Sai Baba the Master

November 6, 2005

As Shama kept closest to Baba, he had such closer glimpses of Baba’s greatness

as others were apt to miss. For instance, one day someone approached Baba for

money. Shama knew that Baba hid it in his pocket. But Baba told the man a lie

and said that he had no money with him. Later, when the man had left the

mosque, Shama frankly asked him, “You are a fakir with no attachment for money

and wedded to truthfulness. Why did you tell him a lie? Do you not always

exhort us to be truthful?” Baba replied that as it was not good for him to be

given the money, and he would not heed Baba’s words if he were to tell the

truth, and thus, for his own good, the man had to be so treated.

As we have not yet transcended the identification of our selves with our

bodies, we cannot help associating our idea of Baba’s greatness with his

physical form. For, after all, we know him first and foremost in that form;

and, without it, we would never, know of him;and to love him with all our

heart, to impress it indelibly on our minds, it is very essential for our

progress. For Jesus the Christ too, like Baba, though he was ‘the word’ he was

‘Word made flesh’ in order to be known to us.

Dr. Gawanker records in his book how once a few visitors requested Baba to

permit them to photograph him. At first Baba refused. However, on persuasion

he agreed to get only his feet photographed. But they tried to take an unfair

advantage of it by taking a full picture. To their astonishment only Baba’s

legs came off in the photograph! When yet another took a photograph without

his consent, the picture that came off was that of the photographer’s own guru

and not that of Sai Baba! Besides, Baba attended the dinner in Hemadpant’s house

only in the form of his picture.

When Bapusaheb Tarkhad forgot to offer naivedya to Baba’s picture in his shrine

in Bandra, Sai Baba referred to the matter at Shirdi to Mrs. Tarkhad and her

son precisely at the same hour. That is the relationship between Sai Baba and

his picture. Thus, we should look upon it as Baba himself who came to us in

the form of the photograph. The remarkable rewards of such an attitude on our

part are its ultimate justification.

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