What is the nature of a universe without Time? If we imagine such a world  the immediate picture is a static one; there is no movement and consequently no change, no development, no progress, nor even any decay. Motion is the primary truth of our material universe, because of which we know that change and evolution are the foremost realities of our existence within this creation. For motion to be, there must be Time. The two are inextricably linked. Thus if we deny the fact of evolution as a central reality of existence, we automatically make of our world a static one.

One of the principal characteristics of Greek thought as it has reached us today and as it has influenced modern-day living until the advent of relativity theory and quantum physics, is its preoccupation primarily with Space. Time was not the major focal point of Greek thought, and hence the line of knowledge that developed in Greece culminated in Aristotle and his largely static image of the world. We find the seeds of this development present in the teachings of Pythagoras as well. His ‘geometry of number’, beginning with 1 and ending with 10, indicates clearly the emphasis on Space — or the horizontal movement. The Zero, which contains the key to Time, was unknown to the Greeks. And hence even in the grand vision of Pythagoras’ ‘music of the spheres’, the major element — the Zero — which could truly harmonise the system and make of his vision the basis of a dynamic model of the universe, was lacking.

Critics of ancient Greek thought lament that the direction the early Ionians gave to science led to what is called Classical Physics, which holds as firm pillars of its system the absolutes Time and Space, largely unconnected and unrelated to each other. Yet the situation in the East was quite different in ancient times. India possessed knowledge of the Zero and with that she was able to unify concepts which in the West took a rigid and separative shape. In consequence, or along with this divisive vision, the religious consciousness in the West also evolved into a more and more rigid formalism, until the stage has been reached where fundamentalist Christians can refuse to accept the findings of science in matters that now stand beyond question. The religious consciousness of the West, which evolved from Judeo-Christianity and its sister Islam, is exclusive and dogmatic, quite contrary to the Eastern way, in particular the Indian.

E pur si muove, were Galileo’s words when forced by the clerics to deny his theory of a moving Earth. ‘Nonetheless she moves!’ was his cry in defense of that which moves, of the truth of movement. And it is motion far and above any other universal principle that characterises the cosmos in which we live, as well as the bodies we inhabit. That same whirling, dynamic universe that our Earth inhabits is the truth of our own habitat: the human body is a whirling mass in constant progression, never static, ever in a state of dynamic change.

Movement is given a supreme place in Indian thought. It is the essence of the Mother, the Shakti or Power, the feminine principle. But the denial of Motion, or Time, is nonetheless not confined to Western philosophy. India too has progressed to a point where there is a fundamental split in understanding regarding dynamics and statics. We find that though the Zero was known in India its truth is now largely ignored in its relation to spiritual evolution. Thus in many ways time and motion, though retained as pillars of worship throughout the country in the form of the Mother, or Nataraja, or Agni, and so forth, are finally set aside in favour of the static realisation beyond this world of time and space and hence movement.

On the other hand, the ancient Vedic Seers lived in quite a different consciousness, as revealed by their hymns in the Rig Veda, India’s most ancient scripture and considered to be the womb of all her subsequent spirituality. This may be true, but it is important to understand that all of Indian spiritual achievement since that time — perhaps 6,000 to 8,000 years ago — has been moving away from the truth of the Vedas, for the purpose of rediscovery and the possibility thereby of uncovering the same truth while embracing a much larger sphere. This also meant that the high truth of the Veda was destined not to remain the sole possession of India but was to permeate the entire Earth. Or better said, the whole Earth was destined to evolve in consciousness toward the one Truth. By this it is not meant that all men must believe the same thing, but rather that the entire civilisation of Earth, as a collective body, is now being revealed as the vehicle for manifesting the one though many-faceted truth, which is the goal of evolution. Thus to deny evolution is to deny the purpose of humanity’s existence; and the logical outcome is a world that seeks to destroy itself.

Though science has proven the truth of evolution, we find that fundamentally it too negates life; and the result is that science has been the vehicle for the development of tools capable now of colossal mass annihilation. Thus both science and spirituality have developed pari passu. Both ignore the purpose of evolution, and without this understanding the final result is a collective death wish. Religion claims that the world is static and man is the ultimate creation of God. Science claims the world is dynamic and evolution is the truth of the human race and all biological species. But science does not perceive Consciousness as the seed or source of these dynamics. Thus the progression of the world and the dizzying movement of our universe and our own bodies is simply a dumb and unconscious process. It sees this process but knows not why.

We have discussed this matter extensively in Volumes 1 & 2 of The New Way. Indeed it can be considered the central theme of the book. For ultimately if we have seen the truth in the realisation of a divine life on Earth, it stands that the mechanics of evolution must be fully appreciated. And in this matter movement is then to be fully accepted and not rejected. Unfortunately, over the centuries the principle of dynamics has been relegated to an inferior status in spirituality, which has itself been a victim of the same divisive action of Mind as science. It is perhaps well to stress once again at this point that the Earth carries evolution forward as one unified movement, in which science, technology, philosophy, politics, spirituality, and so on, all journey together as parts forming one whole. Therefore their progress is invariably linked and the perceptive eye can see a concurrent development’. This is readily perceived in what are considered the two opposing poles of human expression, matter and spirit. But oneness is also the field of their apparently diverse play, and if science extols dynamics while at the same time denying purpose and consciousness and hence prepares to annihilate the world, spirituality does the same by upholding a static realisation as the highest goal of earthly spiritual achievement.

Thinkers throughout the world are appreciating nonetheless that an important juncture has been reached: Science of the West has reached an understanding of matter which closely resembles Eastern thought. One such thinker who comes to mind is Fritjof Capra, author of The Tao of Physics. His exposition of the similarity between present-day science and Eastern wisdom, as well as those of several others working on the same subject, is very intelligently presented. But the important point to stress is that these comparative studies are all based on an incomplete vision. Eastern spirituality is treated as a static reality and as having reached a culmination. For example, most thinkers accept all the ways of Indian spirituality as representations of the heights human consciousness can attain. Enlightenment or illumination for them is an eternal and unchanging poise. What is realised is one truth and this one truth is the truth of all sages of all times, though the form it takes can vary as in the Indian ways where, it is believed, the same reality is experienced through diverse forms.

This picture, however, is far from true. Spirituality is a progressive movement the same as biological evolution. There is a progressive unfolding. The experience is not static and indeed it has developed hand in hand with science, revealing constantly new and fuller aspects of the Divine Consciousness. And like science of the classical age, we have paths of the spirit which are incomplete and a denial of dynamic creation. Or if this is accepted it is merely to propel us out of this material universe and into a static void.

This discussion could be a lengthy one and is not entirely the purpose of this study. It is touched upon here in order to stress the concurrent movement of science and spirituality in that both are in a state of progress and evolution. Spirituality of today is as incomplete as science. It too cannot answer the fundamental questions that plague human consciousness. These are, namely, Is our world real and if so, is it equal or inferior to the absolute and supreme Truth? Is this material creation merely a hell to be lived in for the purpose of expiation in order to reach a higher goal beyond it, or is that goal of this creation itself? These are some of the burning questions that spirituality, as we know it today, cannot answer – because for the spiritualist too the faculty of perception in these matters must widen, just as for the scientist the instrument of measurement must change if the fundamental answers he seeks are to be revealed.

Both science and spirituality of our times — and by this is meant the whole period of our recorded history — are subject to the same insufficiency imposed by the limitations of the human observing instrument; spirituality and mysticism no less than science. It is a limitation proper to the entire human race, imposed by the nature of the instrument and its level of development. But the grand achievement of our age is the manifestation of precisely the faculty in human consciousness which alone can allow both scientist and yogi the joy of a new and truer perception. This is Supermind, the faculty above mind, which is the new Eye and which brings thereby the experience of the true and divine Measure.

The question of motion and its relation to the Supreme Reality arises with great force in this new age because our present Aquarian Age falls within the 9th Manifestation — the whole of which is characterised by the ninth zodiacal sign, Sagittarius. Some of the main features of this sign are speed, motion, displacement of mass and the energy generated thereby, the capacity to break through barriers and limits, to establish new boundaries and to escape the pull of inertia. It is not sufficient to understand the cosmic influences of our age if we look solely to Aquarius as the indicator.[1] But with this fuller understanding we can better appreciate the enormous effect that travel, speed, movement have had on our present-day consciousness. Speed has not only revolutionised our mode of travel, but it has also completely altered the state of relations between nations and individuals by the discovery of new methods of communication, and storage and transmission of data. It is no longer sufficient to communicate at a distance; the demands of the day are that this communication become faster and faster. The world we know is being accelerated to an unimaginable pace, as if time were somehow running out and we must pack the experience of centuries into decades. Thus speed and motion are the major aspects of the Time-Spirit we are experiencing in this Sagittarian 9th Manifestation, covering 6,840 years from 234 BCE.

Science has revealed fascinating aspects of these major 9th Manifestation influences in its discoveries concerning the behaviour of atomic particles. These discoveries are particularly interesting in view of the revelations concerning the Solar and Lunar Lines in Volumes 1 & 2 of The New Way. Observations made by today’s nuclear physicists throw light on aspects of our own study and its newness within the field of the so-called spiritual experience. The ‘patterns’ a particle traces when under observation reveal a similarity to the patterns in Time that are traced by these Lines. Fritjof Capra describes the state of nuclear science in the following words, and in so doing it seems as if he were also describing the nature of the Solar and Lunar Lines in Time of our study: ‘The sub-atomic world appears as a web of relations between the various parts of a unified whole.’[2]

Indeed our method of working with Time follows this same process. A web is constructed consisting of points in Time and the lines drawn between these elements that are unified parts of one whole. If we subtract any piece from the web the construction ceases to be in its completeness and loses its full sense and purpose. But it is fascinating to note that only when all the elements are discovered is it possible to visualise this holistic microcosm whose primary structural component is Time. That is, Time is the binding force of this miniature cosmos we have built in The New Way, and inherent in Time is motion. The energy generated in movement, the result of Time’s energy, is the force that holds this cosmic structure together and grants it permanency and stability and creative ceaselessness.

The ‘unified whole’ we are dealing with in our study is equivalent to the atom, or the cell. The tri-part structure is the foundation, and the interrelation of its parts generates a fourth principle, which, in our microcosm, is Agni, the potent energy released by speed.

There are characteristics of particle behaviour which merit attention in view of their connection with our study. Two principles of nature stand out foremost in these observations, contraction and expansion. It is stated that a particle when confined reacts to its confinement by accelerating its speed: the greater the pressure or the contraction, the faster the speed. It is this terrific speed that presents us with a solid object, inasmuch as the electron, bound to the nucleus by electric forces, moves at tremendous speed because of this contraction and thus creates solidity in the atom. As we know, the solid objects we see and feel are, in reality, the outcome of atoms whose constituent parts are engaged in a movement of unimaginable velocity. Therefore on the basis of this discovery of science, some thinkers of today consider that Eastern spiritualists have been correct in stating that the world is an illusion inasmuch as what we see is not what it appears to be. Solid bodies are merely whirling masses of energy, in appearance solid but in truth nothing but vast empty spaces populated by infinitesimal particles of energy whose rapid motions give us the impression of solidity.

The crux of the confusion and controversy regarding the illusory nature of our material universe can finally be confined to movement. Our material creation is characterised by motion which grants solidity — and solidity is the main feature of matter and distinguishes it from the subtle planes of existence; yet this solidity is in appearance only, a mask of that which is essentially impermanent due to ceaseless change. Thus at the core of the enquiry stands the truth of that which moves with respect to the static dimension. Concurrent with the truth or the falsehood of dynamics is therefore the truth or falsehood of Time.

Measurement seems to be the primary obstacle in the process of true discovery, both in the scientific and spiritual realm. Nuclear physics has understood that the observer and hence the method of measuring a phenomenon are interrelated and can no longer be considered separately. The disturbing features in sub-atomic behaviour are, in fact, largely due to the inadequacies of measuring or observing techniques. When a nucleus is bombarded by particles it splits and does not form divisions of itself into pieces as one would expect, but rather becomes more of its integral self. This occurs because of the energy generated in the process of bombardment which is incorporated by the particle in the formation of other identical particles. Thus movement generates energy for the purpose of creation. But the observer cannot really measure the process without disturbing the state of the object under observation. To measure he must use techniques which alter the state of particles. In view of this it is obvious that a new system of measuring must evolve if science is to surmount its present impasse regarding the study of sub-atomic physics and cross the threshold where answers to these problems may be found and the truth of its findings cease to appear paradoxical.

In spirituality, on the other hand, we encounter the same impasse: Reality is paradoxical and cannot be expressed in our current language because words deform the experience or are not capable of conveying the true nature of the Absolute without paradoxes. Yet like the scientist the yogi who expresses his experience in such a paradoxical way is simply revealing that he too is in need of a different instrument. His method of measuring is as inadequate as the scientist’s. Indeed, it is in many cases even more inadequate because the yogi or the mystic most often rejects the question of Measure entirely. For him that which is measurable is unreal. Therefore the very question of measuring is, in a sense, a blasphemy.

We have this expressed in the following words of J. Krishnamurti: ‘Truth cannot be exact. What can be measured is not truth.’[3] The extent of the predicament in which today’s spiritual leaders find themselves is clearly expressed in these words, and they reveal the imperative need for the manifestation of a new faculty in the human consciousness which will render such perceptions obsolete.

Supermind is the faculty that is now radically changing the human being’s capacity to observe and measure. What before in both science and spirituality could only be expressed in terms of paradoxes and irreconcilables, can now be perceived in a vastly truer light. Mind indeed deforms the experience when it is used as the highest instrument of perception. And in both approaches Mind has been the tool, with its resultant language, insufficient and inadequate to express the higher reality in anything better than paradoxes. With the advent of Supermind this limitation is no longer felt; and with it comes the perception of the true nature of creation, — in particular with respect to that which moves and hence to time and matter.

Motion is the central truth of our universe, of matter. Can we resolve our difficulties in understanding this pivotal feature of creation by simply labelling it unreal, or inferior, or illusory and fleeing from the truth by positing our realisation outside this material creation; or, as science does, by advocating through the discovery, manufacture and deployment of devastating weapons the ultimate destruction of this dynamic thing that we cannot understand?

We may again refer to Capra’s text for a clear presentation of the inadequacies afflicting the human consciousness in regard to the true nature of creation and its connection to dynamics, to movement, and hence to Time. ‘The Eastern spiritual traditions show their followers various ways of going beyond the ordinary experience of time and of freeing themselves from the chain of cause and effect — from the bondage of karma, as the Hindus and Buddhists say. It has therefore been said that Eastern mysticism is a liberation from time. In a way, the same may be said of relativistic physics.’[4]

This statement makes evident the relation between these Eastern ways and Christian dogma. Is there any essential difference between them in terms of their ultimate goals? The Christian idea of an original sin is hence the same as the Buddhist and Mayavadist and to some extent the Adwaitan injunctions that all things in this universal manifestation are in a state of flux and are therefore impermanent. To seek to cling to the impermanent is hence to suffer endlessly and to be caught in the wheel of birth and death. Enlightenment is attained when one liberates oneself from this wheel or perpetual movement. And if these teachings exhort one to ‘join the flow’ and find a harmony therein, as does Buddhism in particular, it is ultimately merely for the purpose of finding the way out of this great dynamic process and into the changeless, the dimensionless, the void. Thus for the Buddhist, birth into this wheel is a fall, just as birth on Earth for the Christian is a fall; and the entire race is burdened with the original sin of Adam and Eve, by their ‘fall’ from paradise into this material creation.

Christians exhort their followers to seek the attainment of heaven after death; they confine the experience to one lifetime. The Buddhist and others may extend this expiating process through several or even thousands of lifetimes, but this is immaterial to the fact of the similar goal each way seeks; and however we look at the matter we find that all paths existing today strive, in one form or another, to find release from birth on Earth and to attain an experience which will liberate them from that which moves.

The limitation of both science and spirituality is thus their understanding of the question of time and timelessness. The latter in particular has been subject to misunderstanding, primarily in the spiritual realm. Science is confronted with the problem in its study of sub-atomic particles when it cannot measure time in its usual forward flow. It appears to be directionless and lacking the continuity of before, now, and after. Studying the trajectory of a particle on the basis of the quantum field theory thus throws the observer into a dimension requiring a total perception, in a sense, where the sequence of the movement is obliterated, and one must view the process without the usual flow of time we are accustomed to in our daily living.

When the forward direction is eliminated we are faced with the problem of causation and effect, as Capra points out. And he states, ‘…in transcending time they (the Eastern mystics) also transcend the world of cause and effect.’[5] This question of karma will be dealt with in the following pages because it is directly connected to Time, and if our appreciation and experience of Time are being altered and a much truer understanding of its place and purpose within the Supreme Reality is to come, we must similarly come to a newer and wider understanding of the mechanics of karma.

The above material has been excerpted from Chapter 2 [of] The New Way, Volume 3, pp. 8-17.

[1] See: The Gnostic Circle, Aeon Books, 1975, Chapter 7.

[2] The Tao of Physics, Shambhala, 1975, p. 159.

[3] J. Krishnamurthy, Krishnamurthy’s Notebooks, New York, Harper & Row, 1976, p. 24.

[4] Fritjof Capra, The Tao of Physics, Shambala, 1975, p. 187.

[5] Ibid.p. 186.

It had always seemed to me that science, unlike spirituality, accepts the validity and relevance of certain cosmic properties such as time and space, which constitute our experience of material creation – indeed, which are fundamental to the emergence of a creation in matter. Spirituality, I had come to discover early on, denied any valid purpose and place to these aspects of creation. In fact, almost all spiritual paths can be summed up as methods devised to carry seekers ‘out of time’ (and space). However, recently I have had the pleasure of becoming acquainted with the pioneering work of the noted physical chemist, Ilya Prigogine, which has radically altered the idea I had of science. Prigogine, I came to discover – with a certain satisfaction – is as obsessed with time as I am; and moreover, he has the same complaint about science as I have regarding spirituality: its denial of time and the contradiction this introduces in its search for truth.

Let me quote certain passages from Prigogine’s interview with OMNI (May, 1983). The interviewer questions him about his methods of discovery and his early experiences as a scientist who was decidedly a ‘nonconformist’. What I shall quote will certainly convince the reader that in the world of science, Prigogine has faced the same resistance that my work faces in the world of spirituality, where my occupation with time is often labelled ‘unspiritual’ or ‘mental’.

Can you recall a particular moment when you had a flash of insight into a specific problem you were working on?

Well, I always remember with pleasure my first work on non-equilibrium thermodynamics, in 1946, when I realised that non-equilibrium might be a source of organisation and order. I was very, very happy to have this idea, which has never left me. Perhaps in science, at some point, there is a close relationship between who you are and what you try to do. Science is a much less objective enterprise than often assumed. It’s true you need some tools. You need to write down your findings and convince yourself and others. But the driving force for new ideas has to be a deep personal involvement in the problems you’re working on.

Are you an intuitive person?

Oh yes. For me mathematics is only a tool to write down my ideas so that in the long run they can be communicated. I say ‘in the long run’ because in my history all of the ideas I have proposed have been poorly accepted.

What was the scientific climate like when you first began to study time?

Well, quite naturally I was interested in the reaction of well-known scientists to this line of research. Their reaction was uniformly negative. It was in 1946 or 1947 when one of the most famous scientists attending the lecture I gave stood up and asked, ‘Why is this young man devoting his interest to irreversible causes? Irreversible causes are just illusory. Time is just a parameter, so forget about it.’ I was so stunned by this reaction that I was unable to get up and respond. But I happen to be very stubborn; so I continued. Today the situation has changed quite a bit. Time has become an essential factor in elementary particles as well as cosmology.

You were a nonconformist, a dissident. How did you muster up the conviction to go against the prevailing ideology?

I would say, again, this probably corresponds to a deep psychological element that isn’t easy to make explicit. The attitude of Einstein toward science, for example, was to go beyond the reality of the moment. He wanted to transcend time. But this was the classical view. Time was an imperfection and science a way to get beyond this imperfection to eternity. Einstein wanted to travel away from the turmoil, from the wars. He wanted to find some kind of safe harbour in eternity. For him science was an introduction to a timeless reality behind the illusion of becoming.

My own attitude is very different because, to some extent, I want to feel the evolution of things. I don’t believe in transcending, but in being embedded in a reality that is temporal.

There is no need to go into further details of the work of this notable scientist. If desired, the reader can pursue the study via his latest book, in the English translation entitled, Order out of Chaos (Bantam Books, 1984). I must point out, however, that in the above statements, Prigogine could be describing the attitude of traditional yogis or seekers on the spiritual path, and the ultimate goal they desire to attain. It is clear that, as Prigogine points out, even a scientist is necessarily influenced in his discoveries by the fibre of his own consciousness-being. Einstein, as probably all other scientists, was seeking a means to ‘go beyond’, to escape the cosmic and earthly dimensions, so painful and apparently irredeemable; just as the practitioners of yoga do, the seekers after nirvana and samadhi. In the world of science it would appear, time and all that it engenders is an illusion. In the Commentaries on The Magical Carousel (Chapter X), I have discussed in depth this position, in particular concerning the theories of Einstein.

It is evident that the life and work of a scientist like Prigogine conspires to demonstrate that the crux of the human dilemma, lodged at the root of all the known spiritual enquiries and systems, was, in its later stages, transported into the heart of the scientific enquiry. This fact, somewhat of a revelation for me, demonstrates in a most emphatic manner that the real and only answer to this problem lies indeed in a synthesis that carries us beyond both science and spirituality.

In my article, ‘The Supramental Synthesis’, I referred to the Mother’s perceptions in this regard, which determined the beginning of certain insights into the new cosmology. Without referring to the details constituting each enquiry – the scientific and the spiritual – she made it clear that ‘something else’ was needed, that pursuing either way or method to its ultimate reaches would not suffice. Indeed, it is this aspect of the Supramental Manifestation that presents the imperative necessity to evolve a new language in order to distinguish it from traditional yogas and spiritual paths, a language that describes more faithfully the new experiences of the reality of our material world and the true foundations of this new consciousness that is being established on Earth, in and of time.

Yet, as the references to Prigogine’s work reveal, this action is certainly not restricted to any one sector of society or country, or any particular discipline in the quest for truth; or to any elite which, by virtue of its dedication to a realisation of God as opposed to Mammon, entitles it to some privileged status. Rather, the Supreme Consciousness is working through inspiringly diversified channels. These may be few at present – all too few we are sometimes brought to lament – but nonetheless there are clear signs that an acceleration is in progress, and the Power is carrying us rapidly to new stages in the establishment of the supramental creation.

Prigogine’s comments expose a truly critical problem – inherent in both science and spirituality, and by consequence at the very root of the human malaise. This is the question of decay, degeneration, and ultimately death that all things born in time are subject to; the only secure fact of our human embodiment, it would seem, is the factor of an irrevocable march of time leading to inevitable death. From the moment of birth we progress toward our demise. The situation is so distressing and has reached such a desperate threshold that the utter purposelessness of such an existence – conditioned so thoroughly by the irreversibility of death – is likely to result in a global, collective suicide. The factor that stands behind and upholds the irrepressible arms race, for example, is this despair over a march of time that we cannot control, that moves us irrevocably toward a death we fear and can in no way avoid. This appears to be the sole purpose of birth.

Sri Aurobindo’s message to the world is the advent of a new way, an entirely new path for humanity. This path leads to a state of immortality. Thus the direction he provides is, quite logically, entirely different from all previous paths that sought in their entirety an escape from birth as well as death, an obliteration of the conscious Seeing Eye and a dissolution (nirvana) into the comforting transcendence of Nothingness. Though some fill this nothingness with fantasies of a blissful paradise, it is still distinctly ‘otherworldly’. But Sri Aurobindo takes us precisely into the core of this world of matter, and hence into the innermost recesses of time and not out of it. As Prigogine might explain it, ‘to be embedded in a reality that is temporal’.

Why is this so? Simply because if we speak of a transformation of matter as central to Sri Aurobindo’s revelation, then time is the indispensable ally in the task. His yoga rests in the secure womb of time, which in turn is the creative driving force behind evolution. Indeed, the last chapter of his The Synthesis of Yoga is aptly entitled ‘Towards the Supramental Time Vision’, which was to open the way to a formulation of his own yoga but which, as he stated, he had not had the time to present. He left us only with this hint that ‘a new vision of time’ would be a key.

Prigogine has described for us the reluctance of the scientific community to accept the place of irreversibility (the ‘arrow of time’, past-present-future) in its postulations. In the same light I shall now quote from a most interesting new publication on this very subject, consisting of dialogues between J. Krishnamurti and the physicist David Bohm. The book is very appropriately entitled The Ending of Time (Harper & Row, 1985). Of all the books I have read on this theme, certainly this particular collection of conversations offers the most dramatic revelation of the conundrum the world knows, engendered by the unwillingness of both the yogi and the scientist to face squarely the question of Time and find the true answer. What we have been witnessing throughout the ages is a shrinking from the problem and a maddening attempt to obliterate the individualised consciousness in order to step out of time and the entire universal creation – as if this were indeed possible – and thus escape the pain, the frustration, the exasperation that the certainty of death imposes and all the difficulties engendered by this ‘corruptible flesh’.

The problem lies in the fact that in so doing no attempt has been effectively made to understand what is the real purpose of birth on this Earth, in this cosmos. For surely the Supreme Consciousness that clearly upholds and controls the course of our lives and evolution, is not some impish, devilish, capricious God, who plays games with a hapless humanity to please and appease some insatiable sadistic hunger. Yet the way to learn what that true purpose is lies in a quest into time, rather than away from and beyond it, insofar as it is time alone that can reveal the sense of the evolutionary process.

What that sense is, Sri Aurobindo has indicated. Likewise, in my work with time via the practice of the integral and supramental yogas, I have been able to confirm those same discoveries. The present level of human evolution is a transitory passage to a higher poise. And rather than being a passage to death and total annihilation, our present Age is the glorious gateway to a splendid new future.

But it is time that offers this encouraging vision and carries us to this newness. Yet all the spiritual leaders insist that we go ‘beyond time’ in order to know God and attain liberation. Some do this openly, as we shall soon learn from the dialogue I will present between Krishnamurti and Bohm; others do it more covertly; and many without even realising that this is their aim. From The Ending of Time, the reader can assess how difficult a transition this is, and how utterly confused both the spiritualist and the scientist are at this point:

J. Krishnamurti:  We have extended our capacities outwardly, and inwardly it is the same movement as outwardly. Now if there is no inward movement as time, moving, becoming more and more, then what takes place? Time ends? You see, the outer movement is the same as the inner movement.

David Bohm:  Yes, It is going around and around.

JK:  Involving time. If the movement ceases then what takes place?… Now if that movement ends, as it must, then is there really inward movement – a movement not in terms of time?… You see, that word movement means time. (Pages 15-16)

Krishnamurti discloses here the correlation, quite logical, between time and movement. According to him, both must cease. In the course of his conversation with Bohm, he defines creation in matter, in particular in our physical bodies with all the elements they provide for experiencing life in the cosmos and on Earth, as being something of which we must rid ourselves. He makes this clear by distinguishing the mind as a property we must disconnect from the brain – the latter, the physical instrument provided for the purpose of enacting the commands of the mind on the physical plane (see Vishaal 0/2), is hence thoroughly ‘in the mire’ as it were.

JK: My brain – but not mind – has evolved. Evolution implies time, and it can only think, live in time. Now for the brain to deny time is a tremendous activity, for any problem that arises, any question is immediately solved.

…Now how are you going to open the door, how are you going to help another to say, ‘Look, we have been going in the wrong direction, there is really only non-movement; and if movement stops, everything will be correct’?

…That is, mankind has taken a wrong turn, psychologically, not physically? Can that turn be completely reversed? Or stopped? My brain is so accustomed to the evolutionary idea that I will become something, I will gain something, that I must have more knowledge and so on; can that brain suddenly realise that there is no such thing as time? (Page 18)

The next part of the dialogue specifically locates the conflict, which, according to Krishnamurti, lies between a brain that has evolved in time, and a mind that is supposedly free of time. Krishnamurti sees this as the root of the problem. However, as far as I can perceive, the conflict is not in a temporal/atemporal dichotomy, but rather in the fact that Krishnamurti is an embodied consciousness like all of us, inhabiting a physical body which is his instrument of perception and his means of participating in this evolutionary and spiritual adventure – and yet, this instrumentation is being wholly denied. To me, the problem is a perception that places us at odds with not only the bodies we inhabit but with our total habitat – the Earth and cosmic dimension. For time, movement, are the underlying truths of our world. What Krishnamurti is describing in this dialogue is the very problem I have been revealing as the root of the species’ extreme distress: the quest that is intended to carry us beyond this dimension we are born into, as the only means of escaping from a pain that we cannot understand in its true perspective and hence overcome within the legitimate boundaries provided us as an evolving species on this particular planet, Earth. And contrary to what Krishnamurti suggests, this is the attitude that is the ‘wrong turn’ humanity took; yet that very ‘wrong turn’ is precisely the remedy he is offering. That is, his solution of seeking to stop time and movement IS THE WRONG TURN, and it was taken many millennia ago, and is the focus of every spiritual discipline and religion the world knows.

The answer lies here. In time. Not out of it. Indeed, embedded deep in the core of time, as I am sure Prigogine would agree.

DB: But I think you are implying that the mind is not originating in the brain. Is that so? The brain is perhaps an instrument of the mind?

JK: And the mind is not time. Just see what that means.

DB: The mind does not evolve with the brain.

JK: The mind not being of time, and the brain being of time – is that the origin of the conflict?

DB: Well, we have to see why that produces conflict. It is not clear to say that the brain is of time, but rather that it has developed in such a way that time is in it.

JK: Yes, that is what I mean.

DB: But not necessarily so.

JK: It has evolved.

DB: It has evolved so it has time within it.

JK: Yes, it has evolved, time is a part of it…Can the brain itself see that it is caught in time, and that as long as it is moving in that direction, conflict is eternal, endless? You follow what I am saying?… Has the brain the capacity to see in what it is doing now – being caught in time – that in the process there is no end to conflict? That means, is there a part of the brain which is not of time? (Pages 19-20)

The problem becomes acute when the exchange between these two eminent men produces these memorable lines:

DB: You see, to go further, I think one has to deny the very notion of time in the sense of looking forward to the future, and deny all the past.

JK: That’s just it.

DB: That is, the whole of time.

JK: Time is the enemy. Meet it, and go beyond it. (Pages 21-22)

This represents the classic postulation of the theory of Illusionism, be this in the realm of spirituality or science. There is something fundamentally, radically, pathetically wrong in a quest that places us in the necessity of denial of our experience of life, in a body, in material creation. Conditioned by this particular vision, the only possible and logical conclusion is that existence on this planet is simply without any rational purpose. The exchange between Krishnamurti and the physicist Bohm, reaches such extremes that toward the end Krishnamurti has Bohm ‘agreeing’ that the universe is not of time:

JK: I am asking you as a scientist, is this universe based on time?

DB: I would say no, but you see the general way…

JK: That is all I want. You say no! And can the brain, which has evolved in time…?

DB: Well, has it evolved in time? Rather, it has become entangled in time. Because the brain is part of the universe, which we say is not based on time.

JK: I agree.

DB: Thought has entangled the brain in time.

JK: All right. Can that entanglement be unravelled, freed, so that the universe is the mind? You follow? If the universe is not of time, can the mind, which has been entangled in time, unravel itself and so be the universe? (Page 220) 

It is certainly difficult to understand how David Bohm, a physicist, can reconcile his lifetime involvement of the study of physical laws, for which measure is essential and temporal studies are paramount, with this perception: the universe is not of time. Furthermore, these dialogues reveal a rather incomplete understanding of just what the universe is; for it is not only the dense material substance that we can know by the external senses, but consists of other subtler dimensions that are all contained in this ‘universe’. Mind and the planes which it rules are just as much ‘of this universe’ as the physical brain. And hence mind is also ‘of time’. While we are on this planet, the brain and mind must work together in order to provide us with an instrument that harmonises our consciousness-being with the laws of time and evolution consonant with Earth’s position in the solar system, a penetrating study of which reveals the purpose of this evolving species that has been so meticulously equipped with the proper instruments to allow for this conscient experience of oneness with our total habitat, in a continuous evolution toward higher embodied states of being.

I believe that these extracts from The Ending of Time have demonstrated more clearly than any material appearing so far in the spiritual or scientific world that the root of humankind’s dilemma is this misguided quest, which over the millennia has sought to carry the human being in the direction beyond the lawful condition of his embodiment. Above all, it is the pernicious misinterpretation that the origin out of which material creation has emerged is a void of nothingness, and that this void, this nothingness is the ultimate attainment in one’s quest, which has done the most damage. This situation is poignantly conveyed in Krishnamurti’s own words:

‘…to be free of becoming? That is the root of it. To end becoming…. Of course, there is only complete security in nothingness!’   (Page 257)

To put it succinctly, this is nothing other than the denial of the Mother, of materia, of the fullness of that womb of creation, and that Vedic Divine Measure that the Mother laboured so intensely to unveil on Earth as the planet’s deepest secret and reason for being. David Bohm has recently presented his new theory of physics, the ‘implicate order’. In our terms, enfolding would be involution; and unfolding, evolution. But surely one has the right to question his position as a scientist, since all this ‘order’ implies the active participation of movement and time. It would appear then that we are here faced with a paradoxical split: on the one hand there are his statements in this dialogue with Krishnamurti to the effect that ‘the universe is not of time’, implying that time only exists as a distortion of the brain in one’s psychological experience, and not elsewhere in the universe or otherwise; on the other hand, he presents a new theory of physics, an implicate order which demands the intrinsic instrumentation of time. This would appear to reflect the same dichotomy, and in some cases down-right schizophrenia, that characterises the acute malaise of our times, discernible in practically every sphere of our collective and individual lives. Above all, with such a philosophy as one’s background, it is understandable that scientists are assiduously working to present us with greater and better means of total destruction. Why not? Insofar as it is all nothing but illusion in any case?

In concluding, this dialogue calls to mind the experiments carried out at the New Jersey Neuropsychiatric Institute (1983), in which hypnosis was used to erase a person’s time-sense. A group of college students were given suggestions while under hypnosis that upon awaking they would have no past or future, or sometimes no time at all. The effect on these patients was most disturbing; some turned catatonic, others behaved like schizophrenics. The conclusion was that life must have a direction provided by its ‘arrow of time’ in order for it to be worth living; and that people who are given a present but without the past and future, become preoccupied with death and behave schizophrenically.

I feel that if one were to pursue the path laid down in The Ending of Time, the results would be similar if not identical to these experiments. While it is simply an intellectual exercise and remains on the level of philosophical banter, no serious harm is done. Nonetheless, when spiritual authorities encourage people to embark upon a quest of this nature – and Krishnamurti’s credentials in this regard are certainly some of the best – then the matter requires serious deliberation. It can be emphatically stated that these old ways, these obsolete perceptions that have been pursuing us like draining phantoms throughout the ages, can in no way bring us into harmony with life, as a civilisation, and above all, solve the distressing impasse in which the human race presently lives.

This is the Age of Supermind. Sri Aurobindo has often described the Supermind as the only reconciler of paradoxes. Are not Prigogine and Stengers in their book, Order Out of Chaos, anticipating the same advent when they write:

‘We are now entering a new era in the history of time, an era in which both being and becoming can be incorporated into a single non-contradictory vision.’

The answer lies, as the Mother has suggested, in a third poise. Beyond both science and spirituality.

P.N.-B.

December, 1985

The Friend

‘Quiet’ comes a voice from the depths
Where Thou art.
Abandonment commands the being
To be silent.
Intimate joy flows in Winds
From within
As we wait in calm assurance
Of the ultimate Power.

Here, here where all was once
God’s hell;
Here where suffering wounded
And scarred,
The ageless Mystery’s secret
Effortlessly unveils
Time the relentless enemy
As Time our heartfelt Friend.

Aryaman
19.12.1985