Destiny and Determinism (SVH 41) Book 6 Canto 2a

Book Six, The Book of Fate, Canto 2, The Way of Fate and the Problem of Pain (Part 1)

What then is fate? Is it a tribunal of justice distributing decrees of reward and punishment meted out to the human soul to keep its feet steady in the right direction? Or is it some mysterious fiat of an arbitrary Creator who enjoys our suffering and pain so that we can turn to Him in supplication? Or is it an evolutionary mechanism devised for the human soul to grow through experience and learn through failure and fall? What is the necessity of suffering and pain in the grand scheme of things? Above all, who chooses our fate, — some gods who weave it for us or our soul that must go through certain experiences and hence chooses its curve of destiny based upon its intrinsic need? And what about the great ones, the shining seers, the Avatars who also suffer when they take a human body? These and many other questions, in fact, all possible questions that man has conceived or has not yet conceived have been raised by Sri Aurobindo through the Queen, mother of Savitri, in this canto.