Through all the second half of the XX Century, the Western world has been occupied primarily in his effort at destroying what has been called “the Communist nightmare”. And, if we look at things as near as possible, it was really a nightmare, though it started as a dream, a partial but puissant Utopia. We have, in front of us, the greatest example with Russia, where the Lenin’s dream was transformed — in the hand of an Asura like Stalin — in a terrible nightmare. So, behind the Western impulse there was the Zeitgeist, the Spirit of Time, that worked for preventing that humanhood would fall into the hands of the asuric forces.
Now, in the beginning of this new Century (which is also the beginning of a new Millennium!), the political system of the West is almost alone, like a huge Titan, eager to eat all the world, bringing with it the global menace of what we can rightly call “the Consumerism nightmare”.
Today, those who hold Economy they want to balance the costs too expensive (for them) payed at the end of the Second World War, when the ‘Communist menace’ was concrete. In the West, counter-measures were necessary, so that the western communists, housed in Western countries, they would not effectuate the revolution amidst the capitalistic societies. And this has been ’a cost‘: the acknowledgement of the labour union as a political entity, the spreading of the instruction and of sanitary assistance to all, and an income that would not create the will for a revolution, are the three main examples. This has permitted a widespread well-being and, on the other side, a swing away from Communism.
But now that the Communism has failed all over the world, why the devilish Lords of Nations will continue to pay? It is time, for them, to ‘cure the malady’ and then to take away part of the money to the people (imposing on them to work more and in worse conditions) and modify the human rights.
This is their purpose. But this time the Zeitgeist is no more on their side. So, we live in a moment of great struggle. We are proceeding as in a thick brink between the Disaster and the Wonderful. We have to be prepared.
«There are moments when the Spirit moves among men and the breath of the Lord is abroad upon the waters of our being; there are others when it retires and men are left to act in the strength or the weakness of their own egoism. The first are periods when even a little effort produces great results and changes destiny; the second are spaces of time when much labour goes to the making of a little result. It is true that the latter may prepare the former, may be the little smoke of sacrifice going up to heaven which calls down the rain of God’s bounty.
Unhappy is the man or the nation which, when the divine moment arrives, is found sleeping or unprepared to use it, because the lamp has not yet been kept trimmed for the welcome and the ears are sealed to the call. But thrice woe to them who are strong and ready, yet waste the force or misuse the moment; for them is irreparable loss or a great destruction.
In the hour of God cleanse thy soul of all self-deceit and hypocrisy and vain self-flattering that thou mayst look straight into thy spirit and hear that which summons it. All insincerity of nature, once thy defence against the eye of the Master and the light of the ideal, becomes now a gap in thy armour and invites the blow. Even if thou conquer for the moment, it is the worse for thee, for the blow shall come afterwards and cast thee down in the midst of thy triumph. But being pure cast aside all fear; for the hour is often terrible, a fire and a whirlwind and a tempest, a treading of the winepress of the wrath of God; but he who can stand up in it on the truth of his purpose is he who shall stand; even though the fall, he shall rise again; even though he seem to pass on the wings of the wind, he shall return. Nor let worldly prudence whisper too closely in thy ear, for it is the hour of the unexpected, the incalculable, the immeasurable. Mete not the power of the Breath by thy petty instruments, but trust and go forward.
But most keep thy soul clear, even if for a while, of the clamour of the ego. Then shall a fire march before thee in the night and the storm be thy helper and thy flag shall wave on the highest height of the greatness that was to be conquered» (Sri Aurobindo, The Hour of God).
October, 2003