Baba and the Intellectual

Mysticism underlines the importance of the guru or spiritual master. Baba eulogizes the guru, saying that the guru is a creator like Brahma, sowing the seed of spirit; that he is a sustainer like Vishnu, tending the seed till it becomes a sapling; and that he is a destroyer like Maheshwara [the Great Lord], removing the weeds in the garden of the disciple’s heart. Aurobindo [Aurobindo Ghose (1872-1950)] observed that the guru promotes not knowingness but knowledge, not willingness but will, and makes you experience, I may add, not feelings but the feel of reality. He gives to his disciple not worldly knowledge but soul and God knowledge.

An intellectual once asked Baba, “Since you are an avatar, why not liquidate the poverty of the nation at one stroke? Every one will be happy.” Baba said, “I will give you the power to do so. But do you have the capacity to accept it and contain it?” The person had no answer to give to this question.

Reality is many sided. Liquidating poverty in a phenomenal way may lead to other dangerous results. A premium has to be put, besides, on human endeavor, for after all, man is here to learn in this vale of soul making. It is this fact that explains the human aspect of the avatar. The avatar is here to teach man how to suffer, strive, and achieve.

Baba is not learned or highly educated. He is a non-matriculate playing with under-graduates in the Sathya Sai colleges! But colleges have been, and universities will be, named after Him. He who holds the secret of the universe in the palm of His hand does not have to worry about the acquisition of university degrees.

Academics everywhere are baffled by Baba. Because He does not fit into their framework, they declare that He, the picture, is non-existent. But He laughs, like the cloud, at His own cenotaph. The physical scientists, with all their elaborate theories, cannot explain the origin of the universe better than He does, for He has known the universe from alpha to omega.

The scientist generates power by discovering the laws of steam or electricity and by applying them in certain ways. Baba produces power by defying these laws; He uses water as gas and turns particles of sand into a beautiful golden image of Krishna. Similarly, sacred ashes, red powder, and turmeric fall in great quantities from photographs (not only of Him but of various gods and saints), and very delicious and fragrant honey oozes from them. So much for the chemists and physicists.

Nor can the biologists explain the origin of life better than He does. All Sai devotees know about the wish-fulfilling tree at Puttaparthi. To the utter chagrin of the cycle of seasons, Baba took out all manner of fruit from this tree and gave them to His devotees: apples and custard apples, berries and mangoes—any fruit that you could ever think of. N. Kasturi has narrated in his biography of Baba how, while discussing the missing link speculated upon by zoologists, Baba filled in the gap by materializing it and showing what it looked like.

As for the environmental sciences like ecology and meteorology, devotees have testified to the fact that Baba can stop or bring rain at any time. And in regard to complex sciences like medicine, engineering, and agriculture, the marvelous powers of Baba as a diagnostician and as a curer of incurable diseases are well-known. Speaking to agricultural experts some months ago, Baba was pointing out how tube wells, multiplied indefinitely, lead to droughts.

Now for Baba’s relation to the social sciences: A critic pointed out, a year ago, that the payment of customs duty is evaded under the law when Baba materializes gold rings, gold images, and so on. This is a good example of how someone can be blinded by the very sciences he is trying to build. To prove that Baba has brought gold on which duty should be paid, we would have to measure all the quantity of gold in the Kolar Gold Fields [in South India] and other gold mines. Even when we have done this, we need to realize that these materializations are not economic goods. The devotees who have been given these rings and images will part with their life rather than with these gifts, which are, in that sense, invaluable.

Baba has spelled out His own version of the social sciences. It is not the socialism of underpayment—going to the Ashoka Hotel for coffee and after drinking it, refusing to pay more than 50 paise [one-half the Indian currency, the rupee]. It is rather an economics based on love—putting the rich man on his guard and making him realize in his bones that he is the trustee and not the owner of his wealth. A trusteeship based on love is the foundation on which to rear the science of economics. Similarly, the science of sociology should be rooted in cooperation, love, and brotherhood, not in competition and diplomacy. Anthropology should be so oriented that, in all its analysis, it never loses sight of the “one caste” of humanity, the “one religion” of love, and the “one language” of the heart. Political science is the science of power. But the political scientist has to realize that the only true power there is flows from truth and love.

Baba never indulges in making hairsplitting metaphysical distinctions, though He can do so as well as any pundit, alive or dead, if only He were required to use them. He is the savior of the common man, and He has formulated His philosophy for the common man. Its central message is that what the individual requires is not information, but transformation. He has often said, “My life is my message.” We don’t have to ask questions about the here-after but live the life given to us as well as we possibly can.

Like the two legs of man, we have to reckon with both this world and the next, not merely one of them. His philosophy is a simple and universal formulation based on the psychology of man—the philosophy of truth, right action, peace, love, and nonviolence. He is a prophet by virtue of this new formulation and an avatar because he lives it Himself and has the power to persuade the individual and the collectivity to live in the light of this philosophy.

Statesmen indulge in double talk, doublethink, and double doing, making life much more complicated than it is. They are pawns in the cosmic game of chess, not chess players. They continuously speak of equality, liberty, and fraternity but do not even observe the elementary decencies of honesty, justice, and recognition of merit.

Intellectually speaking, the true savior of the world is going to be someone who is unfalteringly and unerringly loyal to truth. From an ethical point of view, he will never swerve even an inch from right in the continuous swing and movement toward action. Emotionally, he will stand unshaken, whatever the fury of the storms and waves around him. He will become himself the rock of ages. Again, he will be a ceaseless fount of love, the kind of love that makes each one a friend and disarms enemies. He will be a person who stands foursquare to the world. The savior who answers this description will have infinite patience with things as they are, a clear vision of truth, the power to implement his visions, and universal love.

The savior must also be endowed with the genius of the four great goddesses: Mahasaraswati and her perfection in executive skill; Mahalakshmi and her capacity for establishing love, harmony, and beauty; Mahakali and her power to punish the wicked and trample down the foe mercilessly; and Maheshwari and her surpassing wisdom.

The one question that has faced mankind ever since the morning of creation is when shall right find its appropriate might? When shall we win the world for God? For achieving this aim, we require a personality endowed with truth, right, peace, and love and all the excellences of Saraswati, Lakshmi, Kali, and Maheshwari. But for establishing right and beauty as might, we also require power exemplified by the other divine qualities—omnipresence, omniscience, omnipotence, and omnifelicity. We cannot expect presidents and prime ministers to be either omnipresent or omniscient, much less omnipotent.

Only the avatar can be the X, outside brackets, manipulating circumstances and determining the value of the quantities within. This X is not only out-side the brackets; it is out-side metropolitan cities and cabinets and gives to everything its final worth and value. To crown all, the avatar brings universal delight, shining on all like the sun.

And yet, while in human form, even the divine suffers like human beings. Otherwise, how can the human become divine or be lifted to the level of the Divine unless the Divine descends into the flesh, suffers like us, and still is conqueror? The immortal puts on these garments of mortality to make us feel confident—to help us realize that we can suffer like mortals and yet be divine.

Baba once said, “While in the company of men, I am a man. In the company of women, I am a woman. In the midst of children, I am a child. When I am alone, I am God.” It would be good if intellectuals try to assimilate these steps in their own daily life.

~Late Dr. V. K. Gokak
[Former Vice Chancellor, Sri Sathya Sai Institute of Higher Learning]
Source: “Baba and the Intellectual,” Sanathana Sarathi, February 1976