Devotees speak volumes about their Masters. They speak on the Master's glory, personality, activities, miracles, their personal experiences, and on other devotees and group activities etc. Particularly, when it comes to Shri Sainath Maharaj, devotees speak more about dreams with relation to him, their own experience which they call miracles and on their emotive inter-action with Baba. In short, they experience Him as a Personal God, who can be a Sadguru or a deity. Some of them worship a number of Personal Gods at the same time and therefore, find it difficult to focus on one. In any case the One Ultimate has to be beyond all the Personal Gods. A Personal God, by whatever name, is called Saguna (with certain qualities and powers) Sakara (a form which a human mind can ordinarily comprehend). A finer understanding of God is Nirguna (beyond such limited qualities and powers), Nirakara (beyond specific forms). Nirguna Nirakara - this means seeing or experiencing the essence of God or that Ultimate reality or Brahma in all its creations - i.e. in the devotee himself and in the entire manifested and non-fested creation around him.

By this logic all statues or paintings, structures (like Samadhis), names, Aartis, Mantras, Charan Padukas, etc. are symbols of God and certainly not God, the Ultimate. Such symbols are generally worshipped and contemplated on as it is easy for the limited human mind to comprehend them. The question is whether the human mind should necessarily be limited, or a path should be chosen to keep it limited. If any path or any religion prescribes for such an approach, it itself is limited. Hinduism prescribes certain methods by which a devotee can graduate from a Sakara (limited form) of worship to a Nirakara (form-less) worship. Religion means both ritualism and spiritualism. Unless one transcends ritualism, it is difficult to enter into the arena of spiritualism in the true sense of the term.

Spiritualism means to follow the true dictates of the spirit within. Generally speaking, 'the spirit within' means the soul which is a part of that God the Ultimate who encompasses both the seen and unseen, the living and non-living aspects of nature and from the smallest particles to biggest stars. Spiritualism, therefore, has necessarily to expand the spirit of the soul from its limited body-bounden awareness to a vast cosmic awareness. If sheer ritualisms like puja, Archana, Yagyans do not uplift the spirit of the individual or expand his mental horizon, it certainly is not spiritualism.

Generally, it is due to the lack of understanding of what real spiritualism means that most of the devotees spend their whole life doing certain rituals and yet do not progress. From multiple forms of God to a single form of God to a formless state God is the real prescription for spiritualism. Multiple form worships (i.e. of deities etc.) do not give focus on a particular form.

Since these various symbolic representations of different aspects of nature go with various functions and powers, a person worshipping these forms gets scared to stop such worship even when he understands that he has to graduate to a formless state of worship. For example, Ganapati is for the removal of obstructions, Durga is for protection against enemies or Laxmi is for prosperity or Hanumana for courage, etc. No doubts that all the four deities are manifestations of the Ultimate One but then on whom does the devotee concentrate. Where then is the question of what is called "Ekagra Chitta" as a sine-qua-non for subtle experience of God. In such a situation one has to choose one of the two ways. Either to worship the Ultimate One (Nirguna Nirakara) going beyond the worship of these deities or to evolve through these limited forms to the Ultimate reality through Gyana Marga (Path of Knowledge). All spiritual practitioners in all ages of whichever religion have gone through this process of leaving the forms and contemplating on the formless state of God or in experiencing the formless state of God through the forms. The Perfect Masters or Sadgurus always taught the same method to his disciples at a certain stage of evolution. Those who followed them and tried to experience the impersonal aspects of God evolved faster than those that stuck on to the Personal aspect of God only.

Thus Baba has clearly stated in Shri Sai Satcharitra that the best way of worship is to experience Him as a Formless, Universal existence. If not, to worship Him with a form. Therefore, the devotees of Baba while worshipping Him with a form, should always try to experience Him as the formless. But then, the big question is how to be focused and be in a state of "Ekagra Chitta" when too many forms are contemplated on at the same time. Is not the form of the Sadguru enough !

(Guruji Shri C. B. Satpathy)

Satya Bajjuri, Plymouth, MN

OM Shree Ganeshaya Namaha!

OM Shree Sainathaya Namaha!

RAJADHIRAJA YOGIRAJA SAINATH MAHARAJ KI JAI!

I bow to the lotus feet of Sri Sadguru Sainath Maharaj and pray for His blessings to share following His Sweet Leela. From the beginning of this year 2004, I started doing Kakad Arati to Baba every morning at home around 6:30am. And at the end, I do chant the "Rajadhiraja Yogiraja Parabrahma Sainath Maharaj, Shree Satchidananda Sadguru Sainath Maharaj ki Jai" with high pitch and with long strech as like in Sai Arati cassettes, and to the best I can. I love doing the last charanam (try as much as concentration & love) and my little one (my son 2 years old) joins me and he also tries shout as high as he can. He joins his voice in the prayer couple of times in a week. He loves that, and my wife enjoys watching him doing.

At times a thought used to come into my mind that "I should get a chance to do the last charanam in Prayer centre and Celebration-satsanghs". As we know, our mind is not in one’s control for common persons like us. We cannot control the thoughts that arises in our mind, a variety of thoughts, good and bad both flashes in our mind with its own liberty, sometimes without our wish, it does not need our permission. And we know controlling mind is the most complex and only learned souls can do it. Once on the occasion of coloring Prayer centre, audio system was packed that week-end (Feb ’04), hence I got a chance to do the last charanam also in prayer centre, thus a part of my wish fulfilled. Few months passed, still I used to get this wish once in a while into my mind. And now let us see how Baba played HIS miracle.

SSPC planned to celebrate Sri Ramanavami event on Apr’3rd. On April 2nd (Friday) night 10pm our garage door was not working and my car is inside the garage. I was worried very much as we had Sri Ramanavami event festivities next day and I need to go in the afternoon for stage decorations/arrangements. Talk to couple of friends, I was told that we can open it manually if it’s not working. Next day morning (Apr’3rd) as I was doing my regular daily worship in the morning, I got a message. My inner voice told me that "You will see a miracle today!". I felt happy, I thought garage door will be automatically fixed and will be opened. But oops (:- No, it was not working. My neighbor told me spring got broken so we cannot open it even manually, this made me worried as I cannot take my car out. Called couple shops and everyone was saying they will come in the evening or next day (Sunday). I prayed to Baba again and again and made a call to another shop and got the positive response that he will be there by 12:30 noon and it will take an hour to fix it. I was happy. With Baba’s blessings Technician came at 11am and fixed by 12noon. I was happy and went to Geeta Ashram for the event work and celebrations.

As the day was passing, I was still looking waiting for miracle to happen and wondering myself when and where it will happen. I was curious in the morning but as the day passing I started feeling disappointment. Ramanavami event started as we planned at 3:30pm and program was going well with Baba’s blessings. And slowly I forgot about miracle that was due. Abhisekham to Baba done, Archanas and Dhoop Arati started. I was sitting at the entrance giving Arati tickets to devotees. I enjoyed Dhoop Arati from entrance itself, singing arati-prayers from there itself. In the middle of the Dhoop Arati, due to some problem audio system started re-playing Arati CD from beginning and hence audio system was stopped and devotees continued singing Arati chorus. It almost came to the end, then came a flash in my mind, my inner voice told me that "go to the stage and sing the last charanam, audio system is not working and this is the chance for you, Baba wants to fulfill your wish". I haven’t moved from my place, surprised and still thinking. Then again next message "Hurry up, go , do not hesitate, this is for you". Till that time I didn’t realized that this is the occasion for me to sing my favorite charanam. In next two minutes, I reached to the mike (stage) and it was the time to do the last charanam . I did sing my favorite charanam "Rajadhiraja Yogiraja Parabrahma Sainath Maharaj, Shree Satchidananda Sadguru Sainath Maharaj Ki Jai" with high pitch and long stretch. I was very happy as the message that I got in the morning that "I will see His Sweet miracle" became true, and thus our dear lord Sai fulfilled my wish.

Oh Sai! How can I praise you and your sweet leelas. I can only say that WE, all his devotees, are luckiest humans on the earth as we are His devotees. Dorakuna ituvanti daivam! (How blessed we are, how lucky we are to be His devotees). Our Dear Lord, Sai Baba, please bless us and grant us "Shardda and Saburi". Rajadhiraja Yogiraja Parabrahma Sainath Maharaj, Shree Satchidananda Sadguru Sainath Maharaj Ki Jai!

Bow to Sri Sai, Peace be to all.

Ranjit Kulangaroth, St. Paul, MN

With the blessings of Sadguru Saibaba of Shirdi, would like to share an experience of Baba's leela. Baba's leela's are very sweet and subtle. Not only does HE take care of us in our time of need but HE does it in a beautiful way that reinforces our faith in HIM. To illustrate this is an experience I had a few months back. As part of a subscription to a developer software group, I got a free handheld organizer. The organizer was delivered to me at the office in a shiny red package. I didn't have time at work to go thru the instruction manuals so I kept the package on my desk with the intention of taking it home and reading through it. At the end of that day which was a very hectic one, I went home and realized after reaching home that I had omitted to bring the package with me. Thinking that I had inadvertently forgotten to bring it from work, the next day I checked at work and found that the package was not on my desk!! I searched all around the desk and realized that the package was nowehere to be found. I searched the Lost and Found area and it didn't show up there either. I gave up thinking that either i misplaced it through my carelessness or that maybe some outsider to the office may have actually stolen it. I also prayed to Baba, all the while feeling a little foolish for praying to HIM about such a trivial thing.

About a week after this, I happened to open an overhead cabinet that I rarely use and found the package lying there!!! I was greatly surprised and wondered how it came to be there. Just then a colleague of mine at the office stopped by and said-" I see you got the package". It so transpired that on the day that I got the package, this colleague was walking by my cube and happened to notice the shiny red package lying on the desk. The same day in the evening, he saw the same package lying in the restroom and guessed that I had left the package there by mistake. He then put the package in the overhead cabinet in my cube. See how wonderful Baba's leela is- most of the time people are so busy at work that they have very little time to look into other people's cubes. This colleague not only happened to walk past my cube that day, but also noticed the package and when he saw it in the restroom made the mental association with me.Baba pulled the strings so skillfully that I got my organizer back despite my carelessness.

Now for the second part- who was that good samaritan colleague? None other than a fellow SaiBandhu- our very own Bhasker Kabirdassji.!!

Bow to Sri SAI, Peace be to ALL!!!!

"Have faith and confidence in your Guru. Believe fully, that Guru is the sole Actor or Doer. Blessed is he who knows the greatness of his Guru and thinks him to be Hari, Hara and Brahma (Trimurti) Incarnate. "

- Saibaba of Shirdi