Introducing Shri Shirdi Sai Baba
- (Late) Dr. RS.R. Swami
I give my children what they want so that they will begin to want what I want to give them."
"People do not come to me of their own accord, but I draw them to me as we draw birds by strings tied to their legs."
"Why fear when I am here? Throw your burdens upon me and I will bear them."
The above are some of the answers given by Baba in reply to questions of devotees when He walked on the earth as a human embodiment. They give us an idea about Him and the manner of His functioning. He was Grace incarnate and the greatest boon He conferred on those who sought Him was ABHAYA-heedom from fear. He used His divine powers viz. 'Yathaa Samkalpa Samsiddhih 'i.e. realising whatever one wants, and Tasya Cha Aajna Yathaa Mamah' i.e. getting one's command obeyed universally (vide Srimad Bhaaghavata) for the awakening (UDBODHAN) and upliftment of devotees by stages according to each one's capacity depending on 'rinanubandha' (residual after-effects of previous births) to rise through material advancement of directly on to Spiritual enlightenment.
People came to Him in small numbers at first from the neighbourhood and ere long in ever increasing numbers from far flung places. It might be as a result of a vision or a dream, initiation or prompting provided sub-consciously, or super-consciously, or a message conveyed through a friend or even another divinely at-ONE-ment Saint like the Akalkot Maharaj vibrating in unison directing a person to go to Shirdi, or in rare and blessed instances, Baba Himself appearing as the incarnation at Shirdi or as some fakir or Sadhu to render timely help in ire need and disappear leaving it to the person concerned to realise post facto either when he beheld a photo of Baba or a lucky coincidental visit to Shirdi en route to some place, when to the consternation of the person himself and the assembled devotees, Baba referred to the occasion of His visit with exact details. Not unoften, His visits were simultaneous at widely separated places. At other times He appeared as a dog or cat and later gave proof by exhibiting on His body traces of the injury inflicted on the animals by them. He proved both from His knowledge of past births and objectively how the relationship between Him and some chosen devotees had continued through successive births in some of which the latter were born even as lower mammals, reptiles or amphibians. He modified or completely obviated impending danger from various sources including the elements in respect of His devotees in answer to prayer or as a rule of His own volition as 'Bhaktha Paraadina'. The frantic gestures He used to make all of a sudden, waving His hands, hitting at imaginary Objects or shouting abuses, used to mystify those present at the old mosque where He stayed till, after calming down; He explained how they symbolised His efforts at putting down a fire, preventing a fateful fall or an attack by robbers or a poisonous bite bound to prove fatal and thus saving a devotee far away. Not till the concerned persons happened to visit Shirdi and narrated before Baba how they were saved by the appearance of a Good Samaritan at the nick of time or some such unexpected help did the people resident at Shirdi and were witness to those symbolic gestures realise the divine aspect of Baba. How truly did Robert Oppenheimer' aver that 'Symbolism is more real than fact'. He demonstrated beyond all doubt that He had nothing to do with the body they identified Him with by leaving the body for three days on one occasion (1886 Dasara) saying He was going to Allah* and if He did not return to the body duly, they were to bury it at certain spot. But He did return to re-animate it and let it house Him for another 32 years.
Baba granted a charter of boons to His devotees. Chief among them are His promises that He will continue to act from the tomb and the bones in it will speak and answer their prayers. To this day they are TRUE and continuing to find fulfilment from day-to-day and place to place. The writer, among thousands, is standing proof to bear testimony to this ETERNAL TRUTH of the incredible coming to pass and be experienced again and again, as the forthcoming chapters will prove beyond the faintest ray of doubt. Miracles continue to be worked as they happened before He shook off the mortal coil on the Vijaya Dasami day in 1918, after He Had announced this well in advance. The dead come back to life, the dumb speak, the blind see, the incurable are healed—in a word the incredible comes to pass in the lives of people among whom the writer claims to be counted as 'twice blest'. He is continuing to manifest Himself now and then to a blessed few as the Incarnate Baba of Shirdi, more often in disguise leaving indirect evidence of His identity and in visions and dreams. As in the blessed days of yore, even now at Shirdi His devotees hail from all races and religions—foreigners, Parsis, Christians, Muslims, Hindus, etc—daily in thousands, swelling into tens of thousands during festival days like Ram Navami, Diwali, Dasara, Guru Poornami, etc. But why Shirdi and not any other place? Because near the old, dilapidated, mud-walled mosque chosen by Baba as His abode lay buried the tomb of His Guru in a previous birth. None knew about it till on His advice they dug and found it at the foot of a neem tree. A nice little shrine is built over it and the leaves of the overshadowing branch of the neem tree do not taste bitter. Though sometimes He passed for a mad fakir, He was nobody's fool. He enjoyed discomfiting others with His own humour and practical jokes through which He elucidated a debatable point of philosophy or ethics. Though seemingly unletterd, He startled highly learned scholars with His erudition making them feel small at intellectual acrobatics. He told them they would find not Brahma but brama (illusion) in books. With such purely human qualities streaking through His divine personality, He endeared Himself all the greater to the common people. Infact, as Emerson says, "The human and divine are not separate, but rather various grades of one continuous series." Shri Ramana Maharshi, even as a pure Jnana Yogi, shared these qualities if in a more subtle manner. Valmiki says of Shri Ramachandra:
Mayamanush charitra mahadeuadi pujitaha
Indeed, "the line separating the sublime and the ridiculous is nebulous".
Was Baba a Hindu or Muslim by birth? According to the hints dropped by him now and then, He was born to Brahmin parents, was brought up and given 'Updesh' (spiritual initiation) by a fakir upto the fifth year and blossomed into spiritual perfection under a fully realised Brahmin Guru-indications of His future work of unification.
"The childhood shows the man, as the morning shows the day".
He was in his teens when he came to Shirdi as a Tejasvin' as all 'Urdhwarethaas' (those whose energy is sublimated in toto) are, at the beginning of the second half of the 19th Century. He gave equal respect to all religions. He said, 'If you are Christian, be a better Christian; if Muslim, a better Muslim; if a Hindu, a better Hindu,' and so on. He admonished one who had changed his religion saying, "Have you changed your father?" He thus inspired his devotees to have a common denominator we are sorely in need of. Is it not an irony of the times that man finds it easier to reach the moon than the heart of his neighbour? Baba seen -from all angles is veily the Beacon Light for the 21st century to save humanity from threatening selfannihilation. To deserve His grace fully, He advised, "Speak the truth. Be kind to the lowly, you need not become a Sadhu, but observe sexual purity." Needless to say one learns to be all this as a result of the unseen guidance provided by Him. But one must be a seeker.
Baba is a unique example of truth being stranger than fiction. For sheer incredibility and the thrill provided, just a couple of instances are worth narrating. One night, on hearing the peculiar croaking of a frog in the jaws of a snake at the edge of a pond near the mosque, He hastens to the spot and angrily shouts, "Hallo Veerabhadrappa come on, release Basappa." In implicit obedience it is done and the frog jumps into the water and escapes. When questioned, Baba says He is continuing to fulfil the promise given to Basappa in a privious birth when He was a fakir to save former from the wrath of Veerabhadrappa. Rinanubandha had brought them all together again. The other is about how he suddenly complains of pain in the loins and sends 'Udhi' (ash from the 'dhuni' He kindled with His yogic fire and kept burning at the mosque and continues to be so kept) through a messenger called Bapu Gir late in the night to be given to a devotee, a Deputy Collector, named Chandorkar about a hundred miles away, to be applied to his daughter Meenutai in the throes of labour. The man traveling by train arrives at Jamner, a way-side station not knowing how to reach the officer miles away in the-interior. Presently, to hi joy and relief, a person in office uniform with a lantern com* on the platform shouting, "Who is Bapu Gir from Shirdi?" Bapu Gir follows him to be seated in a brightly lit coach drawn by white horse with trappings and taken and left in the proximit of Chandorkar's bungalow. The 'Udhi' is received and applied and as if by magic the delivery takes place in a split second! " being told how grateful he is for the timely despacth of the coach to pick him up, the surprised officer says he does not have one It is only then that both realise how Baba has played His 'leele in His own inimitable way.
(Adopted from the Book Divine Miracles of Shri Shirdi SAi Baba - A record of thrilling experiences of (Late) Dr.P.S.Ramaswami (An Ardent Devotee of Shri Shirdi Sai Baba)This book can be read in the site
http://www.saileelas.org)
Courtesy:
http://groups.msn.com/sabkamalikek Sai baba let your holy lotus feet be our sole refuge.OMSAIRAM
Topic: Shirdi Sai Thought! (Read 403369 times)