Sai Baba the Master

[Guest guest]

On some occasions Baba’s method of washing himself was frighteningly

marvelous. He was seen to vomit his intestines, clean them thoroughly with

water and place them on a small shrub to dry and he would then swallow all

again! How this was possible for him we shall note when we refer to the

manner of his sleeping.

Then Baba went out on his first round of begging food. He never ate in

anyone’s house nor did he cook for himself. He never kept any food in store

for the next meal. He remained a true mendicant to the last day of his

life, begging his food from a few houses a day, though towards the peak

years of his fame the gifts of money that the devotees gave him amounted to

three to four hundred rupees a day and many a millionaire was literally

choking him with the daintiest of sweets and savouries as their offerings.

Baba never cared to touch them but distributed them freely to all and

sustained himself by his begging.

While starting out on his begging rounds Baba would fold a garment over

his shoulder in the form of a bag that dangled below his left arm and

holding a can or a tin mug in his other hand, he approached a few houses,

about five a day, and called out, "Mother, please give me a roti!" He used

to receive all liquid and semi-liquid foods like soup, vegetables, milk or

buttermilk in the tin pot. Solid food like cooked rice or roti were

received in the folds of the garment. Then he returned to the musjid, put a

small roti and rice in the sacred-fire as a sacred offering and placed the

rest of it in a mud pot. Exposed or uncovered, cats and dogs, beggars and

servants took freely from it and Baba never drove them away nor did he ever

feel any revulsion for them. He never cared for the taste of the food while

eating it. He freely mixed all the food of diverse tastes, into one mass

and ate a few handfuls of it. His devotees were thrilled to note his

perfect conquest of the palate and perfect sense of equality to all

creatures, the very perfection of what the world’s scriptures had enjoined

for the true seeker of god. Those who lacked this perception, however, felt

the whole thing repulsive and confirmed that here was a mad fakir. Sai Baba

viewed the whole creation as nothing but the manifestation of god’s spirit;

what, then, is unholy for such a one?

 

Source: http://www.saibharadwaja.org