Rare Spiritual Treasure: "Divine Games of Bala Sai" by V.R. Krishna Kumar
Excerpts shared for educational and spiritual purposes with reverence to the author. This project is a non-profit initiative, offered as a labor of love and selfless service.
Guha Rahasyam
THE CAVE SECRET PLACE
People may call it a cave, but it was not just a
cave. That was Kailash[1],
more sacred than Brahmalok[2].
One can surely say that when compared to this, all the three worlds were
nothing. In this Kali era a place like this was very rare. The cave was like a
small room, maybe about 6 feet height, 5 feet width and 6 feet length. A
hole-like entrance towards the East was not so easy to enter. As this hole walk
at a higher level to the ground, it was not easily visible, and to climb up to
it was difficult. As this was situated on a small hill, there were lots of
thorny plants and sharp edged stones all around that place, making it difficult
to cross. The floor was even. Towards the South there was a rock-like natural
formation suitable for one to sit on it in comfort. and this was a rare beauty
of nature. Towards the East there was some open space, suitable for one person
to rest. This wonder of nature. when observed carefully, it looked like some
divine architect had carved out a meditation temple. Towards the top left side
there was a small hole from where light entered the cave, and also some cool
air came through. Let it be anyone; once they entered the cave, they would
never feel like coming out of it. How I came to know about all this, I shall
inform.
Once, at the Old Mandir, Swami talked
about this cave and warned that no one should go near it. He threatened that
there was a lion in the cave. Hearing to this, my heart let out a big shout
from within. Whenever something was forbidden, my nature was to get to know
that secret, without any further delay. From the childhood, my sister Kumaramma
was my right hand. I proposed to her that we should see this place secretly, but
she was frightened and declined my offer. She also observed that we should not
overrule Swami's words. It was afternoon time, and Swami was writing some
letters in His room. I coaxed my sister that before anyone would come to know,
we should see the cave and come back. She yielded to this idea of mine with
much difficulty. We started running towards Chitravathi River, so that we could
return back, before Swami came out of His room.
Straight away we started climbing the hill on
which there was the Kalpavriksha[3].
Some land marks mentioned by Swami was firmly rooted in my heart, and this
helped us reach the hole-like entrance of the cave. I felt that some power was
leading me onto this path to reach the cave. When we peeped into the hole, it
was so dark, and we could not see anything. We could not observe any type of
structure to lead us into the cave. Without any further thoughts, I jumped into
the hole, pulling my sister with me. That was that; we started sliding
downwards in total darkness. Our clothes tore in the process, and blood started
oozing out of many bruises. In this scuffle, fear took the back seat. After we
reached the bottom, without eating for anything, we went little further into
the darkness. As already mentioned, due to some light coming from a small hole,
we could see something. Everything was there, as described by Swami earlier. In
the mean time my sister felt that she could see two eyes and hear something
moving. She started trembling badly, and as warned by Swami, she had the
Darshan of a lion. This made us cut our plans, and we started our return
journey putting in all our remaining energy. It was quite easy to slide down
the slope, but very difficult to retrace. We went head over heels to reach the
top. We had the satisfaction of having gained at least this much.
Once on top, we sta1ted running towards the Old
Mandir and decided to inform people who would enquire about our disappearance
that we had gone to Chitravathi. We wanted to enter the Old Mandir from the
rear entrance, to ensure that Swami did not spot us. Our first task would be to
discard the torn clothes and get into fresh ones. But nothing went as planned
by us. What was our plan in front of His plan! Ours was not worth a dime! The
lion that feared us was not in the cave, but it was there, right in front of us
at the Old Mandir gate, in the form of Narasimha Avatar[4].
To see Swami like a ferocious lion with glowing red eyes made us shiver. Now,
to escape from this situation, I planned to send my sister first, with some
pretext, and then somehow jump into the Mandir. But who can escape from the
sight of Swami? Can anyone hoodwink Him? Slowly we saw our mother Radhamma, Seshagiri
tata[5],
and a few others waiting to receive us in a suitable manner. Being a bad monkey
and destroy the garden was all right with me, but I felt bad for pulling my
sister into all this mess against her wishes.
Swami started of with me by landing a few slaps on my cheeks that
became red like fire. But my sister was more fortunate, being a girl, and did
receive this treatment. She got away with a nice hard pinch on her ear by
Swami. Those were no ordinary slaps! Just imagine how would one feel when slapped
by the Avatar of Narasimha? The whole world would spin like a steam turbine.
Fearing what more would come if I breakdown, I boosted my courage and kept a
smile on my face. Before we could open our mouth to explain, Swami told everyone
there about our heroic acts. Was there anything not known to Him? Not only
Swami's hands, but after hearing to this episode, my mother also used her hands
feely and let go on our cheeks. "You! Dunnapotha! Are you not ashamed
of yourself'! Swami scolded us and went inside. Fearing what would happen
if I go into Swami's room, I stood outside near the door. After the lion cooled
down, I heard Him say, "What are you doing"? Hea1ing this, I
also cooled down and entered the room quietly. I was relieved to see a smile on
His face and more relieved to hear Him say, "You went to the cave;
it is alright! But why did you drag Kumaramma with you? What you saw
there?"Listening to this, my heart leapt with joy,
wondering what more secrets are to be known. What I actually felt at this stage
was that someone was waking me up from deep slumber and advising me to sleep
nicely! It was like raking me up to do something more and not allowing me to
stop here. So as expected, the story did not stop here, and please note what
happened latter.
After a few days Swami left for Bangalore leaving me behind at
Puttaparthi. I presumed this as a nice opportunity granted to me and started off at about 10 AM
towards the cave without any fear of being observed. I had no difficulty in
entering the cave and had a lot of time at my disposal. I was struck by wonder.
It was very peaceful inside. The fragrance there shattered my nose. This surely
must have been Parijatha[6]
from heaven I thought. I peacefully sat down and leisurely started observing
what was there. I saw one Kamandalam[7],
one Dandakam[8],
one Rudrakshamala[9],
one pair of Padukas[10],
one bunch of palm leaves with some writings (the old form of holy texts), one
old type pen in the form of a feather, and one ink bottle. The way these were
neatly arranged made me believe that someone was taking good care to keep them
in place. I sat there silently, unable to move out from there. When I did
decide to return. I felt some thing was nudging my mind, and I suddenly
collected all these items and returned back to the Old Mandir. Without anyone's
knowledge, I safely kept all these items in the small storeroom. I never
revealed this to anyone. Even my family members came to know about this, only
when I started writing this book. Swami returned from Bangalore shortly and
everything went on as usual.
After some days Swami asked me, "Have
you kept everything safely?"My heart skipped a beat,
wondering what wrong I had done? I might have forgotten what I brought from the
cave, but would Swami ever forget anything? He was the arouser of the
intentions that originated in me, and He was the One Who made me do all this. I
slowly realised that Swami was asking about this only, but did give Him any
reply. Swami mentioned, "I caused the feelings, he will not come
again"! Though I could not understand what He meant, I shook my head I
pretending to have understood everything. Swami instructed, "Hand it
over to Me whenever I ask for"!
[3]Kalpavriksha: In the sacred land of Puttaparthi, standing on the
slopes of the Obuladevara Gutta hill, there is a tree that holds the whispers
of a thousand prayers. This is the Kalpavriksha, or the
"Wish-Fulfilling Tree." The Story of the Kalpavriksha: In
the early days of the Avatar's life, when Sathya Sai Baba was still a young
boy, he would often lead his devotees and childhood friends up the rocky hills
overlooking the Chitravathi River. Even then, his play was filled with divine
mystery. He would take them to a specific, ancient tamarind tree. Though it was
a common tree by nature, under his touch, it became transcendental. To
show his devotees that the Divine can manifest anything out of nothing, he
would ask them: "What fruit do you desire?" One devotee would
ask for a mango in the middle of winter; another would ask for a ripening
apple, a cluster of grapes, or even out-of-season figs. Sai Baba would simply
reach into the branches of the tamarind tree, and the exact fruit requested
would appear, hanging from the tamarind twigs as if it had grown there
naturally.
[4]Narasimha Avatar: the fearful lion-headed incarnation
of Lord Vishnu.
[5]Seshagiri tata: he was the first poojari. priest in
the Old Mandir and we used to lovingly call him tata-grandfather.
[6]Parijatha: a heavenly flower with a divine fragrance.
[7]Kamandalam: a holy water pot that saints would
carry.
[8]Dandakam: a staff that saints would hold and
rest their hand.
[10]Padukas: wooden sandals with only one
toe grip worn by saints.
[11]Chinta Chettu: Chinta for
tamarind and Chettu for tree.
Sathya Sai Baba at V. S. Tiruvenkatasamy Mudaliar's house, Bangalore 1944
SWINGING SAI
One day Swami asked us to bring
long ropes and made us tie them to a huge tree. He started swinging, holding
the ropes, and on this occasion there was a reason behind it. What I once heard
from Swami flashed in my mind. In that groove where Swami arranged for the
swing, the villagers believed that some Brahma Raksha[1]
and demonic spirits possessed it. They would not go near this groove after
dark. But for the King of the universe, Sai Maharaj, what were these!
When Swami started swinging with the help of the people over there, He
was not at all satisfied. Even if four or five well-built people pushed Him
with all their might, He was not pleased, as the swing went up to a certain
height only. After some time, Swami told everyone to stand aside, at a distance,
and ridiculed that all their combined strength was not of much use. All by His
effort, He started swinging and swinging and went higher and higher. In a
short time, He seemed to reach the sky. The people were totally confused and
went out of their senses. The swing that could not go above certain point with
combined efforts, suddenly was flying like a rocket. All of us started shouting
loudly, but how could our 'Rocket Sai' hear our calls? As we were looking, the
big branch onto which we had tied the ropes, started breaking, but Swami
continued to swing. With a loud crackling sound, the branch shattered to pieces
and fell. Swami was nowhere in sight! I imagined that Swami must have been
flying in the sky, taking the fo1m of an eagle. How He disappeared into the sky
we could not see, and many were worried that something must have happened to
Him. I once again imagined that Swami would be coming down, holding an
invisible parachute! Yes! He appeared from behind and enquired, "You
all got afraid"? Looking at Him, we came back to life. We could
not believe our eyes and with surprise shouted, 'Swami!' Pretending that
nothing had happened, He said, "The time for the spirit had expired,
and thus it is given redemption". When we observed the broken
branch lying on the ground, it appeared bigger than the tree from which it fell.
All the people surrounded the branch and looked at it with astonishment. More
people were pouring in see what had happened. We had observed few such Leelas
of His, but how many such Leelas He had performed is known only to our Leela Sai!
We had heard about such Leelas of Lord
Krishna from the 'Bhagawatham', but now we had the fortune of seeing these with
our own eyes. Once, mother Yashoda, unable to bear the mischief of naughty
Krishna, tied Him to a big grinding stone in the garden, and went inside,
thinking that He had been made immobile. But this mischievous boy pulled that
bio stone along with Him and went in between two huge trees. The stone got stuck
between the trees and by mere force of the rope tied on to His tiny tummy, He
brought down the trees with a crackling noise. From the fallen trees emerged
two celestial beings, as they were redeemed of their curse. They reverently
bowed to young Krishna with gratitude and disappeared. That same thing had been
done by Bala Sai, and He drowned everyone in surprise. That is why, whenever I
saw the huge trees, I wondered who were in that form.
The devotees breathed a sigh of relief and
reached the Old Mandir from the groove. Those who did not come there to witness
this felt depressed. Only when Prashanthi Nilayam was under completion, during
the 1950's there came a change in His divine plays. Now His Leelas have changed
with the times, suitable for the present. As the tender rays of. the Sun rise,
slowly the heat increases. Similarly, even God throws light that suits the
devotees. Now it is not necessary for Him to do such acts in person because,
just by His will, anything can happen. How many more miracles He shall pe1form,
no one can ever estimate. That small village Puttaparthi has become a city, and
it shall keep expanding. This shall become the centre stage for marvellous
deeds. To be bestowed with the fortune of seeing all these, we require His
immense grace.
During that period Swami would frequently make us
tie the ropes to some trees and swing beautifully and gracefully. As my sister
Kumaramma, in her book 'Anyatha Saranam Nasthi' has already covered this, I do
not wish to repeat it here.
