Sai Baba the Master by E.Bharadwaja

[Guest guest]

Kusha Bahu accordingly visited Shirdi in 1888. On seeing him Baba flew

into a rage and did not permit him to enter Dwarakamai until he agreed to

throw away the iron bangle and stop the mysterious transference of

sweetmeats which amounted to theft. After much inner confict, Kusha Bhau

had to yield; for such was his guru’s parting instruction. He threw away

the iron bangle and stopped producing the sweets. He stayed at Shirdi and

lived by begging. Baba ordered him to sit in a corner of the mosque and go

on reading the Dasabodha of Samarth Ramadas during day. He spent three

years at Shirdi and later went on visiting Baba often for the next six

years. During that whole period of nine years Baba used to tell him often

to see ‘the person with three heads’. Obviously, the reference was to Lord

Dattatreya. Henceforth Kusha Bhau started visiting Gangapur, the holy

place of Lord Datta. Once, on Baba’s order he read the holy work ‘Guru

Charitra’ one hundred and eight times, taking three days for each reading.

Then occurred an interesting incident.

 

Kusha Bhau was fasting on an ekadasi day. And Baba asked him what food he

took on such a day. Kusha Bhau said that he took kandamul, something like

sweet potato. Baba deliberately distorted the pronunciation of the

Sanskrit word as kanda which, in Marathi means, ‘onion’. So Baba picked up

an onion and asked Kusha Bhau to eat it. The latter was in a dilemma

whether to obey tradition which forbade eating of onions or the guru’s

word. At last, as a way out, he said to Baba, “If you eat it, I shall also

eat”. Then both of them ate the onions. When visitors arrived, Bada made

fun of Kusha Bhau saying, “Look at this Bamniya! (a belittling

abbreviation of the word ‘brahmin’) He is eating onions on the holy

ekadasi day”! Kusha Bhau protested saying, “Baba ate it and so I did”.

Baba categorically denied that he had eaten any onions. He said that he

ate a sweet potato while Kusha Bhau ate onions. To prove his contention

Baba at once vomited and to the amazement of Kusha Bhau, pieces of sweet

potato feel from Baba’s mouth and there were no pieces of onion!

 

 

(To be contd....)

 

Source http://www.saibharadwaja.org)