Preparing for the Miraculous

244 eleven talks“Avatars” when the realization of a new level of consciousnessbecame necessary.We find this confirmed in Sri Aurobindo. “Are we thento suppose an eternal or continual Avatar himself evolving,we might say, his own mental and physical body accordingto the needs and the pace of the human evolution and soappearing from age to age, yuge yuge? In some such spiritsome would interpret the ten incarnations of Vishnu, firstin animal forms, then in the animal man, then in the dwarfman-soul, Vamana, the violent Asuric man, Rama of the axe,the divinely-natured man, a greater Rama, the awakenedspiritual man, Buddha, and, preceding him in time, but finalin place, the complete divine manhood, Krishna, – forthe last Avatar, Kalki, only accomplishes the work Krishnabegan, – he fulfils in power the great struggle which theprevious Avatars prepared in all its potentialities.” 25And again: “The Hindu procession of the ten Avatarsis itself, as it were, a parable of evolution. First the FishAvatar, then the amphibian animal between land and water,then the land animal, then the Man-Lion Avatar, bridgingman and animal, then man as dwarf, small and undevelopedand physical but containing in himself the godheadand taking possession of existence, then the rajasic, sattwic,nirguna Avatars, leading the human development from thevital rajasic to the sattwic mental man and again the overmentalsuperman. Krishna, Buddha and Kalki depict thelast three stages, the stages of the spiritual development –Krishna opens the possibility of overmind, Buddha tries toshoot beyond to the supreme liberation but that liberationis still negative, not returning upon earth to complete positivelythe evolution; Kalki is to correct this by bringing theKingdom of the Divine upon earth, destroying the opposite25 Sri Aurobindo: Essays on the Gita, p. 166.