Thursday, 27 November 2025

SUPERMAN

 

                                                SUPERMAN

            According to a very brief definition a superman is one who is unusually strong or intelligent or who can do something supremely well. This is also the definition of a superwoman if she has an extraordinary career and can take care of her home and family.

            Some other qualities of a superman are  super strength, stamina and invulnerability.

            Many leaders of states are regarded as supermen if they have dictatorial  powers and their states have ultramodern  weapons of war.

              Brute force in a person is not universally appreciated . Wrestlers and warriors are not loved as great supermen.

            Look at these facts : Despite his god-like power, Superman’s personality is defined by moral traits like humility, compassion, kindness, truth, justice, hope and indomitable will for peace and prosperity.

               Pride, arrogance, combative tendency, lust for more and more  power and the instinct to humiliate others by any kind of personal superiority are not admirable qualities in a superman.

            The Indian yogi Sri Aurobindo Ghosh (1872-1950) defines superman as a divinely transformed individual, a gnostic being who has ascended beyond the limitations of the human mind to embody a higher consciousness. He further says : This spiritual evolution is not a purely mental or ego-driven concept like Nietzsche’s, but one that involves a full transformation of being, including the physical body, into a state of divine consciousness, knowledge and joy. This gnostic being can then act in the world from a place of unity and spiritual purpose, not personal gain.   

               A  Gnostic believes that salvation comes from spiritual knowledge (gnosis) rather than through traditional action of saving or being saved from sin, error, or evil.

            In his essay on Superman Sri Aurobindo says: The world’s discords have to be understood, seized, transmuted. Love must call Power and Knowledge into the temple and seat them beside her in a unified equality; Power must bow its neck to the yoke of Light and Love before it can do any real good to the race.

                                                            ******

G.R.Kanwal

27 November 2025

     

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