Sai Baba the Master

[Guest guest]

Balabhat of Andheri visited Baba on the festival of Deepavali in 1909. One

day after 8 p.m., Balabhat asked Baba to give him upadesh or initiation and

be his guru. Then Baba replied, “It is not essential that one should have a

guru. Everything is within us. What you sow, you reap. What you give, you

get. There is no need for a guru. It is all within you. Try to listen

within and follow the direction you get. We must look at our ‘Self.’ That is

the monitor, the guru.”

 

The type of instruction that he had given Abdul or Balabhat cannot be

generalised as Baba’s essential teaching. For there is and can be no such a

teaching – an absolute teaching for all. No two persons are alike and so no

one method can suit all. In gauging the devotee’s ripeness and giving him

the kind of teaching that he individually needs and in giving him the

necessary fillip lies the greatness of a guru. Or else the mountains of

books that we have, would have sufficed to make great saints of all human

beings. Books on medicine are no substitutes to an astute physician. And we

shall look at such instances in Baba’s teaching.

 

Nanasaheb Nimonkar wished to read The Bhagawata as his daily devotional

study but he did not know Sanskrit. Baba one day said to him, “Kaka. Why

don’t you read pothi?” “I do not know Sanskrit”, said Nimonkar, “Never mind”

, Baba assured, “Musjidi Mai (mother musjid) will teach you Sanskrit, and

gradually you will learn”.

 

With faith in Baba’s words he began reading The Bhagawata daily, not

minding whether he understood it or not. Gradually he began to understand

and soon attained such proficiency in Sanskrit and mystical philosophy that

he could clear the doubts which even those who were well versed in Sanskrit,

like Kakasaheb Dixit and Jog, got in their study of philosophical treatises

like The Jnaneswari and The Bhagavadgita. However, at one stage Baba told

him, “Why should we explain things to others? That will make us puffed up

with self-conceit”.

 

Here, Baba is not advocating any kind of narrow minded unconcern for a

fellow devotee’s spiritual development. Far from it, He did advise certain

others to read and expound philosophical texts. This piece of advice is

specific to Nimonkar and how useful it is can be seen if we but remember how

many are the pundits who get bogged down by scholastic discussion and

argument and the spiritual pride generated therein would close their eyes

to their own real spiritual inadequacy. The pharisees and scribes in the

case of Jesus Christ’s life provide a parallel.

 

Source: http://www.saibharadwaja.org