As one drowned in a sea of splendour and bliss,
Mute in the maze of these surprising worlds,
Turning she saw their living knot and source,
Key to their charm and fount of their delight,
And knew him for the same who snares our lives
Captured in his terrifying pitiless net,
And makes the universe his prison camp
And makes in his immense and vacant vasts
The labour of the stars a circuit vain
And death the end of every human road
And grief and pain the wages of man’s toil.

Savitri, as if swallowed up in ‘a sea of splendour and bliss’, engulfed in beauty and intense delight, is silent, ‘Mute’ in this ‘maze’, lost in this labyrinth of ‘surprising worlds’. When she turns around she realises something very surprising: she discovers that the Being who is the centre and source of these wonderful worlds, the ‘Key to their charm’ and the ‘fount’, the origin from which all their delight flows, is in fact the same Being she has been facing ever since Satyavan’s death: he is the one who ensnares our lives, capturing them ‘in his terrifying pitiless net’ of death; the same one who ‘makes the universe his prison camp’. He is the one who makes all the ‘labour of the stars’ forever whirling through the ‘immense and vacant vasts’of his universe seem like ‘a circuit vain’: a meaningless circling round and round. He is the one who makes ‘death the end of every human road’ and ‘grief and pain’ the payment that human beings receive in return for all their efforts.

[Shraddhavan’s English of Savitri, Book 11]

Transfigured was the formidable shape.
His darkness and his sad destroying might
Abolishing for ever and disclosing
The mystery of his high and violent deeds,
A secret splendour rose revealed to sight
Where once the vast embodied Void had stood.
Night the dim mask had grown a wonderful face.

That ‘formidable shape’, the powerful dark presence which challenged all Savitri’s courage and will-power, endurance and wisdom, has become ‘Transfigured’ – completely changed. All that ‘darkness’, all that sadness, all that negativity, all that ‘destroying’ power has been abolished ‘for ever’ and instead he is ‘disclosing’ or revealing ‘The mystery of his high’, noble ‘and violent deeds’, all that he does. ‘A secret splendour’ which has been hidden now showed itself as it ‘rose revealed to sight’ in the space where that ‘vast embodied’ emptiness, that ‘Void’, had stood. And ‘Night’, that ‘dim’ dark ‘mask’, has changed and is showing instead ‘a wonderful face’.

[Shraddhavan’s English of Savitri, Book 11]

The vague infinity was slain whose gloo
Had outlined from the terrible unknown
The obscure disastrous figure of a god,
Fled was the error that arms the hands of grief,
And lighted the ignorant gulf whose hollow deeps
Had given to nothingness a dreadful voice.

The ‘vague’ or formless and indefinable ‘infinity’ ‘whose gloom’, whose darkness, ‘Had outlined’ or defined before Savitri ‘the figure of a god’ out of some ‘terrible unknown’: the figure of Death, which was ‘obscure’ – shadowy, difficult to see and understand – and yet at the same time ‘disastrous’, terrible and threatening, is now ‘slain’, destroyed, gone for ever. Simultaneously something else has disappeared: ‘the error’, the mistaken way of perceiving or understanding ‘that arms the hands of grief’: giving ‘grief’ its power. That ‘error’ had lighted up the ‘ignorant gulf’, the huge empty spaces, the‘Hollow deeps’ of the ‘terrible unknown’ which had outlined the terrible form of Death and ‘given to nothingness a dreadful voice.’ She sees that the dark and terrifying figure she had faced in the form of Death and seen as the source of all earthly suffering, grief and pain and terror, was in fact an illusory appearance.

[Shraddhavan’s English of Savitri, Book 11]

As when before the eye that wakes in sleep
Is opened the sombre binding of a book,
Illumined letterings are seen which kept
A golden blaze of thought inscribed within,
A marvellous form responded to her gaze
Whose sweetness justified life’s blindest pain;
All Nature’s struggle was its easy price,
The universe and its agony seemed worth while.

Here the poet suggests that it is like a dream in which we see a ‘book’ – a book which has a very dark, ‘sombre binding’. In the dream the ‘book’ opens up and we see that wonderful things are written inside, depicted in gold and brilliant colours: The ‘book’ ‘Is opened’ and ‘Illumined letterings are seen’. In the days when people made books in which everything had to be written by hand, there were scribes who wrote the text. Most of them did ordinary black writing, but there were some special artists who were asked to do ‘Illumined letterings’: beautiful big letters decorated with gold and bright colours made from precious gemstones. The poet says that in the dream, when the book is opened up the ‘Illumined letterings’ which appear reveal ‘A golden blaze of thought’. It is not only that the letters are beautiful; they are also expressing wonderful thoughts. Savitri had seen the god of Death in a dark ‘form’. Now it is as if the sombre ‘book’ of that form has been ‘opened’ and she sees that it contains all this ‘golden’ writing inside – this ‘golden blaze of thought’. Now, in the place of that dark form of Death, responding to Savitri’s ‘gaze’ is this ‘marvellous form’ ‘Whose sweetness’ is so great that it justifies the ‘blindest pain’ of life that we can possibly experience. She feels that all the ‘struggle’ and suffering of Nature is an ‘easy price’ to pay for the privilege of glimpsing this ‘form’: ‘The universe and its agony seemed worth while.’ This is an experience which many mystics have recounted: when the divinity reveals itself then suddenly everything that has ever happened in the world makes sense and seems worth while. You might see your past right back to the time when you were an amoeba and all the things that have ever happened to you, and may realise, “Oh,that’s what it was all about! After all, it was all worthwhile.”

[Shraddhavan’s English of Savitri, Book 11]

Forgetting the Will-to-love that gave it birth,
The passion to lock itself in and to unite,
It would swallow all into one lonely self,
Devouring the soul that it had made its own,
By suffering and annihilation’s pain
Punishing the unwillingness to be one,
Angry with the refusals of the world,
Passionate to take but knowing not how to give.

This is the distortion that has forgotten the original ‘Will’ which has given ‘birth’ to ‘love’: ‘The passion’ ‘to unite’, to experience oneness, has been deformed into an urge to ‘swallow’ everything into itself, ‘Devouring the soul that it had made its own’. When it does not get the response which it expects, it wants to punish instead, by inflicting ‘suffering and annihilation’s pain’. It wants to wipe out, to annihilate the object of love and thus punish that ‘unwillingness to be one’. Hate comes from anger about ‘the refusals of the world’. It is ‘Passionate’, but ‘Passionate to take’; it does not know ‘how to give’.

Q: Why is he describing hate here now?

It is one of the contradictions or oppositions which get dissolved along with that ‘error’ we read about earlier. Hate is the very opposite of the love which Savitri embodies, the true divine emotion. The poet is showing us that all the contradictions we experience here simply vanished at the sight of that glorious godhead.

[Shraddhavan’s English of Savitri, Book 11]

Death’s sombre cowl was cast from Nature’s brow;
There lightened on her the godhead’s lurking laugh.

When she sees this wonderful divine being, for Savitri, it is as if the dark hood – the ‘sombre cowl’ – of death has been removed from the ‘brow’ of Nature. It is no longer there and that glorious godhead seems to be laughing at her, saying “This is what I am really like”. ‘Lurking’ means ‘hidden’ or ‘barely visible’.

[Shraddhavan’s English of Savitri, Book 11]

In him the fourfold Being bore its crown
That wears the mystery of a nameless Name,
The universe writing its tremendous sense
In the inexhaustible meaning of a word.

The poet tells us that ‘all godheads’, all divine beings, are collected in that one glorious form, and also that he embodies ‘the fourfold Being’ that ‘wears the mystery of a nameless Name’ representing the entire ‘tremendous sense’ or significance of the universe in ‘the inexhaustible meaning’ of a single word. That Being expresses itself in four essential aspects which the poet describes for us one by one in the following lines: Virat, the artist and creator of the material world; Hiranyagarbha, the dreamer of the subtle worlds out of which our material future will arise; Prajna, the Supreme Wisdom which has organised all these worlds and is their source; and Turiya, the fourth and ineffable state who ‘wears the mystery of a nameless Name’: the Unknowable and Ineffable.

[Shraddhavan’s English of Savitri, Book 11]

First Sri Aurobindo speaks of Virat:

In him the architect of the visible world,
At once the art and artist of his works,
Spirit and seer and thinker of things seen,
Virat, who lights his camp-fires in the suns
And the star-entangled ether is his hold,
Expressed himself with Matter for his speech:
Objects are his letters, forces are his words,
Events are the crowded history of his life,

Virat, ‘the architect of the visible world’ expresses himself ‘with Matter for his speech’ in this universe of appearances we live He is the ‘artist of his works’ and he also embodies ‘the art’ from which these ‘works’ flow. He is the ‘Spirit and seer and thinker’ who observes all visible objects and happenings. He ‘lights his camp-fires in the suns’. Our earth is connected with one particular sun, but there are so many ‘suns’ in the universe, and all of them are ‘his camp-fires’: each of them indicates his presence, and ‘the star-entangled ether is his hold’. As I have mentioned before, our physicists have proved to their own satisfaction that the element which the ancients named ‘ether’ and considered the finest and subtlest state of substance does not in fact exist. But long after they had come to that conclusion, Sri Aurobindo went on using the word in its ancient sense, and I believe that one day physicists will also realise that after all there is some reality like that although they may give it a different name. When we look out into outer space through the wonderful telescopes that are now available to us we see a whole mass of stars scattered throughout universal space like a tangle of wild jasmine spangling the forest undergrowth. That vast space filled with stars is the stronghold of Virat. There he expresses ‘himself with Matter for his speech’. ‘Matter’ is his language in this embodiment, and all material objects, everything that we perceive around us, make up the ‘letters’ with which his language is written. If we can learn to decipher those ‘letters’ we will be able to read his messages. Similarly, the ‘forces’ of nature ‘are his words’. Everything that happens is part of ‘the crowded history of his life’: the packed experiences of his vast existence, and the ‘sea and land are the pages for his tale’: his story is written on ‘sea and land’ and in the air. And sea and land are the pages for his tale.

[Shraddhavan’s English of Savitri, Book 11]

In him shadows his form the Golden Child
Who in the Sun-capped Vast cradles his birth:
Hiranyagarbha, author of thoughts and dreams,
Who sees the invisible and hears the sounds
That never visited a mortal ear,
Discoverer of unthought realities
Truer to Truth than all we have ever known
He is the leader on the inner roads;
A seer, he has entered the forbidden realms;
A magician with the omnipotent wand of thought,
He builds the secret uncreated worlds.

Within Virat a subtler shadow form appears: ‘Hiranyagarbha’, meaning ‘golden embryo’ or as Sri Aurobindo translates it here ‘the Golden Child’, whose birth is cradled in ‘the Sun- capped Vast’ – the vastness ruled by the supreme Sun of Truth, the subtle space which pervades and envelopes the material universe. ‘Hiranyagarbha’ is the source ‘of thoughts and dreams’, the subtle worlds. He sees what is ‘invisible’ to us and hears ‘sounds’ that our physical ears have never heard, for these are subtle ‘sounds’. He is the ‘Discoverer of unthought realities’: ‘realities’ that have never been grasped by thought and are ‘Truer to Truth than all we have ever known’. He is the one who can lead us when we travel on ‘the inner roads’. He is ‘A seer’: he has the power of subtle vision with which he can enter all ‘realms’ – not only the ones that are accessible but also the ones that are ‘forbidden’; and he can work magic. Everyone who works magic, every ‘magician’, has a ‘wand’: a rod which is the sign of his or her power. Here Sri Aurobindo tells us that the wand used by Hiranyagarbha is an all- powerful ‘wand of thought’. Using that ‘wand’ he produces his subtle creations and ‘builds the secret uncreated worlds’: realms that are not created in the sense that our material universe is created. Perhaps we could say that they are conceived rather than materialised.

[Shraddhavan’s English of Savitri, Book 11]

Armed with the golden speech, the diamond eye,
His is the vision and the prophecy:
Imagist casting the formless into shape,
Traveller and hewer of the unseen paths,
He is the carrier of the hidden fire,
He is the voice of the Ineffable,
He is the invisible hunter of the light,
The Angel of mysterious ecstasies,
The conqueror of the kingdoms of the soul.

Hiranyagarbha is a more mysterious power than Virat: so Sri Aurobindo in describing him is using more mysterious language. He says that one of the powers of Hiranyagarbha is ‘the golden speech’. Gold is the colour of supermind – the supreme creative power, the word that creates. He is also ‘Armed with … the diamond eye’: an organ of vision which is absolutely pure and clear and can pierce through all veils, giving the power of ‘prophecy’ – of seeing into subtle worlds and into the future. He is an ‘Imagist’ who can create forms out of formlessness, using thought or imagination to create shapes that can be seen only with the inner eye. He hews and opens up and travels on subtle ‘unseen paths’ on which we can follow him. To create a road through a mountain or a trackless forest you will have to ‘hew’ or cut your way through. He does that, opening up such ‘unseen paths’. He is carrying ‘the hidden fire’ – some secret energy and power. ‘He is the voice of the Ineffable’: the one who cannot be put into words or described in any way. We do not see him, but he is hunting ‘the light’, maybe catching it also. He is an ‘Angel’, a messenger, ‘of mysterious ecstasies’. He is the one who can lead us to conquer ‘the kingdoms of the soul’.

[Shraddhavan’s English of Savitri, B00k 11]

These are the first two forms of the ‘fourfold Being’. Behind them stands a third, who is their ‘hidden cause’, their secret origin:

A third spirit stood behind, their hidden cause,
A mass of superconscience closed in light,
Creator of things in his all-knowing sleep.
All from his stillness came as grows a tree;
He is our seed and core, our head and base.

This ‘third spirit’, Prajna, the Supreme Wisdom, stands behind Virat and Hiranyagarbha. He is ‘A mass of superconscience closed in light’. His very nature is ‘light’. He creates in a state of ‘all-knowing sleep’. Perhaps we can say that Virat represents the waking state while Hiranyagarbha represents the dream state and Prajna the ‘sleep’ state, deeply indrawn within, drawn back from the surface of things. In that state of deep ‘all-knowing’ trance without moving he creates everything that exists in the material universe and in all the subtle worlds: everything that exists grows out of ‘his stillness’ just as it should: as ‘a tree’ grows out of its ‘seed’. ‘He is our seed and core’: the very centre from which we ourselves have grown. He is ‘our head’ and our ‘base’. We live and move in him.

[Shraddhavan’s English of Savitri, Book 11]

All light is but a flash from his closed eyes:
An all-wise Truth is mystic in his heart,
The omniscient Ray is shut behind his lids:
He is the Wisdom that comes not by thought,
His wordless silence brings the immortal word.

Light’ is equivalent to consciousness and knowledge. This aspect of the fourfold godhead is the original Wisdom in the heart of everything. Although his ‘eyes’ are ‘closed’, the poet tells us that ‘All light’, all consciousness, awareness, knowledge, all ‘light’ in the material universe and in the subtle worlds, is nothing but ‘a flash from his closed eyes’. He hides in his heart a mystic ‘all-wise Truth’: a ‘Truth’ that is perfectly ‘wise’. The ‘omniscient Ray’ which holds and reveals all knowledge is concealed behind his closed eyelids. ‘He is the wisdom’ that lies at the very heart of things, which does not come ‘by thought’ but is inherent in the creation. He does not speak: ‘His wordless silence’ allows ‘the immortal word’ to manifest.

[Shraddhavan’s English of Savitri, Book 11]

He sleeps in the atom and the burning star,
He sleeps in man and god and beast and stone:
Because he is there the Inconscient does its work,
Because he is there the world forgets to die.
He is the centre of the circle of God,
He the circumference of Nature’s run.

That Supreme Wisdom is sleeping everywhere and in everything: ‘in the atom’ and its particles, as well as in ‘the burning star’; he is sleeping in every human being, in every ‘god’, in every animal, and in matter itself: in ‘stone’. It is because that mass of superconsciousness is there at the heart of everything that ‘the Inconscient’ miraculously ‘does its work’. If we look into the heart of things, things that seem to have no consciousness at all, everything is perfectly arranged. That is because within them lies this superconscient wisdom. ‘Because he is there’ ‘the world’ continues; it goes on and on and on; it ‘forgets to die’. If we think ‘of God’ being a ‘circle’, Prajna is at ‘the centre of the circle’. When we stretch our thought out to think of the whole universe including all the subtle worlds we cannot help coming to a limit somewhere, for although there may not really be any limit to the extent of the universe, there does seem to be a limit to the scope of our thought. He is the ‘circle’, ‘the circumference’ marking the limit ‘of Nature’s run’, the activity of Nature.

[Shraddhavan’s English of Savitri, Book 11]

In the orchestral largeness of his mind
All contrary seekings their close kinship knew,
Rich-hearted, wonderful to each other met
In the mutual marvelling of their myriad notes
And dwelt like brothers of one family
Who had found their common and mysterious home.

The Godhead’s look also reveals ‘the orchestral largeness of his mind’ which is able to reconcile and harmonise things that to us would seem ‘contrary’. In it ‘All contrary seekings’ knew and recognised their ‘close kinship’ and delight in coming together, living ‘like brothers of one family’ / Who had found their common and mysterious home’. An orchestra is made up of many different instruments and musicians; but they have to play together; they can even play very different things but altogether it makes a wonderful and moving harmony. The consciousness of this glorious godhead is like that, allowing ‘All contrary seekings’ to meet there generously and harmoniously: ‘Rich-hearted, wonderful to each other’ and mutually marvelling at the myriad notes which all of them can play together or separately, within ‘the orchestral largeness of his mind’, feeling that they are members of one intimate family. They are part of this oneness. Your kin are your relatives: brothers and sisters and uncles and aunts and cousins and second cousins – they are all your kin. ‘Myriad’ means ‘so many that they cannot be counted’. They are all playing different ‘notes’ in their orchestra, in their ‘contrary seekings’. But they come together in ‘his mind’ and marvel: they are amazed by each other’s beauty. They all admire and appreciate each other and live together ‘like brothers of one family’ who after being separated and have now come together again and ‘found their common and mysterious home’, their origin, where they have come from, the place where they are all united.

[Shraddhavan’s English of Savitri, Book 11]