Shirdi Sai Baba's origins in media

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Om Sai Ram

 

Below is an interesting article from "The Indian express" Thursday,

November 20, 2003. Enjoy.

 

Prophet of Integration Shirdi Sai Baba’s origins SATYA

PAL RUHELA Though the last decades of his life are

well-documented, the little that is known about the early life of Sai Baba is

disputed. He was born to Brahmin parents in 1838 in a place called Pathri in

Marathwada. He was abandoned soon after and adopted by a childless Sufi fakir

and his wife. After the death of the fakir, his wife put him in the care of a

guru (Venkusha or Venku Shah) where he remained for 12 years. According to

another version, he studied with a Sufi master, Roshan Shah Miyan, and roamed

the Aurangabad area where Sufism flourished in the 19th century. He was first

seen in Shirdi around 1858 but had disappeared for a while.

 

The first miracle related about Sai Baba is that he clairvoyantly located

one Chand Patil’s lost mare. He came to Shirdi a second time in

connection with a marriage in Chand Patil’s Muslim family. Initially, he

was considered a mad fakir.

 

After staying for a while on the outskirts of the village, under a neem

(margosa) tree, where he said his master was buried, he finally made a

dilapidated mosque his abode. When people began approaching him with health

problems, he gave them some herbal remedies and, later, udi (sacred ash) from

his continuously burning dhuni. In a few years, Mhalsapati, priest of the

Khandoba (village deity) temple, and several others accepted him as their

mentor and sadguru. In 1886 Sai Baba went into samadhi for three days (a term

for direct experience of union with God), after which his spiritual powers

became evident and he started acting as a pir to wandering fakirs.

 

The first miracle he performed at Shirdi was lighting oil lamps in the

mosque with water, after local grocers refused to give him oil. He also saved

the village from a cholera epidemic. As his fame spread, government officials,

a few Britishers, politicians including Lokmanya Bal Gangadhar Tilak, and the

wealthy, started calling on him.

 

One day a Nagpur millionaire named Booty came to Sai Baba and said he was

going to construct a stone building in Shirdi in the name of Lord Krishna. But

before its completion, Baba fell ill and entered Mahasamadi on October 15,

1918. He was buried in Booty’s building. The dargah and a silver idol of

Baba are part of what is now called the Samadhi Mandir.

 

(Extracted from ‘Sri Shirdi Sai Baba’, Diamond Pocket Books).

 

Source:

 

http://www.indianexpress.com/full_story.php?content_id=35640

 

 

Namaste - Reet