Сатья Саи Баба Создал Пророческую ЧудоКарту Индии

                >  http://www.proza.ru/2018/01/16/481
         Сатья Саи Баба Создал Пророческую ЧудоКарту Индии

                _перевод из выступления Друкера
                на Европейской СаиКонференции 1989 г.
         _по источнику >  http://vahini.org/downloads/i-am.pdf .

            Профессор Элвин Друкер= Alvin Drucker
       _работавший в космическом агентстве (=в НАСА) США
           _много лет был одним из основных лекторов
         в структуре международной Сатья Саи Организации,
            преподавал в колледже Сатья Саи в Уайтфилде
           и жил в Духовном центре Саи=Сатья Саи Бабы.
      
ОГЛАВЛЕНИЕ:
1. ЧудоТворение Пророческой Карты Индии
2. Ссылки
3. Приложение: полный текст источника
  =указанного выступления Друкера

                1. ЧудоТворение Пророческой Карты Индии
В последний день Летнего курса в Ути в 1976 г. _Сатья Саи Баба в конце своего выступления рассказал, как 20 октября 1940 г. Он отказался от продолжения учёбы в средней школе > чтобы приступить к Своей Миссии БогоЧеловека=Аватара.
Когда Он рассказал об этом эпизоде > наступил очень драматичный момент в зале Ути,
где присутствовал и я.  До этого в Нём было много хорошего юмора и фамильярности-- но теперь Он вдруг стал очень строгим и серьезным. Мы сидели очень близко все вокруг Него в течение двух часов-- но вдруг Саи сделал шаг назад и стал восприниматься очень отдалённым и отделённым—но и как бы готовым выйти к нам .

>  Мы все затаили дыхание.
И в этот момент Саи махнул рукой >  ЧудоТворно создав в ней предмет чрезвычайно мощной Силы. А именно:  Саи сотворил > СЕРЕБРЯНУЮ ТИСНЁНУЮ КАРТУ ИНДИИ _закреплённую на круге из черного оникса. И восемнадцать драгоценных камней _вкрапленных в серебро карты _ дружно поблёскивали в темноте, видимо, от какого-то таинственного внутреннего света.
Он сказал нам, что на этой карте Индии вписаны 100 санскритских стихов
>  давая всю Его историю БогоЧеловека=Аватара _от рождения до ухода Его из физического тела. Это было впервые, когда Он объявил, когда собирается покинуть
это тело.

Он сказал: Все великие дела , которые будут выполнены Им, и все
лидеры, которые уже выбраны из числа Моих учеников записаны здесь
этими стихами.
В зале поднялся большой шум, потому что всем хотелось увидеть эту ЧудоКарту
более внимательно и прочитать надписи на ней.

Саи пустил её по кругу, чтобы все смогли увидеть её и потрогать. Духовно это очень мощный объект и эстетически очень красивый -- но шрифт слишком мал для чтения. Поэтому Его спросили: прочтёт ли Он то, что там написано, и Он ответил:
Я не буду сейчас говорить о будущем_ потерпите_ все будет открыто вам в свое время.
 
И Он сказал:
Почему вы жаждете этого объекта, когда у вас есть его Творец?
_и бросил эту ЧудоКарту в угол стола, где она приземлилась среди гирлянд.

Затем Он сказал:
Я ваш и вы Мои. И все вы > священные души > исполняющие свои роли в Моей Миссии БогоЧеловека=Аватара. И знайте >  что нет силы на Земле или в Космосе_ которые хотя бы на мгновение смогли бы задержать эту миссию. Всё _что Я хочу > свершится.
В последующие годы я появлюсь во многих проявлениях Моей формы. И Я буду везде _где бы вы ни были.
Then he said, “You have me and I have you. You are all sacred souls and you
all have your roles to play in the mission for which this avatar has come. Know that
there is no force on earth or in the cosmos which can delay this mission by even one
instant. What I have willed will take place. In the years to come I will appear in many
manifestations of my form. Wherever you are, there I will be.”

Конечно: этим Откровением Саи обращался не только к тем_кто был тогда в зале.
>  Он говорил всем нам_ибо все мы _кого Он собрал в мире_все мы удачливые души.
Ибо вы знаете, что несмотря на то, что Его Миссия продолжает быть великим чудом и после стольких лет с тех пор, как Он объявил о ней; и несмотря на то, что Его Миссия продолжается уже так много лет; и насмотря на то, что дела Саи стали широко известны в мире; и несмотря на то, что Саи всё еще довольно легко доступен
--несмотря на всё это
>  так мало тех _кто фактически взяли на себя обязательство стать преданным и кто фактически живут по Его Учению.

2. ССЫЛКИ

О ГРЯДУЩЕМ ИСАИ =Иисусе+Саи
> www.proza.ru/2013/06/27/1215 Новое Пришествие ЯЕдиногоЯ  ИСАИ…
> www.stihi.ru/2016/04/18/8215 Према Саи Баба грядёт = Пришествие ЯЕдиногоЯ…
> http://www.proza.ru/2016/07/20/1527  Про`Видение ЯЕдиногоЯ > Словами ИСАИ говорит Грядущий

ФОТОКЛИП  ИСАИ =Иисус и Саи (слева)
_приведен здесь_с надписью > Как Солнце восходит из Света _ над миром взойдёт ИСАИ
_заимствован из публикации  > http://www.stihi.ru/2016/03/21/8076   
Он  =Я в нас = {Единого Света < ЯЕстина} > Жизни > Пути

ИСТОЧНИК приведенного перевода (путь скпачки):
>  http://vahini.org/downloads.html > I Am - A talk by Al Drucker
                on the occasion of the all-European Sai Conference 1989
>  http://vahini.org/downloads/i-am.pdf

СОПРЯЖЁННЫЕ ССЫЛКИ:
Это ЧудоТворение описано также в эссе «Голубые озёра» 2-й главы 4-го тома книги:
 Kasturi N. >  Sathyam Sivam Sundaram. =The Life of Bhagavаn Shri Sathya Sai Baba
> http://vahini.org/sss/sss.html  Англоязычный источник;
Русскоязычный перевод:
Кастури Н. >  История жизни Сатья Саи Бабы > Том 4-й=1971_1979г.г. 
=Истина_Добро_Красота.= Сатьям_ Шивам_Сундарам. _ пер. с англ. Р. Сергачёва.
—М.: Амрита-Русь, 2-е изд  ISBN: 978-5-413-01261-1
>   http://scriptures.ru/sss_4.htm   скачка
>  http://amrita-rus.ru/books/author/kasturi-n/ бумажная_продажа.

Глушков http://www.proza.ru/avtor/vg891  16.01.2018

3. Приложение: полный текст источника
= выступления Друкера
(последователя Саи_работавшего в НАСА)
на Европейской СаиКонференции 1989 г.
>  http://vahini.org/downloads/i-am.pdf
I AM
A talk by Al Drucker

The occasion was the all-European Sai Conference held in Hamburg, Germany in the
Spring of 1989. It was the Pentecost, the day in Christianity when the Holy Spirit
descended into the disciples of Jesus, who had gathered together on that ancient
Jewish holiday fifty days after Passover, to pray together in gratitude and remembrance
of their lord. As the disciples recollected the miracle of Jesus’ presence among them,
they became radiant with the Spirit of Divinity and were transformed into the apostles of
Christ. Now they were empowered by the Spirit within them to embark on a sacred
mission of spreading the message of the Prince of Peace to all the peoples of the world.
On this particular Pentecostal holiday in Hamburg, two thousand years later, several
thousand devotees from all over Europe came together in Sai Baba’s name and invoked
the spirit of Baba to come and be among them. There was not a picture of Baba or other
spiritual decorations visible in the hall; only a simple jyothi, a flame burning on the stage
to remind us of the miracle of Baba’s presence on Earth and the light of Spirit within us
that he has come to reveal to all mankind. I had been asked to speak on spirituality. I
spoke spontaneously without notes, and found myself weaving together the spirit of the
Pentecost with Baba’s profound wisdom teachings and some of my own experiences
from the eight years spent living in Sai Baba’s ashram. Now, many years later, I still find
myself deeply moved by the talk that emerged. I hope you, dear reader, will be able to
savor the magic of Swami's presence that so powerfully permeated that hall in Hamburg
and inspired these words:
Invocation
May the Blessings of God rest upon you.
May His Peace abide with you.
May His Presence illuminate your heart.
Now and forever more.
Sai Ram dear Brothers and Sisters:
I started off this morning feeling very peaceful and empty inside. Then I took a little
walk and came across a plaza that’s only a few steps from here. It’s just a little grass
area with a large rectangular rock in the middle of it. That rock, taller than I can touch
with my hand outstretched, is obviously a quarried rock that’s been put there; but it is
rough and unworked and full of drill holes. It has the appearance of the walls of a
dungeon. And there it sits in this little park with nothing else around it but the grass and
the birds, and the tall modern buildings encompassing it. I felt a strange sensation being
there, and then I noticed a little placard just to the side of the rock, with the inscription:
LET US NEVER FORGET
During the Nazi time, thousands of our Hamburg citizens
were herded together here, and sent to their death.
So, for these unfortunate ones, one night they were comfortable in their homes,
secure with their families, and filled with some semblance of dignity and hope. Then the
next morning, there were sirens and shouts and police dogs, and they were torn away
from their families and packed off in cattle cars to their death.
Having woken up in a rather serene state, without anything particular on my mind, not
even being too concerned about my talk here this morning, I was quite open to the
impact of this memory, which is enshrined in that little park. It affected me very deeply
and I carry that feeling with me even now. And so, I want to talk to you about a most
important spiritual practice, which has to do with preparing oneself, moment to moment,
to be ready for death. We always think of life, but Swami teaches us to always
remember death. He gave us these three directions:
Remember God. Forget the World. Never fear Death.
One Hundred Percent
One time Swami called in the students studying for their masters in Business
Administration. He told them, “No shares. I want you to remember... no shares.”
“Swami, we promise we won’t play in the stock market and get involved with any share
holdings,” one of them replied.
“No, no, not that,” Swami said,”No shares... no sharing... do not share God with
anything or anyone. You must be one hundred percent with God... only with God.”
And then he told a number of stories from the Indian epics, one of them of Draupadi
who was the wife of the Pandavas. She was being forcibly dragged into the court and
disgraced in front of all the elders. A villainous rogue who had grabbed her by the hair
was now pulling her sari off. With one hand she tried to hold on to her sari and with the
other she tried to fend off her attacker. She cried out to her husbands, the Pandavas, for
help, but the husbands felt powerless to do anything. She cried out to the elders
assembled there to come to their senses and stop this terrible thing, but no one lifted a
finger to help her. In her distress she called out to Krishna for help. But even the Lord
did not respond. Finally, in total resignation she let go of her sari and surrendered
herself body and soul to the Lord, to do with as he pleased. Immediately, Krishna
showered his grace on her. Her sari became longer and longer without end and her
honor was preserved. In this story, Swami’s message is:
Surrender fully to God. Turn towards him and he will turn towards you and take care
of you totally. Rely on him one hundred per cent... no shares.
Now, we are spending three days in this conference, meeting together in Swami’s
name. Everywhere there are reminders of Sai, and perhaps by the time this conference
is over we will be filled with his loving presence and gain a little of the feeling that he is
everywhere, including inside of us.
But then we will go home to our worldly life, we will do our work, we will go about our
own business. Perhaps we have been making a habit of spending a little time each day
in spiritual practice and getting together to chant bhajans once a week. ‘That’, we say to
ourselves, ‘is God’s time; the rest is our time.’
But this is not what Swami means by ‘no shares’. He said,”There is no separate Godlife
and worldly-life. Do not separate your day into God’s time and your time. You must
make all your work God’s work, all your time God’s time. No shares. One hundred
percent God, all day, every day and everywhere.”
Does that mean that we should neglect our worldly work? No, of course not. He says,
“Do your duty in the world, engage yourself in your professions, take care of your family
responsibilities, but perform all these activities in the name of God and for God’s sake.
Offer them all to God. That is the meaning of no shares.” It is also what is meant by the
great saying in the Bible... “Love God with all your heart, with all your strength and with
all your mind.” Subsume all your limited worldly loves in the one all-consuming love for
God.
Now, why is all this so important? It is important because at the moment of death
nothing must be allowed to distract us from a total absorption in God. At that moment of
death it must not be one percent or five percent or ten percent, but one hundred per
cent God. All our spiritual practices have no other purpose but to prepare us for that last
moment when we can end in joy. That, Swami says, is the real meaning of ‘enjoy’. It is
to make the end one of joy, no matter what the circumstances, even under the horrid
conditions brought to mind by that memory preserved in the little park.
Nothing can disturb our equanimity when we are one hundred percent immersed in
God. Nothing of world remains to disturb us. Fear no longer holds any meaning, for
everything will have become God for us. Death will have lost its sting. We will be
merged in the ocean of eternal bliss and these kinds of dark events will be just like bad
dreams of the night which have no hold on us. That is the promise contained in that little
phrase, ‘no shares’.
Education in Human Values
How do we start this practice? Swami says, “The only way to immortality is through
the removal of immorality.” The very act of purifying our lives evokes the Divinity to
reveal itself in our lives, and not only we but the whole world benefits thereby. Then
these kinds of bad dreams become less and less likely to happen again. That is why
education in human values is so very important. Really the most important thing that we
as devotees can do in the world today is to spread the message of love and peace and
righteous living.
If there is to be unity and peace in the world it will happen when there is the removal of
immorality, which means when human beings live like real, whole human beings not like
fractional pseudo-human beings. Now, Swami tells us, human life is not filled with peace
but is broken into little pieces. There is no unity anywhere. Swami tells a story of how to
bring peace and wholeness back into human existence and unity into the world.
There is a little boy who found his way into his father’s study. The little boy is not
permitted in there normally because there are some very valuable papers inside,
and the door is kept closed. But one day the door happened to be ajar and the
window was also open a little, so that a bit of a breeze was blowing through the
room. The boy saw the open door and went inside. And just then a very important
paper was carried by the breeze off the desk and wafted down onto the floor. It was
a very old and very rare map of the world, a very beautiful map with many colors,
each representing a different country.
The boy saw this beautiful piece of paper. He picked it up and looked at it, then he
bent it this way and that, making a little boat out of it and then a hat and then a
house. Oh, it was so nice to play with! But the ancient map could not stand so much
bending and soon it was in two pieces and then in four and then in eight and then in
lots and lots of pieces comprising many different colors. The little boy was just
delighted with this new turn of events... now he had more things to play with, and so
in no time at all, the whole world was in pieces.
When the father came in, he saw that his boy had been playing with the world and
that he had managed to tear the whole world into pieces. The father was very much
disturbed. He said, “Son, look at what you’ve done. You’ve torn the world into
pieces.”
But, after all, it was his son and he was just a little boy and he was really quite
innocent. He just happened to wander in there and start playing; so the father
couldn’t really be too angry with him. But, nevertheless, the world was now in pieces,
and so the father decided to teach the boy an important lesson. He said, “Son, you
shouldn’t have torn the world into pieces. Here, I will give you some tape and you
put it all back together again. When you paste it back together, daddy will feel better
and you will also feel better.”
Try as he would, the little boy didn’t know how to put the world back together again.
There were just too many pieces and he just couldn’t understand how they were
meant to fit together.
But then a small gust of wind came and one of the pieces happened to be blown
onto its backside. There on the back of the paper he saw a human eye. Well, that
was surprising. He turned another piece over and on its backside he found a hand.
And then on another piece he saw a nose, and on another a foot, and then the top of
a head, and a shoulder, and pretty soon he had all the pieces over on their back and
saw all the different parts of a human being.
Well, even a little boy knows what a human being looks like. Now he had a puzzle
that he could solve. When he used the tape to hold all the pieces together he found
that he now had a beautiful image of a complete human being. Then, when he
turned the pasted together pieces over, to his delight he discovered that the whole
world was back together again.
So, the whole world is in pieces and no one knows how to put it back together again.
But put the human being back together and the whole world comes together again
automatically. That is really what human values education is all about. And that is
something we must foster and spread in the world. Let each put himself together and
the world will come together. We don’t have to go out and try to change the world,
getting involved in all kinds of causes. Just allow the inner man to become whole again
and one by one the message of unity will spread, and the whole world will come
together again.
From the Human to the Divine
I was scheduled to speak to you on spirituality, but as yet, I have not really defined
what it is. Spirituality is very, very simple, according to Swami. Spirituality is nothing
more than being established in your own true nature. It is being home in your true Self.
And for that no spiritual practice is required. Sugar does not need to do any spiritual
practice to be sweet. Sweetness is its unchanging nature. We always are who we are.
We can never change being ourselves, which is the eternal sweetness of pure bliss.
The only spiritual practice required is to remove the veil that keeps us from knowing
who we really are.
We have to give up this mistaken notion that we are limited individuals separate from
God, experiencing pleasures and miseries in the world. That is a false notion, based on
ignorance. First, Swami reminds us that we are human and not animal. We can control
our impulses and channel our desires. We can live selfless and sacred lives. But then
we discover an even higher truth. We are not really limited individuals. We are the
Divinity itself, in all its splendor and glory. Our essential nature is divine. When the
clouds of illusion are dispelled the truth shines forth. When we remove the false, what is
true remains. To remove the false is all we ever need to do. It is all we can ever hope to
do.
Karma
As beings we have lived so many lives, and there are yet countless lives to come. It is
like a huge warehouse which is filled with the consequences of our actions in previous
lives; and all this karma is still waiting to fructify in future lives. We have only taken out
one little push-cart-full from this huge warehouse, and that little cart-load is our present
life. The warehouse remains full to the brim with future lives. Where they will be lived, in
what circumstances, we do not know.
But now, we are oblivious to all that. We care only about this present life. We think that
this life is so very important. But, in how many lives past have we had families, have we
had possessions, name and fame, worldly achievements and ambitions? Where are
they all now? How many more lives are necessary before we wake up to the futility of all
these endless rounds of births and deaths? Swami says, “How often do you need to
read the same newspaper over and over again? Today’s newspaper is tomorrow’s
waste paper.”
What is really important is not this life but that huge warehouse of future lives to come.
We must find a way to burn down that warehouse. We must fry those seeds so that they
can never sprout. We must make an all-out effort to live this life as if it is our last life.
The avatar has come to show us the way home. He said that when Rama finished his
career and walked into the river, the citizens of Ayodha followed him. When this avatar
finishes his career tens of thousands will be swept out with him. Have we booked our
reservations for that final journey home?
All depends on our attitude. As we think so it is. Swami says, “Dust if you think, dust
you are. God if you think, God you are. Think God! Be God!” We create the world with
our own thoughts. If we think that we are separate individuals and limit the unbounded
divinity which we truly are, by shutting it into a cage of narrow-minded selfishness, then
our reality protests against this limitation with pain and suffering. In this life itself we
must remove the cage of limitation which has manifested itself as this false ego and
personality.
When Swami addresses us in his discourses he doesn’t start his talks with ‘Ladies and
Gentlemen’ or ‘Citizens of Germany’ or ‘Middle-class Housewives’. When he addresses
us, he calls us ‘Embodiments of the One Immortal Self’, ‘Embodiments of Pure, Selfless
Love’, ‘Embodiments of Eternal Bliss’. He knows better than we who we really are. He
says we are the Divinity itself. If he says so, then it must be so. We may not feel that we
are pure, selfless, divine love, that we are unmitigated joy, that we are the unbounded
Self. Instead we may feel that we are small and limited and filled with bad qualities and
misery. That may be our perception, but it is a false view of our essential nature. It is
something artificial that has come onto our true nature and hidden it from our view. So,
we must set aside these false views and go wholly on faith. We must trust in Swami. If
he says our nature is joy and love, that we are divine, then so we are.
Now, the question is: Are we ready to make such a leap of faith? Are we ready to
believe in him rather than in our false self-concepts? Are we ready to first jump in and
then find out how to swim? Such one hundred percent faith is what he asks of us. If we
follow him and let him drive our chariot then no matter what happens to this outer ‘us’,
we will be heading on the godward path home. For this, faith is all important.
The Exodus from Egypt
Today is the Pentecost, forty days after Easter, when, according to the Christian Bible,
the Holy Spirit descended. In the Hebrew Bible this would be the time when the people
were wandering in the desert, undergoing great difficulties, as the Lord gave them one
trial after another to test their faith and their spiritual strength, until finally they were
ready to receive the Ten Commandments on Mount Sinai. Let us recall that story.
For 430 years they were slaves in Egypt. And then it was time for them to be freed.
God sent Moses to bring them out of Egypt. But God said, “To reveal my glory, I will
harden Pharaoh’s heart and he will not let the people go.” And so Egypt had to suffer
all those plagues until finally the Pharaoh let the people go. They left so quickly that
they didn’t have time to take any food with them except for a few loaves of
unleavened dough, and so for their provisions they were totally dependent on the
bounty of the Lord.
They followed the angel of the Lord in the form of a column of smoke, who took them
out into the desert and then to the banks of the Red Sea. Here they stopped, unable
to go further. It was at this point that God again induced the Pharaoh to harden his
heart. The Pharoah marshalled his whole army of chariot warriors and decided to
pursue the Israelites into the desert and destroy them. One morning the people
looked up towards the horizon and saw a huge army arrayed in full battle dress
descending upon them from the west, like death itself. Trapped, the children of Israel
were caught between the devil and the deep sea. They set up a howl and lamented
to Moses, “Did you bring us out of Egypt so that we would die here?” Moses
answered,”Why do you have so little faith? When the Lord has brought you this far,
do you think he will abandon you now?”
I think you know the rest of the story, of how the sea split to let them through and then
closed in again and drowned the army that was pursuing them. And so they were
saved. But then they had to wander in the desert without water or food, except what
was provided by the Lord in the daily manna which came in with the morning dew, and
the water which miraculously came out of rocks cleft by Moses with his sacred staff. For
forty years they wandered, and they learned to become totally dependent for their
survival and their spiritual food as well, on the bounty of the Lord. It required a total
letting go to His grace... one hundred percent trust.
It is really a Swami story... an archetypal surrender to divine providence... a complete
faith in God, without any shares. It is what he wants of us.
Lost In the Storm
My airplane experience is of the same vein.
I was flying a small plane and suddenly found myself fighting for my life when I got
caught in a very powerful winter storm. It was a foolish trip to begin with. I had no
good reason for being there. My passenger was slumped in the corner, either
unconscious or dead, I didn’t know. During all those hours I was busy beyond the
point of exhaustion just trying to keep the airplane flying and to stay alive in that
awful turbulence. I called on the radio, “Mayday! Mayday! Please help. If anyone can
hear me please help me!” But there was no answer.
We were over an uninhabited wilderness area in the mountains of Northern Nevada.
There were no radio stations anywhere near. Finally the fuel gauge was bouncing on
empty, the airplane itself was coming apart, and I had no energy left to fight. I just let
go of the controls, knowing full well that in no time at all in such a maelstrom, the
airplane might be flipped onto its back. For the first time in thirty-five years I turned to
God for help.
When I was a little boy I thought very often of God, but then, when we came to
America, science became my god, and I forgot all about God. But now, after all
those years, I cried out to God, “O Lord! Please come and help me! I don’t want to
die!” But then I let go of even that hope and added, “Let thy will be done.” It was a
complete resignation to the divine will. Suddenly, this wonderful voice came over the
radio, “Aircraft in distress, can you hear me?” And from that point on this angel of
mercy guided me around the worst cells of the storm and brought me safely into an
airport 50 miles away on the other side of the mountains.
The airport was open for only about 10 or 15 minutes. And during these few minutes
a snow plough had cleared off the runway just in time for this little airplane to come
flying out of the clouds and land. After four hours of battling the elements, I was
exhausted. Now, I thought, at last the danger was over. But then, almost
immediately after we touched down the storm hit again in a swirl of snow. Suddenly I
had my hands full again trying to keep us from crashing. A torrent of wind had picked
up one wing and was about to flip us on our back. I quickly managed to get the
power back on and turn the airplane into the wind so that it could ride out the storm.
Just as it had gotten around... plop... plop... plop... the engine quit as the last drop of
fuel was used up. But now we were safe. At that moment, the passenger woke up
and said, “What happened?” I knew everything would be OK.
The control tower man told me, “I don’t know how you got here, but you can thank
God you’re alive.” “A ground controller guided me here,” I replied. “He had a radar
and saw me in trouble and vectored me here.” And the tower-man said,”Are you
kidding? That’s an Indian reservation out there... a wilderness area. For two hundred
miles there is nothing. No ground stations, no controllers, no radars.”
That ended the conversation. The adventure was over... but a new one had been
launched... undoubtedly, the greatest adventure of all... the adventure of waking up to
the presence of God in your life.
The Play of Life and Death
In this way, through the experiences he sends, we slowly begin to learn how he
functions within us. It seems whenever there is a crisis he waits until the last moment to
step in. He takes us to the precipice and even down into the depths. And then, at the
last moment, he raises us up to the sky. And soon it’s down the roller-coaster again. But
then, just when we think we know a little bit about him and how he works, he dashes all
our knowing and we are plunged back into confusion and wondering what’s going on.
Like this he plays with us, and slowly but surely, all our expectations and hopes, all
our concepts, all our knowings, all our self-importance, and with them, the ego that
claims ownership of all these wisps of the mind, dissolve into nothingness, and just a
sweet unpredictability and loving presence remains.
I’ve been close to death a number of times, but I must not have been ready to end in
joy, for I am still standing here. The last time was just a few months ago. Swami had
told me, “This is a very serious illness. You must go into the hospital and think only of
Swami.” And then he sent me back to America to get medical treatment. A Sai brother
from America, Don Heath, whom I had known for many years and who happened to be
visiting Prashanti Nilayam at that time, also got very sick and also ended up in the
hospital. Lying there side-by-side we decided that if we had to die, how nice it would be
if we could die in this holy place.
I’ve been the funeral director at Prashanti Nilayam eight or nine times when
Westerners died there. It was my job to look after the last rites. I would arrange for
twenty rupees of firewood and organize a procession of devotees to take the body down
to the sand-banks of the Chitravarthi River. We would have a little service and then light
the fire, and in a few minutes the body rejoined the five elements.
So, I said to Don, “Wouldn’t it be nice if we could save twenty rupees between us, if
we both go at the same time?” He said, “Let us see what the Lord wishes.” A few days
later he was dead, whereas this body, as you see, is still standing here, talking.
A few months after returning to America, I visited Esalen Institute, the beautiful center
on the Big sur coast in California where I had previously taught and lived for fourteen
years. Everyone there was so very loving to me. They asked me to come back and stay
for a while and get healed there. And so I returned and lived there for a couple of
months. One day, when I was coming into the lodge, I recognized a man whom I had
last seen in Prashanti Nilayam, a doctor from Australia. He was talking to someone, and
I went over to him and said, “Graham, what are you doing here?”
He turned to look at me and his face turned ashen. Overwhelmed with astonishment,
he said, “Wow, is that really you Al? Are you alive?”
“Well, I don’t think I’m a ghost,” I replied.
Without saying another word he ran up to his car to get his camera and immediately
came back to take a picture of me. For a moment I was wondering if he had lost his
mind, but then he explained, “Just last month I attended your memorial service in
Sydney. So many people came and there was beautiful singing. The mother of the
Australian boy you looked after at Prashanti Nilyam gave a heart-warming talk and
several others spoke in memory of you. We made a video to circulate to the other
centers. I will send you a copy.”
So it looks like they got me mixed up with Don. Now, I’ll have to disappoint all those
nice people. You see it was all just a play of Swami’s. I think no one enjoys the Lord’s
plays as much as he does. We should be happy knowing that with all these little dramas
and play-lives that we take so seriously, we are giving some enjoyment to the Lord.
The Birth of the Human Being, the Death of the Lord
My favorite book of Swami’s is the Bhagavata Vahini. It is a marvellous storybook. It is
filled with the play of the Lord, relating the wonderful happenings in the life of Krishna. In
this book, Swami has rewritten the Srimad Bhagavatam, the great Indian scripture. He
presents it somewhat differently from the original.
In Swami’s book, it starts out with the birth of a child. That child is Parikshith, the only
heir to the Pandava throne. The Pandavas, as you know, of whom the most well-known
was Arjuna, represent the side of good, whereas their cousins, the Kauravas, represent
the side of evil. These two sides fought a war of total annihilation, which is the
Mahabharata, immortalized in the great Indian epic of that name.
Swami said that the Mahabharata represents the inner war being waged between the
forces of good and evil inside our own hearts. We cannot win this war on our own. We
must turn towards the Lord. Then he will come and take hold of the reins of our chariot,
just as he did for Arjuna in the Mahabharata. That is our only hope of winning this inner
war.
In the story, at the end of the war, the Pandavas were victorious, but the war
exacted a terrible price. In a dastardly deed on the last night of the war, one of the
last surviving fighters on the Kaurava side broke into the Pandava camp at night and
killed all the Pandava children while they were sleeping. The Pandavas were
devastated. Their only hope for continuing the royal succession was the child that
was growing in the womb of the widowed wife of Arjuna’s son. But the same warrior
who killed the other children resolved to destroy this last vestige of the Pandava line,
by sending an arrow into the womb of the helpless woman.
The royal foetus in the womb, saw that terrible missile coming towards it, spitting
sparks of fury and destruction. But then he saw a beautiful blue boy with a lovely
smile on his face, whirling a discus and hurling it at the arrow. The lethal missile
broke into a thousand pieces. The babe in the womb was saved. Immediately
afterwards the beautiful blue boy disappeared.
After the child was born, all he could think of was that lovely blue boy who had saved
his life, and he sought for him everywhere to see that beautiful face again. “Who was
he?” he asked himself. “Why did he come to save me?” In every face he saw he
wondered,”Is this him?” Because he was always searching for something so
intensely, they called him, Parikshith, which means the one who seeks.
There also, close to the beginning of the book, we find an account of the death of
Krishna. The Lord had finished his work on earth and left his body. So, the beginning of
the book, as Swami tells the story, has the birth of a human child and the departure of
the Lord. Then the whole book is filled with the wonderful stories of the life of Krishna,
mostly the wonderful play of the young Krishna. These stories are related by a great
sage to Parikshith, after Parikshith had become the emperor of the realm. They are told
under unusual circumstances. The Lord had left the earth and the Kali Yuga, the age of
materialism and unrighteousness had begun. That dark age took hold of everyone,
including even King Parikshith.
One day the king was hunting in the forest and got himself separated from his party.
He was very thirsty and saw a little hut nearby, in which a sage was sitting in
meditation. Parikshith did not realize that this was a sage immersed in trance; he
thought the man was just asleep. Parikshith tried to awaken him but he could not
bring the sage out of his trance. Parikshith was desperate for some water but he
could not find any and he could not get this sleeping person to tell him where it was.
So in frustration he left, but before leaving, he picked up the dead skin of a snake
and draped it around the sage’s neck as a parting gesture of disgust.
The sage’s young son discovered his father sitting with this snake skin on his
shoulders. The lad became so furious seeing this insult to his father, that he cursed
the man who had perpetrated this outrage to die seven days later from a snake-bite.
When the father came out of his trance and heard what the son had done, he said,
“Son, you shouldn’t have done that. He didn’t mean any harm. I cannot now set
aside your curse, but you made a great mistake. He is a good king and he doesn’t
deserve this ignoble end. Go and tell him what happened. Let him prepare himself
and turn this curse into a blessing, by using the chance to elevate himself spiritually.”
And so, Parikshith finds out that he is under a sentence of death, to die in seven
days. But for him this news is a tremendous relief. His burden of worldly life has now
been taken from him. He takes off his crown and his royal robes and goes down to
the banks of the Ganges to immerse himself in contemplation on the Lord. Sages
come and sit with him and then the great God-realized saint, Suka, comes and tells
the king the stories of the divine play of the Lord. And that is what fills the
Bhagavata, the inspiring stories of the Lord related to a man who is under a
sentence of death.
Making This Life Our Last Life
Swami says that we are all under a sentence of death. How are we spending these
last days that we have left? Do we know when that last day will be? Those thousands
who were herded together just a few steps from here, did they have any idea the day
before, that they would be sent off to their death the next morning? When I went flying
for the joy of it, did I have any idea that within minutes I would be in mortal danger? Are
we ready this very second to end this life joyfully, if the god of death comes calling?
If we are immersed in the Lord, one hundred percent, body and soul, then it makes no
difference when death chooses to come. Then we are always ready, and we don’t have
to be concerned about that huge warehouse filled with future lives. It will be reduced to
ashes.
Swami once came up to me on the verandah at the temple and asked me, “Do you
think that I’m fat?” Swami has a little belly. I replied to him, “No, Swamiji, I think you are
beautiful.” “But what about this pumpkin?” he said, patting his belly. I replied, “Swami,
it’s just the folds of your gown.” He said, “Not gown, pumpkin!” And then he whispered
in my ear, “It is Prema Sai. He is growing inside.” We know that Swami is coming in
another incarnation. In the same way, we are also pregnant with our next incarnation,
which even now, is growing within us.
Whether we consider ourselves as males or females, Swami says that in the spiritual
context we are all females. And we are all heavy with our next birth. Swami once said
that the whole world can be compared to a play put on in a girl’s college. On stage they
will play the part of gents or ladies, of young or old, of saints or sinners, of beggars or
kings. The dress will be different, the make-up will be different, the bodies will look
different, but all these varied parts are just being played by the same class of girl
students. There is one man. He is the director of the play. All the rest are ladies.
And so it is with the one Lord who is the director of this world play, The feminine
principle is this whole creation, and like the dream world and its characters, it can but do
the bidding of the dreamer. As long as we are caught up in the illusion we are players in
the Lord’s play. That great drama features the wheel of birth and death and rebirth.
So, where will our next birth be? Will it be with Prema Sai, the final incarnation of the
Sai avatar, who will usher in the golden age? It may not be. We may be reborn in
another era. Or we may be reborn in the ghettos of Calcutta or in a world ravaged by
destruction. We don’t know. Therefore, we must make every effort to evoke the Lord’s
grace, and make this birth the last birth, this life the last life. We must live with the
conviction that when we finish this time, we will be finished for good.
The way to do that is to be established one-hundred percent in Sai at the last moment.
And we get there by being established one-hundred percent in Sai at this moment. And
at every moment from now on. It is constantly reaffirming Swami’s prescription: “Let go
of the world, hold on to God and never fear death.”
“My grace comes like a flash,” he says. “When you least expect I act. You must
always be ready.”
Let Go, Let God
Once I complained to Swami, “Swamiji, the spiritual path is so difficult.”
“No,” he said, “it is very easy, easier than anything else in the world.” He took his
handkerchief and grasped it in his hand very tightly.
He said, “You see, this is difficult. But spiritual path is not this. Spiritual path is very
easy.” He just opened his hand and the handkerchief fell down to the ground. “You see
how easy it is. Letting go is easy. That is all there is to it.”
So when we reach the point when we want nothing else but God and to fill ourselves
only with God, then we are on the spiritual path. And that is not really so difficult. All we
have to do is just let go of everything else.
One time he came up to me on the verandah and asked, “Drunker, what do you
want?” I laughed at his twist of my name and I answered his question, “Swamiji, I’m very
content. I’m satisfied.”
“You mean you want nothing?” he asked, with some astonishment in his voice.
I said,”Swamiji, all I want is God!”
“That’s not NOTHING,” he said quite forcefully, “That’s EVERYTHING... that’s health,
wealth, freedom, liberation, bliss...” And he continued on with a long list of good things.
Then he added, “Nothing is there!” pointing to the world outside the ashram, “Everything
is here! Everything!” and he pointed to my heart.
So, it is all already here within us, one hundred percent; nothing more needs to be
given. Only the veil of ignorance must be removed. The room may have been dark for
thousands of years, but the sunlight will always be waiting. Pull away the curtain and
instantly the darkness will be replaced by a dazzling flood of light.
The Death of the Human Being, the Birth of the Lord
Now, let us get back to Swami’s Bhagavata Vahini:
When the book is almost finished, on the very last pages, Suka tells the story of the
birth of Krishna. So, this book starts with the birth of a human child who seeks
everywhere to find his savior. He cannot forget the powerful vision he had of that
beautiful boy who saved his life.
After the royal child is born he discovers that the remarkable uterine brother who had
come and saved him in the womb was none other than Lord Krishna. But soon
thereafter the Lord left the earth. The child became a man, a king, involved in the affairs
of the world. With the onset of Kali, his spiritual roots become more and more dried up.
Only his name, Parikshith, remained to remind him of his indefatigable quest as an
infant to find the Lord, who was so close to him in the womb.
But then the king came under a sentence of death. Now, after all these years, he
returns to his quest. Again he looks for the Lord, but this time he must find Him
inside.So, he fills his heart with the sweet stories of the miracles and play of the Lord.
And finally, at the end of the book, Swami tells the story of the birth of the Lord in
human form as Krishna.
Krishna was born in a dungeon cell, the eighth child of Devaki and Vasudeva. The
mother and father were chained to the wall of this dark dungeon cell. It had been
prophesied that their eighth child would kill the evil king, Kamsa. Kamsa threw them
into the dungeon so that each child as it was born could be taken by him and
destroyed.
You can almost get a sense of what those poor souls must have felt like, with each
of their children and all their hopes shattered, if you go out to that rock a little
distance from here and see those holes in it, which could have held the chains that
shackled Krishna’s parents to the dungeon wall.
Suddenly, their candle went out; they were plunged into darkness. Then this
beautiful golden light filled their cell and they made out the image of Narayana, the
Lord, with his four hands, one hand raised in blessing. The Lord said to them, “In a
moment I will be born as your child. Do not have any fear. There is no force on the
earth or in the whole cosmos that can harm me in any way. The mission for which I
have come will succeed.”
Sai Baba’s Declaration
These are also the very words that Swami spoke in a very special talk that he gave at
the end of the summer course at Ooty, in 1976. When the summer course was over,
Swami had left, and therefore, everyone else had also pretty much left. Only the college
boys were still there, waiting for their buses, and a few of us were still around.
Suddenly, Swami came back. He told us to gather in very close around him. It was a
very secretive and hush-hush thing; he had the loudspeakers and outside lights turned
off. Then for two hours he told us many wonderful stories of himself as a young boy.
They were every bit as magical as the stories of the young Krishna that fill the pages of
the Bhagavatham.
Towards the end of his talk, Swami related how one day he had thrown down his
school books and walked out of the school assembly to commence his avataric mission.
When he related this episode it was a very dramatic moment in the hall at Ooty. Before
there had been much good humor and familiarity, but now he became very stern and
serious. We had been sitting very close all around him for two hours, but suddenly
Swami stepped back and felt very distant. It looked like he was poised to walk out on us
also. We all caught our breaths.
Just at that moment, Swami waved his hand and created a most powerful object. It
had a round black onyx base and on it was a silver map of India. Surrounding the map
were eighteen jewels that all glistened in the dark, apparently from some mysterious
inner light. He told us that on this map of India were inscribed 100 Sanskrit verses
giving the whole history of this avatar from the time it had taken birth to the time when it
leaves its body. It was the first time he had ever announced when he was going to leave
his body.
He said, “All the great works that will be accomplished by this avatar and all the
leaders who have already been chosen from among my students are recorded here in
these verses.” Now there was a big hubbub in the room. Everyone wanted to see this
object more closely and read the writing on it.
Baba took it around for all to see and touch. Spiritually it was a very powerful object
and aesthetically it was very beautiful, but the writing was too small for anyone to
decipher. So Swami was asked if he would read what it said, and he answered. “I will
not tell the future. Be patient. Everything will be revealed to you in due time.”
Then he said, “Why do you hanker after this object when you have its creator?” And
he took that thing and threw it into the corner of a table, where it landed among some
garlands. Then he said, “You have me and I have you. You are all sacred souls and you
all have your roles to play in the mission for which this avatar has come. Know that
there is no force on earth or in the cosmos which can delay this mission by even one
instant. What I have willed will take place. In the years to come I will appear in many
manifestations of my form. Wherever you are, there I will be.”
Of course, Swami was not just speaking to those students. He was speaking to all of
us... we who are the fortunate souls whom he has gathered in. You know, it continues to
be a great wonder to me how after so many years since Swami announced his avataric
mission, and so many years since the Sai phenomenon has become widely-known in
the world, that not only is Swami still quite easily accessible, but there are so very few
who have actually made the commitment to become devotees and live his teachings.
Who Is a Devotee?
Swami said that his devotees are very, very rare. He said that among ten people you
can find one truly good person. And among ten good people you will find one who has
some deep feelings for God. We all know lots of good people, but how many of them
have a love for God? Not just going to church on Sunday but a real yearning for the
transcendental... for going beyond? And he says that among those who love God one
out of ten will yearn for a direct experience, a deep communion with God. And of ten
who have such a deep yearning, one will be ready to let go totally, to renounce
everything he previously held dear and surrender himself completely to God, filling
himself with God alone. “That is my devotee, and he is very dear to me,” Swami said.
As yet, there are not very many such committed souls, but Swami will see to it that we
all reach that blessed state. One time, in the Poornachandra auditorium on a festival
day, when there were fifteen to twenty thousand inside, and tens of thousands outside,
Swami looked around and said, “I cannot see even one devotee here. Not one!”
He told us, “When Swami comes around you all have your hands folded, looking very
sacred. But, this is just like the lions and tigers and leopards in the circus ring when the
ringmaster comes in with his whip. Then everyone sits on their haunches and displays
their best behavior. But, as soon as the ringmaster leaves, they start growling and
snarling at each other.”
“I am not interested in such so-called devotees,” he said. “I have not come to gather in
devotees of this Sai Baba form. I want you to be devotees of Sai’s teachings,” he said.
“Even if out of all these Sathya Sai educational institutions only a small handful of real
devotees comes forth, I will be able to complete my mission. Just a few genuine
devotees is enough. I’m always interested only in quality, never in quantity.” And then
he explained what he meant by a devotee.
A devotee is one who sees God wherever he looks. Not just when he turns towards
this Sai Baba form, but wherever the devotee looks he sees only Sai and fills himself
with that omnipresent Sai. That is the true devotee he is looking for and that is where he
will surely take us, if we follow him implicitly.
Swami has told the story a number of times of Jesus walking with his disciples on a
road in the Galilee.
As Jesus and his followers walked along, Peter was up ahead. He came upon the
remains of a dead dog. It had been lying there on the road for some time,
decomposing in the hot sun. Now even the vultures and crows had left it, and all that
remained was a rotting mass of sinews and bones and decomposed flesh. Peter
went back and tried to guide Jesus’ party around it by taking a detour across a field,
so that the master would not have to see this unpleasant sight.
But Jesus went straight to the carcass, looked down at it and said,”Look at those
beautiful white teeth. How perfect they are. How much love and care this animal
must have received during its life in order to have teeth like that.”
So Jesus saw the one thing, in that otherwise revolting scene, that was beautiful, that
was a reflection of love. That is how we must be, Swami says. There will always be
something good and something beautiful even in the worst situation. Even when there is
a horrible stench, love will waft its subtle fragrance and can be recognized by those who
are attuned to it. Seeing good everywhere is seeing God everywhere. We must live like
that in the world. We must fill ourselves with that goodness. Then by themselves, the
chains will fall off us and we will be free.
Letting Go of the Illusion of Separation
Close to the end of the Bhagavata Vahini, Baba tells the story of the birth of Krishna.
The divine child emerged from the womb in a halo of light. Immediately, it turned to
the father and said, “Now, quickly take me to the home of Yashoda across the river.
There a little girl has just been born. Bring that little girl baby here and put her in the
cradle in my place.” At that moment, the shackles fell off the parents, the prison
doors opened, the guards outside fell into a deep sleep, and the father stepped out
of the prison into the dark of the night, to take the little divine child across the river.
Swami beautifully describes all the auspicious signs and portents that Vasudeva
encounters along the way. It was as if all of nature had received the good news that
the Lord of the universe had been born and it put on its finest dress to welcome him.
Vasudeva exchanged Krishna with the little girl in Yashoda’s sleeping arms, and
brought her back to the dungeon cell. Then he became overwhelmed with emotions
and he broke down in tears.
There is more about this little girl in the traditional Bhagavata, relating what happened
to her when the wicked Kamsa discovers that the eighth child has been born. But
Swami pays no further attention to her in his book. All the stories he relates have only to
do with the Lord. In the final chapter Swami writes only of the baby Krishna. Then who
was that little girl? That was the yoga maya, the illusory power of the Lord. Whenever
the Lord is born, this power of illusion is born with him. But Swami teaches us to focus
totally on the Lord and pay no attention to the illusion.
So it was with King Parikshith.
As he heard this story being told of the divine birth, Parikshith cried out, “Krishna!
Krishna! Krishna!” A snake had just bitten him on the toe and was seen slithering
away. Then Suka, the great saint, said to all the sages gathered there, “The king has
reached the Lord. May all humanity be immersed in eternal bliss.”
So, the book ends with the death of the human being and the birth of the Lord. The
human is just a transitional stage. Parikshith’s long quest and human journey were over.
The Lord had been born and the human shackles had fallen off. Parikshith became one
with Krishna.
This is not just a story from the Indian scriptures. This is our own story. We are born,
we seek the Lord but he is nowhere to be found. We seek the happiness that we know
is our birthright, but we look for it in the world and it eludes us. Then, one blessed day,
he reveals himself to us. But soon, he takes us out into the desert and we wander
about, lost.
We become totally dependent on him for everything, for our food, for our shelter, for
our work, for our health, for our direction, for our very lives. He gives us what we need
to sustain these bodies and minds, he grants us experiences to develop our faith, and
he gives us teachings and stories to develop our love. Then finally, he fills us with
himself. We become 100% immersed in the Lord. No shares. Then we end in joy. We
drop off this skin and reach home.
That is spirituality. It is nothing more than removing what is unreal and unnatural...
letting go of the illusion of a separate self and being established in pure love. At that
point we are home, we are one with the Lord, we are one with the blessed Self.
Dear Brothers and Sisters:
Let us be thankful and celebrate. The avatar has come. He is here so that we may
awaken and realize who we truly are. And who are we? Let us never forget. We are
divine love. Love, love, love is our unchanging reality.
Om Tat Sat

Глушков http://www.proza.ru/avtor/vg891  16.01.2018