Ratanlal Joshi - The Unfinished Game

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THE UNFINISHED GAME

 

Ratanlal Joshi

 

This is a free translation of an article in Hindi which

appeared in the June 1980 issue of Kadambini, Vol.20, No.8.

The writer of the article, Sri Ratanlal Joshi is a noted Hindi

scholar. In his quest to know the meaning of life he came in

contact with thinkers, philosophers like Schweitzer, Einstein,

Sartre, Aurobindo, The Mother, Camus and others. But in

Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi he found, as he says, “The

end of my quest, the fulfilment of my life.”

 

ON account of ill health I had been feeling weary and

melancholy for quite some time and this had made me

shun company and become disinterested in life itself. I tried

my best to overcome this feeling. I started re-reading those books

that had once interested me; brought about drastic changes in

my daily routine; for some time, dropped all rules and became

a profligate and a libertine. But the weariness did not abate,

and the burden of life continued to grow heavier.

 

Worried, my family accepted my doctor’s suggestion that

a change of place and climate might do me good, and soon I

was transported to Mahabaleshwar.

On reaching the holiday resort, I started a routine of

morning and evening walks. Mahabaleshwar at that time looked

splendid in its natural virgin forest beauty and its dozens of

rivers flowing down the mountain to the plains.

 

One day, during one of my early morning walks, I found

myself on a narrow footpath. I kept happily walking on until,

feeling tired, I sat down on a rock and gave myself up to a

reverie encouraged by the murmur of the river. I woke up from

that reverie to find that I had slept through the day and it was

evening. Puzzled, and feeling slightly disoriented, I tried to walk

back the way I had come, but soon found myself hopelessly lost

in the forest. Then suddenly, I saw at a distance a man sitting

on a big rock. I went towards him intending to ask him the

way but he rose and walked away. Confused as to what to do, I

simply followed him.

 

A half an hour’s walk brought us to a thatched hut with

two dogs tied outside. When on seeing me, the dogs started

barking, a well-built man who seemed European, came out of

the hut. In his left hand was a lantern and in his right a book

with the title, Maha Yoga.

 

The stranger seemed astonished to see me and stood still

for a moment. As for my reaction, I was pleasantly surprised to

find that many emotions assailed me, each simultaneously fading

and fusing into another. With folded hands I walked forward

and offered my respects to the gentleman. He smiled a very

sweet, encouraging and reassuring smile and embraced me and

took me into the hut. “I shall make a bed for you,” he said.

“You must rest.

 

He rolled out a mattress on one of the two cots in the

room, arranged the pillow and sent the old man away with

some instructions. I lay down thankfully. My host then lit the

stove and heated some water. Soon the old man returned with

two others, one of them holding a kamandalu (pot made of

dried gourd) and the other, a fruit-laden mango branch. My

European host boiled the milk, washed my hands and feet with

the hot water and offered me the mangoes. The fruits, ripened

on the tree itself, were small but delicious. After giving me a

large cup of hot milk, he advised me to go to sleep. I just went

on doing whatever was told, like an automaton.

As I slowly sank into a deep and peaceful sleep, I noticed

that my benefactor was wearing the Saivite symbol of the three

thick horizontal lines drawn in ash on his forehead and that he

himself was gradually going into meditation.

 

It was already bright morning when I awoke to the sounds

of a low-pitched prayer. It was my friend, the European

gentleman, still sitting at the head of my bed and watching

over me with concern. I tried to sit up but was gently pushed

down again and told in an anxious voice: “You have high fever.

You were delirious last night. Please do not get up yet.

Continuous prayers are being offered at the shrine of Bhagavan.

He will soon make you alright.” Settling me comfortably back

in bed, he resumed his chanting. I listened carefully to the sounds

and syllables. He was chanting Om Namo Bhagavate Sri

Ramanaya. As my eyelids again drooped heavily, I suddenly

perceived Bhagavan Ramana’s benevolent figure clearly in the

bright rays of the sun entering the hut. Soon the hut seemed to

be filled with effulgent images of Bhagavan. It was as if each

time “Om Namo” was chanted the words created another image

of Bhagavan. It was an unforgettable supernatural experience.

I looked at my host. Tears were pouring from his eyes. I

looked at his tears and felt them washing my troubles, doubts

and sins away. I felt clean, liberated. And without any volition

on my part, the story of my life poured out of me. My host sat

listening quietly. At the end of the narrative he said calmly:

“Now you will be all right. Your treatment is in the able hands

of an expert doctor. You took the correct decision when you

made up your mind to come here.”

 

Then, in his courteous and graceful manner, he told

me his story. He was Arnold Sedderling, a Polish citizen. On

May 21, 1935, he had left home when his doctor told him

that he was suffering from a malignant growth in the

intestines and that he had only another eight months to live.

Sedderling had discontinued all treatment and decided to

die in peace and solitude.

 

“One of my greatest wishes was to meet Sri Ramana

Maharshi before the end came and learn from him all about

birth and death,” said Sedderling.

He had disembarked at Bombay and come to

Mahabaleshwar. His health, in the meanwhile, had deteriorated

further. One day, feeling extremely weak and tired he had

come out of his hotel and entered the Mahabaleshwar temple.

He had stood in a corner leaning against a pillar watching the

Shiva Linga being bathed continuously by the waters of the

sacred rivers.

 

“Suddenly,” said Sedderling, “I saw Bhagavan Ramana

Maharshi himself standing in the place of the Sivalinga. Was it

a hallucination? I wondered. Rubbing my eyes again and again,

I looked intently at the spot. It was true, it was indeed Ramana

Maharshi for whose darshan I had come all the way from Poland

in my helpless physical condition. I also saw his extended hand

of protection and heard him say to me: ‘Stay here. I shall come

here for your sake’.”

That was his experience.

 

For another two days I stayed with Sedderling. Then as

soon as my fever subsided, I returned to my hotel in

Mahabaleshwar. In the next three weeks, I regained my old

vigour and felt fit and happy. I went to see Sedderling once

again but missed him as he had gone out to distribute medicines

to the tribals, a service he had dedicated himself to.

Coincidentally enough, that day was May 21 which was his

75th birthday as well as the day he had left home – the great

‘out-going-day’ in his life. With all his other activities, however,

he had promised himself that he would visit Sri Ramanasramam

every year to have darshan of Bhagavan. “And I return every

time,” he had said to me, “with a fresh understanding of life.”

Afterwards when I went in search of Sedderling in 1975, I

could not find him. Six or seven months later he visited my

house en route to Poland to get his books published. Two of his

books were on Ramana Maharshi written in German. I do not

know when he returned to India. Letters to his sister simply

elicited the reply that Sedderling had returned to India to spend

his days incognito.

 

My desire to see him again brought Sedderling to my home

one day, but strangely, I was away at Ramanasramam that day.

By the time I returned he had already gone back to the Ashram.

We could not meet each other. Nevertheless, I have no doubt

we will certainly meet again one day, somewhere, somehow

because our association is part of a triangular integrality, the

third side holding us together, being none other than he who

had brought us together – Bhagavan Ramana.