OM SAI RAM !!!
CHAPTER 43 & 44 : Part - 2
Some days before Baba's departure, there occurred an ominous sign foreboding
the event. There was, in the Masjid an old brick on which Baba rested His hand
and sat. At night time He leaned against it and had His asan. This went on for
many years. One day, during Baba's absence, a boy who was sweeping the floor,
took it up in his hand, and unfortunately it slipped from thence fell down broken
into two pieces. When Baba came to know about this, He bemoaned its loss,
crying - "It is not the brick but My fate that has been broken into pieces. It was
My life-long companion, with it I always meditated on the Self, it was as dear to
Me as My life, it has left Me to-day." Some may raise here a question - "Why should
Baba express this sorrow for such an inanimate thing as a brick?" To this Hemadpant
replies that saints incarnate in this world with the express mission of saving the poor
helpless people, and when they embody themselves and mix and act with the people,
they act like them, i.e., outwardly laugh, play and cry like all other people, but inwardly
they are wide awake to their duties and mission.
Thirty two years before this, i.e., in 1886 A.D., Baba made an attempt to cross the
border line. On a Margashirsha Pournima (Full moon) day, Baba suffered from a severe
attack of asthma. To get rid of it Baba decided to take His prana high up and go into
samadhi. He said to Bhagat Mhalasapti - "Protect My body for three days. If I return,
it will be alright; if I do not, bury My body in that open land (pointing to it) and fix two
flags there as a mark." Saying this, Baba fell down at about 10 P.M. His breathing stopped,
as well as His pulse. It seemed as if His prana left the body. All the people including the
villagers came there and wanted to hold an inquest and bury the body in the place pointed
by Baba. But Mhalasapati prevented this. With Baba's body on his lap he sat full three days
guarding it. After three days passed, Baba showed signs of life at 3 A.M. His breathing
commenced, the abdomen began to move. His eyes opened and stretching His limbs, Baba
returned to consciousness (life) again.
From this and other accounts, let the readers consider whether Sai Baba was the three
and a half cubits' body that He occupied for some years and that He left thereafter or He
was the Self inside. The body, composed of the five elements is perishable and transient,
but the Self within is the thing - Absolute Reality which is immortal and intransient. The pure
Being, Consciousness or Brahma, the Ruler and Controller of the senses and mind is the
thing Sai. This pervades all things in the universe and there is no space without it. For
fulfilling His mission He assumed the body and after it was fulfilled, He threw away the
body (the finite aspect), and assumed His infinite aspect. Sai ever lives, as also the previous
Incarnation of God Datta, Shri Narsimha Saraswati of Ganagapur. His Passing away is only
an outward aspect, but really He pervades all animate and inanimate things and is their Inner
Controller and Ruler. This can be, and is even now experienced by many who surrender
themselves completely to Him and worship Him with whole-hearted devotion.
Though it is not possible for us to see Baba's form now, still if we go to Shirdi, we shall
find His beautiful life-like portrait adorning the masjid. This has been drawn by Shamrao
Jaykar, a famous artist and well-known devotee of Baba. To an imaginative and devout
spectator this portrait can give even to-day the satisfaction of taking Baba's darshana.
Though Baba has no body now, He lives there and everywhere, and will effect the welfare
of the devotees even now as He was doing before when He was embodied. Saints like
Baba never die, though they look like men, they are in reality God Himself.
OM SAI RAM, SHRI SAI RAM, JAI JAI SAI RAM !!!