The Fettered Fire

Indra Devi, who is well known to our readers, has had the experience of a great big act of Grace from Baba, something which we love to call a Miracle.

“In person and through writings in most of the 11 languages Indra Devi speaks, she has tried to help lead the world `from darkness to light’, in such seeming diversity of places as the Kremlin and the White House”, says a Los Angeles magazine. The writer of that article speaks of `sitting in the shadows on the deep carpeting’ of the Sathya Sai Hall, which is so vast `that it becomes its own psychic experience’.

“This center, the Yogic Nilayam, is on Rancho El Cachuma, which adjoins La Puerta.” Recently, Indra Devi has added a 100-acre piece of land adjacent to this Yoga Institute and named it Sai Nilayam.

On September 26, the Bocks (Janet and Richard) wrote to us from Los Angeles: “Bhagavan’s Grace has blessed us with protection in the midst of disaster. We have just learned that a major fire has burned over 6000 acres of land in Tecate, which is, as you know, the location of Indra Devi’s Yoga Foundation, and of the property called Sai Nilayam—a retreat for those who wish to practice sadhana (spiritual exercises) in an atmosphere devoted to Him. Indra Devi’s property was untouched by the fire! Although most of the property, Sai Nilayam, was burned, the miraculous will of the Lord protected the house (!) and the ancient trees (!), as the fire burnt everything else including tents and a truck! The people at the house in the Sai Nilayam were forced to seek shelter on top of Mount Cachuma, the only escape possible for them. When they came down later, they found the whole house blackened with soot, except for the Shrine Room, which was untouched!

Richard Bock writes, “We cannot explain the reason for His Grace; we only hope that with His help we will someday be worthy of it”.

Writing about the incident, Indra Devi says in a letter, “While I was away in Chicago, big fires broke out in South California. The newspapers carried reports that they were turning 200 yards from our Center”. (The Tecate Fire, worst in the country in more than a year, was started by campers who abandoned a smoldering campfire along the border, four miles west of the village of Tecate. It was reported at 10.05  A.M., and it spread rapidly up the eastern slopes of the 3885-foot Tecate Mountain and in a south‑westerly direction to Mexico. A total of 2000 acres were afire in the United States, and Mexican officials estimated their burned acreage at 4500. Indra Devi continues, “But that didn’t disturb me one bit since I was confident that Bhagavan will protect the place dedicated to Him. And if they were to be lost, there must be a good reason for it. And so it was.

On the Mexican side, only the hillside behind our vegetable garden was burned down. On the American side, Sai Nilayam had suffered the destruction of some trees and bushes, a truck and tents. But the house was untouched.

When the devotees who fled to the mountain top from the devastating flames returned, they found that all rooms were thickly covered by black soot with the exception of Bhagavan’s Meditation Room.

Nobody could explain it otherwise than by the fact: “Baba must have been here.”

There is a consciousness
beyond this body
where love feels no bounds

There is a space
beyond this mind
free from narrow confines

There is a Truth
beyond this delusion
where myself is known

Divine Mother
I pray I may
Come home

~Michele Malvin
Source: Sanathana Sarathi, Nov. 1970