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<title>-018_Miracles - Their True Significance.htm</title>
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<p class="paracenter">XVII
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<p class="paracenter"><b>MIRACLES: THEIR TRUE SIGNIFICANCE
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<p class="para"> Miracles are happenings where we 
see the result only without the process that leads to the result. It is like a 
mathematical problem where the solution only is given and not the gradual steps 
leading to the solution. The steps may be shortened or altogether suppressed, in 
the latter case it looks like a puzzle or a riddle or a paradox. We know of 
mathematical prodigies, we marvel at the capacity they show in performing 
formidable calculations for which an ordinary mind would need sheets of paper 
and considerable amount of time. But the prodigy can do it in the twinkling of 
an eye. He has a consciousness that can contain the whole process in a 
simultaneous grasp or speed through it like a lightning flash. Therefore the 
whole thing has the look of a miracle.
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<p class="para"> Usually, the name 'miracle' is 
given to something that seems to us &quot;unnatural&quot;, that is to say, something that 
does not conform to the laws of nature or what we think to be the laws of 
nature. A man standing in the air without any support or squatting on the 
water—feats familiar to the yogis—are termed veritable miracles. The famous rope 
trick is a legendary miracle. Some of these miracles done by yogis are authentic 
facts. They apparendy seem to violate the prevailing so-called laws of nature, 
but if we knew the process, the mechanism behind the event
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</p><p class="pageno">Page-64</p>
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<p class="para">because it is not apparent to the 
external logical mind, if we had a slightly different perception, the whole 
glamour of a miracle would fall to the ground.
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<p class="para"> A miracle is nothing but the 
intervention of a force from another plane of consciousness. It must be 
recognised at the very outset that the physical plane of existence is not the 
only reality, there are many other planes superimposed one upon another, each 
having its own special consciousness and power, its own laws of being and 
action. Obviously we all know apart from the material <i>or </i>physical being 
there is the vital being, the life-force and there is the mental being, the 
mind-force. And there are many other levels like these. A miracle happens, that 
is to say, a material formation behaves in an abnormal way because a force has 
come down from the vital region and has influenced or taken control of the 
material object. So the material object instead of obeying the material law is 
obliged to obey a vital law which is of a much greater potency. Yogis who do 
miracles possess this vital power, they have acquired it through a regular 
discipline and training. Spirit-calling, table-turning, even curing diseases and 
ailments in a moment and many other activities of the kind are manifestations of 
very elementary energies of life. From the occult point of view these are very 
crude and rudimentary examples of what a different kind of force can achieve on 
a different plane. Even the vital plane possesses deeper and higher energies 
whose action on the materiel plane is of deeper and higher category. A deeper or 
higher vital power can change radically your character and
</p><p class="pageno">Page-65</p>
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<p class="para">long-standing habits, help to 
mould them into a different, nobler and more beautiful pattern. The mind too is 
capable of performing miracles, a strong mental energy can dictate its terms to 
life and even to the body. Only the miracles here are not of a dazzling kind 
that astound or confound you. They have a subder composition, yet they belong to 
the same category. In the mind itself miracles happen also when a higher light, 
a superior consciousness —intuition, inspiration, revelation—descends into the 
normal mental working and creates there a thing that is abnormal in beauty and 
truth and reality. Thus for example, a matter of fact mind is seen turned into a 
fine poet or a workaday hand is transmuted into a consummate artist (as Mother 
has described).
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<p class="para"> A miracle can be said to be 
doubly a miracle; first of all, because it means an intervention from another 
plane, a superior level of being, and secondly because the process or the action 
of the intervention is not deployed or staged out but is occult and telescoped, 
the result being almost simultaneous with the pressure of the moving force.
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<p class="para"> The supreme miracle, the miracle 
of miracles happens when the Supreme, the Divine Himself descends and enters 
into this lower formation and gradually lifts it up in. an incredibly unforeseen 
way to its divine image. 
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</p><p class="pageno">Page-66</p>
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