21. September 1966

Ich weiß das Auroville sein wird, es ist beschlossen.

Die letzte Hoffnung, um auf die bevorstehende Katastrophe zu reagieren. Eine Wirkung im Unsichtbaren.

Die Zusammenarbeit der Nationen, um etwas zu erschaffen, das auf der Wahrheit gegründet ist, statt auf der Rivalität in der Schöpfung der Falschheit.

Die Menschheit ist nicht die letzte Stufe der Schöpfung.

Die Evolution geht weiter, und der Mensch wird übertroffen werden.

30. Dezember 1967

Auroville wird eine materiell unabhängige Stadt sein.

Alle, die dort leben, werden sich an ihrem Leben und ihrer Entwicklung beteiligen.

Diese Teilnahme kann passiv oder aktiv sein.

Es wird keine Steuern als solche geben, aber jeder wird durch Arbeit, Güter oder Geld zum allgemeinen Wohlergehen beisteuern.

Bereiche wie Industrien, die aktiv teilnehmen, werden einen Teil ihres Einkommens zur Entwicklung der Stadt beisteuern, oder wenn sie etwas für die Bürger Nützliches herstellen (wie Nahrungsmittel), werden sie in Sachwerten zur Stadt beitragen, die für die Ernährung ihrer Einwohner verantwortlich ist.

Es werden keine Regeln oder Gesetze aufgestellt.

Die Dinge werden sich von selbst in dem Maße formulieren, wie die zugrunde liegende Wahrheit der Stadt sich entwickelt und Gestalt annimmt. Wir greifen nicht vor.

7. Februar 1968

1.

Auroville gehört niemandem im besonderen. Auroville gehört der Menschheit als Ganzes. Um sich jedoch in Auroville aufhalten zu können, muss man ein williger Diener des göttlichen Bewusstseins sein.

2.

Auroville wird der Ort einer fortwährenden Ausbildung, eines steten Fortschrittes und einer Jugend sein, die niemals altert.

3.

Auroville will die Brücke zwischen Vergangenheit und Zukunft sein. Unter Ausschöpfung aller Entdeckungen geht es kühn den künftigen Verwirklichungen entgegen.

4.

Auroville wird der Ort spiritueller und materielle Forschungen sein, um der konkreten menschlichen Einheit einen lebendigen Körper zu verleihen.

1.

Auroville belongs to nobody in particular. Auroville belongs to humanity as a whole. But to live in Auroville one must be a willing servitor of the Divine Consciousness.

2.

Auroville will be the place of an unending education, of constant progress, and a youth that never ages.

3.

Auroville wants to be the bridge between the past and the future. Taking advantage of all discoveries from without and from within, Auroville will boldly spring towards future realisation.

4.

Auroville will be a site of material and spiritual researches for a living embodiment of an actual Human Unity.

6. April 1968

Jede Bewegung des Zurückweisens oder des Herabstiegs steht im Gegensatz zu einem Leben in Auroville, das ein Leben des Aufstiegs und der Zukunft ist.

Any movement backward or downward is in contradiction to life in Auroville, which is a life of ascent towards the future.

3. August 1968

Auroville ist der Ort, an dem sich diese neue Lebensweise erarbeitet, ein Zentrum beschleunigter Evolution, wo der Mensch anfangen soll, seine Welt durch die Macht des inneren Geistes zu verändern.

Auroville is the place where this new way of living is being worked out, it is a center of accelerated evolution where man must begin to change his world through the power of the inner Spirit.

30. August 1969

Auroville wants to be the cradle of the superman.

Auroville, the free international township. No army, no police…

They are replaced by a battalion of guards, consisting of athletes and gymnasts.

17. September 1969

The earth needs a place where people can live sheltered from all national rivalries, all social conventions, all contradictory moralities and antagonistic religions.

A place where, freed from all those slaveries of the past, human beings will be able to wholly dedicate themselves to the discovery and practice of the Divine Consciousness that wants to manifest.

Auroville wants to be that place, and offers itself to all those who aspire to live tomorrow’s truth.

20. September 1969

Auroville is the ideal place for those who want to know the joy and liberation of not having any more personal possession.

15. November 1969

Who took the initiative of Auroville?

The Supreme Lord.

Who is participating in the financing of Auroville?

The Supreme Lord.

If one wants to live in Auroville, what does it mean for oneself?

Striving towards the supreme perfection.

In order to live in Auroville, must one be a student of Yoga?

All life is a yoga. Thus one cannot live without practicing the supreme yoga.

Will family life continue in Auroville?

If one has not gone beyond that.

Can one keep religion in Auroville?

If one has not gone beyond that.

Can one be atheistic in Auroville?

If one has not gone beyond that.

Will there be a social life in Auroville?

If one has not gone beyond that.

Will there be compulsory community activities in Auroville?

Nothing is compulsory.

Will money circulate in Auroville?

No, it is only with outside that Auroville will have money dealings.

Who will be the owner of lands and buildings?

The Supreme Lord.

In which languages will teaching be given?

In all languages spoken on earth.

31. December 1969 (Matrimandir)

…and at this center, there is what we first called the “Matrimandir” – which I always see as a very large hall, absolutely bare, you understand, and getting a light from above: it should be so arranged that the light from above gets concentrated on a spot where there would be… what we want to put as the center of the city. We first thought of Sri Aurobindo’s symbol, but we can put anything we like. Like that, with a ray of light constantly striking from above – revolving and revolving… to follow the sun, you understand. If it’s done well, it would be very good. And then, below, people would be able to sit and meditate, or just rest, but there would be NOTHING – nothing except something comfortable below so they can sit without getting tired, probably with pillars acting at the same time as backrests. Something like that. That’s what I always see. A hall with a ceiling high enough to allow sunlight to come in as a RAY, depending on the time of the day, and fall on that center which will be there.

3. January 1970 – The Matrimandir

I could describe it. It came like this. It will be a kind of hall which will be like the inside of a column. No windows. Ventilation will be artificial, with this kind of machinery (Mother points to an air conditioner), and just a roof. And sunlight striking the center; or, when there is no sunlight (at night or on overcast days), an electric spotlight. The idea is to build right now an example or a “model” for a hundred people or so. Once the city is built and the experiment is made, we will make a BIG thing of it – but then it will be very big, for one or two thousand people. And the second one will be built around the first, which means that the first will go only when the second is built.

But the big temple will be built afterwards, and then on a huge scale.... The smaller one will go only once the bigger one is built. But of course, for the city to be completed, we must allow some twenty years (for everything to be in order, in its place). It’s the same with the gardens: all the gardens that are being prepared are for now, but in twenty years, all that will have to be on another scale; then it will have to be something really... really beautiful. And I wonder what substance that globe should be made of, the big one?... The small one could be made of crystal: for a globe this size (gesture about one foot) I think it will do. The globe will have to be visible from every corner of the room.

Yes, a roof with two sides so as to get sunlight. It will have to be so arranged that rainwater can’t get in. Something that needs to be opened and closed every time it rains won’t do, it’s not possible; it will have to be in such a way that rainwater can’t get in. But sunlight must get in AS A BEAM, not diffused. So the opening will have to be limited....

It’s a kind of tower with twelve regular facets representing the twelve months of the year, and absolutely empty.... Only, it will have to hold one to two hundred people. So, to support the roof, there would be inside (not outside, inside) twelve columns; and right at the center, the object of concentration.... And with the sun’s concentration, all year round it will have to get in AS A BEAM (not diffused: it will have to be so arranged that it can get in as beams); then, according to the hour of the day and the month of the year, the beam will revolve (there will be some device at the top) and it will be directed onto the center. At the center, there will be the symbol [of Mother], then Sri Aurobindo’s symbol supporting a globe. A globe which we’ll try to have made of a transparent substance such as crystal or... A large globe. Then people will be let in order to concentrate – (laughing) to learn to concentrate! No fixed meditations, nothing of the sort, but they will have to stay there in silence – silence and concentration.

So, depending on the hour of the day (the hour of the day and the month of the year), the sun will go round. Then, at night, as soon as sunlight has vanished, we’ll switch on spotlights which will have the same effect and the same color. Night and day the light will remain there. But no windows or lamps or things of the sort – nothing. Ventilation through air conditioners (they’re set inside the walls, that’s very easy).

25. March 1970

For instance, the idea is that those who will live in Auroville will have no money—there is no circulation of money—but to eat, for instance, everyone has the right to eat, naturally, but… On quite a practical level, we had conceived the possibility of all types of food according to everyone’s tastes or needs (for example, vegetarian cooking, non-vegetarian cooking, diet cooking, etc.), and those who want to get food from there must do something in exchange—work, or… It’s hard to organize in practice, on a quite practical level…. You see, we had planned a lot of lands around the city for large-scale agriculture for the city’s consumption. But to cultivate those lands, for the moment we need money, or else materials. So… Now I have to face the whole problem in every detail, and it’s not easy!

You see, the idea is that there will be no customs in Auroville and no taxes, and Aurovilians will have no personal property. Like that on paper, it’s very fine, but when it comes to doing it in practice…

The problem is always the same: those given the responsibility should be people with a… universal consciousness, of course, otherwise… Wherever there is a personal consciousness, it means someone incapable of governing—we can see how governments are, it’s frightful!

3. June 1970 – True Aurovillian

TO BE A TRUE AUROVILLIAN

1) The will to consecrate oneself entirely to the Divine.

That’s what HE said. I found it fine.

2) The Aurovillian must not be a slave to his desires.

The idea is this: “We come to Auroville to escape social and moral rules that are artificially practiced everywhere, but it is not to live in the licentiousness of the satisfaction of every desire: it is to rise above desires in a truer consciousness.” Something like that…. It appears they quite need this! (Mother laughs) So we should add it.

1) The first necessity is the inner discovery so as to find out what one truly is behind all social, moral, cultural

…racial, hereditary appearances.

But then, we should tell them that there IS a discovery to be made, because many don’t know it at all! (Mother laughs)

In the center, there is a free being, vast and knowing, which awaits our discovery and must become the acting center of our being and our life in Auroville.

We should teach them to free themselves from the idea of personal possession…. You see, everything belongs to the Divine, and the Divine gives you not only a center (the center of your individuality), but also the possibility of the personal use of a number of things; but you must take them all like that, as things LENT to you by the Divine. The Divine is eternal, of course, he is everlasting, as they say in English, and at the same time as he creates this individual center, a number of things are there to be used for his work, so those things are LENT. That’s exactly the point: you hold them in your possession for a time.

It’s to uproot the sense of personal possession.

The only true way to cure desires is to give oneself to the Divine and accept what He gives you as the only things you need. But that’s already very advanced.

2) One lives in Auroville to be free from moral and social conventions; but that freedom must not be a new slavery to the ego, its desires and ambitions.

The fulfillment of desire bars the road to the inner discovery, which can only take place in the peace of perfect disinterestedness.

3) The Aurovillian must free himself from the sense of personal possession.

For our transition in the material world, what is indispensable to our life and action is put at our disposal….according to the place we are to occupy.

The more we are CONSCIOUSLY in contact with our inner being, the more the exact means are given to us.

It’ll become interesting!

4. September 1971 – Auroville

But take this other example: I am trying to make Auroville a link between the old way of being and the new, but they are all sunk in…. I mean they use their freedom to live in the most ordinary way. So… it’s discouraging. There are some—a few—who are good, but the majority is a subhumanity, an altogether animal humanity. So….

1. February 1972 – Auroville

Auroville is intended to hasten the advent of the supramental reality upon earth.

The help of all those who find that the world is not what it ought to be is welcome.

Each one must know if he wants to associate himself with an old world on the verge of death, or to work for a new and better world ready to be born.

4. February 1972 – Auroville is not for Easy Life

We must strive for Order, Harmony, Beauty and… collective aspiration—all the things which for the moment are not there. We must… you see, being the organizers, our task is to set the example of what we want others to do. We must rise above personal reactions, be exclusively attuned to the divine Will and be the docile instruments of the divine Will—we must be impersonal, without any personal reaction.

We must “be” in all sincerity. What the Divine wants—let it be. That’s all. If we can be that, then we are as we ought to be, and THAT is what we must become. For the rest… for all the rest, we do the best we can.

I know it’s not easy, but we are not here to do easy things; the whole world is there for those who like an easy life. I would like people to feel that coming to Auroville does not mean coming to an easy life—it means coming to a gigantic effort for progress. And those who don’t want to keep up with it should leave. That’s how things stand. I wish It were so strong—the need for progress, for the divinization of the being, so intense—that those who are unable (unable or unwilling) to adjust to it would leave by themselves: “Oh, this is not what I expected.” As it is now, all those who want an easy life and to do what they please as they please, say, “Let’s go to Auroville!” It should be just the opposite. People should know that coming to Auroville means an almost superhuman effort for progress.

It is the sincerity of our attitude and effort which makes a difference. People should feel that insincerity and falsehood have no place here—they just don’t work, you can’t fool people who have devoted their entire life to go beyond humanity.

There is only one way to be convincing—it is to BE that.

Then we’ll stand strong, we’ll have all the divine force on our side.

We are here to prepare a superhumanity, not to fall back into desires and easy life—no.

People must feel it; it should be so strong that the sheer force of our sincerity would drive them out—that’s what they have to feel. At that point, we will be what we should be. The power of the realization—of the sincerity of the realization—is such that it’s UNBEARLABLE to those who are insincere.