Tuesday, October 25, 2005

Sri Aurobindo passes away

The Hindu dated December 6, 1950:
Sri Aurobindo (79), the great seer and thinker of modern India, passed away at 1-30 a.m. on December 3 in his Ashram at Pondicherry. Though in indifferent health for over two weeks, suffering from kidney trouble, his end came unexpectedly, suddenly. The passing of the renowned seer plunged all of Pondicherry and its environs into deep mourning.
Editorial comments: ``In an age of rampant materialism, incorruptible witnesses to the supremacy of the spirit are none too many. And when the great beacons go out, when a Gandhi, a Ramana, an Aurobindo withdraw from the mortal scene, the world is left visibly darker. ...Aurobindo's was a universal message and his marvellous mastery of the written word helped to secure for it respectful hearing across the barriers of race and language. For this prophet from India, the unity of the human family in Divine Consciousness was not merely a matter of faith; it was a goal practically to be realised.
``A shining page in our history records Aurobindo Ghosh's heroic part in the struggle for Indian freedom. Nurtured on the English poets, his ardent nature rallied early to the call of patriotism, spurning a life of elegant ease. He brought to public life a burning eloquence, a power of idealism, and a dynamic leadership which roused the land from end to end and destroyed that passive consent which had been the charter of Imperialism. But it was left to other hands to finish the great work which he had begun. Generations to come will honour his memory''.

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