In the Name of The Father, and of The Son and of The Holy Spirit, Amen.

Countrymen,

ORBIS NON SUFFICIT
SOLUS DEUS SUFFICIT

My western boots in the sea of sandals at Whitefield, Bangalore, India were a delightful sight. I was the only one who didn’t have trouble locating their footgear.

When Swami finished speaking with me, he went over to the side table and picked up the sun glasses and straw western hat and brought them over to me ever so sweetly, as a perfect gentleman’s gentleman, offering them
with a deep bow, which I acknowledged.

The Indians appeared to think I must be a Hollywood celebrity. They were all a-twitter. Many crowded about asking me to contact this relative or that of their in the United States. It was the dress, which was just my ordinary wear from Arizona, where I lived then. The boots and belt are still my ordinary wear.

 

There is a story I heard last Saturday night at a bhajan group: As occasionally happens, Yama, the Lord of Death, accidentally came to visit the wrong man. But fortunately, Yama discovered the mistake before taking the man’s life, though it frightened the poor soul tremendously.

So to apologize, Yama offered the man a boon. First, the man naturally asked for eternal life, which Yama — just as naturally — had to refuse. So the man then asked Yama to give him plenty of advance warning, so as to allow him the needed time to finalize his worldly affairs.

To this, Yama agreed.

A score of years passed, and the man’s health deteriorated. And one night, the fierce Lord of Time came in earnest. As Yama stood over the hapless soul, the man looked up in despair.

“You have broken your promise to me, Yama! You gave me no warning and I have not arranged my affairs,” he wailed.

“Your business is your business,” Yama replied. “But I gave you plenty of warning. Do you remember the serious illness you suffered two years ago? Do you recall that last year your eyesight began fading and that your hair turned white? And do you recall several months ago when some of your teeth fell out? ….”

 

I assume you do not mean the hand wave that produces vibhutti but rather the hand wave and the writing that appears to be done “in the air.” I will answer accordingly.

I do not know.

How is that for an answer?

I will ll tell you what I think, but I cannot say this is what the motions really are.

I think the motion with palm up toward himself is raising awareness and bringing ghandarvas (angels) and sages to the scene. I think the writing motion is a rare glimpse of what in Christian theology we call prevenient grace, namely grace rewriting destiny — destiny for someone or someones. But rewriting it on the spot. Karma, destiny and maya are all in the control of Swami. He does with them as He wishes. This is one of the experiences that so startles many — they can feel it happening and had never thought that it could. When you hear people say “Swami blew my mind” or such like it is this “rewrite the envelope” experience they have as they observe Him that they refer to with this language.

All of that is what I think is going on, or better, part of what I think is going on. What is really going on? Only Swami could say, especially plenarily.

I will mention this, however: that whatever it is that is going on actually, it is ALWAYS something very simple. This is important to keep in mind. It is always something very simple and not only so but also very tangible.

Like the time he came by a mother and child on a cold morning in the Darshan Line and produced a blanket, handed it to the mother and said, “Your child is cold.”

 

The only time we worry whether we smell like canine ca-ca is when we have contrived to step in a stack of the stuff.

Similarly, the only time we worry about illusion is when we are implicated in the thing.

And the only time we are concerned with liberation is when we are headed in the opposite direction.

And the only time we are concerned with reality or happening is when we are confused for some reason.

And the only time we are concerned with yoga is when we are living boga.

And the only time we think we need vedantha is when we are practicing himsa.

And the only time we want amrit is when we are submerged in anrit.

And the only time we are concerned with will and scripting is when we feel we are not making ours felt strongly enough.

Happy people do not seek happiness. Loving people do not seek love. They do it because they are it. They have no need to talk about it. They are it. Happiness and love should be merely givens.

The hospital at Puttaparthi is free to all patients. And the SSSIHL is free to all admitted students. In Kali Yuga we call business service and do not know what service is. In Sai Era we call business business and service service and we understand the difference. Both are legitimate, each with a place.

The effort to say anything is not religious is absurd. Religion means binding up, healing. What is not that is not living. And it is service, not business. Pythagorean Doctors — e.g., the Essenes of Palestine early CE — did not charge for treatment or medicament. Neither did Franciscan or Templar doctors. The Solar Dynasty does service for humanity without distinction or grade. It is the only continuous element of history which has this mission and which does it consistently. The Red Cross is the Knights Templar (Solar Dynasty).

All through Kali Yuga folks here and there try to say they have something important to say that is not religious and is better than religion. It is such an hackneyed old chant that It is nauseating. It is so presumptuous as to be infantile — and also futile. They merely want to start their own religion — or business — and feel a need to disparage the existing in order to get a leg up. None succeed because religion is universal and not exclusive. When we say anything is not this — yoga is not religion, etc. — we define and so exclude, and exclusion is the opposite of truth.

Look what nonsense some church bishops made by contriving a creed! It was a prescription for perpetual war because it excluded the best part of spiritual reality.

We do not define. Defining is excluding. We describe. And we include all. That is what the neti procedure is for: not only that, but also …. (include, include, expand, expand, merge/emerge, merge/emerge)

The “It isn’t happening” mantra is a medicament for those whose intellect is clouded by doubt. It is a low level medicament, akin to an aspirin, for what is a high level disease. The appropriate medicament for doubt is Ramanam.

Vedantha is the universal topic. Whatever anyone wants to talk about is Vedantha. Every question is Vedantha. Every concern is Vedantha. Vedantha is religion. If one had not stepped in the ca-ca, one would not be smelling as though one had. All topics are Vedantic. Vedantha is the triple thread of existence and essence, both. It is the common ground of humanity. It is Sanathana and what is Sanathana includes everything. Nothing is excluded. All topics are appropriate, all questions, all comments, all concerns, all exuberances. That is the nature of religion, of Vedantha and of the Sai Era.

What is missing from the exposition by many of religion/yoga/vedantha is Karuna — compassion. This essential sweetness is not present in their presentation. This soft melting quality that is the essence of all
man’s beloved personalities is not present in their exposition. It could be.

When Baba tells one one is God, He has pushed one over the edge. He does that to people. Let us have a good laugh and get on with life. Karuna is the essential quality of humanity. That quality is what convinces one and all that one understands and is trustworthy.

 

 

During the early years CE there was no TV/Sports or Movies/Radio and people relied for entertainment on their own versions of these mass opiates. These included the well-known “games,” which like our “sports” were scripted productions, and what they called Rhetoricians.

These latter Mel Brooks, playing one in History of the World Part I, called Stand Up Philosophers — to which Bea Arthur responds, “Oh, you mean Bullshit artist!”

Several of the so-called Fathers of the Church (“writers” from the first three centuries) were in fact Rhetoricians of the kind just mentioned.

Now, these guys — and one supposes also gals — were entertainers, meaning, for them the goal was a full house. They were the Rush Limbaughs and Ophras of the day. As you know, these guys and gals market a line of patter. The line of patter means nothing to them except that it attract a large house. Some take one line of patter and others an oppostie or variant line and both get a house so both are happy.

What they say is immaterial. That it attracts a following is all that matters. Nor does the nature of the following matter. Leni Reifensthall was an original and still unsurpassed, in my opinion, practitioner of the art in the modern era. Father Coughlin was most competent and Al Sharpton tried hard but DePalma nailed him with Bonfire of the Vanities. Martin Luther King was pretty good at it. Time Inc. is superb and the highly skilled contemporary TV/Radio practioners of the art require no mention.

As I say, several of the Fathers of the Church were of the same type:  entertainers pitching to interests of the day, earning of living from it, at least hopefully. All the tricks used by entertainers, their auto-erotic procedures, were used by these Rhetoricians (Stand Up Philosophers) some of whom are regarded in church history as Fathers of the Fleet.

We see the same thing happening today in the so-called spiritual realms: people working gigs for a buck, pitching bogus stochastic structures (called yogas) and ridiculing, scurrilating what they take to be competing acts. They cannot imagine that anyone would be genuine in what they say because they know they are not. Entertainers auto-eroginate so much that they forget the harmony of humanity and spend their lives jumping from “relationship” to “relationship” spawning this and that bionic but really caring about none of it.  The auto-erotic gig itself — the story line — is so obsessing.

Now, what is the solution for these misguided souls who think they sit atop the world directing it but are really under its backside eating shit and taking/proclaiming that as nourishment?

My answer to that question is this: understand the precedents and await developments; schizophrenia, which is the clinical name for the phenomenon mentioned, is amenable to kundalini, and to Swami, Who is All, but Who, as we know, is also Time — and we do not know that. So, understand precedents and await developments is my answer to the question posed.

In the Sai Era, as before, the Solar Dynasty is the teaching and organizing authority of the entire world. Its branches — through family lines — are in all nations. And all teaching, as in Rama Era, is now under the auspices of this Family. The Solar Dynasty is the adwaithin cynosure of the heaving humanity. The only yoga now is Sai Yoga, which is simply love for all and service for all as Sai motivates/teaches from within.

This means, for example, that in the Church, clerical ordination, which until now has been of two kinds, dynastic and apostolic, is now only dynastic. So-called “Apostolic Succession” — always an accommodation to the ambition of certain monastics — was terminated Christmas Eve 1997. Ordination now proceeds by Dynastic Succession only. All persons who had ordination by “apostolic succession” (laying on of hands) have lost that and are no longer entitled to conduct the mission of the Church. Those who also had ordination through Dynastic Succession are still ordained and still entitled to conduct the mission of the Church.  All members of the Solar Dynasty are ordained in the Christian Church regardless of their nation or religion of origin. This has always been the case. The Solar Dynasty is for humanity and, while valuing and therefore leading nations as appropriate, is itself transnational.

That is a little exposition of a part of the meaning of the Sai Era.

 

The date of these stories is the same: on or a day or two either side of 11/23/71:

First Story

We arrived Puttaparthi by cab from Bangalore late in the afternoon a day or two before 11/23/71. Few Americans or Europeans were there. We stood out much, both tall, dressed natively for us, self in western clothes, including boots.

Facilities then were nothing like what now. Eating was in impromptu cafes. Showers a gang unisex bamboo affair with water in oil drum heated by buffalo dung, poured by bucket: one had two buckets, one hot and one cold. Sleeping on the ground or, for us, assigned to a place. Ours was stoop of the infirmary. Urinal was gang unisex open plot of ground between bungalows, not enclosed. Hillside above Mandir/infirmary was for gang unisex defecation, again, not enclosed.

Mandir was smallish prayer hall and smallerish quarters upstairs for Swami. A metal shed with open spaces around was for speeches. Pundits spoke frequently, under Swami’s gaze.

Only one machine in the area, excepting autos. That was what I took for a diesel running a generator. It came on periodically. Electric light was possible but not constant except around the Mandir. When this engine came on it was music to the ears — mine and Jani’s a fellowtraveler musician, philosopher I met after arriving there. She is still there, I have heard, the only “Westerner” (I abhor that term) allowed to remain. Anyhow, Jani and I were constant pals, well-met and hung together.  She had been a violin prodigy with Stokowski, ripped a muscle in her shoulder, could not play again.  A Franciscan at heart, a kin to Brother Juniper.  Penniless, euphoric.

At arrival by cab, numerous Indians accosted us, mostly with insistence that Darshan was to begin forthwith and we should get sat and ready. Knowing nothing of procedures, we dutifully obeyed, she taken to female side, in front of Mandir door, and I to male side, on the West of Mandir.

Plunked down about 8 rows back from His walking area. Maybe 100 men in the area, numerous Indians with pillows to sit on. I remember fondly a Mr. Bhat, who had a bungalow (i.e., wealthy) and took it upon himself to teach me Vedas.

I was all agog, clueless. Within minutes, my attention was suddenly taken to a door on the men’s side of the Mandir. As my eyes hit the door, it opened and there was Swami. On the instant, He looked directly at me eyeball-to-eyeball, raised His Right Palm/Hand in what I later learned was the standard Blessing and I saw a flash to purest white light coming from His Eyes, both of them, which for an instant formed the entire field of my vision, all I could see, and then was receded so I saw normally, Very rapid, immediate, total, then over. He now walked slowly, talking calmly, vibhutti-ing here and there, carrying on private business with sitters.

The flash of light, eye-to-eye, was done in an instant. But I mention this to confirm that this happens and appears to be “’nuff said” for whomever has the experience.

I do not know if the Indians around me saw the light, but they saw the attention directed to me and were all over me with wonderment after Swami passed by.  I considered it all natural. They were astonished and in awe.

Not before and not since have I craved an interview. I was called in (“hauled in” is language I have usually used to indicate the moment) on the second visit, which was not for me but to retrieve her. The interview was in March 1972 and was long and wide-ranging. Mostly the three of us and then just Swami and I, after He excused her. But I never craved an interview and still do not. There is no distance.

Story Two

Back to around 11/23/71. I was sitting on a cement surface next the front door of the Mandir, watching comings and goings, ostensibly waiting for darshan, which was scheduled for a couple of hours hence. Outside the main gate, which was an arch, not a doored gate, a small caravan of cars came up. Maybe three vehicles or four. Out of the lead vehicle pops an American. obviously a chief of staff (secretary) of some dignitary. Retainers emerge, gather about, and then the dignitary comes forth. Very tall, silver haired, thin, American, dressed in Indian whites, love beads (Japamala), jewlery, bossy. Walks through the arch and looks around, entourage behind and on the sides. Much like a Mafia Don from Godfather series. Same bearing.

He spots me, who, light skinned and tall and languid like himself, stands out in these seas of short, brown-skinned kinetic people. Motions to his secretary to approach me. The secretary comes over under the impression that I am knowledgeable and perhaps a dignitary. I am, of course, a little of the former and none of the latter except in a manner about which this chap would not know.

The secretary said that Sri Subramanyam, the dignitary he represents, wants an interview with Sathya Sai Baba and wants to arrange same through Baba’s secretary. Am I Baba’s secretary or do I know who that dignitary is? I told him he wants to speak with Mr. Kasturi and pointed that worthy out in the group doing this and that nearby.

The secretary went over to Kasturi who listened and then shook his head politely, not the Indian “yes” head shake but the Indian “no” headshake. The secretary insisted and I could see Kasturi, the soul of graciousness, say that he would consult Baba. The secretary made it clear that Subramanyam did not have a lot of time to take with this and wanted the interview now.

I thought the guy a petulant puppy and wondered who he was. Later I discovered that he was an American based on one of the Hawaiian islands running an ashram for devotees, presumably wealthy superannuated widows whose guilt needs release in the form of donations to a Swami’s coffers.

The guy had a decent gig going. He had the bearing of Cabot Lodge or Galbraith and the height to match. Easy to lord it over these “little brown brothers,” to use the language of Taft — and Galbraith did just that as JFK’s man in Delhi as well as in econ seminars packed with Indians at Harvard.

Kasturi left for the upper rooms. I left for the little gaggle of Americans, mostly drug-crazed hippies, just west and south of the Mandir. Shortly, an Americans came up breathless to announce that Swami had just OK’d an interview for Subramanyam. He was disgusted. I was amused. He said Subramanyam was just another guy “on a power trip,” a common phrase of the day among the hippie crowd. The Americans went back to what they were severally doing.

I, however, started getting a strange feeling. I felt that this wasn’t right. Without really thinking about it, I walked over to the west side of the Mandir — people were all around — looked up at the second storey window I presumed to be of Swami’s quarters and said with considerable strength but no heat, “No.”

Then I walked back to the gaggle of Americans and asked Jani if she would like some ice cream. We were in the habit of obtaining some of the pleasant stuff — the only pleasant food in the neighborhood — whenever possible. She was penniless and I had an abundance and was eager to feed her, which she did not do herself for lack of means. She jumped up and we bounced off to the parlor, which was across the street from the arch that was the main gate of the compound. Subramanyam’s caravan of vehicles was right in front of us, across the road. We got some cold stuff and seats and started relishing. Presently, another American came running up, breathless, saying that Swami had just cancelled the interview for Subramanyam and that the latter was loudly and bitterly denouncing Swami as a cheat and a fraud, etc., etc., sparing nothing.

Jani and I sort of giggled. Then out of the arch comes S and his entourage. They make gesture of shaking the dust from their skirts and pile into the cars. S takes his seat in the rear of the lead vehicle and motions his driver to start off. The driver, however, popped the clutch and Jani and I watched with rolling laughter as Subramanyam Swami was thrown first violently backward and then foreward as the physics of misapplied technology took its course. It was one of the funniest sights we ever saw, we agreed: the arrogant ass being thrown to and fro by his incompetent lackey.

Story Three (bonus)

The second day there, I was accosted south of the Mandir by a young lad who wanted money and made signs of hunger. I wondered for a moment and then took him for Swami in disguise and gave him 10 rupees. An adult Indian immediately berated me hotly for appeasing beggars, breaking a major rule of the Ashram. I replied that the lad wanted the money. The Indian was adamantly condemnatory of myself. But the lad appeared again in the dark of morning a few days later, out of the blue (or black), twice, to help me with critical matters that would have meant trouble if they were not attended to in the manner obviously only he knew about. How he knew? From where he came? I’ve never doubted it was Swami. Perfectly natural. Nothing extraordinary.

 

Well, as you say, interviews are private, but I can say that ours and mine contained much and left me with words remembered down through the years. Some things I think I understood then. Others I understood — I think! — through the years. And some are still mysterious noumena to me. I think the simplest things are the least understood. At one point His accent — He was with us without any interpreter — was seeming to obscure the words themselves. I asked, “What?” about twice and He paused then restated in perfect American English. Such a laugh.

The general setting was a legal proceeding in which I was the accused and He vacated or quashed (I’m not sure of the proper language) the indictments (there were several). As I say, I did not request the interview. I was subpoenaed by the plaintiff, literally. The plaintiff was excused after the indictments were vacated or quashed and we talked together for a time.

The stupidist things I did were to ask questions. It’s best just to listen and ruminate and speak only when spoken to. Speaking on an initiative only wastes precious time. Nothing one has on one’s mind is as important as what the Avathar has on His. Shutting up and listening is essential, I say from rueful experience.

I can also say that everything He said turned out to be true, which shouldn’t surprise anyone here and didn’t surprise me. I would have been surprised it it hadn’t. These things ranged from the mundane to the momentous, as in the happiness of my life and the availability of a flight out that afternoon, respectively.

I forgot to mention that the interview was at Whitefield, March 1972, where I had gone to retrieve plaintiff. Both visits were less than a week in duration. I never felt a desire to stay. She had cancer and hoped for a cure. It came in 1973 in the form of a termination of that birth, which had been miserable. She now has a very happy one, all tweeting birds and streaming suns, Blueberry Bagels frequently and pasta on weekends at least.

Spiritual/physical discussion reminded me of a story Hislop told. Baba asked him about his meditation. Jack said he meditated on the Formless. Swami laughed and said that is impossible, that meditation has to be with a form of some kind, that God cannot be approached as the formless. Actually, God is Brahman with attributes. To talk of God at all is to be immersed in the realm of the physical, of necessity. No one worships or meditates or does yoga with the nirguna-brahma, only with the triguna-brahma. It is intrinsic to the thing that it must be done this way and no other. The physical is the only road Godward. The same road is also spiritual.

We should be physically spiritual and spiritually physical.

(Incidentally: the three yogas — karma, bhakthi and jnana — are the names for different stages of the same thing. They are not different things. They are the same thing, different stages thereof. This is important. There is no good, better, best, either. All the same thing.)

Again, the physical mediates the spiritual and is existentially indistinguishable from it. For example, folks crave to kiss and fondle Swami’s hind paws. They descend on hands and knees to do this. This is an intensely physical activity that is also intensely spiritual. The two aspects can be distinguished linguistically but not existentially. They are aspects of the same experience, both necessary. Really speaking, maya is thinking that there is something wrong with or unreal about the world. The world is God. God is the world. It’s all real as can be. The illusion is thinking it isn’t real or is somehow wrong or bad. This is why it is said that God loves the world, loves man, loves all creatures. They’re all as real as He is, which means absolutely.

If we want to say we are God, we say the world is God. Thinking anything is unreal is the maya. Whatever is thought exists, is real.

It is Shirdi’s picture which rides in my 4-Runner.

We have always seen Shirdi and Swami as Narasimha and we love the sight.

We do everything we can by 9. The technical term for the sum of the digits of a number is pythmen. This is a Greek word, from Greek (Pythagorean) mathematics. It is beneficial to note — especially in AofT context — that a principle root of both pythmen and Pythagoras is pyth. This root means … snake. As in the symbol of the Delphic Oracle and the Caduseus. Now, who is the snake? Adisheesha, He of the Thousand Hoods. In Ramayana, Lakshmana, Rama’s brother who accompanies Rama into exile. So this tells us that the Delphic Cult is a Sanskritic Cult. Actually, it is Saivite. Christianity, too, is a Saivite Cult (Greek/Egyptian = Hellenic). The Vaishnavite Cult of the area is Persia: Zoroaster and Baha’u’llah and then Mohammed.

Namasmarana is all that is required for everything in Kali Yuga and Sai Era. Swami mentioned once that Vyasa said this at the start of Kali Yuga.

Here is a funny tale, and true.

Some years ago I was dead-heading a bus over one of our floating bridges, heading to the University District of Seattle from the Eastside (Bellevue), where is located the base from which I work. I had been mulling a Sai problem for days, a naughty one. Could not get clarity, which always comes to me, when it comes, as a sentence composed from the intuition. Just as I ascended the off ramp of the freeway the illumination occurred and the thing came clear. At that moment, in happiness, I happened to glance down on the traffic still on the freeway below. My eye caught an old VW bug — we had two of them until last year — tootleing along with a license plate which read: BABA KUL

You probably know that Kul means school. What a rip this Guy is!

When we were taken from the hotel in Bombay to the airport there for flight back to NYC, we were driven by a particularly ancient and grim cabbie in a whitish turban with orange cloth peeking from the back. I told her it was Baba. I did not then understand about Shirdi. It was actually He. I thanked Him and He was stoney but aware and not in the least frightening. Actually He was attractive and exceeding memorable.

And finally, our cat is Shirdi playing cat. His name is Blighter, which Shirdi was to ordinary eyes. Shiva loves the role. He appeared to Arjuna as a bumptious, insulting Bil (scruffy forest dweller) whom Arjuna was moved to attack (shades of Jacob and Paul).

 

 

Mary and I have always had a humorously peptic and not un-ascerbic view of Swami. I have been meaning to write the story of our first meeting with Him, separately a continent apart but about the same time. Soon.

She sees Narasimha. Drew a picture of Him following a lion with His Hands behind His Back and a lion tail wagging cheerily from under His robe. Nadine Clegern and not a few in California were outraged at the sacrilege.

Lila Youngs said she could understand it — but did not like it — but others could not understand it, much less like it. The picture was of Narasimha done humorously. Both Narasimha and humor with regard to the Divine are unpopular topics for mantra and especially yantra. The children loved it. Still do. Children consider God near and dear and fun and funny, which is the truth, as we all know. So Mary draws.

Sandweiss used to talk about Swami as a cookie giver. I riposted that He is The Boss. Sam did not like that. Not attractive (of new devotees). He was right … and so was I.

I guess I will have to tell the First Meet story now to make sense of this. Here goes.

He first showed Himself to me in the Puttaparthi form in the early fall of 1971 in a creaky movie in an appalling loft on the Lower East Side during one of Hilda Charleton’s meets. Hilda was then Den Mother to a sordid assortment of missing links from the reaches of the boroughs, and I was then, and no doubt still am, not without certification necessary for that particular congeries.

In fact I had just a few months previous forsook, on my own, a stellar career for much the same reasons that de Bergerac refused to join the entourage of the Compte de Guiche — or any other, for that matter. I was then 28 years of age, the time, I found later, Schweitzer says that a man either becomes his own or is kept. The price for this indiscretion was a destruction of career, companionship, social status, money and ability to earn a living (so far as I knew) and a bereavement I cannot begin to describe.

I had hitch-hiked back to NYC from Phoenix, where I had been living rather high, penniless and planning to ask relatives at Time-Life for employment as a custodian. That was my plan.

This by a guy who in recent days had addressed the Board of Union Theological Seminary on the coming wide use of computers (a la Clarke’s *2001*), and led a futurist conference for the Young Presidents’ Organization at Key Largo, who had turned down job offers at NIH and a cushy life on the foundation circuit and was welcome to play the organ at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine. Now I was hoping, hungrily and with utter bewilderment, to work as a custodian for Time-Life.

I was offered temporary lodging — I had no money for that or food — by a cleric acquaintance of earlier days and used this to foray for employment.

My first call, however, was to a fellow Union grad, a lady on the governing board of Broadway Congregational United Church of Christ, where I had been a member and counsellor while a student at Union. She worked at a bank. After lunch, for which I had said she would have to pay, I got the urge to ask if I could stay with her — off Park in the high low 60s — rather than with the cleric pal in Brooklyn while job hunting midtown. She warmly said Yes. And it was she who took me to Hilda’s gathering of missing links. In her own way, she was one, too. So were we all, all missing links in various degrees of disrepair and sordidness. Hilda, too.

We taxied down to the loft — a place I never would have considered entering much less contemplating — and I listened stand-offishly while Hilda read mail from Ram Das — I still cannot respect the bloke — and answered questions from the white-clad, beaded addicts and worse. Then she led a “meditation,” which sounded to me like auto-suggestion and a bit of a gig, and during this she interrupted her patter to declare harshly that all had to participate or the full effect could not be had … she was referring to me, wide-eyed and alert in the midst, noting exit routes and preparing to ward off reefers and needles.

I was not intimidated by her threats and she knew that I was not. We Christians have 4000 years of genuine spirituality and mere crap behind us — and a huge, dynamic mixture in between — and it had been my job for 28 years to learn the differences. And I had.

Then Hilda announced that we would see a movie of Sathya Sai Baba. The lady I had come with had brought me — and herself — here for this purpose. It was a low-quality film, probably Super 8, but the effect on me was instant and simple. I was aware immediately I saw the Face and Form Who this is. I was aware that this is God in Human Form, the Supreme Absolute Divinity and Ruler of All right there putzing about like the rest of us mortals, playing at a party.

The element of play is perhaps foremost in my mind’s-eye view or grasp of Swami. Play such as no one here even dreams about being able to do, such wild dancing and insouciance as cannot even be conceived from our pedestrian, banal, bourgeois habits of thought and custom.

The recognition was immediate and plenary. From that moment to this I have never had any thought otherwise about this phenomenon than that He is what I later learned is meant by the word Avathar. Furthermore, I was aware immediately and fully that this was extremely more than the Incarnation Christians call Jesus. Jesus was never negated or questioned for me. This was just the More. Swami later supplied the language: The Father Who sent Jesus. Same light different intensity relative to different mission.

Swami never made me doubt Jesus but only always intensified my devotion to Jesus. I am actually a genuine Christian in that the mantra repeating constantly in my mind employs the Name, Jesus. I never felt or saw a conflict. Not to this day. All of one piece.

There was never any question about the position of Jesus or the position of Swami. For some reason the whole thing was intuitively grasped immediately the moment He came on the screen. I don’t know how else to say it. I have never felt the doubts others have, the wondering who this is, the hope of being convinced. I had no need to be convinced because the reality of the phenomenon was apparent to me from the first instant it was seen.

I did have to rescan and reorganize Christian theological articulation in light of this phenomenon — and that has been a lot of fun, also time-consuming — but I never felt any need to “coordinate” or “explain” what Swami is vis-a-vis Christianity. God is God. There ain’t more than one of Him. Somehow I have always understood this. I have always detested the Christian denominations, of any stripe. And I have always corrected the imprecise when they disparage Christianity when really they mean to deplore the denominations.

Who Swami is was clear to me immediately and I have never thought otherwise. Hislop and others trying to “explain” Swami has always appealed to me as not only arrogant but much more so an exhibition of their own confusion and doubt. Only doubters feel a need to explain.

Now, when the meeting broke up and we got back into a taxi, I said to the lady that the “miracles” we had seen on film were silly parlour games and unnecessary. She was incensed. She said it confirmed people’s belief in Swami. I thought that if they had to have their belief confirmed they hadn’t yet gotten the picture, hadn’t yet grasped Who this really is. She didn’t follow this line of thought and I dropped the discussion.

What did I mean? That the miracles were unreal or actual tricks, as in sleight of hand? Not hardly. I was well aware that they are real. What I meant was that they are meant for doubters, to bolster faith, and that they are common, garden variety occurrances, parlour games such as one would expect in that sort of a Parlour.

With the exception of Mary, I have rarely found this attitude grasped by others. Most think these miracles are big stupendous happenings, even if unobtrusive. I have never thought so. I expect them and would be startled if they were not around the Personality. They are part of the territory, so to speak. Their absence would be remarkable, not their presence.

(I remember feeling gratified reading Kasturi reporting that Swami turned furiously on a group of devotees coveting a “miracle” and shot, “Miracle, miracle, you want miracle. You are My miracle!”)

One might call this a “top-down” approach. Some think I do not have that approach, but actually I do. More so than seems recognizable.

So when I received the Hand-Up and saw the flash of light from the Eye at Puttaparthi that first evening I did not consider either of these things remarkable. This is why I did not ever feel a desire for interview, and still do not. If He wants, fine, if not, so what? Interview, miracles, blessings, etc — none of this changes a thing. Makes one feel good or bad — both of which experiences are redemptive — but does not say anything one way or another about the Source. The Source is there whether one wants to acklowledge or not, whether one is aware or not. It is constant and immutable. I guess I have always understood that implicitly. No one ever had to teach me that, no convincing had to be done. I knew it whether Swami was there or not.

Three months in an iron lung (1949) probably helped to instill this attitude or deepen it. Even as a 6-year-old you can tell when the difference between seeing and not is an electric plug in a wall. You know in Whose Hands you are. You do not ever think otherwise. It never occurs to you to think, as so many so stupidly do, that you are anything other than dependent absolutely on that Divine God who is all in all.

Luther said once that he is the freest of men because he is the most bound of men (to God). There is supreme wisdom in that remark. It is ineffable.

The next morning after this gathering with Den Mother Hilda and her missing links, I was lying in bed at the lady’s chalet. She was fixing breakfast. Imperceptibly but with great effect, a gentle sweetness came through and over me and the bed seemed to wave with it, which was waving gently. The phenomenon lasted for maybe two minutes then easily subsided and was gone, not to return since. I smiled a whole lot, aware of Who it was, and rose and walked to the kitchen. “___,” I said, “we’re going to see Sai Baba.” She was ecstatic. “When?” she said. I told her I didn’t know that but that it would be soon.

A couple of days later we were traveling with another clan of oddities — her orbit was that way — to another gathering but of different missing links and someone mentioned that Sai Baba’s brithday was November 23. I turned and told the lady that we would travel to Puttaparthi for that occasion. And we did.

I have told a story or two or three of that time, around 11/23/71.  See above.

Now, Mary also recognized Swami instantly and fully but in San Diego at a gathering called by Indra Devi ostensibly to learn yoga but actually to show Swami Flicks. So she and I are alike in this fundamental of instant, plenary recognition. It appears to be an unusual occurrence, but not unprecedented. Bharadwaja appears not to have had any trouble recognizing Rama. However, Arjuna did of Krishna. This is important. Arjuna is an Everyman in part because he does not see what (Who!) is standing right in front of him.

Uddhava, however, did not have any trouble recognizing Krishna. Drupadi had less trouble recognizing Krishna than her husbands did. Kausalya had less trouble seeing Rama than Dasaratha did. The sathwic nature is more able easily to see God: “blessed are the humble and meek ….”

I hope this illustrates an aetiology of some apparently unorthodox views and attitudes we have of Swami. We have a wide latitude in talking about Him.

Years ago a Michelle Ferrari came to the hermitage and brought some vibbhuthi she claimed was from Bozzanis, her buddies she said, and just from Swami’s hand. She acted as if it were some super sacred substance entrusted to her stewardship. She hesitantly offered us some, thinking we might be barbarians who could hurt the vibbhuthi or be hurt by it. We gladly accepted because we could see that at least it was vibbhuthi, though the genuineness of the bearer was not clear.

The children were young then. This was early 80s. Mary took the container, licked her finger, stuck it in the vibbhuthi and had the children lick it off her finger. I did the same for myself, but I noticed that Michelle was stewing big time. In fact she was frying.

She finally got the container back after Mary had dosed each of the children and could not contain herself. She launched into a tirade about sacrilegious handling of vibbhuthi, that it must be taken in water, never touched, etc., etc., etc. We are not org members and never knew that. If we had, we would not have thought a thing of it. Swami is our buddy, the stuff appeared genuine — it was — and we took it like we did any common food in the absence of utensils — we were in the prayer room. Utterly informal, as with Friend. Utterly common. Nothing important or unusual about the vibbhuthi  just common stuff. “Tinsel and trash” is language He uses. But we actually feel it as such. He wants to feed us, we eat. It passes through and is eliminated. That is life. That is Swami. Natural and precise, just like a child.

So we listened to Michelle’s tirade and smiled and dismissed her. We were not surprised to learn that she reported us exquisite barbarians and a positive threat to humanity, not to mention the Sai Organization and devotees of Seattle, whom Michelle seemed ambitious to organize. Seattle then was considered a flake area by the Hislop cabal down south. I think Grahams did not do anything to allay that fear and did much to confirm it.  Except that we were the genuine article, and, I “outranked” most of the “devotees” of that day, including Michelle Ferrari, by earliest awareness of Swami and especially by private interview.

But it all is illustration of the point that Swami appears differently to different people. It has been our lot to have a radically less formal and emphatically more humorous — because ineffably more plenary — view of Swami than appears to be customary among the majority of those attracted to Him.

Life is a blast. I’ve always been numbered among the missing links — no doubt with unimpeachable justification. And somehow this affects the seeing of Him. I think it is not without charm.

AUM NAMAH SHIVAYA