Background

Every time a new truth has attempted to manifest upon earth, it has been immediately attacked, corrupted, and diverted by pseudo-spiritual forces – which did represent a certain spirituality at a given time, but precisely the one that the new truth wants to go beyond. To give but one example of those sad �spiritual diversions� which clutter History, Buddhism was largely corrupted in a sizeable part of Asia by a whole Tantric and magical Buddhism. The falsity lies not in the old spirituality which the new truth seeks to go beyond, but in the eternal fact that the Past clings to its powers, its means, and its rule. As Mother said in her simple language, �What’s wrong is to remain stuck there.��And Sri Aurobindo with his ever-present humour: �The traditions of the past are very great in their own place, in the past� …
        – Satprem

It is worth remembering that the action takes place in the final days of the Trojan War, which symbolises a great reversal of yoga. The ancient yoga aimed only at liberation in the spirit - either considering the world to be a perfect illusion, or judging that the divinisation of matter is impossible. In contrast, the new yoga must work towards the divinisation of matter within the unity of spirit and matter.

According to the ancient Greek masters of wisdom, this reversal occurs when the adventurer of consciousness, already well established in the higher mind and partly in the illumined mind, under the pressure of his aspiration, seeks to ascend to the plane of the intuitive mind.
Indeed, the royal dynasty of Troy belongs to the plane of the illumined mind, in the line of descent from the Pleiad Electra (see diagram 16). But the plane towards which Agamemnon and Menelaus, heroes in the lineage of Tantalus “the aspiration” (see diagram 15), is that of the next plane, the intuitive mind or intuition. This is because these two kings respectively took as their wife Clytemnestra “renowned wisdom” and Helen “evolution towards more freedom or more light”. The two sisters belong to the lineage of Taygete, which represents the intuitive mind (see diagram 13). It should be noted, however, that the corresponding yoga incarnated by Agamemnon and Menelaus was established based on the higher mind, since Hippodamia, “the master of life”, was their grandmother, whose mother or grandmother was Sterope, symbol of “the higher mind”. Let us briefly recall what Sri Aurobindo said about these two planes of the higher mind: At the level of the illumined mind, Truth penetrates the mind in a continuous and stable flow of light rather than in sporadic flashes. There emerges a power of direct knowledge of Truth resulting from a more perfect union with what is Real. It is no longer a question of ’thought’ but of the ’light’ of the spirit, which can be associated with vision. This is why ancient sages were called ‘seers’.
Then come the higher regions of the intuitive mind. On this plane, the activities of the mind have come under the direction of the Intuition and can operate in four ways, which Sri Aurobindo describes as follows: �A power of revelatory truth-seeing, a power of inspiration or truth-hearing, a power of truth-touch or immediate seizing of significance, which is akin to the ordinary nature of its intervention in our mental intelligence, a power of true and automatic discrimination of the orderly and exact relation of truth to truth, � these are the fourfold potencies of Intuition.� 2

It should be noted that the seeker also sometimes makes inroads into the overmind, because according to the Iliad, Thetis, the mother of Achilles, “often revealed to him the mind of Zeus”. 3

Thus, the Trojan War is an inner struggle to discern which is the best path to greater freedom/light brought about by access to the intuitive mind. That is, the pursuit of yoga in the separation of spirit/matter (the Trojans) or that of purification of the depths combined with powerful aspiration (the Achaean coalition supported by Achilles’ Myrmidons). However, it is still the aspiration to ‘improve the present mental man’ that is being sought, and not a complete transformation of human nature towards an undetermined goal. The Trojan camp corresponds to what Sri Aurobindo expresses; until now, the seeker who united with the divine consciousness in spirit could not manifest this union in the planes of manifestation. This is because these limited planes brought not only their limitations but also the distortions inherent in duality. The conclusion that had to be drawn was that union could only be fully realised if creation were annulled. The Mother confirms this in the agenda: �There is a whole side of human thought which has held the conception that identification with the supreme Consciousness could only come through the abolition of the individual creation, but in fact Sri Aurobindo said it was possible WITHOUT�doing away with the creation. They hold the conception that the creation must be done away with because they do not take the creation beyond the human creation � it is impossible for man, but possible for the supramental being. And that will be the essential difference of the supramental being: being able, without losing a limited form, to unite his consciousness with the supreme Consciousness. But it is impossible for man. That I know. As I said, you have it [union with the supreme Consciousness], but as soon as you want to express it, it is finished, it becomes again… (gesture as if enclosed in a box). That means the substance we are built with is not sufficiently purified, illumined, transformed (anything, any word) to express the supreme Consciousness without distorting it.� 4 The situation at the start of the war can be summed up as follows: �A previously established psychic control is very desirable as that creates a general responsiveness and inhibits the revolt of the lower parts against the Light or their consent to the claims of the Ignorance. A preliminary spiritual transformation will also reduce the hold of the Ignorance; but neither of these influences altogether eliminates its obstruction and limitation: for these preliminary changes do not bring the integral consciousness and knowledge;� 5

According to mythology, the initial deviance occurred when the seeker, well settled in the higher mind, aspired to stabilise the illumined mind by perfecting ’liberation’ (Ilus), ‘peace’ (Assaracus) and ‘joy’ (Ganymede). There was, however, a lack of consecration or self-giving to the Divine (surrender), illustrated by Laomedon’s two perjuries.

The first was to refuse to pay the gods the wages agreed when the citadel of Troy was built. This was a refusal to acknowledge divine action. Most probably, we can understand that the seeker has not yet completed the second stage of yoga as described in the Bhagavad Gita: Even if he has renounced the results of the action, he has not yet fully detached himself from the belief that he himself is the author of the action, at least in part. There is still an attachment to the action itself.

The second was to refuse Heracles the immortal white horses promised in exchange for the release of his daughter Hesione, who was bound to a rock at sea to be offered as food to the sea monster Ceto. These immortal white horses symbolise the vital powers acquired through yoga. Since Heracles is the hero who embodies the yoga or Tapasya that must be pursued until divinisation, this refusal shows that the seeker is not completely ready to abandon certain realisations of the past to go even further. These realisations have given the seeker access to the forces, essentially vital, belonging to the cosmic planes.

In Book I, Sri Aurobindo clearly posed the question that he intends to examine in Ilion: namely, what can be preserved from the outer forms (’the moulds’) of the old Yogas in the new yoga? This new yoga concerns the totality of being, integrating spirit and matter, from the heights of the mind down to the smallest cells of our body. It gives priority to truth over love. In Book II, after recalling the ultimatum issued by Achilles through the mouth of Deiphobos, Sri Aurobindo tackles the problem from the perspective of the highest Rajasic-Sattvic wisdom with the discourse of the wise Antenor.

Although we have no documents that would enable us to link Antenor to a Pleiad, we can assume that he represents the plane of the illumined or spiritualised higher mind. He belongs to the generation of Trojans that was ‘redeemed’, of Priam. In fact, he is one of the city’s wise elders who, because of their old age, can no longer take part in the battle. However, the seeker who has gained access to mental silence with Teucer, as mentioned below: “From Ida they sent Pallas Athena to llion: she came in secret, and with her, he gained luminous silence”. The higher mind can no longer be the guide of yoga, which would explain why Antenor is “fallen”, signifying a departure from the path of spiritual enlightenment.
It should also be remembered that the energies that supported the first steps in the illumined mind and contributed to the power and radiance of Troy have, over time, become mixed with other influences. The structures that were valid at the beginning have become rigid due to a lack of adaptation to the movement of Becoming, i.e., a lack of fluidity. Let us recall the story of Tithonus, brother of Priam, studied in Book I: Eos had asked Zeus to grant Tithonus immortality, but she had failed to request eternal youth as well, resulting in the latter being reduced to a larva. When the adventurer of consciousness limits his quest to the sole realisation of the static impersonal divine, forgetting the evolutionary divine, his realisation loses its lustre and its power over time.

To approach the second chapter, we need to situate the adventurer of consciousness in his spiritual progression. There are two main opposing tendencies in the most advanced part of his consciousness, represented by the Trojans. The first is symbolised by Antenor, the symbol of the highest thought, that of the illumined higher mind, the plane after that of the intellect. On this plane, intuition already plays a major role, as Ant�nor “speaks the words that the gods have inspired in him”. But it is still a mental yoga based on the logic that realisations are the direct consequences of specific practices, as Sri Aurobindo describes it: “Take these steps, and your heart will be given what it desires”. But this highest thought has been set aside, if not rejected, with the attainment of mental silence (Teucer), supported by a psychic transformation towards love (Aeneas) and a progression in equality, the detachment acquired through renunciation (P�ris). The Trojans no longer regard Antenor as a guide. The importance of the psychic predominance of the mind of light is illustrated in the Trojan camp by the importance of direct psychic perception of what is right. The second tendency is therefore represented by Apollo’s seer, Laocoon. But the light or truth that could have been perceived is distorted because Laocoon is “Apollo’s seer obscured by fate”. The judgement of Paris, by which the shepherd prince chose the goddess of love as the most beautiful, introduced a new form of deviance into yoga. This psychic opening and transformation led the seeker, and humanity in his wake, to come to regard Love as the primary evolutionary necessity, relegating the search for and establishment of Truth to the background. The psychic centre is in fact linked to divine Love. This is why Apollo and Aphrodite were the main deities who supported the Trojan camp. This pre-eminence of love over Truth becomes, at some point, an evolutionary error. Sri Aurobindo tells us that Aeneas, son of Aphrodite, gives “advice that wisdom hates”. This error is rooted in the judgement of Paris, who considered Aphrodite to be the most beautiful and therefore the truest on the evolutionary level, to the detriment of Athena, the goddess who oversees the growth of the inner being and the mastery of the outer being, and Hera, the goddess of the right evolutionary movement. The conflict is therefore essentially at the level of the higher mind and partly at that of the illumined mind, represented by the Trojan royal line. The stake in the war, Helen, belongs to the even higher plane- that of the intuitive mind.

In Books 2 and 3, Sri Aurobindo develops each line of thought, drawing upon specific experience to its conclusion, thus granting them their fullest significance. This approach mirrors the logic of the overmind, as exemplified in his Savitri. Ant�nor’s discourse is very well argued and easily won over by the reader. Yet, Sri Aurobindo only reveals its flaws at the end. While Antenor�s speech is very satisfying for the mind, Sri Aurobindo at the end reveals its limitations. Despite the illumined higher mind perspective, Antenor�s convictions remain tethered to the supremacy of the spiritual path symbolised by Troy�s founders. He bets on the eventual demise of the Achaeans, predicting that they will engage in a fratricidal struggle between the Achaeans of the North and those of the South. Ant�nor, in an evasive manner, therefore advises acceptance of Achilles’ insincere offer. Under the guise of a conciliatory speech, the seeker clings to the certainties on which Troy was founded, namely the improvement of the current mental man in the unity of spirit and matter. He blames the Trojan deviances that led to the mind/matter split. This is a part of the seeker who relies on an illumined higher mind but who does not yet envisage a more complete transformation, a divinised matter.

If Ant�nor’s position lacks long-term vision, the psychic perception represented by Laocoon, which will be developed in Book 3, is also tainted by errors, for Sri Aurobindo tells us that it has been obscured by fate. Laocoon is ’the seer of Apollo obscured by fate’. Sri Aurobindo sums up these two tendencies as follows: “Neither the thought of the statesman nor the dream of the prophet is decisive”. Both have their flaws: either an attachment to old conceptions or a lack of purification of intuition.

Inevitably, the victors will be the Achaeans, as decreed by the gods before the war began. The forces of the overmind will take advantage of the seeker�s refusal to engage in a profound purification of the vital - the strike of Achilles - to force him to carry out a very large number of purifications on all levels prior to the great overthrow, illustrated by the death of many heroes. It is only when the Trojans have reached the essence of Achaean yoga - in the vicinity of the ships, when the situation seems hopeless for the Achaeans - that the changeover can take place.
It is the seeker�s willingness to undergo a purification of the deep vital that will allow the reversal to take place. For the seeker can only rise in proportion to the purification and transformation carried out in the lower planes.

On the other hand, we must always bear in mind that the poem Ilion concerns not only about the adventurers of consciousness but the whole humanity in the present period of evolution. Humanity too, by rising above the intellect, must purify and transform its outer nature and embody the Truth.

However, one might ponder whether Achilles’ offer could have been accepted. Is there a way out of the inner conflict, acknowledging that evolutionary truth requires a purification of the lower planes alongside a profound aspiration towards greater freedom, while retaining the ancient structures and practices of yoga? Can Troy be saved from destruction and its inhabitants spared? We shall see that this is not possible. All attachments, even to the old realisations, must cease, and Truth must reign in humanity before Love can manifest itself.

Finally, we might ask why the decision belongs to the gods - the powers of the overmind - and not to one of the two camps. At the very beginning of this chapter, we read: ‘Thus over Ilion condemned leaned the immense tenderness of the rising sun’.

If it is the gods who decide, and Zeus in particular, this means that the seeker has not yet succeeded at this level in integrating the forces of the overmind within him and that he is still partly their plaything. So, even if Antenor had won over Laocoon, Aeneas and Paris to convince the Trojans, the gods would have arranged one way or another for Troy to be destroyed. Sri Aurobindo gives us the justification for this, both for the researcher and for humanity as a whole: “How could greater light come if twilight were not followed by night.”

We should also note that, according to Apollodorus, Heracles killed all the sons of Laomedon except Priam, which would show that the seeker has already worked hard to erase the errors symbolised by Laomedon’s perjuries (the lack of greater consecration). However, Homer mentions about the three sons still alive among the old men present at the end of the war, a sign that some errors are still very much present.