The Ascension of Gangadharan

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T.R.Thulasiram, Arut Perum Jothi and Deathless Body. A

comparative study of Swami Ramalingam with Sri Aurobindo and the

Mother and Tirumoolar), University of Madras 1980, Vol. I, pp. 918-922

 

APPENDIX V

 

FLOOD OF GRACE AND GOLDEN LIGHT

 

VISIONS AND EXPERIENCES

 

by

 

Gangardhan, Sri Aurobindo Ashram

 

It is by Grace that I came into contact with the Mother of the Sri

Aurobindo Ashram in my youth when she visited my village

Veerampattinam, four miles off Pondicherry, in 1928. She poured her

looks of Grace into my heart. I was soon attracted to join the Ashram

in my twentieth year which fell in 1933. I come from a poor and

uneducated family. I had only completed the lower standards of school

education. All the sadhana or spiritual discipline that I did and am

still doing is wholly centred upon the work which She gave to me. I

work in the sanitary service of the Ashram

 

 

By doing the work with sincerity and devotion as the Mother's own

work, I began to get experiences. By Her grace my soul or psychic

being opened after five years of Ashram-life. Since then, the psychic

has been my guide and I feel always the Mother's Presence in my

heart. From time to time various kinds of spiritual experiences have

come, one after another. In my 63rd year, I had a flood of spiritual

experiences and visions soon after I had sat in meditation in Sri

Aurobindo's room on my birthday, along with fellow disciples and

devotees whose birthdays coincided with mine. Then in the next year,

when I meditated in my own room on my sixty-fourth birthday (24-7-76)

at 12 noon, the Grace of our Divine Mother descended and entered into

the depth of my mid-forehead.

 

She came in the form of a Luminous Young Child - Bala, in the same

form as when She had been about seven years old - and opened

the "chakra" on the top of the head, the Sahasrara, giving rise to

wonderful visions and experiences.

 

I feel that these are purely a gift of the Grace of our Divine

Mother, and not at all due to my merits or qualifications or Sadhana.

The experiences have continued and developed since then and

especially in my midnight meditation between 2 and 3 a.m. Soon after

the experiences, the Grace comes in the form of Tamil poetry in which

they get expressed. Below I am giving in English some recent

experiences in the order in which they came.

 

 

The Divine Mother lit the Light of a Lamp burning in the middle of my

forehead. It is a Light that extended, with its flaming heat, in all

directions.

 

In the depth of a silence beyond mind and heart, I found the pure

flame of Truth blazing in its intensity. As the bud blossoms

unfolding its petals all around, so the inner consciousness blossomed

and expanded in that profound silence.

 

In lonely silence again, I realised the Divine Mother, the

Consciousness of all consciousnesses, manifesting Herself as a

luminous young child - Bala. I became one with Her in consciousness.

 

My uvula curved upwards and tasted the oozing Amrita (Nectar) of

Grace. The thousand-petalled lotus opened itself. I sensed its subtle

fragrance full of Grace.

 

The lid of Brahmarandhra (Aperture of Brahman) opened itself. The

last vestige of the ego was dissolved. A flood of Light entered in

from above. I became absorbed in Bliss, the most precious gift of the

Mother. The infinite pure Consciousness and the Self were realised.

 

The bond of birth and death has been broken and with that the

dualities of pleasure and pain, sorrow and happiness were cancelled.

The being has become free by realising the Light of Consciousness

which is the source of the Vedas.

 

Mother Bala gave by Her Grace the Eye of Knowledge to see and realise

the Truth. By surrendering to Her Lotus-Feet one can receive the

supreme fulfilment of life as Her gift.

 

 

After the rending of the lid on the top of the head, and being

surrounded by Light, I quickly rushed through wide spaces of heavens.

Heavens within heavens were entered. The consciousness moved both

upwards and inwards. It crossed six overhead planes which had been

screening the Truth. Then I entered into the experience of the Void,

the Sunya of Nothingness. But this was not the end. I felt I was near

the Vast Realm of Light which is the Home of Mother Bala who has

manifested to me in Her Splendour of Light. The ascending path to the

Home of Grace and Peace was seen. The Golden Door opened. I trod the

interior path to the Heaven of Mother Bala and quickly entered into

the vast Realm of Truth-Knowledge (Satya Jnana Peru Veli). I saw

Mother Bala seated in Her Form of dynamic and vibrating golden Light

in Her own supreme and universal Heaven of Light. I had wonderful

visions of Truth; and Bliss coursed through and overflowed my whole

being.

 

Cascades of intensities of the pure golden Light spread in all

directions, and all the spaces were flooded with the golden Light.

The Light within the inner Light was realised and I became one with

the consciousness of Light and partook of the Amrita of Bliss.

 

I entered into the vast Golden Truth-world (Pon Ambalam) and realised

its vast Golden Light of Truth-knowledge. There was an enjoyment of

the dynamic play of the Lord, His play of the beginningless and

endless Bliss. I realised the Supreme Lord with His Shakti Uma as the

Two-in-One in the vast Golden Realm of Truth, which even the great

gods fail to see. I realised Him as the Lord of my soul and self,

present everywhere and bestowing His Grace on the devoted faithful in

the depth of their hearts.

 

I saw the supreme Lord, realised union with Him, and became verily

Himself. The birth, maintenance and destruction of the universe

taking place in the Heart of the supreme Lord was seen. My being got

fused and absorbed in the eternal Ananda which is beginningless and

endless, and verily became that.

 

There, all the crores of heavens and worlds and the physical cosmic

bodies, namely, the sun, planets, earth, moon and stars, were seen

whirling like atoms. I saw them with the eye of Grace.

 

I realised the vast and supreme golden Light of Grace (Pon Arut Perm

Joti) in its own Home of Truth which is without beginning and end. I

became the pure Consciousness of the dynamic golden Light of Truth.

The source of the secret Truth of the Vedas was found, and that

without one's learning to know of it. I realised the supreme Light

(suddha param Jyoti) spreading, from far beyond above, in all

directions.

 

In the supreme and pure infinity of existence which is without day

and night the unity of the all-containing supreme (eka poorana) was

realised. It was realised also as the one infinite and eternal Bliss

of the supreme Consciousness.

 

The world of play of Truth-knowledge (Ambalam) is found in the depth

of silence. The whole universal movement is the play of the Lord of

the Truth-world, the play of Knowledge-Will, the play of the

beginningless and endless Ananda. The earthly life shall get changed

into a play of Bliss when one annihilates the ego and realises the

supreme Lord who has extended Himself as the universe.

 

The Golden Sun of Truth-knowledge rose up in that supreme world of

Peace and Silence, and in the midst of the vibrating ocean of Ananda,

spreading the flood of golden Light everywhere and illuminating,

sustaining and nourishing the earthly world of ours. With the rising

of the Sun of Truth-knowledge, the darkness disappeared everywhere

and the Golden Light pervaded the whole universe and the earth too

became golden.

 

The pure Golden Light descended from the vast Heaven of Truth-

knowledge like the raining of waters. The earth, being flooded with

the descending golden Truth-Light of Grace, changed into a golden

earth, shining in its golden luminosity. A golden world is seen born,

and men too become golden in the mental, vital and physical levels of

existence. With the descending force of the golden Light of Truth on

the earth, a new era has begun and the earth has woken up with a new

consciousness which is seen vibrating with a new awakening of life at

all levels of human existence. The human race is awakening everywhere

with a new life.

 

 

Carried by the force of the flood of the descending golden Light, I

came down to the earthly consciousness when I entered into my body

through the Brahmarandhra.

 

I hear the Omkarananda vibrating in me and, along with it, the Golden

Truth-Light infiltrates into my adhara. The heart is filled with the

consciousness of Grace which is indeed the Golden Light of Grace. The

ego has been completely effaced. The golden Light of Truth also

descended into me, into my mind, life and body and made them golden.

The golden Light entered into all the cells of the body, into the

bones, muscles, tissues, brain and nerves, blood and its cells, skin

and even the hairs, from the root to the end, and made them appear

golden with a tinge of red. The whole body appeared a beautiful

golden red body.

 

I saw even the Sun of golden red Light rising up over the earthly

sky, spreading its golden red Light of Truth into the whole material

earth. The golden red Light of Truth is verily the concrete physical

form of the highest supreme consciousness. The descending Golden

Light becomes the golden red Light when reaching into matter and the

material world and the material body.

 

The phenomenal universe which is derived and born from the supreme

eternal Truth of Bliss, Light and Peace moves to reach and become the

Truth of Bliss, Light and Peace again, by enjoying the endless Bliss.

 

Man shall realise the eternal Truth and become That and he shall live

the immortal life here on the earth by attaining a deathless body.

 

The Golden Light of Truth is awaiting above the head to descend and

enter in man through the opening of the Sahasrara when one, being

awakened to the psychic being, remains in undisturbed silence and

peace. The golden Light is seen to rush into the whole adhara and

into the body and shall transform man.

 

(From "Mother India" March 1977)

 

 

Author's Remarks:

 

Gangadharan's above experiences of the Truth-World have been here

reproduced from the March 77 issue of Mother India Journal of the

Ashram. Only he has added now a few Tamil terms by way of foot notes

for a better understanding of his experiences by the readers. The

Mother of the Ashram remarked once long time before that Gangadharan

is always in Her consciousness.