Mahavatar Babaji-Kadambara Arya Anandanatha

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Dear Rajivji, (In reality he looks much younger than this version of the image printed in Autobiography of a yogi) I will satisfy your query regarding Babaji. He is an enigmatic person and he is a great Srividya Upasaka too. He has his Gowri-shankar Peetham in Rishikesh. His Srividya Deeksha name is Kadambara Arya Anandanatha. IN THE year 203 AD somone was born on the night before the new moon during the Tamil month Kartikai (or November). This happened in Tamil Nadu, in a small village called Parangipettai. The seaport town Porto Novo lies there now. His parents gave him the name "Nagaraj", or "King of serpents" to honour the great primordial life force ... After being kidnapped at the age of five by a Pathan and taken north to Dacca, he was later released. He wandered with religious mendicants till the age of eleven - he migrated to Benares where he rose to be a Sanskrit scholar. Discontent with his early success, he sailed by boat to the shrine of Katarigama on the southern coast of Sri Lanka. For eighteen months he plunged into such contemplation (meditation) where he could analyse different philosophical systems with the bright mind of a twelve years old youth or so. Inspired by a siddha, Boganathar, he was able to appreciate and understand what such as siddhantha yoga and soruba samadhi stood for. Next he wandered throughout South India and was initiated into the mysteries of kundalini yoga by a still remembered Agastyar . Agastyar is presented as the guru of Boganathar. With the help of these two South

Indian gurus, Babaji was enlightened when he was twelve. Retiring to a lonely Himalayan cave, he remained absorbed in intensive yogi training for years at a stretch, finally to emerge laughing at the limitations of death: He is said to have won physical immortality at the age of sixteen and he went on from there to become a great Mahayogi. Mahavatar Babaji, a Himalayan mahayogi said to be about 1,800 years old, is the founder of Kriya Yoga as we know(though Kriya Yoga originally emnated from Lord Shiva's lips to Parvathy Devi). The world first heard about him courtesy Paramahansa Yogananda's Autobiography of a Yogi. Today, many cults are growing around his enigmatic persona. Mumbai-based Dr Ram Bhosle claims to have lived with him for six years. I first learned about him in sixth standard in a train.

I bought a book then and read it from Bangalore to Madras Brindavan Express. With my enthusiasm and my father's help I finished the book when the train arrived on Chennai central Platform. Legend has it that the remote parts of the Himalayas are home to many rishis, tapasvis and siddhayogis—Eternal Masters engaged in singular methods of sadhana or disciplined practice dedicated to cosmic exploration and in guiding the destiny of humanity through the ages. They live in rough-hewn natural caves under glacial conditions. Some have ashrams amidst verdant greenery, located at a vibrational frequency at variance with the 'normal' three-dimensional one to keep intruders at bay. Their abode has been verily named Shambala,

Gyan Ganj, or Siddha Loka. In this phantasmagorical world of accomplished yogis, anything is possible. A siddha sadhak (realized master) may simply choose to take the form of an ancient tree to meditate undisturbed for hundreds of years. Others, when they venture beyond the confines of their rarefied sanctuaries, may fly through the air as themselves, or change into swans, geese, eagles, or even into animals, fish and insects. There are many creative ideas for teleportation, with some just travelling on beams of light from one place to another! Exalted as these beings are, a distinct feature common to all is their complete

identification with India and her Vedic heritage. When people attain a certain level in their sadhana, they automatically lose their narrow personal bonds of family, language, caste or province. Then the old terrain of the Motherland takes over, so that it matters not whether it is Kabir, Lahiri Mahasaya, Shirdi Sai Baba or Ramana Maharshi, they all belong to India. And they converse with each other using an argot common to the wandering sadhus (monks). Thus it is that the venerable heritage of Gorakhnath and Machhindranath is claimed for its own by Garhwal, Konkan, Bundelkhand, Mewar and Coorg, and many a little girl in the remotest village of India is put to sleep to the refrain of "Chalo Machhinder, Gorakh Aaya...." With his lithe and youthful figure, Mahavatar Babaji (whose feats have been reported by Paramahansa Yogananda in

his Autobiography of a Yogi) is one such eternal master. He is the man with the 1,800-year-old immortal body. He's also the founder of kriya yoga, a discipline involving purification of the body-mind organism through breath control techniques to aid longevity and spiritual evolution. 'Mahavatar' means 'great incarnation'. He is also known as Mahakaya Babaji, the word 'Mahakaya' describing his immortal body. . There's a free-for-all on the Internet with the various Babaji Web pages multiplying rapidly to a current count of several thousand.

Yet, the Self-Realisation Fellowship established by Yogananda in California almost sounds as if it holds patent rights over the 'Babaji lineage'. After conquering the West within decades, it's time for Babaji to return home to capture the interest of Indians who are still obsessed with pot-bellied gurus. A new international group called the Babaji's Kriya Yoga Order of Acharyas with a base of sorts in Pondicherry recently held kriya yoga seminars in major metropolitan cities across India. The Babaji they're selling is the same kriya yogi, but he's now positioned in a new Tamil incarnation as Babaji Nagaraj and never mind that he's been a permanent resident of the Himalayas for 1,800 years. A book claiming to present new information about Babaji, written by the Canadian guru and chief of the Kriya Yoga Order, Marshall Govindan, presents startling claims about the Tamil origins of many ancient rishis and siddhas, including Macchindranath and Gorakhnath. Welcome to the club! Tibet too claims them for its own, and the Gorkhas of Nepal and India claim to be the original descendants of Gorakhnath. Babaji with His cousin sister

Nagalakshmi Thankfully, there's a lot more than that to Mahavatar Baba, who never left the shores of India and who's way beyond the reach of puny intellectual property rights. He's a patriotic yogi and keeper of ancient faith, whose mission for ages has been to stem the tide of barbaric conquerors overrunning India. He has often changed the course of Indian history, guided by otherwise immortal rishis, working way above insidious parochial divisions. Babaji's influence as a guru is said to have prevailed

over the ages from Adi Shankaracharya and Kabir to more recent saints like Sai Baba of Shirdi, Gajanan Maharaj of Shegaon and Swami Samartha of Akkalkot. The last three were reportedly firebrand revolutionaries who were given up for dead in the First War of Indian Independence in 1857. It is said that the first was a Muslim, while the other two were Hindus. They escaped to the Himalayas for sanctuary and were later given a spiritual initiation by Babaji. They eventually returned as illumined leaders of humanity. Babaji mostly works in obscurity, even while serving as a spiritual mentor to scores of masters. He has guided the destiny of India and her people, yet he is perhaps one of the most accessible of siddhayogis to walk in our midst in recent times. Over two millennia, Babaji has continued to nurture hundreds of accomplished disciples. Like great yogis, Babaji can supposedly materialize, dematerialize and take on any form at will. He may choose to present himself as an old man, an animal or a bird. He once promised a devotee that he would

attend a feast at the man's house, but seemingly did not. When the man later questioned him, Babaji replied: "I was there. I was the dog whom you fed the leftovers." (If one has read Sai Sat charita one finds a similar instance in it too) Babaji can travel anywhere in the universe. When he is too busy to do so, he sends specific instructions to his chosen disciples through birds. He's taught a chosen few how to discern birdcalls, and it may well be that the pigeon stridently cooing at your window is actually a messenger from the great seer! WANDERING SOUL The Mahayogi can be stern when the situation so demands, even while displaying a great sense of humor and rare devilry at other times. He once instructed Dr Bhosle to perform underwater meditation at midnight in the sea off the Mumbai coastline to purify his healing energy. Often, Babaji walked by to supervise his disciple's work, treading on the waves. He would chat for a while, and then walk away nonchalantly. (A cave in Rishikesh upper reaches(now made a small shrine) where Mahavatar Babaji is said to have done tapas

for sometime.) Babaji sometimes greeted his disciple with an unprintable epithet, as is often the custom in youth subcultures around the world. At one time, the ageing Dr Bhosle reacted with considerable anger, remonstrating that such swear words did not befit his status as a mahayogi. Babaji replied: "These words are just creations of grammar." Mostly, the language spoken by the Master is incredibly creative, drawing from a fount of inspiring, lyrical Sanskrit words lending themselves beautifully to new improvisations in Hindi. Interestingly, Babaji's entourage of enlightened and immortal disciples includes

yoginis who are over 600 years old. Babaji conveys the impression that he cherishes individuality and thoughtful dissension, rather than servile obedience. The sage with the immortal body has walked the length and breadth of India and is inured to the ways of the seemingly berserk lone ascetics that are a law unto themselves. There is no field of knowledge that is beyond him and the transmutation of atoms is simply an entertaining pastime. One day, Babaji took his entourage to a crematorium. There, he picked up a skull and placing some faeces in it, he offered them to his disciples, ordering them to eat. All of them declined, except Dr Bhosle, who gingerly touched it with his tongue. To his amazement, the revolting stuff had transformed into the most delectable dish. In the 1950s, Babaji had set up an ashram in the Himalayan heights above Badrinath. He eventually closed it down. A true wanderer, he is not to be found in any one place, whether in the Himalayas or elsewhere. Yet he is very much amongst us, in Mumbai or Delhi, as much as he is in Badrikashram. He encourages disciples to strive for their highest destiny. Neither God nor an angel, Babaji is more like the atmik guru, or the inner light. Dr Bhosle sounds a note of caution—the masters are suprahuman, beyond the frailties of emotion, and they demand total commitment to the chosen path. It is of greatest importance to follow the light with determination, discernment and detachment. The wise doctor concludes: "There is no such thing in this

world as miracles. Everything happens through science. Only a person who doesn't understand science calls it a miracle." You had mentioned in the email that you got to know Him from Yoganananda satsangh. It is not yogananda but Yogada Satsangh. Below is an excerpt from "Autobiography of a Yogi"-By Paramahamsa Yogananda... ------------------------------- Mahavatar Babaji - The Deathless Master The northern Himalayan crags near Badrinarayan are still blessed by the living presence of Babaji, guru of Lahiri Mahasaya. The secluded master has retained his physical form for centuries, perhaps for millenniums. The deathless Babaji is an avatara. This Sanskrit word means "descent"; its roots are ava, "down," and tri, "to pass." In the Hindu scriptures, avatara signifies the descent of Divinity into flesh. "Babaji's spiritual state is beyond human comprehension," Sri Yukteswar explained to me. "The dwarfed vision of men cannot

pierce to his transcendental star. One attempts in vain even to picture the avatar's attainment. It is inconceivable." The Upanishads have minutely classified every stage of spiritual advancement. A siddha ("perfected being") has progressed from the state of a jivanmukta ("freed while living") to that of a paramukta ("supremely free"—full power over death); the latter has completely escaped from the mayic thralldom and its reincarnational round. The paramukta therefore seldom returns to a physical body; if he does, he is an avatar, a divinely appointed medium of supernal blessings on the world. Lahiri Mahasaya An avatar is unsubject to the universal economy; his pure

body, visible as a light image, is free from any debt to nature. The casual gaze may see nothing extraordinary in an avatar's form but it casts no shadow nor makes any footprint on the ground. These are outward symbolic proofs of an inward lack of darkness and material bondage. Such a God-man alone knows the Truth behind the relativities of life and death. Omar Khayyam, so grossly misunderstood, sang of this liberated man in his immortal scripture, the Rubaiyat: "Ah, Moon of my Delight who know'st no wane,The Moon of Heav'n is rising once again;How oft hereafter rising shall she lookThrough this same Garden after me—in vain!" The "Moon of Delight" is God, eternal Polaris, anachronous never. The "Moon of Heav'n" is the outward cosmos, fettered to the

law of periodic recurrence. Its chains had been dissolved forever by the Persian seer through his self-realization. "How oft hereafter rising shall she look . . . after me—in vain!" What frustration of search by a frantic universe for an absolute omission! Krishna, Rama, Buddha, and Patanjali were among the ancient Indian avatars. A considerable poetic literature in Tamil has grown up around Agastya, a South Indian avatar. He worked many miracles during the centuries preceding and following the Christian era, and is credited with retaining his physical form even to this day. Yukteswara Giri Babaji's mission in India has been to assist prophets

in carrying out their special dispensations. He thus qualifies for the scriptural classification of Mahavatar (Great Avatar). He has stated that he gave yoga initiation to Shankara, ancient founder of the Swami Order, and to Kabir, famous medieval saint. His chief nineteenth-century disciple was, as we know, Lahiri Mahasaya, revivalist of the lost Kriya art. Paramahamsa Yogananda The Mahavatar is in constant communion with Christ; together they send out vibrations of redemption, and have planned the spiritual technique of salvation for this age. The work of these two fully-illumined masters—one with the body, and one without it—is to inspire the nations to forsake suicidal

wars, race hatreds, religious sectarianism, and the boomerang-evils of materialism. Babaji is well aware of the trend of modern times, especially of the influence and complexities of Western civilization, and realizes the necessity of spreading the self-liberations of yoga equally in the West and in the East. That there is no historical reference to Babaji need not surprise us. The great guru has never openly appeared in any century; the misinterpreting glare of publicity has no place in his millennial plans. Like the Creator, the sole but silent Power, Babaji works in a humble obscurity. The deathless guru bears no marks of age on his body; he appears to be no more than a youth of twenty-five. Fair-skinned, of medium build and height, Babaji's beautiful, strong body radiates a perceptible glow. His eyes are

dark, calm, and tender; his long, lustrous hair is copper-colored. A very strange fact is that Babaji bears an extraordinarily exact resemblance to his disciple Lahiri Mahasaya. The similarity is so striking that, in his later years, Lahiri Mahasaya might have passed as the father of the youthful-looking Babaji. Swami Kebalananda, my saintly Sanskrit tutor, spent some time with Babaji in the Himalayas. "The peerless master moves with his group from place to place in the mountains," Kebalananda told me. "His small band contains two highly advanced American disciples. After Babaji has been in one locality for some time, he says: 'Dera danda uthao.' ('Let us lift our camp and staff.') He carries a symbolic danda (bamboo staff). His words are the signal for moving with his group instantaneously to another place. He does not always employ this method of astral travel; sometimes he goes on

foot from peak to peak. "Babaji can be seen or recognized by others only when he so desires. He is known to have appeared in many slightly different forms to various devotees—sometimes without beard and moustache, and sometimes with them. As his undecaying body requires no food, the master seldom eats. As a social courtesy to visiting disciples, he occasionally accepts fruits, or rice cooked in milk and clarified butter. "Two amazing incidents of Babaji's life are known to me," Kebalananda went on. "His disciples were sitting one night around a huge fire which was blazing for a sacred Vedic ceremony. The master suddenly seized a burning log and lightly struck the bare shoulder of a chela who was close to the fire. "'Sir, how cruel!' Lahiri Mahasaya, who was present, made this remonstrance. "'Would

you rather have seen him burned to ashes before your eyes, according to the decree of his past karma?' "With these words Babaji placed his healing hand on the chela's disfigured shoulder. 'I have freed you tonight from painful death. The karmic law has been satisfied through your slight suffering by fire.' "On another occasion Babaji's sacred circle was disturbed by the arrival of a stranger. He had climbed with astonishing skill to the nearly inaccessible ledge near the camp of the master. "'Sir, you must be the great Babaji.' The man's face was lit with inexpressible reverence. 'For months I have pursued a ceaseless search for you among these forbidding crags. I implore you to accept me as a disciple.' "When the great guru made no response, the man pointed to the rocky chasm at his feet.

"'If you refuse me, I will jump from this mountain. Life has no further value if I cannot win your guidance to the Divine.' "'Jump then,' Babaji said unemotionally. 'I cannot accept you in your present state of development.' "The man immediately hurled himself over the cliff. Babaji instructed the shocked disciples to fetch the stranger's body. When they returned with the mangled form, the master placed his divine hand on the dead man. Lo! he opened his eyes and prostrated himself humbly before the omnipotent one. "'You are now ready for discipleship.' Babaji beamed lovingly on his resurrected chela. 'You have courageously passed a difficult test. Death shall not touch you again; now you are one of our immortal flock.' Then he spoke his usual words of departure, 'Dera danda uthao'; the whole group

vanished from the mountain." ----------- I have substantiated this well-known story

with other interesting tid-bits about His life. He still continues to be there and I could feel His presence guiding me as I was typing these lines of posting at this odd hour(12 midnight here exactly). Infact I could not get sleep today night and felt that someone was prodding me to give this posting. Now after seeing your request, I know who that was. Breath in me the way to love you,That I may Faultlessly love you.Pour me the wisdom-wineBy which I become intoxicated with You.Whisper in my ears of silenceThe way to be with you always.Speak to my wandering sensesAnd lead them back to Your sanctuary within. Jayosthu Paramba! Jayosthu Kadambara Aryananda! Sadaashivoham! Yours yogically, Shreeram Balijepalli

 

 

 

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