Sri Aurobindo

Aurobindo Ghose was born on 15th August 1872 in Calcutta / India.

At the age of seven his father sent him and his brothers to England for education. In 1890 he joined King's College in Cambridge. When he was about 20 he got interested in his home country and Indian politics.

In 1893 after graduating from college he returned to India. In the following 13 years he worked as an civil servant, college professor and finally as vice chancellor at the Baroda College in Baroda.
In this time he intensively occupied himself with Indian history and culture, studied Sanskrit and wrote numerous poems. During this period he was also member of a revolutionary group and played a leading role in the secret preparations for an uprising against the British occupation.

In 1906 he joined the Indian Nationalist movement and became one of its leaders. In 1908 he was accused of conspiracy and got imprisoned. The following year in the prison of Alipur became the turning point of his life as he had a series of fundamental spiritual realisations. After his acquittal in 1909 he first continued his political and journalistic work but finally followed an inner call and withdrew completely from political life.

On 4th April 1910 Sri Aurobindo arrived at the city of Pondicherry at the Indian east coast where he settled and commited himself entirely to his spiritual work.

During his 40 years in Pondicherry he developed a new method of spiritual practice, the Integral Yoga. His aim was a spiritual realisation that does not only liberate the human consciousness but also transforms the whole being.

Sri Aurobindo wrote numerous philosophical books, among others "The Life Divine", "Essays on the Gita", "On the Veda" and "Ideal of Human Unity".

In 1926 Sri Aurobindo and his spiritual companion, The Mother, founded the Sri Aurobindo Ashram. In the same year Sri Aurobindo withdrew from all external contacts and devoted himself to his inner work. However, he maintained an intensive correspondence with his disciples. In this time he also finished his greatest literary work, the epic "Savitri".

Sri Aurobindo left his body on 5th December 1950.

Sri Aurobindo on Himself:
"There is no difference between the Mother's path and mine; we have and have always had the same path, the path that leads to the supramental change and the divine realisation; not only at the end, but from the beginning they have been the same."

from: Sri Aurobindo "On Himself"

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