Sri Aurobindo’s twelve and the Mother’s six

Re: 18: The Wonderful Boon by RY Deshpande

on Sun 22 Apr 2007 06:28 AM PDT Profile Permanent Link

With this instalment we complete Part One of Savitri. It is interesting that this should be the eighteenth article in the series covering the spiritual biography of Savitri. In Vyasa’s narrative of Savitri, as we have in the Mahabharata, Aswapati does yajna-tapasya for eighteen years at the end of which the Goddess Savitri appears from the Fire-Altar and gives him a boon, of a radiant daughter, kanyā téjasvinī, as sanctioned by the Creator-Father Brahma himself.

There are eighteen parts of the monumental Mahabharata itself, with hundreds of cantos and some two hundred-thousand shlokas in it. There are eighteen chapters of the Gita. Coincidentally, there are eighteen steps in Savitri Bhavan’s building that has come up in the first phase of its construction. We may also say with some justification that, Aswapati’s yoga-tapasya in Sri Aurobindo’s Savitri has eighteen cantos covering the individual, the universal and the transcendental attainments, leading finally to the boon from the Divine Mother. Eighteen is supposed to be a wholesome number in several respects, particularly when we see that it is made up of Sri Aurobindo’s twelve and the Mother’s six. RYD