Sai Baba the Master

[Guest guest]

By about 10 a.m. Baba returned from Lendibaugh and then for an hour and a

half he sat with visitors. A detailed picture of these items of Sai Baba’s

daily life are given as recorded by Khaparde in his “Shirdi Diary” in a

latter section. Sometimes, during this period, he would again go out for

another round of begging. At about noon, arti was performed by the

devotees, at the end of which Baba distributed ‘udi’ to all of them and

they left for lunch. Devotees used to get the first portions of their lunch

or some other special delicacy prepared for the occasion as offering to

Baba. Baba sometimes took the whole offering and distributed it to all and

left a little for the devotee. Along with some devotees like Bade Baba and

Shama, Sai Baba sat inside the musjid for lunch and usually curtains were

drawn for privacy for his devotees. None was expected to enter the musjid

once the curtain was lowered.

 

The mosque was an old mud structure in such a bad shape that now and then

some of the earth and stones used to fall off from the ceiling. One day

Baba, along with some of his devotees, was having his lunch. Suddenly a

crackling sound was heard overhead by all. At once Baba lifted his hand up

in a gesture and said, “Sabar Sabar” (i.e., “wait, wait”). The noise

stopped. When everyone had finished his meal, along with the devotees Baba

also came out. At once a huge part of the ceiling - earth, stones and parts

of the rafters fell down with a loud noise exactly in the spot where Baba

was seated earlier. Only then did every one understand that Baba said,

“Wait” to the crashing roof and it did wait.

Once Sai Baba appeared to a lady at Burhampore in her dream, standing at

her door and begging for kichadi (i.e., rice cooked with dal or pulses and

salt). Later, when her husband was transferred to Akola, they went to

Shirdi and stayed there for two months. The lady longed very much to serve

kichadi to Baba as he asked her for it in her dream-vision but for some

reason or the other she could not do so for sixteen days. On the

seventeenth day she could at last prepare kichadi. By the time she arrived

there, Baba already sat for lunch and the curtain was lowered. At first she

was a little disappointed. But soon she threw up the curtain and entred

with the offering. Precisely Sai Baba was saying that he wanted kichadi

first and the devotees were in a fix as there was no kichadi. Exactly at

the moment, the lady of Burhampore was there with it! Baba took it eagerly

and ate it. Baba wanted to demonstrate to her that the experience she had

at her home town was not just a dream, but a vision which he graciously

vouched her.

 

 

Source: http://www.saibharadwaja.org