BABA'S METHOD OF TEACHING

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BABA’S METHOD OF TEACHING

As for Baba’s declaration about his Guru, Professor Narke heard Baba say,

Maja Guru Brahman ahe, that is, My Guru is a Brahmin. Having said so much about

his Guru, professor Narke carefully noted that Baba did not say that he had any

sishya to continue his line. On the other hand, Sai Baba said, ‘I would

tremble to come into the presence of my Guru.’ There was no one prepared

to serve Sai Baba in that way at Shirdi.

Once Sai Baba asked, it seems, ‘Who dares to call himself my disciple? Who

can serve me adequately and satisfactorily?’ But apart from a disciple to

continue the line, Baba helped in various ways and in various degrees. He

encouraged them, protected them, and gave them instructions occasionally.

Narke was studying Baba’s methods of teaching and improving devotees. Baba

gave our moral tales and a few occasional directions. But these were

exceptional. But the traditional method of Baba was not oral. His traditional

method was first the negative portion; that is, the Guru did not give to his

chosen disciple any Guru mantra. Usually a Guru whispers a mantra into the ear

of the sishya, and he seems to be almost biting the ear when he is whispering.

So, Baba said, ‘Me Kanala Dasnara Guru Navhe.’ That is, ‘I am

not the Guru that bites the ear. He did not regard japa and meditation as

sufficient for the sishya. These produce in the sadhaka Abhimana or Ahamkara.

Unless and until Ahamkara is completely wiped out the Guru is unable to pour

all his influence into the sishya.

In Baba’s school, the Guru does not teach. He radiates or pours influence.

That influence is poured in and absorbed in full by the soul which has

completely surrendered itself and blotted out the self, but is obstructed by

the exercise of intelligence by reliance on self-exertion and by every species

of self-consciousness and self-assertion. Baba, therefore, would tell some

devotees, ‘Be by me and keep quiet and I will do the rest,’ that

is, ‘secretly or invisibly.’ Of course faith in him –

absolute faith – is a pre-requisite. One who was merely seeing him and

staying by him for a while got faith. Baba gave experiences to each devotee, of

his vast powers of looking into his heart, into the distance regions of space

and time, past or future and this infused faith. One need not swallow a thing

on trust. The solid benefit, temporal or spiritual reaped by the devotee and

his feeling that he is under the eye and power of Baba always, wherever he may

be and whatever he may do, gave him an ineradicable basis for his further

temporal and spiritual guidance.

Baba’s is the power that controls this world’s goods and our fate

here and now, as well as our experience and fate in the future, in this world

and many unseen worlds. The professor concludes that the duty of a devotee

under Baba is only to keep himself fit for the Guru’s grace. That is, he

should be chaste, pure, simple and virtuous and he should look trustfully and

sincerely to the beloved master to operate on him secretly, and to raise him to

various experiences, higher and higher in range, till he is taken at last to the

distance goal. ‘But one step is enough for me’, is the proper

attitude now, He need not take the trouble to decide complicated metaphysical

and philosophical problems about the ultimate destiny. He is ill-prepared to

solve them now. The Guru will lift him and endow him with higher powers, vaster

knowledge and increasing realisation of truth. And the end is safe in the

Guru’s hands.

These above conclusions, as the professor says, are not from any single lecture

or address by Baba, but are gathered from the various hints, his dealings with

many people and his occasional words.

Written by: HH Pujyasri B. V. Narasimha Swamiji

(Vasuki Mahal Shri Shirdi Sai Baba Trust, Coimbatore-641025, India)