The Winds of Wonder

They Withdraw — Narrated by Nirodbaran

Sri Aurobindo Withdraws

On returning to Sri Aurobindo the Mother laid her garland at his feet and stood and watched him. She again remarked, “He is withdrawing himself.” At 11 p.m. [4 December 1950] she helped him take a drink. At midnight she came again. This time he opened his eyes and the two looked at each other in a steady gaze. We were the silent spectators of that crucial scene. What passed between them was beyond our mortal ken, but Sri Aurobindo’s look seemed to bear a touch of unusual softness. At 1 a.m. she came back, her face was calm, there was no trace of emotion. Sri Aurobindo was indrawn. … we know that at this particular hour the Mother had very important occult work to do. At 1.26 a.m., [5 December 1950] leaving his physical sheath, “the Colonist from Immortality” departed from the earthly habitation, in the presence of the Mother who stood near his feet with an intense penetrating gaze, an incarnation of divine strength, poise and calm.

The Mother Withdraws

But all of a sudden things took a different turn. She had said that her body was the first ever to be subject to the Supramental Power — here was an experiment Sri Aurobindo had wanted her to undergo. The pressure of this Power to which she had unreservedly opened herself began to tell on the physical instrument and she fell ill. All work and interviews came to an abrupt cessation from the early months of 1973. She went into complete retirement, seeing no one except her personal attendants. Since these are matters of an occult dimension it will be futile on anyone’s part to venture an interpretation. All we can say is that at the end of her tremendous isolated labour through twenty-three years after Sri Aurobindo’s passing away in 1950, the Mother also departed. [7.25 p.m. 17 November 1973] Now that the special support had been withdrawn, we had to fall back considerably upon our own efforts. But that did not mean that her help has been withdrawn. She has given us the assurance, like Sri Aurobindo, that she will always be with us. It is the constant experience of the sadhaks that her Presence is ever active. We have only to carry on with unflagging zeal, faith and surrender, and her aid will be unfailingly with us.