Excerpt from Walking the Path With Sai Baba (Howard Murphet)

[Guest guest]

and several other people. The party halted for a time in the forest of the

Sanctuary, and soon one of the students began taking photographs with his

Polaroid camera. Each photograph was a shot of Swami standing beside one of the

people of the party, and as the photograph came out from the camera, Swami

gave it to the person concerned. It was meant as a souvenir of the occasion.

Incidentally, I have sometimes been present when this kind of thing took place,

and I have a treasured souvenir of my wife and self standing beside Swami, the

photograph having been taken during a luncheon halt in this same forest. Said

the author Murphet On this occasion, the two narrators told us, after many

members of the party had been photograph with Swami, he said

that he would be photographed alone, and stood well away from the group. As the

students photographer began to focus the camera carefully, Mrs. Ratanlal came

toward Swami and indicated that she would like to straighten his robe, so that

the folds would fall nicely; she was like a mother who wants to arrange her

child's clothes attractively before a photograph is taken. "Stand Back!"

Swami ordered her in a loud, commanding voice. Alarmed, she jumped back,

without touching his robe. When the photograph came out of the camera. Swami

told the students to give it to Jagarao. The latter, puzzled but pleased, stood

holding the dark print while the image slowly came out. But instead of

well-known image of Sathya Sai Baba, there appeared the form of Lord

Dattatreya, with the three heads. Jogarao was stunned and speechless; the Lord

had answered his prayer in a totally

unexpected manner. The photograph was passed around for everyone to see, and

while they were looking at it, Swami said quietly to Mrs.Ratalal, in

explanation of his frightening command to her, "If you had touched me, the

power have killed you." I understood this statement better after Gopal of

Venkatagiri told me about an incident of Swami's early life. Once, Gopal said,

when Swami was lying on a couch in one of the large rooms of the palace, he

said to Gopal, "Don’t grab my feet, but touch them lightly with the tips of

your fingers." Gopal did so and the power sent him reeling back across the room

to bang against the opposite wall. It was like a high voltage electric shock,

Gopal said. Evidently the power going through Swami when he was

creating the form of Dattatreya for the camera was strong enough to kill anyone

who contracted it. "I wonder why he showed you Dattatreya instead of Rama or

Krishna, which seem to be the forms he takes most often?" I asked Jogarao. "Oh,

Dattatreya is his true form," Jagarao answered, shortly. But a spiritual

philosopher present remarked, "They are all his true forms; or rather, he has

no true form at all." That was the deepest truth, ofof course Yet I felt that

in Jogarao's remark there was some meaning, which he either could not explain or

did not want to. Was there a special connection between the Dattatreya and the

Sai forms? Jai Sai Ram (Sharing With Sai Love) Ram.ChuganiRam

ChuganiKobe, Japanrgcjp

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