PAST LIFE:       Shirdi Sai Baba      1838  - 1918    (SHIVA)

Who was Shirdi Sai Baba?

Sai Baba of Shirdi was a jewel among Saints. He lived his entire life out in a small and obscure village in India. The villagers of Shirdi each claimed him as a member of their own religion, Muslim or Hindu. He really came to make peace between them and he always encouraged each to follow to his own religious path.

Devotees flocked from all over the country though he never travelled and never cared for fame. Over and over his devotees found he knew their innermost thoughts and details of their lives. He effected cures, conferred health, happiness, and prosperity, and made childless couples conceive. His real purpose though was to awaken in them a longing for the spiritual life.

Thousands thought of him as a wonderful saint with miraculous powers but his innermost circle knew him to be in incarnation of God himself. Some said of Dattatreya, others of Shiva, still others saw ecstatic visions of their own beloved Guru or chosen personalized icon of God while gazing at Him. He said that he was the humble servant of God and pleased and furthered all who came in contact with him.

Sai Baba was first seen as a youth of sixteen sitting under a Neem tree in Shirdi. None knew his origin or past. Even then he seemed to be full of the knowledge of Brahman. Completely Selfless He had no desire for worldly objects. There was no Maya (illusion) and Mukti (illumination) was serving at his feet. This young lad, fair, smart, and very handsome, was first seen under a Neem tree seated in an Asana . The village was wonderstruck to see such a young lad practicing hard penance, in spite of the heat and cold. He associated with none, unafraid.

There was much speculation of his antecedents. His form and features were so handsome that a mere look endeared him to all. He went to nobody's door, always sat near the Neem tree. Outwardly he looked very young; the compassion and love shone on his face. A great enigma to all. Peace or calm was his ornament and he was the repository of wisdom. He had no love for perishable things and was always engrossed in self-realization. He did not know or care for honour or dishonour.

The name of Allah was always on his lips. His inner being was calm as the deep sea. Though he sat in one place, he was fully aware of all. Although he was ascended Master , he acted like a sadhaka (disciple on the spiritual path). He was meek, humble, and pleased all.

A saint name Gangagir who frequented Shirdi said of him on first setting eyes on him "Blessed is Shirdi, that it got this precious jewel". Another saint by name Anandanath said "This is a precious diamond in reality, though he looks like an ordinary man. You will realize this in the near future."

Sai  Baba strongly believed in uniformity of religion and he never distinguished anyone on the basis of caste, creed or religion. He always made it a point not to return empty handed those who had come to him in their hour of need and grief. He performed miracles to alleviate the suffering of poor people. On one occasion he restored the eyes of a blind elderly and in another occasion he lighted a lantern with water when there was no oil to burn it.

 "Baba" left his body on his own will on 15th Oct. 1918.

 Information from:   http://www.crystallotus.com/saibaba/Sai02.htm

Sathya Sai Baba invariably refers to Shirdi Baba as 'my previous body' whenever He speaks about Him. He often describes to His devotees, how He in His previous body dealt with people and situations, what illustrations He gave to clarify certain points, what questions were asked, etc. Many devotees of Shirdi Baba have had experiences confirming the unity of the two Sais.    Click here to read some of these instances

 

 

PRESENT LIFE:     Sathya Sai Baba     1926  - 2022     (SHIVA - SHAKTI)

 Who is Sri Sathya Sai Baba?

 “I am God. And you too are God. The only difference between you and Me is that while I am aware of it, you are completely unaware.”  This is the answer Bhagawan Sri Sathya Sai Baba gives to people who query Him about His identity and divinity.

This fundamental truth of man’s divine nature is at the heart of His message and mission. Indeed, in His discourses to devotees, He addresses them as “Embodiments of the Divine Atma”.

All who experience His pure and selfless love, and benefit from His illuminating counsel, and witness His miraculous nature get a glimpse of the glory and majesty of God, and therefore of what one potentially and inherently is.

Sri Sathya Sai Baba was born as Sathyanarayana Raju on November 23, 1926 in the village of Puttaparthi, in the state of Andhra Pradesh in South India.

Even as a child, His spiritual inclination and contemplative nature set Him apart from other children of His age, and He was known as ‘Guru’ and “Brahmajnani’ (knower of Brahman or Godhead) among His peers and others in the village.  However, it was not until October 20, 1940, the day He made the historic declaration of His Avatar-hood, (Avatar - Divinity Incarnate) that the world at large learnt of this divine phenomenon.

 Today, millions of devotees from all over the world, professing various faiths, and hailing from various walks of life worship Him as an ‘Avatar’, and an incarnation of the Sai Baba of Shirdi. Thousands gather every day at Prasanthi Nilayam, His ashram established beside the village of Puttaparthi, for His Darshan, when He moves among devotees blessing them and providing spiritual succour and solace.

Revealing the purpose of His Advent, Sai Baba has said that He has come to re-establish the rhythm of righteousness in the world and repair the ancient highway to God, which over the years has systematically deteriorated. In His own words,

“This Sai has come in order to achieve the supreme task of uniting the entire mankind as one family through the bond of brotherhood, of affirming and illuminating the Atmic Reality (Atma – The Self) of each being, to reveal the Divine which is the basis on which the entire cosmos rests, and of instructing all to recognise the common Divine Heritage that binds man to man, so that man can rid himself of the animal and rise up to the Divine, which is the goal.”  Bhagawan Sri Sathya Sai Baba is an integral manifestation who combines two very significant roles. Firstly, He is a great spiritual Master, famed for His simple and sweet exposition of the greatest and most intricate of spiritual truths which form the fundamental teachings of all the religions of the world. Elucidating on His mission, Bhagawan declares “I have come not to disturb or destroy any faith, but to confirm each in his own faith, so that the Christian becomes a better Christian, the Muslim a better Muslim and the Hindu a better Hindu.”

The Concept of Avatar-hood ... Who is an ‘Avatar’ and why does He incarnate?

In Bhagavad-Gita, Lord Sri Krishna, the Avatar of the Dwapara Age, declares thus:

Whenever there is a decline of Righteousness and rise of evil, the Lord incarnates from time to time to uphold Righteousness, to protect the Virtuous and to uproot the evil.

The Avatar appears whenever the world is passing through a spiritual and moral crisis. The Avatar comes in order to uphold Dharma (Righteousness) and raise the universal consciousness.

 Information from: http://www.srisathyasai.org.in 

 

FUTURE LIFE:      Prema Sai Baba        2030 - ?     (SHAKTI)

Who will be Prema Sai Baba?

 The first mention of Prema Sai by Sathya Sai Baba appears to be in the discourse Shiva Shakthi,  6 July 1963,  In a conversation between Shiva, Shakthi, and Bharadwaja after Bharadwaja performed a ritual, Shiva said that they would take human form and be born in the Bharadwaja lineage, thrice: Shiva alone as Shirdi Sai Baba, Shiva and Shakthi together at Puttaparthi as Sathya Sai Baba, and Shakthi alone as Prema Sai, later.

Prema Sai will be born eight years after the passing of Sathya Sai Baba, which will take place when Sathya Sai Baba is 96.

 Howard Murphet, in his book Sai Baba: Invitation to Glory (Chapter 4), says that Finally, Sathya Sai states, there will be Prema Sai who, one year after the passing of the Sathya Sai form, will be born in Karnataka (the old Mysore State), at a place between Bangalore and the city of Mysore.

 In Glimpses of the Divine: Working with the Teachings of Sai Baba" (1993), author Birgitte Rodriguez writes

 In a more private talk to students in recent years, Baba told them that the father of His next incarnation, as Prema Sai, had been born in the southern Indian state of Karnataka. He also said that the body of Prema Sai was in the process of being formed.

Hislop's changing ring

 In John Hislop's My Baba and I, page 55-56, Hislop writes about Swami materializing a ring for Hislop with Prema Sai on it. The image of Prema Sai on the ring actually changed its position over the years. Hislop writes,

 The stone was a cameo of Prema Sai, the loving Lord of Creation, destined to appear on Earth a few years after the death of the Sathya Sai Body. It was a brownish stone, highly glazed, sculptured in profile, the bridge and length of the nose visible with a suggestion of the arch of the left eye. It was a noble head with shoulder-length hair, moustache, and beard; the head resting on, or emerging from, a lotus flower. His countenance was tranquil, peaceful, majestic.

 Baba said, "He is only now in the process of birth, so I cannot show more of him. This is the first time he is shown to the world."

 Wherever I go, devotees ask to see the ring. ... In a year or so, those devotees who had seen the ring sometime earlier said something surprising on seeing it again. They said, "It is turning. The whole nose can be seen now."

 My reply was always, in truth, that I could see no change. But they said, "You see it every day and do not notice."

 ... One day, [in 1980], at a devotee meeting, I was showing the ring, and I looked at it carefully. It struck me, "It is different! It is changing!.

 Now the entire nose is there and visible, whereas at first the entire nose was not visible -- or better to say the nose merged into the edge of the stone and did not appear to be fully visible. But now there is a space between the nose and the edge of the stone. Moreover, a portion of the left eye can be seen and also a portion of the left cheek.

 Information from:

 http://www.sathyasai.org/intro/premasai.htm

 

Sathya Sai Baba on Meditation 

Jyoti Meditation - Silent Sitting 

Have a lamp with a bright steady flame or a candle before you. Sit in the Padmasana posture or any other comfortable asana in front of the flame. Look at the flame steadily. Then closing your eyes, try to feel the flame inside you, between your eye brows. From there let it descend down into the lotus of your heart, in the centre of the chest, illumining the path. 

 

 

When it enters the heart, imagine that the petals of the lotus bud open out, one by one, bathing every thought, feeling, emotion and impulse in the light and so removing darkness there. There is no space now for darkness to take refuge. It has to flee before the flame.

 

 

Imagine that the light becomes wider, bigger and brighter. Let it pervade the limbs; now these limbs can never more deal in dark, suspicious and wicked activities. These have become instruments of light and love.

 

 

Let the light reach up to the tongue and falsehood, slander and spite vanish from it. Let it rise up to the eyes and the ears and destroy all the dark desires therein. Let your head be surcharged with light and all the wicked thoughts flee there from, for these are the denizens of darkness. Imagine that light in you more and more intensely and it will become so.

 

 

Let it shine all around you and let it spread from you in ever widening circles, taking in your loved ones, your kith and kin, your friends and companions, your enemies and rivals, strangers, all living beings, the entire world. Stay on in that thrill of witnessing light. If you are adoring God in any form, now try to visualise that form in the all pervasive light, for light is God and God is light. '

 

If God brings you to it,
He will bring you through it.
Happy moments, praise God.
Difficult moments, seek God.
Quiet moments, worship God.
Painful moments, trust God.
Every moment, thank God'
 

 

Sarva-dharma Symbol

 

The sarva-dharma symbol is the symbol of the Sathya Sai Organization. Sarva: all, Dharma: divine law, is equal to religion.

The first sarva-dharma symbol stands for a lotus flower with six leafs, with in every leaf the symbol for a world religion. Together these symbols represent all religions in the world.

 

The Pillar: the pillar (lotus) in the middle expresses the path of unity with God, with the several steps and phases one has to go forward. The blooming lotus is the heart that blossoms in love; this results in the flower of enlightenment.

 

 

Hinduism: (the AUM/OHM-sign) Actually sanâthana-dharma = eternal divine law. God is One, but the wise call Him with various names (the Gods are many aspects of the one God). Some names are: Is'vara, Krishna, Râma, etc., Paramâtmâ or Brahman. "Listen to the primeval Pranava AUM resounding in your heart as well in the heart of the Universe".

 

Buddhism: (the wheel) The soul of a religion does not lie in theory or dogmas, but in the way of living. The Buddhists, even so the Jains, do not accept the existence of God in a certain or immediate way. They believe that the maximum stage a human being can reach is the stage of the Buddha. He, the Kevalin or Mukta (the liberated) or the Buddha, the embodiment of love and wisdom, is divine. "Remember the Wheel of Cause and Consequence, of Deed and Destiny and the Wheel of Dharma that rights them all".

 

Parseeism: (the fire vessel) Ahura Mazda (= light): dwells in the heart of human beings. Fire, wide at the basis and pointed at the top. In this way, also the differences disappear at the highest divine level. The devotees of Zoroaster call their God the most holiest principle in the universe. Ahura Mazda, the God of truth, wisdom en enlightenment. (Zoroaster: Founder of the ancient Persian religion Zoroastrianism. The sacred text called the Gaathas were revealed to him while in deep meditation. Ahur Mazda is the name for the Supreme). "Offer all bitterness in the sacred Fire and emerge grand, great and godly".

 

Islam: (the crescent moon with star) Islam means literally surrendering. There is no God than God (and Mohammed is his prophet). The Muslims call God Allah, the merciful, the compassionate, the unique Lord of creation. "Be like the Star which never wavers from the Crescent but is fixed in steady faith".

 

Christianity: (the cross) Let your ego die on the cross. The life of Jesus: 'I am the messenger of God. I am the son of God. I and the Father are One'. "Cut the 'I' feeling clean across and let your ego die on the Cross, to endow on you Eternity".

 

Judaism: (the star of David) Hear Israel: The Lord our Lord is One.

 

Sai Baba teaches us to respect our own religion in which we were raised and honor other religions. Let the various religions exist, let them bloom and let God's glory be sung in all languages and varieties. That must be the ideal goal.

Respect the differences between the religions and acknowledge them as valuable as long as they do not extinguish the flame of unity. You can search for God in churches and temples as the mystery of all mysteries, you will find Him at last in the deepest silence of your own heart.
 

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