being(s)
in the world. However, this division itself is not a final Heideggerian inten-
tion, as is evident from his conception of das Geviert (the fourfold), which
brings the ‘divinities’ together with earth, sky, and mortals in a ‘primal
oneness’,98 in a manner reminiscent of the Aurobindonian Vedic sevenfold
(embodied spirit). However, the perplexity lies in reconciling Heidegger’s
critique of onto-​theo-​logy with his das Geviert  –​the former banishes the
absolute beyond human conception and the latter embodies the divini-
ties within the world. These two positions that stem from Heidegger have
been advanced in the works of two Heideggerians –​Jean-​Luc Marion and
Gianni Vattimo –​and articulated in the conference entitled Transcendence
and Beyond (2003).

Parātpara Brahman beyond onto-​theo-​logy

The question is, even as I seek to represent the Aurobindonian metaphysical
project, does Aurobindonian metaphysics escape the charge of onto-​theo-​logy?
I claim that not only does it escape the charge of onto-​theo-​logy, but that it
even offers a critique of it. My aims in this section are three: first, to lay out
Aurobindo’s critique of onto-​theo-​logy; second, to trace Aurobindo’s under-
standing of Parātpara Brahman as transcendence beyond onto-​theo-​logy and
its relationship to the sevenfold; and finally, to demonstrate that there is a cor-
relation between the Aurobindonian Parātpara and the Heideggerian ‘It gives’.
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Transcendence and the sevenfold being 105

Aurobindonian critique of onto-​theo-​logy
I will begin with Aurobindo’s critique of onto-​ theo-​
logy. Similar to the
Heideggerian critique, Aurobindo points out that ‘the concepts of metaphysi-
cal knowledge do not in themselves fully satisfy the demand of our integral
being’.99 Aurobindo argues that the ‘ordinary tongue of metaphysical thought’,
while a ‘kind of speech which suits our method of logical and rational under-
standing’ serving the intellect, is unable to truly describe the ‘omnipresent
reality’ or being.100 As a purely rational enterprise, metaphysical truth can
become merely ‘a play of the intellect without any dynamic importance’.101
Thus, Aurobindo critiques rational metaphysics as ‘futile to speak about the
ineffable’.102 Furthermore, he contends that humans themselves are not merely
rational, but entail other non-​rational faculties as well:

Mankind can never be wholly rational, because our race is essentially

built up of various elements, none of which can be eliminated from its
system of being. It is our nature to be physical, animal, emotional & sen-
sational as well as intellectual and the coldest thinker or most inexorable
rationalist cannot escape from the constitution of our common nature.103

Aurobindo’s critique is against the scientific rationalism that undergirds meta-

physics as such, both Indian and European. He points out that ‘our [Indian]
metaphysical method of arriving at the higher truth is practically … as much
an intellectual & logical method as the method of European metaphysics or
the method of scientific rationalism’.104 The problem with metaphysics is that
as scientific rationalism, it builds its conclusions from the observed ‘sensible
facts of life & Nature’. Aurobindo contends that what is valued is the ‘strenu-
ous manner of justifying certain great assertions of Veda & high experiences
of spiritual seekers by the reason and by logical disputation’ and not its ‘rev-
elation & experience’.105 Aurobindo traces this form of metaphysical thinking
to a ‘powerful general movement of humanity’, alluding to Jaspers’ axial age
(800 to 200 BCE), which was ‘simultaneous throughout the world, although it
most thoroughly affected Greece and through Greece extended to the general
temperament & thought of modern Europe’. Aurobindo argues that while

it cannot quite be said that Greece invented the intellect or the intellectual
temperament but it is certain that the Hellenic race first began the appli-
cation of reason, inexorably, to their moulding of thought & life in the
temperament of intellectuality

and that this tendency was pursued ‘simultaneously by Graeco-​Roman civi-

lisation, by Confucian China, by philosophical & Post-​Buddhistic India’.106
In a comparative study of the Absolute in Aurobindo and Hegel, Maitra
points out that for Hegel since ‘logic coincides with metaphysics’,107 the
Absolute is defined in terms of thought. However, Maitra argues that for
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106  Transcendence and the sevenfold being

Aurobindo, the Hegelian Absolute ‘is artificial’ and ‘It is, in fact, a man-​made
Absolute’ and that the Aurobindonian Absolute ‘cannot be identified with any
type of human consciousness that has so far emerged, neither with thought,
nor with will or feeling or intuition’.108 Phillips’ work on Brahman, which is
the focus of his dissertation on Aurobindo at Harvard (1982), is probably
the most lucid account of the Aurobindonian understanding of transcend-
ence. Phillips too argues that although it could be suggested that Aurobindo’s
absolute Brahman is a result of an ‘idealist dialectic’, which is similarly found
in ‘Plato, Hegel, Bradley, and others in the West, and in Mādhyamika and
Advaita Vedānta in India’, Aurobindo ‘does not, however, embrace this rea-
soning at all’. He emphatically states that ‘Aurobindo’s Absolute (Brahman)
is not arrived at through a “rational” dialectic’.109

Parātpara Brahman as ‘beyond the beyond’

Although it is clear from the above that Aurobindo’s Absolute or Brahman
is not a metaphysical rational Absolute, Phillips ends the chapter (three)
‘Brahman, “Experienced” and Conceptualized’, in exasperation with the
Aurobindonian Brahman:

But let me say now that I do not believe that Aurobindo resolves the fun-
damental problem of how we are at all to understand such a necessarily
dual self for Brahman. He does not resolve the tension between his ideas
of the transcendence and inscrutability of Paratparabrahman on the one
hand and of mystical identification with Brahman and ‘discovery’ of its
essential nature on the other.110

While Maitra always mentions the Absolute in the singular, which perme-
ates through the Aurobindonian sevenfold, for Phillips, the Aurobindonian
Brahman is a ‘dual self[ed]’ Brahman. Phillips’ understanding of the
Aurobindonian ‘dual Brahman’ as nirguṇa and saguṇa Brahman is a reading
of this passage from The Life Divine:

In Overmind, in all the higher ranges of the mind, we find recurring the
dichotomy of a pure silent self without feature or qualities or relations,
self-​existent, self-​poised, self-​sufficient, and the mighty dynamis of a
determinative knowledge-​power, of a creative consciousness and force
which precipitates itself into the forms of the universe. This opposition
which is yet a collocation, as if these two were correlatives or comple-
mentaries, although apparent contradictions of each other, sublimates
itself into the coexistence of an impersonal Brahman without qualities,
a fundamental divine Reality free from all relations or determinates, and
a Brahman with infinite qualities, a fundamental divine Reality who
is the source and container and master of all relations and determina-
tions –​ Nirguna, Saguna. If we pursue the Nirguna into a farthest possible
  107

Transcendence and the sevenfold being 107

self-​experience, we arrive at a supreme Absolute void of all relations and
determinations, the ineffable first and last word of existence. If we enter
through the Saguna into some ultimate possible of experience, we arrive
at a divine Absolute, a personal supreme and omnipresent Godhead,
transcendent as well as universal, an infinite Master of all relations and
determinations who can uphold in his being a million universes and per-
vade each with a single ray of his self-​light and a single degree of his inef-
fable existence. The Overmind consciousness maintains equally these two
truths of the Eternal which face the mind as mutually exclusive alterna-
tives; it admits both as supreme aspects of one Reality: somewhere, then,
behind them there must be a still greater Transcendence which originates
them or upholds them both in its supreme Eternity. But what can that be
of which such opposites are equal truths, unless it be an original inde-
terminable Mystery of which any knowledge, any understanding by the
mind is impossible? … but in the last resort it seems to escape even from
the highest mentality and remain unknowable. (Italics mine.)111

Phillips reads this passage as an attempt to resolve the ‘problem of the conflict
between the concept of That or nirguna Brahman (NB) with the concept of a
personal God (PG) [saguna]’ as the ‘two opposed ontological possibilities, NB
and PG’. He states that Aurobindo is positing an unknown x ‘of which NB
and PG would be aspects or properties’. Phillips concludes that Aurobindo
‘entertains the idea’ that ‘the x might be in principle unknowable, the ultimate
noumenon or thing-​in-​itself underlying NB and PG (and all other phenom-
ena) and resolving their seeming opposition’. He argues that for Aurobindo,
Absolute Brahman as x sublates both NB and PG ‘to preserve both of its
types of indication as intrinsic to the Divine’. But this leads to a problem
for Phillips: ‘Aurobindo holds that Brahman has an essential nature, svarūpa,
“self-​form” ’, which being ‘self-​existent’ is ‘considered distinct from Brahman
in its “self-​manifestation” as our universe’. But how could this be, questions
Phillips: ‘it is difficult to understand how experience could reveal Brahman’s
essential nature apart from world phenomena while also indicating the unity
of the world with Brahman’.112
To understand Phillips’ reading of Aurobindo, if we take his ‘Personal God’
as the Heideggerian Theological Transcendence and ‘nirguna Brahman’ as the
Heideggerian Ontological Transcendence (metaphysical), then for Phillips, x
is a sublation of both, in other words, x = NB + PG. In this view, x as NB +
PG is a clear case of the Heideggerian onto-​theo-​logical Absolute. Phillips
arrives at this through two moves: (a) by using a Hegelian lens of ‘sublation’
to entail NB and PG within x, although he does admit that Aurobindo and
Hegel have different understandings of the Absolute, and (b) by conflating x
with NB and then wondering how x as NB contain both NB and PG, leading
to his exasperation with the Aurobindonian Absolute. But this exasperation
is Phillips’ own making because he defines the Aurobindonian x as a sublation
of two opposed ontological possibilities and then asks how they could be so.
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108  Transcendence and the sevenfold being

However, in using the Hegelian concept of Aufhebung (sublation) and con-
cluding with an onto-​theo-​logical Absolute, Phillips’ view of Brahman has
eclipsed the Aurobindonian vision of the Absolute. The above passage that
Phillips was working with claims precisely the opposite: first, NB and PG are
not ‘oppositions’, rather a ‘collocation’, ‘correlatives’, or ‘complementaries’,
and only apparent ‘contradictions of each other’. Aurobindo makes this ‘col-
location’ and ‘co-​existence’ explicit by putting both the terms next to each
other, literally juxtaposing them, with just a ‘comma’ in between –​‘nirguna,
saguna’. If this be the case, then the Hegelian mechanism of Aufhebung is dis-
armed. Second, Aurobindo uses the term ‘sublimates’ or ‘modification’, rather
than ‘sublation’, which contains the dual movement of ‘abolish–​preserve’.
‘Sublimate’ is used not for NB and PG but for how these two terms appear
as the ‘silent self’ and ‘forms of the universe’ in the Overmind which then
through the process of ‘sublimation’ become NB and SB (saguṇa Brahman
and not ‘Personal God’ [PG]). He does talk about how they appear as ‘exclu-
sive alternatives’ for the ‘mind’, which for Aurobindo is always manas, or the
sense mind, which is an inferior way of seeing things in oppositions and con-
tradictions. Therefore, there is no sublation within the Aurobindonian text –​
both remain after the sublimation. Finally, what about Phillips’ x, which after
sublation has now become an onto-​theo-​logical Absolute? Aurobindo argues
that behind NB and SB there must be a ‘greater Transcendence’, which both
‘originates and upholds’ them. Phillips refers to the ‘greater Transcendence’
as the ‘sublated x’ which is onto-​theo-​logical in nature. However, Aurobindo’s
‘greater transcendence’, which is elsewhere termed Parātpara Brahman,
escapes ‘even from the highest mentality and remain[s]‌unknowable’.113 This
‘greater transcendence’ is, I argue, none other than the post-​metaphysical and
post-​onto-​theo-​logical transcendence, which we have termed transcendence2 –​
the Parātpara Brahman which translates to ‘beyond the beyond Brahman’.114
So what is Parātpara Brahman?

Parātpara Brahman as ‘It gives’

There are not two Brahmans (NB and SB), as Phillips notes, but three within
the Aurobindonian schema. Aurobindo uses different terminologies for them
such as ‘Three Purushas’, ‘Brahman, Purusha, Ishavara’, and, in the above
passage, NB, SB, and ‘greater transcendence’ or ‘indeterminable Mystery’
to describe the threefoldness of the Brahman. Aurobindo traces the ‘Three
Purushas’ from his translation of and commentary on Īśā 4–​7. He translates
Īśā 4 as ‘One unmoving that is swifter than Mind, That the Gods reach not,
for It progresses ever in front. That, standing, passes beyond others as they
run. In That the Master of Life establishes the Waters.’115
Aurobindo explains that in Īśā 4 the term āpas can only mean ‘waters’ as it
is ‘accentuated in the version of the White Yajurveda’, and only if the ‘accen-
tuation is disregarded’ and āpas be taken in the singular can it mean ‘work’
or ‘action’, which Śaṇkara renders as ‘works’. For Aurobindo, āpas is neither
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Transcendence and the sevenfold being 109

‘waters’ nor ‘work’ but rather the ‘sevenfold’ of the Veda. He contends that ‘the
true Vedic sense of the word had been forgotten’, according to which, ‘waters’
refers to the ‘seven streams or the seven fostering cows’, the Vedic symbol for
the ‘seven cosmic principles’, which are ‘three inferior, the physical, vital and
mental, four superior, the divine Truth, the divine Bliss, the divine Will and
Consciousness, and the divine Being’ –​in other words, the two triples and the
link term vijñāna.116 In light of the above discussion, if the lower triple is saguṇa
and the higher is nirguṇa, then what is the ‘unmoving that is swifter than Mind,
That the Gods reach not’, within which ‘the Master of Life establishes the
Waters [sevenfold]’? For Aurobindo, it is the Parātpara Brahman. Within the
sevenfold, the lower trinity (matter, life, mind) refers to the SB, the higher trin-
ity (sat, chit, ānanda) refers to the NB, and the Parātpara (a) contains NB +
SG as well as (b) stands outside them. It is this ‘standing outside’, as a sākṣin
(witness), of the Parātpara that escapes rational conception and the strangle-
hold of rational metaphysics and, therefore, is the ‘unknowable’ and the ‘inef-
fable’. In the analysis of Īśā 6–​7, Aurobindo has a section called The Threefold
Purusha, in which he lists the three states of the Puruṣa –​‘These three states
are Akshara, unmoving or immutable; Kshara, moving or mutable; and Para
or Uttama, Supreme or Highest.’ His description of the Para Puruṣa is as ‘the
Self containing and enjoying both the stillness [NB] and the movement [SG],
but conditioned and limited by neither of them. It is the Lord, Brahman, the
All, the Indefinable and Unknowable.’117 It is referred to as the ‘That’ or Tat,
which is the ‘Absolute unmanifested’.118
If the Parātpara is unknowable, then how are we to know it? Phillips,
towards the end of his chapter, relentlessly pursues this question, to the point
of terming the Aurobindonian project ‘incoherent’. Phillips contends that
‘the presumption of Brahman’s self-​existence is undefended by Aurobindo’
and that ‘Aurobindo considers Brahman to be the ultimate “natural state”
and thus not to require explanation’, but that for him it is ‘not at all evident
why Brahman should not require explanation’. He concludes by saying that
there is a ‘weakness in the pattern of argumentation’ in Aurobindo concern-
ing the Parātpara, which is left as a ‘brute fact, a very grand brute fact’.119
What is interesting is that the terms of Phillips’ critique are precisely charac-
teristic of post-​onto-​theo-​logical transcendence –​that Phillips, characterizing
Aurobindo’s Brahman as ‘undefendable’, ‘unexplainable’, and ‘unarguable’,
can be seen as characteristic of a post-​onto-​theo-​logical transcendence. Thus,
in his critique of Aurobindo, Phillips affirms the post-​ onto-​theo-​ logical
nature of the Aurobindonian Parātpara without realizing it. It appears that
working within the conception of metaphysics as onto-​theo-​logy, Phillips is
unable to appreciate Aurobindo’s Parātpara as post-​onto-​theo-​logical  –​ the
beyond, beyond the beyond.
How are we to talk about the post-​onto-​theo-​logical Parātpara if it is the
unknowable, and unreachable by metaphysical thinking? The Heideggerian–​
Marion ‘destruction’ of the metaphysical tradition aimed not only at being
a critique of onto-​theo-​logy, but rather through the ‘destruction’, to open
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110  Transcendence and the sevenfold being

new vistas for doing metaphysics beyond onto-​theo-​logy. What is interesting
to note is that the speculations of Aurobindo and Heidegger–​Marion about
what is beyond onto-​theo-​logy contain similar registers of vocabulary. While
my aim here is to trace Aurobindo’s post-​onto-​theo-​logical Parātpara, a broad
comparative with the Heideggerian–​Marion register will bring to light the
contribution of Aurobindo to the post-​onto-​theo-​logical discourse of Western
metaphysics and to the study of religion.
If the Aurobindonian Parātpara is the ‘indefinable and unknowable’, how
are we even to have any knowledge about it? Aurobindo’s response is, if the
‘Absolute Parabrahman is unknowable to us … because It is pre-​existent &
supra-​existent to even the highest & purest methods and the most potent &
illimitable instruments of which soul in the body is capable’, then if we wish
to ‘know Paratpara Brahman, then know It as It chooses to manifest Itself in
world and transcending it’.120 Thus, our knowledge of the Parātpara is con-
tingent on ‘Its’ choosing to manifest itself, in other words, unless ‘It gives’.
Aurobindo states that the Parātpara is also ‘that which flows forth, Virat, the
pervading spirit which enters into all things and encompasses’.121 Thus, the
first insight is that Parātpara can be known only in its choosing to manifest or
reveal or give itself. This coincides with the idea of ‘It gives’ of both Heidegger
and Marion as the possibility of accessing ‘on this side of being (or beyond)
what precedes it’.122 Marion traces the history of the idea of the ‘It gives’ in
Heidegger, to argue that Heidegger’s thinking post-​onto-​theo-​logy led him to
the ‘It gives’.
The aim was to think the ‘Being without beings’ by not resorting to the
representational thinking of metaphysics. Heidegger uses the term ‘clearing’
to phenomenologically denote what lies prior to being which is phenomeno-
logically unapparent. But this leads to the question, ‘where does the clearing
come from and how is it given?’ In the essay, Time and Being (1962), Heidegger
shifts from ‘Being is’ and ‘time is’ to ‘There is’ and ‘It gives’, from which the
clearing can be said to come. For Heidegger ‘es gibt’ or ‘il y a’ is ‘there is/​it
gives’ –​‘For the “It” that here “gives” is Being itself. The “gives” names the
essence of Being that is giving, granting its truth. The self-​giving into the
open, along with the open region itself, is Being itself.’123 There are three ideas
here that are worth explicating: first, what gives is Being itself, which remains
hidden behind the giving. Marion sees this in the sense, in which ‘the painter,
sculptor, or certain artisans distance themselves from their immediate work’.124
Aurobindo uses the example of ‘Shakespeare pouring himself out in a hun-
dred names and forms, Desdemona, Othello, Iago, Viola, Rosalind, Macbeth,
Hamlet, Lear, Cymbeline … [and] putting aside his works and returning to his
own single & sufficient existence’.125 Thus, the ‘withdrawing’ or ‘returning’ is
the being that gives. Second, the self-​giving is first that of an ‘open region’ or
what Heidegger calls the ‘clearing’. Marion calls the ‘clearing’ as ‘a new pas-
sage from the being of beings to being itself’.126 For Heidegger, ‘The clearing
is the open region for everything that becomes present and absent’ and he uses
Goethe’s terminology as a ‘primal phenomenon’.127 Finally, in the ‘It gives’
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Transcendence and the sevenfold being 111

the being itself is given. In light of this, we have (a) being as the Absolute that
conceals itself behind beings, and is not to be equated with the being of the
beings and the beings that are given, (b) the clearing as a primal phenomenon
that opens the field for the giving, and (c) what is given, the gift, or as Marion
calls it ‘the donation’. In Aurobindonian language (a)  the ‘It gives’ can be
seen as the Parātpara that while stays concealed behind the Being of beings,
manifests itself or flows or descends; (b) the clearing or the field refers to the
Parabrahman in which the Parātpara envisages itself; and (c) the being that is
given for Aurobindo is the sevenfold.
There are three moments in both Heidegger and Aurobindo in a continuum –​
(a) the concealed Being behind beings, or the Parātpara at one end, and (c) the
gift or donation, or the ‘what is given’ at the other end, with (b) the ‘clearing’
or the ‘field’ or the Parabrahman that links these two ends. But the relation-
ship between (a) and (c) is crucial here, between what is ‘It’ that gives in the ‘It
gives’ and the gift or donation that is given. There is ambiguity in Heidegger
about what ‘It’ is. On one hand the ‘It’ is referred to as Being itself while on
the other assigning the ‘It’ to being is held in suspension because as Marion
points out, the ‘It’ of ‘It gives’ precedes being, ‘precisely because being …
depends upon the unnamed event which gives it’. ‘Which one of these two
hypotheses should we choose?’ Marion questions. If ‘It gives’ is taken as being
that gives then it will result in a ‘thinking of being’, and if from the point of
view of ‘It’ preceding being then it will be a ‘thinking of what gives’.128
The first option equates the ‘It gives’ with what is given, beings, which is
what Heidegger was being very cautious about, while the second option radi-
cally separates ‘It gives’ from what is given. These two possibilities, followed
up by Vattimo and Marion respectively in two radically different ways, were
problematized in the conference on Transcendence and Beyond.
The two poles of the debate were set out between ‘post-​transcendence’,
represented by Vattimo, defined as transcending transcendence in the sense of
putting transcendence behind and looking at what is given, and ‘hypertran-
scendence’, which is defined as a ‘still-​more transcendent transcendence’ rep-
resented by Marion.129 The former position calls ‘for a more worldly life’ with
the focus on a ‘more material, gendered and planetary existence’, with God
becoming one of us, as advocated by Vattimo. For Vattimo, ‘God as the one
who abandons his own transcendence, first by creating the world, and then by
redeeming it through the Incarnation and the Cross –​through kenosis’. Then,
for Vattimo, ‘Secularization is, more fundamentally, an essential aspect of the
history of salvation.’130 For Vattimo, inspired by Bonhoeffer’s ‘A God who
is, is not’, argues for a ‘weak historicism, which knows that it has no other
resources outside its (own) history’.131 The latter position advocates a radical
transcendence of the Absolute that is revealed and given. Thus, for Marion,
it is a return to a form of Christian theology that seeks to go beyond the
onto-​theo-​logical God of traditional theology that correlated ‘the claims of
reason and the disclosures of revelation’, by developing concepts and catego-
ries arising solely out of revelation, which is the gift.132 Marion contends that
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112  Transcendence and the sevenfold being

the ‘strictly inconceivable Gϕd, simultaneously speaking and spoken, gives
himself as the Word’, as is the ‘Word given even in the silent immediacy of
abandoned flesh’, which for him is the ‘Eucharistic site of theology’.133
The former can be taken as secularism that denies transcendence, and
the latter as theology that acknowledges a ‘greater transcendence’ that gives.
However, in Heidegger, the three moments of (a)  the withdrawing being,
(b)  the clearing, and (c)  the being that is given, are maintained together
through the ‘event of Appropriation’. Appropriation is the belonging together
of ‘giving as destiny, giving as an opening up which reaches out’ and ‘Both
belong together, inasmuch as the former, destiny, lies in the latter, extend-
ing opening up.’ Furthermore, if giving is seen as ‘sending’ of the ‘It gives’
then ‘to giving as sending there belongs keeping back’, a ‘withholding’, or a
‘self-​withdrawing’ or simply ‘withdrawal’.134 Thus, the three moments con-
tinue to be maintained in Heidegger even in the ‘It gives’ –​‘But in as much
as the modes of giving that are determined by withdrawal  –​sending and
extending –​lie in Appropriation, withdrawal must belong to what is peculiar
to the Appropriation.’135 They can be summarized as –​withdrawal, sending,
extending.
But how does Aurobindo understand the process of the giving or descend-
ing of the Parātpara in the Parabrahman or the clearing? For Aurobindo, it is
the Parātpara’s production of two shadows of itself in itself, and the shadows-​
in-​itself is the Parabrahman, which as a field or an opening is able to receive
and give passage to these shadows. The two shadows consisting of the seven-
fold are –​(a) the ‘luminous shadow’, which Vedānta describes ‘in two great
trilogies, subjective and objective, Sacchidanandam, Existence, Consciousness,
Bliss; Satyam Jnanam Anantam, Truth, Knowledge, Infinity’, and (b)  the
‘dark shadow’ called Maya ‘where Duality begins, Purusha differentiates
from Prakriti, Spirit from Matter, Force from Energy, Ego from Non-​Ego;
and as the descent into phenomena deepens’.136 Thus, even in Aurobindo, the
three moments as three puruṣas or three Brahmans are kept together  –​the
Parātpara, the Parabrahman, and the sevenfold.
Broadly speaking, there is an uncanny resemblance between Heideggerian
and Aurobindonian thinking, although, as I have argued, they did not know
of each other’s works and use different vocabulary to articulate their post-​
onto-​theo-​logy. Heidegger makes an interesting comment at the end of his
Letter on Humanism relevant to this similarity between thinkers:

To bring to language ever and again this advent of Being that remains,
and in its remaining waits for man, is the sole matter of thinking. For this
reason essential thinkers always say the Same. But that does not mean the
identical.137

Both their understanding bursts the transcendence–​immanence dichotomy,

by maintaining together the belonging of the unknowable and the known.
It is thus that transcendence becomes an important subject of enquiry, not
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Transcendence and the sevenfold being 113

just to understand Marion’s ‘what speaks in the “It gives” ’ but also Vattimo’s
‘worldly life’.

Transcendence3 as imagination in dialogue

If transcendence is the mechanism that holds Aurobindo’s metaphysics
together, then we have seen above how transcendence1 as the ‘activity’ of
‘going beyond’ correlates with vijñāna, which as ‘understanding’ is at work
in the transcending of buddhi (reasoning mind) to vijñāna (understanding or
supermind). Transcendence2 as the Parātpara refers to ‘the beyond’ or the
‘over against’ or the transcendent Being. With that we come to transcend-
ence3, which refers to the ‘boundary’ or ‘limit’ that needs to be surpassed by
the one transcending. Here, the focus is on the Self’s relation to the world.
Both Aurobindo and Heidegger, by positing transcendence as constitutive of
the self, obliterate the ‘boundary’ between the self and the world. Aurobindo’s
vijñāna and Heidegger’s Dasein not only obliterate the subject–​object distinc-
tion by entailing the world within the self, albeit in completely different ways,
but also argue that the mechanism that makes this possible is transcendence.
However, if the boundary that circumscribes the selfhood of a self is oblit-
erated, then how do we understand ‘other–​self’ or another Dasein? If tran-
scendence3 is internal to the self, then is the other also subsumed within the
self ? Here, I want to explore transcendence as imagination to be the ontologi-
cal ground for dialogue between self and other. I will begin by explicating the
role played by imagination in the self–​other relationship and argue that it is
transcendence that is the mechanism enabling imagination. Once this is estab-
lished, I will explore how transcendence is at work in the relation between self
and the world and particularly between self and other.
The role played by ‘imagination’ in the study of religion, particularly in the
context of our debate on reductionism, has already been observed by no other
than Segal himself. Although Segal uses this idea negatively for arguing rather
‘confusingly’, as pointed out by Wiebe,138 that non-​believers are incapable of
even appreciating the beliefs of the believer, this negative assertion contains
a positive exposition on the possibilities of ‘imagination’, which is relevant
for us. Therefore, ignoring the substantive issues about religion that arise out
of Segal’s assertion, which has been amply addressed by Wiebe, I  focus on
the role played by ‘imagination’ in the engagement between the believer and
non-​believer:

Why, one might ask, can a nonbeliever not simply imagine what the belief
of others is like? Is he not likely to use his imagination to conceive of other
states of mind which he himself does not share? Does he not daily use his
imagination to grasp myriad beliefs and actions of other individuals and
societies, past and present, native and foreign? Undeniably, a nonbeliever,
like anyone else, uses his imagination to comprehend others in countless
ways. The issue, however, is not whether he is capable of employing his
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114  Transcendence and the sevenfold being

imagination in other circumstances but whether he is capable of employ-
ing it in the case of religion. (Italics mine.)139

Segal understands the employment of ‘imagination’ as what enables one to

‘grasp’ in order to ‘comprehend’ the other’s state of mind, beliefs, and actions,
even when one does not share them. Jensen, according to Gilhus, is a con-
temporary phenomenologist who ‘understands religion as a communicative
system and uses linguistics as the basic model for theorizing about the study
of religion’.140 In his article on the role of universals in the comparative study
of religion, he argues for ‘imaginative competence’ along with ‘direct percep-
tion’ to be the basis for ‘socio-​cultural and symbolic cognition’ of religion.141
Flood, in his latest work, dedicates a whole chapter to the connection between
art and religion entitled The Union of Nature and Imagination, in which he
explores how ‘imagination’ offers a conduit or structure for the ‘mediations of
the world’ through the production of artwork. For Flood, artworks are inten-
tionally produced artefacts, which as ‘a kind of cultural sign in imagination’
communicate in two directions –​one back to the author and the other to the
audience and thus inviting participation.142 While Flood goes on to argue for
art as communication through its characteristics of address, expression, and
imitation, my interest lies in the ontological understanding of ‘imagination’
that enables mediation of the self to the other. But how does it precisely hap-
pen and what is the mechanism involved that makes it possible for the self to
‘leap’ in communication?
I want to argue that ‘transcendence’ is both the ground and the process
in imagination that enables this leap of the self in the world and even to the
‘other’ in dialogue, which thus supplies the ontological ground for dialogi-
cal hermeneutics. The term ‘imagination’ suffers from ‘bad reputation’ due to
the understanding of ‘image’ as ‘a mental, private, and unobservable entity’
within academic discourse. Ricoeur lists four ways in which the term ‘imagi-
nation’ is used: (a) as ‘mention of things absent but existing somewhere else’,
(b) as denoting ‘portraits, paintings, drawings’ where presence takes the place
of the things they represent, (c) as ‘fictions that evoke not absent things but
nonexistent things’, and finally, (d)  as ‘illusions’ which are representations
that are ‘directed to absent or non-​existent things’.143 Ricoeur interrogates the
‘phenomenon of imagination’ within the framework of the theory of meta-
phor, to view it as ‘semantic innovation’ in discourse and thus to redeem it
from its ‘disrepute’ by shifting it from ‘things seen’ (image) to ‘things said’
(hearing or reading).
He begins with Aristotle’s Poetics: ‘a good metaphor implies of an intui-
tive perception of the similarity in dissimilars’ (Poetics 1459a7–​8). Here the
‘similarity’ between ‘distinct semantic fields’ that a metaphor brings together
is seen not in terms of ‘association of ideas’ or ‘through resemblance’, but
rather in ‘the sudden glimpse’ that ‘abolishes the logical distance’ between the
‘dissimilars’ and ‘ignites the spark of meaning of the metaphor’. This Ricoeur
attributes to ‘imagination’ as apperception. It is the ‘operation of grasping’ by
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Transcendence and the sevenfold being 115

‘seeing as’, for example, in ‘time as a beggar’ or ‘old age as the dusk of day’.
In other words, imagination enables the emerging of meaning by grasping the
similar from the dissimilars in a metaphor. If emerging of ‘meaning’ is none
other than ‘understanding’, and ‘grasping’ can be read as ‘projective func-
tion’ or mechanism of transcending, in which semantic distance is crossed,
then within inter-​subjectivity, it is ‘transfer through imagination of “my” here
into “there” ’, which we call empathy.144 This detour into Ricoeur’s theory of
imagination is to bring to the fore two ideas: first, the process or mechanism
in imagination as projecting, grasping, or transferring is none other than tran-
scendence, and second, that it is this process that is active in inter-​subjectivity
as empathy between self and the other. This is but to echo Kant, for whom
‘the transcendental power of imagination’ is a basic faculty or ability of the
human soul to do something.145
The question is how transcendence, as the mechanism of imagination,
operates in self’s relation with the other, which would be the ontological
ground for any dialogue. Aurobindo’s understanding of ‘imagination’ entails
the ‘disrepute’ that Ricoeur cautioned earlier about this term. In Aurobindo’s
definition, ‘Imagination is the power of presenting to yourself things or truths
not actually perceived or established by reason, [of] seeing possibilities other
than actual experience.’146 He considers imagination along with reason, judge-
ment, and perception as a faculty of buddhi, or the reason-​mind, which, as
we have seen earlier, needs to travel and transform through the mechanism of
transcending to vijñāna.147 However, in a similar vein to Ricoeur, Aurobindo
too envisions a redeeming of buddhi’s imagination in vijñāna as ‘inspiration’
or śrúti. Aurobindo’s definition of inspiration as ‘hearing’ and a coming of
‘meaning’ that ‘brings new truth’ in a ‘sudden flash’, finds close similarity
with Ricoeur’s redemption of imagination through the theory of metaphor,
although Aurobindo writes within ontology:

Inspiration is called Sruti or Hearing because it is not the direct sight of

the Truth but a sort of coming of the Truth into the mind in a sudden
flash. Generally this Truth comes as a vibration which carries the Truth in
it and sometimes it comes as the actual word which by revealing its mean-
ing brings new truth to the mind.148

Once again, this is the dual movement or transcending of buddhi travel-

ling to vijñāna, which in turn is brought about by a descending of truth
into the mind, which is none other than vijñāna. But how does this pan
out in inter-​subjectivity in the context of dialogue between the self and
the other? Aurobindo can be critiqued for not working this out clearly.
Aurobindo’s understanding of knowledge in vijñāna is ‘knowledge by iden-
tity’ (see Chapter 3), in which the subject–​object distinctions are obliterated
and the world of objects is arranged in certain ‘fixed relations & processes’
within itself.149 This resonates with the Heideggerian notion of ‘worldhood’
of Dasein as ‘being in the world’. How does vijñāna relate to the world?
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116  Transcendence and the sevenfold being

Through ‘knowledge by identity’, the self ‘has become’ the other, or real-
izes the other in itself. Aurobindo interprets this from his reading of Īśā
Upaniṣad 7:

In him his Self, that which he feels to be his true I has become all crea-
tures. Not only does he feel himself or perceive himself to being all crea-
tures as the divine presence in them & around them, but he is they, –​he
is each bhuta.150

Aurobindo argues that bhūta means ‘that which has become’ as opposed to
‘that which eternally is’, a translation supported by Olivelle, who too trans-
lates bhūta as ‘has become’,151 which, therefore, includes ‘name & form & play
of mind & play of action’, suggesting again movement. It is this movement of
the self in identity with the world that we call transcendence3. It is the mecha-
nism of transcending within vijñāna that enables it by identity to obliterate
subject–​object distinction and to be-​in-​the-​world.
Therefore, if buddhi-​imagination has transformed by transcending to
vijñāna-​inspiration, the continuing of the transcending happens in imagina-
tion as vijñāna-​inspiration to identify itself with the world, then how does it
play out in the self–​other relationship? This application of vijñāna in inter-​
subjectivity will reveal to us the ontological ground of transcendence for dia-
logue with the other. Aurobindo replies: ‘There will be a close and complete
consciousness of the self of others, a consciousness of their mind, life, physi-
cal being which are felt as if they were one’s own.’ The action towards the
other will be ‘not out of a surface sentiment of love and sympathy or any
similar feeling, but out of this close mutual consciousness, this intimate one-
ness’.152 In this view, the ‘separative ego’ is abolished and there is a transcen-
dental unity that is achieved through identity between self and the other on
the basis of a ‘common consciousness consolidating a common life’, where
every self would feel itself to be ‘embodiments of a single soul, souls of a
single reality’.153 Aurobindo concludes that there will be ‘no conflict between
the ideal of individualism and the collective ideal’.154 However, because his
project is Vedantic, in which separation is overcome through identification,
not much importance is given to inter-​subjectivity or for dialogue between the
self and the other.
The Aurobindonian and Heideggerian projects of self’s relation to the
world through the mechanism of transcendence bear close resemblance.
Heidegger understands transcendence as ‘the primordial constitution of the
subjectivity of a subject’. He contends that the ‘subject transcends qua sub-
ject’ and that ‘it would not be a subject if it did not transcend’, in other words,
‘To be a subject means to transcend’.155 With relation to the world, Heidegger
defines world as ‘that towards which the subject transcends’. Therefore, for
Heidegger, the ‘primordial being of Dasein’ always already ‘as surpassing,
crosses over to a world’ and is characterized as ‘being-​in-​the-​world’. Once
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Transcendence and the sevenfold being 117

again, the subject–​object distinction is obliterated, and the same question
posed to Aurobindo can be posed to Heidegger, concerning inter-​subjectivity
and the relation to the other.
The difference in Heidegger is his understanding of the worldhood of the
world, which while it has similarity with Aurobindo’s project, is also differ-
ent. ‘World’ for Heidegger is a ‘mode of being’ of the Dasein and thus is
constitutive of its being. Dasein appropriates the world through its ‘freedom’
to choose itself, or to be committed to a mode of being that is constitutive of
its world. Although for both Aurobindo and Heidegger there is one world,
for Aurobindo, vijñāna is constituted through ‘identity’ with the world, it also
identifies with the other’s mode of being. However, in Heidegger, the other’s
mode of being is preserved as constitutive of the other’s Dasein. Warding off
a similar critique as the one that is launched against Aurobindo, Heidegger
clarifies, ‘Many times, even ad nauseam, we pointed out that this being qua
Dasein is always already with others and always already with beings not of
Dasein’s nature.’ Furthermore, Heidegger contends that ‘Only because Dasein
can expressly choose itself on the basis of its selfhood can it be committed
to others.’ How does choosing oneself lead to a commitment to an ‘other’?
Heidegger explicates that it is only in ‘choosing itself Dasein really chooses
precisely its being-​with others and precisely its being among beings of a dif-
ferent character’.156
The difference between Aurobindo and Heidegger is precisely on this
point of ‘identity’ and ‘difference’ with Aurobindo leaning towards the
former and Heidegger towards the latter. In conclusion, not only does
transcendence define the constitution of the self as transcending one’s
own being as ‘being-​in-​the-​world’, in both the Aurobindonian vijñāna and
Heideggerian Dasein, but transcendence as transcendence3 can be seen, at
least in Heidegger, as an ‘extreme existential-​ontological model’, and as
‘transcending being as being-​with others’.157 This mechanism of transcend-
ence3 is in operation in the imagining of the other as the other provides the
ontological ground for the self to transcend itself to dialogue with the dif-
ferent and incommensurable other.

Summary
In this chapter, I began by arguing that the problem of ontological reduction-
ism is better understood as a conflict over ‘transcendence’ within the study of
religion, which in turn is notoriously characterized by the absence of any ref-
erence to it. I then explicated the three senses in which transcendence could
be understood, and developed them in light of the three aims of this work. If
the first aim is to demonstrate that Aurobindo’s philosophy of religion pos-
sessed the structure of traditionary-​hermeneutics, then I argue that vijñāna
as ‘act of understanding’ is the mechanism of transcendence active in the
faculty of understanding, which takes place at the site of ‘interpretation of
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118  Transcendence and the sevenfold being

texts’. Thus, the mechanism of vijñāna, as transcendence through the chain
of interpretations, constitutes the structure of a traditionary-​hermeneutical
enquiry. In light of this, I argued that not only is Aurobindo a traditionary-​
hermeneutical thinker, but also, through his interpretation of the Vedic texts
and aligning himself within the chain of past interpretations, he locates him-
self firmly within the Vedantic tradition. If the second aim is to draw impli-
cation for the study of religion, then in this chapter, through the critique of
onto-​theo-​logy and understanding of transcendence2 in post-​metaphysical
terms, I  argue for the current relevance of the study of transcendence for
religious studies. Here, I  argue that Aurobindo’s Parātpara Brahman not
only escapes the charge of onto-​theo-​logy but also offers a way forward for
the study of ‘religion after metaphysics’, particularly by bringing transcend-
ence into the academic centre-​stage. Finally, with regard to the third aim
of dialogical hermeneutics as an approach for the study of religion, I argue
that transcendence3 as imagination is the ontological ground for dialogue
between the self and the other.

Notes
1 Willem B. Drees, “Should Religious Naturalists Promote a Naturalistic Religion?,”
Zygon 33, no. 4 (1998): 619.
2 Ibid., 20.
3 Gustavo Benavides, “Religion, Reductionism, and the Seduction of Epistemology,”
Religion 26, no. 3 (1996): 276.
4 Gavin Flood, Beyond Phenomenology: Rethinking the Study of Religion (London:
Cassell, 1999), 69. Although the term naturalism and non-​naturalism in theol-
ogy means exactly the opposite, with natural theology being a form of theology
and non-​natural theology not allowing theistic conclusions. For more, see Kai
Neilson’s engagement with Penelhum at Kai Nielsen, “On the Rationality of
Radical Theological Non-​Naturalism:  More on the Verificationist Turn in the
Philosophy of Religion,” Religious Studies 14, no. 2 (1978): 201.
5 Flood, Beyond Phenomenology: Rethinking the Study of Religion, 66–​67.
6 Daniel Pals, “Reductionism and Belief: An Appraisal of Recent Attacks on the
Doctrine of Irreducible Religion,” The Journal of Religion 66, no. 1 (1986):
27–​32.
7 Robert A. Segal, “In Defense of Reductionism,” Journal of the American Academy
of Religion 51, no. 1 (1983): 115.
8 Ibid., 16.
9 Donald Wiebe, “Beyond the Sceptic and the Devotee:  Reductionism in the
Scientific Study of Religion,” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 52, no.
1 (1984): 158.
10 Gregory D. Alles, “Rudolf Otto, Cultural Colonialism and the ‘Discovery’ of the
Holy,” in Religion and the Secular: Historical and Colonial Formations, ed. Timothy
Fitzgerald (London: Equinox, 2007), 194.
11 Timothy Fitzgerald, The Ideology of Religious Studies (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 2000), 18.
12 Russell T. McCutcheon, “‘They Licked the Platter Clean’: On the Co-​Dependency
of the Religious and the Secular,” Method and Theory in the Study of Religion 19,
no. 3 (2007): 179.
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Transcendence and the sevenfold being 119

13 Taylor identifies three senses of secularity: secularity1 which refers to the creation
of public spaces, or social spheres, with their institutions and practices that are
emptied of God and religion; secularity2 is the ‘falling off of religious belief and
practice’; and secularity3 refers to the changing ‘conditions of belief’, in the sense
of a move from ‘a society where belief in God is unchallenged and indeed, unprob-
lematic, to one in which it is understood to be one option among others, and
frequently not the easiest to embrace’. Charles Taylor, A Secular Age (Cambridge,
MA: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2007), 1–​3.
14 Rudolf Otto, The Idea of the Holy, trans. John W. Harvey (London:  Oxford
University Press, 1923 (1917)), 10–​11.
15 Flood, Beyond Phenomenology: Rethinking the Study of Religion, 15.
16 Linda Woodhead, “Introduction,” in Peter Berger and the Study of Religion, ed.
Linda Woodhead (London: Routledge, 2001), 3.
17 William R. Garrett, “Troublesome Transcendence:  The Supernatural in the
Scientific Study of Religion,” Sociological Analysis 35, no. 3 (1974): 178.
18 Andrew M. McKinnon, “Sociological Definitions, Language, Games, and
the ‘Essence’ of Religion,” Method and Theory in the Study of Religion 14, no.
1 (2002):  75; Timothy Fitzgerald, “A Critique of ‘Religion’ as a Cross-​Cultural
Category,” Method and Theory in the Study of Religion 9, no. 2 (1997): 93–​95.
19 Taylor, A Secular Age, 19–​20.
20 Flood, Beyond Phenomenology: Rethinking the Study of Religion, 66–​67.
21 Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine (Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust, 2006
(1914–​1919)), 1051.
22 Ibid., 6.
23 Ibid., 8.
24 Ibid.
25 Ibid., 276.
26 Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda (Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust,
1998 (1914–​1920)), 3.
27 Ibid., 3–​5.
28 Ibid., 5–​8.
29 See Introduction in Patrick Olivelle, Upanisads (Oxford:  Oxford University
Press, 1996).
30 Aurobindo gives the ­examples of

the seven delights, sapta ratnāni; the seven flames, tongues or rays of
Agni, sapta arciṣaḥ, sapta jvālāḥ; the seven forms of the Thought-​princi-
ple, sapta dhītayaḥ; the seven Rays or Cows, forms of the Cow unslayable,
Aditi, mother of the gods, sapta gāvaḥ; the seven rivers, the seven mothers
or fostering cows, sapta mātaraḥ, sapta dhenavaḥ, a term applied indiffer-
ently to the Rays and to the Rivers.
(Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, 97)

The Atharva Veda speaks of seven rivers that extend over a region like heaven and
earth (Atharva Veda IV.5.2).
31 Aurobindo mentions that the ‘the enquiry into the number of these tattvas greatly
interested the speculative mind of the ancients and in Indian philosophy we find
various answers ranging from the One upward and running into the twenties’.
Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, 97. While Aurobindo largely borrows from
the Sāṃkhya cosmology, he reworks it within an Advaitic non-​dual framework but
extrapolates them out of his Vedic studies as the sevenfold.
32 Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, 98. Although in some other places Aurobindo
posits eight principles rather than the seven, with an addition of ‘psyche’ or ‘prāṇa’
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120  Transcendence and the sevenfold being

which can be seen as desire, emotion or passion. Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 278.
In the Miscellaneous Notes taken by some of his disciples in 1914, we find a fig-
ure that gives meanings of the eight terms of existence that Aurobindo finally
settled upon:

Sat: is essence of being, pure, infinite
and undivided.
Chit-​Tapas: is pure energy of
consciousness, free in its rest or
action, sovereign in its will.
Ananda: is Beatitude, the bliss of
pure conscious existence and energy.
Vijnana: –​ Supra-​mental
knowledge –​is the Casual Idea
which, by supporting and secretly
guiding the confused activities of
Mind, Life and Body ensures and
compels the right arrangement of the
Universe.
Buddhi: is the lower divided intelligence
as opposed to Vijnana.
Manas-​chitta: is the life of sensations
and emotions which are at the mercy of
the outward touches of life and matter
and their positive or negative reactions,
joy and grief, pleasure and pain.
Prana: is the hampered dynamic
energies which, feeding upon physical
substances, are depended on and limited
by their sustenance; also [it] is the lower
or vital energy.
Annam: is the divisible being
which founds itself on the constant
changeableness of physical substance.

Sri Aurobindo, Record of Yoga (Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust, 2001

(1909–​1927)), 1460–​61.
33 Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, 44–​45.
34 Olivelle, Upanisads, xlv–​xlix.
35 Ibid., xlvii.
36 Ibid., lii.
37 Ibid., lv.
38 Joel Brereton, “Upanishads,” in Approaches to the Asian Classics, ed. Wm.
Theodore de Bary and Irene Bloom (New  York:  Columbia University Press,
1990), 118.
39 S.K. Maitra, The Meeting of the East and the West in Sri Aurobindo’s Philosophy
(Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram, 1956), 191, 99.
40 Martin Heidegger, “Building Dwelling Thinking,” in Poetry, Language, Thought
(New York: Harper Perennial, 2001), 147.
41 John D. Caputo and Michael J. Scanlon, eds, Transcendence and Beyond:
A Postmodern Enquiry (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2007).
42 Martin Heidegger, The Metaphysical Foundations of Logic, trans. Michael Heim
(Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1984 (1978)), 160.
43 Ibid., 165.
44 This is taken from Aurobindo’s summary of the argument of his chapter ‘The
Sevenfold Chord of Being’ that was initially part of the Arya publication of
the chapter but later removed when the Arya chapters were brought together as
The Life Divine in 1939–​1940. Sri Aurobindo, Essays in Philosophy and Yoga, vol.
13, The Complete Works of Sri Aurobindo (Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram,
1998 (1910–​1950)), 486.
45 Aurobindo is not happy to use ‘intuition’ as a translation for vijñāna. In a footnote
he states, ‘I use the word “intuition” for want of a better. In truth, it is makeshift and
inadequate to the connotation demanded of it.’ Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 72.
  121

Transcendence and the sevenfold being 121

46 Sri Aurobindo, The Isha Upanishads (Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram, 2003
(1900–​1915)), 417. Olivelle’s translation of Īśā 7 is similar to Aurobindo’s: ‘When
in the self of a discerning man, his very self has become all beings, What bewilder-
ment, what sorrow can there be, regarding that self of him who sees this oneness.’
Olivelle, Upanisads, 249.
47 Aurobindo, The Isha Upanishads, 417.
48 Ibid., 419.
49 This is Aurobindo’s definition of these terms taken from his Record of Yoga writ-
ten in 1914. Aurobindo, Record of Yoga, 1461. ‘Vijñāna Supramental knowledge
is the Causal Idea which, by supporting and secretly guiding the confused activi-
ties of Mind, Life and Body, ensures and compels the right arrangement of the

Buddhi Vijnana
Perception Revelation = Pratyaksha or Drishti
Imagination Inspiration = Sruti
Reason (Smriti) Intuition
Judgement (Smriti) Discrimination = Viveka

Universe. Buddhi is the lower divided intelligence as opposed to Vijnana.’ Also the
difference between both of them can be seen as a table below: Aurobindo, Record
of Yoga, 1462.
50 He saw this particularly for the Buddhists, either as one of the five constitu-
ent elements or skandhas, or as one of the six elements or dhātus or as ‘one
of the twelve links in the chain of causation’. Sir Monier Monier-​Williams,
“Vijñāna,” in A Sanskrit–​English Dictionary (Oxford:  The Clarendon Press,
1899), 961.
51 J.N. Farquhar, The Vedānta and Modern Thought (Oxford:  Oxford University
Press, 1928), 33.
52 Sir Monier Monier-​Williams, “Kośa,” in A Sanskrit–​English Dictionary (Oxford:
The Clarendon Press, 1899), 314.
53 Aurobindo, The Isha Upanishads, 548.
54 Ibid., 547.
55 Ibid., 548.
56 Ibid., 90.
57 Ibid.
58 Martin Heidegger, Being and Time, trans. John Macquarrie and Edward Robinson
(New York: Harper & Row, 1962 (1926)), 184–​86.
59 Aurobindo, Record of Yoga, 17.
60 Aurobindo, The Isha Upanishads, 568.
61 Sri Aurobindo, Essays Divine and Human, vol. 12, The Complete Works of Sri
Aurobindo (Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram, 1998 (1910–​1950)), 36.
62 Ibid.
63 Ibid., 33.
64 Ibid., 33–​34.
65 Ibid., 36.
66 Richard King, Indian Philosophy: An Introduction to Hindu and Buddhist Thought
(Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1999), 175–​76.
67 Aurobindo, Essays Divine and Human, 37.
68 Paul Ricoeur, “What Is a Text? Explanation and Understanding,” in From Text to
Action: Essays in Hermeneutics, vol. 2 (London: Continuum, 1991), 114.
69 Ibid., 113–​20.
70 Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, 4.
71 Ibid., 363.
122

122  Transcendence and the sevenfold being

72 Sri Aurobindo, Kena and Other Upanishads, vol. 18, The Complete Works of Sri
Aurobindo (Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust, 2001 (1900–​1920)), 169.
73 ‘Sayana and Yaska supply the ritualistic framework of outward symbols and their
large store of traditional significances and explanations. The Upanishads give their
clue to the psychological and philosophical ideas of the earlier rishis and hand
down to us their method of spiritual experience and intuition. European schol-
arship supplies a critical method of comparative research, yet to be perfected,
but capable of immensely increasing the materials available and sure eventually
to give a scientific certainty and firm intellectual basis, which has hitherto been
lacking. Dayananda has given the clue to the linguistic secret of the rishis and
reemphasized one central idea of the Vedic religion, the idea of the One Being
with the Devas expressing in numerous names and forms the many-​sidedness of
His unity.’ Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, 33.
74 Ibid., 5–​8.
75 See the introduction to Olivelle, Upanisads.
76 Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, 33.
77 Ibid., 23.
78 Yvonne Williams, “A Critical Examination of Aurobindo’s Contribution to the
Tradition of Vedanta” (Oxford University, 1986), 4.
79 The book opens with this question in the short introduction right at the begin-
ning of the book. Mark A. Wrathall, “Introduction:  Metaphysics and Onto-​
Theology,” in Religion after Metaphysics, ed. Mark A. Wrathall (Cambridge,
UK: Cambridge University Press, 2003).
80 Ibid., 1.
81 Ibid., 4.
82 Charles Taylor, “Closed World Structures,” in Religion after Metaphysics, ed.
Mark A. Wrathall (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 66.
83 Benavides, “Religion, Reductionism, and the Seduction of Epistemology,” 278.
84 Martin Heidegger, “The Onto-​Theo-​Logical Constitution of Metaphysics,” in
Identity and Difference (New York: Harper & Row, 1957).
85 Jean-​Luc Marion, “The ‘End of Metaphysics’ as a Possibility,” in Religion after
Metaphysics, ed. Mark A. Wrathall (Cambridge, UK:  Cambridge University
Press, 2003), 166.
86 Ibid., 167.
87 Martin Heidegger, “The Word of Nietzsche:  ‘God Is Dead’,” in The Question
Concerning Technology and Other Essays (New  York:  Garland Publishing,
1977), 53.
88 Heidegger, “The Onto-​Theo-​Logical Constitution of Metaphysics,” 58–​59.
89 Heidegger, The Metaphysical Foundations of Logic, 162.
90 Marion, “The ‘End of Metaphysics’ as a Possibility,” 174.
91 Martin Heidegger, “Introduction to ‘What Is Metaphysics’ (1949),” in Pathmarks,
ed. William McNeill (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1998), 278.
92 Marion, “The ‘End of Metaphysics’ as a Possibility,” 172.
93 Martin Heidegger, On Time and Being, trans. Joan Stambaugh (New York: Harper
& Row, 1972), 24, 2.
94 Martin Heidegger, “The End of Philosophy and the Task of Thinking,” in Basic
Writings: From Being and Time (1927) to the Task of Thinking (1964), ed. David
Farrell Krell (London: Routledge, 1993), 449.
95 Marion, “The ‘End of Metaphysics’ as a Possibility,” 177.
96 Alasdair MacIntyre, “Epistemological Crises, Dramatic Narrative, and the
Philosophy of Science,” The Monist 69, no. 4 (1977): 453–​72.
97 Alasdair MacIntyre, After Virtue (London: Duckworth, 1981 (2007)), xi.
98 Heidegger, “Building Dwelling Thinking,” 147.
99 Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 67.
  123

Transcendence and the sevenfold being 123

1 00 Ibid., 337.
101 Ibid., 693.
102 Ibid., 337.
103 Aurobindo, The Isha Upanishads, 559.
104 Ibid., 558.
105 Ibid.
106 Ibid., 559.
107 The full quote from Hegel is ‘Thus logic coincides with metaphysics, with the sci-
ence of things grasped in thought, which was taken to express the essentialities
of things’. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, The Encyclopaedia Logic, with the
Zusätze: Part I of the Encyclopaedia of Philosophical Sciences with the Zusätze,
trans. W.A. Suchting, T.F. Geraets, and H.S. Harris (Indianapolis, IN: Hackett,
1991), 56.
108 Maitra, The Meeting of the East and the West in Sri Aurobindo’s Philosophy, 275–​76.
109 Stephen H. Phillips, Aurobindo’s Philosophy of Brahman (Leiden:  E.J. Brill,
1986), 110.
110 Ibid., 121.
111 Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 324–​25.
112 Phillips, Aurobindo’s Philosophy of Brahman, 108–​14.
113 Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 325.
114 Phillips, Aurobindo’s Philosophy of Brahman, 116.
115 Aurobindo, The Isha Upanishads, 6. He also references Gita XV.16–​17, which talks
about ‘two spirits in the world the perishable and the imperishable. All beings are
the perishable; the unchanging is called the imperishable’ (16) and then ‘But the
highest Spirit is another, Called the supreme Self’ (17). This is Sargeant’s trans-
lation in Winthrop Sargeant, The Bhagavad Gita (New  York:  State University
of New  York Press, 1994), 605–​06. Aurobindo too has a chapter on Gita XV
entitled ‘The Three Purushas’, in Sri Aurobindo, Essays on the Gita, 30 vols,
vol. 13, Sri Aurobindo Birth Centenary Library (Pondicherry:  Sri Aurobindo
Ashram, 1972), 435–​49. Aurobindo argues that this idea of three Purushas is
‘alien to the traditional Sankhya’ and also that the idea of the third Purusha
or Parātpara ‘though continually implied in the Upanishads, is disengaged and
definitely brought out by the Gita and has exercised a powerful influence on the
later developments of the Indian religious consciousness’. Aurobindo, Essays on
the Gita, 78–​79.
116 Aurobindo, The Isha Upanishads, 6 note 6.
117 Ibid., 32.
118 Aurobindo, Record of Yoga, 1337.
119 Phillips, Aurobindo’s Philosophy of Brahman, 117–​21.
120 Aurobindo, Essays Divine and Human, 93–​95.
121 Aurobindo, The Isha Upanishads, 162.
122 Marion, “The ‘End of Metaphysics’ as a Possibility,” 177.
123 Martin Heidegger, “Letter on Humanism,” in Basic Writings:  From Being
and Time (1927) to the Task of Thinking (1964), ed. David Farrell Krell
(London: Routledge, 1993), 238.
124 Marion, “The ‘End of Metaphysics’ as a Possibility,” 177.
125 Aurobindo, The Isha Upanishads, 176.
126 Marion, “The ‘End of Metaphysics’ as a Possibility,” 177.
127 Heidegger, “The End of Philosophy and the Task of Thinking,” 442.
128 Marion, “The ‘End of Metaphysics’ as a Possibility,” 179.
129 John D. Caputo and Michael J. Scanlon, “Introduction: Do We Need to Transcend
Transcendence?,” in Transcendence and Beyond: A Postmodern Enquiry, ed. John
D. Caputo and Michael J. Scanlon (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press,
2007), 2.
124

124  Transcendence and the sevenfold being

130 Gianni Vattimo, “After Onto-​ Theology:  Philosophy between Science and
Religion,” in Religion after Metaphysics, ed. Mark A. Wrathall (Cambridge,
UK: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 35.
131 Gianni Vattimo, “Nihilism as Postmodern Christianity,” in Transcendence and
Beyond:  A  Postmodern Enquiry, ed. John D. Caputo and Michael J. Scanlon
(Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2007), 46, 48.
132 David Tracy, “Foreword,” in God without Being, ed. Jean-​Luc Marion (Chicago,
IL: University of Chicago Press, 1991), x.
133 Jean-​Luc Marion, God without Being, trans. Thomas A. Carlson (Chicago,
IL: University of Chicago Press, 1991), 139.
134 Heidegger, On Time and Being, 19.
135 Ibid., 22.
136 Aurobindo, Kena and Other Upanishads, 366–​78.
137 Heidegger, “Letter on Humanism,” 264.
138 Wiebe goes to the extent of calling Segal’s view ‘muddled talk’. Wiebe, “Beyond the
Sceptic and the Devotee: Reductionism in the Scientific Study of Religion,” 162.
139 Segal, “In Defense of Reductionism,” 111.
140 Ingvild Saelid Gilhus, “‘Is a Phenomenology of Religion Possible?’: A Response
to Jeppe Sinding Jensen,” Method and Theory in the Study of Religion 6, no. 2
(1994), 168; Jeppe Sinding Jensen, “Is a Phenomenology of Religion Possible?
On the Ideas of a Human and Social Science of Religion,” Method and Theory in
the Study of Religion 5, no. 1–​2 (1993).
141 Jeppe Sinding Jensen, “Universals, General Terms and the Comparative Study of
Religion,” Numen 48, no. 3 (2001): 254.
142 Gavin Flood, The Importance of Religion: Meaning and Action in Our Strange
World (Oxford: Wiley-​Blackwell, 2012), 173–​74.
143 Paul Ricoeur, “Imagination in Discourse and in Action,” in From Text to
Action: Essays in Hermeneutics, vol. 2 (London: Continuum, 1991), 165–​66.
144 Ibid., 169, 73, 76. The connection between ‘grasping’ and understanding is made
by Heidegger in his interpretation of Kant:  ‘The essence of understanding is
original comprehending or grasping’. Martin Heidegger, Kant and the Problem
of Metaphysics, trans. Richard Taft (Bloomington, IN:  Indiana University Press,
1990), 38.
145 The synthesis between intuition, the representation of the unified whole (time-​
space) with thinking ‘is a mere result of the power of imagination, a blind but
indispensable function of the soul without which we would have no knowledge
whatever, but of which we are seldom conscious even once’ (Heidegger’s italics).
Heidegger, Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics, 44; Immanuel Kant, Critique of
Pure Reason, trans. J.M.D. Meiklejohn (London: Henry G. Bohn, 1855).
146 Aurobindo, Record of Yoga, 1472.
147 Ibid., 1462. See note xliii.
148 Ibid., 1472.
149 Aurobindo, The Isha Upanishads, 547.
150 Ibid., 417.
151 Olivelle, Upanisads, 249.
152 Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 1066.
153 Ibid., 1068.
154 Ibid., 1102.
155 Heidegger, The Metaphysical Foundations of Logic, 165.
156 Martin Heidegger, “Transcendence,” in The Heidegger Reader, ed. Güner Figal,
trans. Jerome Veith (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2009), 73.
157 Heidegger, The Metaphysical Foundations of Logic, 190.
  125

Transcendence and the sevenfold being 125

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128

5 
The Human Cycle
Articulation as narrative

Introduction
In this chapter, I  offer a reading of The Human Cycle as Aurobindo’s phi-
losophy of history, arguing that it provides the larger narrative that supplies
meaning for Aurobindo’s enquiry into religion. With respect to tradition-
ary enquiry, I have already shown that not only does it possess a tradition-​
constituted rationality (Chapter  3) but also textuality, in that it progresses
through the chain of interpretations of its authoritative texts (Chapter  4)
through the mechanism of transcendence. In this chapter, I  argue that
Aurobindo’s traditionary-​ hermeneutics is demonstrated in The Human
Cycle as a historical narrative that appropriates ‘past meanings’ in an open-​
ended narrative, which is precisely the mechanism that generates tradition.
With regard to the study of religion, I argue that religion is best understood
as a narrative rather than as a category. Furthermore, the debate between
explanation and understanding, within the study of religion, can be over-
come by appropriating them both as constitutive moments of interpretative-​
narratives. Finally, with regard to dialogical hermeneutics, if imagination as
the ontological ground for dialogue (Chapter 4) supplies the possibility to go
beyond incommensurability between traditions (Chapter  3), then ‘different’
interpretation-​narratives can be engaged with one another in the ‘act of inter-
rogation’ in dialogue. However, I will begin with a critical introduction to The
Human Cycle.

A critical exposition of The Human Cycle

Aurobindo acknowledges that it was Lamprecht’s psychological approach to
history that provided him with the starting point for this work. Lamprecht’s
theory of history is contained in his Moderne Geschichtswissenschaft (1904),1
translated into English under the title What Is History?2 by E.A. Andrews
in 1905. Aurobindo did not read the book itself,3 but only a review of it
by Guglielmo Salvadori in The Hindustan Review.4 However, he borrows
Lamprecht’s framework of psychological stages and social types to structure
his own work in The Human Cycle.
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Articulation as narrative 129
Conversing Aurobindo with Lamprecht via Salvadori
Lamprecht is seen, along with Barth, Bernheim, and Breysig, as a late
nineteenth-​century positivistic historian advocating an extreme form of natu-
ralism, who understood the ‘highest task of history as the discovery of causal
laws connecting certain constant types of historical phenomena’.5 Collingwood
lists three characteristics of this form of extreme positivist history, of which
he cites Lamprecht as a chief example:  first, it does not take into account
accident, free will or the demands and conceptions of men. Second, the his-
torically significant is associated with what is typical and recurrent and, there-
fore, history becomes the history of groups or societies, with the individual
disappearing from it. Finally, the task of history becomes to establish social
and psychological types following one another in a deterministic manner.6
Although much of Collingwood’s description is characteristic of Lamprecht,
his critique, that Lamprecht does not take into consideration the histori-
cal individual, appears as a reaction to Lamprecht’s socio-​psychic method,
stemming from Collingwood’s own historicist position.7 Collingwood’s own
method privileges the individual in history, as for him the primary source
of knowledge is the historical agent whose mind could be re-​enacted by the
historian to get historical knowledge, while Lamprecht was primarily looking
for the dominant social ideal to inform his work. On the whole, Lamprecht
holds the position that individuals, as children of their age, are affected by
the dominant socio-​psychic forces, although he does not completely disregard
the individual. He exclaims, ‘yet how false would be the general application
of this melancholic conclusion’. Furthermore, he also refers to the class of
‘geniuses’ who are creative and different even if they too are the product of
the socio-​psychic process.8
Salvadori’s review article of Lamprecht, which Aurobindo read, can be
summarized as follows. First, he argues that Lamprecht applied the psycho-
logical view to the study of historical facts, in order to seek their innermost
causes in the motives, which determine human actions. Second, like a natural
process, every fact and event about the social or political state and life has in
its explanation its determining factors in the preceding facts and events, as
every effect follows its cause. Third, history itself is the evolution of national
consciousness. Taking German history as an example, Salvadori outlines
Lamprecht’s five stages of progress, namely, symbolic-​mythological, typical,
conventional, individual, and subjective respectively. Fourth, he puts forward
an explanation of the hidden psychic processes by which these periods arise,
develop, and decay, thus enabling the next period to begin. Here, transition
periods between different epochs are given importance and analysed. Two
processes called ‘psychic dissociation’ and ‘redomination’ occur, through
which the existing dominant mental association is broken up due to new stim-
uli and then there is a re-​association which creates a new mental dominant
consisting of the new impressions and sentiments. Through these processes
epochs change. Finally, the psychic development is primarily dependent on
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130  Articulation as narrative

and determined by the economic factors in the society, and other fields such
as social, political, and intellectual are indirectly influenced.9
Salvadori’s critique of Lamprecht is that by focusing on the psychological
factor, he has not taken into consideration the other factors that go into the
making of history. He further argues that psychologism is as faulty as mate-
rialism –​if materialism denies the role of the human mind, then psychology
denies the role of external causes, and thus the philosophy of history must seek
the unity of all historical processes, both material as well as intellectual, in a
physio-​psychic unity. His central critique, however, is that Lamprecht’s psy-
chological explanation is based primarily on the economic factor. Salvadori
argues that according to Lamprecht, the psychic development directly influ-
ences only the industrial field while it indirectly produces the changes in the
social, political, intellectual, and moral phenomena. Therefore, Salvadori
questions as to why these other fields could not also be directly derived from
the psychic evolution. Finally, Salvadori argues that human consciousness is
a complete fact, and trying to reduce its activities to any single element will
always result in simplistic and one-​sided interpretations.
Aurobindo builds upon Salvadori’s critique of Lamprecht and uses it as
a starting point to outline his own account of history in an integral sense.
He begins by lauding Lamprecht as having done original work in producing
the first psychological theory of history, as opposed to merely the prevalent
material explanations of reality that do not take into account a mental, emo-
tional, and ideative being like man.10 However, he critiques Lamprecht for
the importance he gives to the economic factor. Furthermore, he argues that
Lamprecht’s theory of psychological history does not reveal the ‘inner mean-
ing of its successive phases or the necessity of their succession or the term
and end towards which they are driving’.11 However, Aurobindo’s critique
of Lamprecht on the central role he gives to the economic factor is merely
an echoing of Salvadori’s position, and is misplaced by both Salvadori and
Aurobindo. The main argument of Lamprecht is precisely the inverse, that
historical significance and meaning are the result of higher intellectual activi-
ties like religion, art, and science, with ‘political history, social and economic
conditions and activities’ being of secondary importance. Lamprecht argues,

the history of individual nations, must not be valued and appraised

according to the canons of economic, social, or constitutional history,
but according to the standards of the highest intellectual attainments,
else it would never appear what individual peoples have stood for or still
represent in universal history.12

Nevertheless, Aurobindo’s critique that Lamprecht’s psychological the-

ory has not understood either the ‘inner meaning’ or the telos of history
is based on how Aurobindo understood both ‘inner meaning’ as well as
‘modern psychology’. For him, ‘inner’ had to do with the ‘Spirit’, which
while being transcendent could be realized through human subjectivity (the
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Articulation as narrative 131
Advaitic view). Equally, he understood ‘modern psychology’ to be another
scientific discipline, which provides material explanation for the ‘self ’,
and hence for him psychology will not arrive at the ‘inner meaning’ of the
‘spirit’. Therefore, he argues that psychology not only studies ‘Soul and
Mind’ based on physical data, but that the entire discipline is founded upon
‘physiology and the scrutiny of the brain and nervous system’.13 Therefore,
he found it limiting and used it only as a point of departure for his integral
project which took into consideration both the ‘inner’ as well as the ‘exter-
nal’ aspects of history together.
He further critiques Lamprecht’s schema of the five stages as a rigid cate-
gorization, arguing that one cannot make rigid classifications as ‘the psychol-
ogy of man and his societies is too complex, too synthetical of many-​sided
and intermixed tendencies to satisfy any such rigorous and formal analysis’.14
However, although Lamprecht was an extreme positivist, he too had acknowl-
edged that to generalize human individuals and communities completely is
not possible and that they are capable of exhibiting ‘antipathetic conceptions,
endeavours, and feelings’. Lamprecht also writes, ‘by no means are individu-
als or societies cleverly devised books, but organisms made up of contradic-
tions’, in a clear reaction to a Romantic hermeneutics that considered world
history as a text.15
Aurobindo follows Lamprecht’s structure of psychological stages of his-
tory in his account, but leads to a sixth stage called the ‘spiritual age’. On the
other hand, while Lamprecht is concerned about German history, Aurobindo
focuses on world history, although in some parts there is a focus on Indian
history. In the first chapter, he rushes through three of the five psychologi-
cal stages that Lamprecht had proposed  –​the Symbolic, the Typal, and
the Conventional. The subject of Lamprecht’s account is German history,
while Aurobindo’s was Indian for these three stages. Then, in ­chapters 2 to
20, Aurobindo describes the next two stages –​Individualistic and Subjective.
He analyses the different philosophical themes that undergird the transition
between these two stages and argues for their insufficiency. The final four
chapters (21 to 24) argue the necessity for a new stage –​the Spiritual age in
world history.

A summary of The Human Cycle

The narrative in The Human Cycle operates at two levels  –​‘historical’ and
‘explanatory’, characteristic of any ‘philosophy of history’. For Aurobindo,
the historical process is the inter-​play between three key elements  –​Spirit,
Material Form, and the human self  –​journeying through different stages
(Lamprecht’s stages). Explanations of these different stages are encapsu-
lated in the texts produced in those ages and one has to enter its spirit to
understand them.16 Aurobindo pre-​supposes that these texts contain a self-​
understanding of the age in which they were created, for example, the Vedas
contain the understanding of the Vedic thinkers about their life, and we need
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132  Articulation as narrative

to understand the spirit in which they wrote them, in order to get their true
import and not by reading into them our own views and mind-​set.
However, Aurobindo does not do justice to his own method especially for
the Typal and Conventional stages, which he does not explore in detail. He
interprets three stages –​Symbolic, Typal, and Conventional –​in one chapter,
with only two paragraphs for the Typal age, and then devotes the rest of the
twenty-​three chapters to the other three stages. However, we can see that in
each stage, Aurobindo is able to describe the nature of that stage in light of
his interpretation of the self-​understanding of its relationship to the three
key elements that drive history for him, namely, the Spirit, the material form
(Matter), and the Self.
Now to summarize the development of Aurobindo’s central idea, at both
levels, in the different stages:  in the Symbolic age, directly governed by the
spiritual idea, life in all its forms was taken as a symbol of the spirit. This
could be seen as the intuitive age, with a direct access to Spirit, but the mate-
rial forms were only symbolic and the subjective self did not develop. The
explanation offered in this stage was an intuitive explanation. In the Typal
stage, the ideas were organized into psychological and ethical ideals which
linked with social honour and utility or, in other words, the focus was less
directly on the Spirit and more on its ideals which had become social ideals
or dharma and governed the social forms. Aurobindo calls this the ethical age
and again there is no mention of the subjective self. The explanation offered
is dharmic or ethical explanation. In the Conventional age, the spirit com-
pletely recedes and disappears and the ideals sustained by the externalities
of society such as social structure and economics become rigid and oppres-
sive mostly in the form of organized and institutionalized religion. Aurobindo
calls this religionism with the domination of material forms and the subjective
self is still not present. He argues that the explanation of this age was based
on all the externalities of religion, which we can call religionistic explana-
tions. The Individual age comes as a corrective to purify religionism using
rationality. But in so doing, it completely does away with religion and, being
anchored to material science, replaces it with scientific materialism offering
objective external explanations for reality. However, its positive contribution
was to turn the gaze inward to discover the individual self and for the first
time, there is an understanding of the self, but as reason. The explanation
offered is rationalistic or material explanation. The Subjective age in Europe
builds on this inward turn but identifies the self with life and ego resulting in
a vitalist worldview and thus a false subjectivity. The greatest discovery of the
Subjective age was the ‘group-​soul’ or ‘nation’ and the horrors of German
nationalism are a result of this false and egoistic subjectivism informing the
notion of nation. The explanation offered is a vitalistic explanation. Thus, the
need for a new subjective age and in this inward turn, the deepest essence of
man will be understood neither as reason nor as life, but as the spirit, and the
Spirit will become conscious of itself through the human self and will then be
able to penetrate and live through all the material forms. Aurobindo calls this
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Articulation as narrative 133
age ‘true religion’ or ‘spirituality’. This is the telos, to which human history is
directed or, in other words, human history is the self-​discovery of the Spirit in
the soul of man and the explanation has to be spiritual, which, for Aurobindo,
is a philosophy of history possessing an integral explanation.

Aurobindo’s human cycle (six stages)

1 Symbolic –​Vedic Form, Revealed Spirit, No Self –​Intuitivism
2 Typal –​Dharmic Forms, Functional Spirit, No Self –​Ethicality
3 Conventional  –​Religious Form, Forgotten Spirit, No Self  –​
Religionism
4 Individualistic  –​Material Form, Denied Spirit, Rational Self  –​
Materialism
5 Subjective –​Vital Form, Denied Spirit, Egotistic Self –​Vitalism
6 Spiritual –​ Spiritual–​Material Self –​ Integralism

Philosophy of history as narrative

Philosophies of history can simply be said to represent what historians believe
or think about the historical process (what is the past and where is history
going) itself or, in other words, the assumptions of historians.17 Equally,
Collingwood demonstrates that the term ‘philosophy of history’ entails
two technical terms  –​‘philosophy’ and ‘history’, representing two kinds of
enquiry. It is the relationship between these two modes of enquiry that consti-
tutes philosophy of history. However, since both history and philosophy have
virtually all of human activity as subject matter, albeit for history it is human
activity of the past, they tend to resemble each other.18 Stanford gives two
meanings of ‘history’: (a) History 1 or History-​as-​Event and (b) History 2 or
History-​as-​Account.19 The textualization of History 1 gives History 2, which is
a narrative account of History-​as-​Event. One form of History 2 is philosophy
of history arising in the modern era, which offers a unifying narrative using
both History 1 and History 2 as its material. Ricoeur points out that in most
European languages the term ‘history’ –​Geschichte, histoire, history –​pos-
sesses Stanford’s two senses, ‘meaning both what really happens and the nar-
rative of those events’.20
Ricoeur defends the thesis of the ‘irreducibly narrative character of history’
against history being seen as an explanation analogous to physical explana-
tion of the Hempelian-​type analysis.21 Ricoeur argues that ‘historical events
derive their historical status not only from their articulation in singular state-
ments [explanations], but also from the position of these singular statements
in configurations of a certain sort, which properly constitute a narrative’. To
be historical then, an occurred event must be defined in terms of its ‘contribu-
tion to the development of a plot’.22 He defines plot as ‘the set of combinations
by which events are made into a story or –​correlatively –​a story is made out
of events’.23 Ricoeur acknowledges the problem associated with extending the
Aristotelian notion of plot to historiography, which includes philosophy of
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134  Articulation as narrative

history. He points out that it appears to be a ‘lost cause’ to even claim that
‘modern history has preserved the narrative character’ which was found in ear-
lier chronicles and accounts of political or ecclesiastical history of battles, trea-
ties, and so on. He contends that history has moved away from the chronicle
model to become ‘social, economic, cultural and spiritual history’, and thus no
longer ‘proposes to tie together events with a chronological and causal thread;
and it ceases, thus, to tell stories’.24 However, Ricoeur argues that in spite of this,
not to call modern history narrative would not be correct as the intelligibility
of all forms of historical account is ‘conferred upon the narrative by the plot’.
In other words, all historical narratives, to be intelligible entail a plot, thus pos-
sessing a narratival structure. Ricoeur points out that a narrative has both an
episodic character that refers to the chronological series of events and a con-
figurational character, which is mostly overlooked, that provides the basis of its
intelligibility. Therefore, even when history is social, economic, or philosophi-
cal in the configurational sense, and becomes a ‘history of long time spans’,
Ricoeur argues that it is ‘still tied to time and still accounts for the changes that
link a terminal to an initial solution’.25 There is a ‘particular directedness’, in
which the ‘ “conclusion” of the story is the pole of attraction of the whole pro-
cess’ reflecting a ‘teleologically guided movement’ of the account.26
In this light, all philosophies of history, both Hegelian universal histo-
ries and world histories of the historical school of Ranke, Droysen, and
Dilthey, possess a narrative structure. For Aurobindo, it was not history per
se that he was interested in, or even philosophy, for that matter, but he was
intentionally using the form of ‘world history’ modelled after Lamprecht’s
psychological history, with a clear intention to locate his vision of a his-
torical ‘spiritual age’ as a natural outcome of ‘world’ historical processes.
Therefore, the Aurobindonian account possesses a clear direction and tel-
eology. Different stages of world history are affirmed for their individual
importance, but then also co-​opted and unified in a vision that saw the
world progressing to the ‘spiritual age’. For the historical school, Gadamer
points out that ‘World history is, as it were, the great dark book, the col-
lected work of the human spirit, written in the languages of the past, whose
texts it is our task to understand.’27 Seen in this light, philosophy of his-
tory intersects with Romantic hermeneutics as a historical narrative which
seeks to understand world history. Aurobindo’s psychological interpreta-
tion can be seen to apply Schleiermacher’s psychological interpretation,
as a ‘divinatory process’ that apprehends the ‘inner form’ of a work by
understanding the writer better than he understood himself, to the process
of world history, where it was to offer an understanding of the inner work-
ing of the spirit in the different stages of world history better than how the
epochs and previous accounts understood them. Aurobindo argues that
‘behind the economic motives and causes of social and historical devel-
opment there are profound psychological, even perhaps soul factors’.28
Thus, The Human Cycle can be interpreted as a narrative that appropriates
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Articulation as narrative 135
the past as the inner psychological working in operation in world history
and envisions a future, which is a ‘progression’ of the ‘psychological spirit’
towards a telos of a ‘spiritual age’. Aurobindo’s historical narrative, seen
in this sense, affirms Ricoeur’s interpretation of tradition in the second
sense of ‘traditions’ as material concept, where ‘we are never in a posi-
tion of being absolute innovators, but rather are always first of all in the
situation of being heirs’,29 and affirms MacIntyre’s ‘living tradition’, which
is a ‘historically extended, socially embodied argument’, which not only
‘manifests itself in a grasp of those future possibilities which the past has
made available to the present’ but also must ‘continue a not-​yet-​completed
narrative’.30 MacIntyre argues that traditionary enquiry, which is histori-
cal in nature, will give certain theses the status of ‘first principles’ from
which other claims within the enquiry will derive their justifications. These
‘first principles’ themselves will be justified only when they are proved to
be rationally superior to ‘all previous attempts within that particular tra-
dition’.31 This is precisely what Aurobindo does in The Human Cycle. His
philosophy of history is a historical narrative that considers and critiques
the different proposals presented in the different past ages. On the basis
of successfully critiquing all previous articulations about the ‘ultimacy of
existence and the role of the human’, Aurobindo offers his proposal of
‘spirituality’ and the vision of a ‘spiritual age’. In light of the relationship
between historical work and tradition, as Gadamer has shown, ‘Modern
historical research itself is not only research, but the handing down of tra-
dition’,32 I argue that The Human Cycle too is a handing down of tradition.
However, the point I want to emphasize here is that Aurobindo offered a
historical narrative as an argument for his conception of the Spiritual age.
This leads us to the second section, about Aurobindo’s understanding of
religion and spirituality.

Articulation: explanation and/​or understanding

The argument I  present here is that Aurobindo did not give a nomologi-
cal explanation of what religion or spirituality is, nor did he derive religion
through logical argumentation. Furthermore he did not reduce religion to a
mere internal experience or understanding of the divine. Rather, he gives us
the story of The Human Cycle, culminating in the Spiritual age, which takes
on meaning only in light of the larger narrative of world history that he has
narrated. Building on this, I address how the question ‘what is religion?’ has
been considered in the study of religion, to argue that the old debate between
explanation and understanding can be overcome within a narratival under-
standing, which considers every articulation of religion as an interpretation,
entailing both explanation and understanding. I begin by demonstrating that
it is more intelligible to talk about religion as a narrative rather than as a
category.
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136  Articulation as narrative

Religion as narrative and not category
Waardenburg drew our attention to the uncritical and naive use of the cat-
egory ‘religion’ by the classical theorists of religion in their description of
traditions belonging to different cultures. Although Wilfred Cantwell Smith is
considered to have authored the first significant critique of the category ‘reli-
gion’ in his Meaning and End of Religion, in the past few decades, especially
from the 1980s onwards, the critical scholars within the academic study of
religion such as Fitzgerald, McCutcheon, King, Masuzawa, Sugirtharajah,
and Balagangadhara, influenced by postmodernism and postcolonialism,
especially the works of Foucault and Said, have applied the genealogical cri-
tique to deconstruct the category ‘religion’. Equally, post-​critical scholars
such as Sweetman, McKinnon, Lorenzen, and Pennington have responded to
the critical school with monographs of similar titles, counter-​arguing for the
retention of the category ‘religion’. Terms such as ‘invention’ (Masuzawa),
‘manufacturing’ (McCutcheon), and ‘imagining’ (Smith) began to appear in
the title of works on religion as ‘active verbs’ that signified the construction
of ‘religion’. Similar terms came to be used in titles of works on cognate cat-
egories such as Hinduism  –​‘mapping’ (Sweetman), ‘invention’ (Lorenzen,
Pennington), and ‘imagining’ (Sugirtharajah, Oddie), also Imagining India by
Ronald Inden.
This complex and finely nuanced, multi-​layered debate is well-​rehearsed in
recent literature on religion and, therefore, the aim here is not to reproduce
the debate, but to ‘exemplify’ the impasse that has been reached within the
contemporary academic study of religion in the debate between the critical
and post-​critical scholars of religion. The vignette I have chosen is a debate
that took place between McKinnon, a sociologist of religion, and Fitzgerald
in the Method and Theory in the Study of Religion journal, in the first decade
of the twenty-​first century. In an interesting discussion between McKinnon
(2002, 2006) and Fitzgerald (2003), the different positions of the debate on
the category ‘religion’ have been outlined.
Fitzgerald, in his earlier works, had vigorously challenged the validity of
‘religion’ as a category and called for its abandonment,33 although the origi-
nal call to ‘drop’ this term and concept had come much earlier from Wilfred
Cantwell Smith, in 1962.34 Underlying Fitzgerald’s call for the abandonment
of religion as an analytical category lies the argument that the category ‘reli-
gion’ historically developed in the West and thus is a Western construct and so
to use it cross-​culturally is an exercise of cognitive imperialism, which attempts
to ‘remake the world according to one’s own dominant ideological categories,
not merely to understand but to force compliance’.35 He also argues against
this cross-​cultural use on the basis that ‘the construction of “religion” and
“religions” as global, cross-​cultural objects of study has been part of a wider
historical process of Western imperialism, colonialism and neo-​colonialism’.36
McKinnon counter-​argues for the retention and the global use of religion. He
says that religion has already become a global category and that it has become
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Articulation as narrative 137
part of the global political-​economic discourse. He argues that religion has
been translated into over 300 languages and thus has global currency. This
part of his argument can be summed up in saying that religion is translatable,
and people are able to identify what is and is not with relation to the category
‘religion’ across the world.37 He uses Wittgensteinian game-​theory or ‘family
resemblances’ to argue that if we are looking for a distinction between religion
and non-​religion, then we are still holding on to an essentialist view of religion,
so rather we ought to look for resemblances between the things that we call
religion. He argues, ‘if we are looking to define “religion” we should not be
looking for the element that distinguishes religion from non-​religion, but we
should explore a set of family resemblances between things we call religion’.38
Fitzgerald critiques McKinnon for not providing any ethnographic or textual
analysis to prove that the word religion is used in a family resemblance manner
and counter-​argues that the history of the term reveals that its usage belongs to
the context of power and control. He asks the following questions:

Did the discourse of religion spontaneously combust? Or was it the result

of generations of debates and definitions and arguments by people with
specific interests and agendas? How, where, and why did this category
arise historically, and who had an interest in formulating it? What real
effects will this category formation have in organizing or reorganizing
social (power) relations? What interests are being served by the historical
valorisation of privatized ‘religion’ in the modern period?39

This above vignette seeks to capture the underlying assumptions operative in

the debate, which are shared by both the participants, although they are argu-
ing against each other’s positions. This engagement, both in my above vignette
as well as in their respective articles, operates over a three-​legged genealogical
framework: (a) a postcolonial critique based on Nietzschean ‘will to power’
and a Foucauldian critique of knowledge production, (b)  a critique of an
essentialist and encyclopaedic understanding of categories which continues to
be contingent upon the idea of a ‘rigid category’, and (c) finally, denying any
stable meaning to the categories on the basis of its origin as well as its inap-
plicability in different contexts and cultures, while still being continuously
defined by the idea of ‘category’ that is being critiqued. Both Fitzgerald and
McKinnon working out of these common presuppositions are dependent on
the idea of ‘rigid category’ even as they critique each other’s positions. I pro-
pose that this is the reason why there is an impasse within the contemporary
study of religion because its genealogical critique continues to be informed by
what it deconstructs, that is the idea of a ‘stable and essential’ category. This is
seen by the other contributions made by the post-​critical school. Pennington
refuses to accept the complete discontinuity that the postmodern critique of
totalizing discourses seems to suggest in the fragmentation of history and
human experience, and argues that ‘the very categories with which we estab-
lish and characterize these commonalities’ must be constantly evaluated.40
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138  Articulation as narrative

J.S. Jensen argues that all analytical concepts are constructs, and that they
can be discussed, developed, and refined. He further points out that through
the intellectual work of criticism, the unwanted implications of a concept
can be removed and the concept can be reconstructed to serve the purposes
of the scholarly community.41 Thus, the notion that ‘religion’ is a category is
unchallenged in both its affirmations and negations, and I claim that this has
brought about a circularity in the debate, and irrespective of the arguments
forwarded, the debate has gone cold because there appears to be no way to
go beyond the ‘unearthly ballet of bloodless categories’ as dictated by ana-
lytical philosophy. This insight is brought out by MacIntyre, who argues that
‘analytical philosophy’ has the ‘tendency to think atomistically about human
action and to analyze complex actions and transactions in terms of simple
components’, that is, through categories.42
In MacIntyrean language, this is the sign of an ‘epistemological crisis’, one
that cannot be overcome with the resources available within the critical school
engendered by the genealogical tradition of enquiry and, therefore, requires
resources from other traditions of enquiry to overcome this impasse. The aca-
demic study of religion, dominated by the critical and post-​critical schools,
has been unable to move past these debates, even as these debates themselves
have gone stale. Hence, there has been pressure to dismantle the discipline of
religious studies, as seen through the eyes of the genealogist, as there can be
no relevance to this enterprise. However, unlike Nietzsche, who left the univer-
sity in protest, the critical school continues to work within the academy and
desires that the scholars of religion be relocated to other disciplines, or the
discipline of religious studies be transformed into cultural studies. However,
this reveals the internal contradiction of the genealogical critique in general
and the position of the critical school in particular. Any other category posed
as alternatives, such as Fitzgerald’s ‘ritual’, ‘politics’, or ‘soteriology’, or the
proposal of any other discipline in place of religious studies, could be subject
to a similar critique, as the genealogist, who has given up all forms of stability
in meaning, cannot make any meaningful proposals that will stand the test of
deconstruction. In this light, the alternative proposals suggested by the criti-
cal school reveal that the critique is not against all proposals of meanings, but
only selectively to some, and in this case to ‘religious meanings’. This further
reveals the hard-​lined secularist position adopted by the critical scholars of
religion.
When a tradition reaches an impasse or an epistemological crisis, it needs
resources from another tradition to help overcome this crisis and in the pro-
cess be changed and transformed in the dialogue with the other tradition.
Flood’s Beyond Phenomenology:  Rethinking the Study of Religion, putting
forward a hermeneutical approach, provides precisely that breakthrough for
the academic study of religion. While the main contribution of this work is its
critique of the phenomenological approach, it is the subsequent development
of its implications in his proposal of ‘narrativism and dialogism’, stemming
out of a hermeneutical tradition, as an alternative approach for the study of
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Articulation as narrative 139
religion that provides a way out of this impasse.43 His critique of categories
as seen to have ‘rigid boundaries’, and his reconceptualizing ‘religion as a soft
category with “fuzzy edges” ’, paves the way to shifting the focus away from
‘analytical categories’ to ‘narratives’ by problematizing language itself. This
preference of ‘narrative’ over ‘category’ is explicitly seen in this statement:

A general, non-​specific view of the category ‘religion’, such as I am pro-

posing, bypasses the problem of projecting the abstraction on to other
cultures, for whatever the binding narrative and behaviours within a cul-
ture may be, whatever the traditions, communities and expressions of
authenticity, they are the legitimate object of inquiry from the perspective
of the academic study of religion.44

Therefore, narratives rather than categories represent human behaviour

including religious behaviour. Our enquiry has revealed that representation
is not in categories, albeit semantically dense, rather that representation is
articulation through narratives.
But this leads to the question of how explanation and understanding, both
offering rival articulations, relate to narrative.

Explanation and understanding in narrative

But how should we understand the difference between explanation and under-
standing? In a revealing article, Ricoeur draws the difference between the
two, on the basis of Dilthey’s work, in whom the difference found their acute
form: for Dilthey, these two terms denote two spheres of reality –​natural sci-
ences and human sciences. The natural sciences, through the use of scientific
observation, enterprise of mathematization (Galileo), and canons of induc-
tive logic (Mill), explain the ‘region of objects’ in nature. The human sciences,
on the other hand, for Dilthey, had to do with mind and mental life, which
can be known by ‘transference into another mental life’ by understanding the
‘external signs’ in which ‘inner life is given’.45 Dilthey defines understanding as
the ‘process by which we recognise some inner content from signs received by
the senses’: ‘We are mainly aware of the inner life of others only through the
impact of their gestures, sounds and acts on our senses. We have to reconstruct
the inner source of the signs which strike our senses.’46 Although both expla-
nation and understanding, à la Dilthey, seem to be clearly different spheres
of enquiry, they share a commonality in ‘articulation’  –​both explanations
and understandings are articulated in language. Therefore, the understand-
ing of ‘articulation’ both precedes and informs the debate between Verstehen
(understanding) and Erklären (mechanistic explanation). Articulation is a key
Heideggerian concept, which has been interpreted by Taylor in his famous
essay ‘Rationality’.
Taylor traces the history of ‘theoretical understanding’ as contemplation
(theōria) to the Greeks and argues that it is to have a ‘disengaged perspective’
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140  Articulation as narrative

about things and to ‘grasp them as they are’. This ‘disengaged perspective’
that should be distinguished from the ‘ordinary perspective’, offers a ‘supe-
rior’ view of reality not found in every culture. He asserts that theoretical
contemplation is connected with rationality within the beginning of Western
culture and draws the connection. If reason is translated from logos, then,
Taylor argues, logos, also has other meanings such as ‘ “word”, “speech”,
“account” as well as “reason” ’. He argues from Plato’s Republic that having
real knowledge (epistēmē) of something is to ‘give an account’ of it (logon
didōnai) and, therefore, ‘rational understanding is linked to articulation’. He
interprets the relationship as  –​to have a rational grasp of something is to
articulate it. On the other hand, to articulate is to ‘distinguish and lay out
the different features of the matter in perspicuous order’, which happens in
‘formulating things in order’. This, he claims, marks the inner connection
between speech and reason. In other words, theoretical contemplation was to
grasp something as-​it-​is through a disengaged perspective (theory), and the
grasping of something as-​it-​is in its perspicuous order is ‘articulation’. Taylor
concludes that it is the plausibility of this connection between the ‘rational’
and ‘theoretical’ in ‘articulation’ that tempts ‘to judge other, atheoretical cul-
tures as ipso facto less rational’.47 To summarize Taylor, rational explanation
is articulation on the basis of the simultaneous interpretation of logos as
both speech and reason. To articulate an account of something is to possess
a rational understanding of its inherent order. Therefore, articulation is to
give a rational account of the inherent order of the ‘something’ that is to be
explained. In this sense, articulation is collated with assertion as judgement,
where assertion can be described as: ‘a pointing-​out which gives something
a definite character and which communicates’.48 We can equate ‘articulation’
with ‘assertion’ or as ‘rational explanation’ as, for Taylor, articulation can be
said to be a rational explanation.
If articulation is understood to be logos as rational account, possess-
ing universal truth value, due to its explanatory power, then interpretation,
seen in a subjective and relativist manner, would be a weaker form of artic-
ulation characteristic of Taylor’s ‘atheoretical’ cultures. The first goal then,
is to interrogate Taylorian understanding of logos as rational account, to
argue that logos is best understood as ‘self-​revelation’ and self-​disclosure’.
Second, if logos is seen in this manner, then assertion as logos cannot be
a ‘rational account’ as Taylor envisioned it, rather as I argue, it possesses
the structure of an interpretation albeit as its limiting case. Third, I argue
that if assertion is the most basic form of articulation as its limiting case,
and assertion possesses the structure of interpretation then articulation too
possesses the structure of interpretation. Finally, I map the conceptual con-
nection between interpretation and understanding to reveal the inevitabil-
ity of the vicious ‘circle of understanding’ and argue that while the moment
of ‘explanation’ is one possible way to introduce ‘critique’ into the circle, a
better way is dialogical hermeneutics, which will be considered in the final
section.
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Articulation as narrative 141
Critique of logos as rational account
How did Heidegger and Aurobindo understand ‘logos’ and how is it differ-
ent from the Taylorian understanding of ‘logos as rational account’? We saw
Taylor, interpreting Plato, argue that articulation as logos is understood as the-
oretical discourse from a disengaged perspective that gives a rational account
of something-​as-​it-​is. Here, logos is interpreted as ‘theoretical contemplation’
or ‘thinking’ that in its disengagement from what it seeks to explain gives a
rational account.
In light of Heidegger, we can locate Taylor’s account of ‘logos as think-
ing’, as originating in the Platonic-​Aristotelian schools, where ‘being as idea’
became an object of scientific knowledge (epistēmē). However, Heidegger
terms this identification of thinking with logos as a ‘misinterpretation’ and
an ‘absurdity’, thus ‘we just have to free ourselves from the opinion that logos
and legein originally and authentically mean thinking, understanding, and
reason’.49 Heidegger asks, if logos does not mean thinking, what does it mean?
He answers –​while it means word and discourse, originally, for the Greeks,
it had nothing to do with language but meant ‘gathering’ or ‘interrelation’
or ‘relationship’. It was seen originally and unitarily as the same with being
(phusis), and interpreting Heraclitus he defines it as  –​‘the gatheredness of
beings themselves’. Heidegger gives two final characteristics of the Heraclitan
logos –​(a) only if logos as being opens itself up does vocabulary become word
and the apprehension of the ‘self opening of Being of beings’ is to rule the
word, particularly by poets and thinkers, and (b) if being as logos is gathering
then to it also belongs ‘rank and dominion’.
Aurobindo wrote seven articles on the philosophy of Heraclitus for the
Arya, which later were put together as a book. Although this work begins as
a response to Ranade’s ‘treatise’50 on Heraclitus, Aurobindo develops it as a
presentation of Heraclitus’ philosophy in comparison with Vedānta. In the his-
tory of Greek thought, Heraclitus (521–​480 BCE), according to Aurobindo,
belonged to the period of transition between the age of the mystics and that
of philosophic rationalism.51 He is said to have inherited two intellectual tra-
ditions, first, the wisdom tradition of the poets and the sages (mystic tradi-
tion) and second, the technical and scientific tradition, which developed in
Miletus in the sixth century BCE.52 Echoing Aurobindo, Kahn argues that
the originality of Heraclitus can be fully appreciated only when his historical
position and his role as a sage are ‘clearly seen as a bridge between these two
traditions’.53 This is precisely why, for both Aurobindo and Heidegger, the
logos of Heraclitus differs from that of the Platonic-​Aristotelian schools.
But how did Aurobindo understand the Heraclitian logos? Similar to
Heidegger’s ‘rank and dominion’, Aurobindo interprets logos as ‘power’
(kata ton logon), which ‘determines’ everything (being) and ‘fixes their meas-
ures’. Thus, while logos is not ‘an inconscient reason in things’ but, as ‘Zeus’,
is an originary ‘force’ and ‘intelligence’ which is the ‘origin and master of
things’, it is neither ‘identical in its nature with the human reason’ as that
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142  Articulation as narrative

would make it ‘relative and partial’, rather it is an ‘absolute reason therefore
combining and managing all the relativities of the many’. In the midst of
this uncanny resemblance, there is also an interesting contrast between the
Aurobindonian and Heideggerian interpretation of logos in Philo’s appro-
priation of the Heraclitian logos as part of his doctrine of creation. While for
Heidegger, ‘a world separates all this from Heraclitus’, for Aurobindo, Philo
was ‘justified in deducing’ from Heraclitus, ‘his interpretation of the logos as
“the divine dynamic, the energy and the self-​revelation of God” ’.54 However,
even in this disagreement, there is a similarity, as Aurobindo, after drawing
the connection between Philo and Heraclitus, concludes that Philo’s deriva-
tion, while it is legitimate, might not have been part of Heraclitus’ conscious
thought: ‘Heraclitus might not so have phrased it, might not have seen all that
his thought contained, but it does contain this sense when his different sayings
are fathomed and put together in their consequences’. This development of
Heraclitus in Philo strengthens Aurobindo’s own conception of existence as
Brahman:

We get very near the Indian conception of Brahman, the cause, origin
and substance of all things, an absolute Existence whose nature is con-
sciousness (Chit) manifesting itself as Force (Tapas, Shakti) and moving
in the world of his own being as the Seer and Thinker, kavir manīṣī, an
immanent Knowledge-​Will in all, vijñānamaya puruṣa, who is the Lord or
Godhead, Īś, Īśvara, deva, and has ordained all things according to their
nature from years sempiternal, –​Heraclitus’ ‘measures’ which the Sun is
forced to observe, his ‘things are utterly determined’. This Knowledge-​
Will is the Logos.55

Comparing it to the spermatikos of the Stoics, Aurobindo argues that logos as

vijñāna ‘sees things, not as the human reason sees them in parts and pieces, in
separated and aggregated relations, but in the original reason of their existence
and law of their existence, their primal and total truth’.56 From this, are we
to conclude that vijñāna as characteristic of Brahman or the superconscient
belongs to the divine and is unavailable for human beings? Aurobindo replies
with a negative, that through vijñāna, the Vedic seers, in similar-​dissimilar
ways to Heraclitus ‘believed that men also could become truth-​conscious,
enter into the divine Reason and Will and by the Truth become immortals,
anthrōpoi athanatoi’.57 So, how does vijñāna play a role in this transformation?
In the Aurobindonian schema, this picks up from the manas-​buddhi mecha-
nism that was explored above (Chapter 3). He argues that while manas-​buddhi
‘even in their highest’ continue to be ‘reflection in mental identifications’, there
is a need to go beyond if one were to attain ‘supreme self-​existent identity’.
In order to do that, he locates manas-​buddhi within his larger evolutionary
schema as a mediator between the subconscient All (Life) and the super-
conscient All (Light). If in the subconscient, knowledge, or consciousness
is involved as action, then in the superconscient, he argues, action re-​enters
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Articulation as narrative 143
into Light and no longer contains ‘involved knowledge’ but is itself contained
in a supreme consciousness. Intuitional knowledge58 (vijñāna) is that which
is common to both of them and the foundation of intuitional knowledge
(vijñāna) is conscious or effective identity between that which knows and
that which is known; it is that state of common self-​existence in which the
knower and the known are one through knowledge. Vijñāna or intuition, for
Aurobindo, primarily represents the ideas of revelation or dṛṣṭi equivalent to
sight and inspiration or śrúti, representing the two ends of ‘divine-​human’ in
the evolutionary schema. Interestingly there is a similar idea, ‘sight’ (sicht)
in Heidegger, which could be seen as an equivalent to vijñāna as ‘intuitive’
knowledge by identity. For Heidegger, ‘Dasein is this sight equiprimordially’
in being with the world (through concern), others (as solicitude), and Being
as such. He states that the ‘sight’ directed at the ‘whole of existence’ is called
‘transparency’ designating ‘knowledge of the Self’, where the Self is not ‘a
point’ but rather ‘the full disclosedness of Being-​in-​the-​world throughout all
the constitutive items which are essential to it’.59 The idea of primordial sight
is common to Aurobindo and Heidegger, as embracing all of existence, and
in this sicht and dṛṣṭi is knowledge by identity. But how does it work out for
Aurobindo? He argues that the subconscient intuition is manifested in action,
in effectivity, and the ‘conscious identity’ is more or less concealed in the
action. On the contrary, in the superconscient, ‘light being the law and the
principle, the intuition (vijñāna) manifests itself in its true nature as knowl-
edge emerging out of conscious identity’.60 But how is this gulf between the
subconscient and superconscient to be bridged, or how is man to become
immortal, anthrōpoi athanatoi? Aurobindo asserts that buddhi and manas
as intermediaries between the subconscient and the superconscient in their
engagement with vijñāna ‘liberate knowledge out of its imprisonment in the
act and prepare it to resume its essential primacy’.61 But what is the mecha-
nism that brings about this transformation and conversion? Aurobindo gives
a three-​part description: (a) when the knowledge by identity is extended to
metaphysical truths, in that the self-​awareness in the manas is applied to both
own-​self and other-​self (subject and object), (b) it results in ‘luminous self-​
manifest identity’ and at this intersection (c) buddhi or ‘reason also converts
itself into the form of the self-​luminous intuitional knowledge [vijñāna]’.62
With this, he concludes that at this point the manas or the mind fulfils itself
in the supramental and is the highest possible state of our knowledge. In
Aurobindo’s interpretation of the Vedānta, this is the ‘schema of the human
understanding upon which the conclusions of the most ancient Vedanta were
built’.63
Thus, we have seen how Taylor’s Platonic logos as thinking or theoreti-
cal understanding is critiqued in both Aurobindo and Heidegger, by their
going before Plato to Heraclitus, in whose writing logos originated. Herein,
logos and the Aurobindonian vijñāna entail the notion of ‘gatheredness of
being’ with rank and power, in which the subject–​object distinctions are
obliterated and only in its ‘self-​opening’ and ‘self-​revelation’ does logos
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144  Articulation as narrative

become language and a self-​expression. This interpretation of logos offers
a critique of the Taylorian interpretation of logos as rational account. But
this begs the question of how then should assertion as rational account be
understood?

Assertion: language and reality

The Taylorian articulation presupposes a correspondence between language
and reality. For Taylor, ‘real knowledge’ of something is to ‘give an account’ of
it, in other words, to ‘say clearly what the matter in question is’ or ‘to formu-
late things in language’, which is to make an ‘assertion’ about reality. By ‘real
knowledge’, Taylor means rational or scientific knowledge that claims to be
absolute and true. Flood elucidates the Taylorian position of ‘correspondence
between statements and reality’ logically through the bi-​conditional statement
‘S is true if and only if P’, where S stands for statements and P for reality.
If assertions that correspond to reality are termed as scientific knowledge,
then assertion is central to scientific rationality. However, Flood is quick to
point out that the universality of truth assertions are contested by Foucault,
MacIntyre, and Milbank.64 Before I  engage with the validity of universal
truth assertions, I need to consider the relationship between statements and
reality or the nature of ‘assertions’. In this section, I begin by exploring the
Aurobindonian critique of truth-​assertions to be ‘real knowledge’ and draw
implications from it for the debate between explanation and understanding.
To state the argument: while the claim of assertions, particularly about the
‘whole of existence’ (we will use the term ‘existence’ from now on), to be ‘real
knowledge’ is rejected, assertion itself is argued to be a derivative of interpre-
tation being its limiting case.65 Both Aurobindo and Heidegger offer a critique
of the claim of assertions to be true knowledge, although from very different
starting points.
For Aurobindo, as we saw above, true knowledge is ‘intuitional knowl-
edge’, which is ‘knowledge by identity’ mediated through vijñāna. Therefore,
in light of the manas-​buddhi-​vijñāna mechanism, language does not appear to
play any role in the Aurobindonian schema of knowledge. In fact, there is a
strong critique of language as inadequate to formulate intuitional knowledge
particularly about the Absolute or Brahman. He argues:

it is ineffable by a mind-​created speech; it is describable neither by our

negations, neti neti, –​for we cannot limit it by saying it is not this, it is not
that, –​nor by our affirmations, for we cannot fix it by saying it is this, it
is that, iti iti.66

He refers to it as the ‘ordinary tongue of metaphysical thought’, which only

offers a ‘distant indication, an approximation by abstractions’, a ‘kind of
speech which suits out method of logical and rational understanding’ but
‘which only speaks of the reality but does not express it’.67
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Articulation as narrative 145
Aurobindo offers two critiques of language’s claim to formulate real-
ity: first, there is a conclusive rejection of all forms of assertions, both affirm-
ative and negative, to describe existence. Both neti (it is not this) (–​S) and iti
(it is this) (S), positively and negatively, are examples of a ‘categorical state-
ment’, which has the structure of the simplest limiting case of an assertion.
Aurobindo argues that these assertions (–​S, S) are unable to give ‘real knowl-
edge’ about existence (P). This claim of Aurobindo is in direct conflict with
the Taylorian claim. What is Aurobindo’s justification for this claim? He gives
an example. Aurobindo questions: how is it possible for both –​S and S to be
true of P? The logic of the bi-​conditional statement ‘S is true if and only if P’
breaks down if both –​S and S are true for P. He contends that to say existence
is ‘none of these things’ and at the same time to say that existence is ‘all these
things’ is only the problem of the ‘undue finiteness’ of ‘verbal expression’,
whereas in reality there is none. He gives an example of a categorical state-
ment with a predicative that can be reconstructed as –​Existence is courage
(S) and Existence is not courage (–​S). He argues that it would be absurd to
affirm courage as existence and equally absurd to deny the ‘capacity of the
Absolute to put forth courage’ as self-​expressions in its manifestation.68 The
reason being, ‘courage’ is a ‘quality’, which is put forth from itself by exist-
ence; however, existence itself cannot be defined as a quality of courage and
that we cannot even say that it is a characteristic feature of existence. This
is what Aurobindo calls the ‘logic of the infinite’. This view of whole–​part
or one–​many is in line with Rāmānuja’s doctrine of bhedābheda-​vāda in his
Viśiṣṭādvaita Vedānta. For Rāmānuja, while each self is non-​different (abheda)
from and a part (aṃśa) of its cause, which is the partless or whole Brahman, the
Brahman does not undergo the suffering and impurity that the self undergoes.
Therefore, the relationship between the part (self) and the whole (Brahman)
in the Brahma-​Sūtra propounds a form of holism, which King argues is ‘remi-
niscent in some respects of the Nyāya-​Vaiśeṣika view that a whole (avayavin)
is a separate reality over and above its constituent parts’.69 Thus, while the
Brahman transcends the sum of its parts, it also wholly indwells each of its
parts. Finally, Aurobindo contends that assertions are ‘abstract conceptions’
or formal constructions unable to describe something that is not abstract, but
rather what is ‘living and intensely real’. He argues that the abstractions ‘get
fixed into differentiating concepts with sharp lines between them; but the real-
ity is not of that nature; its aspects are many but shade off into each other’.
He concludes with this caution, that the ‘intellectual representation’ necessary
for a ‘philosophical enquiry’ into existence is only an attempt to represent
truth in ‘abstract symbols, as if in a cubist art of thought-​speech, in geometric
figure’, but to ‘express it completely there is needed a concrete experience and
a more living and full-​bodied language’.70 In other words, formal assertions
that seek to describe or define existence are unable to capture the phenom-
enon in its entirety.
Heidegger’s critique of ‘assertions’, while it follows a different route, not
only is similar to Aurobindo’s critique of assertions, but also arrives at a similar
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146  Articulation as narrative

conclusion. However, Heidegger’s critique of assertion, takes us directly back
to the debate between explanation and understanding. The primary goal of
Heidegger’s critique of ‘assertion’ is to show that it is not only a derivative
of interpretation, but also its limiting case. In other words, all assertions are
primarily interpretations. If this can be proved, then we can legitimately claim
that all articulations are necessarily interpretations. Then it would be left for us
to draw its implications for the explanation–​understanding debate. Heidegger
proves this both negatively and positively. Negatively, he demonstrates that
assertion is ontologically inadequate and therefore cannot be more originary
than interpretation, even if that is how it was considered from ancient ontol-
ogy onwards. Positively, he shows that assertion necessarily entails the three-​
part structure of interpretation as its existential foundation.
I will first recount, as pointed out by Heidegger, how assertion is onto-
logically inadequate. Heidegger traces back ancient ontology’s understanding
of logos as assertion and demonstrates how that understanding is ontologi-
cally inadequate. This has resonance with Aurobindo’s critique of logos as
reason and his interpretation of it as vijñāna. The argument is technical but it
is worth pursuing, as it will intensify our overall critique of scientific explana-
tion that is articulated in assertions.71
In ancient ontology, logos was taken to be present-​at-​hand as an entity,
just as things, for any sequence of words –​thus, logos is ‘the Being-​present-​
at-​hand-​together of several words’. Logos, according to Plato, is always logos
tinos, ‘logos of something’, therefore, it is both ‘synthesis and diaeresis’, or that
it contains the unity of formal structures of ‘binding and separating’. How
does ‘binding and separating’ work in ‘logos of something’? In a phenomenon
when something is understood as something, while it is taken together in the
understanding, it is simultaneously taken apart in ‘articulating it interpreta-
tively’. In other words, understanding being an ontological existentiale for
Heidegger, the synthesis is between the understanding subject and the object
understood, thus bypassing the subject–​object distinction, while, because the
articulation of that understanding is interpretation, in diaeresis, the interpre-
tation is linguistically separated, while continuing to be part of the same phe-
nomenon. However, when this existential source of ‘synthesis and diaeresis’ is
veiled, then the analysis of logos collapses into a ‘superficial’ theory of judge-
ment where ‘binding and separating’ becomes invisible and only the linguistic
‘representations and concepts’ are seen as corresponding to the object being
understood, in other words, logos is reduced to verbal assertion, which does
not do justice to the ontology of the phenomenon.
Even if assertion is ontologically inadequate, how is it derived from inter-
pretation? A  clue is already given in the above critique of its ontological
inadequacy. Heidegger demonstrates it in two ways: first, that assertion has
its origin in interpretation and second, that every assertion entails in it the
structure of interpretation thus being its limiting case. Heidegger takes a
categorical statement –​‘the hammer is heavy’ –​similar to Aurobindo’s neti
and iti, as an example of assertion. He begins by showing how primordial
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Articulation as narrative 147
interpretation is not an assertion or ‘theoretical statement’, rather is an
‘action of circumspective concern’ consisting of phrases such as ‘too heavy’
or even actions without words. However, when the entity, the hammer,
becomes an ‘object of assertion’, then it undergoes a modification in its fore-​
having, where it changes from being ready-​to-​hand, with which we do or per-
form to about which the assertion is made. In so doing, it is cut off from the
environmentality, within which it finds its significance and dwindles to the
structure of present-​at-​hand or an object. Thus, Heidegger concludes, asser-
tion cannot deny its ontological origin in interpretation. This thesis is further
strengthened when he demonstrates that assertion possesses the conceptual
structure of interpretation. Heidegger defines ‘assertion’ as ‘a pointing-​out
which gives something a definite character and which communicates’, and
argues that the justification for taking ‘assertion as a mode of interpreta-
tion’ lies in the recurring of the ‘essential structures of interpretation’ in it.
Heidegger contends that the ‘pointing-​out’ of assertion is ‘not a free-​floating
kind of behaviour’, which is capable of ‘disclosing entities in general in a
primary way’, rather, on the contrary, based on Being-​in-​the-​world, it is
performed ‘on the basis of what has already been disclosed in understand-
ing or discovered circumspectively’. Seen in this manner, Heidegger argues
that assertion too requires fore-​having, fore-​sight, and fore-​conception, the
threefold structure of interpretation. Thus, we have seen both Aurobindo
and Heidegger share similarities in their critique of assertion as a rational
representation of existence. However, Heidegger’s critique brings the dis-
cussion back to interpretation and understanding, which is central to the
explanation–​understanding debate, with which we began.
To summarize the argument so far: first, we contended against the inter-
pretation of logos as rational account and argued for it to be interpreted as
the self-​expression of self-​gatheredness. Second, if logos is a self-​expression of
being-​in-​the-​world, then assertion as judgement, which is disconnected from
the phenomenon of being-​in-​the-​world from which it arose, is ontologically
inadequate. Finally, if assertion is a ‘pointing-​out’ that arises out of its exis-
tentiality of being-​in-​the-​world, it entails the threefold structure of interpre-
tation. So, in sum, it has been argued that assertion is an interpretation and
not a rational account. However, assertion is only one kind of articulation,
although Taylor equated articulation to assertion, for as discourse, it also
consists of other expressions. So the next question is –​how is articulation as
discourse connected to interpretation? This will lead to how interpretation is
related to understanding.

‘Articulation as interpretation’ and understanding

Heidegger states, ‘that which is understood gets articulated when the entity
to be understood is brought close interpretatively by taking as our clue the
“something as something” (as-​structure); and this articulation lies before our
making any thematic assertion about it’.72 Therefore, while ‘articulation’ is
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148  Articulation as narrative

being distinguished from ‘thematic’ or ‘rational’ assertion, it is being equated
with ‘interpretation’. In other words, articulation is termed as an interpre-
tation of ‘something as something’. If Heidegger is equating articulation
with interpretation, then how does he understand interpretation? There are
a constellation of concepts that need to be clarified in the process of under-
standing interpretation, as Heidegger’s understanding of ‘interpretation’ is
built upon his understanding of ‘understanding’, which, in turn, is contin-
gent on the basic constitution of Dasein as ‘being-​in-​the-​world’. The purpose
here is to map out the conceptual connection between interpretation and
understanding.
For Heidegger, ‘understanding’ is a primordial existentiale that constitutes
the structure of being distinguished from a kind of cognizing like ‘explaining’,
which in comparison is an ‘existential derivative’ of ‘primary understanding’.
Thus, right at the start, Heidegger makes a distinction between understand-
ing and explanation, where the latter is seen as a derivative of the former.
But, what is ‘understanding’? Simply put, Heidegger states: ‘in the “for-​the-​
sake-​of-​which”, existing Being-​in-​the-​world is disclosed as such, and this
disclosedness we have called “understanding” ’.73 So, what does Heidegger
mean by ‘for-​the-​sake-​of-​which’ and its role in Dasein as ‘being-​in-​the-​world’?
Heidegger states that in existing, Dasein’s being-​in-​the-​world is ‘being-​in’ as
‘being-​there’ in that if ‘Dasein is its “there” ’ then it is the same as saying ‘the
world is “there” ’. In other words, Being-​in-​the-​world, synonymously entailing
‘being-​in’ and ‘being-​there’, circumvents the subject–​object dichotomy and
sees them as a whole. This is a reaction to the Platonic-​Aristotelian concep-
tion of being-​in-​the-​world.
Heidegger interprets Plato’s ‘doctrine of ideas’ to cause the separation
between subject and the world. The subject through theōria, or intuition,
‘looks’ at the world that contains the ideas and, thus, the subject is separated
from the world it is looking at and theōria is the act of looking, which articu-
lates the ideas in the world. Heidegger argues that this way of relating the
subject and the world with transcendence is not a correct rendition of the
state of affairs. He points out that in ‘Plato transcendence was not investi-
gated down to its genuine roots’ as it was seen between the subject and the
world, which, however, had to be seen as operational within the Dasein as
being-​in-​the-​world.74 Heidegger picks up his thesis from Plato’s ‘idea-​of-​the-​
good’ (ιδέα τον αγαθών), which lies ‘beyond the ideas’. Heidegger warns that
we should not read ‘good’ in our modern sense of ‘value’ or morals, but rather
to see the ‘idea-​of-​the-​good’, ‘which is beyond beings and the realm of ideas’
as the ‘for-​the-​sake-​of-​which’ (ον ένεκα) that transcends the ‘entirety of ideas’
and yet organizes them in their totality. Thus, the idea-​of-​the-​good (highest
idea) as the ‘for-​the-​sake-​of-​which’ or as the organizing principle, organizes
the entirety of the ideas by determining them and ‘gives them the form of
wholeness’ and this ‘wholeness’ of the ‘entirety of ideas’ is the ‘world’, which
is determined by the ‘for-​the-​sake-​of-​which’ or the highest idea, the idea-​of-​
the-​good: ‘World, as that to which Dasein transcends, is primarily defined by
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Articulation as narrative 149
the for-​the-​sake-​of-​which’. Here, Heidegger is more or less following Plato-​
Aristotle, but then he moves away from them:

But a for-​the-​sake-​of-​which, a purposiveness [Umwillen], is only possible

where there is a willing [Willen]. Now insofar as transcendence, being-​in-​
the-​world, constitutes the basic structure of Dasein, being-​in-​the-​world
must also be primordially bound up with or derived from the basic fea-
ture of Dasein’s existence, namely, freedom. Only where there is freedom
is there a purposive for-​the-​sake-​of, and only here is there world.75

In other words, if the highest idea as for-​the-​sake-​of-​which is the organizing

principle, then it cannot exist on its own; rather it has to be willed by a being,
which for Heidegger is Dasein’s willing in its freedom. We can see how ‘world’
seen as the ‘organized whole’ of beings is intrinsically connected with the
Dasein that organizes the world through its free willing. This is the mechanism
that holds the constitution of Dasein as being-​in-​the-​world together.
Now, to take this back into our discussion on ‘understanding’:  for
Heidegger, ‘in the “for-​the-​sake-​of-​which”, existing Being-​in-​the-​world is dis-
closed as such, and this disclosedness we have called “understanding” ’.76 So,
if for-​the-​sake-​of-​which is the organizing principle of the highest idea that
gives a totality of the world by the ‘willing’ of the Dasein, then the disclosure
of Dasein’s world in its entirety through its willing is ‘understanding’.
Heidegger argues that the disclosure of Dasein’s being-​in-​the-​world as
understanding is Dasein’s ‘potentiality-​for-​being’ in the world, in other words,
what ‘Dasein is in every case what it can be’. However, this ‘potentiality-​for-​
being’ is not ‘free-​floating’ but conditioned by both being-​in and being-​there
(its world) and, therefore, it has already got itself into definite possibilities.
Dasein’s pressing forward into possibilities is due to understanding’s exis-
tential structure of ‘projection’. The projecting of understanding, which dis-
closes the possibilities of ‘being-​in-​the-​world’, for Heidegger, existentially
constitutes ‘sight’. Heidegger uses the term ‘transparency’ for the sight, which
is primarily related to the whole of existence, which he designates as ‘knowl-
edge of the self’. In ‘understanding’ as ‘sight’, Dasein becomes transparent to
itself by revealing all the items that constitute it: being-​alongside the world
and being-​with others constitute the worldhood of its world.
Heidegger contends that this grounding of ‘sight’ in understanding
deprives both ‘intuition’ (empirical) and ‘thinking’ (rational theōria) of their
priority and makes them derivatives of understanding. In this projecting
of understanding upon its possibilities, understanding has its own possibil-
ity of developing itself, and it is this ‘development of understanding’ that
Heidegger calls ‘interpretation’. In interpretation, ‘understanding appropri-
ates understandingly that which is understood by it’.77 Interpretation is not
acquiring of information rather it is the ‘working-​out of possibilities pro-
jected in understanding’, thus, in interpretation, understanding becomes
itself. Interpretation brings explicitly to ‘sight’, through circumspection, the
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150  Articulation as narrative

significance of the world that is already constitutive of understanding. That
which is understood has an ‘as-​structure’ of ‘something as something’ and
this interpretation of ‘something as something’ is none other than ‘articula-
tion’, with which we began.
However, Heidegger argues that the ‘as’ does not ‘turn up for the first time’
here, rather as something already expressible, ‘it just gets expressed for the
first time’ in articulation. In other words, ‘the mere seeing of the Things which
are closest to us bears in itself the structure of interpretation’ in a primordial
sense and the problem lies in trying to ‘grasp something free … of the “as” ’.
There are no pure entities or objects, which are articulated in the Taylorian
sense of grasping of something as-​it-​is in its perspicuous order. Therefore,
Heidegger argues that while to think that ‘we have experienced something
purely present-​at-​hand, and then take it as a door, as a house’ would be to
misunderstand how ‘interpretation functions as disclosure’,78 it would be an
equal misunderstanding to disregard the role of ‘understanding and interpre-
tation’ in the articulation of the world. Heidegger interprets ‘interpretation’
as not throwing a ‘signification’ over ‘some naked thing which is present-​at-​
hand’, rather that ‘the thing in question already has an involvement which is
disclosed in our understanding of the world, and this involvement is the one
which gets laid out by the interpretation’.
Heidegger offers three foundations for articulation as interpretation. First,
in every case interpretation is always already grounded in ‘something we
have in advance –​in a fore-​having’. Second, interpretation is always already
grounded in ‘something we see in advance –​in a fore-​sight’. Finally, interpre-
tation is always already grounded in ‘something that we grasp in advance –​ in
a fore-​conception’. Thus, interpretation is never ‘a presuppositionless appre-
hending of something presented to us’. Heidegger takes the example of ‘tex-
tual interpretation’ and argues that everything the interpreter appeals to in
her interpretation of what ‘stands there’ in the text, is ‘nothing other than the
obvious undiscussed assumption [Vormeinung] of the person who does the
interpreting’.79 Thus, we can see that Heidegger privileges understanding as
constitutive of interpretation over explanation, which as assertion is seen as
derivative of originary interpretation so that ‘all explanation is thus rooted in
Dasein’s primary understanding’.

The vicious circle of understanding

However, there appears to be circularity here: all articulation seen as interpre-
tation, if it were to contribute to understanding, ‘must have already under-
stood what is to be interpreted’ and thus there appears to be a circulus vitiosus,
a vicious circle. So, the immediate question is, does this not open the ground
for the charge of relativism and subjectivism? Does this mean ‘anything goes’
as interpretation? First of all, these questions of critique already presuppose
a subject–​object distinction, in which the question is being asked from a posi-
tion that is distanced from the object that is being assumed to be described in
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Articulation as narrative 151
multiple ways, in order to choose one assertion over another. As we have seen
above, this Heidegger does not allow. But positively, Heidegger contends that
‘if we see this circle as a vicious one and look out for ways of avoiding it …
then the act of understanding has been misunderstood from the ground up’.80
First, as shown above, Heidegger too argues that the notion of a ‘definite
ideal of knowledge’ itself is ‘only a subspecies of understanding’ and, thus,
cannot escape the circle. So, second, Heidegger proposes that ‘what is decisive
is not to get out of the circle but to come into it in the right way’. Therefore,
the ‘circle of understanding’ is not ‘any random kind of knowledge’, rather an
expression of the ‘existential fore-​structure of Dasein itself’. Finally, the ‘cir-
cle of understanding’ is not to be reduced to a vicious circle, as in it is hidden:

A positive possibility of the most primordial kind of knowing [which

can be taken hold of when] we have understood that, our first, last, and
constant task is never to allow our fore-​having, fore-​sight, and fore-​
conception to be presented to us by fancies and popular conceptions,
but rather to make the scientific theme secure by working out these fore-​
structures in terms of the things themselves.81

But the question can still be asked, is the circle truly transgressed? Even if it
is possible primordially to know differently, as Heidegger claims, through the
working out of the fore-​structures in light of the scientific theme, especially in
light of different cultures, conditioned by different fore-​structures of their tra-
ditions, how are we to secure knowledge? To put it more bluntly, the ‘fancies
and popular conceptions’ of one culture can be held as ‘truth’ by another –​so
who is there to arbitrate? The Heideggerian subordination of epistemology
to ontology does not seem to secure the status of the human sciences. This is
precisely Ricoeur’s critique of Heidegger:

With Heidegger’s philosophy, we are always engaged in going back to

the foundations, but we are left incapable of beginning the movement of
return which would lead from the fundamental ontology to the properly
epistemological question of the status of the human sciences.82

Ricoeur’s pointing out that ‘a philosophy which breaks the dialogue with
the sciences is no longer addressed to anything but itself’ is insightful in two
ways: first, it brings the question of critique or explanation back into inter-
pretation. Second, in its use of ‘dialogue’ it points to the methodology of
how explanation should enter the ‘circle of understanding’. The first points
to the nature of interpretation as constitutive of both explanation and under-
standing, and the second demonstrates the modus operandi of how critique is
brought back into interpretation through dialogue.
One could say that the Gadamer-​Habermas debate was precisely on this
subject. On the one hand Gadamer, following Heidegger very closely, by reha-
bilitating the concepts of prejudice, authority, and tradition, argues that the
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152  Articulation as narrative

‘ground of … validity’ is secured by tradition. He contends that there is no
‘unconditional antithesis between tradition and reason’. It is the Romantic
understanding of tradition that views it in opposition to reason and thinks
of it as a passive transmission through generations –​this Gadamer calls tra-
ditionalism, of which he is critical. Gadamer’s argument is that the idea of
freedom and reason are built within tradition. He contends that tradition per-
sists only when it is preserved through being ‘affirmed, embraced, cultivated’,
however, ‘preservation is an act of reason’ even if it is inconspicuous.83 It is
only in the application of reason that tradition itself is preserved over time.
However, Gadamer’s ‘tradition’ does not escape Heidegger’s vicious ‘cir-
cle of understanding’ as the reason and rationality that are exercised already
presuppose a certain understanding supplied by the tradition. It was precisely
this point of Gadamer that was critiqued by Habermas through his ‘theory of
interests’ and critique of ideology from the critical sciences.
According to Habermas, all enquiry is directed by a variety of interests,
which he defines as the ‘basic orientations rooted in specific fundamental con-
ditions of the possible reproduction and self-​constitution of the species’.84
Habermas lists three interests  –​the technical/​instrumental interest of the
empirical-​analytic sciences, the practical/​ethical interest of the historical-​
hermeneutic sciences, and the emancipatory/​communicative interest of the
critical sciences.85 The last of these alone, Habermas argues, rather than seek-
ing to control nature or understand a cultural heritage, seeks to unearth the
interests at work in the other branches of enquiry:

Gadamer’s prejudice in favour of the legitimacy of prejudices (or pre-

judgments) validated by tradition is in conflict with the power of reflec-
tion, which proves itself in its ability to reject the claim of traditions.
Substantiality disintegrates in reflection, because the latter not only
confirms but breaks dogmatic forces. Authority and knowledge do not
converge.86

Beyond the circle: dialogical hermeneutics

It is into this Gadamer–​Habermas debate that Ricoeur enters with his ‘critical
hermeneutics’ and instead of taking sides, integrates them both by locating
the Habermasian ‘critique’ within Gadamerian philosophical hermeneutics.
He argues that if Gadamer put ‘tradition’ above ‘judgement’, then Habermas
put ‘reflection’ above ‘institutionalized constraints’.87 However, Habermas’
‘reflection’ cannot be detached from ‘hermeneutic presuppositions’ and
his critique of ideology is equally constitutive of tradition. Ricoeur puts it
bluntly: ‘critique is also a tradition’.88 And, he contends that, if hermeneu-
tics is to account for a ‘critical stance’ on its own premises, then it must go
beyond the explanation–​understanding dichotomy inherited from Dilthey.
Ricoeur, exploring the dialectic for a ‘strict complementarity and reciprocity
between explanation and interpretation’,89 argues that both ‘explanation and
  153

Articulation as narrative 153
understanding would be considered as relative moments in a complex process
that could be termed interpretation’.90 Ricoeur gives three illustrations to evi-
dence this claim –​the theory of texts, the theory of action, and the theory of
history. As this chapter is on ‘philosophy of history’, I will consider the theory
of history. Ricoeur claims that ‘history –​historiography –​is a kind of narra-
tive, a “true” narrative in comparison with mythical or fictional narratives’.
On the one hand, the understanding of history seen as ‘an extension of the
understanding of others’ thus involves the ‘self-​implication of the historian’
and her subjectivity. On the other hand, the ‘critical moment’ is constituted
in the use of ‘explanatory procedures’ of scientific history, belonging to the
Hemplian model, to ‘reconstruct the series of antecedents in accordance with
connections different from those of the motive and reasons alleged by the his-
torical actors’. So, should understanding and explanation be grafted together
in history by falling back on the notion of history as narrative? Ricoeur
argues that ‘a theory that bases understanding on the narrative element better
enables us to account for the passage from understanding to explanation’ as
explanation in a narrative ‘naturally serves to extend understanding’, where
understanding is taken as ‘the competence to follow a narrative’. In short,
‘explanation is what allows us to continue to follow a story when spontaneous
understanding is impeded’, by proceeding on ‘variable levels of generality,
regularity, and hence scientificity’.91
Although Ricoeur has successfully brought explanation and understand-
ing together as constitutive-​moments in interpretative-​narrative, the question
is  –​has he been able to overcome the vicious circle of understanding? For
Ricoeur, explanation proceeds either from a semiological model, in the case
of theory of texts, or system theory in the case of theory of action, or the
Hemplian deductive-​nomological model, grafted onto understanding of the
human sciences. What I want to point out is that the limitation of this account
is that while it claims to go beyond the nineteenth-​century opposition between
natural–​human sciences, it has replaced it with newer oppositions between
all the above-​mentioned newer scientific theories over against hermeneutics.
But the real problem lies in viewing knowledge as one whole, in which these
two sets of theories complement one another and complete each other. As far
as explanation and understanding are seen as ways of enquiry stemming out
of different historical traditions of enquiry, it will hold. However, Ricoeur’s
manner of bringing them together, as components of a single traditionary-​
narrative to produce a single narrative, which entails both understanding and
explanation as constitutive-​moments, is limiting. This is because while this
beautifully brings into dialogue understanding with explanation, it has no
space for any other form of enquiry, arising out of other traditions, such as
Aurobindo’s ‘knowledge by identity’. I  propose, following Flood, that each
of these enquiries must be seen as separate narratives stemming out of differ-
ent traditions.92 The critique against Habermas’ ‘critique’ will hold value for
any position of critique, in that all explanations can only come from another
tradition and not from a non-​space and is always mediated through dialogue.
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154  Articulation as narrative

The dialogue can proceed through mutual-​interrogation. What Ricoeur says
of narrative is applicable to tradition as well, that ‘a narrative [tradition] is
seldom self-​explanatory’ and, therefore, ‘summons questions, interrogation’.93
This can be fruitfully applied to dialogue between traditions, that traditions
are seldom self-​explanatory, thus summoning questions and interrogation
from the other. I  claim that this interrogation of/​by the other is a possible
means to go beyond the circle of self-​understanding. This possibility is found
in both Aurobindo and Heidegger. In Heidegger, it is found in the relation-
ship he maps between freedom (for-​the-​sake-​of-​which), the organizing prin-
ciple, and the world that it organizes. Heidegger refers to this freedom as the
‘willing’ of the Dasein, which basically holds together the Dasein’s world. In
dialogue, this free willing is extended, through an extended sight, to an ‘other’
and brings the ‘other’ into sight, into one’s own world and horizon and thus
creating the possibility of dialogue. Similarly, in Aurobindo’s knowledge by
identity, when the vijñāna sees the other and ‘identifies’ with it, it is in some
sense bringing the other into its own horizon and creating the possibility of
dialogue. Here, the ‘other’ can be any tradition, and not limited to explana-
tory science. Thus, I propose that the explanation–​understanding binary that
is seen as composing a ‘whole’ be exploded, and space created for any alien
other to enter and be part of the Dasein’s world, even if the question of ‘truth’
continues to linger on.

Summary
In this chapter, I  began by arguing that The Human Cycle is best under-
stood as philosophy of history, which possesses the conceptual structure of
a narrative. If the first aim of this book is to demonstrate that Aurobindo’s
integralism is a traditionary-​hermeneutical philosophy of religion, and
historical narrative provides the meaning-​structure of a tradition due it
being a ‘historically extended, socially embodied argument’, then I argue
that The Human Cycle as a historical narrative possessing a clear direc-
tion and teleology is a historically extended argument characteristic of
traditionary enquiry that provides the necessary meaning-​structure for
Aurobindo’s proposal of an eschatological spiritual age. The second aim
is to draw implications for the religious–​secular debate and in this chap-
ter I attend to the question about the nature of ‘religion’. I argue that the
problem lies in understanding ‘religion’ as a category and must instead be
seen as possessing a narrative structure, in other words, representation is
not to be seen in terms of categories but as articulation through narratives.
However, this shift from categories to articulation brought with it its own
set of problems –​the nature of articulation and its relationship to expla-
nation and understanding. If articulation is understood as logos, which
in turn is understood as assertion or a rational account, then I argue that
our understanding of logos is impoverished when it is narrowly seen as a
‘rational account’, and inspired by Heraclitus must be seen as a ‘gathering’
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Articulation as narrative 155
that expresses itself. Seen in this manner, I argue that assertion as logos is
no longer merely a rational account, but rather that it possesses the struc-
ture of interpretation. Once I had demonstrated that articulation is inter-
pretation, I argued that the debate between explanation and understanding
can be surpassed by positioning both as constitutive moments within
interpretation. However, this raises the problem of the vicious circle of
understanding due to its contingency on the fore-​structures. The resolution
of the vicious circle leads us to the third aim of developing a dialogical-​
hermeneutical approach for the study of religion. I argue that the circle can
be effectively transgressed through a dialogue with another tradition that
is operational through the mechanism of mutual interrogation. However,
until now, as I have largely focused on the textual nature of tradition, in the
next chapter the focus is shifted from text to practice or action.

Notes
1 Karl Lamprecht, Moderne Geschichtswissenschaft (Freiburg: Hermann Heyfelder,
1904).
2 Karl Lamprecht, What Is History? Five Lectures on the Modern Science of History,
trans. E.A. Andrews (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1905).
3 Aurobindo in the August 1916 issue of the Arya, which contains the first chapter
of The Human Cycle, mentions in a footnote the article by Salvadori as his source
for Lamprecht’s work.
4 Guglielmo Salvadori, “The Psychological Interpretation of History,” The
Hindustan Review 33, no. 201–​02 (1916).
5 R.G. Collingwood, The Idea of History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1973
(1946)), 176.
6 Ibid., 177.
7 David Bebbington, Patterns in History:  A  Christian Perspective on Historical
Thought (Leicester, UK: Apollos, 1990), 110.
8 Lamprecht, What Is History? Five Lectures on the Modern Science of History,
176–​77.
9 Salvadori, “The Psychological Interpretation of History.”
10 Tilton too argues that Lamprecht was the first to systematically use the prin-
ciples of socio-​ psychic method for historical studies. Asa Currier Tilton,
“Review: Lamprecht: What Is History,” The American Historical Review 11, no. 1
(1905).
11 Sri Aurobindo, “The Human Cycle,” in The Human Cycle, the Ideal of Human
Unity, War and Self-​ Determination (Pondicherry:  Sri Aurobindo Ashram
Publication Department, 1962 (1949)), 6.
12 Lamprecht, What Is History? Five Lectures on the Modern Science of History, 209.
13 Aurobindo, “The Human Cycle,” 5.
14 Ibid., 6.
15 Lamprecht, What Is History? Five Lectures on the Modern Science of History, 178.
16 This has resonance with Collingwood’s understanding of history as the enact-
ment of the agent’s mind in the mind of the historian. It also has resonance with
Spengler’s view that each culture, age and epoch had its own understanding and
self-​expression. Collingwood, The Idea of History, 282; Oswald Spengler, The
Decline of the West (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991 (1918)), 14–​17.
17 Bebbington, Patterns in History: A Christian Perspective on Historical Thought, 17.
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156  Articulation as narrative

18 Michael Stanford, An Introduction to the Philosophy of History (Oxford: Blackwell
Publishers, 1998), 4.
19 Ibid., 5.
20 Paul Ricoeur, “The Narrative Function,” in Hermeneutics and the Human Sciences
(Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1981), 288.
21 Ibid., 275.
22 Ibid., 276–​77.
23 Paul Ricoeur, “On Interpretation,” in From Text to Action: Essays in Hermeneutics,
vol. 2 (London: Continuum, 1991), 3–​4.
24 Ibid., 4.
25 Ibid., 5.
26 Ricoeur, “The Narrative Function,” 277.
27 Hans-​Georg Gadamer, Truth and Method, trans. Joel Weinsheimer and Donald G.
Marshall (London: Continuum, 1975), 178.
28 Aurobindo, “The Human Cycle,” 5.
29 Paul Ricoeur, Time and Narrative, trans. Kathleen Blamey and David Pellauer,
vol. 3 (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1988), 221.
30 Alasdair MacIntyre, After Virtue (London: Duckworth, 1981 (2007)), 223.
31 Alasdair MacIntyre, Whose Justice? Which Rationality? (London:  Duckworth,
1988), 8.
32 Gadamer, Truth and Method, 285.
33 Timothy Fitzgerald, “A Critique of “Religion” as a Cross-​Cultural Category,”
Method and Theory in the Study of Religion 9, no. 2 (1997); Timothy Fitzgerald,
The Ideology of Religious Studies (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000).
34 Wilfred Cantwell Smith, The Meaning and End of Religion:  A  Revolutionary
Approach to the Great Religious Traditions (New York: Harper & Row, 1962), 50.
35 Fitzgerald, The Ideology of Religious Studies, 22.
36 Ibid., 8.
37 Andrew M. McKinnon, “Sociological Definitions, Language, Games, and the
‘Essence’ of Religion,” Method and Theory in the Study of Religion 14, no. 1
(2002): 77.
38 Ibid., 71.
39 Timothy Fitzgerald, “Playing Language Games and Performing Rituals: Religious
Studies as Ideological State Apparatus,” Method and Theory in the Study of
Religion 15, no. 3 (2003): 217.
40 Brian K. Pennington, Was Hinduism Invented? (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2005), 14–​15.
41 Jeppe Sinding Jensen, “Is a Phenomenology of Religion Possible? On the Ideas
of a Human and Social Science of Religion,” Method and Theory in the Study of
Religion 5, no. 2 (1993): 123.
42 MacIntyre, After Virtue, 204.
43 Gavin Flood, Beyond Phenomenology: Rethinking the Study of Religion (London:
Cassell, 1999), 12.
44 Ibid., 50.
45 Paul Ricoeur, “What Is a Text? Explanation and Understanding,” in From Text to
Action: Essays in Hermeneutics, vol. 2 (London: Continuum, 1991), 106.
46 Wilhelm Dilthey, “The Development of Hermeneutics,” in Selected Writings,
ed. Hans Peter Rickman (Cambridge, UK:  Cambridge University Press, 1976
(1900)), 247.
47 Charles Taylor, “Rationality,” in Rationality and Relativism, ed. Martin Hollis and
Steven Lukes (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1982), 89–​90.
48 Martin Heidegger, Being and Time, trans. John Macquarrie and Edward Robinson
(New York: Harper & Row, 1962 (1926)), 199.
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Articulation as narrative 157
49 Martin Heidegger, Introduction to Metaphysics (New Haven, CT: Yale University
Press, 2000), 130.
50 Though we are not able to locate the particular treatise of Ranade that Aurobindo
read, we do have a chapter published by Ranade in 1953 in a volume on ‘History
of Philosophy’. In this work he has a section on Heraclitus and in his bibliogra-
phy we find the mention of Aurobindo’s Heraclitus. It is interesting to note that
Ranade in this work refers to Heraclitus as a mystic, a view he had rejected (which
was critiqued by Aurobindo) in his earlier work. R.D. Ranade, “Pre-​Socrates,”
in History of Philosophy Eastern and Western, ed. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan
(London: George Allen & Unwin, 1953).
51 Sri Aurobindo, “Heraclitus,” in Essays in Philosophy and Yoga, ed. Sri Aurobindo,
The Complete Works of Sri Aurobindo (Pondicherry:  Sri Aurobindo Ashram,
1998 (1910–​1950)), 220.
52 Charles H. Kahn, The Art and Thought of Heraclitus: An Edition of the Fragments
with Translation and Commentary (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press,
1979), 9.
53 Ibid., 10.
54 Heidegger, Introduction to Metaphysics, 143; Aurobindo, “Heraclitus,” 250. In
spite of strong similarities, there are differences between the Aurobindonian and
Heideggerian interpretations of Heraclitus. Another example is that Heidegger
does not mention Heraclitus’ allusion to the Greek gods, which is central to
Aurobindo’s reading of Heraclitus as analogous to Vedānta.
55 Aurobindo, “Heraclitus,” 250–​51.
56 Ibid., 251.
57 Ibid.
58 Aurobindo is not happy to use ‘intuition’ as a translation for vijñāna. In a footnote
he states, ‘I use the word “intuition” for want of a better. In truth, it is make-
shift and inadequate to the connotation demanded of it.’ Sri Aurobindo, The Life
Divine (Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust, 2006 (1914–​1919)), 72.
59 Heidegger, Being and Time, 186–​87.
60 Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 72.
61 Ibid.
62 In Aurobindo’s understanding this is possible, because there is a strong corre-
sponding connection between human buddhi and divine vijñāna. Aurobindo, The
Life Divine, 66–​77. See the table in Chapter 4, note 43.
63 This entire section has been an attempt to summarize most of Aurobindo’s chap-
ter, “The Methods of Vedantic Knowledge,” in Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 66–​77.
64 Gavin Flood, The Importance of Religion:  Meaning and Action in Our Strange
World (Oxford: Wiley-​Blackwell, 2012), 138.
65 A limiting case is an extreme case, one extreme or the other. For example, the lim-
iting case of the ellipse is a circle and a straight line. When an ellipse is stretched
out it becomes a line and when it is pressed in it becomes a circle. Another way of
looking at it is in philosophy of science, where Popper and Putnam have argued
that a limiting case is a successor theory that entails the ‘theoretical laws and
mechanisms of the predecessor theory as limiting cases’. In our case of assertion
and interpretation, we are arguing that assertion is the limiting case of interpreta-
tion, meaning, as an extreme case of interpretation while it retains the charac-
teristics of interpretation it has also been significantly modified. T. McGrew, M.
Alspector-​Kelly, and F. Allhoff, Philosophy of Science: An Historical Anthology
(Oxford: Wiley-​Blackwell, 2009), 615–​16.
66 Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 336–​37.
67 Ibid., 337–​38.
68 Ibid., 349.
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158  Articulation as narrative

69 Richard King, Indian Philosophy: An Introduction to Hindu and Buddhist Thought
(Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1999), 221–​22.
70 Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 372–​73.
71 The following is an exposition of the section entitled “Assertion as a Derivative
Mode of Interpretation,” in Heidegger, Being and Time, 195–​203.
72 Ibid., 190.
73 Ibid., 182.
74 Martin Heidegger, The Metaphysical Foundations of Logic, trans. Michael Heim
(Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press., 1984 (1978)), 184.
75 Ibid., 185.
76 Heidegger, Being and Time, 182.
77 Ibid., 188.
78 Ibid., 190.
79 Ibid., 191–​92.
80 Ibid., 194.
81 Ibid., 195.
82 Paul Ricoeur, “The Task of Hermeneutics,” in Hermeneutics and the Human Sciences,
ed. John B. Thompson (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1981), 59.
83 Gadamer, Truth and Method, 282.
84 Jürgen Habermas, Knowledge and Human Interests (Boston, MA: Beacon Press,
1971), 196.
85 For a detailed exposition, see Robert Peter Badillo, The Emancipative Theory of
Jürgen Habermas and Metaphysics (Washington, DC:  Council for Research in
Values and Philosophy, 1991).
86 Jürgen Habermas, On the Logic of the Social Sciences (Cambridge, MA:  MIT
Press, 1988), 170.
87 Paul Ricoeur, “Hermeneutics and the Critique of Ideology,” in From Text to Action:
Essays in Hermeneutics, vol. 2 (London: Continuum, 1991), 282.
88 Ibid., 298.
89 Ricoeur, “What Is a Text? Explanation and Understanding,” 106.
90 Paul Ricoeur, “Explanation and Understanding,” in From Text to Action: Essays
in Hermeneutics, vol. 2 (London: Continuum, 1991), 122.
91 Ibid., 134–​38.
92 Flood talks about emic/​etic enquiries or insider and outsider modes of enquiry in
the study of religion. The insider enquiries are internal to tradition while the out-
sider enquiries refer to sociological and scientific modes of enquiry. Flood, Beyond
Phenomenology: Rethinking the Study of Religion, 138–​39.
93 Ricoeur, “Explanation and Understanding,” 137.

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162

6 
The Synthesis of Yoga
Action, yoga, and tradition

Introduction
In this chapter, I read Aurobindo’s The Synthesis of Yoga (from now on The
Synthesis) with one eye on how he develops his project of purna-​yoga, and
with the other on how the relationship between ascetic action and tradition
draws implications for the study of religion. I outline the internal structure
of Aurobindo’s purna-​yoga even as he brings three traditions of Classical,
Brahmanical and Tantric yoga conceptually together by knitting haṭha, rāja,
karma, gyāna, bhakti, and tantra into a single system which I argue is at the
heart of The Synthesis.
With regard to the threefold aim of this book, I argue with respect to her-
meneutics of tradition that ascetic practice consisting of an apprentice/​master
relationship, telos and rationality possesses the structure of tradition. With
regard to the study of religion, I argue that representations of ‘actions and
practices’ can legitimately be termed ‘religious’ because the representation of
action in language is part of the larger circle of mimesis, according to which
it is the pre-​figuration in action (religious) that is con-​figured in language and
in the construction of texts which through the act of reading is further re-​
configured into action (religious). While this overcomes a ‘representational’
view of language, it also reveals the mechanism underlying the transmission
of traditionary material in the relationship between action, knowledge, and
passion. Finally, with regard to dialogical hermeneutics, while in the last
chapter I argued for dialogue as interrogation of the other, here I argue that
the knowing of an ‘other’ requires concrete inhabiting of the other which is
achieved through participation in the other’s practices.
Although Aurobindo left his legacy as a politician and a philosopher, his pri-
mary contribution has been claimed to be in the field of yoga –​its philosophy
and practice –​developed out of his personal spiritual experiences.1 He was not
only a practicing yogi, but also wrote voluminously on its philosophy. His writ-
ings on yoga have been collected and compiled primarily into four volumes. The
Record of Yoga is a compilation from Aurobindo’s personal diary that recorded
his yogic experiences between 1909 and 1927, although it was regularly main-
tained only between 1912 and 1920.2 Letters on Yoga (three volumes) contains
  163

Action, yoga, and tradition 163

the letters, classified into different subjects, written by Aurobindo to sādhakas
responding to their queries in their sādhanā.3 The book Essays in Philosophy
and Yoga is a collection of short prose works written between 1909 and 1950
on ‘spiritual philosophy, yoga and related subjects’.4 However, Aurobindo’s
chief volume on the philosophy of yoga, the work that is also the focus of this
meditation, is The Synthesis, which was written serially for the monthly review
Arya between August 1914 and January 1921, when it was abandoned and left
incomplete with the discontinuation of the Arya. It was never published as a
book during the lifetime of Aurobindo, but was published for the first time as a
book by the Sri Aurobindo International University Centre in 1955.5
The justification for the choice of The Synthesis over the other volumes
is several: first, although it is written serially, as all of his other main works
were, it still is his most systematic work on yoga as the other three volumes
are compilations of diary entries, letters, and essays respectively. Second, The
Synthesis contains an account of the new approach to yoga developed by
Aurobindo known as purna-​yoga or integral yoga; as Chaudhuri argues ‘the
fundamental principles of integral yoga have been set forth by Sri Aurobindo
in his The Synthesis of Yoga’.6 Finally, The Synthesis is not a mere descrip-
tive statement of yogic methods and systems or an account of yogic experi-
ences, both of which have been done by Aurobindo in other volumes, but is an
attempt to provide the philosophy behind purna-​yoga. Aurobindo reflectively
wrote about The Synthesis that its preoccupation was meant to be with ‘a
deep study of the principles underlying the methods rather than with a pop-
ular statement of methods and disciplines’,7 although it does contain brief
descriptions of the different yogic methods, such as raja-​yoga and haṭha-​yoga,
including a brief mentioning of the Sapta Chatusthaya, the seven-​quaternary
system of yoga that Aurobindo both practised and was developing as the
unique method that would achieve his yogic goals.8
What approach should then be used to study Aurobindo’s philosophy of
yoga? There is not even one full-​length secondary work on The Synthesis
although there are several shorter pieces on its key themes. First, The
Synthesis will have to be studied against the backdrop of the rich historical
yoga traditions from which it borrows, transforms, and integrates. That would
be an interesting study because even though Aurobindo was locating his work
within the yoga traditions and using their defining texts as his basis, he explic-
itly questioned the continual authority of these texts. Furthermore, a delib-
erate move to distance his work from any particular tradition can be clearly
observed. Second, a study of The Synthesis will have to take into account the
Neo-​Vedānta tradition of the nineteenth century of which it was a part, even
if explicit engagement with the work of Ramakrishna, Vivekananda, or any
other Neo-​Vedantin is rare. Finally, although these different discourses on
yoga are important for the study of The Synthesis, and will be engaged with,
we must not forget that this is an attempt to read The Synthesis in light of
the problematic of the religious–​secular debate, explored at the intersection
between religious studies and the hermeneutics of tradition.
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164  Action, yoga, and tradition

If Aurobindo’s central thesis in The Synthesis is ‘all life is yoga’ denoting
all human actions, then while the representation of human action has been
a point of contention within the study of religion, the structure of human
action in relationship to practice, body, text, and tradition has been the hall-
mark of post-​Heideggerian hermeneutics. Thus, the bringing together of
the study of Aurobindo’s yoga with religious studies, on the one hand, and
traditionary-​hermeneutics on the other hand, is not arbitrary. Etymologically,
the term ‘yoga’ appears to share conceptual similarities with both ‘religion’
and ‘tradition’ and I will begin my analysis through an exploration of these
conceptual similarities.
The word ‘yoga’ has many meanings depending on the ancient text from
which its meaning has been abstracted or the root word with which it is linked.
Following Eliade, yoga is predominantly translated in two senses:  ‘binding’
and ‘method or technique of ascetic meditation’.9 The first sense can be cor-
related with ‘religion’, which brings to the fore the larger problematic of
religious–​secular distinctions, with which this book is concerned, and the sec-
ond sense links it to the notion of ‘action’ within traditionary-​hermeneutics,
which will provide the conceptual tools for this reading of Aurobindo’s The
Synthesis.

Yoga and the religious–​secular distinction

For most scholars, ‘yoga’, derived from the root yuj, means ‘to bind together’,
‘hold fast’, ‘yoke’, and ‘union’.10 Furthermore, as Eliade has pointed out, the
binding or union of the human soul is with the Divine or Spirit and, for the
mystical devotional schools, with God.11 Similarly, the term ‘religion’ from the
Latin religio, when traced back to the Christian writer Lactantius, who derives
from religare, the meaning ‘to bind fast’.12 Furthermore, Smith has shown
that, right from Cicero through to the Christian writers such as Lactantius,
this ‘binding fast’ through worship or ‘an attitude or practice of reverence’
was directed towards ‘the gods’. Therefore, not only are ‘yoga’ and ‘religion’
similar in their meaning as ‘binding’, but also share similarities in the object
to which they are bound, which for both is God or the Divine. However, this
idea that there are actions or practices called ‘religious’, which are directed to
a transcendent being with a view to ‘binding’, has become contentious within
religious studies.
In this sense, yoga as ‘binding with the divine’ not only resonates with
the dominant constitutive ideas of ‘religion’, but also explicates the central
problematic that this book is addressing, which has to do with the represen-
tation of human action as religious or secular. Within religious studies, the
opposing positions with regard to representing human action is best brought
out by the contrasting positions held by Fitzgerald and Flood: Fitzgerald
argues against the notion that there are some actions which can be clearly
represented as religious and are analytically distinct from what is described
as the secular. He, therefore, would ask if the acts according to sharia laws
  165

Action, yoga, and tradition 165

and the Laws of Manu, which have to do with customary ritual prescrip-
tions and conventions, be termed religious. If yes, then how are ‘voting at an
election, bowing to the Queen, using a knife and fork instead of the hands,
attending a committee meeting, or wearing the colours of the football team
one supports’ not religious acts, or the Japanese tea ritual, ‘baseball, sumo
or martial arts’ not religious rituals?13 Underlying Fitzgerald’s analysis,
there is a legitimate critique and the flagging of a genuine concern:  it is
the critique of the uncritical use of the term ‘religion’ and related catego-
ries which, although arising out of a particular culture, namely Western
Protestant Christianity, have been used to represent cross-​cultural human
actions. In other words, Fitzgerald argues that ‘religion’ does not represent
a universal phenomenon found in human experience in all cultures and
any attempt to represent cross-​cultural actions and practices as ‘religion’
is to indulge in cultural imperialism.14 Flood too shares this critique of an
essentialist and sui generis view of ‘religion’. Flood defends the position that
there can be no understanding or representation of religion that is ‘essen-
tialist’ in nature and that all representations and discourses of religion are
situated within particular cultures.15 However, Flood argues that ‘there are
forms of cultural life, which are clearly identifiable as “religion” in contrast
to other cultural practices’ and that there are definite differences between
offering flowers to Kṛṣṇa and cooking an evening meal.16 Thus, although
both Fitzgerald and Flood share in the critique of a trans-​cultural use of the
category ‘religion’ to represent human actions and practices, the difference
lies in their ensuing proposals.
In Fitzgerald’s proposal, which according to McKinnon is a ‘secular study
of religion’,17 there is not only a rejection of the category ‘religion’ as an ana-
lytical concept but a demand for its replacement with the alternative concepts
of ‘ritual’, ‘politics’, and ‘soteriology’ as categories for analysis, especially
for the study of Hinduism and Buddhism. Fitzgerald’s rejection of ‘religion’
because of its origin within Protestant Christianity has been critiqued by
Sweetman for committing the ‘genetic fallacy’:  ‘to think that because the
concept of religion emerged from theological claims … the concept remains
theological is to commit the genetic fallacy’. However, Sweetman does
not engage with Fitzgerald’s alternative categories although he does men-
tion them.18 However, it is this conceptual shift to alternative categories in
Fitzgerald’s proposal that does not make a substantive contribution to the
problematic concerned with representing human actions. All that has been
accomplished is the shifting of the analytical centre of gravity from ‘reli-
gion’ to alternative categories. Therefore, there is nothing to stop extend-
ing Fitzgerald’s critique of ‘religion’ to the categories of ‘ritual’, ‘politics’,
and ‘soteriology’ as well. These concepts, similar to ‘religion’, can be shown
to stem from and to contain semantic density within the particularity of
Western civilization. None of these concepts in the ‘English’ language emerge
either etymologically or conceptually from the cultures that originated the
‘Hindu’ and ‘Buddhist’ traditions, which is Fitzgerald’s precise critique of
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166  Action, yoga, and tradition

‘religion’. Hence, it can be asked, how then is the use of these alternative cat-
egories more legitimate or culturally non-​imperialistic than the use of ‘reli-
gion’? Fitzgerald’s genealogical critique can be applied to all categories in the
English language, so although a genealogical critique is valuable as a critique
of encyclopaedic claims, it falls short of resources in providing an alternative
proposal. This reveals that the problematic is not necessarily in the choice of
categories like ‘religion’, rather that it has to do with the larger philosophi-
cal debate concerned with representation in the language of human action.
This leads to questions with regard to the nature and structure of human
action and its relationship to representation and knowledge. It is in this light,
opposed to Fitzgerald’s critique, that Flood’s proposal within religious stud-
ies, stemming from a hermeneutical discourse, is not only illuminating but
also provides a way forward, to which I will return.

Yoga, action, and hermeneutics of tradition

This brings me to the second sense, in which the term ‘yoga’ has been under-
stood, as ‘action’ or ‘practice’ or ‘technique’. This active sense of yoga is
brought out by Monier Williams’ definition, based on the Ṛg Veda, which
defines yoga as ‘the act of yoking, joining, attaching, harnessing, putting to’
(italics mine).19 For Eliade, yoga designates ‘any ascetic technique and any
method of meditation’.20 De Michelis, in her work on modern yoga, also
argues for the primacy of ‘practices’ such as āsanas and postures for medita-
tion as the immediate correlates of yoga.21 Whicher expresses this distinction
between these two meanings of yoga as ‘union’ and ‘action’ with clarity. He
argues that ‘not only “joining” or “union” but also the methods and practices
leading to the “joining” or “union” are called Yoga’ (italics mine).22 Thus,
yoga can be seen as a ‘specific form or method of “practice” ’ and as ‘skill in
action’.23
In this sense of ‘action’ or ‘practice’, yoga finds conceptual similarity with
the idea of ‘tradition’. Valliere argues that the noun form of ‘tradition’ –​tradi-
tio (handing over) –​closely corresponding to the Greek paradosis, refers to the
‘content’ of what is being handed over.24 As Morris would say, ‘each genera-
tion has handed on something to the next and that something is –​Tradition’.25
Ricoeur uses the concept of ‘traditions’ to refer to this ‘material concept
of the contents of a tradition’.26 Shils describes ‘tradition’ as ‘mechanisms
of persistence’ that operate through beliefs, practices, and performance of
actions.27 Glassie on the other hand equates ‘tradition’ with ‘distinct styles of
volitional, temporal action’.28 Hammer, in his interesting work on Oakeshott
and Gadamer’s use of ‘tradition’, states that ‘the origin of tradition lies in
human activity’.29 The point being made here is that ‘action’ is a key category
in any ‘traditionary enquiry’, although it comes along with a constellation of
other categories. Nevertheless, in this sense, if yoga is defined as ‘action’ or
‘practice’ then there is an implicit conceptual relationship between ‘tradition’
and ‘yoga as action’.
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Action, yoga, and tradition 167

The central argument
I now move beyond conceptual similarities to articulate the argument that
will be developed in this study of Aurobindo’s The Synthesis. The aim is to
read it through a traditionary framework and draw implications for religious–​
secular distinctions within the study of religion. It is here that I  have to
return to Flood’s proposal within the religious–​secular debate. Not only does
Flood, as shown earlier, differ from Fitzgerald, in that he argues that there
are ‘actions’ and ‘practices’ that can be clearly differentiated to be religious
in nature but more importantly, his works, namely The Ascetic Self and The
Tantric Body, make a key contribution to this present work. The conceptual
framework used by Flood for reading yogic traditions in these works, through
a hermeneutic lens within the study of religion, informs both the concep-
tual strategy as well as the central argument of this work. There are three
insights that I want to particularly draw upon from Flood’s works. The first
two are from his central contention in The Ascetic Self and the third from The
Tantric Body. The Ascetic Self, a work in comparative religion, offers a post-​
foundational or post-​critical reading of the ascetic self in the three scriptural
religions of Christianity, Buddhism, and Hinduism. Flood states his general
argument about the ascetic self in terms of performance, the memory of tra-
dition, the ambiguity of the self, and subjectivity. If Flood’s ‘performance’
can be read as ‘action’,30 then the central contention of The Ascetic Self, given
by Flood, can be rewritten as: the ascetic self is acted out and it acts out both
the memory of tradition as well as the ambiguity of the self.31
The first insight is about the nature of the ascetic self, that in being a
‘performed’ or an ‘acted out’ self, it acts out the memory of tradition. This
brings together action and tradition. Flood argues that for an ascetic self this
relationship between action and tradition is paradoxical, which he terms the
‘ambiguity of the self’. While the ascetic self through its actions renounces
itself with a view to being liberated from the saṃsāra, it is ‘a self that is always
expressed through the structures of tradition’. Flood argues that while the
ascetic self is intent on reversing the flow of life, it continually ‘shapes the nar-
rative of her life to the narrative of tradition’.32 Thus, the ascetic self, through
its actions or practices, becomes the carrier of the memory of tradition. This
relationship between practice and tradition is explored by MacIntyre, even
as he identifies practice with techne. The second insight has to do with the
mechanism involved in the mapping of tradition on the ascetic self through
ascetic practice. Flood states his general argument about the ascetic self in the
coming together of four ideas: Performance (Action), Memory of Tradition,
Ambiguity of the Self, and Subjectivity. Keeping in line with the Greek roots
of ‘asceticism’, askesis, which denotes the ‘practices’ of spiritual athletes,
Flood defines ascetic action as practices or habits performed by the ascetic
self. Second, that ascetic practices are determined by ‘discipline of tradition’.
Here, tradition is understood by Flood as Shils’ traditum as ‘that which is
handed down from the past’ through Hervieu-​Leger’s ‘chain of memory’,
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168  Action, yoga, and tradition

where ‘memory’ ensures the ‘transmission of information and knowledge’.
Thus, the claim that ‘ascetic traditions are the enactment of the memory of
tradition’ is to claim that ascetic practices embody information and knowl-
edge. Third, the practice of tradition by the self is an ‘act of will’ or ‘an asser-
tion of the self’ even while its aim is to eradicate the self thus resulting in
an ambiguity within the ascetic self  –​a determination or intentionality to
eradicate determination and intentionality. Flood refers to ascetic action as
‘the “I will” of ascetic intention, which ironically seeks to erase itself’ and
argues that ‘asceticism entails the assertion of the individual will, a kind of
purified intentionality’, which aims all its training and form towards the tra-
dition’s goals, thus intentionality-​guided-​actions of the ascetic. Finally, the
notion of the ascetic self, which is a tradition-​specific ‘subjectivity’, possessing
both ‘interiority’ and ‘inwardness’. Expanding on the ‘ascetic subjectivity’,
Flood argues that this ‘assertion of subjectivity’ in ascetic pursuit is expressed
through ‘voluntary acts of will’. The notion of ‘voluntary acts’ brings the
role of ‘passion’ or ‘motives’, in which there is ‘recognition of human emo-
tion, such as love and tenderness, of anger, of fear and of desire, which can
be turned to the service of a spiritual path’.33 As Ricoeur would say, ‘pas-
sions are the will itself’.34 Flood brings together these categories, where their
interrelationship makes possible the mapping of tradition on the ascetic self
through ascetic practice. From this, one can conclude that ascetic practice’s
relationship between traditionary knowledge, intentionality-​driven actions,
and subjective passions forms the mechanism that maps tradition onto the
ascetic self. Ricoeur gives explicit shape to this mechanism through his three-​
part theory of mimesis. The third insight comes from The Tantric Body, a
work that explores the relationship between tradition-​specific and textually-​
mediated subjectivity and the body within Tantric traditions. The general
claim made by this work is that ‘through the internalization of the text’ and
‘through the inscription of the body by the text’, the practitioner or yogi
‘learns to inhabit a tradition specific subjectivity’, while her body becomes
a vehicle for tradition.35 Flood argues that in ‘ritual’ or ascetic action, ‘tradi-
tion and text are mapped on to the body’, which elsewhere he refers to as the
process of entextualization.36 Thus, this brings us directly to the notion of
‘action (as techniques or practices) of the body’ and its representation. Flood
argues that both ‘techniques of experience’ and the ‘representation of body
and experience’ are intimately linked, in that while on one hand representa-
tions are not ‘passive texts’ but ‘performative’, on the other hand, techniques
contain representation, thus representation and technique come together in
the body  –​‘distinctions between knowing and acting, mind and body, are
disrupted by the tantric body’. As Flood states, ‘the text is expressed as body
and the body articulated in the text’.37
In light of these three insights from Flood, this reading of Aurobindo’s text
on yoga presents the following argument: yogic action, prefigured by struc-
tures of tradition in relationship with text, intentionality, and passion, and
inscribed onto the body, performs the embodied traditioned self as a vehicle
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Action, yoga, and tradition 169

of tradition. The three parts of this argument are as follows: first, yogic action
as a practice or technique maps the ‘substance’ or memory of tradition on
to the ascetic self, when it is conceived as a techne with a telos, a master–​
apprentice relationship and an internal rationality. This embodied in the
Aurobindonian enquiry reveals its traditionary-​hermeneutics nature. Second,
the yogic action’s relationship with knowledge (text) of the tradition, the
ascetic’s volition (intentionality), and passion (motives) is the mechanism that
enables the formation of the traditioned self. This argues for the legitimacy
of representation of religious action in language, which can be distinguished
from non-​religious actions. Finally, the embodied nature of the traditioned
self is the vehicle of tradition, in which the distinctions between performed
body and its representation in tradition are blurred. Here, the argument is that
true knowledge of the other requires ‘inhabitation’ of the other’s practices by
inscribing their texts on one’s body. This three-​part argument is correspond-
ingly developed in the three main sections, which in turn conceptually cor-
relates with the three parts of Aurobindo’s The Synthesis. However, before
I  move onto these three main sections, there are two preliminaries on The
Synthesis.

Preliminaries to The Synthesis

In this section, I introduce the text by focusing on two issues, namely, (a) the
structure of The Synthesis and (b) a summary of purna-​yoga.

The structure of The Synthesis

Apart from the Introduction, which lays out the conditions of the synthesis,
The Synthesis is naturally divided into four sections  –​The Yoga of Divine
Works, The Yoga of Integral Knowledge, The Yoga of Divine Love, and The
Yoga of Self-​Perfection. However, conceptually, The Synthesis can be divided
into three parts corresponding to the three yogic traditions, with which it
engages. Aurobindo was creating a grand synthesis of the dominant yogic sys-
tems of his time. Aurobindo termed his project as integral yoga or purna-​yoga
as an attempt to organically synthesize the six different yogas. In his Foreword
to Donnelly’s introductory work on Aurobindo’s integral yoga, Basu gives
an overview of the Aurobindonian project. In this concise and yet compre-
hensive summary, Basu puts forward the six yogas that Aurobindo was syn-
thesizing:  haṭha-​yoga, raja-​yoga, gyāna-​yoga, bhakti-​yoga, karma-​yoga, and
tantra-​yoga.38 Whicher, in his historical sketch of the development of yoga in
early Hindu thought, argues that yoga can be traced back to the Vedic period
to the text of the Ṛg Veda itself, and thenceforth its ‘richly textured history’,
within different texts and traditions, reveals that it cannot be ‘conceived as
a monolithic system’ and, therefore, its ‘methods/​techniques/​practices and
philosophies … can vary from school to school and from preceptor to pre-
ceptor’.39 Against this historical view, scholars such as Eliade, Flood, and
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170  Action, yoga, and tradition

Whicher have delineated different yogic traditions, with a view to providing
a taxonomy, chief among which are the Classical, Brahmanical, and Tantric
traditions. The Synthesis is literally a synthesis of different yogas –​haṭha-​yoga,
raja-​yoga, gyāna-​yoga, bhakti-​yoga, karma-​yoga, and tantra-​yoga –​which can
be further traced back to these three different yogic traditions –​haṭha-​yoga
and raja-​yoga to the classical tradition based on the Yoga-​Sūtras of Patañjali,
gyāna-​yoga, and bhakti-​yoga and karma-​yoga to the Brahmanical tradition
based on the Bhagavad-​Gītā, and tantra-​yoga to the Tantric tradition.
I will read Aurobindo’s engagement with these three traditions of yoga in
light of the three parts of the argument I have stated above. In other words,
in the first section, I will read Aurobindo’s engagement with the Yoga-​Sūtras
of Patañjali via haṭha-​yoga and raja-​yoga, to argue that yogic actions and
practices are the carriers or the ‘substance’ of tradition. In the second section,
I will read The Synthesis’ treatment of the trimarga yogic practices of karma,
gyāna, and bhakti based on the Bhagavad-​Gītā, in light of the mechanism at
work in the formation of a ‘traditioned self’. Finally, I will read Aurobindo’s
engagement with tantra-​yoga to understand the role played by the ‘body’ in
tradition.

Aurobindo’s purna-​yoga: a summary

In this section, I  summarize the basic framework within which Aurobindo
developed his purna-​yoga. As stated above, he was bringing together three
yogic traditions  –​Classical, Brahmanical, and Tantric  –​into one synthetic
system of purna-​yoga. Sorokin’s critique of purna-​yoga is that in its eclecti-
cism ‘it simply puts together, side by side, several techniques taken from other
yogas’ and that since there is nothing new, ‘it hardly contributes much that is
original to this field’.40 However, in anticipating this critique, Aurobindo sets
out the unique features of purna-​yoga. Aurobindo admits that the ‘principal
yogic schools’ that he is synthesizing are highly specialized, disparate in their
tendencies, and even possess a ‘mutual opposition of their ideas and meth-
ods’. Therefore, he argues that ‘an undiscriminating combination in block
would not be a synthesis, but a confusion’, and even a ‘successive practice’
of each of these yogas would be unfeasible in the limited economy of human
life and energy.41 Thus, acknowledging and identifying with Sorokin’s critique
of eclecticism, Aurobindo shows how purna-​yoga escapes that critique. He
argues that if the synthesis cannot be achieved through ‘combination in mass’
or by ‘successive practice’ then:

It must be effected by neglecting the forms and outsides of the Yogic dis-
ciplines and seizing rather on some central principle common to all which
will include and utilise in the right place and proportion their particular
principles, and on some central dynamic force which is the common secret
of their divergent methods and capable therefore of organizing a natural
selection and combination of their varied energies and different utilities.42
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Action, yoga, and tradition 171

I will draw out three key features of Aurobindo’s purna-​yoga from this pas-
sage: first, after setting forth the key characteristic of purna-​yoga, Aurobindo,
immediately in the following paragraph, states that his synthesis has a prede-
cessor in the yogic system of tantra, which ‘is in its nature synthetical’ even if it
is not, like purna-​yoga, an intentional synthesis of different yoga schools. This
synthetical nature of tantra is echoed by both Samuel, who calls the ‘Tantric
forms of religion’ as the ‘classical synthesis of Indian culture’  –​a bringing
together of both the Brahmanical and the Buddhist/​Jaina traditions  –​and
Eliade who calls it an ‘assimilation’.43 Although Aurobindo, in synthesizing
the yogic systems of his time, is producing an innovative system, it appears
that he intentionally wanted to connect his ‘act of synthesis’ with similar acts
within the history of the larger yogic tradition, where such syntheses have
taken place.
Second, Aurobindo was formulating a yogic meta-​system, which, in turn,
incorporated all the other schools by seizing on their central principle. For
Aurobindo, this central principle, that is common for all yogic systems, is
the very aim of yoga as the ‘passage from the lower to the higher’.44 Here,
‘lower’ refers to the present human status with its limitations, divisions, igno-
rance, and egoism and the ‘higher’ to culminate in the ‘life divine’. He argues
that ‘it is always through something in the lower that we must rise into the
higher existence’, the ‘something’ referring to some form of ‘activity’, even
if the point of departure and specialized activities of each school of yoga
is different from the other.45 For Aurobindo, the central principle common
to all schools of yoga is ‘intentional activity’ which, in other words, can be
described as ‘method’, ‘practice’, or ‘technique’, that are different concept-​
terms precisely for yoga. What is common to the different schools of yoga is
yoga itself understood as ‘practice’ and ‘method’.
Aurobindo realizes that there could be two completely different telos for
yoga, (a) a ‘rejection of the lower and escape into the higher’ or (b) ‘the trans-
formation of the lower and its elevation to the higher’. He claims that if the
telos was the former, which is what yogic action is ordinarily meant to achieve,
then synthesis is ‘unnecessary and a waste of time’ as then the goal to escape
the world would be to find the shortest path to God. However, if the aim of
purna-​yoga is the latter telos, where the aim is not escape but is a ‘transforma-
tion of our integral being into the terms of God-​existence’, then synthesis
becomes a necessity as being-​in-​the world in all its dimensions becomes the
target for transformation.46
Finally, in light of the establishment of purna-​yoga’s central principle as
the ‘movement from the lower to the higher’ with its telos as transforma-
tion of the lower through its elevation to the higher, Aurobindo organizes
the different yogic schools into a hierarchical system. This organization is
based on a three-​part evolutionary schema that moves from the material to
the spiritual as manifested in man –​from bodily life to mental life to finally
spiritual or divine existence.47 It is this evolutionary schema that determines
the role played by individual yogic traditions within the larger framework of
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172  Action, yoga, and tradition

purna-​yoga. While on the one hand, Aurobindo was taking ‘Darwinian evolu-
tion’ to its logical conclusion, on the other hand, systematizing yogic schools
in a hierarchical fashion was not totally alien to the earlier yogic traditions.
We find in the earliest texts of Haṭhayoga –​ Śiva Saṃhitā (fifteenth century
CE), Haṭhayogapradīpikā (fifteenth–​sixteenth centuries CE), and Gheraṇḍa
Saṃhitā (seventeenth–​eighteenth centuries CE) –​a hierarchy where ‘Haṭha-​
yoga is presented as a “stairway” to Rāja-​yoga’.48
In Aurobindo’s purna-​yoga, haṭha-​yoga corresponds to the lowest rung of
bodily life, raja-​yoga to the next level of mental life, the trimārga of karma-​
yoga, gyāna-​yoga, and bhakti-​yoga referring to the aspects of will, intellect,
and heart of the mental life that were left unoccupied by raja-​yoga and, finally,
the actualization of the divinization of human existence through the yoga of
self-​perfection, which corresponds to many features of tantra-​yoga.

Purna-​yoga and Patañjali’s Yoga-​Sūtras

In this section, Aurobindo’s understanding of the nature of ‘yogic action’ is
explored especially by looking at his appropriation of haṭha-​yoga and raja-​
yoga into the schema of integral yoga. I  hope to offer an interpretation of
Aurobindo’s reading of Patañjali’s Yoga-​Sūtras, to which he relates both
haṭha-​yoga and raja-​yoga, while making the larger argument that yogic actions
carry the memory of tradition, thus arguing for the traditionary nature of
Aurobindo’s enquiry.
However, there is an apparent paradox in Aurobindo’s understanding
of yogic practices. On the one hand, his overarching claim, ‘all life is yoga’,
includes a perceptible downplaying of established yogic practices and tradi-
tions, which has been observed by his recent critics, Singleton and Alter.49
A  cursory reading of The Synthesis reveals Aurobindo’s critical stance
towards the Yoga-​Sūtras of Patañjali, haṭha-​yoga and raja-​yoga. It appears
that Aurobindo’s integral yoga, at the expense of particular yogic methods,
seeks to subsume all human activity into itself as yoga. On the other hand,
the thrust of Aurobindo’s project of purna-​yoga is particularly concerned
with the synthesis of the dominant yogic practices, termed by him generically
as ‘Indian yoga’, to create a grand yogic meta-​method. Heehs captures this
paradox in his introduction to The Synthesis:  on the one hand, Aurobindo
had said that he would publish ‘practical methods of inner culture and self-​
development’, while on the other hand, ‘readers hoping for a step-​by-​step
guide to nirvana’ were to be disappointed as The Synthesis contained ‘no
easy-​to-​follow techniques’.50 This raises several questions:  did Aurobindo
reject yogic practices and traditions? In other words, are yogic practices and
traditions important for Aurobindo or is there a rejection of traditionary
yogic practices in the all-​inclusivistic nature of purna-​yoga? What kind of an
animal is purna-​yoga? Sorokin’s work most clearly expresses the particulari-
ties of this inherent paradox in Aurobindo’s purna-​yoga. He argues that ‘the
techniques of the purnayoga largely dispense with the posture and breathing
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Action, yoga, and tradition 173

exercises of haṭha yoga and the rāja yoga, and to some extent with Patanjali’s
superhuman exercises in mental concentration and withdrawing of the senses’
while equally claiming that Aurobindo makes an important contribution to
the ‘field of the techniques’.51
In light of this paradox, I offer a reading of Aurobindo’s critique of the
Yoga-​Sūtras of Patañjali, with a view to answering the larger questions dealing
with yogic practices and tradition. While Vivekananda, in the Preface to his
Raja-​yoga, explicitly states the source of his work as Patañjali’s Yoga-​Sūtras,
by saying, ‘the aphorisms of Patañjali are the highest authority on Rāja-​yoga
and form its textbook’,52 Aurobindo does not even mention Patañjali in The
Synthesis in connection with his purna-​yoga.53 However, in what has come to
be called The Chandernagore Manuscript of 1910, we find two articles titled
haṭha-​yoga and raja-​yoga, earlier versions of the chapters with similar names
in The Synthesis that were written in 1918, of which one explicitly engages
with Patañjali.54 While studying these two yogic traditions, I  will primarily
focus on the two chapters written in 1918 in The Synthesis, and the two arti-
cles from The Chandernagore Manuscript (1910). Generally, while Aurobindo
is more critical of Patañjali’s aṣṭānga in The Chandernagore Manuscript, he is
more sympathetic and accommodative of it in The Synthesis, even if the main
points of his critique continue to be upheld.
Aurobindo’s first observation about the Yoga-​Sūtras of Patañjali is that
they contain elements of both raja-​yoga and haṭha-​yoga:

The processes of the Rājayoga are mental and emotional. Patañjali’s sci-
ence is not the pure Rājayoga; it is mixed and allows an element of the
Haṭha in its initial processes. It admits the Āsana, it admits the Prāṇāyām.
It is true it reduces each to one of its kind, but the method of conquest is
physical and therefore not Rājayogic. It may be said that the stillness of
the body is essential to concentration or to samādhi; but this is a conven-
tion of the Haṭhayoga.55

Vivekananda considered the Yoga-​Sūtras as the ‘highest authority’ and ‘text

book’ of only raja-​yoga and at best could only say while expositing Patañjali’s
āsana that ‘this portion of yoga is a little similar to haṭha-​yoga’ but clearly
disassociated his work from haṭha-​yoga, by giving it no significance in his raja-​
yoga.56 Aurobindo, on the other hand, considered the Yoga-​Sūtras to contain
both raja-​yoga and haṭha-​yoga but this was not unique, as de Michelis has
shown that both these contrary views were present in the intellectual milieu
of the late nineteenth century, namely, that (a) the Yoga-​Sūtras contained only
raja-​yoga and (b) it contained both raja-​yoga and haṭha-​yoga, especially in the
works of the Theosophists –​Blavatsky, Judge, and Dvivedi.57
The relationship between the Yoga-​Sūtras, rāja-​yoga, and haṭha-​yoga has a
complex historical trajectory. However, on the one hand, the aṣṭānga system
of Patañjali both built upon and formalized what was already present in the
early and middle Upanishads58 or, as summarized by Whicher, that while the
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174  Action, yoga, and tradition

Yoga-​Sūtras provided ‘a foundational text on the formal philosophical system
of Yoga’, it was a ‘climatic event in the long development of yogic practice and
philosophy’.59 On the other hand, it was in the medieval period that raja-​yoga
was identified with Patañjali, in order to distinguish it from the Tantric based
haṭha-​yoga and this is particularly traced by Feuerstein to Vijnana Bhishu in
the sixteenth century.60 However, even haṭha-​yoga, with its two main prac-
tices āsana and prāṇāyāma, has been traced back to the Yoga-​Sūtras. While
Aurobindo takes the Yoga-​Sūtras of Patañjali to generally expound raja-​yoga,
the elements that primarily refer to ‘bodily practices’, which are the āsana
and prāṇāyāma, the third and fourth elements in the eight-​fold system or the
aṣṭānga yoga are assigned by him to be haṭha-​yogic.
There is more or less scholarly consensus that the Yoga-​Sūtras were written
around 300 CE61 by Patañjali.62 Although it presupposes the dualist meta-
physics of Sāṃkhya philosophy, Samuel reveals that there is a debate about
its overall position on the telos of its yoga, as revealed in the final relationship
between puruṣa, prakṛti, and the jīvanmukti. The debate is whether it leads to
an ‘abandonment of material existence’ and a withdrawal from the cosmic
circuit, as proposed by Eliade, reading from a Brahmanical tradition, or that
it proposes a ‘responsible engagement’ with the world, as suggested by the
recent revisionist reading offered by Whicher.63 Aurobindo offers a similar
revisionist reading to Whicher about the overall objective of the Yoga-​Sūtras
through his interpretation of samādhi. He argues that it serves a ‘double pur-
pose’ –​not only does it allow the mind to be liberated and pass to the higher
supra-​mental planes, but it also acquires the capacity (knowledge and mas-
tery) of the ‘primary cosmic energy’ that is ‘useful or necessary to his activities
in the objective world’ –​thus Aurobindo concludes that this ancient system
aims at both Svarajya (control of the subjective consciousness of itself) and
Samrajya (control by the subjective consciousness of its outer activities and
environment).64
This engagement with Aurobindo’s reading of the Yoga-​Sūtras follows the
goals of Flood’s reading of the Yoga-​Sūtras, which is to demonstrate how the
ascetic self performs the memory of tradition. Flood argues that Patañjali’s
phenomenology demonstrates how the Yoga-​Sūtras are ‘an excellent exam-
ple of the way in which the ascetic internalises tradition and recapitulates
cosmology in inwardness’. The strategy adopted by Flood was to ‘give an
account of the purpose of yoga in Patañjali’s terms, the relation between the
structure of consciousness and the cosmos, and the form of practice itself’.65
However, while Flood looks at the entire sūtra, Aurobindo’s interest in the
Yoga-​Sūtras is narrowly focused. Although the Yoga-​Sūtras has four chap-
ters consisting of 195 sūtras, Aurobindo is primarily concerned with only
the aṣṭānga sections found in Yoga-​Sūtras (II.28–​55 and III.1–​8). This calls
for a change in strategy, even while following Flood’s goals. As mentioned
above, MacIntyre’s idea of ‘tradition as techne’ will provide us with the con-
ceptual tools needed to demonstrate that ascetic actions perform the mem-
ory of tradition. MacIntyre argues that practices are both embedded and
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Action, yoga, and tradition 175

made intelligible only in light of the tradition through which the practice was
conveyed.66 MacIntyre identifies practices with skill or techne to explain its
relationship with tradition. He argues that the practice of any techne entails
three crucial elements:  first, the practice of a techne requires a relationship
between a ‘master-​craftsman to apprentice’, where the master is able to not
only actualize the apprentice’s potentialities, but also define the content of
the habits that need to be cultivated and acquired to master the craft. Second,
every techne possesses a ‘rationality’ that is conditioned by its history and is
thus dependent on time, place, and historical circumstances, in other words, a
historically situated rationality. Finally, every techne as a craft has a ‘telos’, an
‘ultimate excellence’, towards which the practice is directed.67 To summarize,
according to MacIntyre, every techne or practice that has a master–​apprentice
relationship, an internal rationality that is unique to itself, and possesses a
telos, is a traditionary practice. Thus, I argue that a yogic practice, which has
a master–​apprentice relationship, an internal rationality, and a telos, would be
a carrier of tradition.
Aurobindo divides the eight aṅgas into three parts –​moral practices (pre-
paratory), bodily practices (haṭha-​yoga), and mental practices (raja-​yoga).
Although he does not quote the text, he follows a consistent strategy of first
giving a description of the limb (aṅga) followed by a critique. It is his critique
in which we are most interested. At face value it appears that Aurobindo’s
critique is directed against the very notion of practice (abhyasa), which lies
not only at the heart of the aṣṭānga of the Yoga-​Sūtras, but is also central
to performing the memory of tradition. It is this Aurobindonian critique of
the Yoga-​Sūtras that I  will investigate. I  will then examine the relationship
between master–​ apprentice relationship, internal rationality, and telos in
yogic practices that enable them to perform the memory of tradition.

Yama and niyama: preparatory moral practices

Aurobindo begins by stating that the first step in yoga is the ‘preparation of
the moral nature’, which is the discipline and perfection of the heart. The first
two aṅgas –​ Yama and Niyama –​that Aurobindo translates as ‘moral exer-
cises’ and ‘moral habits’ are meant to accomplish this. They are put forward
by Patañjali in sūtra II.30 and sūtra II.32. My goal in this section is to argue
that yogic practices or abhyasa implicitly require a master–​apprentice frame-
work, which is a conceptual requirement for the yogic practice to be seen to
perform the memory of tradition within the MacIntyrean schema. Also, I will
be primarily following Bryant’s 2009 translation of Patañjali and Feuerstein’s
word-​studies to inform this reading of Patañjali’s text.
Aurobindo does not mention sūtra II.29, which lists the eight limbs, but
directly deals with the first aṅga, and lists the five yamas or moral exer-
cises given in sūtra II.30  –​ ahiṃsa-​satyasteya-​bramacaryaparigrāḥ yamāḥ.
Aurobindo, commenting on this sūtra, writes ‘Patanjali prescribes the prac-
tice of the five yamas or regulating moral exercises’, and he translates them as
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176  Action, yoga, and tradition

‘truth, justice and honesty, harmlessness, chastity and refusal of ownership’.68
Aurobindo’s list does not follow the order of Patañjali’s yamas: Aurobindo’s
‘truth’ corresponds to satya; ‘justice and honesty’ to asteya; ‘harmlessness’
as opposed to the normal translation of ‘non-​violence’ for ahiṃsa; ‘chastity’
again opposed to the standard ‘celibacy’ for brahmācarya; and ‘refusal of
ownership’ for aparigrahāḥ, which is again usually translated as ‘covetous-
ness’. If Aurobindo had expanded more, it would have given us more insight
on his choice of terms in translating these yamas.
In dealing with the second aṅga, he lists the five niyamas or moral hab-
its as given in sūtra II.32 –​ śauca-​santoṣa-​tapaḥ-​svādhyāyeśvara-​praṇidhānāni
niyamāḥ. Translating this sūtra, Aurobindo writes that the five niyamas or
‘regulating moral habits’ are ‘cleanliness and purity, contentment, austerity,
meditation on Scripture, worship and devotion to God’.69 Here, in contrast
to the earlier aṅga, Aurobindo’s translation precisely follows Patañjali’s order
and also does not contain any innovation in meanings: ‘cleanliness and purity’
corresponds to śauca; ‘contentment’ to santoṣa; austerity to tapaḥ; ‘medita-
tion on Scripture’ to svādhāya; and ‘worship and devotion to God’ to Īśvara-​
praṇidhānāni. Once again, there is no further elaboration.
By declaring that yama and niyama as ‘regular practices’ can be purposive
in both creating a moral calm as well as be a preparative, ‘upon which the
secure pursuance of the rest of the Yoga can be founded’, Aurobindo gives
them a positive affirmation in The Synthesis. However, it is conditioned upon
yama and niyama being taken in a broader sense to include forms of ‘any
self-​discipline’ (not restricted to Patañjali’s lists).70 The answer to this condi-
tional affirmation lies in Aurobindo’s critique of these two practices in The
Chandernagore Manuscript.
In The Chandernagore Manuscript, Aurobindo levels two critiques against
yama and niyama, which are closely related:  first, he critiques Patañjali’s
expectation of the yogi to use ‘the method of abhyasa or constant practice’
in removing the impurities from the heart through establishing these moral
habits and exercises. He argues that anyone who has tried will vouch that
this abhyasa is difficult, long, and tedious to be established even imperfectly.
Here, Aurobindo appears to be critical of sūtras I.12–​13, which talk about the
central role played by abhyasa (I.12) and ‘effort’ (I.13) in not only the still-
ing of the mind, but also, according to Vacaspati Misra’s interpretation of
abhyasa as sādhanā, for the practice of all the aṅgas of the aṣṭānga.71 Second,
closely related, he questions –​how can life be purified and quietened when the
mind and heart are impure and restless? He concludes that due to the near-​
impossibility for ordinary people to attain its goals because of the difficult
abhyasa, Patañjali’s yoga-​system has been made possible only ‘for hermits in
an asrama’, who have presumably already purified their minds and hearts,
and, therefore, Patañjali’s aṣṭānga has ‘fled the homes of men and taken refuge
in the forest and the cavern’.72
My immediate response to Aurobindo is as follows: at first glance, it does
appear that ‘abhyasa’ or ‘practice’ is a problem for Aurobindo that would then
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Action, yoga, and tradition 177

validate the critique brought against him by Singleton and Alter. Equally,
Aurobindo’s second critique can be dismissed by counter-​arguing that his cri-
tique does not seem to take into consideration Patañjali’s first chapter that
deals with the quietening of the mind –​yogaś cittavṛttinirodhaḥ (I.2), where
the emphasis is precisely on the primacy of stilling the mind, something that
Aurobindo accuses Patañjali of not taking into account.
However, this response would only be to miss the larger argument that
Aurobindo’s critique is aiming to make, the weight of which is primarily
against the prevalent understanding that yoga with its hard abhyasa and spe-
cialized discipline was not fit for normal social living, but was only for ascetics
living away from society. Aurobindo’s critique stems from this awareness that
these hard abhyasas required by Patañjali’s aṣṭānga can only be fulfilled in an
asrama system, which has a guru–​śhiṣhya paramparā or tradition. Although
the guru–​śhiṣhya paramparā itself is argued to be a must for yogic abhyasa
by Aurobindo, albeit negatively, right from the beginning of The Synthesis,
Aurobindo flags this system as the main problem of Indian society, in his
reading of Indian history of the last thousand years. The larger problem for
Aurobindo was the separation of the spiritual from the material and the con-
finement of ‘the spiritual’, such as Patañjali’s aṣṭānga, within the walls of the
asrama, while the larger society with its material life is handed over to ‘inertia’
and ‘ignorance’. Aurobindo sees an intentional compromise between the mate-
rial and the spiritual, to which ‘the schools of Indian yoga lent themselves’,
thus the bigger culprit for him was the guru–​śhiṣhya paramparā, in which ‘the
teacher gave his knowledge only to a small circle of disciples’, which left the
rest of society to ‘purposeless and endless duality’ between material life and
customary religion.73
To summarize his critique –​Aurobindo appears critical of difficult abhyasa
or yogic practices as demanded by Patañjali because they can only be per-
formed in an asrama setting within a guru–​śhiṣhya paramparā, and since a
guru is able to teach only a few disciples, he does it at the expense of con-
demning the rest of the population to ignorance, due to which the larger soci-
ety suffers, which for Aurobindo has been the historical reality of regress in
India. This establishes, even if negatively, that Aurobindo saw yogic practice
or abhyasa as intrinsically dependent on a guru–​śhiṣhya or master–​apprentice
relationship. This is one of the central pieces in our argument that requires the
master–​apprentice relationship to be conceptually related to action as prac-
tice or abhyasa to be able to read the yogic practice or techne as tradition. This
point is further driven home forcefully when we look at Aurobindo’s under-
standing of the guru–​śhiṣhya relationship.
Aurobindo cites ‘guru’ as one of the four aids for yoga-​sidhhi along with
śāstra, utsaha, and kala. He demonstrates that there are two types of gurus,
who are important for a yoga-​sādhaka: the first guru is the Supreme Guide
or World Teacher or jagad-​guru, who is within us. He operates by disclos-
ing within us his nature and setting his ‘divine example’ as our example, so
that by contemplating it, our lower existence is transformed into its reflection.
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178  Action, yoga, and tradition

This echoes the Sāṃkhya-​based Patañjali’s final aṅga of samādhi. This guru
is the Lord, Īśvara or the Master of Yoga. This guru, who is universal and
not bound within the confines of an asrama, is available to the whole society.
Aurobindo gives the highest importance to the jagad-​guru. Therefore, a uni-
versal guru–​śhiṣhya paramparā is not only affirmed but also given a central
place within the sādhanā of purna-​yoga. The second guru, Aurobindo says,
according to Hindu spirituality, could be of three kinds –​the Iṣṭa Devatā, the
Avatāra, and the living Guru. Iṣṭa Devatā refers to any particular name and
form of the universal and transcendent Godhead. An Avatāra is an incarna-
tion or a ‘Divine manifest in a human appearance’ and, finally, the guru, who
is a living influence and example, is equally needed for the completion of the
sādhanā. Aurobindo argues that the Hindu discipline makes provision for a
guru–​disciple relationship. It is in this last part about the ‘living guru’ that we
seem to have gone full circle and Aurobindo appears to be promoting what he
set out to critique in the first place –​and that is indeed so. The only way we can
account for this contradiction is to look at his critique through a diachronic
lens –​the past asrama systems with their guru–​śhiṣhya frameworks, accord-
ing to Aurobindo, were structurally flawed in the sense of being secluded and
outside mainstream society, hence his critique. On the other hand, the present
asramas structured differently can be effective in influencing mainstream soci-
ety and, thus, the master–​apprentice relationship is a key for Aurobindonian
spirituality. Although during his lifetime Aurobindo was ambivalent with
regard to starting a formal ashram, he had many ‘disciples’, who looked up to
him for guidance. This ambivalence is seen in the establishment of the formal
Aurobindo Ashram as late as 1926, primarily as an initiative of The Mother,
that nevertheless has over 1,200 full time sādhakas even today.

Āsana and prāṇāyāma: haṭhayogic practices

Aurobindo refers to the next two aṅgas, āsana as ‘the quieting of the body’
and prāṇāyāma to be ‘the mastering of the Prāna’.74 They are found in
Patañjali’s Yoga-​Sūtras II.46–​51. In this section, while I analyse Aurobindo’s
understanding of the haṭha-​yogic practices of āsana and prāṇāyāma and their
relationship to purna-​yoga, I will argue that not only does Patañjali’s aṣṭānga
possess an internal rationality that is unique to itself, but also that different
yogic traditions possess different rationalities and thus that yogic practices as
techne possess their own internal rationality. In Aurobindo’s view, the bodily
practices of āsana and prāṇāyāma are haṭha-​yogic in nature, as their goal is
‘purification of the body’. He refers to two kinds of haṭha-​yoga  –​ modern
and ancient –​and comments that while the number of āsanas in the modern
haṭha-​yoga is limited, the number in the ancient one is innumerable.75 Here
the timeline ‘modern’ and ‘ancient’ appears to refer to the nineteenth century
(modern) and medieval India (ancient) for Aurobindo and is not related to the
time of either Patañjali or earlier. Feuerstein and Bryant confirm Aurobindo’s
observation:  Feuerstein shows that the ‘modern textbooks on haṭhayoga
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Action, yoga, and tradition 179

describe as many as 200 such postures’,76 while Byrant, referring to medieval
haṭha-​yogic texts, shows that, according to the Goraka-​Sataka, ‘there are as
many āsanas as species –​8,400,000 in all’.77
Patañjali gives only three sūtras (II.46–​48) consisting of a mere eight words
for āsana. Aurobindo puts forward four objectives of the asana, which form
an eclectic collection as they are picked up from different parts of the Yoga-​
Sūtras. The first objective is to ‘conquer’ the body as it is a must for the body
to become divine. Patañjali refers to this conquest, albeit in a negative way,
in sūtra II.48 –​ tato dvandvānabhighātaḥ. Bryant translates this as ‘from this,
one is not afflicted by the dualities of the opposites’.78 In other words, one
is not overcome (ānabhighātaḥ) in the body by any extremities and has thus
conquered the body. The second objective is to develop the four physical sid-
dhis of –​ laghimā (minuteness), aṇimā (lightness), garima (steadiness),79 and
mahima (largeness). Bryant argues that these siddhis are part of the ‘standard-
ized list of powers’ in classical Hindu texts, which Feuerstein traces to Vyasa’s
Yoga-​Bhāṣya (3.45), to which there is a reference in sūtra III.45 in Patañjali.80
Aurobindo’s third objective is to do with developing bodily force ‘called tapaḥ
or vīryam, or the fire of Yoga’.81 In the aṣṭānga, while tapaḥ as austerity is one
of the niyamas (II.32), vīrya in the sense of power (fire of yoga) is shown as
the ‘gain’ (labah) of brahmācarya, a niyama, in sūtra II.38. Finally, we come
to Aurobindo’s fourth objective, which is to become ‘ūrddhwaretāḥ’,82 again
a characteristic of the niyama of brahmācarya. Aurobindo states that it is to
‘draw up the whole virile force in the body into the brain and return so much
of it as is needed for the body purified and electricised’.83 Feuerstein traces
ūrdhva-​retāḥ to the Maitrāyaṇīya-​Upaniṣad (2.3), which refers to the psycho-​
physiological process, in which there is an upward (ūrdhva) flow of the semen
(retas), due to the yogic practice of brahmācarya, which then is transmuted
into vital energy (ojas) that feeds the brain.84
This brings us to prāṇāyāma, the fourth aṅga in Patañjali’s eight-​fold
schema. Aurobindo’s three-​part description of prāṇāyāma appears to be an
approximate summary, corresponding to each of the three sūtras in the sec-
tion sūtras II.49–​51 on prāṇāyāma. Describing the nature of prāṇāyāma,
Aurobindo says, first, that it entails ‘various regulations’ of breathing, which
echoes the second part of sūtra II.49  –​ vicchedaḥ (regulation) prāṇāyāma
(breath-​control). The second type of prāṇāyāma refers to the three manifesta-
tions of breathing according to sūtra II.50 –​respiration (bahya), inspiration
(abhyantara), and rhythmic regulations of both with an interval of inholding
of the breath (stambha). The third type of prāṇāyāma has to do with cessation
of breath, which after some effort, Aurobindo says, becomes as easy and natu-
ral as normal breathing.85 This corresponds to what Patañjali calls the fourth
(caturthaḥ) type of prāṇāyāma in sūtra II.51, which, according to Bryant,
Vyāsa refers to as total suppression of breath involving the cessation of inha-
lation and exhalation and is called by Vijnanabhiksu kevala-​kumbhaka.86
Aurobindo ends his description by stating that the conquest of the prāṇa will
add to the earlier four physical siddhis gained by āsana, five more siddhis,
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180  Action, yoga, and tradition

which are, however, psychical in nature –​prakamya, vyapti, aiswaryam, vash-
ita, and ishita,87 which add up to a total of nine siddhis. As mentioned earlier,
both Bryant and Feuerstein have pointed out, based on the classical tradition,
that there are only eight siddhis in the standardized list according to Vyāsa’s
Yoga-​Bhāṣya (3.45). The extra siddhi is aiswaryam, meaning ‘lordly powers’,
and is the name given to the entire system of the eight siddhis, also known as
maha-​siddhi, which Aurobindo adds to his list of siddhis and ends with a total
of nine siddhis.
Now, I come to Aurobindo’s critique of āsana and prāṇāyāma. However,
here there is a paradox. On the one hand, Aurobindo praises the rationality
and inherent logic of the arrangement of these aṅgas, while on the other hand,
equally declaring that they are not indispensable for his purna-​yoga. First the
praise: when Aurobindo begins his section on prāṇāyāma, he highlights the
intrinsic relationship between āsana and prāṇāyāma in Patañjali’s aṣṭānga. He
rationalizes that the ‘real reason why Patañjali laid so much stress on āsana
was that he thought prāṇāyāma essential to samādhi and āsana essential to
prāṇāyāma’.88 In other words, he argues that for Patañjali the āsanas pro-
vided the ground for prāṇāyāma. This reasoning resonates with Patañjali’s
intention as seen in sūtra II.49 –​ tasmin sati śvāsa-​praśvāsayor gati-​vicchedaḥ
prāṇāyāmaḥ. Bryant argues that tasmin sati is a sati saptami or a locative
absolute construction, which indicates that prāṇāyāma is to be undertaken
while āsana is being perfected. Bryant interprets this sūtra to say that ‘one
can thus argue for a consecutive interdependence among the limbs, each one
presupposing that the yogi is cultivating and mastering the previous ones’.89
Thus, there is an intrinsic rationality within Patañjali’s aṣṭānga, between its
limbs, which are dependent on each other. Aurobindo is more explicit in
his comment on the sequencing of yama and niyama before āsana, which,
in turn, is prior to prāṇāyāma. Aurobindo makes two points here: first, that
unless life and character are previously made quiet and pure (through yama
and niyama), prāṇāyāma ‘done in one’s own strength may do immense moral,
physical and mental mischief’. Second, the key role played in the admission
of the āsana is to still the body and prepare it for prāṇāyāma. In light of these
two points in the sequencing of the aṅgas, Aurobindo concludes that ‘it must
be admitted that Patañjali’s system is admirably logical and reasonable in its
arrangement’.90 Finally, Aurobindo argues that even if it sounds strange, these
haṭhayogic practices of āsana and prāṇāyāma are ‘scientific processes’ because
like the science of the physical universe they ‘are equally based on definite
experience of laws and their workings and give, when rightly practised, their
well-​tested results’.91 Thus, Aurobindo finds not only these two aṅgas, but
also the entire schema of Patañjali possessing an internal rationality, which
he argues not only to be similar to the natural sciences, but also unique in its
inner working.
However, Aurobindo calls them dispensable and not required for his purna-​
yoga and argues that ‘in a synthetic and integral Yoga they take a second-
ary importance’.92 The question is –​why is haṭha-​yoga not worthy enough to
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Action, yoga, and tradition 181

have equal importance in purna-​yoga, in spite of it being shown to possess a
superior rationality? It is into this paradox that we must enquire. Aurobindo’s
answer is simple –​the rationale that the purna-​yoga operates with is different
than the one haṭha-​yoga is operating under, or simply put, both possess con-
flicting rationalities. Aurobindo argues that since haṭha-​yoga is primarily con-
cerned with the body, its whole principle of action is founded on an intimate
relationship between the body and soul. The body is both the basis and the
bridge between the physical and the spiritual. Its method is to ascend from the
body upwards. In contrast, Aurobindo argues that the methods of purna-​yoga
are primarily spiritual and the ‘dependence on physical methods or fixed psy-
chic or psycho-​physical processes on a large scale would be the substitution
of a lower for a higher action’.93 In the purna-​yoga, it is not only the ascent of
the physical to the spiritual through the aṣṭānga, but equally the descent of
the spiritual to the physical, which, in contrast to the former, is less laborious.
This is because the rational frameworks that haṭha-​yoga and purna-​yoga work
under are different and, hence, both what is valued as important as well as
the methods are different. This is also sharply illustrated in the difference that
Aurobindo draws between raja-​yoga and haṭha-​yoga. Aurobindo shows that
opposed to the haṭhayogin, which is focused on the body, the rājayogin, by
tranquillizing and mastering the mind, equally tranquillizes and masters the
body. For the rājayogin, the mind is the master of the body and not the other
way around. To an extent, the body does not even affect the mind unless by
consent. Finally, for the rājayogin, cessation of thought can bring about the
cessation of breathing –​‘a calm, effortless and perfect kumbhak’, which is the
precise opposite strategy of the haṭhayogin, for whom it can be brought about
only through prāṇāyāma. Aurobindo concludes that the contrary nature of
these systems is because both stand at opposite ends of the spectrum. That
is why, to the rājayogin, the psycho-​physical results are of little importance
and the purely psychic and spiritual alone matter, while for the haṭhayogin the
physical is of immense importance. This is once again a result of the differ-
ence in the systems and their rationalities. To summarize this section, not only
does Patañjali’s aṣṭānga have a unique internal rationality, but also, on closer
inspection, the different traditions of yoga such as haṭha-​yoga, raja-​yoga, and
purna-​yoga, all have their own rationalities  –​unique and internal to them,
thus satisfying the requirement for yogic practices to be a techne and identified
with tradition.

Pratyahāra to saṃyama: rājayogic practices of mind

After the haṭhayogic aṅgas of āsana and prāṇāyāma, I come to the third and
final section of Aurobindo’s treatment of the aṣṭānga-​yoga of Patañjali that
deals with the last four practices of the mind (manasah), which he terms pure
raja-​yoga, relating to the mastery of the restless mind. For Aurobindo, there
is a clear transition here from haṭha-​yoga to raja-​yoga  –​from the physical
to the psychical and spiritual. These four aṅgas are found in Patañjali from
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182  Action, yoga, and tradition

sūtras II.54 to III.3. In this section, I argue that not only are all yogic prac-
tices teleological in nature, but also that only by giving a ‘theistic telos’ was
Aurobindo able to sublate raja-​yoga and use it within his larger schema of
purna-​yoga, even if he considered its methods dispensable. For Aurobindo,
these last four aṅgas are Patañjali arranging ‘concentration in four stages of
development’. Aurobindo does not expand on any of these four practices/​
stages but merely gives a one-​line description for each of them: pratyahāra as
the ‘drawing inward of the senses from their objects’; dhāraṅā, as ‘the fixing of
the mind for a moment on a single thought, feeling or object, –​such as a sin-
gle part of the body, the tip of the nose or the centre of the brows for prefer-
ence’; dhyāna as ‘the continuation of this state for a fixed period’; and samādhi
as ‘the entire withdrawing into oneself for an indefinite time’.94 Aurobindo’s
account seems to do an injustice to Patañjali’s schema as Aurobindo’s descrip-
tion takes them as three different steps and thus misses out on the build-​up of
all three as saṃyama, which can said to be the key achievement of Patañjali
which, interestingly, appears to have similarity with the three steps in Husserl’s
transcendental phenomenology  –​ epoche, eidetic vision, and transcendental
reduction.95
The last three practices of Patañjali’s aṣṭānga  –​ dhāraṅā, dhyāna, and
samādhi –​together constitute one process, which is called saṃyama in sūtra
III.4 as trayam ekatra samyamah. Aurobindo argues that raja-​yoga aims at the
liberation and perfection, not of the body like haṭha-​yoga, but rather ‘of the
mental being, the control of the emotional and sensational life, the mastery
of the whole apparatus of thought and consciousness’. It does this by focus-
ing on the citta, within which the above activities take place. The normal state
of man is of cittavṛtti –​it is a ‘condition of trouble and disorder, a kingdom
either at war with itself or badly governed’, with the puruṣa subject to citta-​
faculties.96 It is this vṛtti that raja-​yoga through samādhi, its highest level of
saṃyama, seeks to achieve by

the perfect quieting of the restless mind and its elevation to a higher plane
through concentration of mental force by the successive stages, which
lead to the utmost inner concentration or in gathered state of the con-
sciousness which is called Samādhi.97

Aurobindo calls this arriving at saṃyama as Patañjali’s ‘essence of yoga’,

which is ‘the coercion of all vṛttis or functionings of the mental and moral
qualities’.98 Thus, for Aurobindo, saṃyama fulfils the primary goal of yoga
with which Patañjali began his Yoga-​Sūtras in sūtra I.2  –​ yogaś citta-​vṛtti-​
nirodhaḥ –​and resolves the problematic of the vṛtti (fluctuations) of the mind.
In The Chandernagore Manuscript, Aurobindo concludes that ‘saṃyama is a
mighty power’ and whatever a yogi does saṃyama upon, that he masters.99
After listing a few of the fantastical things a yogi could do, he ends by stating
that Patañjali has left the choice to the successful yogin as to what he wills
with his power.
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Action, yoga, and tradition 183

Even though this abrupt ending and open-​endedness of the article reveals
Aurobindo’s dissatisfaction with Patañjali, it accurately captures the essence
of Patañjali’s Yoga-​Sūtras. It is claimed that even though Patañjali was a the-
ist, he had a low-​key approach to Īśvara as he was diplomatically manoeuvring
within the contours of the Sāṃkhya traditions. This is best revealed in the
final sūtra (IV.34)  –​ purusartha-​sunyanam gunanam pratiprasavah kaivalyam
svarupa-​pratistha va citi-​saktir iti –​interpreted by Bryant as –​‘Ultimate lib-
eration is when the gunas, devoid of any purpose for the purusa, return to
their original [latent] state; in other words, when the power of conscious-
ness is situated in its own essential nature.’100 Thus, Patañjali ends the Yoga-​
Sūtras leaving the puruṣa in his kaivalyam (aloneness). In his commentary
on this sūtra, Bryant writes, ‘Puruṣa now lives in total isolation, its power
of consciousness no longer aware of anything else except itself, unconnected
with the citta and the world of prakṛti it had mediated.’101 This was the goal
(artha) or telos, to which Patañjali drove his project and attained the ultimate
liberation for the puruṣa. Thus, it is very obvious that Patañjali had a clear
and definite telos, which his aṣṭānga was directed to achieve. The eight steps
(aṅgas) formed a ladder to reach a goal, which was the telos of his yogic prac-
tice. Thus, the implicit containment of a telos within a yogic practice appears
to be straightforward in the case of Patañjali. This is further exemplified in
Aurobindo’s case, in his second reading of Patañjali in The Synthesis. In The
Chandernagore Manuscript, although he had accurately represented Patañjali,
we find a rather unfavourable critique of Patañjali102 with no effort made to
appropriate him within purna-​yoga. However, in The Synthesis, one can find a
radical positive change in Aurobindo’s reading of Patañjali. This reading was
intentional with a view to synthesize Patañjali within the larger framework
of purna-​yoga. However, Aurobindo could only do this after he had crucially
revisioned Patañjali’s telos in the Yoga-​Sūtras from its Sāṃkhya conception
to a Vedantic theist telos. Aurobindo writes in The Synthesis that raja-​yoga
(referring to Patañjali) serves a double purpose –​first, through its purely men-
tal action, the soul is not only liberated from the ‘confusions of outer con-
sciousness’ (this is Patañjali), but also ‘enters into its true spiritual existence’
(Aurobindo’s revision of Patañjali). In his work on the Gītā, he refers to this
new telos as the eternal result of ‘divine union’.103 While listing the second
purpose of raja-​yoga, Aurobindo is explicit about the change that he is bring-
ing in to Patañjali’s telos. He writes that the soul also ‘acquires the capacity
of that free and concentrated energising of consciousness on its object which
our philosophy asserts as the primary cosmic energy and the method of divine
action upon the world’ (italics mine).104 The necessity for the change of the
rājayogic telos for a yogic-​ātman, from the kaivalyam-​puruṣa to a jīvan-​mukta,
for it to be incorporated into the Aurobindonian schema not only reveals the
incorporation of Patañjali within purna-​yoga, but also more importantly, the
importance given to defining the telos of purna-​yoga.
In this section, through my reading of the first part of Aurobindo’s The
Synthesis, I have argued that his purna-​yoga as a yogic practice or abhyasa has
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184  Action, yoga, and tradition

a clear structure containing: master–​apprentice relationship, internal ration-
ality, and a telos, which are the central elements in the conceptual structure
of tradition, when it is understood as a techne in the MacIntyrean sense. This
provides evidence to my claim that Aurobindo’s enquiry into religion implic-
itly possesses the structure of traditionary-​hermeneutics. We began by set-
ting up the problematic in terms of Aurobindo’s universalistic notion of ‘all
life is yoga’ and questioning if that meant a rejection of particular specific
yogic practices and traditions. However, as I have demonstrated, Aurobindo’s
purna-​yoga was not clearly an open-​ended project, but rather situated within
existing historical traditions with which it engages, critiques, and co-​opts.
Furthermore, it possesses a clear understanding of master–​apprentice rela-
tionships, internal rationality, and telos, which give it the structure of a tradi-
tion. Thus, I can conclude that, in this section, yogic practices are traditions,
and in that sense, yogic actions and practices perform the memory of tradi-
tion. Yogic actions are the ‘substance’ or ‘material’ content of traditions. With
this, we move to the next section, which deals with the mechanism that makes
yogic actions and practices into tradition with significance for the religious–​
secular debate.

Purna-​yoga and the Bhagavad Gītā

The second key tradition that Aurobindo engages with, in the construction
of purna-​yoga, is the Brahmanical tradition and its chief text, the Bhagavad-​
Gītā. Three of the four parts, the majority of The Synthesis are an engagement
with the Gītā.105 Aurobindo engages with the next three yogas –​karma-​yoga,
gyāna-​yoga, and bhakti-​yoga, in light of action, knowledge, and passion
respectively, even as he integrates them within his larger framework of purna-​
yoga. On the one hand, I will be offering a phenomenological interpretation
of Aurobindo’s engagement with the trimarga yoga of the Gītā while, on the
other hand, I  will be particularly looking at how Aurobindo conceptually
relates action, knowledge and passion, and then presenting the argument à
la Ricoeur’s theory of mimesis that the interaction between these three cat-
egories forms the mechanism necessary for the mapping of tradition on the
ascetic self. The aim is to show that textual representations as part of the
mimetic circle are able to analytically distinguish religious actions.

Reading Aurobindo’s Gītā: Ricoeur’s theory of mimesis

In the first section, I argued that yogic action as a practice or abhyasa is a car-
rier of tradition. In this section, exploring the connections Aurobindo makes
between karma-​yoga, gyāna-​yoga, and bhakti-​yoga, I  will argue that yogic
practice’s relationship to intentionality driven actions (karma), traditionary
knowledge (gyāna), and subjective passions (bhakti) forms the mechanism
that maps tradition on to the ascetic self. We already saw how Flood brings
together these categories, wherein their interrelationship makes possible the
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Action, yoga, and tradition 185

mapping of tradition on the ascetic self. Ricoeur gives explicit shape to this
mechanism through his three-​part theory of mimesis. In this chapter, I  am
dealing with the ‘substance’ of tradition, which I have argued in the beginning
to be texts and practices. Ricoeur views the term ‘tradition’ in three senses,
which he calls traditionality, traditions, and tradition. His conceptualization
of the second sense, ‘traditions’, as ‘the material concepts of the content of
tradition’ is relevant to this part of our study. He clarifies, ‘by traditions, we
mean the things said in the past and transmitted to us by a chain of interpre-
tations and re-​interpretations’.106
Understanding the mechanism of how ‘traditions’ are formed has been the
central problematic Ricoeur has been addressing in his three volumes of Time
and Narrative. Ricoeur’s basic hypothesis is that there is a correlation between
the ‘temporal character of human experience’ (Time) and the ‘activity of nar-
rating a story’ (Narrative). The operative mechanism that makes this corre-
lation possible is his three-​part theory of mimesis –​ mimesis1, mimesis2, and
mimesis3 –​which is argued here to also be the internal structure of ‘traditions’.
If mimesis means ‘imitation’ or ‘representation’, then it immediately brings
into focus the ‘what’ and ‘how’ of representation, which are ‘human action or
experience’ and ‘narrative’ respectively and the theory of mimesis puts forward
the structure of representation. Simply put, the theory of mimesis is about
‘textual configuration’ or production of knowledge (mimesis2), which mediates
the ‘preconfiguration of the practical field’ or the field of action (mimesis1)
and its ‘reconfiguration through the reception of the work’, in the subjectivity
or passions of the reader (mimesis3). Each of these three parts of the theory
of mimesis will have to be explicated with a view to reconstructing this theory
for my use. What makes this uniquely interesting for my project is its concep-
tual similarity with the trimarga (karma, gyāna, and bhakti) of the Gītā that
Aurobindo integrates in his purna-​yoga.
Mimesis1 refers to a ‘preunderstanding of the world of action’ as already
possessing meaningful structures, symbolic resources, and a temporal charac-
ter. Meaningful structures refer to action as understood as ‘practice’ (yogic in
our case), containing a ‘conceptual network’ that distinguishes the ‘domain
of action’ from that of mere ‘physical movement’. ‘Action’ consists of goals,
motives, and agency. We could compare this with the MacIntyrean view of
techne seen above, in which action as practice contains an implicit rationality
and telos. Second, human actions are able to be narrated because they are
‘always already articulated by signs, rules and norms’. As ‘first signification’,
actions are mediations with ‘implicit or immanent symbolism’ incorporated
into their very structure. Borrowing from Geertz, Ricoeur gives the example
of a ‘ritual act’ similar to our ‘yogic act’, which contains a meaningful pre-​
structure, as it is already ‘set within a cultic system’ and defined by ‘conven-
tions, meanings and institutions’ that forms the symbolic framework of any
culture. Thus, before any interpretation, symbols are already ‘interpretants
internally related to some action’. Finally, action implicitly contains a tempo-
ral structure, which Ricoeur illustrates through Heidegger’s concept of care
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186  Action, yoga, and tradition

(Sorge). Ricoeur defines ‘within time-​ness’ and ‘being thrown among things’
as the basic characteristics of care. Or, as Heidegger would say, ‘being-​in-​the-​
world is essentially care’.107 Therefore, since ‘care’ is ‘preoccupation’ or action
in the world, both the merely occurrent and political, it makes the ‘description
of temporality dependent on the description of the things about which we
care’. In short, a description of care or action is a description of temporality.
Thus a preunderstanding of human action reveals its semantics, symbolic sys-
tem, and temporality already present in action.108 In this section I will focus
on the semantics that pre-​structure yogic action.
For Ricoeur, mimesis2 is the mimetic relation of narrative to action, which
treats imitated action as text. Since Ricoeur has an expanded understanding
of text, it includes within it discourses and knowledge in general, articu-
lated either through explanation in the natural sciences or through under-
standing in the human sciences.109 By locating mimesis2 in an intermediary
position, Ricoeur assigns it a mediating function  –​mediation between the
pre-​understanding and the post-​understanding of the order of action. Thus
a composition, be it fictional or historical narrative, is the ‘grasping together’
or configuration of individual events and incidents (actions) into a narra-
tive. This is clearly built on the Poetics, where Aristotle argues for the pre-​
structure of incidents imitated in a tragedy:  ‘Tragedy is an imitation, not
of men, but of an action and of life, and life consists in action.’110 In the
context of tradition seen as a living transmission (of knowledge), Ricoeur
argues that it is constituted of the interplay of sedimentation and innovation,
where sedimentation refers to existing ‘paradigms’ or ‘forms’ of knowledge
and innovation is the deviation from established paradigms and the inven-
tion of new.111 Thus, mimesis2 refers to the relationship between knowledge
and action.
According to Ricoeur, mimesis3 is the ‘intersection of the world of the
text and the world of the hearer or reader’, in other words, the intersec-
tion between the world configured by the knowledge of the text and the
world wherein real action occurs, an idea similar to Gadamer’s ‘fusion
of horizons’, which is conveyed by Aristotle himself in many passages of
his Poetics. Aristotle talks about the effect of the tragedy, which evokes
the ‘excitation of the feelings, such as pity, fear, anger, and the like’ in the
spectator112 and, therefore, Ricoeur argues that ‘it is in the hearer or the
reader that the traversal of mimesis reaches its fulfilment’.113 In the lan-
guage of traditionary-​hermeneutics, we could say that mimesis3 is the effect
of traditionary knowledge on the reader, her emotions, and passions, by the
act of encountering the text. From this study of Ricoeur, we can conclude
that the three-​part theory of mimesis reveals the interplay between pre-​
structured action in the world, configurative knowledge in texts, and effected
passions of the reader. This, I argue, is the mechanism underlying the con-
struction of traditions. With this in mind, I will read Aurobindo’s engage-
ment with the Gītā which co-​opts karma-​yoga, gyāna-​yoga, and bhakti-​yoga
into purna-​yoga. It is well established in scholarship that the Gītā contains
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Action, yoga, and tradition 187

a variety of yoga paths. While Feuerstein identifies a new type of yoga in
each of the eighteen chapters, the standard understanding is that the Gītā
contains three main yogas –​karma, gyāna, and bhakti.114 King argues that
karma as ritual action and gyāna as metaphysical knowledge represented
two different traditions of Vedic interpretation  –​Mīmāṃsā and Vedānta
respectively, which are brought together in the Gītā.115 Aurobindo’s purna-​
yoga was not only bringing together three traditions of yoga  –​Classical,
Brahmanical, and Tantric –​but also integrating the six yogas of haṭha, rāja,
tantra, and (the trimarga of) karma, gyāna, and bhakti. In his Introduction,
Aurobindo argues that the Gītā’s trimarga picks up where raja-​yoga has
left off and seeks to convert normal operations of the intellect, heart, and
will by ‘turning them away from their ordinary and external preoccupa-
tions and activities and concentrating them on the Divine’.116 However, he
is quick to show two defects of the trimarga in light of purna-​yoga: first,
the trimarga’s indifference to ‘mental and bodily perfection’ (which is com-
pensated by haṭha and rāja) and second, in spite of its claims, in actual
practice ‘it chooses one of the three parallel paths exclusively and almost
in antagonism to the others, instead of effecting a synthetic harmony’.117
The second critique has been considered by scholarship on the Gītā, where
there is consensus that implicit within the Gītā there is actually an attempt
to reconcile these different paths.118 Therefore, the Aurobindonian project
of integrating the three yogas of the Gītā was not completely a novel inno-
vation, rather a building up of the integrating project found within the Gītā
itself. Aurobindo has a section on each of these three yogas respectively in
which, on the one hand, he outlines the main themes from the Gītā, while,
on the other hand, in his treatment of each of the yogas, he is constantly
looking for ways to integrate it with the other two yogas. It is this ‘act of
integration’, which explores the interconnections between action, knowl-
edge, and passion, that will be the focus of my reading even as I  read it
through the eyes of Ricoeur’s theory of mimesis.
Karma-​yoga: the yoga of divine works (mimesis1)
Even while I  describe Aurobindo’s karma-​yoga, I  will be reading it in light
of Ricoeur’s mimesis1, which as I have demonstrated above refers to a pre-​
understanding of action as already possessing semantic structures, sym-
bolic resources, and a temporal character. In this section I  will argue that
Aurobindo’s integral yoga as work or action possesses semantic structures.
Aurobindo has thirteen chapters in this section, twelve of which were origi-
nally written for the Arya, although since then he made extensive revisions, and
the thirteenth was a later addition written during the 1940s. Aurobindo sum-
marizes that the aim of karma-​yoga is ‘the dedication of every human activity
to the supreme Will’, which results in an abandonment of both ‘our works’ as
well as the ‘results of our work’ to That (the Divine).119 This highlights the ten-
sion between the doing of activity and its abandonment. It also brings to the
fore the great debate within the Gītā about which is better –​the performance
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188  Action, yoga, and tradition

of action or its renunciation as questioned by Arjuna to Kṛṣṇa: ‘you praise
renunciation of actions and again you praise yoga, Krishna. Which one is the
better of these two? Tell this to me definitely’ (Gītā 5.1).120

Pre-​understanding of action: semantic structures

Flood argues that this tension between the ‘performance of action and its
renunciation’ is not only at the heart of the Gītā, but also of the whole epic of
the Mahābhārata and that the Gītā tries to resolve this tension between ‘expres-
sion of action’ and its ‘restriction’ by showing them to be compatible.121 The
commentatorial tradition shows that there are a variety of resolutions between
action and its renunciation, which revolve around three main issues: agency,
motive, and goal of action. The different positions put forward by commenta-
tors are in accordance with the presuppositions of the tradition they repre-
sent. Aurobindo acknowledges these three issues as the ‘three first Godward
approaches in the Gītā’s way of karma-​yoga’ and refers to them as ‘equality,
renunciation of all desire for the fruit of our works, action done as a sacrifice
to the supreme Lord’.122

EQUALITY AS ‘AGENCY’

Aurobindo’s principle of ‘equality’ correlates with the notion of agency or

explores the question of the ‘who’ of action. He argues that renunciation
of desire leads to equality, while the surrender of the ego brings about one-
ness. The object of both equality and oneness is the Divine or Brahman,
who for Aurobindo is the true agent of all actions. The purpose of yoga, for
Aurobindo, is to ‘exile the limited outward-​looking ego and to enthrone God
in its place as the ruling inhabitant of the nature’.123 In other words, it is to
gain the consciousness of ‘the great universal Energy as the true doer of all
our actions’ and the ‘Lord of that Energy as their ruler and director’ through
the renunciation of the ‘egoistic aim’ of action.124 Thus, opposed to Śaṅkara,
for whom the true self is passive and agency illusory, and following Rāmānuja
and Madhava, both of whom acknowledge the Lord (antaryamin) as the true
actor,125 Aurobindo affirms the Divine or the Lord as the ‘true doer of all our
actions’. Zaehner makes this point in his commentary on Gītā 3.27 –​‘through
the constituents God alone is the real agent’.126 The divine Will is not alien
to the individual self rather, Aurobindo argues, that it is ‘intimate to us and
we ourselves are part of it’ as it is our own ‘highest self’ that possesses and
supports it. However, our ‘highest self’ is not the ‘ego-​self’ but the ‘trans-
cendent and universal’ Self, of which the ego-​self is the ‘foam and flowing
surface’.127 The renunciation and surrender of the surface ego-​self will then
‘allow it to be made one with the will of the Eternal’ and the Divine Will
then becomes the true actor of our actions –​‘to act in God and not in the
ego’. However this is possible, only by ‘a conscious subjection and merging
of the natural man into the divine Self’.128 This seeming paradox between
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Action, yoga, and tradition 189

self-​renunciation and agency is clarified marvellously on the side of agency
by Bakhtin, who terms self-​renunciation as a ‘great symbol of self-​activity’
and declares that in self-​renunciation, the self actualizes ‘with utmost active-
ness and in full’ its unique place in being –​‘the world in which I, from my
own unique place, renounce myself does not become a world in which I do
not exist’ rather ‘self-​renunciation is a performance or accomplishment that
encompasses Being-​as-​event’.129

RENUNCIATION OF MOTIVES

This immediately raises the question of ‘how’ –​how is this ‘consummation’

of the ascetic and divine agency attained? Aurobindo connects the ‘how’ of
divine agency in the human self to the ‘why’ of the individual self’s agency, in
other words, the consummation is directly related to the (removal of) motive
or ‘desire’ that underlies human action. The second Godward approach is the
‘renunciation of all desire for the fruit of our works’ correlates to the ‘motive’
behind actions, which answers the question of the ‘why’ of action  –​why
does one act? Aurobindo answers this question in saying that, ‘ordinarily the
human being acts because he has a desire or feels a mental or vital or physical
want or need’ and calls this the ‘motive power’ behind action.130 These motives
could be –​necessities of the body, lust for riches, honours or fame, craving
for power or pleasure and even a moral need  –​which seek and crave after
the fruit of one’s work. These motives attach the self to the action through
its desire for its fruit and keep it bound within egoistic activity. Therefore,
Aurobindo concludes that the ‘the first rule of action laid down by the Gītā is
to do the work that should be done without any desire for the fruit, niskama
karma’.131 The ‘worldly’ motives behind one’s action and the desire for the
fruit of one’s action are to be renounced. Does this mean a negation of desire
and motive? For Aurobindo, it seems not because he argues that if ‘motive
power’ is removed then ‘action itself must necessarily cease’. If there are no
motives and desires, he questions –​‘how then shall we continue to act at all?’
For Aurobindo, it is not in the negation of ‘motives’ but in their transforma-
tion into ‘God-​love’ and ‘God-​service’, which results in a transformation of
the very character of action, the key for the consummation of the human self
with the Divine.132

GOAL OF ACTION: SACRIFICE

Changed motives mean changed goals. If the earlier goals of the self were ego-
istic, then are there new goals to which ‘action’ should be directed? This brings
us to the third Godward approach outlined by Aurobindo –​action as sacrifice
to the supreme Lord. This reveals the transformed goal of human action,
which is no longer egoistic but divine work. In support of this, Aurobindo
offers a loose commentary of Gītā 4.19, which refers to the action in the world
of the liberated person.133 It raises the question, how can a liberated person
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190  Action, yoga, and tradition

be active in the world? In reply, he puts forward a common interpretation
(Śaṅkara’s) of it that the liberated person acts in the world for the sake of the
masses that are not liberated.134 Aurobindo offers an alternative commentary
on the verse (4.19) to argue for the importance of the liberated person’s action
in the world due to the transformation of the goal of action. He argues that
through action in the world, a liberated person (a) participates in the divine
work by living for God in the world; (b) manifests the Divine in the world;
and (c) takes the world forward, nearer to the divine ideal.135 Thus we can see
how in addressing the Gītā’s debate between ‘action’ and ‘renunciation’ and
arguing for the central role of action in the world, even for a liberated person,
Aurobindo addressed the three issues of agency, motive, and goal of action.
According to Ricoeur’s mimesis1, the ‘conceptual network’ or the semantic
structure that structurally distinguishes action from mere physical movement
primarily contains the terms –​agency, motive, and goal –​which reflect the
preunderstanding of the world of action.136 Thus, by addressing the issues
of agency, motive, and goal of action, in yogic action Aurobindo was teasing
out the conceptual network that prestructured ‘yogic action’ as understood
by purna-​yoga.

Gyāna-​yoga: the yoga of integral knowledge (mimesis2)

Gyāna-​yoga, or the ‘Yoga of Knowledge’, is the second yoga of the trima-
rga that Aurobindo deals with from the Gītā. It examines the role played by
‘knowledge’ in the overall schema of purna-​yoga. He has twenty-​eight chapters
dedicated to this section on gyāna. Aurobindo, in the ‘Introduction’, sets up
the problematic for his treatment of gyāna-​yoga: traditional gyāna-​yoga, with
its origin in Mīmāṃsā and developed by Vedānta, aims at the realization of the
supreme Self through intellectual reflection (vicāra) and right discrimination
(viveka). The gyānayogin is able to distinguish the different elements of prakṛti
as part of the phenomenal world. Even as he separates from it and identifies
with the pure Self, it leads to a rejection of the phenomenal world and leads
to a final immersion of the individual in the Supreme without any return.
Aurobindo argues that this need not be the sole result of the gyāna-​yoga and
gives two alternative goals: first, if the supreme Self can be realized not just
in one’s being but also in all beings and in the phenomenal world of action,
then the goal of gyāna can be ‘an active conquest of the cosmic existence for
the Divine’, and the second goal is a ‘conversion of all forms of knowledge’
into ‘activities of the divine consciousness’, so that all forms of knowledge
can be used to perceive the Divine in knowledge and its different forms and
symbols.137 Thus, it is resolving the tension between (a) the rejection and the
realization of the phenomenal world of action by the act of knowing, and
(b) knowledge as a means of transformation and transformation of knowl-
edge itself that directs Aurobindo’s work on the gyāna-​yoga. My reading of
Aurobindo’s gyāna-​yoga will thus be on these two lines –​first, to explore the
role played by knowledge in the process of embodying the phenomenal world
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Action, yoga, and tradition 191

of action by the ‘knowledgeable’ self and second, more importantly, the rela-
tionship between yogic action and different forms of knowledge.
Both these goals are concerned with the relationship between knowledge
and action. Ricoeur’s mimesis2 explores the relationship between the con-
figuration of knowledge (in the broader sense of text), both as natural and
human science, and human action. Although he is primarily concerned with
the construction of historical and fictional narratives, which seems completely
unrelated to the Aurobindonian project, his general thesis of the relationship
shared between action and the configuration of knowledge will aid me in this
enquiry, even as I explore the connection between action and knowledge in
Aurobindo. Therefore, even as I trace Aurobindo’s argument, I will be reading
Aurobindo’s gyāna-​yoga in light of Ricoeur’s mimesis2, which deals with the
relationship between action and knowledge.
Aurobindo’s exposition of the gyāna-​yoga is built upon a critique of the
position held by what he calls the ‘traditional systems’, which is primarily the
position of the Advaita Vedānta of Śaṅkara. All spiritual knowing is the seek-
ing after of the Infinite or the Absolute (any form of transcendence). Its goal
is to know by identity the consciousness of the Absolute, which is different
from the ordinary consciousness of ideas and form because the Absolute can
only inhabit ‘a pure transcendent state of non-​cosmic existence or else a non-​
existence’ and all cosmic existence is illusory. Therefore, the attainment of this
goal of knowledge by identity is necessarily ‘an extinction of ego, a cessation
of all mental, vital and physical activities’. Thus, in any severe or pure gyāna-​
yoga, all activity is abandoned and there is a transcendence of the intellect
through its separation from the phenomenal self.138
Although Aurobindo agrees that ‘thought’ with its functions of ‘gathering
and reflection, meditation, fixed contemplation, the absorbed dwelling of the
mind on its object, śrāvaṇa, mañana, nididhyāsana’ is a central aid to our reali-
zation of the Absolute, he offers a two-​fold critique of the central importance
given to it by traditional gyāna-​yoga. First, he argues that ‘thought’ can only
be a ‘scout and pioneer’ and guide but can never ‘command or effectuate’
because the true ‘leader of the journey’ and the ‘priest of our sacrifice’ is the
Will, which determines the orientation for both the thought and the emotions
to follow. Second, the ‘quiescent Self’ is neither ‘the one entirely real existence’
nor the Supreme Self, which is the Eternal Lord, who determines all activities
even as they proceed from it. In these activities, the Supreme Self manifests
itself in infinite ways as the conscious Will, which is ‘not ignorant but at one
with its own Self-​knowledge and its knowledge of all that it is put out to
express’. Aurobindo concludes by saying that ‘knowing that will in ourselves
and the universe and following it to its divine finalities’ is surely the high-
est goal of gyāna-​yoga. Thus, Aurobindo has not only critiqued traditional
gyāna-​yoga as insufficient for complete knowledge of the Absolute, he has
argued for how ‘knowing’ the Supreme Will is both a ‘knowing’ of its self-​
knowledge as well as the knowledge of its manifestation in the phenomenal
world, which is the highest goal of Aurobindo’s gyāna-​yoga.139
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192  Action, yoga, and tradition

This brings me to the second issue Aurobindo addresses, which has to do
with the ‘status of knowledge’ itself and the relationship it has with the phe-
nomenal world of action. We already have a clue from the above discussion,
when Aurobindo argued that the Supreme Will, which, on the one hand, is the
goal of our ‘knowing’, on the other hand, itself contains both Self-​knowledge
as well as the knowledge of the manifest world of action which is its expres-
sion. This brings us directly to the issue of the relationship between action
and knowledge.
Aurobindo acknowledges that there are two statuses of knowledge –​first,
the knowledge of the ‘phenomenon of existence’ or the ‘apparent world’
(lower knowledge) and second, the knowledge of the ‘truth of existence’
(higher knowledge).140 He argues that the lower knowledge is a ‘false report,
an imperfect construction, an attenuated and erroneous figure’ of both the
universe and the individual self as it appears to the ‘unenlightened’ mind and
senses. However, what they seem to be is still a ‘figure’ of what the universe
and the individual-​self ‘really are’ –​‘a figure that points beyond itself to the
reality beyond it’.141 What is interesting is Aurobindo’s double-​use of the term
‘figure’ –​first, ‘figure’ refers to the lower knowledge and, second, it refers to
the universe and the individual self itself as it appears to the unenlightened
mind. From this, we can infer that for the unenlightened mind, while there
is an imperfect match between its knowledge-​construction and ‘reality’, the
cause for the mismatch is because of the direct correspondence between this
knowledge-​construction and the phenomenal world of action as it appears
to the unenlightened mind. Aurobindo calls this the lower knowledge, the
knowledge of ‘what is ordinarily understood as life’. The examples of the
lower knowledge given by Aurobindo are science, art, philosophy, ethics, psy-
chology, religion and history.142 He concludes that while these ‘constructions
and representations’ are necessary for the self’s action in the world, they are
not self-​existent truth (higher knowledge). Thus, it can be argued that, for
Aurobindo, the lower knowledge-​construction is a configuration of the phe-
nomenal world of action, even though for him it is imperfect knowledge as it
is not the self-​existent truth. This is precisely Ricoeur’s understanding of text
in mimesis2, where it is a configuration of the world of action.
The higher knowledge on the other hand, is the knowledge of the Absolute.
Aurobindo asserts that the higher knowledge reveals that

the Absolute is beyond personality and impersonality, and yet it is both

the Impersonal and the supreme Person and all persons. The Absolute
is beyond the distinction of unity and multiplicity, and yet it is the One
and the innumerable Many in all the universes…. It is the cosmic and
the supracosmic Spirit, the supreme Lord, the supreme Self, the supreme
Puruṣa and supreme Shakti . . . .143

The goal of gyāna-​yoga is to take a sādhaka from the lower knowledge to the
higher knowledge. The traditional gyāna-​yoga eliminated and rejected ‘the
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Action, yoga, and tradition 193

body, the life, the senses, the heart, the very thought in order to merge into
the quiescent Self or supreme Nihil or indefinite Absolute’. Thus, in the tra-
ditional approach, the lower knowledge had to be negated so that the higher
could be achieved. The traditional gyāna’s strategy of ‘absolute abstraction’
resulted in arriving at an ‘infinite empty Negation or an infinite equally vacant
Affirmation’.144 However, Aurobindo argues that in the schema of the purna-​
yoga, the two knowledges are two sides of the same seeking and that until the
mental consciousness is developed through the seeking of the lower knowl-
edge of the external life, the spiritual knowledge (higher knowledge) of the
internal life is not possible. Thus, he rejects this strategy of the traditional
gyāna-​yoga and argues that the lower knowledge is ‘the means by which we
arrive at the workings of God through Nature and through Life’.145 However,
Aurobindo differentiates between the methods of the lower knowledge (sci-
ence, art, philosophy, and so on) from the methods of gyāna-​yoga, which are
purification, concentration, and identification. The methods of the lower
knowledge can only prepare the mind but never enter the Absolute as they are
external approaches. On the other hand, once the intellect is prepared, yoga
steps in and is able to approach the Absolute directly from within. Purification
is to make the mental being as a mirror to reflect and receive the divine pres-
ence. Concentration turns the mind and will from the ‘dispersed movement of
the thoughts’ to the ‘eternal and the real’ behind all. It also breaks down the
‘veil’ erected by the mind between the self and the Self. Finally, identification
is ‘the condition of complete knowledge and possession’. Although none of
these can be attained by the methods of lower knowledge, Aurobindo argues
that they not only have a preparatory role, but also they have an auxiliary role.
The gyāna-​yoga according to purna-​yoga does not ‘exclude or throw away the
forms of the lower knowledge’, even though it separates itself from them by
the intensity of its objective and the specialization of its method. It not only
starts from them, but also ‘carries them with it and uses them as auxiliaries’.
The contemplation of the Absolute in Nature and in the life of man and the
world –​past, present, and future –​are equal elements of the gyāna-​yoga for
the ‘realisation of God in all things’. The yogin sees God in all of the finite
through the ‘data of science’, ‘conclusions of philosophy’, ‘forms of beauty
and the forms of good’, ‘all the activities of life’, and finally ‘in the past of
the world and its effects, in the present and its tendencies, in the future and
its great progression’. From the lower, he has risen to the higher knowledge
and the higher not only illumines for him the lower, but also makes it a part
of itself.146
Even as we see how Aurobindo’s gyāna-​yoga overcomes the ‘otherworldli-
ness’ of traditional gyāna, there is a clear sense of Aurobindo’s gyāna’s cor-
relation to the phenomenal world of action in both the lower and higher
statuses of knowledge. Furthermore, this knowledge is not illusory, but rather
it is always correlated to the status of the yogin’s action. His knowledge is
transformed inasmuch as his world is transformed through his action. Even
though Aurobindo does not refer to the production of texts in the same sense
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194  Action, yoga, and tradition

as Ricoeur, both have in mind ‘knowledge construction’, even though one is
thinking of formal texts and the other discourses and lastly, for both, knowl-
edge represents the world of action. This is central to mimesis2, even as the
connection between action and its representation as knowledge or text is
established.

Bhakti-​yoga: the yoga of divine love (mimesis3)

The final yoga of the trimarga of the Gītā is bhakti-​yoga. Aurobindo devotes
eight chapters to its exposition in The Synthesis. Here the sādhaka becomes
a bhakta. If the goal of gyāna-​yoga was to draw ultimately in unity with the
Absolute in realization, in bhakti-​yoga, the focus is on the other end, nearing
duality, where the ‘otherness’ and the ‘personality’ of the Lord has to be pre-
supposed with the self and the Absolute mediated through ‘love’ in the act of
‘worship’ and ‘adoration’. For Aurobindo, ‘love’ is the ‘power and passion of
the divine self-​delight’ and is primarily concerned with all the emotions of the
individual self. The ‘love’ of the bhakta does not exclude knowledge but rather
is dependent on it –​‘the completer the knowledge, the richer the possibility of
love’. In other words, love without knowledge is ‘blind’.147 If we keep in mind
the above discussion about Aurobindo’s conception of knowledge, the inter-
penetrated lower and higher knowledge, equivalent to the texts and discourses
of all human knowledge, then bhakti-​yoga, is the encountering and reception
of this knowledge by the emotions of the bhakta in the act of worship and
adoration. In other words, it is the emotive self receiving and appropriating
knowledge, which in Ricoeurian language could be stated as ‘the act of read-
ing’ of the text even as the ‘world of the text’ intersects with the ‘world of the
hearer or reader’.148 In other words, it is an intersection between the world
configured by the knowledge of the text and the world, wherein real action
occurs, an idea similar to Gadamer’s ‘fusion of horizons’. In this view, ‘wor-
ship’ and ‘adoration’ could be termed as ‘acts of reading’. Ricoeur terms the
‘act of reading’ as the third and final stage of his three-​part theory of mimesis
and calls it mimesis3.
Building on Gadamer’s notion of ‘application’ and from the suggestions
in Aristotle’s Poetics about the effect of the tragedy, which evokes the ‘excita-
tion of the feelings, such as pity, fear, anger, and the like’ in the spectator,149
Ricoeur argues that ‘it is in the hearer or the reader that the traversal of mime-
sis reaches its fulfilment’.150 In the language of traditionary-​hermeneutics, we
could say that mimesis3 is the effect of traditionary knowledge on the reader,
her emotions and passions, in the act of encountering the text. In light of
mimesis3, I will read Aurobindo’s bhakti-​yoga, specifically looking to identify
and explicate the relationship between knowledge and the emotive self.
Aurobindo sets up the problematic for his exposition on bhakti-​yoga by
comparing his project with the traditional systems. He argues that tradi-
tionally there has been a schism between the philosopher and the devotee
and between knowledge and passion. The gyānayogin despises bhakti as it
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Action, yoga, and tradition 195

necessarily presupposes duality and seeks after the Personal God, while for
her the Impersonal unity is the highest reality. While not rejecting this cri-
tique, Aurobindo responds to it in two ways: first, he makes the distinction
between worship and adoration in that, while external worship presupposes
duality, internal adoration passes into the ‘bliss of union’. Second, he con-
tinues to maintain the position that love ‘returns gladly upon a difference
in oneness’, in which the oneness itself is made richer. The counter-​critique
offered to traditional gyāna is that in affirming difference in oneness, the heart
(emotive self) exposes the weakness of the intellect. The intellect fixes itself
on opposite ideas of the Divine as ‘logical contradictions’ and excludes one
for the other, while the truth of the Reality for Aurobindo is that the Many
are encompassed in the One.151 In this response to the critique of bhakti,
Aurobindo brings to the fore two issues, related to each other, that are central
to our exploration: first, the nature of worship and adoration, and second, the
relationship, although here negatively, between thought and heart, in other
words, between knowledge and passion. I would argue that Aurobindo’s ‘wor-
ship and adoration’ in their reception of the Divine can be seen as ‘acts of
reading’, in which the passion of the bhakta/​reader in worship encounters the
knowledge of the text (in the broadest sense of knowledge-​construction or
discourse). I will first look at Aurobindo’s conception of worship and adora-
tion, even as I argue they are acts of reading and then particularly look at the
relationship between the passion of the bhakta and knowledge.
Aurobindo takes from the Gītā that there are three kinds of bhakti  –​
(a) seeking refuge in the Divine from the sorrows of the world (arta) (b) desir-
ing the Divine as the giver of its good (artharthi), and (c) yearning to know
the divine Unknown (jijñāsu). The third form of bhakti –​ jijñāsu’s ‘I do not
understand, I love’ brings together the idea of knowledge and passion, albeit
negatively. However, Aurobindo argues that jijñāsu’s ‘intensity of passion’,
which loves without knowing, is not love’s ‘last self-​expression’ but its first.
Therefore, turning jijñāsu on its head, Aurobindo argues that ‘as knowl-
edge of the Divine grows, delight in the Divine and love of it must increase’.
Although this bhakti-​encounter begins with ignorance, its degree of intimacy
is directly proportional to the growth of knowledge, as increase in knowledge
decreases ignorance.152
Therefore, in this sense, Aurobindo’s worship, as an external encounter
with different discourses of knowledge, aims to increase knowledge so that
ignorance will decrease. He gives the examples of the knowledge of the sci-
ences –​theoretical and practical –​and the knowledge of the arts, and argues
that worship is to be able to ‘see’ the Divine in these discourses of knowledge.
For example, ‘the yogin’s aim in the sciences that make for knowledge should
be to discover and understand the workings of the Divine Consciousness-​
Puissance’, while in the practical sciences, worship is to know that knowledge
(mental and physical or occult and psychic) ‘for a conscious and faultless
expression of the spirit’s mastery, joy and self-​fulfilment’. Finally, ‘the yogin’s
aim in the arts should not be a mere aesthetic, mental or vital gratification,
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196  Action, yoga, and tradition

but seeing the Divine everywhere, worshipping it with a revelation of the
meaning of its own works’. Thus, for Aurobindo external worship is in the
encounter with and reception of the different discourses of knowledge by
the bhakta. Simply put, knowing is worship. Although Aurobindo does not
have any reference to the ‘act of reading’, the act of knowing any of the dif-
ferent discourses of knowledge mentioned by Aurobindo presupposes the act
of reading. In fact, we could argue for a direct correlation between ‘know-
ing’ and ‘reading’ in Aurobindo’s scheme of things. Thus, it is not far-​fetched
to argue that the act of worship in the bhakta’s encounter with discoursial
knowledge is necessarily an ‘act of reading’.153
Aurobindo also argues for external religious worship in a very similar fash-
ion. He knows that worship is not merely an encounter with abstract knowl-
edge, but with a Personal Divine, otherwise worship and human emotions
become meaningless if directed to an Impersonal, which is featureless and
relationless and unable to respond to the expression of human emotions.
That is why, Aurobindo argues, even the Advaitin had to admit the ‘practical
existence of God and the gods’ and the Buddhist the ‘supreme deity of the
Buddha’, for the sake of worship.154 But if bhakti is between the bhakta and
the Personal Divine, then what role does the increase or decrease in knowledge
play in this emotive encounter? Aurobindo explains that the Personal Divine
takes the form and quality assigned by the bhakta and through that form
responds to them. Therefore, although they see of him a truth, it is a truth
that is constructed and represented in terms of the being and consciousness
of the bhakta. In other words, the bhakti of the bhakta is directed to a Divine
Personality, who while representing the truth of the Divine is still a ‘construc-
tion and representation’ within the bhakta’s mind. Hence, Aurobindo posits,
the different religions of the world put forward different conceptions of the
Divine. In Aurobindo, there appears to be a hint of the standard phenom-
enological study of religion when he claims the existence of different forms,
representations, and constructions have but one reality behind all of them
whereby, for example, the Divine reveals itself as ‘Christ personality or the
Buddha personality’.155 However, the difference between Aurobindo and phe-
nomenology is that while phenomenology affirms a single universal essence
that is seen as different forms in different contexts, for Aurobindo, the Many
are also real –​‘he is each separately and all together’. He argues that when we
see beyond an exclusive vision, we can see ‘behind Vishnu all the personality
of Shiva and behind Shiva all the personality of Vishnu’.156 In fact, there is a
critique of the phenomenological act embedded in his critique of ‘philosophi-
cal intellect’. He summarizes that ‘philosophical intellect’ gives an abstract
reality of its own, which is ‘apart from all their concrete representations’ and
‘reduce these representations to their barest and most general terms’ and,
if possible, into a ‘final abstraction’.157 However, the emotive self, unable to
live with abstractions, finds satisfaction only in what is concrete. Therefore,
‘intelligence’ although not the ‘pure intellect’ using its ‘power of imagination’
becomes the ‘image-​maker’, a spiritual artist and a poet and creates symbols
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Action, yoga, and tradition 197

and values,158 which result in the discourses of religious knowledge and fol-
low the same strategy of ‘knowing’ the non-​religious discourses of knowledge
through the ‘act of reading’.
However, Aurobindo makes a shift from external worship in its ‘secular’ and
‘religious’ forms to ‘adoration’, an internal form of worship. It is here that the
passions of the emotive bhakta are affected in its encounter with the Divine.
The motives and emotions driving external worship are fear, desire, or a sense
of awe. However, it is in the purification and elevation of the ‘religious instinct
of worship’ that one enters into the inner bhakti-​yoga. Aurobindo uses the term
‘Katharsis’ for what takes place in this inner act of adoration at the stage of puri-
fication. Katharsis is an Aristotelian term from the Poetics, which as Ricoeur
tells us, particularly refers to the ‘spectator’s emotional response’ brought about
by the plot of the tragedy resulting in the catharsis of emotions.159 Aurobindo
uses the same term for what happens in ‘adoration’  –​a Katharsis of ‘all the
conflicts whether with the idea of the Divine in himself or of the Divine in
ourselves’ resulting in both ‘an imitation of the divine’ as well as ‘a growing
into his likeness in our nature’.160 Once purification is complete, ‘adoration’ is
the ‘intense devotion of the thought in the mind to the object of adoration’
accompanied by intense feelings and emotions with the goal of, ‘not to pass
into the being of the Divine’, but to ‘bring the Divine into ourselves and to lose
ourselves in the deep ecstasy of his presence’.161
To summarize, in the internal act of adoration, involving an emotional
encounter, the passion of the bhakta is not expended or given out, but rather
it is ‘impacted upon’. It is a receiver rather than a giver. In the process of
‘purification’, the very emotions undergo change to take on the ‘likeness’ and
‘imitation’ of the Divine and in ecstatic adoration, it is the ‘bringing in’ of the
Divine within the bhakta’s interiority. In the internal act of adoration, similar
to the external act of worship, the subjectivity of the bhakta is affected and
there is a ‘receiving’, almost an ‘impression’ of the knowledge of the Divine.
In this sense, it will not be illegitimate to term both the acts of worship and
adoration as acts of reading, in which the subjectivity of the reader/​bhakta
‘reconfigures’ knowledge (secular, religious, or esoteric) upon itself.
This completes my consideration of Aurobindo’s trimarga of the Gītā.
I have argued that the three paths of yoga –​karma, gyāna, and bhakti –​ while
as yoga they are paths to unite with the Divine, they also play out different pro-
cesses between action, knowledge, and passion within the ascetic practitioner.
Using Ricoeur’s theory of mimesis, I have traced and explicated these rela-
tionships. In karma-​yoga, using mimesis1 I argued that ‘yogic action’ contains
a preunderstanding through its semantic, symbolic, and temporal structures.
These pre-​structures in action, as its ‘first signification’, enable its readabil-
ity and its configuration into narrative. Second, in gyāna-​yoga I argued that
all forms of ‘knowledge’ are representative constructions and, therefore, a
configuration of the phenomenal world of action. Thus, the acquisition or
production of knowledge is an imitative act, representing the pre-​configured
world of action. Finally, I argued in bhakti-​yoga that both external worship
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198  Action, yoga, and tradition

and internal adoration can be seen as ‘acts of reading’ because they are emo-
tive acts of encounter with the Divine, either through discourses of knowl-
edge or directly (still involving the use of symbols), which is a reception of
the (knowledge of) the Divine into the interiority of the bhakta. This provides
a clear answer to Fitzgerald’s question about the representation of religious
actions. Religious actions are what they are because they entail in their pre-​
understanding, through its semantic, symbolic, and temporal structures, reli-
gious knowledge and, in turn, they can be represented in texts that can be
said to signify actions directed to the divine as religious, which can be dis-
tinguished from non-​religious actions. Equally, Ricoeur’s overarching argu-
ment has been to show that the three-​part process of mimesis contains the
mechanism that transmits the materiality of tradition. Although Aurobindo’s
concern in his exposition of the trimarga of the Gītā did not have any con-
nection with a mechanism for the transmission of tradition, this hermeneu-
tical reading of Aurobindo’s trimarga has shown that the interrelationship
between action, knowledge, and passion, as conceived by Aurobindo, does
indeed reveal a mechanism for the transmission of traditionary material. This
draws our attention to the many yogic traditions that have thrived and kept
vibrant through hundreds of years. Could this be because they entail within
them the mechanism for the transmission of tradition, even if they do not
reflectively understand it in this language of tradition?

Purna-​yoga and tantra: the yoga of self-​perfection

After engaging with haṭha-​yoga and raja-​yoga of the classical tradition and
the trimarga of karma-​yoga, gyāna-​yoga, and bhakti-​yoga of the Brahmanical
tradition, Aurobindo finally engages with the tantra tradition in the fourth
part of The Synthesis, even as he brings his project of purna-​yoga to com-
pletion. While Aurobindo’s engagement with the earlier two traditions could
be traced to Patañjali’s Yoga-​Sūtras and the Bhagavad-​Gītā respectively,
Aurobindo’s engagement with tantra cannot be traced back to any particular
Tantric text but reflects a borrowing from the entire corpus.162 What I want to
point out here is that traditions are not only defined by their texts, but equally
by their practices and, therefore, to dialogue with another tradition is not only
to interrogate its texts, but also to inhabit its practices, by inscribing them on
one’s own body. It is at this stage that hermeneutics becomes truly dialogical.
Stoeber argues that the ‘young’ Aurobindo was deeply involved with
the practice of tantra during his days of political activism. The symbols of
the ‘Mother’ and ‘goddesses’ used in the freedom-​struggle are evidence for
Aurobindo’s acceptance of Tantric language and symbolic systems. However,
Stoeber’s claim that Aurobindo participated in extreme Tantric rituals is
debatable, since his claim is primarily based on Aurobindo’s correspondence
with Motilal Roy from Chandernagore (who was both a revolutionary as well
as a tantric), which has regular allusions to tantra. However, both Roy and
the editors of Aurobindo’s papers reveal that tantra was a code name used
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Action, yoga, and tradition 199

by Aurobindo for revolutionary material, the import of which Stoeber is not
willing to completely agree.163 However, Aurobindo did associate with tantra
as he even declared ‘I have taken one standpoint to which many of you have
not been accustomed … I am a tantric’.164 Therefore, what is certain is that
Aurobindo did experiment with tantra-​yoga, as later some of it became central
to his purna-​yoga, even if he did not participate in some of its extreme rituals,
which is seen in his strong rejection of left-​hand (vāma-​mārga) Tantrism.165
My primary interest is not in Aurobindo’s personal yoga but more with the
philosophy of yoga that he developed. Opposed to Advaita, Aurobindo found
Tantric philosophy more attractive for two main reasons:  first, tantra itself
was a synthesizing tradition and second, and more importantly for our work,
for the central importance it gave to the body and the female energy (śakti).
Aurobindo claims that there still exists in India a yoga system, tantra, which
in its nature is a synthesis. This ‘synthesis’ primarily refers to the unifying
role, between Brahman and Śakti and between Spirit and Nature, played by
tantra. In the Introduction to The Synthesis of Yoga, Aurobindo, with a view
to differentiating his own synthetic strategy in purna-​yoga from tantra, cat-
egorically states that the tantra synthesis is ‘not a synthesis of other schools’.
However, towards the end of the book, in the tantra section, he argues that in
its ‘system of instrumentation’, tantra includes haṭha-​yoga, raja-​yoga, and the
trimarga –​the different schools.166 This idea that the tantra has an integrating
quality is also noted by other scholars. Urban argues that the Tantric tradi-
tions, along with the Sahajiya tradition, were co-​mingling and synthesizing
with various Sufi orders from the ninth century onwards.167 While Muller-​
Ortega gives the example of Abhinavagupta, who synthesized two Saivite tra-
ditions and founded Kashmir Saivism, Faure shows how Tantric Buddhism
assimilated Hindu gods, who were re-​absorbed within the Hindu fold around
the twelfth century.168 Although, in some way, Aurobindo wanted to distin-
guish the synthetic nature of purna-​yoga from the synthetic nature of tantra,
even this recognition of tantra is, in a sense, declaring the Tantric project a
precursor to purna-​yoga. In other words, the ‘act of synthesising’ has a precur-
sor in Abhinavagupta’s tantra, as well as in other Tantric traditions that have
similarly synthesized different traditions and schools in their time.
This brings me to the central theme of this section, which has to do with
the importance given to the ‘body’ and ‘sakti’ by tantra-​yoga as opposed to
Advaita, particularly of Śaṇkara, which dismisses them as illusions. The
Tantric system also makes liberation its final aim but it is not its only aim –​
‘it takes on its way a full perfection and enjoyment of the spiritual power,
light and joy in the human existence’. In light of tantra, Aurobindo restates
the aim of purna-​yoga as  –​‘to arrive by the shortest way at the largest
development of spiritual power and being and divinise by it a liberated
nature in the whole range of human living is our inspiring motive’.169 Thus,
what Aurobindo was borrowing from tantra for his purna-​yoga was the
notion of ‘divinised body’ or ‘embodied spirit’ or ‘jīvanmukti’. Traditional
schools, like Advaita, have argued that yogic action will result in liberation
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200  Action, yoga, and tradition

and a negation of the present, existent world. However, Aurobindo argues
that yogic action can transform the yogin into a state of ‘living liberation’,
where one is liberated and yet in the world, in the body. Aurobindo men-
tions tantra as a method of enquiry for the first time in 1912, when he wrote
in one of his letters that he was developing a theory and system of yoga
that was new. He gave it the name Sapta Chatusthaya, or the seven quater-
naries, which was built upon seven Sanskrit formulae.170 The four elements
of the seventh chatusthaya were shuddhi (purification), mukti (liberation),
bhukti (enjoyment), and siddhi (perfection) –​which were the aims of tantra-​
yoga.171 Heehs argues that tantra-​yoga provided the ‘general foundation of
the yoga of self-​perfection’.172 Aurobindo describing the general direction
of purna-​yoga, states that ‘this starts from the method of Vedanta to arrive
at the aim of the Tantra’.173 The necessities for achieving the highest perfec-
tion of ‘living liberation’ can be summed up in two steps: first, the growing
of the soul into a ‘perfect equality, samata’  –​ ‘Brahman is one in all and
therefore one to all’. Equality is the poise of unity with Brahman, becom-
ing Brahman and living in the infinite. The different methods embraced
by purna-​yoga organized within the matrix of Sapta Chatusthaya ought to
work together to result in this equality. Second, once the consciousness has
reached the Divine and has become one with it, then not to flee from its
worldly existence, rather to

raise all the active parts of the human nature to that highest condition and
working pitch of their power and capacity, sakti, at which they become
capable of being divinised into true instruments of the free, perfect, spir-
itual and divine action.174

The different parts of human nature can be taken as the understanding,

the heart, the prāṇa, and the body. Thus, the spiritual perfection is accom-
plished here in the body and it becomes a centre for divine action in the
phenomenal world.
In this section, we see the relationship between yogic action and the body.
If, in the previous section, we saw how the mechanism of mimesis maps tradi-
tion on the consciousness of the ascetic self, then, in this section, I argue that
the relationship between tradition-​specific and textually-​mediated subjectivity
and the body within Tantric traditions leads to the mapping of tradition on
the body. Flood, in The Tantric Body, claims that ‘through the internaliza-
tion of the text’ and ‘through the inscription of the body by the text’ the
practitioner or yogi ‘learns to inhabit a tradition specific subjectivity’, while
her body becomes a vehicle for tradition.175 So, what would it mean to dia-
logue effectively with an ‘other’ tradition? Does it require one’s subjectivity
to ‘inhabit’ the other’s ‘tradition? I  claim that the knowing of the other is
not merely verbal dialogue, but rather an inhabitation of the other’s tradition
through the inscription of its texts on one’s own body.
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Action, yoga, and tradition 201

Summary
In this chapter, I have read Aurobindo’s The Synthesis of Yoga with one eye
on how he develops his project of purna-​yoga and with the other on the rela-
tionship between ascetic action and tradition, in light of the threefold aims of
this book. On the one hand, I outlined the internal structure of Aurobindo’s
purna-​yoga, even as he brought three traditions of Classical, Brahmanical,
and Tantric yoga conceptually together by knitting haṭha, rāja, karma, gyāna,
bhakti, and tantra together into a single system, which is at the heart of The
Synthesis. On the other hand, my hermeneutical reading of The Synthesis
has advanced my argument in the threefold aim of this book. Simply put, the
overall argument presented here was that yogic action, prefigured by struc-
tures of tradition, in relationship with text, intentionality and passion and
inscribed onto the body, performs the embodied traditioned self as a vehicle
of tradition. With regard to the first aim of arguing that Aurobindo’s integral
philosophy possesses the structure of a traditionary-​hermeneutical enquiry,
I demonstrated that not only do ascetic practices conceived as a techne and
an apprentice–​master relationship, telos, and internal rationality possess the
structure of tradition, but also they map the ‘substance’ or memory of tradi-
tion onto the ascetic self. This reveals the traditionary-​hermeneutical nature
of Aurobindonian enquiry. With regard to the second aim of drawing implica-
tion for the study of religion, I argued that the yogic action’s relationship with
knowledge (text) of the tradition, the ascetic’s volition (intentionality) and
passion (motives) is the mechanism that enables the formation of the tradi-
tioned self. This argues for the legitimacy of representation of religious action
in language that can be distinguished from non-​religious actions. Finally, with
relation to the third aim of developing a dialogical-​hermeneutical approach
for the study of religion, I argued for the embodied nature of the traditioned
self as the vehicle of tradition, in which the distinctions between performed
body and its representation in tradition are blurred. Here, the argument is that
true knowledge of the other requires an ‘inhabitation’ of the other’s practices
by inscribing their texts on one’s body.

Notes
1 McDermott argues that because of the importance played by ‘personal experi-
ence’ in his thought, Aurobindo is better compared with mystics than philosophers.
Robert A. McDermott, “The Experiential Basis of Sri Aurobindo’s Integral Yoga,”
Philosophy East and West 22, no. 1 (1972).
2 See the Publisher’s Note at the beginning of the book. Sri Aurobindo, Record of
Yoga (Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust, 2001 (1909–​1927)).
3 These letters have been published in different formats, however the standard and the
most exhaustive collection are the three volumes published by Sri Aurobindo Birth
Century Library in 1972: Sri Aurobindo, Letters on Yoga, vol. 22, Sri Aurobindo
Birth Centenary Library (Pondicherry:  Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust, 1972);
Sri Aurobindo, Letters on Yoga, vol. 23, Sri Aurobindo Birth Centenary Library
(Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust, 1972); Sri Aurobindo, Letters on Yoga,
202

202  Action, yoga, and tradition

vol. 24, Sri Aurobindo Birth Centenary Library (Pondicherry:  Sri Aurobindo
Ashram Trust, 1972).
4 See Publisher’s Note at the beginning of the book. Sri Aurobindo, Essays in
Philosophy and Yoga, vol. 13, The Complete Works of Sri Aurobindo (Pondicherry:
Sri Aurobindo Ashram, 1998 (1910–​1950)).
5 See Publisher’s Note at the beginning of the book. Sri Aurobindo, The Synthesis
of Yoga (Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram, 1955 (1914–​1921)).
6 Haridas Chaudhuri, “The Philosophy and Yoga of Sri Aurobindo,” Philosophy
East and West 22, no. 1 (1972): 10.
7 Aurobindo, Essays in Philosophy and Yoga, 104.
8 See ‘Note on the Text’ at the end of The Synthesis. Aurobindo, The Synthesis of
Yoga, 914. A  fuller treatment (which is still very brief) of Sapta Chatusthaya is
found also at the beginning of The Record of Yoga (pp. 3–​29). Aurobindo, Record
of Yoga, 3–​29.
9 Mircea Eliade, Yoga: Immortality and Freedom, trans. Willard R. Trask (Princeton,
NJ: Princeton University Press, 1958), 4.
10 Ibid.; Ian Whicher, The Integrity of the Yoga Darśana (New Delhi: D.K. Printworld,
2000), 7; Edwin F. Bryant, The Yoga Sūtras of Patañjali (New York: North Point
Press, 2009), xvii. Echoing Eliade, Flood, on the basis of Bhagavad Gītā 4.18,
argues that the meaning of yoga as ‘to control’ or ‘to yoke’ is derived from yukta,
the passive past participle from the root yuj, in the above passage, which means
‘becoming controlled or disciplined’. Gavin Flood, The Ascetic Self: Subjectivity,
Memory and Tradition (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 67.
11 Eliade, Yoga: Immortality and Freedom, 5.
12 Gavin Flood, Beyond Phenomenology: Rethinking the Study of Religion (London:
Cassell, 1999), 44; Wilfred Cantwell Smith, The Meaning and End of Religion:
A Revolutionary Approach to the Great Religious Traditions (New York: Harper &
Row, 1962), 204.
13 Timothy Fitzgerald, “Playing Language Games and Performing Rituals: Religious
Studies as Ideological State Apparatus,” Method and Theory in the Study of
Religion 15, no. 3 (2003): 221, 241.
14 Timothy Fitzgerald, The Ideology of Religious Studies (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 2000), 8.
15 Gavin Flood, An Introduction to Hinduism (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University
Press, 1996), 8.
16 Flood, Beyond Phenomenology: Rethinking the Study of Religion, 42.
17 Andrew M. McKinnon, “Ritual Re-​Description as Passport Control: A Rejoinder
to Fitzgerald after Bourdieu,” Method and Theory in the Study of Religion 18, no. 2
(2006): 186–​87.
18 Will Sweetman, Mapping Hinduism (Halle: Verlag der Franckeschen Stiftungen zu
Halle, 2003), 48–​49.
19 Sir Monier Monier-​Williams, “Yoga,” in A Sanskrit–​English Dictionary (Oxford:
The Clarendon Press, 1899), 856.
20 The stress in Eliade is on the technique or method. Eliade, Yoga: Immortality and
Freedom, 4. However, for Halbfass, the term yoga is not to be exclusively associated
with ‘doctrines and techniques of meditation and inner discipline’ as he argues
that its root yuj ‘also accounts for the word yukti’ which contains in it the meaning
of reasoning and argumentation. Wilhelm Halbfass, India and Europe: An Essay
in Understanding (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1988), 278.
21 Elizabeth De Michelis, A History of Modern Yoga:  Patanjali and Western
Esotericism (London: Continuum, 2004), 8.
22 Whicher, The Integrity of the Yoga Darśana, 27.
23 Ibid., 28, 29.
  203

Action, yoga, and tradition 203

24 Paul Valliere, “Tradition,” in Encyclopedia of Religion Second Edition, ed. Lindsay
Jones (New York: Thomson Gale, 2005), 9267.
25 E. Herbert Morris, Tradition (London: George Pulman & Sons, 1940), 3.
26 Paul Ricoeur, Time and Narrative, trans. Kathleen Blamey and David Pellauer,
vol. 3 (Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press, 1988), 221.
27 However, in this article, Shils primarily deals with ‘beliefs’ as ‘evaluative, apprecia-
tive and cognitive judgments’ and with only those aspects of ‘traditional actions’
that are engendered by these beliefs. Edward Shils, “Tradition,” Comparative
Studies in Society and History 13, no. 2 (1971): 123, 25.
28 Henry Glassie, “Tradition,” The Journal of American Folklore 108, no. 430
(1995): 396.
29 Dean C. Hammer, “Meaning and Tradition,” Polity 24, no. 4 (1992): 552.
30 This reading of ‘performance’ as ‘action’ is keeping in line with Flood’s under-
standing of ‘performance’ as he himself uses the term ‘acting’ for ‘performing’ in
the same paragraph where he states the above-​mentioned central contention: ‘the
nature of asceticism as acting out the memory of tradition …’. Flood, The Ascetic
Self: Subjectivity, Memory and Tradition, 2.
31 Ibid., 1–​4.
32 Ibid., 2.
33 Ibid., 104.
34 Paul Ricoeur, Freedom and Nature:  The Voluntary and the Involuntary, trans.
Erazim V. Kohak (Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 2007 (1950)), 21.
35 Gavin Flood, The Tantric Body:  The Secret Tradition of Hindu Religion
(London: I.B. Tauris, 2006), ix, 5.
36 Ibid., 27.
37 Ibid., 4.
38 Arbinda Basu, “Foreword,” in Founding the Life Divine:  An Introduction to the
Integral Yoga of Sri Aurobindo, ed. Morwenna Donnelly (London:  Rider and
Company, 1955), 33–​37. Whicher too, while acknowledging the existence of a
multitude of yoga schools and traditions, singles out six main kinds, which are
identical to Basu’s list except that tantrayoga is replaced by mantrayoga. Whicher,
The Integrity of the Yoga Darśana, 6.
39 Whicher, The Integrity of the Yoga Darśana, 38, 28.
40 Pitirim Sorokin, “The Integral Yoga of Sri Aurobindo (1872–​1951),” in The
Integral Philosophy of Sri Aurobindo: A Commemorative Symposium, ed. Haridas
Chaudhuri and Frederic Spiegelberg (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1960), 208.
41 Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, 41.
42 Ibid., 42.
43 Geoffrey Samuel, The Origins of Yoga and Tantra: Indic Religions to the Thirteenth
Century (Cambridge, UK:  Cambridge University Press, 2008), 193; Eliade,
Yoga: Immortality and Freedom, 202.
44 Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, 44.
45 Ibid., 45.
46 Ibid., 44–​45.
47 Ibid., 19.
48 Georg Feuerstein, “Hatha-​Yoga,” in The Shambhala Encyclopedia of Yoga, ed.
Georg Feuerstein (London: Shambhala, 1997), 119.
49 Mark Singleton, Yoga Body:  The Origins of Modern Posture Practice
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010); Joseph S. Alter, Yoga in Modern India:
The Body between Science and Philosophy (Princeton, NJ:  Princeton University
Press, 2004).
50 Peter Heehs, The Lives of Sri Aurobindo (New York: Columbia University Press,
2008), 279.
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204  Action, yoga, and tradition

51 Sorokin, “The Integral Yoga of Sri Aurobindo (1872–​1951),” 207–​09.
52 Swami Vivekananda, Raja-​Yoga (New York: Ramakrishna-​Vivekananda Center,
1956), 5.
53 Except three times, once as a footnote and once in the text, both times referring
to it in the context of the idea of saṃyama and a third time arguing that rāja-​
yoga can be practised in other ways than described in Patañjali. Aurobindo, The
Synthesis of Yoga, 493, 858, 56.
54 The Chandernagore Manuscript is a fifty-​one-​page handwritten manuscript writ-
ten by Aurobindo most certainly in February and March of 1910, while he
was in Chandernagore. For more details, see Notes on the Text (Section Six).
Sri Aurobindo, Early Cultural Writings (Pondicherry:  Sri Aurobindo Ashram
Publication Department, 2003), 774–​75.
55 Sri Aurobindo, “Rajayoga,” in Early Cultural Writings, ed. Sri Aurobindo
(Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust, 2003 (1910)), 507.
56 Vivekananda, Raja-​Yoga, 23. However, de Michelis strives to prove in her section
of The Yoga-​Sūtras: A Rājayoga Textbook?, that this is a ‘misidentification’ with a
view to demonstrating that Vivekananda was actually more sympathetic to Haṭha-​
yoga even if he did privilege Rāja-​yoga. But Singleton shows that Vivekananda
was anti-​Haṭha-​yoga and his reading of ‘the basic texts of medieval haṭha yoga
alongside Patañjali’s Yoga-​Sūtras’ demonstrates that Vivekananda traced Haṭha-​
yoga to the medieval texts and did not identify it with Patañjali. Michelis, A
History of Modern Yoga:  Patanjali and Western Esotericism, 178–​80; Singleton,
Yoga Body: The Origins of Modern Posture Practice, 72.
57 Michelis, A History of Modern Yoga: Patanjali and Western Esotericism, 178.
58 Deussen traces five of the eight aṅgas to the Maitreyi Upanishads (6.18) and
Amritabindu Upanishad (6). Further examples can be the finding of pratyahāra
in Chāndogya Upanishad (8:15) and prāṇāyāma in the Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upanishad
(1.5.23). Paul Deussen, The Philosophy of the Upanishads (Edinburgh: T&T Clark,
1906), 385.
59 Whicher, The Integrity of the Yoga Darśana, 39–​42.
60 Feuerstein, “Hatha-​Yoga,” 119.
61 Whicher dates it to either the second or third century CE while Flood dates it
to around 300 CE. Whicher, The Integrity of the Yoga Darśana, 41; Flood, The
Ascetic Self: Subjectivity, Memory and Tradition, 72; Samuel, The Origins of Yoga
and Tantra: Indic Religions to the Thirteenth Century, 222.
62 There has been debate about the identity of Patañjali. The earlier scholarship of
Dasgupta, Garbe, and Rukmani identified the author of the Yoga-​Sūtras with the
author of the Mahābhāṣya (second century BCE). However, the present scholarly
consensus has shifted the date of the Yoga-​Sūtras to the second or third century
CE, thus ruling out the earlier Patañjali and proposing another person. Whicher,
The Integrity of the Yoga Darśana, 42.
63 Samuel, The Origins of Yoga and Tantra: Indic Religions to the Thirteenth Century,
222; Eliade, Yoga: Immortality and Freedom, 5; Ian Whicher, “The World-​Affirming
and Integrative Dimension of Classical Yoga,” Cracow Indological Studies 4–​5
(2002–​2003): 619.
64 Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, 37.
65 Flood, The Ascetic Self: Subjectivity, Memory and Tradition, 72.
66 Alasdair MacIntyre, After Virtue (London: Duckworth, 1981 (2007)), 222.
67 Alasdair MacIntyre, Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry:  Encyclopaedia,
Genealogy, and Tradition (Notre Dame, IN:  University of Notre Dame Press,
1991), 61–​65.
68 Aurobindo, “Rajayoga,” 509.
69 Ibid.
  205

Action, yoga, and tradition 205

70 Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, 339.
71 Bryant, The Yoga Sūtras of Patañjali, 49.
72 Aurobindo, “Rajayoga,” 509.
73 Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, 28.
74 Aurobindo, “Rajayoga,” 509.
75 Sri Aurobindo, “Hathayoga,” in Early Cultural Writings, ed. Sri Aurobindo
(Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust, 2003 (1910)), 504.
76 Georg Feuerstein, “Asana,” in The Shambhala Encyclopedia of Yoga, ed. Georg
Feuerstein (London: Shambhala, 1997), 35.
77 Bryant, The Yoga Sūtras of Patañjali, 284.
78 Ibid., 288.
79 Garima is not part of Vyāsa’s list of siddhis found in Yoga-​Bhāṣya 3.45. It instead
has prāpti, meaning ‘attainment’ or ‘extension’.
80 Georg Feuerstein, “Siddhi,” in The Shambhala Encyclopedia of Yoga, ed. Georg
Feuerstein (London:  Shambhala, 1997), 288; Bryant, The Yoga Sūtras of
Patañjali, 384.
81 Aurobindo, “Hathayoga,” 5.
82 The standard way to write Aurobindo’s ‘ūrddhwaretāḥ’ is ūrdhva-​retāḥ.
83 Aurobindo, “Hathayoga,” 505.
84 Georg Feuerstein, “Urdhva-​Retas,” in The Shambhala Encyclopedia of Yoga, ed.
Georg Feuerstein (London: Shambhala, 1997), 316–​17.
85 Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, 534.
86 Bryant, The Yoga Sūtras of Patañjali, 292–​95.
87 Aurobindo, “Hathayoga,” 505.
88 Aurobindo, “Rajayoga,” 508.
89 Bryant, The Yoga Sūtras of Patañjali, 289.
90 Aurobindo, “Rajayoga,” 509.
91 Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, 529.
92 Ibid., 528.
93 Ibid., 542.
94 Aurobindo, “Rajayoga,” 510.
95 Edmund Husserl, Cartesian Meditations:  An Introduction to Phenomenology,
trans. Dorion Cairns (The Hague:  Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1999
(1950)), 21–​25.
96 Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, 35.
97 Ibid., 36.
98 Aurobindo, “Rajayoga,” 510.
99 Ibid.
100 Bryant, The Yoga Sūtras of Patañjali, 457.
101 Ibid., 457–​58.
102 In the article in The Chandernagore Manuscript, we find Aurobindo highly
critical of rāja-​yoga. First, he argues that pratyahāra, the drawing inward of
the senses, is enormously difficult and that it could only be achieved if the
haṭhayogic kumbhak is rigorous enough to bring it to pass. Thus, yet again, we
see a connection between the previous haṭha-​yogic practices and the present
rāja-​yogic practices. Second, he speculates if the bringing of dhāraṅā ahead
of pratyahāra would have been a more natural way, though he concludes that
though his suggestion is more ‘easy and straightforward’ Patañjali’s is ‘more
logical and scientific, and, if mastered, may lead to greater results’. Aurobindo,
“Rajayoga,” 510.
103 Sri Aurobindo, Essays on the Gita, 30 vols, vol. 13, Sri Aurobindo Birth Centenary
Library (Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram, 1972), 69.
104 Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, 36–​37.
206

206  Action, yoga, and tradition

105 Apart from The Synthesis, his Essays on the Gita contain two series of essays
written monthly for the Arya from August 1916 till July 1920 on all the eighteen
chapters of the Gītā. For more information see “Note on the Text,” in Aurobindo,
Essays on the Gita, 595.
106 Ricoeur, Time and Narrative, 222.
107 Martin Heidegger, Being and Time, trans. John Macquarrie and Edward
Robinson (New York: Harper & Row, 1962 (1926)), 237.
108 Ricoeur, Time and Narrative, 64.
109 Paul Ricoeur, “What Is a Text? Explanation and Understanding,” in From Text
to Action: Essays in Hermeneutics, vol. 2 (London: Continuum, 1991), 101.
110 Aristotle, Poetics (New York: Dover Publications, 1997 (330 BCE)), 12.
111 Ricoeur, Time and Narrative, 68. Ricoeur’s sedimentation and innovation uses
Kuhnian language of paradigms, while scientific research normally works under
existing paradigms, with anomalies emerge scientific discoveries that result in
paradigm-​shifts. Thomas Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (Chicago,
IL: University of Chicago Press, 1962).
112 Aristotle, Poetics, 37.
113 Ricoeur, Time and Narrative, 71.
114 For the full list see Georg Feuerstein, Introduction to the Bhagavada Gita (Wheaton,
IL:  Quest Books, 1974), 129–​30. Of those who suggest the three main yoga of
karma-​yoga, gyāna-​yoga, and bhakti-​yoga in the Gītā are Richard King, Indian
Philosophy: An Introduction to Hindu and Buddhist Thought (Edinburgh: Edinburgh
University Press, 1999), 67; S. Radhakrishnan, The Bhagavadgita (London: George
Allen & Unwin, 1948), 50; and Christopher Chapple, “Foreword,” in The Bhagavad
Gita, ed. Winthrop Sargeant (New  York: State University of New  York Press,
1994), xx–​xxi.
115 King, Indian Philosophy: An Introduction to Hindu and Buddhist Thought, 53.
116 Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, 37.
117 Ibid., 38.
118 Chapple, “Foreword,” xxi; King, Indian Philosophy: An Introduction to Hindu and
Buddhist Thought, 67; Radhakrishnan, The Bhagavadgita, 50.
119 Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, 40.
120 I follow the translation of Sargeant for all the quotes from the Gītā. Winthrop
Sargeant, The Bhagavad Gita (New York: State University of New York Press,
1994), 243.
121 Flood, The Ascetic Self: Subjectivity, Memory and Tradition, 67.
122 Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, 105.
123 Ibid., 90–​91.
124 Ibid., 40.
125 This point about ‘agency’ is made by Flood in neatly summarizing the commenta-
torial tradition. Flood, The Ascetic Self: Subjectivity, Memory and Tradition, 70.
126 R.C. Zaehner, The Bhagavad-​Gita (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1969), 18.
127 Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, 97.
128 Ibid., 97, 101.
129 Mikhail M. Bakhtin, Toward a Philosophy of the Act, ed. Vadim Liapunov and
Michael Holquist, trans. Vadim Liapunov (Austin, TX:  University of Texas
Press, 1993), 16.
130 Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, 104–​05.
131 Ibid., 102.
132 Ibid. 104.
133 Gītā 4.19 (Sargeant’s translation):  ‘He who has excluded desire and motive
from all his enterprises, and has consumed his karma in the fire of knowledge,
him the wise men call a sage.’ Sargeant, The Bhagavad Gita, 219. Aurobindo’s
  207

Action, yoga, and tradition 207

translation-​commentary of the same:  ‘The Gītā declares that the action
of the liberated man must be directed not by desire, but towards the keep-
ing together of the world, its government, guidance, impulsion, maintenance
in the path appointed to it.’ Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, 272. Though
the translation-​commentary is very loose, we know that this is the verse that
Aurobindo is referring to, because he goes on to refute Śaṅkara’s interpretation
of this verse.
134 Sastry’s translation of Śaṅkara’s commentary of Gītā 4.19:
… there may be a person who, having started with action and having since
obtained the right knowledge of the Self … finding that for some reason
he cannot abandon action, may continue doing action as before, with a
view to setting an example to the world at large, devoid of attachment to
action and its result, and therefore having no selfish end in view . . . .
(Alladi Mahadeva Sastry, The Bhagavad Gita: With the Commentary
of Adi Sri Sankaracharya (Madras: Samta Books, 1977 (1897)), 135)
Aurobindo’s translation of Śaṇkara’s commentary:
This injunction has been interpreted in the sense that the world being an
illusion in which most men must be kept, since they are unfit for libera-
tion, he [liberated person] must so act outwardly as to cherish in them an
attachment to their customary works laid down for them by the social law.
(Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, 272)
Śaṅkara, however, negates the action of the liberated sage and says ‘such a man
really does nothing’ keeping in line with what the Gītā says in the next verse
(4.20):  ‘He who has abandoned all attachment to the fruits of action, always
content, not dependent, even when performing action, does, in effect, nothing at
all.’ Sargeant, The Bhagavad Gita, 220.
135 Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, 272.
136 Ricoeur, Time and Narrative, 55.
137 Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, 38.
138 Ibid., 287–​88.
139 Ibid., 289–​90.
140 Ibid., 512–​13.
141 Ibid., 293.
142 Ibid., 513–​14.
143 Ibid., 297.
144 Ibid., 291.
145 Ibid., 513.
146 Ibid., 517–​18.
147 Ibid., 547.
148 Ricoeur, Time and Narrative, 71.
149 Aristotle, Poetics, 37.
150 Ricoeur, Time and Narrative, 71.
151 Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, 549.
152 Ibid., 550.
153 Ibid., 142.
154 Ibid., 556.
155 Ibid., 586.
156 Ibid.
157 Ibid., 578–​79.
158 Ibid., 580, 582.
159 Ricoeur, Time and Narrative, 42–​43.
208

208  Action, yoga, and tradition

1 60 Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, 573.
161 Ibid., 574.
162 Stansell and Phillips, in their recent (2010) article, compare Aurobindo with
Abhinavagupta the eleventh-​century Tantric philosopher even though no links
between them of any kind are established, including whether Aurobindo ever
read Abhinavagupta or was even aware of him. Ellen Stansell and Stephen
Phillips, “Hartshorne and Indian Panentheism,” Sophia 49, no. 2. However,
there is evidence that Aurobindo had read the works of Sir John Woodroffe, the
Mahanirvana Tantra (1913) and Hymns to the Goddess (1913), which contained
hymns to the goddesses from the Tantric tradition and was subsequently reviewed
by Aurobindo in the Arya in the May 1915 issue. In the review, there is a deep
appreciation for Woodroffe’s translation even while Aurobindo was evaluative
of it. Thus, we can be certain that Aurobindo had read at least those tantras in
Sanskrit. Aurobindo, Early Cultural Writings, 571–​72; John Woodroffe, Hymns
to the Goddess (London: Luzac, 1913).
163 Michael Stoeber, “Tantra and Saktism in the Spirituality of Aurobindo Ghose,”
Studies in Religion/​Sciences Religieuses 38, no. 2 (2009): 297–​98.
164 Aurobindo, Record of Yoga, 1395.
165 Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, 42.
166 Ibid., 611–​12.
167 Hugh B. Urban, The Economics of Ecstasy: Tantra, Secrecy and Power in Colonial
Bengal (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), 35.
168 Paul E. Muller-​Ortega, “On the Seal of Sambhu: A Poem by Abhinavagupta,” in
Tantra in Practice, ed. David Gordon White (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University
Press, 2000), 575; Bernard Faure, “Japanese Tantra, the Tachikawa-​Ryu, and
Ryobu Shinto,” in Tantra in Practice, ed. David Gordon White (Princeton,
NJ: Princeton University Press, 2000), 544.
169 Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, 613.
170 Aurobindo’s different outlines of the Sapta Chatusthaya are compiled together
and published in the beginning of his Record of Yoga. Aurobindo, Record of Yoga,
3–​29. Heehs offers a good summary of it in Heehs, The Lives of Sri Aurobindo,
239–​42.
171 Heehs, The Lives of Sri Aurobindo, 239.
172 Ibid., 285.
173 Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, 612.
174 Ibid., 693.
175 Flood, The Tantric Body: The Secret Tradition of Hindu Religion, ix, 5.

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212

7 
Conclusion
The journey and beyond

Introduction
Although I have journeyed to the concluding part of this story, it in no way
claims, à la Bakhtin, to be the ‘last word’ on the excavation of the main ideas
found in the three key texts of Aurobindo that were engaged with in this work.
This is but one reading among others of these texts (although as I have regu-
larly reiterated, there is a paucity in readings of Aurobindo’s texts), one con-
versation in existing and future dialogues. As Bakhtin writes:

There is neither a first nor a last word and there are no limits to the
dialogic context (it extends into the boundless past and the boundless
future). Even past meanings, that is, those born in the dialogue of past
centuries, can never be stable (finalised, ended once and for all) –​they will
always change (be renewed) in the process of subsequent, future develop-
ment of the dialogue.1

If the Aurobindonian texts are the primary ‘past meanings’, with which this
work has engaged and if they have been put in dialogue with the religious
studies and the hermeneutical traditions, then in this concluding chapter,
I  want to summarize and bring together the ‘renewal’ of those past mean-
ings that have been brought about through this dialogue in the four main
chapters on Aurobindo’s three key texts. The central argument of this book
that has been put forward through the argumentation in the four main chap-
ters can be simply stated as contending that Aurobindo’s integral philosophy
is best understood as a hermeneutical philosophy of religion, which naturally
poses three questions:  How is Aurobindo’s philosophy hermeneutical? In
what way does it make a contribution to the study of religion? And, what
can be learned from Aurobindo’s integral mode of enquiry? These questions
formed into three interrelated aims. This summary will not be a mere re-​
telling of the book’s conclusions, but a critical statement of its contributions
in light of the three aims, with which it began –​(a) to demonstrate that the
power of the Aurobindonian vision lies in its self-​conception as a traditionary
enquiry into religion, (b) to draw insights from the Aurobindonian enquiry
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Conclusion 213
into religion for the religious–​secular debate in contemporary academic study
of religion, and (c) building on Aurobindo’s integral approach and the her-
meneutical approach used to read Aurobindo’s texts, to explore a dialogical-​
hermeneutical approach for the study of religion.

The first aim: Aurobindonian enquiry as traditionary-​hermeneutics

The first aim was to demonstrate that the power of the Aurobindonian
vision was in its self-​conception as a traditionary-​hermeneutical enquiry into
religion. I  have argued throughout the four main chapters that when expli-
cated, the structure of the Aurobindonian enquiry reveals the structure of
a traditionary-​hermeneutical enquiry. Aurobindo has situated his enquiry
within the Vedānta tradition and while this resulted in his explicit argu-
ment for a Vedānta standpoint, he did not make naive universalistic claims.
Rather, working in the presence of ‘other’ traditions of enquiry, such as the
Enlightenment materialistic tradition, and constrained by the limits of the
Vedānta tradition, to which he explicitly claimed to belong, Aurobindo was
able to reflexively understand his enquiry as uniquely belonging to the Vedānta
tradition. Furthermore, he relativized his own enquiry, in that he argues that
it ‘will go the way of all ideas’, unless it has the ‘truth of our being’.2 Thus,
I claim that Aurobindo’s enquiry implicitly possesses the structure of the her-
meneutics of tradition, the unravelling of which has been the first task of
this work. While this nature of Aurobindo’s enquiry has not been previously
acknowledged, this need not be surprising because its ‘disclosure’ was made
‘favourable’ only by the questions brought to these texts which, arising out
of the hermeneutically-​influenced ‘semantic cultural context’ of our contem-
porary epoch, are characteristic of contemporary human sciences and par-
ticularly the study of religion. This notion of ‘disclosure’ has been observed
by Bakhtin:  ‘semantic phenomena can exist in concealed form, potentially,
and be revealed only in semantic cultural contexts of subsequent epochs that
are favourable for such disclosure’.3 Building on MacIntyre and the larger
Post-​Heideggerian hermeneutical tradition, I  proposed in the Introduction
that if traditionary-​hermeneutical enquiry possesses a tradition-​shaped ration-
ality that is constituted and transmitted through texts and practices in a his-
torically extended narrative, then it is constituted of a four-​part structure,
namely:  (1)  Rationality (2)  Textuality (3)  Narrative, and (4)  Action, which
progresses the tradition in temporality through enquiry. The question for us
now is, after examining Aurobindo’s texts, if Aurobindo’s enquiry can be truly
termed as possessing the structure of a traditionary-​hermeneutical enquiry?
In Chapter 3, in light of Aurobindo’s critique of (a) universal rationality,
and disassociation from (b) relativism and (c) mystical irrationalism, and in
light of his interpretation of Vedānta-​rationality as ‘knowledge by identity’
and ‘logic of the infinite’, I argued that although Aurobindo does not explic-
itly articulate a concept of traditionary rationality, his work presupposed
a ‘tradition-​internal reasoning’ or a rationality of tradition. In Chapter  4,
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214 Conclusion
I argued that if tradition is constituted by a chain of textual interpretations,
then not only does Aurobindo explicitly align his own interpretation within
the Vedantic tradition, but also the role played by transcendence1 (vijñāna)
as the ‘act of understanding’ in his theory of symbolic-​psychological inter-
pretation is the mechanism that not only progresses the self forward from
buddhi (reason) to vijñāna (intuition) in self-​understanding, but also propels
the chain of textual interpretations constitutive of tradition. In Chapter  5,
I  argued that if tradition can be seen as a historically-​constituted and not-​
yet-​completed narrative, which not only appropriates the past, but also pos-
sesses a telos, then The Human Cycle as a philosophy of history was one such
narrative, which following the framework of ‘world history’ appropriated the
past stages of development as ‘inner psychological working’ and used this
narrative to legitimize its own telos of a ‘spiritual age’. While the narratival
structure is evidence for traditionary-​hermeneutics, this is Aurobindo’s weak-
est link, in that Aurobindo’s narrative can be critiqued for not tracing the his-
torical progression of the Vedānta tradition, to which he explicitly belonged,
rather than giving us a reading of world history belonging to the nineteenth-​
century historical school of Ranke, Droysen, and Dilthey. Although both in
the title (The Human Cycle) as well as throughout the text an attempt has
been made to articulate the narrative out of the context of an Indian cyclical
history, including regular allusions to Indian history, his explicit following of
Lamprecht’s model did not help to establish a philosophical narrative of his-
tory that reflected the different stages of development of the Vedantic tradi-
tion. Aurobindo’s historical narrative followed an evolutionary schema that
appears to be borrowed from nineteenth-​century ideas of ‘social evolution’,
reminiscent of the work of Herbert Spencer. However, as it has been shown,
for Aurobindo, the idea of ‘transcendence’ or ‘passage’ is there in the Vedas.
The application of this to different stages of human history is definitely part
of nineteenth-​century historical consciousness. While it is similar to Hegelian
universal history in its tracing the journey of the Absolute Spirit through his-
torical epochs via psychological stages, it was neither built upon a dialectical
schema nor possessed a culmination of absolute knowledge, but rather was
open-​ended in its anticipation of the ‘spiritual age’. We find another narrative
in the first chapters of The Secret of the Veda, where Aurobindo maps the his-
tory of interpretation of the Vedānta tradition and how his work stems from
this tradition. While the exposition of that text did not find space in this work,
it offers further evidence for not only Aurobindo’s explicit location of his
work within the Vedānta tradition, but also for the traditionary nature of his
enquiry.4 Finally, in Chapter 6, I have argued that if yogic action as a practice
or technique maps the ‘substance’ or ‘memory’ of tradition onto the ascetic
self when it is conceived as a techne with a telos, a master–​apprentice rela-
tionship, and an internal rationality, then the first component of Aurobindo’s
purna-​yoga, building on Patañjali’s Yoga-​Sūtras, entails this threefold struc-
ture, thus making the larger argument that yogic actions carry the memory of
tradition. In my reading of the Aurobindonian texts, I have pointed out that
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Conclusion 215
the implicit mechanisms and conceptual schemas entailed within it reflect the
traditionary-​hermeneutical nature of the Aurobindonian enquiry.

The second aim: Aurobindonian contribution to the

religious–secular debate
The second aim of this book is to get ‘answers’ from the Aurobindonian
texts for ‘questions’ raised by the contemporary debates in the study of reli-
gion, even as the questions I  take to the text alter the way I  represent the
Aurobindonian texts. This is what Bakhtin means by ‘renewal’ of ‘past mean-
ings’ in subsequent dialogues. An aspect responsible for ‘renewal’ has to do
with the ‘outsideness’ of the ‘questions’ taken to the texts. For Bakhtin,

creative understanding does not renounce itself, its own place in time,
or its own culture; and it forgets nothing. In order to understand, it is
immensely important for the person who understands to be located out-
side the object of his or her creative understanding –​in time, in space, in
culture.5

Thus, ‘questions’ arising out of the religious–​secular debate located within

the contemporary academic study of religion have defined the necessary ‘out-
sideness’ of this enquiry to the Aurobindonian texts written about a hundred
years ago.
So, what ‘questions’ were asked and what ‘answers’ were received? What
I want to do now, instead of listing my conclusions on these four themes, is to
first re-​state the central problematic in the religious–​secular debate and then
demonstrate how my findings take the debate forward.
Although I deconstructed the religious–​secular debate in the Introduction
to locate four points of tension, and four sets of questions regarding ration-
ality, transcendence, articulation, and action, I  need to bring the findings
together in light of the fifth point listed in the Introduction that had to do
with the overarching debate on secularization. Simply stated, the genealogi-
cal critique of religion of the critical school, while it is explicitly postcolo-
nial, implicitly continues the presuppositions of the Enlightenment mode of
enquiry of religion, which, working out of the ‘scientific rationality’ of ‘natu-
ralist reductionism’, denies all forms of ‘transcendence’. Hence, not only is all
‘god-​talk’ fictive, but equally no ‘action’ can be legitimately termed ‘religious’
as it can be ‘explained away’ scientifically  –​we live in the seculare and all
things are secular.
I want to probe this problematic a bit further. Fitzgerald has argued that
from the seventeenth century onwards, in the works of scholars like Penn
and Locke, there was a revolt against ‘encompassing religion’  –​‘religion
as permeating the whole of life’  –​resulting in the invention of the non-​
religious public domain and the ‘ “privatized” and “essentialized” religion
and religions’. He further argues that ‘politics’ as a non-​religious domain
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216 Conclusion
could not have been invented unless ‘ “religion” had been siphoned out
of the totality and placed in a special essentialized category’.6 This has
resulted in the mutually exclusive essentialized domains of ‘secular’ and
‘religious’, where the former is defined as ‘non-​religious’ and the latter as
‘non-​political’. Fitzgerald is quick to add that the ‘secularization thesis’
of the sociologists rests precisely on this view of religion –​‘we could not
imagine ourselves to be occupying an essentially non-​religious space unless
we had been able to siphon out of the space whatever we deem to be “reli-
gious” ’.7 He concludes that this concept of ‘privatized religion’ is already
both a product of ‘secular’ thinking as well as a condition for the realiza-
tion of secularity. McCutcheon, arguing on similar lines, calls secularism
as religion’s alter-​ego and as co-​dependent categories:  ‘they are mutually
defining terms that come into existence together –​what we might as well
call a binary pair  –​the use of which makes a historically specific social
world possible to imagine and move within’.8 Furthermore, McCutcheon
argues that secularism ‘constitutes the discursive conditions by means of
which we in the modern world think religion into existence’ and, therefore,
as long as we talk about religion there is no ‘beyond secularism’.9 The criti-
cal scholars of religion, with their idea of ‘the siphoning out of religion
to create secularism’, have been thus informed by the early secularization
thesis of the sociologists, who have argued that with the increase in secular-
ity there will be a decrease and an eventual wipe-​out of religion  –​which
Taylor has called a ‘subtraction theory’.10 A  standard definition of secu-
larization is offered by Casanova, in which he spells out the three senses in
which this term is ordinarily understood: (a) the decline of religious beliefs
and practices, (b) the privatization of religion, and (c) the differentiation
of the secular spheres (state, economy, science).11 It is this understanding
of secularization defined as a ‘decline’ in religion that continues to inform
contemporary scholars of religion, although within sociology itself, this
view has been long discarded, as in the famous ‘recantation’ of Berger.12
Taylor separates three senses in which the terms ‘secular’ or ‘secularity’
have come to be used: secularity1 is similar to Casanova’s third point about
differentiation in public spaces and the creation of ‘autonomous social
spheres’; secularity2 is the ‘falling off of religious belief and practice’; and
finally, secularity3 is a change in ‘conditions of belief’. Taylor is primarily
interested in secularity3 of the modern West and his A Secular Age is a histori-
cal survey from 1500 CE to the present, of how Western society has changed
from ‘a society in which it was virtually impossible not to believe in God, to
one in which faith, even for the staunchest believer, is one human possibil-
ity among others’.13 The common change experienced by both believers and
non-​believers is in the change of the ‘conditions of belief’, which form the
background of both belief and unbelief, a change from a ‘naive’ to a ‘reflec-
tive’ background framework. The insight of Taylor about secularity3 as the
common ‘disenchanted’ imaginaire, shared by both contemporary secularists
and religionists, affirms the position of Fitzgerald and McCutcheon about the
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Conclusion 217
invention of modern religious and secular domains within an already secular-
ist framework.
Taylor does not hold on to a ‘subtraction theory’ of secularization held
by the early secularization thesis or by the contemporary critical scholars of
religion, which views religion and secularity as rivals with the decrease in one
bringing about an increase in the other. Taylor argues that he does not want to
talk about belief and unbelief as ‘rival theories’ but rather as ‘alternative ways
of living’. He argues that his position, as opposed to the mainline seculariza-
tion thesis, is that ‘secularity is the fruit of new inventions, newly constructed
self-​understandings and related practices, and can’t be explained in terms of
perennial features of human life’.14
It is this ‘perenniality’ of the Enlightenment understanding of religion that
continues to be maintained by the critical school, even in its critique. The
explicit reason given for the rejection of religion has to do with the differ-
ent experiences of other cultures, which cannot be mapped analytically by
religious–​secular categories and the role played by the colonial processes in
the invention of religion. However, the problem with this form of postcolo-
nial critique is that while it critiques the universalism of the classical theorists
of religion, who ‘found’ religion in every society, it presupposes the same uni-
versalism that it critiques. For example, in arguing that ‘universal religion’ is
an invention and has to be abandoned, it presupposes ‘religion as universal’,
which it critiques as an invention and needs to be abandoned. What is eclipsed
in this form of thinking is (a) the historical particularity of the modern West
and its larger narratives and traditions, within which these terms have cur-
rency, and (b) how these narratives have been set in dialogue with other cul-
tural narratives and what have been the creative outcomes of such dialogues.
In Sweetman, we find a similar critique against the critical school:

That the modern academic concept of religion emerged in the West does
not by itself mean that the concept is inapplicable in other cultures, any
more than it means that religion did not exist in the West prior to the
articulation of the modern sense of religion.15

Taylor puts forward the historical particularity of a purely ‘immanent frame’

as a unique creation of modern Euro-​American society, while arguing that his
own work focuses primarily within the North Atlantic world. This enables us
to go beyond the current impasse within the religious–​secular debate by locat-
ing it within the history of the modern West. Any attempt to foist this debate
onto ‘other’ spaces must bear the brunt of its own postcolonial critique.
Aurobindo, long before the critical school and Taylor, argued that the
religious–​secular divide is peculiar to the West and the Indian view of reli-
gion and life are ordered differently. He writes, ‘Modern Europe separated
religion from life, from philosophy, from art and science, from politics, from
the greater part of social action and social existence.’16 In contrast, referring
to the Indian understanding of religion, Aurobindo says, ‘instead of putting
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218 Conclusion
religion into an unobtrusive and ineffective corner, the Indian mind has the
pretension the preposterous pretension which rational man has outgrown for
ever, of filling with it the whole of life’.17 Within Aurobindo’s Vedantic frame-
work, there is no difference between the secular and the sacred. In a letter
to Baptista, he writes, ‘my idea of spirituality has nothing to do with ascetic
withdrawal or contempt or disgust of secular things. There is to me nothing
secular, all human activity is for me a thing to be included in a complete spir-
itual life.’18 Here, the religious–​secular binary is not only located historically
in the West, but also challenged.
So, learning from Aurobindo, what is the contribution of this work to
the religious–​secular debate? I  see that there are two pulls presently in the
debate between the secularists and religionists, both of whom are working
under the common condition of Taylorian secularity3. On the one hand, the
critical school, or the true secularists, deny religion and affirm naturalist and
materialist secularity, while on the other hand, the religionists, also working
out of Taylorian secularity3, acknowledge religion as a sphere of activity that
particularly relates to transcendence without denying secularity. There could
be a third position of the pre-​modern Latin West that dwelt within the ‘sacred
canopy’ and considered all of life as religious, a position which is untenable,
according to Taylor, within our modern condition of secularity in the West.
Hence, fresh insights for the debate can be gleaned from Aurobindo’s work,
emerging from a Vedānta tradition, which is unwilling to either grant the con-
dition of secularity or work under its binaries.
My main line of argument advanced in this work has progressed in four
stages:  (1)  it began with a critique of the universal claims of secularity on
the basis of its dominant scientific rationality (Chapter 3). The critique was
carried out by tracing Aurobindo’s critique of (a)  subject-​object distinc-
tions, which result in objectification, (b)  logico-​nomological reasoning that
gives universal generalizations, and (c)  the necessity of logical consistency
required by the classical laws of logic. This critique, while demonstrating the
limitations of scientific rationality, especially for articulating transcendence,
entailed the proposal that rationality must be seen as constituted by tradition.
The implication of this critique for the religious–​secular debate is that the
religionists and secularists could be seen as two distinct traditions of enquiry,
each with its own self-​understanding and practices with alternative ways of
living, that have historically evolved within the new conditions of secular-
ity3, sharing a common Latin Christian history and a common background
defined by secularity3. So, we should be able to talk about ‘secular rational-
ity’ and ‘religious rationality’ within the post-​Latin West. On the other hand,
this does not mean that rationality is an arbitrary category, where ‘anything
goes’, but rather it is the conceptual structure of tradition that preconditions
traditionary rationality.
In Chapter 4, I engaged with the central contention between the religion-
ists and secularists: the idea of transcendence. Engaging with Aurobindo and
the post-​metaphysical tradition in philosophy and theology, I  posited three
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Conclusion 219
senses of transcendence. I argued that both the camps hold on to the same
idea of a ‘great transcendence’ which is narrowly defined to refer to non-​
naturalism (transcendence2), and that there is a transcendence that is not only
an ontological existentiale, but also a mechanism in operation in the basic
constitution of the human self (transcendence3), and finally that it is also the
mechanism in operation in the progression of tradition in the relationship
between the chain of interpretations of the text and self-​understanding (tran-
scendence1). This called for a change in understanding of ‘transcendence’,
which has been basically seen in its second sense –​in supernatural terms. In
Taylor, we have a broader notion of ‘transcendence’ to be understood as a
‘beyond’ in three senses: (a) good higher than human flourishing, (b) belief
in higher powers, and (c)  lives extending beyond ‘this life’. This classifica-
tion has a resemblance to the sociologist Luckmann’s tripartite categorization
of transcendence into little, intermediate, and great transcendences.19 When
secularists, including the critical school, reject transcendence they are mostly
rejecting Taylor’s (b)  or Luckmann’s ‘great’ transcendence  –​the existence
of and belief in higher powers, gods, and anything ‘supernatural’, which is
beyond the physical realm, whereas they affirm transcendence in other ways.
Taylor shows three ways: first, the critical school leans heavily on postmodern
and deconstruction thinkers such as Foucault, Derrida, and Bataille, all of
whom are anti-​humanist thinkers drawing heavily on Nietzsche. Nietzsche,
firmly rooted within an immanent framework, rebels against the dominant
humanism of his time, which is defined by an ‘unrelenting concern with life,
the proscription of violence, the imposition of equality’. Taylor argues that the
Nietzschean immanent counter-​Enlightenment’s understanding of ‘enhanced
life’ with its will to power, ‘in a sense takes us beyond life’ albeit negatively,
and affirms transcendence paradoxically within the larger immanent frame.20
Second, he argues that there are three forms of ‘malaise of immanence’ due to
the ‘eclipse of transcendence’, which sends the secularists ‘back to seek some
relation with the transcendent’. They are:  (a)  fragility of meaning and the
search for significance, (b) the flatness felt in solemnizing rites of passage, and
(c) utter flatness and emptiness in the ordinary life.21 Finally, Taylor argues
that the presence of a sense that there was something higher to aim for, a
more moral way of life and ‘strong evaluation’ distinguishing good from evil,
characteristic of the secular humanist position, is itself ‘ineradicably linked
to God, or something ontically higher (transcendent)’. This includes the neo-​
Durkheimian notion of a ‘collective good’, which seems to have some ‘essen-
tial relation to transcendence’.22 Thus, the point being made via Taylor is that
the secularists too have an understanding of transcendence implicit in their
secular positions and therefore I want to further argue that ‘transcendence’ is
an integral component of the constitution of being human. What separates
the religionists from the secularists is not unbelief in transcendence but belief
in a different form of transcendence, which Taylor has called ‘Immanent tran-
scendence’. But this is in no way to deprive the centrality of transcendence2
or Luckmann’s ‘great transcendence’, rather it is to legitimize its centrality as
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220 Conclusion
truly the ‘great transcendence’, the denial of which is linked to all other forms
of transcendence. What is being envisioned here is that if transcendence is an
ontological existentiale pervading all aspects of human life, then a ‘great tran-
scendence’ is a logical extension. However, as Taylor remarked, this link has
not yet been conceptually established.23 Maybe this is where the religionists
and secularists of the West need to dialogue with traditions originating from
elsewhere with alternative conceptions of transcendence, in order to enrich
their own understanding. In this work, the engagement with Aurobindo’s con-
ception of transcendence in the Parātpara and the sevenfold, which envisions
a unified ontology of ‘embodied spirit’, was able to supply Parabrahman and
vijñāna as means to link ‘great transcendence’ with ‘little’ and ‘intermediate’
transcendences in Luckmann’s tripartite categorization. If transcendence is
such a central category, then it has huge ramifications for the study of reli-
gion, whose specialization is the study of transcendence.
In Chapter 5, using the narrative of Aurobindo’s philosophy of history as
the starting-​point, it was proposed that ‘religion’ must be seen as a ‘narra-
tive’, rather than as a ‘category’. I argued that the atomistic thinking presup-
posed in analytical categories can be surpassed only if there is a shift from
categories to narratives in representing human behaviour meaningfully. Thus,
the Hempelian model of explanation became the object of critique, even as
this brought us into the thick of the old debate between explanation and
understanding. We entered the debate by way of examining the genus-​concept
‘articulation’, possessing the structure of a narrative, whose species-​concepts
were argued to be ‘explanation’ and ‘assertion’. The argument advanced was
that if all articulations are interpretations, then assertions and explanations
too are necessarily interpretations. On the other hand, if understanding,
from Schleiermacher onwards, is seen as a psychological process, then, à la
Heidegger, it was re-​envisioned as providing the ontological ground for inter-
pretation. Thus, interpretation as narrative became the central form for the
production of meaning, which was then argued, via Ricoeur, to be constitu-
tive of two moments –​understanding and explanation, where explanation was
at the service of understanding. In light of this, if religious traditions can be
seen as narratives, then not only do they provide meaning, but also they entail,
within their structure, the possibility of critique via the work of explanation.
Finally, in Chapter 6, the question about representation of religious action
was engaged with, in light of the philosophy of action and Aurobindo’s phi-
losophy of yoga. In the chapter on transcendence, the aim was to demonstrate
that religion and secularity are not part of an oppositional binary, but rather
that both are different traditions entailing different forms of transcendence.
But this was not to conflate religion with secularity, rather to show the overlap
due to the traditionary structure, with a view to arguing that the study of reli-
gion is not only important for its focused enquiry on transcendence, but also
is able to study the mechanism of transcendence in operation in other tradi-
tions, including the secular tradition. I want to strengthen the argument of
the uniqueness of religious traditions, in that they consist of actions directed
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Conclusion 221
towards the divine or ‘great transcendence’. To identify a certain action as
religious is not an arbitrary naming, rather the naming itself is part of the
process of mimesis. If mimesis1 as ‘pre-​understanding of the world of action’
already possesses meaningful structures, symbolic resources, and a temporal
character, then mimesis2 is the mimetic relation of narrative to action, which
treats imitated action as text. Thus, the representation of religious action is
only a narration of the ‘religious pre-​understanding’ in action. The circle of
mimesis, if completed with mimesis3, enables the ‘intersection of the world
of the text and the world of the hearer or reader’. Traditionary-​narratives
(religious narratives), through their texts, inform the actions and practices of
their followers or readers. This chapter argues for the uniqueness of ‘religious
actions’, which receive their meaning from the larger religious traditions that
supply the pre-​understandings through their texts.
Therefore, the religionists and the secularists, within the academic study of
religion, are not to be seen as being part of a single tradition of enquiry, but
as belonging to different traditions of enquiry with differing rationalities, pre-
supposing/​enquiring after different transcendences depending on their ‘spin’
and ‘background’. Once this is accepted, that there exists at least two conflict-
ing traditions of enquiry within the academic study of religion –​the religion-
ist tradition of enquiry and the secularist tradition of enquiry –​then, using
the lens of dialogical hermeneutics, the debate between the religionists and
secularists can be mapped onto how different traditions of enquiry dialogue
with each other. This has been explored in this work as a possible approach
for the study of religion.
Taylor remarks that currently the ‘spin of closure’ is hegemonic in the
academy, which reflects the dominant position held by secularists even within
the academic study of religion. But this hegemony of secularism applies to all
other disciplines and is taken as the ‘given’ stand of the academy. Equally, the
modern social domains (due to the process of differentiation) in the larger soci-
ety are constituted within the immanent frame and secularity. Furthermore,
the religionist ‘spin’ is relegated to confessional domains (both in society and
the academy) as private and if it is ever allowed in the ‘public’ academy then it
is required to play the game according to the dominant secularist ‘spin’. This
point is made by McKinnon, who, responding to Fitzgerald’s earlier critique
of his work, had this to say in reply: ‘his (Fitzgerald’s) work constitutes and
defends the “secular” study of religion against all perceived challenges to that
project and its form of symbolic capital’.24
While this is not an attempt to cry ‘sour grapes’ on behalf of the minority
religionists, it can definitely be seen as an attempt to perceive a problem in
the present arrangement. If a chief task of the academy is to challenge, cri-
tique, and contribute to existing conceptions of social domains, so that social
structures are kept healthy and in check, then the present arrangement does
not enable a serious critique of the dominant secularist ‘spin’ within the acad-
emy which then, in turn, is unable to offer a critique to the larger secularism
dominated societies, particularly in the West. The unchecked hegemony of
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222 Conclusion
‘enchantment’ or religion in pre-​modern Europe is being repeated by present
‘disenchantment’ or secularism, anticipating a re-​run of the many movements
of protest and reformation since the late Middle Ages. Only this time the
protests are from the religionists, which could be argued to be already upon
us, such as religious fundamentalism and religiously motivated terror attacks.
A healthy society would entail active and vibrant ‘anti-​structures’, to use
a Taylorian phrase, to critique the powers that are in vogue. If the academy
is meant to play that role of providing an intellectual ‘anti-​structure’, then
I propose that the academic study of religion, within the department of reli-
gious studies with a hermeneutically informed imaginary, is most suited for
the job. Religious studies, with its dialogical methodology, not only provides
a platform for different religious traditions to present their voices within the
secularist public sphere, but also brings in dialogue, both religionist and secu-
larist, through which the secularist’s ‘closed’ imaginary is problematized and
critically engaged. Therefore, it is only the contemporary academic study of
religion, possessing the required standards of academic excellence and hav-
ing evolved itself beyond naive phenomenology, using the resources offered
by the hermeneutical tradition that is able to offer a unique platform within
the academy, where explanations and descriptions framed both in openness
to transcendence (religious) and those framed purely within an immanent
framework (sociological) can be brought in dialogue and mutually critiqued,
irrespective of their stance with regard to transcendence. In other words, true
to its origins, the academic study of religion is open to different understand-
ings of transcendence and takes these claims as seriously as sociological and
political explanations. Within the contemporary academy, situated within
immanent secularity, the religious studies discipline alone is able to provide
space for enquiry into different forms of transcendence, even as it investigates
the structure and claims of different religious and quasi-​religious traditions.
As Flood points out, it attempts to be a ‘field of inquiry that gives hospitality
to traditions and their self-​representations’.25
Religious studies, as a discipline, is able to offer a sustained critique of
naturalist reductionism within the human sciences, including in the study of
religion, so that it would not become as dogmatic and fundamentalist as the-
ology, out of which it was first developed in the nineteenth century.

The third aim: dialogical hermeneutics as an approach for

religious studies
If the first aim was to demonstrate that the Aurobindonian enquiry into
religion possessed the structure of traditionary-​hermeneutics, then I  want
to argue that not just for the Aurobindonian enquiry, but that enquiries
in general necessarily have the structure of tradition. The second aim was
to show how the religious studies tradition could be profitably brought in
dialogue with the Aurobindonian tradition, represented primarily by three
key Aurobindonian texts. The final aim was to understand that if enquiry is
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Conclusion 223
constitutive of tradition, then the enquiring into an ‘other’ is always a dia-
logue with another tradition. For example, within the study of religion, the
dialogue is between the religionist and secularist traditions and, in this work,
it was bringing Aurobindo’s Vedānta in dialogue with contemporary religious
studies. Thus, the nature of dialogical enquiry and its internal structure were
explored. In each of the four main chapters, I have tried to tease out different
aspects of dialogical hermeneutics. In Chapter 3, I argued that dialogical her-
meneutics is truly born with the rejection of universal rationality, opening the
door for multiple rationalities that reflect incommensurability exhibited in dif-
ference and incompatibility between rationalities and traditions. In Chapter 4,
I argued that in light of trancendence3 in operation within the basic concep-
tion of the self as being-​in-​the-​world, transcendence as imagination provides
the ontological ground for dialogue with the other. In Chapter 5, I argued that
interrogation of the other is the process through which dialogue progresses.
Finally, in Chapter 6, I argued that for dialogue to run its full course, along
with interrogation, inhabitation of the ‘other’ through participation is neces-
sary. Thus, I have identified incommensurability, imagination, interrogation,
and inhabitation as the four components of dialogical hermeneutics. In this
section, building on these ideas, I am going to develop, in brief, dialogical her-
meneutics as an approach for the study of religion, in dialogue with a form of
dialogical hermeneutics found within the history of Indian philosophy –​the
Samvāda tradition.
In Chapter  2, I  argued that incommensurability establishes the starting
point of dialogue as it acknowledges difference. However, incommensurabil-
ity could easily be subsumed as propounding relativism or perspectivalism. If
relativism denies the possibility of debate between traditions because ‘every
tradition incorporating a set of standards, has as much and as little claim
to our allegiance as any other’ and no rational debate between traditions is
possible, then perspectivalism denies the possibility of universal truth claims
in light of the reality of ‘multiplicity of rival traditions, each with its own
characteristic modes of rational justification internal to it’. Thus no tradition
is ‘entitled to arrogate to itself an exclusive title’.26 What is immediately clear
is that for dialogical hermeneutics to become a possibility, not only is ‘other-
ness’ required to be preserved, but equally the possibility of dialogue with the
‘other’ needs to be preserved. Relativism of the extreme kind denies these pos-
sibilities and therefore needs to be rejected. With extreme relativism not only
is one unable to make a distinction between the rational and the irrational,
but one is also unable to know anything outside one’s own tradition. This
form of deconstruction, when regressively applied to one’s own self, culmi-
nates with the Sartrean ‘liquidation of the self’,27 thus denying any form of
coherence. While this form of extreme relativism needs to be rejected, a milder
form or soft relativism needs to be retained in order to give difference its due
recognition, the acknowledgement of which is the beginning of dialogue.
In Chapter 4, I looked at how the mechanism of transcendence, in opera-
tion in imagination, provided the ontological ground for dialogue. Having
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224 Conclusion
granted the ontological ground, what else does imagination accomplish?
‘Acts of imagination’ enable one ‘to learn to think as if one were a convinced
adherent of that rival tradition’.28 The act of imagination, MacIntyre argues,
requires the enquirer to become a ‘convinced adherent’ of the other tradition
or, as Bakhtin would say, to belong ‘to someone else, which is almost as much
“one’s own” as one’s native language’.29 It is to become one ‘who knows and
is able to utter the idiom of each from within, who has become, so to speak,
a native speaker of two first languages, each with its own distinctive concep-
tual idiom’.30 MacIntyre’s prime example is Aquinas, who was at home in
both the Aristotelian as well as the Augustinian traditions. But the question
is –​how is one able to be a native in two first languages? The answer to this
question is explored by Bakhtin in The Dialogical Imagination. In the context
of analysing the novelistic discourse, Bakhtin shares three concepts that can
guide us in understanding the MacIntyrean act of imagination: first the con-
cept of parody creating a novelistic image, which enables the objectification of
another language and style in one’s own. The second concept is the nature of
language as polyglossia and heteroglossia –​the internal and external differen-
tiation in languages –​which are the conditions that allow a literary conscious-
ness, in our case the enquirer, to look at another language or style-​form, in
our case another tradition, while standing in one’s own. It is the pre-​condition
for a dialogical contact between different traditions. Finally, this leads to the
notion of a literary multi-​lingual consciousness, which inhabits a plurality of
languages. I argue that these three elements of language reveal the mechanism
that makes the ‘act of imagination’ possible.31
In Chapter 5, I argued how dialogue progresses through the interrogation of
the other. As Heidegger points out, there is a ‘leap’ in the ‘act of questioning’.32
However, the questioning from the rival tradition’s own standpoint, while
continuing to stand within one’s own, is to identify from the standpoint of
the rival tradition, the important unresolved issues and unsolved problems
within the rival tradition. Scott and Sallis argue that ‘to interrogate the tradi-
tion is to bring questions to bear on it’ and it consists of two moments. On
the one hand, we turn away from it, and, on the other hand, we turn toward
it. In other words, tradition ‘predetermines, limits, orients and even directs the
interrogation’, thus both enabling and limiting it. Thus,

when questioning comes into play and is addressed to the very tradition
that enables it (while limiting it), its comportment is such that it distances
itself from the tradition, sets the tradition at the distance opened by ques-
tioning and the suspension of covert acceptances, even while continuing
to receive from the tradition its own delimitation.33

MacIntyre refers to these unresolved issues as an ‘epistemological crisis’

within traditions, one in which by its own standards of progress, it ceases
to make progress.34 MacIntyre gives steps to overcome this epistemological
crisis:  first, invention or discovery of new concepts and theories to form a
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Conclusion 225
new conceptual scheme that will provide a solution to the epistemic impasse
within the tradition in a coherent way. Second, this conceptual scheme must
be able to give an explanation for the epistemological crisis that the tradi-
tion had experienced and, finally, this new conceptual scheme must exhibit a
fundamental continuity with the shared beliefs of the tradition as defined up
and until the epistemological crisis. These new resources come from the rival
tradition that the person equally inhabits.
Here an important question needs to be asked:  can one ‘claim to truth’
be accepted over another? MacIntyre argues that this is possible when one
is able to conclude that it is ‘from the standpoint of their own tradition that
the difficulties of that rival tradition can be adequately understood and over-
come’.35 It is at this point, MacIntyre argues, that one tradition is able to
show itself superior to its rival tradition, as it contains the resources within it
to overcome the epistemological crisis of the other, even though there are no
neutral standards available for appeal. This may be the case even if the pro-
tagonists of the defeated tradition are not able to recognize the defeat as they
are still bound within the rationality of their own tradition. This can be called
a ‘claim to truth’ as asserted by a tradition. Ricoeur discusses ‘tradition’ as
a ‘claim to truth’ under the heading ‘tradition’ of his three-​part schema of
‘traditionality’, ‘traditions’, and ‘tradition’. This is Ricoeur’s intervention in
the legendary debate between Gadamer and Habermas, which Ricoeur has
termed as one between the ‘hermeneutic of traditions and the critique of ide-
ologies’. At this point, I will not rehearse all the details of that debate,36 but
specifically look at how Ricoeur’s intervention both clarifies and strengthens
MacIntyre’s ‘claim to truth’ of one tradition over another. Ricoeur makes
two preliminary remarks, which lay out the Gadamerian position as well as its
critique of Habermas, before entering the debate himself. First, he lays out the
Gadamerian position by arguing that as the content of tradition, that is, what
is received from the past, are ‘beliefs, persuasions, convictions’, it is always a
‘proposal of a meaning’, which is at the same time a ‘claim to truth’. This con-
nection between ‘language-​like realm of traditions’ and ‘truth claim bound
to the order of meaning’ and the ‘claim of traditions for truth’ forms the
basis for Gadamer’s threefold notions of ‘prejudice, authority and tradition’.
Ricoeur interprets these three main concepts of Gadamer in this light: first,
prejudice is intrinsic to what is passed from the past as the ‘self-​presentation
of the “things-​themselves” ’ –​the ‘thing itself’ in its pre-​judged state contains
a ‘structure of the preunderstanding’, outside of which it cannot make itself
known. Simply put, as the content that is being passed on from the past is in
the realm of language, it contains a certain proposal of meaning, which is a
self-​claim to truth, even before it is understood by the recipient –​all tradi-
tions contain an implicit prejudice in their structural formation. Gadamer
argues that the ideal of total freedom from prejudices, Vorurteilen, is ‘not a
possibility for historical humanity’.37 Second, authority or auctoritas, Ricoeur
argues, is the ‘increase that the claim to truth adds to mere meaning, in the
context of “holding for true” ’, which on the recipient’s side of tradition is the
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226 Conclusion
recognition of superiority. Finally, Ricoeur argues that for Gadamer tradi-
tion is ‘customs’, the equivalent to the Hegelian Sittlichkeit, which not only
preserves (bewahrt) the voices of the past, but also carries us in its flow even
before we can judge or condemn it.38 Ricoeur’s second preliminary remark has
to do with Gadamer’s critique of methodologism, which he argues questions
the ‘pretensions of a judging consciousness’ that claims to be ‘unencumbered
by any prejudices’. The goal of this critique is to argue that the judging con-
sciousness is already located within tradition and, therefore, the initial atti-
tude cannot be one of freedom or distance from the transmitted contents, in
other words through tradition, ‘we find ourselves already situated in an order
of meaning and therefore also of possible truth’.39 The idea of research as a
‘critical moment’ is a second moment, and Ricoeur terms it ‘distanciation’,
which is necessary to get hold of the ‘instance of truth’ between rival tradi-
tions, by distinguishing true prejudices, through which we understand, from
the false prejudices, which cause misunderstanding.40
Having laid out the two sides of the debate, Ricoeur argues for the pos-
sibility of a ‘claim to truth’, irrespective of the fact that all such claims have
their prejudices. He begins with a critique of the Gadamerian ‘hermeneu-
tic of tradition’ by calling into question how Gadamerian prejudice can be
translated into a truth claim. In other words, how can necessity –​müssen –​
be converted into a right –​sollen –​or how can the ideology of tradition be
overcome? The immediate answer, proposed by Habermas in his ‘critique of
ideologies’ through his ‘theory of interests’, is insufficient. Habermas’ third
sphere of human enquiry, the critical social sciences, governed by an eman-
cipatory interest, which seeks to unearth the interests at work in the other
branches of enquiry by exposing ‘violently distorted communication’,41 falls
short, as this critique of ideology itself becomes a new claim to universality,
while being blind to its own prejudice, arising out of being grounded in the
historical tradition of the Enlightenment.42 So, the question remains –​if we
have to be true to the notion that all knowledge is tradition-​bound, then how
do we make any claim to truth especially between rival traditions? Ricoeur
argues that we must turn to Kant and Fichte’s selbstreflexion, but to protect
it from becoming a ‘monological truth’ undergoing a Kantian transcendental
deduction, it needs to be posited alongside a dialogical principle. This results
in a ‘presumption of truth’ based on a better argument and a stronger reason,
but always in a dialogical context. In other words, after a person, through
dialogue, is able to speak two native languages, then he is able to, through self-​
reflexivity (selbstreflexion), presume the truth of one over the other, basing on
a better argument and stronger reason using a comparative approach.
Finally, in Chapter 6, I argued that inhabiting the other tradition involves a
bodily participation in the tradition of the other. In other words, the texts and
practices of both one’s own as well as the other’s tradition are inscribed upon
one’s body. At this point of the dialogue, there is an integration that takes
place. The act of integration takes place in persons, who are able to inhabit two
or more rival traditions and integrate, reconcile, and synthesize them without
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Conclusion 227
doing an injustice to any of them. Another term for this form of being is
polyhabiting. Integration of traditions results in the birth of new traditions
and it is in the works of giants such as Aristotle, Augustine, and Aquinas, to
which I will add Aurobindo, in whom new traditions are born. In the chapter
‘Aristotle and/​or/​against Augustine’, MacIntyre argues this point by citing the
integrating philosophical work of Aquinas, who having immersed himself in
both the rival traditions of Aristotelianism and Augustinianism, was able to
make their reconciliation the central problem, not just of his philosophical
enquiry but of his very existence.43 The main points of contention between
both these traditions had to do with conflicting views about the standards
of truth and rationality, the understanding of truth and the nature of defect
and error. MacIntyre further argues that there is no neutral standard to judge
between these two traditions, including appealing to empirical data, as the
very conception of the data will have presupposed a position advanced by
either of the two traditions. Furthermore, only that person, who is an inhabit-
ant of both the rival conceptual schemes, which in this case was Aquinas, can
be aware of these conflicts. Thus, the integrating rationality is an embodied
rationality, resulting from the embodying of both the rival traditions.

The Samvāda tradition and dialogical hermeneutics

The philosopher of religion, John Clayton, from the early 1990s, proposed
a dialogical hermeneutical approach for the study of religion, based on the
Indian vāda tradition of enquiry.44 He observes that ‘religious claims are
made and contested in a variety of contexts’ and lists three different con-
texts: intra-​traditional, inter-​religious, and extra-​religious. While Clayton’s
intra-​traditional context resonates with our understanding of traditionary
enquiry, his other two contexts, namely, inter-​religious and extra-​religious,
dealing with challenges between two traditions, fall under dialogical her-
meneutics. Analogous to MacIntyre’s encyclopaedic and genealogical
enquiries, Clayton distinguishes two kinds of enquires, the Jeffersonian and
Wittgensteinian models respectively, from a traditionary model. MacIntyre’s
tradition-​constituted enquiry finds its parallel in Clayton’s proposal of
the ‘vada-​tradition’ model of enquiry. Clayton illustrates the structure of
a vāda or inter-​tradition debate (in our terms, a dialogical-​hermeneutical
approach), through the Buddhist–​Hindu debates found in the eleventh-​
century Udayana’s treatise Atmatattvaviveka. The structure of the debate
consisted of two parts –​negative and positive.45 The conventions governing
the negative component, the goal of which was to undermine the opponent’s
position, were:  (a)  a presentation of a ‘fair statement’ of the opponent’s
position, (b) the arguments in its favour, and finally, (c) the arguments that
can be used against it. What is interesting here, as Clayton observes, is that
this negative component was carried out completely in accordance with the
opponent’s rationality. Even in citing authorities, one had to use texts that
were authoritative for the opponent. The conventions governing the positive
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228 Conclusion
component, the goal of which was to offer arguments in favour of one’s own
position, dictated that proofs could be supplied that were either (a) based
on reasons shared with the opponent, in which case there could be a winner
of the debate or (b) were ‘tradition-​specific reasons that were not acknowl-
edged as reasons by one’s opponents’ in which case the debate only clarifies
difference between the two traditions and there are no winners.46
There is clear resemblance between the vāda-​tradition and the dialogical-​
hermeneutics that we have been developing in this work. This similarity is
attested by Flood with regard to his own work that the vāda-​tradition is
‘wholly in accord with the dialogical model I wish to develop in the coming
chapters’ for the study of religion.47 The Samvāda form of enquiry historically
has brought in dialogue different intellectual traditions primarily to delineate
the boundaries of the discourse between rival schools of Vedic textual exege-
sis, in ways that clarified difference and debate in South Asia.48 The dialogue
of Samvāda-​tradition with post-​Heideggerian hermeneutical tradition can be
a rich source for the continued development of the dialogical approach for the
study of religion, which will not only be hospitable to different religious tradi-
tions, but also philosophically rigorous, meeting the highest requirements of
the academy.

A forward look
But can the contribution of this work and the conclusions drawn from it
be of any value, especially if ‘meanings’ constantly change and are unsta-
ble? Bakhtin’s judgement that meanings ‘can never be stable’ does not in any
way suggest a low-​view of ‘meaning’ itself. That ‘meanings’ constantly evolve
neither degrades the meaning-​making enterprise nor nullifies the significance
of particular articulations of ‘meaning’ as whimsical and arbitrary. On the
contrary, for Bakhtin, it is in these new moments of the ‘dialogue’s subse-
quent development’ that ‘forgotten contextual meanings’ are ‘recalled’ and
‘invigorated’ in a ‘renewed form’ and ‘new context’. In that sense, it is not
merely a glorification of the originary text but equally a celebration of each
of the subsequent meanings that ensue from it, which hopefully this book has
also produced. Thus, with Bakhtin, one could rejoice: ‘nothing is absolutely
dead: every meaning will have its homecoming festival’.49

Notes
1 Mikhail M. Bakhtin, “Methodology for the Human Sciences,” in Speech Genres
and Other Late Essays, ed. Caryl Emerson and Michael Holquist (Austin, TX:
University of Texas Press, 1986), 170.
2 Sri Aurobindo, “The Ideal of Human Unity,” in The Human Cycle, the Ideal of
Human Unity, War and Self-​Determination (Pondicherry:  Sri Aurobindo Ashram
Publication Department, 1962 (1949)), 578.
3 Mikhail M. Bakhtin, “Response to a Question from Novy Mir,” in Speech
Genres and Other Late Essays, ed. Caryl Emerson and Michael Holquist (Austin,
TX: University of Texas Press, 1986), 5.
  229

Conclusion 229
4 The first five chapters of Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda (Pondicherry: Sri
Aurobindo Ashram Trust, 1998 (1914–​1920)).
5 Bakhtin, “Response to a Question from Novy Mir,” 7.
6 Timothy Fitzgerald, “Encompassing Religion, Privatized Religions and the
Invention of Modern Politics,” in Religion and the Secular: Historical and Colonial
Formations, ed. Timothy Fitzgerald (London: Equinox, 2007), 212.
7 Ibid., 214.
8 Russell T. McCutcheon, “‘They Licked the Platter Clean’: On the Co-​Dependency
of the Religious and the Secular,” Method and Theory in the Study of Religion 19
(2007): 179.
9 Ibid., 173.
10 THR, eds, “Introduction:  After Secularization,” The Hedgehog Review:  Critical
Reflections on Contemporary Culture 8, no. 1–​2 (2006): 5.
11 Jose Casanova, “Rethinking Secularization: A Global Comparative Perspective,”
The Hedgehog Review:  Critical Reflections on Contemporary Culture 8, no. 1–​2
(2006): 7.
12 Other sociologists who equally do not hold on to the view of secularization as
a decline of religion are Paul Luckmann and David Martin, although there are
other scholars, like Steve Bruce, who hold on to a version of the ‘early’ seculariza-
tion theory.
13 Charles Taylor, A Secular Age (Cambridge, MA: The Belknap Press of Harvard
University Press, 2007), 2–​3.
14 Ibid., 22.
15 Will Sweetman, Mapping Hinduism (Halle: Verlag der Franckeschen Stiftungen zu
Halle, 2003), 51.
16 Sri Aurobindo, The Renaissance in India and Other Essays on Indian Culture
(Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust, 1997 (1918)), 140–​41.
17 Ibid., 146.
18 Sri Aurobindo, “Letter to Joseph Baptista,” in The Essential Writings of Sri
Aurobindo, ed. Peter Heehs (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1999 (1920)), 48.
19 Thomas Luckmann, “Shrinking Transcendence, Expanding Religion?,” Sociological
Analysis 51, no. 2 (1990): 129.
20 Taylor, A Secular Age, 373–​74.
21 Ibid., 309. However, this should not be confused with Taylor’s ‘three malaises’ of
modernity in his book on authenticity, the original title of which was The Malaise
of Modernity. They are: loss of meaning, eclipse of ends, and the loss of freedom.
Although there are some overlaps, especially with (a), the focus of the other points
are slightly different. Charles Taylor, The Ethics of Authenticity (Cambridge,
MA: Harvard University Press, 1991), 10.
22 Taylor, A Secular Age, 544–​45.
23 Charles Taylor made a remark to the effect that the link between immanent tran-
scendence and great transcendence has not been conceptually established, in a
private conversation at The British Academy, at the event entitled Reflections
of Templeton Laureates  –​the joint celebration of the anniversaries of Gifford
Lectures and John Templeton Foundation on 1 June 2012.
24 Andrew M. McKinnon, “Ritual Re-​Description as Passport Control: A Rejoinder
to Fitzgerald after Bourdieu,” Method and Theory in the Study of Religion 18, no. 2
(2006): 187.
25 Gavin Flood, “Reflections on Tradition and Inquiry in the Study of Religions,”
Journal of the American Academy of Religion 74, no. 1 (2006): 48.
26 Alasdair MacIntyre, Whose Justice? Which Rationality? (London:  Duckworth,
1988), 352.
27 Alasdair MacIntyre, After Virtue (London: Duckworth, 1981 (2007)), 205.
28 Ibid., xi.
230

230 Conclusion
29 Mikhail M. Bakhtin, The Dialogical Imagination, ed. Michael Holquist, trans. Caryl
Emerson and Michael Holquist (Austin, TX: University of Texas Press, 1981), 62.
30 Alasdair MacIntyre, Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry: Encyclopaedia, Genealogy,
and Tradition (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1991), 114.
31 Bakhtin, The Dialogical Imagination, 53–​62.
32 Martin Heidegger, Introduction to Metaphysics (New Haven, CT: Yale University
Press, 2000), 6–​7.
33 Charles E. Scott and John Sallis, “Introduction,” in Interrogating the Tradition:
Hermeneutics and the History of Philosophy, ed. Charles E. Scott and John Sallis
(Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 2000), 1.
34 Alasdair MacIntyre, “Epistemological Crises, Dramatic Narrative, and the Philosophy
of Science,” The Monist 69, no. 4 (1977): 453–​72.
35 MacIntyre, After Virtue, xi.
36 A summary of this debate can found in these following works: Jack Mendelson,
“The Habermas–​Gadamer Debate,” New German Critique, no. 18 (1979); Robert
Piercey, “Ricoeur’s Account of Tradition and the Gadamer–​Habermas Debate,”
Human Studies 27, no. 3 (2004); Susan E. Shapiro, “Rhetoric as Ideology Critique:
The Gadamer–​Habermas Debate Reinvented,” Journal of the American Academy
of Religion 62, no. 1 (1994).
37 Hans-​Georg Gadamer, Truth and Method, trans. Joel Weinsheimer and Donald
G. Marshall (London: Continuum, 1975), 276.
38 Paul Ricoeur, Time and Narrative, trans. Kathleen Blamey and David Pellauer,
vol. 3 (Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press, 1988), 222–​23.
39 Ibid., 223.
40 Ibid., 224.
41 Jürgen Habermas, Knowledge and Human Interests (Boston, MA: Beacon Press,
1971), 283.
42 Ricoeur, Time and Narrative, 226.
43 MacIntyre, Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry: Encyclopaedia, Genealogy, and
Tradition, 115.
44 It is no surprise that Clayton’s last book Religions, Reasons and Gods, posthu-
mously published in 2006, opens with two quotations, one from Aristotle and
the other from MacIntyre, which reads ‘it is traditions which are the bearers of
reason’. John Clayton, Religions, Reasons and Gods:  Essays in Cross-​Cultural
Philosophy of Religion (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006).
45 Based upon a fifteenth-​century Tibetan Buddhist account, King gives a more
detailed structure of the vāda-​tradition with eight basic steps. Richard King, Indian
Philosophy: An Introduction to Hindu and Buddhist Thought (Edinburgh: Edinburgh
University Press, 1999), 134–​35.
46 Clayton, Religions, Reasons and Gods:  Essays in Cross-​Cultural Philosophy of
Religion, 38–​39.
47 Gavin Flood, Beyond Phenomenology: Rethinking the Study of Religion (London:
Cassell, 1999), 57.
48 Clayton offers three sources of the vāda tradition: first, it was developed within the
Brahmanical circles, arising from ‘the question-​and-​answer methods of instruc-
tion in the meaning of Vedic ritual texts’ [J.C. Heesterman, ‘On the Origins of the
Nastika’, WZKSO 12–​13 (1968–​1969), 171–​185 and Solomon, Indian Dialectics,
21 ff.]. Second, it was developed from ancient methods for resolving legal dis-
putes and medical practitioners’ methods for agreeing diagnosis/​treatment and,
finally, in philosophical dialectic, independent of Brahmanic circles, within Jaina
and Buddhist groups ‘according to their own distinctive procedures and categories
which eventually fed into the mainstream tradition of vāda’. Clayton, Religions,
Reasons and Gods: Essays in Cross-​Cultural Philosophy of Religion.
49 Bakhtin, “Methodology for the Human Sciences,” 170.
  231

Conclusion 231
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McCutcheon, Russell T. “‘They Licked the Platter Clean’:  On the Co-​dependency
of the Religious and the Secular.” Method and Theory in the Study of Religion 19
(2007): 173–​99.
MacIntyre, Alasdair. After Virtue. London: Duckworth, 1981 (2007).
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of Science.” The Monist 69, no. 4 (1977): 453–​72.
232

232 Conclusion
MacIntyre, Alasdair. Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry: Encyclopaedia, Genealogy,
and Tradition. Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1991.
MacIntyre, Alasdair. Whose Justice? Which Rationality? London: Duckworth, 1988.
McKinnon, Andrew M. “Ritual Re-​description as Passport Control: A Rejoinder to
Fitzgerald after Bourdieu.” Method and Theory in the Study of Religion 18, no. 2
(2006): 179–​88.
Mendelson, Jack. “The Habermas-​Gadamer Debate.” New German Critique, no. 18
(1979): 44–​73.
Patton, Laurie L., Chakravarthi Ram-​Prasad, and Kala Acharya. “Hinduism with
Others: Interlogue.” In The Life of Hinduism, edited by John Stratton Hawley and
Vasudha Narayanan, 288–​300. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2006.
Piercey, Robert. “Ricoeur’s Account of Tradition and the Gadamer–​ Habermas
Debate.” Human Studies 27, no. 3 (2004): 259–​80.
Ricoeur, Paul. Time and Narrative. Translated by Kathleen Blamey and David Pellauer.
Vol. 3. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1988.
Sallis, John, and Charles E. Scott. “Introduction.” In Interrogating the Tradition:
Hermeneutics and the History of Philosophy, edited by Charles E. Scott and John
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Shapiro, Susan E. “Rhetoric as Ideology Critique: The Gadamer-​Habermas Debate
Reinvented.” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 62, no. 1 (1994): 123–​50.
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Halle, 2003.
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University Press, 2007.
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Reflections on Contemporary Culture 8, no. 1–​2 (2006): 5–​6.
  233

Glossary of important terms

Term Meaning
Abheda Non-​different
Abhyantara Inspiration
Abhyasa Yogic practice which not only lies at the heart of
the aṣṭānga of the Yoga-​Sūtras but is also cen-
tral to performing the memory of tradition
Advaita Vedānta A major school of Vedānta founded by Śaṅkara
in the eighth century CE, which is based on the
teaching of non-​duality, i.e. the ultimate unity
of Brahman and Atman
Ahaṃkāra The ‘Ego’ or the feeling of ‘I am’ with the sense
of ‘ego individuality’ which is contained within
the buddhi
Ahiṃsa ‘Harmlessness’ as opposed to the normal trans-
lation of ‘non-​violence’
Aiswaryam Lordly powers
Akshara Unmoving or immutable
Aṃśa Fragment, part
Ānabhighātaḥ Overcome
Ānandamaya Sheath of bliss
Aṅga Limbs
Aṇimā Lightness
Annamaya Sheath of food
Antaryamin The Lord, the inner dweller or the inner guide
Anthrōpoi athanatoi Become immortal
Aparigrahāḥ ‘Refusal of ownership’ as opposed to the usually
translated ‘covetousness’
Āpas Water; the tattva associated with the element
of water
Arta Seeking refuge in the Divine from the sorrows
of the world
Artha Meaning
Artharthi Desiring the Divine as the giver of good
234

234 Glossary
Āsana A posture adopted in performing haṭha-​yoga, a
manner of sitting
Askesis A term denoting the ‘practices’ of spiritual ath-
letes; Gavin Flood defines ascetic action as prac-
tices or habits performed by the ascetic self
Asrama A hermitage, a place of religious retreat or
community
Aṣṭānga A type of yoga based on eight principles and con-
sisting of a series of poses executed in swift suc-
cession, combined with deep controlled breathing
Asteya Justice and honesty
Auctoritas Authority
Aufhebung The Hegelian concept of ‘sublation’
Aufklärung The term here refers to the age of Enlightenment
and its encyclopaedic universalism
Avatāra A reincarnation, a Divine manifest in a human
appearance
Avayavin Whole
Bahya Respiration
Bewahrt Preserves the voices of the past
Bhakta Reader
Bhakti-​yoga The path of active involvement by the devotee in
divine worship and devotion for the attainment
of union with the Absolute
Bhukti Enjoyment
Bhūta Aurobindo argues that bhūta means ‘that which
has become’ as opposed to ‘that which eter-
nally is’, which therefore includes ‘name & form
& play of mind & play of action’, suggesting
movement
Brahmācarya Aurobindo prefers the meaning ‘chastity’ again
as opposed to the standard ‘celibacy’
Buddhi Reason, that enables conceptions beyond sense
perceptions
Buddhigrāhyam atīndriyam ‘Beyond perception by the sense but seizable by
the perceptions of the reason’
Caturthaḥ Fourth
Causa prima First cause
Circulus vitiosus Vicious circle
Cittavṛtti The normal state of man; it is a ‘condition of
trouble and disorder, a kingdom either at war
with itself or badly governed’ with the Purusha
subject to citta-​faculties
Dasein Dasein is a German word famously used by
Martin Heidegger that literally translates as
‘there-​Being’, and is generally used to refer to
  235

Glossary 235
being, i.e. being in its ontological and philosophi-
cal sense, being that is thrown in the world
Dhāraṅā The fixing of the mind for a moment on a single
thought, feeling, or object
Dharma The term is here used to mean ‘social ideals’
Dhyāna Meditation
Draṣṭā A seer, who is the first ‘knower’ according to
Aurobindo, the second of which is the inter-
preter of texts
Dṛṣṭi Intuitive ‘sight’ of the Veda through which the
‘transcending’ of rudimentary vijñāna of buddhi
to true vijñāna-​buddhi is made possible
Enumeratio  Enumeration of necessary and constituent
components
Epistēmē Real knowledge, knowledge that is intellectually
certain at any particular time
Erklären Mechanistic ‘explanation’ of the natural sciences
Existentiale An essential feature of Dasein i.e. an element of
the being of Dasein
Garima Steadiness
Gegenaufklärung The counter-​enlightenment ideas of Nietzsche
that strove to deconstruct Enlightenment uni-
versalism by arguing for perspectivalism
Gegenstand Object, that which stands against
Geist A German word for Spirit, which for Hegel is
‘Reason’ that is equivalent to the realization of
‘Freedom’
Geisteswissenschaften Human sciences
Guru Master, a living influence and an example
Guru–​śhiṣhya Master–​apprentice relationship
Guru–​śhiṣhya paramparā Tradition
Gyāna-​yoga The yoga of knowledge; it is the path of the
mind and requires development of the intellect
through the study of scriptures and texts of the
yogic tradition
Haṭha-​yoga A system of yoga which selects the body and the
vital functionings as its instruments of perfec-
tion and realization
ιδέα τον αγαθών Plato’s ‘idea-​of-​the-​good’
Integralis Latin for ‘entire, consisting of entireness’ or it is
said of ‘a part’ or ‘parts’ belonging to a whole or
constituting a unity, used here to stress the term
integral in what is known as integral philosophy
Iṣṭa Devatā Any name and form of the universal and trans-
cendent Godhead
Īśvara-​praṇidhānāni Worship and devotion to God
236

236 Glossary
Īśvarakṛṣṇa That which functions as the ‘centralizing organ
which co-​ordinates all of our sensory percep-
tions, thoughts and actions’
Iti iti An affirmation, meaning ‘it is this, it is this’
Jagad-​guru There are two types of gurus who are important
for a yoga-​sādhaka –​the first guru is the Supreme
Guide or World Teacher or jagad-​guru who is
within us. This guru is the Lord, Īśvara or the
Master of Yoga. This guru, who is universal and
not bound within the confines of an asrama, is
available to the whole society. Aurobindo gives
the highest importance to the jagad-​guru
Jijñāsu The seeker of God-​knowledge; yearning to know
the Divine unknown
Jīvan-​mukta Refers to someone who, in the Advaita philoso-
phy of Hinduism, has attained the realization of
the Self and is liberated from rebirth while living
in a human body
Kaivalyam Aloneness, total isolation; a state where the
power of consciousness is no longer aware of
anything else except itself, unconnected with the
citta and the world of prakṛti it had mediated
Kala Time
Karma-​yoga The achievement of union with the Absolute
and attaining perfection through action
Karman Ritual and moral action
Katharsis Aurobindo uses the term for what takes place
in the inner act of adoration at the stage of
purification
Kevala-​kumbhaka Total suppression of breath involving the cessa-
tion of inhalation and exhalation
Kshara Moving or mutable
Laghimā Minuteness
Langagière Language-​like
Logon didōnai Give an account of
Mahayugas The Vedic and Puranic units of time-​span from
the Śrúti to the mahamanvantara
Mahima Largeness
Manas The life of sensations and emotions, which are
at the mercy of the outward touches of life
and matter, and their positive or negative reac-
tions, joy and grief, pleasure and pain. Also
known as the sense-​mind, which is an infe-
rior way of seeing things in oppositions and
contradictions
Manomaya Sheath of empirical sense-​mind
  237

Glossary 237
Manvantara Manvantara is a Sanskrit sandhi, a combina-
tion of the two words manu and antara, literally
meaning the duration of a Manu or his life span
Maya The dark shadow where duality begins, for
example purusha differentiates from prakṛti etc.
Māyā The illusion or appearance of the phenomenal
world
Mīmāṃsā The name given to one of the six Darsanas or
Hindu schools of philosophy whose primary
enquiry is into the nature of dharma and is con-
cerned with correct action in accordance with
dharma
Mukti Liberation
Müssen Necessity
Nāma Name
Naturwissenschaften Natural sciences
Neti neti A negation, a chant or a mantra meaning ‘not
this, not this’; it is a saying also found in the
Upaniṣads
Nididhyāsana Fixed contemplation, the absorbed dwelling of
the mind on its object
Nirguṇa Brahman Signifies the concept of ‘That’ in Hindu philoso-
phy, the Absolute unmanifested (tat), God who
is formless and transcendent
Niskama karma Work that should be done without any desire for
the fruit; the first rule of action laid down by
the Gītā
Niyama The second stage or limb of yoga as defined by
Patañjali in his Yoga-​Sūtras and is a collection
of five observances or personal disciplines
Nyāya The name given to one of the six Darsanas or
Hindu schools of philosophy, the school has been
generally known as the analytic or logical school
Ojas Vital energy
Onto The most general ground-​ giving unity of all
beings which is universally valid everywhere
ον ένεκα For-​the-​sake-​of-​which
Para Supreme
Para Brahman The supreme absolute; the impersonal, nameless
universal principle
Para Purusha Absolute unmanifested
Paradosis Content of what is being handed over
Paramparā A tradition, especially one’s prior education and
predisposition
Parātpara Brahman The Absolute who is both unknowable and
ineffable
238

238 Glossary
Prakamya Fulfilment of desire
Prāṇa Breath, considered as a life giving force in Hindu
teachings
Prāṇamaya Sheath of breath
Prāṇāyāma Breath-​control
Purna-​advaita The metaphysics of Aurobindo usually known as
Integral Vedānta or Integral Non-​Dualism
Purna-​vijñāna The part of Aurobindo’s metaphysics usually
known as Integral Idealism
Purna-​yoga Integral yoga in the teachings of Aurobindo,
which refers to the union of all the parts of one’s
being with the Divine
Purnavada Integralism
Rāja-​yoga Understanding of the form of the Absolute
within many forms, realized through the prac-
tice of the eightfold yoga system from Patañjali
Reductio Identification of first principles
Religionswissenshaft The science of religion that set out to develop a
scientific approach for the study of religion and
religions
Ṛṣi A seer; a Hindu sage or saint
Ṛtaṃ Bṛhat Truth-​consciousness
Rūpa Form
Sachchidānanda A compound of three words sach, chid, and
ananda meaning the divine existence, conscious-
ness, and bliss
Sādhaka Someone who follows a particular sādhanā,
or a way of life designed to realize the goal of
one’s ultimate ideal, whether it is merging with
Brahman or realization of one’s personal deity
Sādhanā A means of accomplishing something; it is a spirit-
ual practice which includes a variety of disciplines
Saguṇa Personal God; the term signifies that He has
form and personality
Sākṣin Cosmic consciousness; witness standing out-
side, as a sākṣin (witness), of the Parātpara that
escapes rational conception and the strangle-
hold of rational metaphysics and therefore is
the ‘unknowable’ and the ‘ineffable’
Śakti Female energy
Saloka A couplet of Sanskrit verse, especially one in
which each line contains sixteen syllables
Samādhi A stage of intense concentration achieved
through meditation, the final stage at which
union with the divine is reached
Samasti The collectivity
  239

Glossary 239
Samrajya Control by the subjective consciousness of its
outer activities and environment
Saṃsāra The cycle of death and rebirth to which life in
the material world is bound
Samvāda Dialogue, especially with another tradition
Saṃyama Self-​restraint, self-​control, forbearance; a state
when the fixedness of attention, contemplation,
and meditation are practised
Sanatana Dharma Rene Guenon, a French metaphysician and one
of the founders of an esoteric school of thought
in the early twentieth century and the movement
called the ‘traditionalist school’ or ‘integral tra-
ditionalism’, defines it as an integral tradition,
which for him is also the primordial tradition
that alone ‘survives continuously without change
although all the Manvantara’ and ‘includes prin-
cipally all branches of human activity’
Santoṣa Contentment
Sapta Chatusthaya The seven-​quaternary system of yoga that Auro­
bindo both practised and was developing as the
unique method that would achieve his yogic goals
Śāstra Text, scripture
Satya Truth
Satyam Jnanam Anantam Truth, Knowledge, Infinity
Śauca Cleanliness and purity
Śábdam Brahma Word of God where Śábdam has three
­elements –​‘the word, the meaning and the spirit’
Shuddhi Purification
Sicht Sight
Siddhi Perfection
Śleṣa Rhetorical figure of double entendre
Sollen A right
Sorge Heidegger’s concept of ‘care’
Śrāvaṇa One of the methods of bhakti-​yoga, reading or
hearing of different scriptures
Śrúti Literally ‘that which is heard’; sacred utterance
handed down by tradition
Stambha Rhythmic regulations of both inspiration and expi-
ration with an interval of inholding of the breath
Sui generis Of its own kind or unique in its own characteristics
Sūkṣma Subtle, which means ‘non-​material, not belong-
ing to the physical world perceived by the outer
mind and senses’
Sūkṣma deha Subtle body
Sūkṣma dṛṣṭi Subtle means of vision and experience which
are beyond the physical world
240

240 Glossary
Sūkṣma indriyas Subtle organs
Sūtra Literally means a thread that holds things
together, and generally refers to an aphorism or
a collection of such aphorisms in the form of
a manual
Svādhāya Meditation on scripture
Svarūpa Self-​
form; the essential nature of Brahman
which being ‘self-​existent’ is ‘considered distinct
from Brahman in its “self-​manifestation” as our
universe’
Swadeshism A term used by Aurobindo to stress a unity that
is not merely as a country, but a soul, a psycho-
logical, almost a spiritual being
Svarajya Control of the subjective consciousness of itself
Swarupa The essential figure of Truth which cannot be
known with the human intellect
Tantra-​yoga Connectedness with God by means of transfor-
mation of sexual energy
Tapaḥ Austerity
Tattvas The fundamental principles; the word is used to
signify the Vedic classification of the fundamen-
tal principles of existence. Aurobindo interprets
these tattvas as ‘psychological principles’ because
in his psychological interpretation of the Vedas,
the Vedic Ṛṣis are seen as conceiving ‘existence’
as a ‘movement of conscious being’ which pro-
vided the ‘thought-​basis’ for their ‘living psycho-
logical practice’, although he acknowledges that
modern interpretations view these classifications
as ‘dry metaphysical distinctions’
Techne Techne, as distinguished from epistēmē, is often
translated from the original Greek as crafts-
manship, craft or practices. It is the skill that
requires practical rationality in producing an
object or accomplishing a goal
Telos A final aim
Theo Metaphysical God
Tradere Tradere refers to the process of ‘delivering’ or
‘passing on’ and ‘handing down’, in other words
it has the idea of transmission or delivery.
Tradition as tradere entails the idea of transmis-
sion –​a three-​part movement from the past, to
the present, to the future; a movement in time
Tradicion Hand over, to deliver
Transcendere Surpass, step over, to cross over or to go beyond
Transmettre The notion of tradition as an act of transmission
  241

Glossary 241
Trikaladrsti The three times (past, present, and future) are
seen as one movement, seen singly and indivisibly
even in their succession of stages, periods, cycles
Ultima ratio Final accounting
Ūrdhva-​retāḥ Upward (ūrdhva) flow of the semen (retas)
Utsaha Effort
Uttama Highest
Vaiṣṇavism A tradition of Hinduism, distinguished from
other schools by its worship of Vishnu or his
associated avatars, principally as Rama and
Krishna, as the original and supreme God
Vāk Word
Vedānta The name given to one of the six Darsanas or
Hindu schools of philosophy whose primary
enquiry is into the nature of Brahman and is
concerned with correct knowledge of Brahman
Verstehen ‘Understanding’ of the human sciences
Vicāra Intellectual reflection for realization of the
supreme Self
Vicchedaḥ Regulation
Vijñāna Supramental knowledge; the causal idea, which
by supporting and secretly guiding the confused
activities of mind, life, and body ensures and
compels the right arrangement of the universe
Vijñāna-​Buddhi Both the faculty that does the ‘transcending’ or
‘releasing’ and also the act of ‘transcending’ and
‘travelling’ between buddhi and vijñāna-​buddhi
through intuitive ‘sight’
Vijñānamaya Sheath of reason and understanding
Virat That which flows forth, another name for
Parātpara, the pervading spirit which enters into
all things and encompasses all
Viveka Right discrimination for realization of the
supreme Self
Volksgeister The historical civilizations in a dialectical fash-
ion, the stages where Hegel’s Spirit realizes itself
in history
Vorurteile The ideal of total freedom from prejudices
Vyasti The separative being, the individual
Yama The first stage or limb of yoga as defined by
Patañjali in his Yoga-​Sūtras and is a collection
of five abstinences or principles governing the
way to relate to other people
Yugas An epoch or era within a cycle of four ages.
These are the Krita Yuga, the Dvapara Yuga,
the Treta Yuga, and finally the Kali Yuga
242

Index

Page numbers with ‘g’ are glossary terms.

abheda (non-​different) 145, 233g Appropriation 6, 10–​11, 24, 98, 100,

Abhinavagupta 199, 208n.162 112, 172
abhyantara (inspiration) 179, 233g Aquinas, St Thomas 224, 227
abhyasa 175, 176–​7, 183, 184, 233g Aristotle, Poetics 114, 186, 194, 197
Absolute 10, 105–​8, 111, 191, 192, 193; arta 195, 233g
Parātpara Brahman 93 Art and Answerability (Bakhtin) 14–​15
absolute idealism 45, 46 artha 97, 193, 233g
acosmism 44 articulation 25, 26, 29, 49–​50, 154–​5,
action 9, 91, 184, 213; ascetic 162; 220; explanation/​understanding
mimesis1 185–​90; reading 198; and the 135–​40; as interpretation/​
religious–​secular debate 26, 220, 221; understanding 147–​50
and traditionary-​hermeneutics 19, 20; arts 195–​6
yogic 166, 168–​9, 170, 171, 186, 190, Arya (journal) 17, 39, 120n.44, 141, 163,
191, 201, 214 208n.162
Advaita Vedānta 45, 68, 106, 191, 196, āsanas 166, 173, 174, 178–​81
199, 233g ascetic action 162, 168
Advaitic reductionism 45–​6, 87 ascetic refusal 45–​7
After Virtue (MacIntyre) 20 ascetic self 167–​9, 174, 184–​5, 200, 201,
agency 185, 188–​9 214, 234
ahaṃkāra 97, 233g Ascetic Self, The (Flood) 167
ahiṃsa 176, 233g ascetic traditions 167–​8
aiswaryam 180, 233g Ashcraft, Michael 3
Akshara 109, 233g Ashramites 1, 2–​3, 4, 17
Alfassa, Mirra (aka The Mother) askesis 167, 234g
17, 178 asramas (ashrams) 176, 177, 178, 234g
Allen, Amy 27–​8 assertion 140, 144–​7
Alles, Gregory D. 84–​5 aṣṭānga 173–​5, 176–​7, 178–​9, 180, 181–​3,
Alter, Joseph S. 172, 177 233, 234g
aṃśa 145, 233g asteya 176, 234g
āndamaya, sheath of bliss 95, 233g attunement 50–​7, 70
aṅgas 175–​84, 204n.58 Aufhebung 108, 234g
aṇima 179, 233g Aufklärung 5, 234g
annamaya 95, 233g Aurobindo: corpus 16–​18; life 16;
answerability 14–​15 see also Human Cycle, The; Life
antaryamin 188, 233g Divine, The; Synthesis of Yoga, The
anthrōpoi athanatoi 142, 143, 233g authority 20–​1, 151–​2, 163, 225;
aparigrahḥ 176, 233g auctoritas 152, 225, 234g
āpas 108–​9, 233g Avatāra 178, 234g
  243
avayavin 145, 234g
axial age 105
bahya 179, 234g
Bakhtin, Mikhail M. 14–​15, 21, 188,
212, 213, 215, 224, 228; Art and
Answerability 14–​15; Dialogical
Imagination, The 224
Bartley, W.W. 68
Basu, Arbinda 169
‘being as being’ 103–​4, 117
‘being-​there’ 50–​1, 148, 149
Bellah, Robert 41
Benavides, Gustavo 83, 102
Berger, Peter 86
Bernstein, Richard J. 18–​19, 69; Beyond
Objectivism and Relativism 18
bewahrt 226, 234g
‘beyond the beyond’ 106, 108–​9
Beyond Objectivism and Relativism
(Bernstein) 18
Beyond Phenomenology (Flood) 138–​9
Bhabha, Homi 16
Bhagavad-​Gītā 170, 183; and purna-​yoga
184–​98
bhakta 194, 195, 196–​8, 234g
bhakti/​bhakti-​yoga 162, 169, 170, 184,
187, 194–​8, 201
bhukti (enjoyment) 200, 234g
bhuta 116, 234g
binding, and worship 164
Bliss 43, 90–​1, 92, 109, 112
body 199–​200
brahmācarya 176, 179, 234g
Brahman 45, 65, 142, 144–​5, 188, 199,
200, see also Absolute; Divine Being;
Paratpara Brahman
breathing 172, 179, 181, 234
Brereton, Joel 91
Bristow, Sir Robert 17, 39, 40
Bryant, Edwin F. 175, 178–​9, 180, 183
buddhigrāhyam atīndriyam 55, 234g
buddhi (reason) 54, 55, 94, 95, 97, 234g;
and imagination 115
Buddhism 46, 68, 196; and the ascetic
self 167
Caplan, Arthur L. 41–​2
Capps, Walter H. 18, 48–​9
care (Sorge) 185–​6, 186, 239g
Casanova, Jose 216
Certeau, Michel de 66
‘chain of interpretations’ 98–​100
‘chain of memory’ 167–​8
Index 243
Chandernagore Manuscript, The
(Aurobindo) 173, 176, 182, 183
Chatterjee, Satischandra 16, 44, 44–​5
Chaudhuri, Haridas 44, 45, 163;
Philosophy of Integralism 17
Chincholkar, L.G. 17
Cho, Francisca 40
Christianity 15, 32n.33, 167
circle of understanding 150–​2, 153, 155
circulus vitiosus 150–​2, 153, 155
citavṛtti 182, 234t
Clayton, John 227
‘clearing’ 110–​11, 112
Cocq, Rhoda P. Le 17, 73n.59, 73n.69
Collingwood, R.G. 129, 133
colonialism 24–​5, 136
common rationality 49, 58
concentration 193
‘conditions of belief’ 216
conferences: Religion after Onto-​
Theo-​logy 101; Religion and
Postmodernism 4 92; Religion
and Reductionism 40, 102;
Religion–​Secular Dichotomy 24–​5;
Transcendence and Beyond 104, 111
Consciousness/​consciousness 41, 43,
45–​7, 46, 57, 64; Absolute 45; cosmic
(sāksin) 46; divine 190, 195, 196, 200;
Divine Consciousness-​Puissance 196;
judging 226; and sāchchidānda 90,
238g; saksin 46, 109, 238g; samādhi 83,
173, 174, 178, 180, 182–​3, 238g; and
the sevenfold being 85, 88, 90, 91, 92,
106, 107, 109, 112, 161; supreme 143;
Truth-​ 238; and Yoga-​Sūtras 174, 182
constructivist thinkers 48
contemplation (theōria) 139–​40, 148,
149, 193; nididhyāsana 191, 237g;
theoretical 141
‘continent’ 56
Conventional stage 131, 132, 133
cosmic consciousness (sāksin) 46
cosmologies 54, 74n.72
Coventry, Henry 76n.125
creative understanding 21, 215
critical school 22, 23, 25, 85, 86–​7, 136, 138
Cunningham, G. Watts 76n.131
Dasein (being-​in-​the-​world) 50–​3, 93,
96, 104, 113, 115–​17, 143, 234g;
and articulation/​interpretation/​
understanding 148–​9
das Geviert 92, 104
Dawson, Lorne 57–​8
244
244 Index
Dayananda Saraswati 99, 122n.73
deductive-​nomological model
57–​61, 70
denial, materialist 44–​5
Descartes, René 48
Deussen, Paul 204n.58
development of a tradition 28
dhāraṇā 182, 235g
dharma 132, 235g, 237, 239
dhyāna 182, 235g
dialogical hermeneutics 9, 10, 11, 15,
26–​9, 38, 65, 68–​70, 128, 140, 152–​4,
155, 162, 221, 222–​7; and the Samvāda
tradition 227–​8
Dialogical Imagination, The
(Bakhtin) 224
‘difference’ 16, 68–​9, 117
Dilthey, Wilhelm 37, 139, 152
disciples 2, 120n.32, 177–​8, 178
Divine Being 44, 81, 88, 109, see also
Absolute; Brahman
Divine Consciousness-​Puissance 196
Donnelly, Morwenna 17
draṣṭā 97, 235g
Drees, Willem B. 83
dṛṣṭi 95–​6, 96, 143, 235g
dualistic theistic explanation 44
Eliade, Mircea 23–​4, 41, 83–​4, 164, 166,
170, 171, 174
‘embodied spirit’ 7, 8, 10, 199, 220; and
the sevenfold being 81, 82, 87–​8, 90,
91, 92–​3, 102, 104
Energy, and the three negations
43–​4
enjoyment (bhukti) 200, 234g
Enlightenment 5, 18, 20, 27, 48–​9, 85,
215, 217, 226, 234g
epistēmē 140, 141, 235g, 240
epistemological crises 138, 224–​5
epistemological reductionism 42–​8
epistemology 37
Epstein, Brian 49
equality 188–​9, 200
Erklären (explanation) 57, 61,
139, 235g
Essays on Indian Philosophy
(Mohanty) 17–​18
Essays in Philosophy and Yoga
(Aurobindo) 163
excluded middle, law of 61, 62
existentiale 51, 52, 53, 56, 82, 95, 96, 146,
148, 219, 220, 235g
explanation 9, 220; and articulation
135–​9, 146; and narrative 139–​52;
-​understanding debate 146, 147,
152–​3, 154; see also Erklären
‘family resemblances’ 137
Farquhar, J.N. 95
Faure, Bernard 199
female energy 199, 238g
Feuerstein, Georg 175, 178–​9, 187
Feyerabend, Paul 18, 61, 69
Fitzgerald, Timothy 85, 86, 136–​7, 138,
164–​5, 198, 215–​17, 221; Religion and
the Secular 24–​5
Fitz, John 19
Flood, Gavin 29, 42, 49, 51, 56, 59, 60,
83, 85–​6, 87, 114, 144, 153, 164, 165,
166, 168, 169, 174, 184, 202n.10, 221,
228; Ascetic Self, The 167; Beyond
Phenomenology 138–​9; Tantric Body,
The 167, 168, 200
Forman, Robert K.C. 74
‘for-​the-​sake-​of-​which’ 148–​9, 154, 237
fundamentalism, religious 222
Gadamer, Hans-​Georg 20, 50, 134, 135,
151–​2, 166, 186, 225–​6
game-​theory 137
Ganeri, Jonardon 62
garima 179, 235g
Garrett, William R., ‘Troublesome
Transcendence’ 86
Gegenaufklärung 5, 235g
Gegenstand 235g
Geist 238g
Geisteswissenschaften 37, 235g
generalizations 49, 58–​61
Gītā see Bhagavad-​Gītā
Glassie, Henry 166
God 237g; as dead 6, 63, 101, 102, 103;
and indeterminacy 60; and logos 142;
and reductionism 40, 42, 44–​5, 47;
and the religious-​secular debate 26,
164, 216; and transcendence 81,
82–​5, 87, 91, 93, 97, 101–​3, 107,
111–​12, 219; and yoga 171, 176,
188–​90, 193, 195, 196
Goraka-​Sataka 179
‘grasping’ 114, 150
Greece, ancient 105
‘group-​soul’ 132
Guha, Ramachandra 3
Gunneman, Jon P. 27
  245
gurus 177–​8, 235g
guru–​śhiṣhya 177, 178, 235g
guru–​śhiṣya paramparā 177–​8, 235g
gyāna/​gyāna-​yoga 162, 169, 170, 184,
187, 190–​4, 201
Habermas, Jürgen 151–​2, 153, 225–​6
Halbfass, Wilhelm 202n.20
Halpin, David 19
Hammer, Dean C. 166
harmlessness (ahiṃsa) 176, 233g
haṭha/​haṭha-​yoga 162, 169, 170, 172, 173,
178–​81, 187, 201
hearing 114, 115
Heehs, Peter 1–​4, 172; Lives of Sri
Aurobindo, The 1–​2, 17
Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich
37, 105–​6
Heidegger, Martin 37, 40, 50–​1, 82;
and Appropriation 112; and
assertion 146–​7; attunement 52;
care 185–​6; das Geviert 92, 104;
interrogation 224; ‘It gives’ 110;
Letter on Humanism 112; and logos
141; Onto-​theo-​logical Constitution
of Metaphysics, The 102–​3;
‘thinking’ 53, 54; Time and Being
110–​11; transcendence 92, 101, 113;
understanding 96, 147–​50, 151, 220;
see also Dasein
Hempel, Carl Gustav 49, 57
Heraclitus 53, 141–​2, 143
Herdt, Jennifer 27
Hinduism, and the ascetic self 167
history: and the mind 129–​30; as
narrative 153; positivist 129;
psychological theory of 130
Hollis, Martin, Rationality and
Relativism 18
‘the holy’ 84–​5
human cycle (six stages) 129, 131, 153
Human Cycle, The (Aurobindo) 8, 9,
10, 17, 26, 128–​35, 154–​5, 214
humanism 32n.33
human rationality 49
human sciences 37, 57
Husserl, Edmund 182
‘hybridity’ 16
idealism 15, 45, 46
‘idea-​of-​the-​good’ 148, 235
Idea of a Social Science, The
(Winch) 61
Index 245
identity 91; knowledge by 53, 55, 56,
115, 116, 143, 144, 153, 191, 213;
laws of 62
illusionism 44
illusion (māyā) 46
imaginaire 22, 23, 24, 25
imagination 197–​8, 223–​4; as
transcendence3 113–​17, 223
immanence 6, 62, 81, 84, 85, 87, 219
immortal/​immortality 43–​4, 56, 88,
90, 142; anthrōpoi athanatoi 142,
143, 233g; becoming 142, 143, 233g
incommensurability 69, 70
indeterminacy 47, 59–​60, 61
Individualistic stage 133
inhabitation, of the other’s practices 11,
169, 200, 201, 223
inspiration 97, 115; abhyantara 179,
233g; see also vijñāna
Integral Advaitism of Sri Aurobindo, The
(Misra) 17
integral philosophy; background 15–​16
integration 8, 16, 187, 226–​7
‘intentional activity’ 171
intentionality 11, 168–​9, 184, 201
‘intentional knowledge’ 53
interiority 49, 168, 197, 198
interpretation 117–​18, 140, 212; and
articulation/​understanding 147–​50,
155; and mimesis theory 185; symbolic-​
psychological theory of 89, 93–​4, 98;
Vedic texts 96–​8
Interpretation of Scripture, The
(Aurobindo) 88
interrogation 10, 11, 128, 154–​5, 223, 224
intuition see vijñāna
involution–​evolution 92
Iṣṭa Devatā 178, 235g
Īśvarakṛṣṇa 236g
Īśvara-​praṇidhānāni 235g
‘It gives’ 104, 108–​13
iti iti 64, 144, 236g
jagad-​guru 177–​8, 236t
Jensen, Jeppe Sinding 114, 138
jijñāsu 195, 236g
ĵīvan-​mukta 183, 236g
kaivalyam 183, 236g
kala 177, 236g
Kant, Immanuel 18, 48–​9; and
imagination 115; onto-​theo-​logy 102;
and selbstreflexion 226
246
246 Index
karma/​karma-​yoga 162, 169, 170, 184,
187–​90, 201
karman 91, 236g
Katharsis 197, 200, 236g
Kessler, M. 66
kevala-​kumbhaka 179, 236g
King, Richard 54, 55, 66, 72n.44, 87, 145
knowledge 184, 201; by identity 55, 56,
115, 116, 143, 144, 153, 191, 213;
intentional 53; mimesis2 185, 186,
190–​4; traditionary 168, 184, 186, 194;
-​Will 142
Kshara 109, 236g
Kuhn, Thomas 18, 61, 69
Kuna, M. 27
Lactantius 164
laghimā 179, 236g
Lakatos, Imre 18, 61
Lamprecht, Karl 128–​31
language: and action 162, 169; and
assertion 144–​7; and polyglossia 16,
224; and the study of religion 114
laws of logic 62–​3
Letter on Humanism (Heidegger) 112
Letters on Yoga (Aurobindo) 162–​3
liberation (mukti) 200, 237g
Life 92
Life Divine [Draft C] , The 68
Life Divine, The (Aurobindo) 8, 9, 17, 26,
37–​8, 40–​2, 88; and logic 62; reception
of 39–​40; three negations 42–​8; and
transcendence 81
Lives of Sri Aurobindo, The (Heehs)
1–​2, 17
logic 49, 70; and rationality 57–​61
logon didōnai 140, 236g
logos 140–​4, 146, 154–​5
Luckmann, Thomas 219–​20
Lukes, Steven, Rationality and
Relativism 18
McCutcheon, Russell T. 85, 101, 216–​17
MacIntyre, Alasdair 20–​1, 26–​8, 104,
135, 138, 174–​5, 213, 224–​5, 227; After
Virtue 20; ‘Rationality of Tradition’
20, 28; Three Rival Versions of Moral
Enquiry 19, 20; Which Rationality and
Whose Justice 20
McKinnon, Andrew M. 86–​7, 136–​7,
165, 221
Madhava 188
mahas/​Mahas 90–​1, 92
mahima 179, 236g
Maitra, S.K. 91–​2, 105–​6; Meeting of the
East and the West in Sri Aurobindo’s
Philosophy, The 17
manas (sense-​mind) 55–​7, 74n.72,
74n.73, 91, 95, 108, 143, 144, 236g
manomaya 95, 236g
Marion, Jean-​Luc 102, 103, 104,
109–​12, 113
master–​apprentice frameworks 175, 178,
184, 201
Material Form 131, 132
materialism 44; rationalistic 6, 45
materialist reductionism 40, 46, 87
materialist (scientific) explanation/​denial
43, 44–​5
matter 84, 87, 92; spirit–​matter binary
6–​7, 18, 43–​4, 47, 88; and the three
negations 42–​3, 44
Maya 112, 237g
Meaning and End of Religion (Smith) 3
meanings, renewal of 5, 21, 98, 99, 100,
212, 215, 228
Meeting of the East and the West in
Sri Aurobindo’s Philosophy, The
(Maitra) 17
memory of tradition 167–​8, 214
metaphysics; demise of 101, 109–​10,
118; and onto-​theo-​logy 102–​4; and
transcendence 63, 64
Meyers, Fredrick W.H. 59
Michelis, Elizabeth De 166, 173, 204n.56
Mill, J.S. 61
Mīmāṃsā 187, 190, 237g
mimesis theory 184–​98, 221; mimesis1
185–​90; mimesis2 221; mimesis3 221
mind 28, 47, 54, 64, 92, 100, 218; and
the ascetic refusal 45–​6; cosmological
schema of 74n.72; and gyāna-​yoga
192–​3; and haṭha-​yoga 181; and
history 129–​30; and ‘It gives’ 108–​9;
‘limited’ 43, 88; Overmind 106–​8; and
psychology 131; and raja-​yoga 181–​4;
sense-​ (manas) 55, 95, 143; state-​of-​
51–​2, 56, 85, 113–​14; supermind 90,
92, 94, 113; and Yoga-​Sutras 174,
176–​7; see also buddhi
Misra, Ram Shankar 65; Integral
Advaitism of Sri Aurobindo, The 17
Misra, Vacaspati 176
Mohanty, J.N., Essays on Indian
Philosophy 17–​18
Monier-​Williams, Sir Monier 95, 166
moral philosophy 20
moral practices see aṅgas
  247
Morris, E. Herbert 19, 20, 166
The Mother see Alfassa, Mirra
motives 129, 134, 168, 169, 185, 189,
197; see also passion
mukti (liberation) 200, 237g
Muller-​Ortega, Paul E. 199
müssen 226, 237g
mysticism, and rationality 65–​7, 213
Nagel, Ernest 57
nāma 87, 237g
narrative 9, 185, 213; explanation
and understanding in 139–​52,
220; philosophy of history as
133–​5, 153; religion as 136–​9; and
traditionary-​hermeneutics 19–​20
naturalism 44, 83, 84, 87
naturalist reductionism 40, 222
natural sciences (Naturwissenschaften)
18, 23, 37, 139, 237g; and
reductionism 40, 41
nature see prakṛti (nature)
NB see nirguṇa /​Nirguṇa Brahman
negations, three 42–​8
Neo-​Vedānta tradition 15, 29, 163
neti neti 2, 64, 144, 237g
Nicholson, Andrew J. 72n.39
nididhyāsana 191, 237g
Nietzsche, Friedrich Wilhelm 219; ‘God
is dead’ 102, 103
nirguṇa /​Nirguṇa Brahman 106–​9, 237g
niskama karma 189, 237g
niyamas 175–​8, 179, 237g
non-​contradiction; law of 61, 62–​3
non-​different (abheda) 145, 233g
non-​naturalism 83, 84, 87
non-​reductionism 38
non-​religious 24, 216
numinous 41, 83, 85
Nyāya 62, 145, 237g
objectivism 19, 28, 59
objectivity, scientific 5, 6, 8
ojas 179, 237g
Olivelle, Patrick 89, 91, 94, 100, 116
ontological reductionism 41, 81, 83–​4
ontology 37–​8, 42, 50, 83, 115; Advaitic
45; ‘embodied spirit’ 220; and human
sciences 151; and the Life Devine 81;
and logos 146; Vedantic 53
onto-​theo-​logy 10, 62, 82, 93, 102–​6,
109–​10, 118; conference on 101;
and Parātpara Brahman (Absolute)
104–​13
Index 247
optimization 58
‘other’ 22, 114, 154, 162, 200, 213,
217, 223
Otto, Rudolf 24, 41, 84–​5
Overmind 106, 106–​8, 107
Pals, Daniel 40, 42, 83
Parabrahman 110, 111, 112, 220
paradosis 19, 166, 237g
paramparā 69, 237g
Parātpara Brahman (Absolute) 93, 118,
220, 237g; as transcendence2 101–​13
passion 11, 120, 162, 168–​9, 184, 187,
194, 195, 197, 198, 201
passions of the reader, mimesis3 185,
186, 194–​8
‘past meanings’ 5, 10, 21, 128, 212, 215
Patañjali 174, 176; Yoga-​Sūtras 170,
172–​5, 177, 178, 179, 182, 183, 214
Pelikan, Jaroslav 19
Pennington, Brian K. 137
perfection (siddhi) 179–​80, 200, 239g
Personal God (PG) (Saguṇa) 106, 107,
108–​9, 195, 196
phenomenology 196; of religion 23–​4,
41; transcendental 182
Phillips, Stephen 17, 39, 65, 66, 106–​7,
109, 208n.162
Philo 142
philosophy of history 10, 128, 130,
131, 153, 154, 214, 220; as narrative
133–​5
Philosophy of Integralism
(Chaudhuri) 17
Pieper, Josef, Tradition: Concept and
Claim 19
Plato 51, 141, 148; ‘idea-​of-​the-​good’
148, 235; and logos 146; Republic 140
Plotinus 91–​2
Poetics (Aristotle) 114, 186, 194, 197
politics/​political economy 24, 25–​6
polyglossia 16, 224
Porter, Jean 20
positivism 44, 129
‘post-​critical’ scholars 22–​3
Power, Sally 19
practice see action
prakamya 180, 237g
prakṛti (nature) 54, 72n.40, 174, 183,
190, 236
prāṇa 95, 119n.32, 179, 200, 237g
prāṇamaya 95, 237g
prāṇāyāma 178–​81, 237g
pratyahāra 181–​4
248
248 Index
privatized religion 18, 24, 26,
137, 215–​16
psychological theory of history 130
Purani, A.B. 17, 46
purification (shuddhi) 193, 197, 200, 239g
purnavada 15, 238g
purna-​vijñāna 15, 238g
purna-​yoga 162, 163, 170–​2, 183, 184,
201, 214, 237g; aṅgas 175–​84; and the
Bhagavad Gita 184–​98; and Patañjali’s
Yoga-​Sūtras 172–​5; and tantra
198–​200
purusa 72n.40, 109, 142, 174, 182,
183, 192
Purushas, Three 108, 109, 112
Radhakrishnan, Sarvepalli 15, 62
rāja/​raja-​yoga 162, 169, 170, 172, 173,
181, 183, 187, 201
Raja-​yoga (Vivekananda) 173
Ramachandran, V.S. 59
Rāmānuja 145, 188
Rammohan Roy 15
Ranade, R.D. 141
rational account 140–​4, 147, 154–​5
rationalism, scientific 105
rationalistic materialism 6, 45
rationality 9, 25, 26, 49, 213; and
articulation 140; attunement/​
subject–​object distinction 50–​7;
deductive-​nomological model/​
generalizations 57–​61, 70; difference/​
incommensurability/​dialogical
hermeneutics 68–​70; internal 169,
175, 178, 180, 181, 184, 201, 214; and
mysticism 65–​7; of traditionary 67–​8;
and traditionary-​hermeneutics 20;
universal 48–​65, 213
Rationality and Relativism (Hollis and
Lukes) 18
‘Rationality’ (Taylor) 139
‘Rationality of Tradition’
(MacIntyre) 20
Rationality (Wilson) 18
reasoning 20–​1, 48–​50, 57–​9, 63, 68,
69; and the buddhi 95, 113; logico-​
nomological 10, 50, 218; ‘traditional-​
internal’ 67, 213
Record of Yoga (Aurobindo) 162
Reddy, Madhusudan 17
reductionism 9, 38, 40–​2, 69–​70;
deductive-​nomological model and
generalizations 57–​61; epistemological
42–​8; scientific 86
reductive revelation 47
reflexivity 6, 7, 9, 16, 57, 85, 213, 226
relativism 3, 28, 65, 70, 150, 213, 223
religion: as category 25; as narrative
136–​9; privatized 18, 24, 26, 137,
215–​16; term 164, 165; see also
religious–​secular debate
Religion after Onto-​Theo-​logy
conference 101
religionism 23, 81, 132
Religion and Postmodernism 4
conference 92
Religion and Reductionism conference
40, 102
Religion and the Secular
(Fitzgerald) 24–​5
religionswissenshaft 32n.33
Religion–​Secular Dichotomy
conference 24–​5
religious fundamentalism 222
religious–​secular debate 4, 8–​9, 10,
14, 21–​6, 87, 213, 215–​22; historical
origins 22–​3; and Human Cycle, The
154; and Synthesis, The 163; and
transcendence 81, 84; and yoga 164–​6
renewal of meanings 5, 21, 98, 99, 100,
212, 215, 228
renunciation 46, 188–​9, 190
representation 9
Republic (Plato) 140
respiration (bahya) 179
Richard, Mirra 17
Richard, Paul 17
Ricoeur, Paul 19–​20, 37, 100, 114–​15,
133–​4, 139, 151, 152–​4, 168, 194,
198, 225–​6; mimesis theory 184–​7;
Time and Narrative 185; ‘What Is a
Text’ 98–​9
‘rigid category’ 137
ritual 91
Roy, Motilal 198–​9
ṛṣis 89, 90, 96
ṛtaṃ bṛhat 90–​1, 92, 238g
rūpa 97, 238g
Śábdam Brahma 97, 239g
sachchidānanda 238g
sacredness see transcendence
sacrifice 189–​90
sādhaka/​yoga sādakas 163, 177, 178, 192,
194, 236, 238g
sādhanā 163, 176, 178, 238g
Saguṇa (Personal God) 106, 107, 108–​9,
195, 196
  249
Saivism 199
saksin 46, 109, 238g
śakti 199, 238g
Sallis, John 224
Salvadori, Guglielmo 128–​31
samādhi 83, 173, 174, 178, 180,
182–​3, 238g
Sāmkhya 46, 54, 55, 174, 183
samrajya 174, 238g
saṃsāra 167, 238g
Samuel, Geoffrey 174
Samvāda tradition 104, 223, 227–​8
saṃyama 182, 204n.53, 239g
Śankara 6, 45, 72n.44, 108, 188, 190,
191, 199, 233
santoṣa 176, 239g
Sapta Chatusthaya 163, 200, 239g
Śāstra 177, 239g
satya 91, 176, 239g
Satyam Jnanam Anantam 112, 239g
Śauca 176, 239g
Sayana 89, 99, 100
Schleiermacher, Friedrich Daniel Ernst
41, 85, 134
science 59; and generalization 60–​1;
and logic 63; psychology 131; and
rationality 51, 53
scientific objectivity 5, 6, 8
scientific rationalism 105
Scott, Charles E. 224
Secret of the Veda, The (Aurobindo) 17,
88, 119n.30, 119n.31, 122n.73, 214
Secular Age, A (Taylor) 216
secularisation thesis 22, 81
secularity 4, 9, 25, 102, 119, 217, 220,
221; secularity1 216; secularity2 216;
secularity3 85, 218
‘secular religions’ 23
Segal, Robert A. 23, 41, 83–​4, 113–​14
selbstreflexion 226
Self 60, 94, 96, 109, 113, 116, 132, 143,
188, 190, 193; ascetic 167–​9, 174,
184–​5, 200, 201, 214, 234; and the
human cycle 133; quiescent 191, 193;
Supreme 123n.115, 190, 191, 192, 241
self-​understanding 93–​4
sense-​mind see manas (sense-​mind)
Sethna, K.D. 65–​6
seven, in Vedic system 90
sevenfold being 81, 107, 109, 112, 220;
and transcendence 87–​93
sheaths, five 95
Sheppard, C. 66
Shils, Edward 166
Index 249
shuddhi (purification) 193, 197, 200, 239g
siddhi 179–​80, 200, 239g
sight (Sicht) 96, 143, 149, 239g
Singleton, Mark 172, 177, 204n.56
slesa 89, 239g
Slingerland, Edward 40
Smart, Ninian 39
Smith, Wilfred Cantwell 136, 164;
Meaning and End of Religion 3
social evolution 214
social science 49; and the study of
religion 23
sollen 226, 239g
Somani, Saurabh 2–​3, 4–​5
Sorge 186, 239g
Sorokin, Pitirim 170
Spencer, Herbert 214
spirit 72n.40, 84, 103, 123n.115,
130–​3, 164, 192; and ascetic refusal
45; Geist 235g; matter binary 6–​7,
18, 43–​4, 47, 48, 84, 87, 88, 112; and
philosophy of history 134–​5; and
śábdam 97; and the three negations
42–​3; virat 110, 241g; see also
embodied spirit
spiritual (Advaitic) explanation 43
Spiritual age 133, 134, 135
Squier, Richard K. 40
śrāvaṇa 191, 239g
śrúti 115, 121n.49, 143, 239g
Staal, F. 67
stambha 179, 239g
Stanford, Michael 133
Stansell, Ellen 208n.162
state-​of-​mind 51–​2, 56, 85, 113–​14
Stoeber, Michael 198
Subjective stage 132, 133
subjectivism 150
subjectivity 49
‘subject-​specific frameworks’ 58
subject–​object distinctions 50–​7, 70, 113,
117, 148
sublation 107–​8
subtle (sūksma) 46, 239g
‘subtraction theory’ 216, 217
Sufi Islamic tradition 15, 199
sūkṣma deha 46, 239g
sūkṣma dṛṣṭi 46, 239g
sūkṣma indriyas 46, 239g
Supermind 90, 92, 94, 113
sūtras 179, 239g; see also Yoga-​Sūtras
svādhāya 176, 240g
svarajya 174, 240g
svarūpa 97, 107, 240g
250
250 Index
swadeshism 240g
swarupa 240g
Sweetman, Will 165, 217
symbolic-​psychological theory of
interpretation 89, 93–​4, 97–​8, 100
Symbolic stage 131, 132, 133
‘synthesis’ 199
Synthesis of Yoga, The (Aurobindo)
8, 9, 11, 17, 26, 162–​4, 167–​70, 201;
and the Bhagavad Gita 184–​7;
and bhakti-​yoga 194; see also
purna-​yoga
‘tantra’, as code for revolutionary
material 198–​9
tantra/​tantra-​yoga 162, 169, 170, 171,
187, 201, 240g
Tantric Body, The (Flood) 167, 168, 200
Tantric tradition 15
tapaḥ 176, 179, 240g
tattvas 90, 240g
Taylor, Charles 20, 51–​3, 56, 82, 139–​41,
216–​20, 221; ‘Rationality’ 139; Secular
Age, A 216
techne 167, 169, 184, 185, 201, 214, 240g;
tradition as 174–​5, 177, 181
telos 240g; and history 130, 133, 135,
214; see also artha; and yoga 169, 171,
174, 175, 182, 183–​4, 201
textuality 9, 213; and traditionary-​
hermeneutics 19, 20; and
transcendence1 93–​101
theistic dualism 47–​8
theological (theistic) explanation 43
Theory and Method in Religious Studies
(Whaling) 23
Theosophists 173
Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry
(MacIntyre) 19, 20
time 19–​20, 166, 185, 185–​6, 187, 197–​8,
213, 221
Time and Being (Heidegger) 110–​11
Time and Narrative (Ricoeur) 185
tradere 19, 240g
tradicion 19, 240g
Tradition: Concept and Claim
(Pieper) 19
tradition: and action 162, 166, 167, 170;
as claim to truth 225–​6; development
of 19; and mimesis 184–​7; techne
as 174–​5, 177, 181; Tradition:
Concept and Claim (Pieper); and the
trimarga 198
traditionary-​hermeneutics 8–​9, 14,
18–​21, 68, 89, 98, 184, 201, 213–​15;
and Human Cycle, The 128; and
transcendence 93, 100, 117–​18; and
yogic action 169
traditionary rationality 67–​8, 213
transcendence 9, 10, 25, 26, 59, 117,
218–​19, 221, 223; transcendence1 10,
81, 82, 92–​3, 214; transcendence2 10,
81, 82, 92, 93, 113; transcendence3 10,
82, 92, 93; as imagination in dialogue
113–​17, 223; and logic 61–​2, 64; and
metaphysics 63, 64; and ontological
reductionism 83–​4; as Parātpara
Brahman 101–​13; and sevenfold being
87–​93; and the study of religion 84–​7
Transcendence and Beyond conference
104, 111
transcendence–​immanence binary 81,
87, 112–​13
transcendental phenomenology 182
transcendere 92, 240g
transmettre 19, 240g
transmission of knowledge 19, 152, 162,
168, 186, 198, 240
trikaladrsti 240g
trimarga yoga 184, 185, 187, 194, 197–​8;
see also bhakti/​bhakti-​yoga; gyāna/​
gyāna-​yoga; karma/​karma-​yoga
‘Troublesome Transcendence’ (Garrett) 86
Truth/​truth 92; -​assertions 144; and
buddhi 55–​6; -​consciousness 90, 92,
144; ‘final’ 68–​9; and Life Divine, The
88, 91, 92, 96–​7, 103, 105, 107, 112,
115; and mysticism 65; objective 18;
presumption of 226; and religionism
23; and the Three Negations 42–​3;
tradition as claim to 225–​6;
see also Supermind
Typal stage 131, 132, 133
ultima ratio 103, 240g
‘unconscious superiority’ 23
understanding; and articulation
135–​9, 147–​50; creative 21, 215; and
explanation 146, 147, 152–​3, 154;
Heideggerian 96; in narrative
139–​52; -​Projection 96; Verstehen 57,
61, 139, 241g; vicious circle of 150–​2;
and vijñāna (intuition) 118
universal rationality 9–​10, 18, 48–​65, 68,
70, 213
‘Unnamed Something’ 41
  251

Index 251
Upaniṣads 88, 91, 100 Waardenburg, Jacques 22, 136
Ūrdhva-​retāḥ 179, 240g Whaling, Frank 24, 25; Theory and
utsaha 177, 240g Method in Religious Studies 23
Uttama 109, 240g What is History? (Lamprecht) 128
Whicher, Ian 166, 169–​70, 173–​4, 174,
‘vada-​tradition’ model of enquiry 227–​8 203n.38
Vaisnava Bhakti 15 Which Rationality and Whose Justice
vaisnavism 240g (MacIntyre) 20
vāk (word) 97, 241g whole (avayavin) 145, 234g
Valliere, Paul 166 Wiebe, Donald 23, 113
Vattimo, Gianni 104, 111–​12, 113 Williams, Yvonne 17, 100–​1
Vedānta 8, 50, 88, 143, 190, 241g Wilson, Bryan, Rationality 18
Vedas 131–​2 Winch, Peter 18, 52, 63; Idea of a Social
Verstehen (understanding) 57, 61, Science, The 61
139, 241g Woodroffe, Sir John 208
vicāra 95, 190, 241g ‘world history’ 134
vicchedaḥ 179, 180, 241g worldhood 51, 52, 56, 115, 117, 149
vicious circle of understanding 150–​2, worship 89, 194–​7, 196–​7; binding
153, 155 through 164
vijñāna-​buddhi 235, 241g Wrathall, Mark A. 101–​2
vijñāna (intuition) 54, 90, 92–​101, 109,
117–​18, 144, 241g; -​inspiration yama 175–​8, 180, 241g
115–​16; and logos 142–​3, 146 yoga 162–​9; meaning 164, 166; see also
vijñānamaya 95, 142, 241g purna-​yoga
virat 110, 241g Yoga-​Bhaṣya (Vyasa) 179
Viśiṣṭādvaita (Ramanauja) 91, 145 yoga sādakas see sādhaka/​yoga sādakas
vitalism 45, 133 Yoga-​Sūtras, of Patañjali 170,
viveka 121n.49, 190, 241g 172–​5, 177, 178, 179, 182,
Vivekananda, Swami 62; Raja-​yoga 173 183, 214
volksgeister 241g yogic action 168–​9, 170, 171,
voluntarism 45 186, 190, 191, 201, 214
vorurteile 241g yugas 241g
Vyasa, Yoga-​Bhasya 179
vyasti 241g Zaehner, R.C. 17, 188
252