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MEHER BABA JOURNAL Volume 1, No.4 February 1939

A Monthly Publication of the “Meher Editorial Committee”

An Trust eBook July 2011

All words of Meher Baba copyright © 2011 Avatar Meher Baba Perpetual Public Charitable Trust, Ahmednagar,

Source and short publication history: The Meher Baba Journal, a monthly magazine, was published from 1938 to 1942. This eBook reproduces the original edition of the Meher Baba Journal published by the “Meher Editorial Committee” (, Ahmednagar, India).

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Contents

SHRI MEHER BABA ON THE BEGINNING AND THE END OF CREATION 1 FOLLOW Elizabeth C. Patterson 15 MY EXPERIENCES Chhota Baba 20 THE VAISHNAVITE SAINTS OF C. V. Sampath Aiyangar SOUTHERN INDIA AND THEIR (Late of Madras Judicial Service) 23 HAGIOLOGY YOU MUST BELIEVE IT Dr. Abdul Ghani Munsiff 27

HAZRAT BABAJAN OF POONA Dr. Abdul Ghani Munsiff 29

ST. TERESA OF SPAIN Will Backett () 40 SPIRITUAL ANECDOTE Dr. Abdul Ghani Munsiff 45 THE SIGNIFICANCE OF LOVE Dr. C. D. Deshmukh 47 IN HUMAN LIFE M. A., Ph. D. (London) THE VOICE Princess 53 SHRI MEHER BABA AND THE Mrs. Indumati Deshmukh NEW WORLD CULTURE OF THE 59 M. A., B. T. FUTURE HOW I MET THEM AND WHAT Abdul Kareem Abdulla 63 THEY TOLD ME TO THE BELOVED BABA Countess Nadine Tolstoy 71 FROM THE RUBAIYAT SADGURU IS LOVE INCARNATE 75 QUESTION BABA ANSWERS Dr. Abdul Ghani Munsiff 76 SHRI MEHER BABA'S TOUR OF NINE DAYS THROUGH Princess Norina Matchabelli 78 CENTRAL INDIA SHRI MEHER BABA Princess Norina Matchabelli 85 IMPRESSIONS NOTES FROM MY DIARY F. H. Dadachanji 89

♦

The February number, being the Birthday issue, is dedicated to the Anniversary of the Forty-fifth Birthday of Shri Meher Baba.

"I have come not to teach but to awaken" —SHRI METIER BABA

MEHER BABA JOURNAL

VOL. 1 FEBRUARY 1939 NO.4

Shri Meher Baba on the Beginning and the End of Creation

As long as the human mind does not directly experience Ultimate Reality as it is, it is baffled in every attempt to explain the origin and the purpose of crea- tion. The ancient past seems to be shrouded in inscru- WHENCE? AND table mystery, and the future seems WHITHER? to be a completely sealed book. The human mind can at best make brilliant conjectures about the past and the future of the universe, because it is bound by the spell of . It can neither arrive at final knowledge on these points, nor can it remain content with ignorance about them. 'Whence'? and 'Whither'? are the two everlasting and poignant queries which make the human mind divinely restless. The human mind cannot reconcile itself with infinite regress in its search for the origin of the world, nor can it THE BEGINNING reconcile itself with endless change AND THE END without a goal. Evolution is unin- telligible if it has no initial cause, and it is deprived

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of all direction and meaning if it all does not lead to a terminus. The very questions 'Whence'? and 'Whither'? presuppose the beginning and the end of this evolving creation. The beginning of evolution is the beginning of time, and the end of evolution is the end of time. Evolution has both beginning and end, because time has both beginning and end. Between the beginning and the end of this changing world there are many cycles, but there is, in and through these cycles, a continuity of cosmic evolution. The real termination of the evolutionary process is called Mahapralaya or the final annihilation of the world, when the world becomes what it was in the beginning, namely nothing. The Mahapralaya of the world may be compared with the sleep of a man. Just as the varied world of experience completely disappears in the case of the man who is in deep sleep, the entire objective cosmos which is the creation of Maya vanishes into nothingness at the time of the Mahapralaya. It is as if the universe had never existed at all. Even during the evolutionary period the universe is in itself nothing but imagination. There is in fact only one indivisible and eternal Reality, and it has neither begin- REALITY IS ning nor end. It is beyond time. TIMELESS AND From the point of view of this ABSOLUTE timeless Reality the whole time- process is purely imaginary, and billions of years which have passed and billions of years which are

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to pass do not have even the value of a second. They are like not having existed at all. So the manifold and evolving universe cannot be said to be a real outcome of this one Reality. If it were an out- come of this one Reality, Reality would be either a relative term or a composite being, which it is not. The one Reality is absolute. The one Reality includes in itself all existence. It is everything, but it has nothing as its shadow. The idea of all-inclusive existence implies that it leaves no- REALITY AND thing outside its being. When you NOTHING analyse the idea of Being, you arrive by implication at the idea of that which does not exist. This idea of non-existence or 'Nothing' helps you to define clearly our notion of Being. The complementary aspect of Being is thus Non-being or Nothing. But 'Nothing' cannot be looked upon as having its own separate and independent existence. It is nothing in itself. Nor can it, in itself, be a cause of anything. The manifold and evolving universe cannot be the outcome of 'Nothing' taken by itself. And you have seen that it cannot also be the outcome of the one Reality. How then does the manifold and evolving universe arise? The manifold and evolving universe arises owing to the mixing up of the one Reality and 'Nothing'. It REALITY AND springs out of 'Nothing' when this UNIVERSE 'Nothing' is taken against the back- ground of the one Reality. But this should not be taken to mean that the universe is partly the outcome of

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the one Reality, or that it has an element of Reality. It is an outcome of 'Nothing' and is nothing. It only seems to have existence. And its apparent existence is due to the one Reality which is, as it were, behind 'Nothing'. When 'Nothing' gets added to the one Reality, you get the manifold and evolving universe. But the one Reality which is infinite and absolute does not thereby suffer any modification. It is absolute and is as such entirely unaffected by any addition or subtraction. The one Reality remains what it was, complete and absolute in itself and unconcerned and unconnected with the panorama of creation, springing out of 'Nothing'. 'Nothing' might be compared to the value of 'zero' in mathematics. In itself it has no positive value; but when it is added to another number it gives rise to the many. In the same way the manifold and evolving universe springs out of 'Nothing' when it is combined with the one Reality. The whole evolutionary process is within the domain of imagination. When in imagination the one ocean of Reality gets apparently disturbed, there arises the mani- THE IMAGINED fold world of separate centres of DIVISION BET- consciousness. This involves the basic division of life into the WEEN THE SELF ' ' AND ITS ENVIRON- self and not-self or the I and its MENT LEADS TO environment. And owing to the AN EVOLVING falseness and the incomplete- DUALITY ness of this limited self (which is only an imagined part of a really indivisible totality),

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consciousness cannot remain content with eternal ident- ification with it. Thus consciousness is trapped in ceaseless restlessness forcing it to attempt identification with the not-self. That portion of the not-self or the environment with which consciousness succeeds in identifying itself gets affiliated to the self in the form of 'mine'; and that portion of the not-self with which it does not succeed in identifying itself becomes the irreducible environment which inevitably creates a limit and an opposition to the self. Thus consciousness arrives not at the termination of its limiting duality but at its transformation. As long as consciousness is subject to the working of vitiating imag- ination, it cannot successfully put an end to this duality, and all the varied attempts which it makes for the assim- ilation of the not-self (or the environment) result merely in the replacement of the initial duality by other innumerable novel forms of the same duality. The acceptance and the rejection of certain portions of the environment respectively express themselves as 'wanting' and 'not-wanting', thus giving rise to the opposites of pleasure and pain, good and bad, etc. But neither acceptance nor rejection can lead to freedom from duality, and consciousness, therefore, finds itself engaged in ceaseless and alternate oscillation from one opposite to the other. The entire process of the evolution of the individual is characterised by this oscillation between the opposites. The evolution of the limited individual is completely

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determined by the Sanskaras accumulated by him through THE THOROUGH ages, and though it is all part of DETERMINISM imagination, the determinism is OF SANSKARAS thorough and automatic. Every action and experience, howsoever ephemeral, leaves behind it an impression in the mental body. This impression is an objective modification of the mental body; and as the mental body remains the same through several lives, the impressions accumulated by the individual are also capable of persisting through several lives. When the Sanskaras, thus accumulated, begin to express themselves (instead of merely lying latent in the mental body), they are experienced as desires, i.e., they are apprehended as being subjective. The subjective and the objective are the two aspects of the Sanskaras; the former is the passive state of latency, and the latter is the active state of manifestation. Through the active phase the accumulated Sanskaras determine each experience and action of the limited self. Just as in the cinema several feet of film have to pass for exhibiting a small action on the screen, many Sanskaras are often involved in determining a single action of the limited self. And through such expression and fulfilment in experience the Sanskaras get spent up. The weak Sanskaras get themselves spent up mentally; the stronger ones get themselves spent up subtly in the form of desires and imaginative experience; and those Sanskaras which are powerful get them-

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selves spent up physically by expressing themselves through bodily action. But though this spending up of Sanskaras is going on continually, it does not end in freedom from the Sans- karas, because new Sanskaras are being inevitably created not only through fresh actions but even through the very process of spending up. So the heap of Sanskaras goes on increasing, and the individual finds himself helpless in the problem of throwing off the burden. The Sanskaras deposited by specific actions and experiences render the mind susceptible to similar actions BALANCING and experiences; but after a certain THROUGH THE point is reached, this tendency is OPPOSIT checked and counteracted by a nat- ural reaction consisting in a com- plete change over to its direct opposite, making room for the operation of opposite Sanskaras. Very often the two opposites form parts of one and the same chain of imagination. For example, a person might first experience that he is a famous writer, with wealth, fame, wife and all the agreeable things of life, and may, later in the same life, experience that he had lost his wealth, fame, wife and all the agreeable things of life. Sometimes it seems that a chain of imagination does not contain both the opposites. For example, a person might experience throughout his life that he is a powerful king always victorious in battles. In this case he has to balance this experience by the experience

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of defeats or the like in the next life, taking one more life to complete his chain of imagination. The purely psycho- logical compulsion of the Sanskaras is thus subject to the deeper teleological need of the . Suppose a man has killed some one in this life. This deposited in his mental body the Sanskaras of killing. THE EXAMPLE And if consciousness were to be solely and simply determined by this initial tendency created by these Sanskaras, he would go on killing others again and again ad infinitum, every time gathering further momentum from subsequent acts of the same kind. And there would be no escape from this recurring determinism had it not been for the fact that the logic of experience provides the necessary check to it. The person soon realizes the incompleteness of the experience of one opposite, and he unconsciously seeks to restore the lost balance by going over to the other opposite. Thus the person who has had the experience of killing will develop the psychological need and the susceptibility for getting killed. In killing another person he has appreciated only one portion of the total situation in which he is a party, namely, the part of killing. The other complementary half of the total situation, namely, the role of being killed, remains for him non-understood and foreign datum, which, nevertheless, has introduced itself in his experience. There thus arises the need to complete experience by attracting on oneself the opposite of that through which one has personally gone, and

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consciousness has a tendency to fulfil this new and pressing need. In the above example of a person who has had the experience of killing, he will soon develop a tendency to get himself killed in order to cover the entire situation by personal experience. The question which crops up here is "who would arise to kill him in the next life?" It may be the same person who in the previous life got killed, or it may be some other person with similar Sanskaras. As a result of action and interaction between individuals, there come into existence Sanskaric links or ties; and when the individual takes a new physical body, it may be among those who have previous Sanskaric ties or among those who have similar Sanskaras. But the adjustment of life is such as to make possible the free play of evolving duality. Like the shuttle of the weaver's loom, the human mind moves within two extremes developing the warp and the LIFE MARCHES woof of the cloth of life. To use ON THROUGH THE a geometrical metaphor, the dev- OPPOSITES TO A elopment of the psychic life is STATE BEYOND best represented not as a THE OPPOSITES straight line but as a zig-zag course. The function of the two banks of the river. If there are no banks there would be dispersion of the waters of the river sideways making it impossible for the river to reach its destination. In the same way the life-force would have dissipated itself in endless

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and innumerable ways, had it not been confined between the two poles of the opposites. But these banks of the river of life are best looked upon not as two parallel lines but as two converging lines which meet at the point of liberation. The amount of oscillation becomes less and less as the individual approaches the goal, and it completely subsides when he realizes it. It is like the movement of the doll which has its centre of gravity at the base, with the result that it has a gradual tendency to become steady in the sitting posture. If it is shaken it continues to swing from one side to another for some time, but the movement covers an increasingly shorter span, and in the end the doll becomes stationary. In the case of cosmic evolution such subsiding of alternation between the opposites means Mahapralaya, and in the case of the of the individual it means Liberation. The step from duality to non-duality is, however, merely a matter of difference in degree. As the two are qualitatively different, the difference between them is in- PLANES OF finite. The former is a not- CONSCIOUSNESS state and the latter is the God state. This infinite difference cons- titutes the abyss between the sixth plane of consciousness and the seventh plane of consciousness. All the lower six planes of consciousness are also separated from each other by a kind of a valley or distance. But though the difference between them is great, it is not infinite, because they are all

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equally subject to the bi-polarity of limited experience, consisting in the alternation between the opposites. The difference between the first plane and the second, the second and the third, and so on up to the sixth plane, is great but not infinite. It follows that strictly speaking none of the six planes of duality can be said to be really nearer to the seventh plane than any others. The difference between any of the six planes and the seventh plane is infinite, just in the same way as the difference between the sixth and the seventh plane is infinite. The progress through the six planes is a progress in imagination. But the realization of the seventh plane is the cessation of imagination, and, therefore, the awakening of the individual into Truth-consciousness. The illusory progress through the six planes cannot, however, be altogether avoided. Imagination has to be completely exhausted before a person can realize the PROGRESS Truth. When a disciple has a Master THROUGH THE he has to cross all the six planes. The PLANES Master may take his disciple through the planes, either with open eyes or under veil. If the disciple is taken under cover and is not conscious of the planes which he is crossing, desires persist till the sixth plane; but if he is taken with open eyes and is conscious of the planes which he is crossing, no desires are left after the fifth plane. If the Master comes for work he often chooses to take his disciples under cover, for he is

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likely to be more actively useful for his work if he is blind-folded than if he is taken with open eyes. The crossing of the planes is throughout characterised by the unwinding of the Sanskaras. This process of unwinding should be carefully distinguished from the spending up. In the process of spending up, the Sanskaras become dynamic and release themselves into action or experience. This does not lead to final emancipation from Sanskaras as the never-ceasing fresh accumulation of Sanskaras more than replaces the Sanskaras which are spent up, and the spending up itself is responsible for further Sanskaras. In the process of the unwinding of the Sanskaras, however, the Sanskaras get weakened and annihilated by the flame of the longing for the Infinite. The longing for the Infinite may be the cause of much spiritual suffering. There is no comparison between the acuteness of ordinary suffering and the poignancy of spiritual suffering which a person has to go through while crossing the planes. The former is the effect of Sanskaras and the latter is the effect of their unwinding. When physical suffering reaches its climax a person becomes unconscious and so gets relief from it; but there is no such automatic relief for spiritual suffering. The spiritual suf- fering, however, does not become boring, because there is also intermingled with it a kind of pleasure. The longing for the Infinite gets accentuated and acute until it arrives at its climax, and then gradually begins to cool down. But while cooling down

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consciousness does not altogether give up the longing for the Infinite, but it continues to stick to the aim of realizing the Infinite. This state of cooled but latent longing is preliminary to the realization of the Infinite. It has at this stage been the instrument of annihilating all other desires, and is itself ready to be quenched by the unfathomable stillness of the Infinite. Before the longing for the Infinite is fulfilled through the realization of the Infinite, consciousness has to pass from the sixth to the seventh plane. It has to pass from THE PEACE duality to non-duality. Instead of REALIZATION wandering in imagination it has to arrive at the ending of imagination. The Master understands the one Reality as being the only Reality and the 'Nothing' as being merely its shadow. For him time is swallowed up in eternity. As he has realized the timeless aspect of Reality, he is beyond time, and holds within his being both the beginning and the end of time. He remains unmoved by the temporal process consisting of the action and interaction of the many. Ordinary man neither knows the beginning nor the end of creation. He is, therefore, overpowered by the march of the events which seem to be beyond his control or com- prehension. They loom large in his estimate because of lack of proper perspective. He is caught up in time. He looks upon everything in terms of possible fulfilment or non-fulfilment of his Sanskaras. He is, therefore, pro- foundly

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disturbed by the happenings of this world. The whole objective universe comes to him as an unwelcome limitation which has either to be overcome or tolerated. The Master, on the other hand, is free from duality and the Sanskaras characteristic of duality. He is, therefore, free from all limitation. The storm and the stress of the universe do not affect his being. All the bustle of the world with its constructive and destructive processes can for him have no special importance, for he has entered into the Sanctuary of Truth which is the abode of that eternal significance which is at best only partially and faintly reflected in the fleeting values of the phanta- smagoria of creation. He comprehends within his being all existence, and looks upon the entire play of manifestation as merely a game.

♦

Follow Love

BY ELIZABETH C. PATTERSON

Love is as you experience it. Love "Holy Grail" lures the soul from pro- varies in degree, and the ultimate final found depths to ever greater heights. state is "union with God". The heart that love has carved deep, can Shri Meher Baba in his 'Sayings' has contain greater love. The bliss of God defined: "True love means the dedica- is a state beyond the dual action of tion of one's self or the complete sur- experiencing love, for it is its very render of one's self to the Beloved. It Source. The final state has been in- seeks the happiness of the Beloved timated by Christ in his words: "My without the least thought of obtaining father and I are one." happiness from the Beloved." Love often stirs the heart through a There is little question but that most little thing in life, and at the same time of us desire love for the sake of our has the possibility to end with the own happiness, at least indirectly. Yet greatest thing in life. As much as we all we might see or pause to consider that desire love, it is rare to find one soul our fountains of inspiration—the great who dares even the thought of its love poems of the ages, the great music ultimate completion, rising above all which throughout all time has inspired duality and play of opposites, to love, the rare expressions in art that become truly one through God- have stimulated the heart of multi- realization. The personification of tudes—would in most instances never Divine Love on is the Sadguru or have been created if the artists had Perfect Master, who is Love, Lover, fulfilled their own earthly happiness. and the Beloved. The background of the artist's life is Mystics of all in every land usually one of unsatisfied longing. It is have sought God with intensity of the very difficulty of the attainment of longing. Fervour is a quality of these true love that, like the ever receding lovers of God. Rare

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among them who arrived at sainthood, when the human listeners turned away that beatific stage where God is seen from his sermon, leaving him all alone, face to face, have left to mankind a rich he preached to the birds of the air, and heritage of inspiration and experience these sensitive feathered creatures were which was their inner life. Churches or irresistibly drawn to him. Even of mosques or temples have claimed their Christ, the Master, we are told by St. remains after passing away, and John: "Many therefore of his disciples, canonized them within the fold, though when they had heard, said, 'This is a during their life-time these ardent, hard saying; who can hear it?' From unbounded saints rarely fitted into the that time many of his disciples went pattern of creeds. Mostly they lived back and walked with him no more." apart and sought God through intimate The greatest of iconoclasts were experience of Divine Love, which never the heretics of the accepted order; overflowed into their everyday living, they were such as Christ, , and could not be circumscribed by Buddha, , Mohomed within convention or formalism. They wanted the of their respective birth, as God more than man. They wanted God from them date the passing of the old more than their very lives. They sought order. The message of love proves ever and found Him through various paths, the great emancipator. New religions but the blessed experience of Divine rose forth though only after these great Love was alike. If it chanced that these living exponents of their own teachings saints possessed the of evangel- had departed from earthly existence. ism, their very fervour and extremity of Even scriptures were set down, oft-time vision drove more people from them by disciples after the Master's mission than ever were turned into followers was finished on earth. No external during their earthly life. Of St. Francis religious form took place during their of Assisi, we are told that his love life time—their own spiritually perfec- embraced all creatures, and one day ted being was the very temple of God. From time to time in the

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history of religions there have been that St. Mark's prediction is near its revivals when man asserted his right to time of fulfilment." But in those days, know God for himself and demanded after the tribulation...then shall they see his own experience uncircumscribed by the Son of man." rights and creeds. No amount of per- "How can we recognize the true secution could dim such fervour, and Messiah?" has been many times asked only when the experience ceased to be of Shri Meher Baba. In a series entitled direct and intimate, did the wave 'Questions and Answers' Shri Baba has subside. replied: "The feeling and inspiration for itself is inspired from the things sublime and Divine Love are living example on earth of God as man. imparted by a real Messiah to anyone God, the abstract, can be worshipped who comes in contact with him. A false from afar, prayed to, meditated or pon- Messiah cannot do this. Through His dered upon; but when Divine Love Divinity the true Messiah gradually awakens the heart the affections be- attracts the world to himself, and the come concentrated and objectified. people come to know and feel that He God, the Beloved, has ever been in the is Real. The knowledge and feeling of form of a Saviour. He, who like Christ confidence in His words and works has become one with God, is God-man. grow gradually into certainty, and Every religion has its man who is not masses follow Him drawn by an only of God, but is God. To the be- irresistible force. A mirage attracts the lievers he is the true manifestation of thirsty, but soon it is discovered to be God on earth. Despite the insistence on an illusion and not the life-giving their own avataric manifestation, these water. A false Messiah may attract the great religions all foretell of the return attention of the people through outward to earth of God as man. The "second appearances, by force of personality, or coming" is a part of every , even to by intellectual dissertations about the more primitive ones. Many Chris- , but he cannot do that which tians, today, are given reason to think the true Messiah can

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do, i.e., arouse the highest ideals in men trials, who no one else's moods or be- and touch the hearts of millions." haviour up-sets, one whose faith is Should we be among those seekers never shaken, one who is cheerful even of Truth who look for, or accept, a new in the jaws of death—such a one only is manifestation of the Divine One on worthy of loving me. earth? How best can we receive and An ancient tale has been related to a serve Him? Following the path of group by Shri Baba which illustrates Divine Love has ever been advocated in love for the Master as the way of attain- scriptures. The way has been expressed ment: "In 's time a Yogi once did by Christ in the words: "A new com- for one hundred years. There mandment I give unto you, that ye love was another man who loved the Master; one another; as I loved you." The he did no penance, no fasting. He only Master drew mankind through his loved Rama. One day the Master went personal example of all compassionate walking in the jungle. The first Yogi love, yet he did not make it easy to opened his eyes and said to him, 'Oh follow him. He enjoined those who Rama, when will I see your formless would follow to "leave all"; Christ said: face?' Rama re-plied, 'In fifty years.' "He that loveth father or mother more The Yogi was frightfully disappointed than me is not worthy of me; and he and said, 'I made penance for one that loveth son or daughter more than hundred years, and I suffered much, me is not worthy of me. And he that and still fifty more years to wait!' The taketh not his cross, and followeth after next day the Master accosted the happy me, is not worthy of me." devotee, and this loving one asked, To follow a Master has ever required 'Oh, Rama, when will I see your complete detachment. Several hundred formless state?' Rama replied, 'After years before Christ, Krishna said words fifty more lives.' The devotee said, 'So in effect: "One who is never affected by soon!' And thereupon he got into such circumstance, one who is calm in all an ecstacy that he died; and as he was dying he saw Rama's

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formless state." Concluding Shri Baba in words; the thought cannot grasp it; added: "Love is the very essence of the mind cannot know it. It is the state Godhood." of the Soul beyond the mind—it can be Shri Baba has declared: "The highest understood only when experienced. I state cannot he explained or expressed can make you experirace it by making you realize it."

♦

THE SAYING OF SHRI MEHER BABA

God There is nothing but God. Only three things are of Real Worth: God, Love, and the Perfect Master. These three are almost one and the same. It is the same One Paramatman or Supreme Soul who is playing the different parts of the Almighty, the Creator (Ishwar), Shivatman, and Jivatman. The Almighty, the Supreme Soul, God, is beyond even the super-conscious state. He is infinite; He is the shoreless ocean of Truth. As Ishwar, He is the creator, preserver, and destroyer of the universe. The individual or ordinary consciousness that has not realized God is finite and limited. The Shivatman or God-realized man knows himself as the Almighty, the One Infinite Ocean of Truth. He has attained the Christ-conscious state. Shivatman is the Sadguru or Perfect Master. He knows that He is in every man (Jivatman) and that every Jivatman is in Him. The Perfect Master is Love, Lover and the Beloved.

♦

My Experiences*

BY CHHOTA BABA One of the Boy Disciples of the Meher

I joined the Meher Ashram Institute imparting spirituality to those of us on the 9th August 1927. For the first who were fit for it. One night, after two and a half months I stayed with the delivering a spiritual scientific dis- grown up disciples of the Master and course, the Master said to me, "Child, could not mix with the boys of the have faith and try your best; I will Meher Ashram proper. But on the 25th make 'gold' of you." These words of my of October I was admitted into the beloved Master produced a great im- Meher Ashram as a student. Besides pression on my mind, quite out of pro- secular instruction, spiritual instruction portion to what one would expect. The was imparted to boys by competent above words were surcharged with teachers, in accordance with the com- spirituality, and they made me rest- mands of Shri Meher Baba. From about less... A great spiritual longing took the middle of November, the Holy possession of me, and every moment of Master Himself began to feed us on my waking state I said to myself, spiritual knowledge. Though we (boys) "When will this dust of myself turn into were not out of our teens, the Master gold?" instilled into our minds great spiritual A great revolution was effected in facts, of which even yogis of the fourth me. Boys and disciples wondered at my cosmic plane are unconscious, intel- changed state. I myself wondered at it. lectually acquainted us more and more Sound sleep I could not get, and all with the Path, and gradually went on relish for any kind of food vanished. One day, in

______*The case of Abdulla or Chhota Baba presents one of the most clear-cut examples of the tremendous influence of Shri Meher Baba upon those who came into contact with him. We here reproduce Hazrat Abdulla's recount of his own experience previously published in the "Meher Message".

MY EXPERIENCE 21

the month of December, while par- of my heart that it made me, so to say, taking of dinner, I felt a sort of great 'mad' for my Beloved. Separation from sensation in my body, from the crown Him made me suffer intensely. I was of my head to the soles of my feet. contented only when I was with Him. Tears rolled down my cheeks, and I This love was Divine Love, a gift from could not restrain myself from crying the Master—the love about which loudly. Everything around seemed to Shams-e-Tabriz says: "Shamsul Hacke whirl and then vanish. My blood Tabriz chn begshood paray ishque, became extremely hot, and heat pierced jibreelle amin ra ze paye kheesh davan my body from inside. Then I swooned. kerd." i.e. "When Shamsul Hacke When I recovered, I saw my beloved Tabriz opened the wings of love, it Master sitting near me. I could not help made the Angel Gabriel run after Him." crying and pressing His lotus feet to my Needless to say that by gaining this eyes. I kissed them now and then. He love, I became entirely free from the calmed me and gave me a cup of milk. snares of worldly Maya. Nothing seem- I could now think of nothing and ed to interest me, net even my exis- nobody but the Master. I simply could tence. It was through the 'Divine Love' not help meditating on him continu- that by the grace of my Beloved Master ously. Even in school hours when I was I was transformed into my present state, apparently reading, my heart was with which only a few in the world my Beloved. Sometimes while medi- experience. One day, in January 1928, tating, I used to see Him with my subtle when the Holy Master was imparting eyes sitting near me, with His right instruction to boys and disciples, I hand on my head. Mere sight of Him, began feeling that I was losing my whether gross or subtle, used to make consciousness, and after blurting out, me weep. By the middle of December, "Oh, Baba," I actually lost it. I became on account of my devotion and constant unconscious of everything except the , such love took possession Divine Form of the Master. For four days I continuously

22 MEHER BABA. JOURNAL

remained unconscious of the gross dream with the reality, take bad for world but conscious of the Master's good, and, forgetting the soul, they Divine Form which I was seeing in my- regard the gross world as the only self. reality. Ignoramuses look at the mirage On the fifth day my gross conscious- and think they are the body which is a ness was restored to me, but with its mere instrument, and not the glorious restoration, the Divine Form of the 'effulgent Self' or Atman. When dis- Master which, be it remembered, has crimination makes its appearance, the nothing to do with his body, did not net of ignorance disappears and the vanish. Since then I began seeing it in Reality is seen through the eyes of everything, in everybody, and enjoying discrimination. Finally, in the words of ineffable spiritual bliss, for which I the sages, I say, "Neither despise any have paid a heavy price. Before I at- being, nor look with contempt on tained to my present blissful state, I had others; but attempt, if ye can, to give all oft read and heard that this gross world a helping hand; for Oneness is the is nothing but Maya. I could not under- secret, and the journey is towards the stand properly why it was called Maya, same goal. Believe in the splendour and but now I see for myself that it is really glory of thine own goal. There is the so. treasure of infinite freedom, power and God is real. Everything else is un- purity; so avoid throwing an evil real. Ignorance is the cause of all mis- thought into the world. Don't think that eries, of scepticism, hatred and egoism. thou art born a bound slave full of All the various kinds of impressions, all impurity, for it is forbidden. Weakness attachments and errors of man have for never existed but strength, darkness their sources ignorance and non-dis- never existed but Light and Love from crimination. Many persons confuse the the beginning and so for ever."

♦

The \/aishnavite Saints of Southern India and their Hagiologi* THE LIFE OF SAINT PERI—AZHVAR BY C. V. SAMPATH AIYANGAR

Our Saint was born in Shri Villi- reigned in those days. He was rich and puttur (Tinnevelly District, Southern he wanted nothing material. But he was India) in a high aristocratic Brahmin very anxious to know the Truth of family. His father was Mukunda, and Moksha (liberation) and the purport of Padma Devi was his mother. Our Saint Vedant (the Knowledge as revealed by was a born one, and was a votary of the the Vedas). He, therefore, summoned One Almighty (). He supplied the learned pandits from all parts of his daily flowers to the god of Shri wide kingdom for a learned discussion Villiputtur, and thus served humanity. on the subject. He said that the victor The story that the Lord Shri Krishna would be suitably rewarded. Many went into a small lane in search of a pandits came to the capital in response flower man illustrates a fact that He is to the King's command. Saint Peri- always mindful of the lowliest of the Azhvar dreamt a dream directing him to lowly; and hence the tenderness of attend the intellectual assembly in the saints' hearts. Kuratt-Azhvar, the saint, Pandyan capital. He went and was once helped a woman of the lowest received with due honour by the King. caste in Shrirangam. The saints always Discussion began. Our Saint opened the serve humanity with the eight mental debate and began thus : flowers. "Great pandits, hear. All the Vedas In Madura, the capital of the appear before me. They are infallible. Pandyan Kings, King Vallabha Deva The letter 'A' is the beginning of all al-

______*Continued from January 1939 issue.

24 MEHER BABA JOURNAL

phabet. Lord Shri Krishna says, that He to God was 'benedictory'. This requires is the letter 'A'. Vishnu is Narayana. He clear explanation. The Saint addressed is the Para-Brahma, the Uncaused Him thus: "Here is my God, the All- Cause from whom all creation flows, knowing, the All-powerful, the All- endures and to whom returns. He who protecting! 0, Beauty Transcendent! aspires for liberation (Moksha) shall, Charm irresistible! Thou art above time therefore, meditate on Him, for He and its changes. Thou art worthy of alone is the Grantor there-of..." Thus he receiving the adorations of the ever- discoursed at length, and the audience seeing immortals." This was his Sage- sat petrified. The King gave him the Mood, where we see the relationship of prize and otherwise rewarded him Protector and protected. Again he munificently. But our Saint was as addressed the Lord thus: "But here modest as ever. Ordinarily, Thou art, in a place under the sway of "Man though a worm, would time; here the changing and passing; yet be great; here the hell compared to Thy Heaven; Though feeble, would seem here where spiritual light is eclipsed. strong; Coming from so high, how mayest Assumes an independent Thou render Thyself patent to our state, senses in an atmosphere reeking with By sacrilege and wrong." the undivine! Love for Thee makes me Saint Nammazhvar himself exclaimed: not to forget myself, Love for Thee does not strike me down senseless. I "Myself, I, not under recover; I rise above that sentiment; for -standing, fear for Thee rises uppermost in my Laboured under 'I' and breast, for Thy safety; the safety for one 'mine'." so worthy in the unworthy land. This But to the Perfect Saint, all things re- fear is more than Love. Love for the mind of God, and such Saints are Beloved begets forgetfulness; but fear on earth. supervenes and keeps me above that It is said that the love our Saint bore drowning flood. Oh, let nothing mar Thy Beauty; let

THE VAISHNAVITE SAINTS OF SOUTHERN INDIA 25

nothing steal Thy Strength; let nothing more perfect, if it were possible, than rob from Thy Glory. Let me bless Thee He really is. Yet what a wild impossibi- thus my God! Let me bless Thee as the lity! But if God's love of His creatures parent, the child." Here in the Saint- is itself so exaggerated, He must let us Mood the relationship of Protector and love Him with the simplicity of these protected has changed places. The Saint fervid exaggerations. Moreover this assumes the character of Benedictor habit of wishing God impossible per- and Protector. This is what is called fections is not only the result of a more "The love of benevolence" by Rev. F. worthy and true appreciation of His W. Faber in his "Creator and Creature". perfection and his Majesty, but it tends He explains it thus: also to produce it, to sustain it, and to "The love of benevolence is one increase it. It is at once the cause and which has been commonly practised by the effect of honourable thoughts of the saints, and often has seemed God. Another while the love of ben- childish, or at least mere poetry, to evolence takes the form of venturesome those who love God less fervently. congratulations. We wish God all the There is a strange pleasure in it from immense joy of His unimaginable per- our putting ourselves in an impossible fections. We know that He possesses it position towards God, in order to without our wishing it. We know that confer it on Him. We make ourselves our wishes cannot swell one drop from as it were His benefactors, instead of the mighty sea of His interior jubi- He being ours. We put ourselves on an lation. But it is an expression of our equality with Him, or even above Him. love, not in words only, but in inward So it seems. Yet in reality this love of sentiment which, in His sight, is an act, benevolence is the fruit of a holy and a meritorious act. We bid Him too deep for words, almost too rejoice. We wish Him countless happy deep for tears. By the love of bene- returns of that internal festival which volence we, first of all, wish God to be He has in His own blissful Self. Or another while, by the

26 MEHER BABA JOURNAL

same love of benevolence, we wish tory were emptied into heaven or that Him all increase of His accidental there were no hell, or that all the glory; and our wish is efficacious heathen were converted, or that all prayer, and obtains for Him a real wanderers might return to the fold, or augmentation of that particular glory. that some one day or night there might The very wish of itself adds to it, and be no mortal sin in all our huge adds immensely when it comes out of a metropolis. All this, which the saints pure heart and fervent spirit. It also have reduced to as many practices as obtains grace of others, and makes the there have been saints to practise it, is cause of God to prosper in the world. the love of benevolence." Sometimes we earnestly desire that He Thus our Saint lived and enjoyed by may have accidental glory which He blessing Him, died love-delirious of the does not receive. We wish that purga- Lord, and attained Moksha.

♦

THE SAYING OF SHRI MEHER BABA

In order to realize God and to gain the original state from which everything emerged, we should follow the creed that accords with our own conscience and stick to that path which best suits our spiritual tendency, our mental attitude, our physical aptitude, and our external surroundings and circumstances.

♦

You Must Believe It By Dr. ABDUL GHANI MUNSIFF

The female Saint Rabia of Basrah, party to join her if possible. This in- famous as half Qalandar in the Sufi vitation to prayers was seldom resisted, lore, lived in the early part of the as the spiritual atmosphere about her century after the Arabian Prophet and unconsciously cowed them into willing was of slave extraction. Slavery was in acquiescence. In the few moments thus vogue at the time, and these slaves were occupied, Rabia, with her divine at the mercy of their masters. powers, used to transform the man A woman brothel-keeper, being spiritually and send him out a saint. struck by Rabia's personal charm and This state of affairs continued for beauty, purchased her for a fat sum, months, and hundreds coining in as hoping she would prove an asset to the sinners went out into the world as establishment. The woman little knew saints. the spiritual state of Rabia who, after In the meanwhile the owner of the the manner of the profession, was made establishment became curious and to sit in the balcony gaily attired and inquisitive. She began to wonder as to made up. why a customer, after having once Rabia as expected didn't belie the visited Rabia, never turned up again, hopes of the establishment, and proved which fact was contrary to her long a star attraction. But the world of experience in the matter. The woman admirers and profiteers outside, were decided to look into the affair and not aware of the spiritual drama that ascertain the cause for herself. One day was daily being enacted in the privacy she kept watch, and after ushering in a of Rabia with her prospective custom- visitor as usual, she began peeping into ers. No sooner a customer found him- Rabia's chamber through a slit in the self alone with her, she would always door. beg permission to offer her prayers a What the prying eyes of the woman few minutes and would even ask the witnessed behind

28 MEHER BABA JOURNAL

doors, made her contrite and awe- very often turn up in the most stricken. She was afraid lest the heinous impossible and u n expected quarters. It crime she was responsible for, be is well known, Hazrat Moosa Sohag of visited upon her in some drastic man- Ahmedabad passed his life amongst ner. Trembling and crying she fell at eunuchs singing and dancing; Hazrat Rabia's feet beseeching forgiveness on Baba Tajuddin of Nagpur passed eigh- the plea of ignorance as to her true teen years in a lunatic asylum, and spiritual state, and declared her free of Poona was per- from slavery from that day. petually surrounded by drunkards and Rabia regretted her interference, opium and ganja (Indian hemp) saying, " You fool of a woman, why smokers. were you so inquisitive? Your inter- Such deliberately accepted external ference has cut off my spiritual current surroundings and life by saints is very to the world today." often a smoke screen which keeps off The above spiritual episode in the the world from noticing them, thereby life of St. Rabia, is an instance, helping those not already perfect to amongst many, of spiritual beings pursue their spiritual progress unham- resorting to strange and peculiar ways pered, and the perfect ones this way and means of imparting spirituality to shield themselves against undesirables. different strata of humanity. They never No wonder, the world refuses to see or cease dispensing spirituality in what- acknowledge high spirituality under ever circumstances they are placed; such circumstances and surroundings, nay, they even deliberately create or and consequently deny to themselves invite such compromising situations the light of spiritual knowledge. whereby their object of approaching the When the great Sufi Abu Saeed Abul eligibles and keeping off the ineligibles Khair was told by people that 'men of is achieved or rendered easy. One can God' must be found in mosques only, never tell in what conditions of life he replied, "No, they are also to be saintly personages can be found. They found in the under-world. Look for them in all guises."

♦

Hazrat Babajan of Poona

By Dr. ABDUL GHANI MUNSIFF

Hazrat Babajan, in the history of If there be at all any meaning in this spiritual , is the second manifes- fantastic , it is surely fulfilled in tation of Divinity on earth, in the the manifestation of Hazrat Babajan, female form, after the famous Rabia of though not in the material sense, Basrah. This does not mean there have visualised above. Hazrat Babajan's in- been no other spiritually enlightened carnation synchronises with the end of women in between that period. But it is a previous order of things in the a fact that there have been none in spiritual evolution of the world and the history or within living memory who beginning of the Qalandari Era (Daore- can be said to approach Hazrat Babajan Qalandari). of Poona in spiritual greatness. What is Qalandari Era? It will get A tradition is current amongst automatically explained by the fol- Muslim Sufis of the Qalandariyah* lowing parable recounted by a saint, in order, that the world up to now has seen answer to a question by a disciple as to only two and a half Qalandars; by half the difference in the spirituality of they evidently mean Rabia of Basrah, Masters like Moulana Rumi, Fari- being female. There is also a mystical duddin Attar and Buali Qalandar. The explanation given for the incomplete Saint said, "A woman was drawing numerical figure two and a half. They water at a well, and three travellers believe that the completion of three feeling thirsty approached her for water Qalandari manifestations on earth, to drink. The first one said, 'Mother, would precipitate the end of the world. give me water to drink.' The woman was evidently flattered by the mode

______*Qalandariyah is an order of Sufis founded by Syed Hayat Mir Qalandar known characterktically for its utter disregard of external law (Shariat) and for the utterance of gnosis, shocking to orthodoxy.

30 MEHER BABA JOURNAL

of his address, and feeling it an act of therefore, one finds a reasonable inter- virtue, was too pleased to help him pretation of the legend as to three quench his thirst. The second one Qalandars on earth signifying the end accosted her thus, 'Wife of my father, of the world. Surely the old world of feed me a little water.' The woman, ideas and beliefs, particularly in the with an effort, concealed her dis- domain of religion, is dying, and every- pleasure and allowed him a drink. The one is anxiously expectant as to what third traveller was downright informal, next it will be replaced by. The and invited the wrath of the woman by churches of all denominations have his unguarded mode of address. The ceased to be the magnetic centres of Saint further added, "This explains the human lives and the priests and pandits difference in spirituality of the Masters have come to be looked upon as fos- mentioned by you. Moulana Rumi, ap- silized growths still clinging to the peals to the church of Islam for deliver- walls thereto. The present intellectual ing the knowledge of Divinity (Taohid) level of man and the concomitant clothed in parables. Fariduddin Attar, is irreligiosity demands a different ap- outspoken, and his gnosis (Man) is proach to spiritual knowledge than shocking to the externelists (Able- offered by the church. Spiritual truths Zahir), while Buali Qalandar is blat- hitherto scrupulously guarded, directly antly bold in his exposition of Divinity imparted to a select few and doled out and naturally offends both the church to the world at large in the form of 'Do and the Sufi." Here the third traveller and Don'ts' can no longer be withheld bespeaks the Qalandari Era, the charac- from being made accessible to all. The teristic feature whereof will he the of the few and the mystery universal dissemination of spiritual to many, concerning Divinity, prophet- truths and Divine secrets, however hood, saintliness, creation, evolution, unpalatable they may be to traditionally time and space these days is an open vested interests. In Hazrat Babajan, book for all who care to read. The im- mediate future

HAZRAT BABAJAN 31

visualizes every item of humanity, training was that befitting the status of possessing intellectually the knowledge an Afghan aristocrat. At a very early of its Divine origin, its present evolu- age she became -e- (one tionary stage and its spiritual future. who learns Quran by heart), and later The knowledge of his glorious begin- became conversant with , Per- ning and the transcendental end of man sian, Pushtoo and . From early life will impel everyone to say 'I am God', she developed mystical tendencies, and but the consciousness of crucification unlike girls of her age, she used to pass implied in the utterance will prevent a a good deal of her time in prayers, premature expression. This is what is meditation and solitude. meant by Daore-Oalandari—the gar- This mystical aspect in her asserted ment of religion turned inside out. itself, as when coming of age, she was The following life-sketch of Hazrat found to be dead-set against any idea of Babajan is the most authenticated ver- marriage. The parents could not under- sion as yet presented to the world, stand her and to them the idea of a although the information gleaned from Pathan girl remaining unmarried was different sources is meagre, since Baba- extremely scandalous. Finding the jan herself was never communicative to situation no longer tenable and the anyone with regard to her life history. parents bent upon forcing the issue of The facts of her early life and those matrimony on her, Gul-rukh managed relating to her spiritual career have all to escape and came to (India) been confirmed by Hazrat Meher Baba, and thence to . For a Pathan her chief disciple and spiritual Charge- girl brought up under the strictest man ( Khalifa ). discipline of the system, the Hazrat Babajan hails from Afghan- escape from parental custody at the age istan (Central Asia) and was the of 18 years, was not an easy under- daughter of a well-to-do Afghan of taking. Surely it was her spiritual noble lineage. Her maiden name was destiny that covered up all her tracks Gul-rukh (rose-faced) and her early and landed her safely in India un- scathed

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and undetected. Hereafter for Gul-rukh begins a long At Rawalpindi, Gul-rukh lead an as- trail of journeys from one part of India cetic life for some years, and eventually to another. In one of her itineraries she came into contact with a Hindu Saint, visits Bombay, and after a few months who first initiated her into the Spiritual stay in Bombay, goes back once again Path. After this initiation she went into to the , and spends a good seclusion in a nearby mountain outside number of years at different places in Rawalpindi and underwent very severe Northern India. It was at this time that Riyaz (spiritual austerities) for nearly she happened to utter in a moment of seventeen months. Thereafter she came ecstacy, words connoting her Divine down to the Punjab and stayed a few state. This was treated as rank blas- months in . It was in Multan, phemy by orthodoxy, who, with the while Gul-rukh was 37 years of age, connivance of the church, got her that she contacted a Muslim Saint—a buried alive. Gul-rukh miraculously Majzoob (immersed in Divinity) who survived this ordeal, and finding the put an end to her spiritual struggle by country unsafe for her she bade good giving her God-realization. Gul-rukh bye to the Punjab and Northern India once again wends her way to Rawal- for ever. She travelled South to Bom- pindi, and there she is again spiritually bay, and in this, her second visit to the drawn to the same Hindu Saint, res- City, she took up her abode in a locality ponsible for her first initiation. The known as Choona Bhatti near Byculla. Saint helps her to come down from the Bombay, however, was not to be super-conscious state of God-realiza- graced by her presence for long, and the tion to the normal consciousness of a enviable honour of manifesting Gul- . In the language of Sufis, rukh's spiritual greatness goes to Poona, the super-conscious state of God- situated 120 miles south-east of Bom- realization is called Mushahida and the bay. It was in Poona, that the Sepoys of return to normal consciousness is called the Baluchi Regiment which had only Irfan. recently

HAZRAT BABAJAN 33

arrived from the North and who knew smoking bidis (Indian cigarettes). Her that Gul-rukh was buried and dead, had bodily requirements were very few, and a surprise of their life to find her all food she ate very sparingly at long in- alive and seated underneath a neem tervals. She was very fond of tea which (margosa) tree at a place called was offered her very frequently by Malcolm Tank (Char Bavadi) in Can- visitors. While walking the streets, on tonment limits. The Baluchi Sepoys whomsoever her eyes fell, that person looked upon this as a great , and could not but halt or stand up rever- thus feeling convinced of her spiritual entially until she passed by. The tea greatness, gave Gul-rukh an ovation, by shop-wallas and fruit sellers would bowing to her reverentially. After this expectantly invite her to help herself to incident her saintly fame spread far and anything she liked; if perchance she wide, and she came to be universally condescended to accept anything, that known as Hazrat Babajan. was deemed a great honour and an For some time after her entry into auspicious token of good business for Poona about the year 1903, Babajan the day. had no fixed place of abode. She was An unsettled life of some years in seen sitting or resting at odd places, in and around Poona, sees Babajan at last different parts of the City and Canton- settled at a spot near Char Bavadi, Mal- ment. Although shabbily dressed, there colm Tank, underneath the neem (mar- was something magnetic in her person- gosa) tree. At this time the locality ality, very unusual in a street mendicant mentioned was a picture of dirt, deso- that she looked, that no passer-by could lation and ugliness, a breeding spot of resist giving her a second glance. She plague and pestilence and a regular was seldom seen moving about or haunt of dangerous riff-raffs by night. sitting anywhere all alone. There were In such surroundings full of squalor and always a few people loitering round dirt, protected merely by an apology of eyeing her curiously or sitting with her a shelter, improvised of gunny cloth, Babajan unconcernedly

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goes through all the inclemencies of the By now Babajan's fame as a Saint had Indian weather and seasons, presenting spread far and wide and 'Char Bavadi' a perfect embodiment of resignation became a place of for and self-abnegation (Tasleem-o-Raza). people from all over India. Backed by Within a decade of Babajan's presence, public opinion a few elected members the locality underwent a metamorphosis of the Cantonment Board successfully surpassing all expectations. What with prevailed upon that body to build at the featural changes in buildings all their expense a decent and permanent around, the electrified tea-shops ringing structure, in place of Babajan's shabby with the clatter of cups and saucers, a shelter. When the new structure which concourse of people consisting of all was only a few feet away from ranks and creeds waiting for Babajan's Babajan's original seat was ready, to darshana, a street bard entertaining the everyone's surprise she refused to be crowd with his music, the beggars moved there. The awkward situation clamouring for alms, easy-going idlers however was got over by extending the standing indiscriminately hampering structure a little more so as to include vehicular traffic and the whole and embrace Babajan's original seat, as atmosphere heavily laden with sweet well as the neem tree. smelling incense perpetually kept burn- Years rolled by, seasons kept rota- ing near Babajan, presented a scene ting, the locality put on a new face, the typically Eastern, leaving an indelible number of devotees multiplied beyond impression on one's memory. all computation, but throughout all this The Cantonment authorities became kaleidoscopic evolution, Hazrat Baba- alive to the situation, and had it been jan remained unperturbed and unaf- possible they would unhesitatingly fected. have had Babajan shifted to some out When Babajan first came to Poona of the way spot. But they dared not risk people surmised her age to be not less a public demonstration in the matter. than 90 years, and thereafter even 30 years added to her life in the City

HAZRAT BABAJAN 35

wrought no material changes in her human beings enjoy as sleep. Irregular personality. Short in stature, firm and scanty meals and frequent potions of agile in gait, back slightly bent with Indian tea, would surely have shattered rounded shoulders, skin fair and sun- any robust constitution, but Babajan, in burnt, face broad and heavily wrinkled, spite of her age, felt no adverse effects high cheek bones, liquid blue eyes pos- there-from. One day she would feel out sessing great depths, head covered with of sorts, at times even high fever, and a silvery crown of thick white hair the next day she would be her usual self hanging loose up to the shoulders, deep without recourse to any medication. sonorous voice, all conspired to make Young and old, male or female she her personality very unique and un- used to address everyone as Bacha or worldly. Her attire was simple, con- Baba (child or baby). And if anybody sisting of a long apron extending below accosted her as Mai (mother), she the knees, a pyjama narrowed round the would flare up and say, "I am a man legs and a linen scarf thrown carelessly and not a woman," thereby confirming round the shoulders. She always went one of the sayings of Prophet Moho- about bare-headed; the luxuriant crop med, meaning, "Lovers of God are of white hair—never oiled or groom- males; lovers of paradise are eunuchs; ed—was for all practical purposes a and lovers of the world are females." head-dress in itself. Her method of healing was quite Numerous are attributed to unique and entertaining. When anyone Hazrat Babajan, but for want of space approached her for a cure, she would they shall be recounted later in this say, "The child is being tormented by Journal. However, some of her charac- goliyan (small round pellets), meaning teristic habits (Khirge-adat) need thereby the effect of Antal—Sans- mention here. Babajan slept very little, karas—here wrong actions. To the and the apparent bodily relaxation of amusement of those around, she would Perfect Saints is nothing like what hold between her fingers, the painful or diseased part of the person concerned,

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and calling upon some imaginary opportunity, an unknown person being, she would give two or three snatched away the bangles so very sharp jerks to the affected part, roughly that it gave her wrist a nasty simultaneously ordering the trouble- cut which bled profusely. The cry of some entity to quit. Surprisingly "catch the thief" was raised by people enough, this funny operation would around, and a policeman on duty impart instantaneous relief, and the approached the scene. To the discomfit party concerned would depart smiling of every one around, Babajan ignored and happy. the real culprit, and asked the police- Babajan's love and charity towards man to arrest those around calling for humanity was supremely Divine in thief. An idea can be had of her super- expression; it could not but reclaim a physical state when the act of eating most confirmed sinner and subdue the was described by her as Jodna cruelest of minds. Articles of clothing (patchwork to the body); and the atten- and other presentations to Babajan, dants (majawar) also, when reminding people would remove without her her of food, would address her in that permission, and her seat being open to sense. the road some would even dare to steal, A regular visitor to Hazrat Babajan feeling convinced she would not could never miss hearing her constant protest. Once a man tried to steal a mutterings to herself, worded some- costly shawl covering her body while what like this : "Vermins are troubling asleep, but he found its removal rather me incessantly, I sweep them away, but risky, as some portion of it was held still they keep on gathering." Simul- underneath her body. Babajan instinc- taneous with these mutterings, unintel- tively raised herself bodily a little, ligible to listeners, she would keep on thereby helping the thief to achieve the moving the palms of the hand all over purpose. On another occasion a person her body, as if removing dust or cob- from Bombay, in token of his fulfilled webs. desire, placed two bangles of solid gold Hazrat Meher Baba, when question- round Babajan's wrists. At the earliest ed as to the meaning

HAZRAT BABAJAN 37

and significance of the above meaning- spiritual Amal to the world than what less utterances and the almost constant they destroy. Hence it is that living movement of the hands, gave the Saints are a blessing and mercy to the following illuminating explanation: world, whether one knows it or not." "Annihilation of all Amal (actions) This condition (hala) in Saints is the good and bad, means Najat (salvation) aspect of Divine love and beauty and Babajan being God-realized was (Shane-jamal). much above the state of salvation. She Hazrat Babajan often times when the not only had no Amal (actions) to aspect of Divine glory (Shane—fatal) account for, but was in a position to possessed her, used to rave and grum- destroy the Antals of others. The phy- ble in the following strain: "Why do sical body of a Saint like Babajan, you torment my children; nay you even when working on the earthly plane after kill them. They have done no wrong to Realization, becomes the focal point to you. Do I not feed you, and clothe you? which myriads and myriads of Amal of What is it you lack? And still you per- the universe get attracted, and getting petrate all these atrocities on them. purified in the furnace of Divinity, i.e., What have I done to merit all this?" the body of the Saint, they go out again Words conveying this sense have been into the universe as spiritual Amal. frequently heard from Babajan and Take for instance the white ants which, naturally they gave rise to some guess- you know, have a tremendous power of work on the part of the hearers, who in- multiplying. The queen of the white terpreted the words to mean that ants, a fat round bulky creature about Babajan was remembering and be- three to four inches in length, feeds moaning the loss of her children who upon its on kind, the smaller ants. But perhaps were cruelly dealt with by her the queen procreates much more than people. what she consumes. Likewise perfect Hazrat Meher Baba, when ques- Saints like Babajan give out more tioned on the point, explained: " There can be nothing further from truth; Babajan

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was never married and had no children. when Gnosis predominates he is a By children, she evidently meant the Salik. Babajan had both these aspects in Saints of the time (Awliyae—waqt), her equally balanced, and hence she who are misunderstood, vilified and was the Salik—Majzoob of the time, persecuted by the churches of all possessing all the characteristics of a denominations, unmindful of the cir- Qalandar. cumstances of which they are the Hazrat Babajan, like all Qutubs outcome. Babajan was equally con- (Perfect Masters), had a circle of twelve cerned with the enlightened and the disciples and the spiritual chargeman ignorant, and hence her reference to there-of is Hazrat Meher Baba of feeding and clothing of the latter. She "Meherabad" (District Ahmednagar). was as much for the material well-being She stood in the unique position of a of the world at large, as for the spiri- mother (the store house of spirituality) tuality of the godly few whom she cal- to all the Saints of the time. led her children." Once a complained that Baba Hazrat Babajan's spiritual status in Tajuddin's durbar was more lavish and the hierarchy of Saints is that of Qutub. free in providing worldly amenities Literally the word Qutub means a peg than hers; Babajan retorted by saying, or a pin, and a Qutub functioning on "What can Tajuddin give? He gives the physical plane is the hub round what I give Him." This incident is signi- which the universe revolves. Babajan's ficantly eloquent of Babajan's relation- subjective experience (halat) of Gnosis ship with Saints referred to above. (Irfan), would be described by Sufis as After a spiritual sojourn of about 35 that of Salik—Majzoob. After God- years in Poona, Hazrat Babajan left her realization one returning to normal mortal coil on 21st September 1931 at consciousness is possessed both of the ripe old age of 125 years. Her Divinity and Gnosis (Haqiqat and funeral procession was a tremendous Marefat). When Divinity is uppermost affair, never accorded to any dignitary in him he is called a Majzoob, and or royalty in the annals of Poona. Her remains were laid at rest

HAZRAT BABAJAN 39

at the very spot* underneath the neem "Cycles change, the tree where she sat and dispensed Divine worlds rotate, Grace for such a long number of years, But Qutubs ne'er their thus confirming the Sufi belief, that: seat vacate."

♦

THE SAYING OF SHRI MEHER BABA

Beware of , not only because it is hydra-headed, but because it is deceptive. So deceptive is it that, more often than not, it puts on the apparel of humility.

______*The beautiful shrine in marble stone is built out of a fund of Rs. 4,000/-provided by Hazrat Meher Baba and held in Trust on his behalf by a Muslim Society "The Anjuman-e.Khuddam-e-Ahle-Sunnatul Jamat, Poona."

St. Teresa of Spain* Adapted by WILL BACETT (London)

Inspiring and wonderful as is the record gress, due to the Sanskaras which pre- of such experience, the world today vent proper appreciation of the One may receive another presentation of the Infinite Whole. "Will of the Lord" to which Teresa A God-realized person is able to treat gave up her being. This age of mental the whole position differently, and activity and scientific discovery reveals explain, and more important still, live the law of "Cause and Effect" in new in the full consciousness demonstrating light, and it seems to daze some, the Truth of Man's Infinite Eternal concealing the Truth enshrined in the Existence and identity with the All. Church. Cause and Effect, that law of In treating of the journey of the Soul , is equally a presentation of the through Creation to the Oversoul, Shri Will of God, but as we are within its Meher Baba puts the position clearly: operation, it is difficult to realize it in "Here one might ask whether God- perspective, seeing that the instrument realization means any real advantage to of understanding, the mind, would be the Soul, and the question can best he required to transcend the very limi- answered by understanding the distinc- tations it itself has brought about. It is tion between two types of advantages. the mind that creates the illusion that The first consists in getting what we do the phenomenal world is real. Rather is not previously possess, and the second that world a school of experience type of advantage consists in realizing whereby the process of understanding fully what we really are...The soul who proceeding from the infinitesimal to the is not God-realized experiences itself as infinite, must learn to reject those inter- being finite, and is constantly troubled mediate conclusions which clog its pro- by the opposition of

______*Continued from January 1939 issue.

ST. TERESA OF SPAIN 41

fleeting joys and sorrows, but the soul iant Soul."† who is God-realized knows himself to "There is no progress on the spiritual be Infinite and experiences the infinite path without suffering.* Teresa's life as Bliss and Knowledge of God.* a practical reformer of the Carmelite The life of devotion that Teresa Order, to which she restored the ori- exemplified, she combined with Karma ginal rule of enclosure, had as its object Yoga. She writes: "That prayer is most the establishment of centres of prayer acceptable which leaves the best re- and holy living, so to permeate the life sults...in actions. That is true prayer, of the Nation. She "looked out on the not certain gusts of softness and feeling farce of this life, so ill-ordered"† and and nothing more...I count that to be a saw a country just freed from the good prayer that leaves me more domination of the Moors, revealing in humble, even if it is still with great its over-seas treasures to which Colum- temptations, tribulations, aridities. For bus had led its adventurous spirits, and it must never be thought that because a in the van of European prosperity, man has much suffering, therefore he creating in art and literature and the cannot have prayed acceptably. His crafts and heritage for succeeding suffering is as incense set before generations. This material progress was God..."† Today we can feel her serene shared by the Church, and wealth and spirit hovering over her suffering territory had accrued to its establish- country, and sustaining her people as ments, so that abbots and abbesses she did three and a half centuries ago... controlled wide lands, often living in repeating the words she then wrote to great state and exercising civil as well those in trouble who appealed to her : " as religious authority. Knights and men Our Lord seems treating you like a val- at arms and the great ladies thronged their halls which resembled the

______*Quotation from Shri Meher Baba's "Journey of the Soul through Creation to the Oversoul ". †Extract from "Autobiography of St. Teresa"

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King's own palace in pomp and splen- must have cleared many obstacles mak- dour, and true spirituality languished. ing foes into friends. The more physical difficulties she had It was the occasion of her installation to face were tremendous. Travelling, as Prioress of the "Incarnation" to especially for an aged and ailing which the nuns were opposed. The woman, over the rough paths on foot or latter surged into the Chapter Room, in small tented donkey carts, (for roads only to see in the usual seat of the were few), the primitive accommoda- Prioress, the statue of the Virgin, tion at the inns, when available, ex- holding the keys of the Convent, and posure to the elements, and lack of with Teresa at her feet seated. Thus provision for the essentials at the disarmed, they listened in silence to her journey's end, as well as the rule of words: poverty she enjoined, were met by her "Ladies, Mothers and my Sisters, our in the spirit of a crusader to whom Lord has sent me to this House to every obstacle became a sign of her undertake this post, by reason of my Lord's test for her faith. Thus she obedience, one which I as little ex- sustained the failing spirit of her com- pected as deserved. This election has panions. The opposition from within given me great distress, not only be- the Church, from high dignitaries as cause it has forced duties upon me well as the nuns who opposed the which I may not be able to fulfill, but stricter rule, and others together with also because it has deprived you of the difficulties from City Authorities, lack control which you possessed over your of funds, would have been insuperable, own elections, and given you a Prioress but she lived in the faith that she was against your will. I come only to serve but carrying out a higher Will, and you and to minister to your pleasure, as finally succeeded where even Popes far as I am able. And to this end I hope had failed previously. Her humility and the Lord will help me greatly. For as to tact and the complete absence of the rest, any one of you can teach and egotism which the following disclose, reform me. For that reason, I consider, my ladies, that what I can do for

ST. TERESA OF SPAIN 43

each of you, I will do it willingly, even and without." By her gentle humour, to the shedding of blood and giving up she dispelled over-seriousness. "Let my life. ...My desire is that we should each one give us the benefit of her all serve the Lord with suavity." intelligence today," she would say at re- She took a journey, at the age of 67, creation, "no one has too much." to make her last foundation, despite To an introspective fellow Prioress, fever and the floods which had washed sick in body and mind, she writes away bridges. Plunging into a stream, forcefully: "If you would sometimes she called out to her nuns: "Now then, believe what I say, we should avoid a my daughters, what greater privilege do great deal of trouble...Take no notice of you desire than to become martyrs for the interior troubles you mention...The the Love of God ?"* greater they are the more you ought to Ever a real mother of souls whose despise them...For the love of God, get zeal inspired her nuns, she also knew well, eat enough and be not too much the value of relaxation, and the nuns alone or think much. Occupy yourself often gathered round her, spinning, with what you can and how you can. I sometimes singing Teresa's own bright wish I were with you. I should have a and happy verses on episodes in con- number of amusing tales to tell you." vent life, while those who could, would Wrote to a novice in trouble: "What accompany on the pipe, drum, tambour- tempts your reverence to think you are ine or castinet. When they complained making no progress will on the contrary that domestic duties kept them from be of the greatest benefit to you as time devotions, she would say: "Be not will show. God is treating you as one discouraged, my children, for if obed- who dwells in his palace...Let Him do ience employs you in outward things, as He wills with your soul as His know that even if you are in the bride...The novelty of the life and its kitchen, our Lord moves amidst the practices may seem to have destroyed pots and pans helping us both within your peace... Later all blessings will come together...Glory in helping God

______*Extract from "Autobiography of St. Teresa".

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to bear the Cross and do not be eager to commit to writing for the eye of for delights. Mercenaries are paid day another, the inner experience of her by day. Serve without pay as nobles sensitized nature. But she was ever fight for an earthly king and may the obedient to the Church and its King of Heaven be with you.* discipline. Like others, she knew loneliness of She records how she had to combat soul, and would turn for solace to the for 20 years the natural pleasure she Psalms, for she loved King David, derived from mixing with her fellows another saint of earlier age. In the in the Convent parlour, to which came 102nd Psalm she would read: "I have those outside, as the Convent did not watched and become as a sparrow alone belong to an enolosed order. By all on the house-top. How much greater ordinary standards, there would be no my comfort when these persons were need to struggle against a practice such as David...The soul is then, so I sanctioned by the rules. But Teresa felt think, not in itself but in the house- that her whole life must be devoted to top...above itself and above all created her God, and she struggled until she things; for it seems to me to have its attained that fixity of purpose: dwelling higher than in the highest part "Let nothing disturb thee, of itself."† Nothing affright thee, Her writings in the language of the All things are passing, people, on inner spiritual experience, God never faileth. brought her into some disfavour with Patient endurance the Inquisition, who retained her attaineth to all things. Autobiography for some years, Who God possesseth ultimately releasing. Written at the In nothing is wanting command of her spiritual superiors in Alone God sufficeth…." the Church, it cost her much suffering "Teresa of ."

♦ ______* "Mirrors of Holiness " by Lucy Menzies (1928). † Extract from " Autobiography of St. Teresa."

Spiritual Anecdote By DR. ABDUL GHANI MUNSIFF

Once there was a famous King, by could not understand. Finally he fell at name Janak, who was also a Sadguru. the feet of the guard and asked him to Outwardly he was a great monarch. He explain the meaning of the King's mes- never let it be known generally that he sage. The watchman explained it: was a Sadguru. Only those who could "Drop your 'I'," he said, "throw it off recognize him inwardly knew him to be and say, 'your slave has come to see such. you.' Keep your 'I' aside." This the man In his kingdom there was a man who did, and the King allowed him to enter. had an intense spiritual longing. He was He found Janak fully attired in his royal as restless as a fish out of water. He robes, with his crown upon his head, could not sleep, he could not eat, he seated with his courtiers at a state had grown very lean; but still he had an banquet with much merry-making go- ego. He attempted to see Janak, but the ing on about him. The man who, be- guard would not let him. The King, cause of his spiritual advancement, had however, heard him, and asked from gone for so long without food and inside the palace, "What do you want?" sleep, thought, at the sight of the luxury The man told the guard, "Tell the King about him, 'How can Janak who is that I am so and so, and I have come to dwelling in the midst of such enjoy- see him." Again Janak heard him from ment be a Sadguru?' Janak, who read inside, and called out to him: "Come his thoughts, ordered a cup of milk and when you have left yourself behind." filled it to the brim. Then he called his The man could not understand. He ministers and ordered that throughout repeated who he was, and why he had the town a great celebration should be come. Once more Janak replied: "Leave held, with music, drums and merry- yourself behind and then come." Still he making everywhere. After this, he

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called for two executioners. When they on. But the man's mind was so concen- arrived, he turned to the man, handed trated on the cup of milk that he did not him the cup full of milk, and ordered know what was going on around him. him to carry it through the town with- He did not even hear the noise. out spilling any of it. "If you spill as Finally, they returned to the palace. much as one drop," he said, "these two The King asked the executioners if the executioners will cut your head off at man had spilled any milk. They said once," and he ordered the executioners not. Then he asked the man, "What did accordingly. you see all around you?" The man So they set out, the man with the cup replied, "I saw nothing, I heard nothing, of milk, and the two executioners, one I saw only the cup of milk." Then the on his right and one on his left. King said, "So am I all the time en- Through the town they made their way, grossed in the Infinite, and pay no and all around them there were crowds attention to outer things." of people celebrating. Bands were play- Later the King became known as a ing, drums were beating, people were Sadguru and made this man realize shouting, noises of all kinds were going God. The King, who was a Sadguru, revealed himself as a Sadguru.

♦

The Significance of Love in Human Life By DR. C. D. DESHMUKH, M.A., Ph.D.

"Thou knowest, love, I know that thou dost know That I am here more near to thee be, And knowest that I know thou knowest me; What means it then that we are sundered so?

If they are true, these hopes that from thee flow, If it is real, this sweet expectancy, Break down the wall that stands 'twixt me and thee; For pain in prison pent hath double woe.

Because in thee I love, O my loved Lord, What thou best lovest, be not therefore stern: Souls burn for souls, spirits to spirits cry I seek the splendor in thy face stored; Yet living man that beauty scarce can learn, And he who fain would find it, first must die." —Michelangelo Buonarroti (Translated by J. A Symonds)

Love is of two kinds, human and to the surface and converted in a rat- Divine; and human love in its turn may ional philosophy. Michelangelo's poem be conscious or unconscious. At the quoted above is a splendid example of unconscious state human love is felt as an exalted human love which has a powerful attraction which never- become articulate. It expresses in ex- theless remains inarticulate and does quisite manner the pangs and the hopes not know its own true status, function of human love which is beginning to be or significance, whereas at the con- conscious of the conditions of its frui- scious stage it is illumined by the tion. We have in it human love which is knowledge of its own nature and limi- irrevocably implemented by the under- tations, since its hidden implications standing born of itself, and which is are all made explicit by being brought poignantly

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aware of its destiny and keenly sens- pect of mental happenings which are itive to its own limitation of duality. essentially forward-looking and purpo- Divine Love, on the other hand, as sive. Mental happenings like the ex- revealed in a perfect Master like Shri perience of love have therefore to be Meher Baba, is the expression of understood through the other method infinity which has become fully which interprets the lower values in conscious of itself. terms of the higher values, and which Love thus has many stages, and centres its attention on the ultimate goal might for certain purposes be looked which is being progressively attained upon as a progressive stream ultimately through all mental happenings. If it is pouring itself in that ocean of love right to think of man as an evolved which is God. There are two ways of animal, it is equally right to think of trying to understand the different stages him as a God-man in the making: and if of love. One is the attempt to explain it is right to look upon human love as a love by reference to the psychic factors transformation of sex or ego-centric which have been operative in the past. tendencies, it is equally right to look This psycho-genetic point of view tries upon it as a reflection of Divinity. The to interpret the higher values in terms results of the application of the first of lower values. The modern school of method have therefore to be accepted as psychoanalysis represents one such being only partially true, and must be attempt. The other more important and supplemented and even superceded by more fruitful way of trying to under- the results of the second method. stand human values is to determine As the higher forms of love are a their significance in the light of the fuller reflection of the Truth than the many anticipations of the future. The lower forms of love, it is not possible first method of envisaging the question for us to understand the higher forms of is akin to the method followed by the love by means of our ideas concerning natural sciences; but it is for that very the lower forms of love, whereas it is reason not sufficiently adequate in res- possible for us to understand the lower

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF LOVE IN HUMAN LIFE 49

forms of love by means of our ideas his own potentialities for the future. concerning the higher forms of love. If we take, as it were, a cross-section The higher forms of love include within of human love, and analyse the total them all the really valuable elements in psychic context in which it appears, we the lower forms of love, but the lower cannot fail to notice that human love is forms of love do not contain the valu- often accompanied by various limiting able elements which are present in the factors like pride, selfishness, pos- higher forms of love. Hence a person sessiveness, desire, jealousy, anxiety, who is not evolved spiritually cannot worry, etc. Love cannot take towings completely understand the entire signif- and soar freely in the infinite sky of icance of the love of a more highly consciousness, because it is held up by evolved person. If he tries to under- these strings of ignorance born of stand it, he has to depend mostly upon separative tendencies. In fact, modern his own experience which falls short of psychoanalysis seems to emphasize that what he is trying to understand, and in most cases of love there is also therefore his understanding of the lurking in the unconscious an element higher form of love remains imperfect. of hate which comes to the surface It is for this reason that Divine Love is occasionally. This love-hate attitude unfathomable for all who are still in the has been called ambivalence. stage of struggling with their limi- Psychoanalysis for the most part ac- tations. But a person who is eternally cepts hate as an inevitable counterpart dwelling in the Divine Love has full of love, but this view does not do full comprehension of the human heart justice to the expulsive and purifying where the tree of love is still growing: power of love. Love is the most and this comprehension is unparalleled dynamic power which purges human even by the comprehension which a consciousness of all the grosser ele- limited person can have of himself, ments. A really sincere and intense love since he cannot have real insight into not only represses hate but roots it out. In fact it annihilates

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in the long run all ego-consciousness less. For example, hate which is usually which is the very foundation of its looked upon as essentially opposed to limiting factors like pride, selfishness, love is itself like love in being in- possessiveness, desire, jealousy, anxi- tolerant of the separate existence of the ety, or hate. Just as the moth drawn by other. Hate is an attempt to overcome the irresistible attraction of the flame duality by subordinating or annihilating enters it even at the cost of getting itself the other to which the self is opposed; consumed, the lover who is drawn by and love is an attempt to overcome the fascination of the experience of love duality by losing the self in the life of gets merged in it even at the cost of the beloved. So hate which is the limi- surrendering its separative existence. tation of love nevertheless accepts in its The complex psychic context in own way the objective of love, and thus which love appears need not however confirms its own provisional character be looked upon as a merely negative and the supremacy of love and its right factor making no contribution to the to infinity. Hate (and its correlates) development of love. We might as well might be said to be the negative side of look upon the soil in which the seed incomplete love, and it has no being or lodges itself as being nothing but an finality in itself. In fact, it has often encumbrance to the development of the been looked upon as a form of love plant. Just as a plant cannot grow itself. It has been called Virodh Bhakti without struggling through the enclos- (i.e., love expressing itself as hate). ing soil, human love cannot attain to Hate is a sign of latent love and is its full vitality and richness without find- harbinger. In this light, Christ's com- ing its way through the mazes of limi- mandment, 'Love thy enemies' comes to ting factors. The joy of freedom has to us with fresh significance. be a culmination of a long process of The factors which reinforce the struggling with limitations. development of love are many. The The very limitations of love thus experience of joy in the presence of the point out to the beyond which is limit- beloved

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF LOVE IN HUMAN LIFE 51

and the experience of sorrow in his ecstatic love. Beauty is the spell cast by absence both augment and intensify the the beloved upon the lover who thereby fire of love. Another factor which in- finds his path of love a joyous enter- spires and nourishes love is beauty— prise. not abstract beauty but beauty incarnate To see things in their Truth is to see in forms. As expressed by an American them with the eye of love. Those who poet, "Euclid alone has looked on look upon love as a conjurer of illu- beauty bare." Abstract beauty which is sions and call it blind have hardly nowhere seen in any real form can known the deeper forms of love. The hardly be the inspirer of love, excepting view that 'love is blind' leads to the perhaps rare types of persons (like shallow syllogism : Euclid) whose gaze is turned away Love is blind. from concrete forms in search of ab- God is Love. stract and universal patterns. But for Therefore God is blind. ordinary persons beauty can hardly be a The conclusion of this shallow syllo- potent inspirer of love, unless it is gism might be said to be a reduction ad clothed in matter. Beauty as seen in the absurdum of the false view that 'love is material forms is the reflection of Div- blind'. In fact true love (which should inity and as such never fails to touch be distinguished from infatuation) is the the deepest chords of the human heart. insight which one soul has in the The lover, through his aesthetic per- essential nature and worth of another ception, has a deeper hold on the Truth soul. You have not known a person (as revealed in a form) than a dry and a until you have loved him. Reason is the merely matter-of-fact person. This reflection of reality in human intel- explains why, among the devotees of ligence, and love is the reflection in Shri Meher Baba, there are many who feeling. Reality has to be grasped by have developed along artistic lines. means of reason as well as by means of Wrapt in the contemplation of the love; and the rational grip over reality beloved, the lover forgets himself in would be feeble

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unless it is reinforced by love. Love person inevitably means some prog- is not only not blind, but is actually ress of others who are linked with him insight, and to say that God is Love in love. This is the law of action and is only another way of saying that interaction in the unseen realm of inner God is Truth. values, and it is based upon the soli- What Shakespeare has said of darity and unity of the kingdom of mercy also applies to love: moral and spiritual ends. Through "It blesseth him who gives human love the veil of separateness And him who takes." becomes thinner and thinner. Genuine The lover and the beloved have an love always brings with it the sense of equal share in the bounty of love. completeness, because it takes us The give and take of love creates beyond the self into the super-personal strong likes between individuals realm where there is an intermingling who tend to be unified with each of personalities. To dwell in love is to other. This results in the sharing of step out of the limiting personality. each other's burden and cooperative When the individual realizes the perfec- life in temporal as well as spiritual tion of human love, he might be said to matters. There is no such thing as an be ready for being initiated into the exclusive search for the Truth. Our final state of Divine Love where there destinies get inextricably interwoven is no duality. Human love is the with each other by the give and take equivalent of the Truth in the world of of love, so that the progress of one manifestation: and Divine Love is the Truth itself.

♦

The Voice BY PRINCESS NORINA MATCHABELLI

Shri Meher Baba has said: "For the God in One-All Pure Divine State twelve years no word has passed my in Calm." lips. Yet I am never silent. I speak The individual outward show in you eternally. The Voice that is heard deep as human, the outward dispute, the within the soul is my Voice, the Voice problem, the difficulty, that, I in you of inspiration, of intuition, of guidance. have to remove. I am the Removing Through those who are receptive to this Form in you. I in you owe the pure Voice, I speak." ordaining order in its onward force of And so He speaks to me through will that can remove. I in you do the mouth of sou1. By life within, through removing work. Leave it to me." the deep unfathomable work that is in "In you, as human, you owe the use by Him, I in me know that He in Divine Element that I in you reorder to me was, and ever was, the Guide. When act; and beseech you to be in you the He sends His life message, He speaks Control. I in you reorder the form of in ways one can inwarldly realize. God. That what in you, in any of you, is He, as the Voice, says: "Be my own, in dispute is The Divine in its Spirit Act and be the One in the whole of you. I in as human. It is the Spirit that now in you reordain the whole." you, who is indifferent to the world, One has to be in love with God, then, acts as pure expansion. In the deep of in turn, can one be given to love man. the Sum of all Experience in the human Man cannot in him realize the God, is the Divine Creation Order, and that is until man has in him, in the human Law." form, surrendered the human and the "The Law in you, in any God. —is I." "You, as the divine individual, owe "The Law in you, in any —is Good." "All the work in life, as the

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Divine in the human, I stir. All the tion Order." work, in the work of the human, I "I in you owe, see and feel and act. I control. That what is you in the work, see and feel when I in you owe the Pure in the One growing Soul and Spirit, is I. Impulse." What I in you, in the human sow, as "Remember in your own outward expansion in Consciousness, I, in the deeds and acts that I in you am the All work in the universe, owe and show in in One containing Pure Truth. It is im- Real Evolution Fact. As Fact, I in you portant and real and good and imper- show the Work's Result. You create in ative that you should have the winning you, in the human, another new will to be in the new and old, in the individual that I grow near in its own pure and impure, in the pure and false, work's Divine result, to the pure point in the unreal and unconscious without of Truth. All in the work in the human experience. It is indifferent that you in is I. That can be Experience, and it can you sow the experience. The sum of all be but Intuition. In any of the two pure Being in pure Expansion in all and cases, it is difficult to say what is real, any, in its All-One-Act of universe is I. what is good or what is false." It is unimportant that you in you in the "The Truth Design in the human, in human, do or sow or show more or less, the sum of all human, in the sum of all or full, or half or any experience. The creation, I in you show, sow and order; experience has to go. The lure to be has that you can see, feel and find in your to go. All in its all one outward pure own human. It is indispensable that I in experience has to go. What is of use, you owe the indispensable work, it is and has but use, and is and was Use, is indispensable that I in you am the Life. and was and ever is, the One, as the "I in you owe to be the Pure Truth." individual outcome. All design in life in "One or the other way, in the Main the human, in new, in old, in good, in way's renewing show in all in nature, wrong, in the individual, in the work, in and in the humsn, I in all owe the Crea- the universe, has none other but

THE VOICE 55

the impersonal Use's use. That is real you the individual experience; and in and true. All is use. All is work. All is experience does the Work in your show nature in tune with God's work, and in as indispensable Result." the human it is all the One in All work." "Let me say in you, in all, in any, the "The All-One-Status, reordains orders, Right and Good is more in you than in its one-all ordering outward show the you can operate as you, as the human. Life, the lure to be in the human; and Let it be done by me. Give in, in the the One-in-All as the Divine Individual, Divine of you. In you is the Divine can in the human as Life, as Pure indispensable indifferent good, indis- Being, as Good, as God's all One Pure pensable pure show that I do control. Existence, bring in the work of all life, Let its work's use be to you of use and the Transmutation that is indispen- in me of none but Good." sable." "I know you since the day of all alive "I can see in all directions and I am experience." in all directions the pure Divine Indi- "In you as Creation, I owe you, and I vidual that can and has and is the new in you sow you as Divine Individual. in the old order of Pure. When I saw Let it be the One in I, in All-in-One, you in the state of one that can but that is and has the control over you. Let bring out, throw off and do in its own, it be the One-in-All that has the pure re- as I want it, I knew it was the time to ordering form of Being in you as the be in you the Divine Voice." human. When I say to you: Give me "I am in you the Divine Voice. When you. Be me. I in you owe your own I am in you in your own individual human, then see and sow and under- conscience the individual show of lure stand." to reorder and change you in your own "Be and be in you the One in its all indispensable good, in your own One indispensable act of Divine In- indispensable bad, then, I in you sow dividual outward pain. All in the life in the pure Divine indispensable Intuition man is pain in good, pain in bad, good that creates in you the lure, and gives in all, in one way in pain. It is pain. My universal

56 MEHER BABA JOURNAL

work's pain, my universal design in life new work's use in you by being calm in the human in its One-all-Way of individual. Patient. Strong in the be- Divine Indispensable Evolution, it is all seeching cry. Deep in the longing soul. pain. In the human, in the soul, in all, in Good in dispute. Good in pain. Try the any. In its motion Creation is pain. Be new work's use by being in my One, the in it quiet, sure, pure, good. Leave the One that I have to have in the sum total act in the mind, give no reaction, give of work, I am about to disinterest in the no more individual attention to its world's work. Give me the new in you. work's use. Leave it to me." Bring in me the pure in you. Leave in "I will cure the pain, the world's me the soul. I will bring in the sum work." total of all in you, in the individual "I am the New Life. The One-in-All. soul, the Supreme Individual Reali- The Pure Truth. I am Creation in Love. zation. It is the same in you, in I, in All in you, in any in you, I owe the new One, that it is to be in full act in fact. In in old work's use. Let it be doing. Have the Work's Use you shall be me. I in it be done. Give me the Love that I in you, in One, in all, in any, owe the you sow. Give me the Love that I in controlling life, time, space, and you ordain and awaken. Let it be done individual expansion in its All One, as in the sum of all life and that is me." the God, as Union, as Creation Show of "Be me. Sow me. See me." pure Existence. That is the Theme that "I have none but one indispensable is in you in slow awakening. That is in design to operate in the human, and that One in you, the sum total of pure is to give to the human the new Work's Being, in slow, indispensable creation use. The new Work's use is good. It is action as exchange in consciousness. Divine, indispensable, individual Intui- Let it all be, and let it all try and show tion. It is Divine individual Faith. It is in its own Way's Way. Be my subject, Divine individual good in Love. All and in its subjective experience shall it this I am to be in all, in any. Sow the be and in its all one act shall it operate and become fact. The fact I am in you,

THE VOICE 57

Sow me in Divine experience. Be and in the sum of all expansion, the One- understand, it is all the same Work's All, the One-in-All Solution. That what Use." I in you owe is indispensable creation "I in you show the Way. I in you owe order." the Way." "That drink in, bring out, live, be- "I am in you the New in old in its come." One-all-Way reordaining work in "I have one word in the whole of you Love." to experience, and that is Love. That I "It is indispensable that you know show in you. That I—indispensable me. It is indispensable that you show Truth—show. That I, indispensable me in your own one in all Way's Use." winning view in the human, owe to "All is Divine Theme. All is im- have to be. The aim of all experience is portant and indispensable Truth ex- to have no other experience but me." pansion. Life, man, human, good, God, "Have no one in you but me. Sow no is all one pure Order in Being that in its one in you but I." One-in-All Work's Use has to reordain "Be in its work's Use the impersonal the same pure outward effect and that is instrument. I will in you the dual Good—God—human individual. Sow, experience, and in the dual experience see and create the individual indis- in you, I individually on to the One, pensable effort to understand." show the Way. It is impersonal and "I am the Divine, individual Result." personal work. It is high, individual "In me live—in me alive, die." inspiration. It is individual outcome. "I will in you be the Truth—the Whatever I in its imperative work's use Divine Life." do is One. It is in its onward work "I am your Divine Light. I am your individual multiplicity's work. Let me Divine Experience." in you be the sign of you in dual "I am your All-in-One becoming All- disassociation; let me be in you the One State of God. See this in action. Divine Expansion. Let me be in you the See in its work your own profession Divine Experience. Let it be whatever and try to find in the Way, in the Path, is the onward outward order of pure expression."

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All the new Word's use is mere but me." passing expression of the old sure order "To live in me, is to be in me, in all, in of Divine Intuition. When you hear my any, the one all pure whole universal Voice, say: It is Him. When I sow the Soul in expansion in love." Voice low in its own low show of "To love in me is to have no one but Divine Intuition, say: It is the One. me." When I in you outwardly appear and "To love me in them who do but sow the Word's Use in actual pain, in obscure the view of Divine indis- joy, in fever of obscure individual pensable work's use, be indifferent." struggle, say: It is Him, He is me in the "Let it have in its view's way; one- Voice. When I in you individually all-outcome." reordain the use of life, see to be sure "Be in me. Work in me. Be in my that I in you show the Way to God." indispensable individual." "See in its use in Word, in emotion, in These words I have heard from Him lure to be, in work in individual in- given unto me, from Him the Being in spiration, the Divine Theme. It is in- me. His work's use being the 'I', is dividual and universal. It is impure and working in me through Intuition. He is good. It is clean and unconsciously the impersonal act in Being in life in unclean. It is good and unconsciously new awakening. The impersonal state bad. It is right and it is false." within, that in us is Voice, is to us Life "Leave it to me and to the God in that in Being does the work. It is in us you to act and to resurrect. Leave in pure expansion in Being that in us is you the God, and be in the God's Use the work. It is life in being that in us is the indispensable individual. Leave it to the Truth. We in the working Being me to have the right work's use. Leave see, know, feel, through the new awak- it to me to give you the individual use." ening that He in us is the experience of "To be in me, is to have no one but Life as pure indivisible Life that is Reality.

♦

Shri Meher Baba AND THE NEW WORLD CULTURE OF THE FUTURE BY MRS. INDUMATI DESHMUKH, M. A., B. T.

The whole world has been going culcating the right outlook and establish through a crisis. It is faced with innum- unity amongst the people of the world erable problems. Racial hatred and inspite of the differences of sex, nation, narrow nationalism, religious fanati- creed, religion or culture. He is Shri cism and blind aggressiveness, worship Meher Baba. He all; and His of gold and economic exploitation— comprehensive philosophy is bound to these have been poisoning and per- influence the biggest sphere of human- verting the cultural life of humanity for ity. generations together: and the world's The modern world-culture has to most imperative and pressing need is face the most important problems of more light. In order to meet these forces synthesising the material and the that tend to create chaos, there have spiritual aspects of life. Very few per- naturally come into existence many sons can avoid going to one extreme or spiritual movements which aim at the other. There are those who worship creating order out of this confusion. gold and are utterly indifferent to spiri- Our age is, therefore, also an age of tual values. And there are others who spiritual awakening. But as there is a try to seek spirituality by running away keen rivalry between many spiritual from life and avoiding its responsi- and religious forces, our minds are bilities. Shri Meher Baba's teaching on tossed in the currents and counter- this point helps us to have a balance currents of thought. In this critical between these two extremes. According period of humanity there is in our midst to Him, everyday life and true spiri- one Person whose teaching is destined tuality cannot be separated from each to restore steadiness to our minds by in- other. If the world-culture is to be sound, it must

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find a way of uniting the two. People have forgotten the true and Progress of humanity from the mat- the lasting values with the result that erial point of view is not in any way accumulation of wealth for selfish pur- unimportant. If a man is required to poses has been the guiding philosophy waste all his life only in the struggle for of individuals and nations. This type of maintenance, he can have no time for outlook has created in our social struc- higher things. Shri Meher Baba advises ture pernicious class distinctions. There His disciples to discharge their worldly is a wide gulf between the rich and the responsibilities completely. If He finds poor. The rich are in possession of any disciple neglecting, his duties He abundance of wealth, whereas the poor admonishes him. He teaches that those are half-naked and starving; and there is who can behave properly in everyday exploitation of the poor and the weak life will certainly gain the higher life. for selfish ends. Our political tangle And those who cannot attend well even expressing itself through international to the ordinary things of life can never rivalry and conflict is also due to achieve anything of spirituality. collective for money and power. But at the same time, material ac- Shri Meher Baba, therefore, uncom- hievements cannot be looked upon as promisingly denounces all forms of ends in themselves. If they are not greed which is the root cause of all our completely subordinated to spiritual troubles. But He does not advise the values, they are likely to be used for people of the world to give up their destructive purposes. Even today many worldly pursuits. He only asks them to scientific inventions are used in wars remain unattached in the midst of for killing each other. The kingdom of worldly pursuits and to spiritualise eternal harmony and joy can come only them by subordinating material acqui- through the spiritualisation of life. The sition to spiritual considerations. way to achieve it is not bloodshed but The frame-work of the economic and , not war but friendship, not political structure of society must facili- enmity but love. tate

SHRI MEHER BABA 61

sound cultural life; and the application of joys and sorrows, pains and plea- of Shri Meher Baba's teaching con- sures, hut transcends both and enjoys cerning brotherhood and love requires eternal bliss in conscious union with thorough reconstruction in these fields. the Divinity within. Some persons have Not only will the basis of the new a wrong notion that Supermen or spi- world-culture of the future be thus ritually cultured persons go away from entirely transformed, but our v e r y the world and that they lead a life of ideas of true culture will change inaction, taking no interest in life. But radically in the light of His teaching. in truth the Super-man is more active Culture does not consist in possessions than ordinary persons. The common or power or academic qualifications. It man is engaged in activities concerning is a certain attitude to life—the attitude his own self; but the Super-man has to of love and reason. Shri Meher Baba consider the good of the world and has, emphasises both of these aspects of therefore, a much wider sphere for his Divinity equally; and He is Himself an activities. He takes great interest in life inspiring example of a perfect devel- and lives a full life of creative action. opment of love and reason. He is an He does not trifle with anything, but he embodiment of true culture. does everything with all his being. The sign of culture is a balanced For the transformation of our cultural mind, not the static balance of a lifeless life we naturally look to religion. But thing, but the dynamic equilibrium of unfortunately religion has been often mind which manifests itself through the misunderstood, with the result that it creative response of love and reason to has deteriorated into sectarianism. - all the incidents of life. The spiritual arianism makes men fanatically aggres- man does not shun life if sorrows befall sive instead of broadening their minds. him; nor does he wish to add more Instead of promoting the Truth, it leads years to his life if years shower upon to the spreading of dogmas. Instead of him. He is not moved by the opposites reconciling the differences among men, it accentuates

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them. Instead of increasing the without any sectarian bias. The spirit of happiness of man, it makes him tolerance is a very healthy preservative unhappy and narrow. Thus chaos and of the uniqueness of individuality. It. the misery in this world are due to the secures in the cultural life of the world misinterpretation of the true meaning of a rich variety instead of dull uniformity. religion. Everyone has his own path to Divinity, Shri Meher Baha preaches freedom and yet the goal of all is the same. of spiritual culture. The freedom of the Freedom of spiritual culture, therefore, individual in matters concerning leads to unity, a harmony in differ- spiritual life should not in any way be ences. curtailed by convention or dogma. The history of humanity has been a There are as many diverse paths as history of blunders. But humanity has there are temperaments. All persons been redeemed again and again by the need not accept. the same path to Masters of Wisdom and Love. Shri Divinity. The basic belief of sectar- Meher Baba brings to the world a new ianism is that there is only one path to dispensation of the spiritual Truth. He realization and that it is binding on has come to promote the life of the everyone. But this philosophy leads spirit which alone can contribute to- only to external conversions and com- wards happiness and harmony. If a pulsions. Shri Meher Baba expects person has learnt the art of spiritual life, from us not only tolerance of all reli- he is bound to express creative culture gions, but the active attitude of ap- in all the different spheres of human preciation for the truths which they activities, and thus transform entire life reveal. He brings to the forefront the by the release of love. Not only by his vital truths of all religions and shows teaching but also by the inspiration of them as being identical. In his ex- his supreme example, Shri Meher Baba positions of the Truth we find him helps humanity in its onward march using the terminology of the Sufis, of towards Divinity. He sees God in every Vedanta, or of the Christian mystics person and teaches us the fundamental truth of the

HOW I MET THEM 63

unity of all life. The Light which he the fountain-source of life, creating brings will lead us towards that Abode harmony out of chaos and giving of Eternity which is God and which is meaning to all the mundane activities of man.



How I Met Them And What They Told Me* BY ABDUL KAREEM ABDULLA

I have never searched for mystics ing as to what type of man could have both before and after knowing Baba sat there all alone for days together. whom I, also, met following a chain of I purposely started my enquiries the typical coincidences. Therefore, when I wrong way by asking of the first Faqir thought of enquiring about the old lady found nearby: "Who is that mad mut- amongst the Faqirs (mendicants), I had tering old woman going about here and not the least idea that I was going to there, doing nothing?" I got the kick I meet in the far away Sind, the unknown had bargained for when the Faqir one about whom I had heard in my angrily replied: "Gadha kya jape zaf- childhood, to have retired in solitude at ranki qadar” (a donkey used to grass a hill-station near Bombay where, as a cannot grasp the saffron). Mai—Saheb boy roaming over the hills, I had often (revered mother), God forgive you, a stopped by the small cavity in a rock mad woman?" He looked at me con- overlooking the town below, wonder- temptuously

______* Continued from January 1939 issue.

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and added: "It is better for the wise men finding Mai-Saheb growing happier in of the world to mind their own busi- the direct service to the Master, her ness," and he walked away from me. husband sometimes returned alone. Finding a few more Faqirs leisurely Mai-Saheb was now often reported to smoking chilams (earthen pipes) in the the Master to be restless and preoc- little excuse of a hut at the other end of cupied at home, until one day, Bachal- the boundary, clustered around a clean- Shah declared to the husband that it shaven, aged but smart looking man was time to leave her alone to serve a who was evidently their leader, I greater cause and carry out an impor- invited myself in and squatted amongst tant spiritual mission for the remainder them quite informally as is done by a of her life. Since then, for about forty number of people who go to Faqirs in a years, Mai-Saheb has been in that place wild goose chase after alchemy and during and after the life-time of the permanent youth. But my reverential Master. enquiries for the Mai-Saheb made them When the group saw I was preparing vie with one another in taxing their to leave, one of them enquired for the memories. I soon gathered that Mai- place I hailed from. It is my experience, Saheb was one of the oldest inhabitants when travelling in the far-flung pro- of the place since the life-time of vinces of India, one has to indulge in a Bachal-Shah. When first she called on geographical jumble to make them the Master, she was married and must grasp 'China' in 'Greece'. I there-fore, have been about thirty-five. Both she informed them that I belonged to and her husband became greatly Bombay. Their leader, who had com- devoted to Bachal-Shah and used to pletely escaped my attention and who call on him from time to time. Within a had also ignored me all this time, few years their visits to the Master having maintained a strange and dis- became less formal and more frequent. interested silence, spoke to me for the The pair always came together, but first time enquiring as to where I stayed in Bombay.

HOW I MET THEM 65

While talking with ten others I had "The nearest one is Thana," he remarked heard that he was referred to as again very eagerly, "or perhaps you Mustan-Shah. In appearance he was mean Poona." I felt he was trying to every inch a mystic in keeping with his impress upon the others his knowledge lofty title. He made no secret of his life of the world outside of that little half- of renunciation, but, since an external sleeping colony. I continued to be rejection of the superficialities of life evasive, in order to baffle him, and told and the adoption of a mystic handle to him almost insolently that I belonged to the name is not necessarily a sign of some other town near Poona. My true mysticism, Mustan-Shah did not antagonism towards him and my impress me. On the contrary, his hawk- impatience to leave the place were too like eyes, cool and calculating de- patent to be missed by a shrewd man meanour and an idle enquiry about like Mustan-Shah, yet he persisted in details made me give him a curt reply prompting me to continue the duel of that I did not stay in Bombay proper. words between us as if the matter was My dislike for this aggressive and too important to be dropped undecided. forbidding personality grew all the "Let me remember," he said, "a town more when he insisted upon detaining near Poona, for one, Talegaon..." I did me further to satisfy an apparently idle not let him finish his guess-work. He curiosity. "I know," he said, "Bombay is appeared to know that side of the more than one city with its suburbs like country too well, and to cut the matter Mahim and Bandra. Perhaps you stay short I told him I was a resident of outside the city proper." Having no Lonavla. "I wonder if you know F.?" he more interest in their company, I was asked. F., with his long proverbial eager to get away from the burning white beard, was as prominent in that chilams of reeking gunja (hemp), but, little town as the 'Duke's Nose' is, the to avoid being rude, I replied, " I come point amidst the surrounding hills. This from some other city near Bombay." reference caught my imagination, and once

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again I settled myself as comfortably as had died only recently, he asked: "But I could in that crude little hut. Being Abdulla had a son and a daughter?" prejudiced against Mustan-Shah, I de- "The daughter is married and is all right cided to give only pointed replies to his in Poona," I said. "And the son is here questions, and told him that F. was at. your service." Following this drama- dead since ages. One after the other he tic disclosure, the stern shrewd look repeated half a dozen names of those about his face and eyes swiftly melted whom he knew and cared for, in one into warmth of feeling and hospitality. way or the other, and I continued re- The other Faqir. having left us alone to porting monotonously their passing check up the dead, he had to call out away a long time back or a short time loudly for one, as if he was going to back as the case happened to be. In order a grand feast for me. Some fruits spite of the concern he showed for the were picked from the garden, and these people, to my amazement, he neither he insisted serving to me personally. He expressed sorrow nor any surprise for did not ask any more questions and the unbroken chain of obituary. He appeared keen to see that I ate all he would only say, "Oh," pause for a few had placed before me. After I had moments with eyes steadily fixed on finished the fruits, he still appeared some object, and proceed again with his disinclined to any further conversation apparent quest for the dead, proving and would not so much as ask me as to that he was as much a mystic inside as why I was in Sind and how long I was he was outside. On my part I felt as if going to stay there. we were taking stock of the little grave- "Well, Mustan-Shah," I said. "You yard on that hill station, and began to have asked me so many questions, can I thrill when he referred to the departed ask you a few?" "I don't mind," he members of my own family one after replied. "But the point is," I continued. another. "I believe in mystics, yet I do not be- The weird conversation carne to its lieve in what they say." He laughed climax when, hearing that my father outright and pointed

HOW I MET THEM 67

out that it was a contradiction in terms. could read the Quran-e-Shariff (the I explained, what I meant was the Holy Quran) very fluently, and in my difficulty in getting the right replies. early teens I became a Hafiz (having "That depends," he said, "on the the Quran by heart), well versed with questions to be asked. You never tell the general laws of Shariat (the external lies to a child when he asks for the side of religion). Therefore I was made explanation about a falling star, and tell to study Arabic and translate the Word him that it is the blow from an angel to of God. I was looked upon as a promis- drive away Satan from the heavens. ing student, and all went well with me You like a child's thirst for knowledge, until I came upon the verse in the Holy and humour him for the time being in Book saying that God was nearer to me the best way you can think of." "That is than the very chord of my life." He exactly what I meant to tell you," I said. stopped abruptly and asked me if I "I have had enough of humouring..." could follow him clearly. "Yes, that But before I could finish my sentence, you refused to be humoured any more," he interrupted me with a smile and said, I blurted out. "You are very impatient," "I hope your questions would befit a he said in good humour and continued grown-up man." This was a clean explaining further. "The point was that, knock-over which made me blink, for that happy phrase struck me as ad- the moment, for words until I could ask dressed to me personally, and I could him as to how he happened to be in not feel satisfied with the meaning of- Lonavla. fered and explained to me by my good "To tell you that," said Mustan-Shah, old tutor. "I will have to tell you a lot. Well then, "I began insisting that if God was so listen. Being an only child, my father near to me, then He must be seen or was very fond of me, and he, being a felt. Either it was a meaningless staunch believer , his one statement, I began to argue, or it had ambition was to see me grow into an some special hidden meaning beyond Aalim (a theologian ). At an early age I the pages of

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the dictionary. I became distracted and time, I was not made to feel the black lost all interest in proceeding further sheep in the fold of Islam. To my with my studies. My teacher compla- surprise, he did not try to argue with me ined about me and I complained about at all. Patting my back, he told me very my teacher, to my father who was kindly. 'The Word of God, my boy, can greatly distressed to find me in an never be meaningless, nor is there any inexplicable fix of mental stagnation. A secrecy about it. The meaning is too number of teachers were changed and a clear and direct to dare take it at its face number of methods were tried before I value. But all cannot do so and was declared to have become a regular undertake the Divine quest involved in dunce, and left to myself, its complete unfoldment. The answer to "My one hobby was to be on a look- your question is beyond words. Stop out for religious leaders and to discuss asking and talking about it. Look it. with them this question which had now Listen for it.' With a sigh of yearning he become the question of my life. Hoping added: 'Who knows, you may find out to his last breath that I may be pre- the answer which is already spread vailed upon to proceed with my inter- everywhere all about us.' rupted career, my father died helping "I began to look and listen in the and encouraging me in approaching wilderness that I felt all around me at every available Aalim, until I met one that time. It was somewhere, about this who believed more in the love of the period, that I selected a particular spot Lord than feared the raging fire in hell. in Lonavla, and sat there in solitude for The Mullas and Moulvies (priests and forty days." On checking up with him preachers) had made me go half mad further details about that particular with their talks and terrorizing threats. spot, I was greatly thrilled to find it was This particular Aalim invited me to call the same site around which I used to on him in privacy, when for the first weave one of my boyish dreams of a Hindu yogi in full

HOW I MET THEM 69

paint, with long hair and drooping eyes, mous phrase in his own words, and in contrast to the sharp and clean- assured him, "One last question and I shaven typical Mahomedan Qalandar will go. What was that meaning?" type of Faqir who was now before me. "Don't you feel you are now behaving "The way you referred to your solitary like a spoilt child?" he asked in a mixed retirement in that place," I asked him, tone of reproach and amusement, but "shows that you did not get the required added, "Have patience, you are going to response?" "Of course not," he replied, get it." "but luckily I was neither disappointed The last assurance and confirmation then nor during my subsequent spoke volumes to me and was more wanderings practically all over the than a compensation for Mastan-Shah's country for years and years thereafter." unwillingness or inability to coin words "Which also means," I asked again, which make no difference without the "that you are now here at the end of underlying Experience and Realization, your search?" "Yes, I am now old like the well-known lines of the mystic enough to retire at one place," he an- poet and prince Asif-jah, the late Nizam swerd slowly, as if winding up his of Hyderabad, that for all their lucidity conversation with me. However I per- and boldness remain, after all, words sisted in getting an unequivocal answer without meaning: to the question at issue, and asked him "By the sign of Nahno-Agrab", Asif' point-blank, "Did you realize the understands, meaning? " He became very impatient, "Thou wilt become God, if thy 'I' is and I could feel that he wanted me to rooted out." leave him alone after he had half There can never be a better friend uttered an affirmative. But having than a mystic. True mystics never have asserted to have achieved the exper- an axe of their own to grind in any ience of "Nalmo Agrab," the master key matter. They are always a source of to the Holy Quran, I wanted to obtain inspiration and encouragement towards from him an interpretation of this fa- divine attainments. They do not care

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and mind man-made barriers of society, "There are many who are in the way, country, caste, creed and religion. It is many who have experience, many who second nature to a mystic to help and are yogis, but few who are per- serve others without any motive but fect...Never speak ill of saints. They are that of service, for the sake of service the sign of Truth, and help to the and rendering relief to all life at large. world...My salutations to all those who In the course of a letter to me in His love God, who are saints, yogis, own hand, Baba wrote in January 1926: bhaktas,* and my namaskar† to Sadgurus! All these are me in different forms."



THE SAYING OF SHRI MEHER BABA

A lustful man, no matter what good qualities he may possess, cannot move along the spiritual path; he is like a cart with one wheel.



______* Persons with intense devotion. † Obeisance

To the Beloved Meher Baba BY CONTESS NADINE TOLSTOY

Do not seek refuge in the world! suffering. In the moments of sorrow and grief, As then the pain turns into Bliss and Of bitter offering, go no-where ! cruelty for Love's Wisdom is the sign of Turn straight homeward... greatest trust of Love to the disciple. Seek the true Friend ! I know, Oh Friend, that in you is my Don't you hear His call strength, my joy and my life. He is waiting for you in moments of Where to seek shelter in the joy and in the times of grief. moments of burning thirst and pain of Empty your sighs into the vastness of separation! His Being. Seek refuge nowhere, but in the heart Give your silent complaints to Him; of the Beloved. He will share with you your bitter He hears your sighs. He responds to cup and fill it with sweetness of Love. your plaintive song, He is with you— Where are, and who will give you the Beloved! "those gifts"? And if you go to the world, today it And how unceasingly and discreetly is with you and tomorrow you will be He bears the thorns that make you alone—you, a stranger to the strangers. bleed! Though they, too, seek their way, He shows you only His Love and they also call and need not knowing tender compassion. wherefrom the echo of response is His Love gives you its most when He coming, reads in your heart the readiness to Do not seek refuge in dark lonely stand till the end for the sake of Love. places—there only shadows of Hard though it may appear to the remembrances lurk and hunt the lonely profane seeker of ease—greatest are the heart... "gifts" of fruitful seasons when one’s Turn your steps to fresh sunny heart is willing to receive the fruit of springs where you will find clear water which you

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seek! Tarry not to open your heart: Follow the call of your Beloved. Close firm the gates that open into Let your eyes seek no other beauty the world's enjoyments, and though in than that of your Beloved. the world keep the inner doors closed Let your eye be not caught by the and one only open—to the One! sight of things of the world. For the Beloved is to come, soon, The fluttering wings of a butterfly any time. will be bruised in the whirl of a sudden Wait in readiness... storm... My door is open—in waiting for Stay in your "home" and listen. him... Don't you hear the faithful steps? My eyes are looking for the signs of Don't you feel the signs of His Light, approach, My heart is singing in the anguish of The loving response to your lone- the great meeting. liness? Patient and confident is the love of Having found the true Beloved what true lover; is there to seek in this world! Faithful and strong is the heart of Quiet your heart with certainty of joy such lover ; and fill your being with love. Boundless is the Trust of a loving Boundless is the Source of such heart happiness... Oh—My Beloved!

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From the Rubaiyat* BY HAFIZ

Hafiz mourns his Separation from the Beloved and craves for re-union. This, in Sufi idiom, refers to the doctrine that the soul, before incarnation, was a part of the Deity, but is severed, separated, from Him by being placed in a human body. See " ".

Mi zanaln har nafas az dasti firakat faryad Ah agar nalahi zaram na rasanad ba tu bad Ruz o shab ghussah wa khun mi khuram wa chun na khuram Chun za didari tu duram ba che basham dil shad.

Every moment 1 bewail my separation from Thee! Alas! if the breeze bears not to Thee the moaning of my lamentation! Day and night I suffer grief and anguish: how could I not suffer? Since I am far from Thy sight, how can my heart be joyful ? Ode 251

1 'Twas Union yesterday† with Thee—soul-kindling Bliss! To-day‡—'tis Separation's fiery abyss! Alas! that in the volume of my Book of Life 'Twas writ—"One day for That—and for another, This"! 2 Since that sad day when Heaven parted me from Thee, No one hath ever seen my lips smile joyously;

______*Selections from the Rubaiyat and Odes of Hafiz, the Great Mystic and Lyric Poet of Persia. Editor, John M. Watkins, 21 Charing Cross Road, London, W. C. 2. †Yesterday: i, e. before the soul was incarnated. ‡To-day: now, when the soul is bound to a body.

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Such sorrow doth the separation cause my heart! I know it, and Thou know'st it Who created me. 3 The day of separation drove me far from Thee; Thus severe'd from Thy face, I fret impatiently. If on another's face I gaz'd, then loyalty To Thy fair loveliness would blind me instantly. 4 When my poor soul from Thee was parted, one might say That salt upon my wounded heart Thou then didst lay; I fear'd that day when I should be cut off from Thee; Now Thou hast seen it come to pass, that evil day! 5 Thine absence rends my heart with pain; for Thee I yearn! One sight of Thee!—I die !—no hope can I discern Of Union blest, Longing, I perish and am gone!— And through desire for Thee to dust I now return ! 6 My candle weeps ! still more, cut off from Thee, weep I! As from a flagon, rosy tears well from mine eye; And I am like a wine-cup, for, in my distress, 'Tis blood I weep when sounds the harp's soft, plaintive sigh. 7 O lips like sugar pure, refin'd ! lost to my sight! Parted from Ye, I know no rest by day or night! O Love ! my heart, through sev'rance is like blood outpour'd; O come!— just once--and see ; behold my sorry plight! 8 Return! mine eye to see Thy beauty longeth sore! Return! my grieving heart Thine absence doth deplore! Return I Beloved r for, thus parted from Thy face, From my distracted eyes tears, floods of tears, do pour!

SADGURU IS LOVE INCARNATE 75

9 Sore longing for Thy kiss and Thine embrace, I die! Craving the lustrous ruby of Thy lip, I die! But why prolong my plaint? Thus will I shorten it: Return! Return! Awaiting Thee I die!—I die!*

Sadguru is Love Incarnate†

A Perfect Master is a pure being and only the love for God, the divine love, as it is pure love that he causes in man, that enables one to find Him, to see he creates what no man can. Baba says: Him actually—and become one with "It must be borne in mind that the Him. highest human love is not the highest One’s spiritual progress can never be absolute love. The divine love is the steady and certain without the divine highest aspect of the all-pervading love. It is the real side of religion and love." the only element which reveals or un- One who gets divine love gets God. folds the emotionality of the spiritual The divine love is beyond reason and path. intellect. Nobody can create this high- The highest love is the one which is est aspect of love in himself. The divine devoid of all hopes, interests, desires love is given and not created. It is a and expectations—in other words, grace from the God-man. which is perfectly selfless and disin- Philosophies and intellectual gym- terested. nastics make you intellectually certain Unless a person is spiritually mind- about the . But it is ed, he or she cannot be

______* In the original 1st, 2nd and 4th lines end in the word murdam i.e. I died. † Extracts from Shri Meher Baba's Discourses.

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possessed of this aspect of love. spiritual path. Divine love makes his captive forget The divine love knows no law. It is his own individual existence by making above all rules and regulations, above him feel less and less bound in his dogmas and rituals. onward march by the trammels of Nothing can bind it and nothing can human limitations, till he reaches a set bounds to it. It is fire—an infinite point where he can raise himself to the fire in itself, and those who burn in it realization of the highest in himself. get purified. Unless and until one is possessed of Bear it in mind that only the divine it, one can never feel ecstacy, one can love can bring about self-annihilation never behold illuminations and visions which gives self-realization, which can relating to the different states of the make man lose his individual existence in the universal existence.

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Question Baba Answers BY DR. ABDUL GHANI MUNSIFF

Question The astronomical phenomena, the phenomenon and needs no explanation. eclipse of the moon or the sun, visibly There is, however, a germ of spiritual stirs the Hindu world into great religi- truth behind the grotesquely colourful ous activity. Why is such an occurrence imagery of gods and demons, their as an eclipse deemed opportune for a squabbles and jealousies for the nectar fresh flux of religious fervour, of immortality, all ingeniously con- particularly in the matter of perfecting cocted by the priest-class to flabbergast some mantras? the superstitious masses and inciden- Answer tally to fleece them. The eclipse is purely an astronomical The spiritual aspect of the

QUESTIONS BABA ANSWERS 77

question is this. The whole universe, The Rishis of old knew too well the known and unknown, has come out of a astronomical basis and the spiritual point in the microcosm which may be influence of such an heavenly called the Creation point. Simul- occurrence. Looking at the average taneously with this emanation two mentality of the masses of their time, processes come into play—the the Rishis could do no better than issue Evolution and the Production. The cut and dried instructions as to prayers, differences between the two processes penance and austerities, investing the is rather significant and must be clearly whole affair with a religious im- understood. The process of Production portance rather than give a rational and is dependent on the process of spiritual elucidation. In course of time Evolution in sequence of causation. but the religious 'do and don'ts' of the wise not in sequence of time. Evolution Rishis were very cleverly woven round depends on the ‘Creation point' for by self-seeking priests, with a pic- cause, but Production is dependent on turesque and awe-inspiring legend of Evolution. Evolution connotes spiritual the gods, demons, nectar, the moon in progress and Production signifies travail and its subsequent (Moksha) material growth and change, organic or freedom for purposes too patent to inorganic. thinking minds. Such legendary It is a scientifically acknowledged superstitions persist and flourish with fact that the stellar regions, planets and ignorance and illiteracy, but now stars, do exert an influence on the life people are daily outgrowing such and activity of this planet—the earth. childish beliefs. There is, however, no And since this earth of ours has the denying the fact that a few prayers and highest evolved organic life, the human ordeals undergone with keen con- happens to be the nearest to the centration, concurrently with the ec- spiritual plane; the phenomena of lipse of the sun or moon, do result in eclipse does indirectly affect the world great spiritual benefit to the individual spiritually. concerned.

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Shri Meher Baba’s Tour OF NINE DAYS THROUGH CENTRAL INDIA* BY PRINCESS NORINA MATCHABELLI

Baba's brother J. has arrived from again signals to K. to give the man Ahmednagar with Christmas mail. Let- another three pies. K., with best in- ters, telegrams, cables have to he open- tentions, tries to interfere and says: "Oh, ed, read and answered at once. A few he is no good; if you give that man cables to the West are to be sent on our clothes he will sell them to buy liquor." way to Dadar where again at D.'s a new Upon this Baba renews His order for gathering of more people has been the third time to give another three pies. arranged. The beggar most satisfied withdraws. We stop at the cable office which is At that Baha Himself makes a sign to known as the very best business the beggar to come back, and for the quarters for Bombay beggars. In fact, as fourth time orders K. to give the man soon as our car approaches the side- another three pies. The pies became the walk, a very ragged old man steps 'holy symbol' of mercy and love that forth. K., who is expert in finding the works in realms unseen the purer good souls among the worst of this benefit. The good ignorant man walks erring tribe, recognizes the man and off no doubt thinking it was a profitable warns us not to give alms. Baba, who day. apparently never overhears anything, The programme for the afternoon is placidly turns towards K., and orders to pay some visits to the poor and sick him to give the man three pies. K., who have been anxiously awaiting handing the money to the man, says: Baba's holy visit. We are allowed to go "You have to use it right and not for with Him and share in the feast of drinking." Baba, watching the situation, compassion.

______* Continued from January 1939 issue.

SHRI MEHER BABA'S TOUR 79

On our way home we stop at the we are. They live with things but are apartment of a charming friend, S. P., much more aloof from things. the young Parsi woman whom I last This evening Baba retires early. He saw at Baba's birthday celebration in wants us all to do the same, to rest Nasik and whom I cherish for her before the night's journey to Nagpur the spiritual grace and simplicity. When next day. Baba, walking through the long shady The following day's work begins at balcony, unexpectedly stood before her, 7-30 a. m. Innumerable interviews are she is overwhelmed with surprise and given. At three o'clock in the afternoon, joy. All are asked to enter the living Baba decides to see Paul Muni's film room to meet her mother who is a very `Zola'. During the performance Baba is gentle distinguished old lady. Baba sitting in the dark. He seems to be takes the two women who are dear to totally absent. His form appears as if His heart into a corner of the room, and left empty, but no longer than it has to with intense interest reviews their be; flashes of light make his eyes personal state of affairs. Meanwhile I visible in the darkness. The perfor- take in the charm of this typical Indian mance is over, and all of us enjoyed home which reminds me so much of the this marvelous work of intelligence and habitations of Southern Russia. The tragic human realism. Baba partici- walls are whitewashed, crude in style, pating in our moods humorously the doors and windows made of wood remarks through His board: "Do not ingeniously carved, chairs and easy- worry, it is merely a nightmare." chairs and tables are leisurely placed At 6-30 p. m. that same day, the 25th here and there to serve the simplicity of December, we take the train for that creates facility in living. There is Nagpur. Again the station is crowded no luxury or accumulation of things by the many who did not want to miss without purpose for practical use. the rare occasion to see, once more, These people are much more free than their Beloved Sadguru.

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The ride to Nagpur is amusing. An B. J. drives Baba's car. Cheers are excellent supper prepared ahead was heard loud along the streets until we served to us by K. and A., both in reach the beautiful house of red stone excellent humour making jokes and surrounded by an exquisitely styled ending by singing spiritual hymns in garden filled with roses and jasmine in choir with all the others. At 8-30 p. m. bloom. Women are waiting at the we are all ordered to sleep, huddled up entrance of J.'s home. The women in between beds and garlands of flowers. this part of the world are supposed to It is the usual hour of 4-30 a. m. when guard the Holy Shrine, to perform the Baba calls us to get up and to be ready ritual and wait in patient devotion. B.'s for tea which will be obtained from the wife and daughters are standing in the next station. doorway, and immediately, as Baba Nagpur, 9–30 a. m.—The train pulls enters, they throw their arms around in. There stands B. J., with his son E., their Beloved Guest. Then all pros- and J. K., the High Judicial Official on trating their foreheads to His feet, per- duty in the Central Provinces, also Dr. form the customary ritual—the break- D., a good friend of us all. This ing of the cocoanut—throwing flowers, reception, without women, is matter-of- spraying water to purify the path which fact, quick and executive. Even the leads into their home. All this, to me garlands indescribable in beauty and again, is an unusual sight and unusual richness in choice, placed around experience. To us from the West any Baba's neck are quickly removed by kind of ceremonies appears external Him as if there is no time to loose for and separating, since we have realized sentimental ceremonies. Dr. D. hands the intimate experience of the unique over to Baba quick reports giving the spiritual relationship which needs no programme for the three days stay in more to express through rituals and Nagpur. This time he requests to con- ceremonies. Within, in our hearts, we tact the masses. Baba's this visit to never differ except through customs, Nagpur is after eight years. habits and modes of thinking. Moved

SHRI MEHER BABA'S TOUR 81

by the purity of their hearts we par- Baba's bedroom, which is B.’s bed- ticipate in their symbolism with all room, is situated in the left wing of the sincerity. large central hall representing the The J. family is a wonderful staunch formal living room in most of these group of individuals who have dedi- Eastern houses. It forms a huge space, cated the purpose of their lives to Baba. the inside built like a deep alcove B., the head of the family, who is one protected against heat, with no direct of Baba's right hand men in Nagpur, windows. Two huge doors at either end said to me: "I love Baba more than provide the necessary draft. It is here anyone in my family. Although a where Baba's sacred Darshana is to be father, I merely represent the head of a held during these three days. family of children of Baba." B. is one of The first day's work begins. Baba those men who live and die for their enters the hall. He is welcomed by a cause; reminds me of those ancient simple and sincere greeting expressed heroes that fought for the Holy Grave. by Dr. D., in a speech of welcome. When B. that he loves Baba is then sung to His Holy Presence by all more than his wife and children, he is the members of the J.'s family and our fully aware of the responsibility of his party. Baba in divine humility accepts statement; he loves his wife and the dedication. He lends Himself to all children for their selves which is the religious rites. He accepts to have part in Baba. The impersonal viewpoint placed on his forehead the black guides his life, his home, his duties and powder and the haldi of the Hindus, his activities in civil service. These and expects us, His disciples, to do the live a life of simple, natural dig- same. Love unselfish, service unselfish, nity. The wife cooks the meals and the are the pure expression of the true immediate help is given by the daugh- religion Shri Meher Baba practises in ters. Innumerable servants, who float everyday life. These are the unique around like birds, only do the lower virtues He personifies. True religion is manual work. to live life spiritual;

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dedicating life to God unconditionally which she expresses in unusual poetry, in mind, body and spirit. suffice to mark the indelible sign of her The first interview of the day is spiritual longing. Baba, who knows that given to Sushila and her friend Vimala, the storm in her heart is beginning to two sweet Hindu students. They enter express the purer want, drew her close. Baba's room in attitude of worship with He made her realize the importance of folded hands. They offer Baba fruits the meeting. He offered Himself as the and flowers and sing for Him a most Great Chance of her life, demanding beautiful ancient hymn in Sanskrit unconditional acceptance. She knew conveying the unfathomable faiths of that it was time to give in. She pledged all times. Sushila, the more beautiful of to love—but Him. She, too, remained the two, I shall never forget. While close to Baba's room during the three drawing-in Baba's grace, the pupils of days. her eyes glide behind her lowering Baba's next act of Mercy is the eyelids as if her whole life is diving in washing of the mad child. A special the ocean of Divine Bliss...Baba takes order had been sent, a long time ahead, in the two souls at once and orders for a child that in no way would be an them to stay near Him and not to leave ordinary child, but one of those types the house during the three days. who have to consume in some con- Another very interesting woman, a dition of madness their own spiritual friend of Dr. D.'s wife, follows later. At evolution. The child, unusually shy, is a first she is shy and, with uncertain black-eyed Hindu boy of about seven attitude, stands outside of Baba's room years of age. Whenever the child saw waiting. The spiritual breeze that blows Baba it jumped on His knees throwing the warning in her heart is like storm. its arms around Him. The reality of the Although still very young she is a holiness of the contact became proof in poetess of great renown in the Urdu evidence. The child felt safe within language. Her selfless divine dreams, Baba's embrace and

SHRI MEHER BABA’S TOUR 83

rejoiced in the unfathomable fact of alarm of Life itself. The crying need ‘nearness' with loud cries and resonant made all stirred and ready. Truth, when laughter. Every-day this child, at the at the point to strike the designated same hour, is bathed by Baba's own hour, strikes fast and safe. Many child- hands in the bathroom where Baba ren are brought who are apparently in takes His daily ablutions. We all realize the same state as the first child. It is clearly that Baba is doing great spiritual evident that the first child was pre- reparation work, even if the miracle destined to find its way by creation should remain unseen. Baba, doing the order, that order which Baba sent forth, realization work within, can superview may be long ago, as He knows the soul the path of any life throughout any He needs to draw. phase. He can throw off in man all that Most of the time we are allowed to encumbers the liberating process in stay in the room while Baba is giving evolution. These are His great unseen interviews. This great privilege gives miracles. He governs sure, uncondi- me the chance to gather notes on the tional and pure ‘within and above', the most important facts. 'I', Life, Mind, Way. We so often see Baba's laconic language is the deep the most unexpected facts become work that speaks in pure action; it is realized to the bewilderment of those simple, but it has the power to control who, in no way, are expecting His and form. One interesting incident Grace. The father of the child has been happens at the meeting with a re- ordered to keep the child in the house nowned man of Nagpur, a professor of day and night during Baba's stay in philosophy and comparative religion. Nagpur and to bring it to "Meherabad" Baba's attitude at the beginning was in April. The news spread as quick as almost an aloofness which does not put fire that the God-man was to see the gentleman at ease. He feels shy at anyone whose life was in despair, de- the apparently indifferent attitude of fective, destitute. It came to be the Baba. When

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the suspense reaches a certain point, window of an ancient cathedral, in Baba, summing the answer to all the perpetual adoration before the image of questions, states: "A simple thing has God. been made difficult through ignorance." It is 7-30 p. m. The doors are open Baba's word is Truth, Fact, that is for the impatient worshippers waiting action which forms and transforms. The outside. Hindus, Mahomedans, Parsis man suddenly realizes 'the sense of appearing in the most fantastic Truth'; he apprehended deeper what colourful costumes, kneeling, bowing, philosophy and all the religions in prostrating before the alive God is a theory had not been able to teach Him. spectacle I will never forget—many in After a moment of deeper recollection rags—those refused by social law and looking at Baba with the expression of bound to consume by lower order of a child that has well absorbed its life their expiation. One day through lesson, he says: "Truth." To this Baba, the changing consciousness, these too with His unfathomable smile, gives the will realize that life in ignorance is not sign of affirmation. unjust and only life unconscious is not A mute spectator is standing every safe. moment of the day in a corner of Baba's By passing His Holy hands over their room untouched from facts and results anguished heads, touching the ill spots that witnessed in awe during these of their bodies, He gives to their being strenuous working hours of Baba's first the unconditional order to awaken. God day in Nagpur. He is Jal K., an intimate and His creature in love with each friend of the family whom we already other, longing to join in divine bliss, met at the station. He seems to be lost perform the progress in Union. in the Light that from the Divine Giver It is 11-30 p. m. Baba's life, like the is pouring unending grace on all life white lily floating on a mirror-like that in those stirring hours displays its surface, becomes languorous in ac- loud cry for liberation. He reminds me tion... It is the signal to end the labours of the young monk in the stained glass of the day.

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Shri Meher Baba IMPRESSIONS* BY PRINCESS NORINA MATCHABELLI

We may complain, feel lone-some, is use of my life in true, pure opposing want more love, more appreciation; we order. Take it lightly—be real—be miss recognition, we dread criticism, calm—and react only in me. I am the we lack humour and cannot bear to be pure One in you." What He says— laughed at; we then call on Him for fulfils. pure understanding. We speak to Him Sometimes when the pure Vision openly from the heart in the straight becomes obscured by thoughts, desires, personal way that we cannot disguise wants, and we lose lightness in mood, when confronted be-fore Him...He will never will He touch at the ordeal's answer : " I am in everyone. When they problem. Like the sun behind the laugh at you it is I who laugh at you. clouds will He rise above and project See me in everyone. Bear it for the love the warm light and transform the dull of me. See me alive in all and everyone show of our individuality into pure as the act in reaction that has to per- state of stupefaction of Love, Joy, form in you the creation plan in Being. Bliss! In all in life, the pure, the good, the His whole life in expansion in Divine false, the non-important fact is me. See Love is impersonal sharing indivisible me as the important order in anyone to communion with us—life—human sow in reaction the real pure creature —life as nature—life as Being. opposition, and that is in Being. To Life is practical. Life is use. The divine you, life is martyrdom in reaction. In mutual good is the constant use. He reality life is pure winning order in never wastes. opposition as experience. Everyone in He is clever, sagacious, astute quick in response, playing

______* Continued from January 1939 issue.

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with anyone's ideas, humorously toler- stirs, that performs the awakening. Life ant with our dual speculative experi- is the instrument through which He ment in thoughts, the unconsciously works, reacting in it He fulfils the ideal prepared thoughts. He can avoid be- form that is the real 'human being'. forehand to save us from doing a wrong Once He said, while sojourning in deed. He often stages confusion, call it the West: "For you, children of trial, call it quest; winning in the game America, when my time has come, I He reveals the impersonal state within; shall perform the Grace of God- we experience non-attachment to self- realization to one of your lowest types satisfaction. He plays games with us in consciousness, a criminal." He can making us invent situations. He then make gods out of mud. "Do not fear," lures our soul-driven imagination. He says, "Depend on me." We need When He laughs with the sad child of Him always. this world He liberates it from the Once a friend near suicide calls to attachment to pain. Him in despair. At that time she was in Life is mind and in mind He reigns America and Baba was in India. She unselfish pure. He is control of life in put her heart's anguish into a letter every order in mind. He can do in 'ways addressed to Him. But before the letter unseen' what no ordinary man can. He was closed, the inner wide space opens is in life a man executive, impersonal, and within her deep confusion she sees simple, so natural that for the old His calm eyes appear. The passing fashioned conventional orthodox in quest is cleared. Calm and confidence mind who can conceive Divinity only in life is re-established. He says: "I am through the masquerade of rituals and in you, with you always; in you I work, the practice of austerity. He appears too and out of you, I do the work in will, human. Expressing through art, through and life in energy. When you in me science, through any work of mind, resign, I in you can operate free. When through life in spirit, He is the un- you in me give-in, I in you outwardly conditional pure work of Truth that and inwardly free, the

SHRI MEHER BABA 87

rude, crude show of you, the 'I' and all. He gave, in the Ashram in Nasik, create you like me. I can in you prevent full right to the individual's self-satis- the fall and I can in you render immune faction. Through the exchange in con- the want. I am in the All One Pure sciousness we realized the deeper Work that can what no man can. I am meaning of that order in training. He Infinite—I am Truth." made us understand that in the divine Although suffering in the delusion of scheme in life, Truth in disguise in the false show in Maya, we can within whim and wish and selfish will and low the pure 'indivisible self ' as intuition, selfish desire, does the out in-going know, see, feel, the happy design. We order to win to control to over-come may call it unfathomable joy, love through pure unconditional want. unselfish, pure faith. We need not name As truth Being in disguise, He lured it at all. When we see in Being in joy us deeper into the dual strife, exposing we are the form in Being as in joy, in us to more struggle, to more opposition, faith, in love. We have become the new till we realized the reaction of love in human being that is resigned to the the deep show in mind in Being as our delusion of self-experience and to the spirit existence where He, within, in impure show of imagination. We are our life impersonal, does the stir that made conscious to be within pure good, furthers our deeper understanding, our unselfish, real, natural and at peace spiritual advancement. We realized that with everything. pure benefit and accepted the quest In 1937 Baba established an Ashram free. We know that we would become for the Western group at Nasik. It was a one in the strife, one with the adversity, passing phase. Here, in luxury and one with life in opposition. great comfort, He taught us detachment We were a group of different types, from the want to self-indulge in of different race and character also individual whims and desires. Baba be- different as types in consciousness. The gins by giving all and ends by taking deeper understanding freed us from prejudice; we learned to be

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tolerant and to accept the differences. They know me. Within they do realize He gave us the strength to live up to the my life as Truth that works the liber- spiritual viewpoint which is impartial. ation of their mind, body and spirit. When this phase had fulfilled its They give me themselves, to use results, He again closed the Ashram in through themselves the Creation plan Nasik. He exchanged the external field for Truth. They surrender without pride of activities by ordering most of the their individual modes of life. Their members of the group to go back to own divine existence is my own life. I their old life and to practise in life what ripen the fruit of their life's labour. In they had been able to realize. feeling within joy, they own me. In The 'second Ashram' which Baba spending life in self-sacrifice, they calls simple is in "Meherabad". This realize me. They give me what I owe in place is indeed holy for its memories of them." purer suffering and deep spiritual en- We who have come from afar in durance. It is the place of perfect Re- distant strife in lonesome longing nunciation. Here life has been given search to find the way to realize life without bargain and without resistance divine, bow to this wonderful result in to the impersonal scope. Hero men and fulfilment. women of tender age, and men and To all He says: "Give me you and I women of mature experience of life will make you the wonderful 'I'." have donated the full price of life to the The unfathomable exchange, the Beloved. They have lived in real transmutation act, He operates in us detachment from any order in attach- unconscious, and with us the surren- ment for many years, till they have dering individual. He says: "Be the achieved the last phase which is human individual that you have to be, detachment from non-attachment. Baba and I shall in me consume your sin, says of these staunch bearers of his life: your weakness." The annihilation act in "To them I am father, mother, child. our own ego's work He consumes to fulfilment. When

NOTES FROM MY DIARY 89

we understand that bad is sin, we shall understand. To confirm this new understood that good has to replace understanding He says: "Have I not had. When we realize in Him, Truth, been in you the alive, impure, pure then will be revealed to us the balance impulse since the dawn of creation? of good and bad. Have I not been in you the unfolding When we denunciate the low in understanding? Tolerance is the new creation we denunciate Jesus. When we impersonal understanding when you in denunciate sin in our neighbour we me, the Son of God, resign." To denunciate Jesus the same Perfect One surrender in Him means to recognize in as Him, our Beloved Shri Meher Baba. Him the Divine Theme as our own When we, in our own selves, puzzle, individual life's theme. worry, we misuse in false speculations To be in Him free, unbound, im- in mind God's work. We then create mune, we grow, live, and die to live false witnesses, but through Love we Eternally.

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Notes From My Diary F. H. DADACHANJI

February the 15th of this year, acc- At the time of writing we are at Delhi. ording to the Parsi calendar, will be Our party visited Benares and Agra Shri Meher Baba's forty-fifth birthday. after the long halt at Jubbulpore. The As he is on tour, there will be no public move, as stated above, is still a closed celebration this time. Even the place chapter. where he will next be on this occasion Baba's stay in Jubbulpore for 20 days is unknown. has been full of very interesting inci- dents. To

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summarise, it was a period of great Baba's sojourn was kept private and no activity when much important work interviews were given. But as one of was done, touching both the public and his devotees remarked, "Wherever there private aspects of Baba's spiritual is sun, there is bound to be light," the activities Baba and his large party were very presence of the august Being the guests of one of his very dear disci- aroused the true aspirants and devotees ples, Mr. J. D. K., the City Magistrate. who sensed and felt it. Scores of The spontaneous gesture of placing his inquiries and requests were made by own residence at the disposal of the the many desiring the master's dar- Master and the special group of his shana. There is a saying in vernacular disciples, shifting himself to stay with "Bhakta adhin Bhagwan" meaning the other members of the mnandali in a Bhagwan (God) is always dependent on hired cottage close by, and the careful his Bhakta (devotee). In other words, attention he gave to all the details of the the call of love could not be rejected, special requirements of the party, and whatever the reasons of keeping his cannot be too highly spoken of and visit strictly private, Baba did respond appreciated. Apart from all these to the call of devotion, and a day was perfect arrangements and attending to fixed for public darshana. Sunday the his usual official duties at the courts, 8th of January witnessed long lines of the services that the Master exacted devotees pouring in throughout the day from him in various other spheres were for the benefit of the Master's darshana all rendered in a remarkable spirit of and blessings. Private talks were also absolute submission and readiness to allowed to many, and their questions respond to the Master's will and touching various problems of life were behests, however severe and trying. answered. At the special request of the Love and devotion of a very rare gentry of the city, a second day, the quality only could stand this test. 10th of January, was again fixed for For the first ten days at Jubbulpore, darshana of ladies who kept purdah or for

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other reasons would not come out in explaining the significance of such un- public in the presence of men. On this usual appearances at different places occasion, Baba's answers to the ques- simultaneously, Baba stated, "Baba is tions asked were read from his alphabet here with you and at the same time in board by a lady interpreter. Even after many places." This fact that is the this, till the day of Baba's departure personal experience of many is well from Jubbulpore, crowds of people known to his . desirous of darshana kept waiting Baba and the entire party spent the outside the gates during all hours of the Christmas eve and the day after at the day. Baba occasionally responded by Bhera Ghauts, about 13 miles from coming out himself in the compound. A Jubbulpore, where the famous Marble few were even permitted to his room Rocks present a sight majestic in for private interviews. beauty. Here, the river Narbada has Of special interest among these pil- carved a three mile canyon through grims was a holy man, "clad in sack mountains of varied coloured marbles. cloth and ashes". He has his seat The ancient legend goes that it was the outside of Jubbulpore, is well rec- abode of the Monkey-God Hanuman. ognised and has a following of his own. High above in the hills is one of the Baba appeared to him, he narrated, Hindu temples dedicated to the God coming towards him on a bridge at Vishnu, which is also a place of beauty. Hardwar, a sacred place of piligrimage Baba has chosen to come to this place for the Hindus in the Himalayas, privately and unknown to anyone, to do although Baba physically was at the his internal work in the quietude of time in Ahmednagar, one thousand these secluded surroundings. His miles away. The instant he saw Baba at identity, therefore, was not disclosed. Jubbulpore, he recognized him to be the However, some of the visitors to this Master he saw some time back at place, during these holidays, recognized Hardwar. Turning to his disciples after Baba's disciples, and although they this was related by the holy man, and were explained that this was a

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private visit and he would see none, Sahasra-dhara (thousand water falls). they considered this as no chance Here, it is said; the river Narbada has meeting but a divine benediction on its source. In the solitude of nature here them and appealed for darshana of the stands the temple of the Perfect Master, Master. As if to respond to their call, Sankaracharya, who lived in these Baba arrived just at the time when they surroundings about two thousand years were being informed to meet him later ago. At the river bank Baba performed in Jubbulpore. In such exceptional the symbolic action of putting his foot cases where Baba feels the depth of the into the river, explaining the signifi- heart's longing to see him, he waives cance of this gesture that wherever the aside all restrictions and allows free Avatar touches a river with his feet, the access to love to express itself. Meeting waters are purified for all those who the Guru face to face, they at once laid come after. their heads at his sacred feet and had As usual, none were informed of his darshana. Baba's stay at Mandla, although the At the close of the year 1938, Baba presence of Mr. J. D. K., who acted spent three days at Mandla, a quiet here as a City Magistrate some two place about 60 miles from Jubbulpore years back, and being a well-known situated at the junction of two great personality created a stir. Mails and rivers of India, the Narbada and the telegrams coming in Shri Baba's name, Godavari. Baba had long since expres- however, disclose the Master's identity, sed his predilection for Mandla due to and in consequence inquiries and its spiritual atmosphere. It is here, he requests are made for his darshana explained, that in ancient times lived which Baba grants just before leaving. great souls and saintly beings. tapasvis In one of his pensive moods, Baba and yogis (ascetics) practising pen- one day gave a discourse on general ances. One of the most inspiring subjects and in particular on the incidences during the short stay at benefits and significance of Guru- Mandla was the walk to the famous

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(contact with a Master). He also open one on this side. As the Master touched on a very important point, the liked Mandla for its spiritual atmos- Elimination of the Ego, which is phere and background of the past, he reproduced hereunder in fragmentary agreed to go and see one out of those form: suggested. Although there was very "Of the three most important things to little time, he went over it, making his be eliminated before attaining God- own observations carefully though hur- realization are greed, and ninda, the riedly, just before leaving Mandla. last meaning 'back-biting' is the worst About a week after this, one night, a and most disastrous. One can overcome car arrived at mandali's quarters in greed, or even lust, though both of Jubbulpore, and two Hindu gentlemen these are very hard to get over, but the from Mandla, Mr. Ch. and Mr. P., are worst and the most difficult of all to announced, desiring a personal meeting eliminate is this habit of ninda, with Baba on some important matter. speaking ill and trying to find faults or Despite the late hour of the night, Baba flaws of others, because this particular saw them. After paying their respects to act or vice incurs the burden of sins, or the Master, and disclosing the purpose what is technically termed as sanskaras of his special visit, Mr. Ch. offers, with of others, which is spiritually very great humility, a gift of a hundred acres derogatory and reactionary. " of his property at Mandla, with a Just the night previous to leaving request to the Master to accept it for the Mandla, Mr. P., one of the leading establishment of his Spiritual Centre. pleaders of the place and a friend of This spontaneous offer made with all Mr. J. D. K., came to see the Master sincerity and depth of the heart, was and suggested that there were some lovingly accepted. In this connection, very beautiful sites on the banks of the Baba had again to go to Mandla to see Narbada suitable for a spiritual the property, situated on the banks of Ashrarma (retreat), if Baba intended to the Narbada, with 2000 mango trees, a very choice site indeed. This particular

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area on the banks of the river Narbada in these times of hard materialism. And is said to be the tapobhoomi (the abode it pleased Baba to be with such a group of ) of the ancient rishis. In of cultured people having also a good their times, this particular property had understanding of spiritual literature and a lac (100,000) mango trees and it was Shastras (scriptures), etc., and desiring actually named 'Lakh-Ambe' (meaning a spiritual enlightenment. During the two lac of mango trees), of which these hours that they were in Baba's com- 2000 have still survived. Baba appeared pany, he gave them an important very happy during the stroll of survey discourse on Truth, the Path and Spiri- of this site, and at a particular spot he tuality as it truly is, from what it is sat for half an hour, surrounded by the understood or rather misunderstood by leading men of Mandla, many of whom even the so-called Vedantists and Pun- having accidentally come to know of dits. Spontaneous cooperation and help Baba's arrival that day had come there in the legal and other arrangements to to see him. They had awaited for years, make the gift deed were readily offered they said, for a saintly Being to visit by all concerned. On the request of a this particular place where they always certain party of devotees who had lived felt the spiritual atmosphere. They had a secluded life for years and could not also read and heard of Baba, but had go out, Baba paid one of his rare visits not seen him. His coming now to to give them the benefit of his dar- Mandla, they believed, was in response shana that they desired. to their prayers and long cherished Two days before leaving Jubbulpore, hopes, and they felt sure that Baba Baba went to Katni, about 60 miles would like the place and establish his from Jubbulpore, for a short visit to Mr. Ashram. This group constituted the and Mrs. B. They are long time influential legal practitioners of Mand- devotees of Shri Upasani Maharaj, la, almost all spiritually inclined at the Baba's second Master, whom the de- same time, which is a rare combination voted family had only recently

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had the honour to receive in their home. Answer It is significant to note that simul- I leave Jubbulpore on the 15th, con- taneously with Baba's movements on tinuing my tour to Benares, Agra, tour, Shri Upasani. Maharaj has also Ajmer, Kashmere and other places, and been touring, visiting Nagpur, intend to return to Jubbulpore in April. Jubbulpore, Katni, Benares, etc. The I intend to open a Spiritual Centre here two Masters thus moving in the same or at Mandla. directions simultaneously seem to be Question indicative of important spiritual What is your Holiness' opinion about working in these regions. ? Baba and the party 1eft Jubbulpore Answer on the 15th of January for Benares via He is a good, noble soul, trying to Katni, where they rested for the night in serve humanity with all heart. the same home of Mr. and Mrs. B. of Question Katni. When does your Holiness think India A representative of the Associated will he liberated ? Press in Jubbulpore sought Baba for a Answer message and also wished certain ques- When Hindus and Mahomedans tions answered. These are reproduced cease quarrelling. herewith. Question Question Whether the Jews, the most op- How long will the present chaotic pressed nation in the world at present, state of affairs continue in the world ? will be able to withstand the onslaught Answer that is being perpetrated on them by As long as selfishness exists as its Hitler and Mussolini? root cause. Answer Question Jews or no Jews, whosoever sticks to How long will your Holiness stay in Truth or is on the side of Truth, can Jubbulpore in particular and India in withstand any onslaught. general? Question Will your Holiness kindly give me a Message which I may broadcast to the world?

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SHRI MEHER BABA'S The best and also the easiest way of MESSAGE overcoming the ego and attaining the 9TH JANUARY 1939 Divine Consciousness is to develop Love and render selfless ser-vice to all When suffering leads to real eternal humanity in whatever cir-cumstances happiness, we should not attach im- we may be placed. All and portance to this suffering. It is to elim- religious practices lead to this. The inate suffering that suffering has to more we live for others and the less we come. live for ourselves, the more the lower People suffer because they are not desires are eliminated, and this in turn satisfied; they want more and more. reacts upon the ego suppressing it and Ignorance gives rise to greed and transforming it pro-portionately. vanity. If you want nothing, would you The root of all our difficulties, in- then suffer? But you do want. If you dividual and social, is self-interest. did not want anything, you would not Eliminate self-interest, and you will suffer even in the jaws of a lion. solve all your problems, individual and The widespread dissatisfaction in social. modern life is due to the gulf between The world will soon realize that theory and practice, between the ideal neither , creeds, dogmas, religious and its realization on earth. The ceremonies, lectures and sermons, on spiritual and material aspects of life are the one hand, nor on the other hand, widely separated instead of being ardent seeking for material or physical closely united. There is no fundamental pleasures, can ever bring about real opposition between spirit and matter, happiness, but that only selfless love or, if you like, between life and form. and universal brotherhood can do it. The apparent opposition is due to wrong thinking, to ignorance.

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MEHER BABA JOURNAL A MONTHLY PUBLICATIO N Elizabeth O . Patterson, Managing Editor and Publisher for the "Meher Editorial Committee" "Meherabad", Ahmednagar, India

MEHER EDITORIAL COMMITTE E C. V. Sampath Aiyangar , (Late of Madras Judicial Service) Dr. Abdul Ghani Munsiff, Princess Norina Matchabelli, Adi K. , Elizabeth C_Patterson, Estelle Gayley, F. H. Dadachanji, Abdul Kareem Abdulla.

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