← Mother KrishnabaiHer autobiography

24

About Saints

O LOVE-INCARNATE Papa! The company of Dr. Rama Rao and Sundari helped me a great deal in attaining my oneness with your infinite Being and the resultant immortal bliss. As Dr. Rama Rao had to go to foreign countries, Sundari came to Kasaragod along with me and the children to reside in her parents’ home. It was here that I obtained your Darshan.

O Papa who is pervading the entire universe! When I first came to you with Sundari I was thinking that the family members alone were mine. Then you taught me how to love the whole universe while residing at home. Thereafter, when I remained with you always, freeing me from body-consciousness, you gave me the realisation that I was the universe itself, and the consciousness of my oneness with you. As I describe all the different good or defective parts of my body as “I” and “mine”, in the same way, when I realise the whole universe as “I”, I describe the good and bad qualities I see in it as “I” and “mine”.

O Purushottam Papa! Just as I was looking after the needs of my body and providing it with whatever was necessary at regular hours, though at first I felt that the body was myself from head to foot while really I was different from it, similarly even knowing that I am the entire universe and also beyond it, and having the awareness that I am one with your omnipresent Being, whenever occasion arises I perform the service of all people taking them as “I” and “mine”. O Papa, manifesting yourself as the cosmos and playing in various ways, you are still changeless and transcendent! Victory to you! Victory to you! Victory to you!

O Papa, the giver of bliss! From my childhood I was afraid of Sadhus and saints. When we were living at Haliyal, a saint was coming to our house. He had a long beard and moustache and I used to tremble with fear whenever I saw him. He was a hot tempered person. He was orthodox in his ways and if children touched him after his bath he would fly into a rage and frighten them. So we were afraid to approach him.

O all-pervading Papa! When I was about twelve years old I had gone to Bhatkal. Here at that time a saint had come to Nadgar Temple. Whenever I saw a saint, whoever he might be, I would question my elders, “Why do you call him a saint? Why do they think of God? Why does God love them so much? Why are people doing Namaskars to them? Why should people become their disciples? Particularly I want to know why women become their disciples.” In this manner I would ask questions like pouring rain.

To this the elders would reply, “A saint is God Himself Because they are always remembering God, He has great love for them. One should not have any doubts about them. If you speak ill of a saint, you commit sin and have to go to hell.”

Then I would immediately ask, “What do you mean by hell?”

Then they would answer, “The messengers of Yama would throw those who commit sin into hell and give them dire punishment.” To confirm what they said, they would show pictures depicting how a soul which committed sins suffered. Consequently, whenever any kind of disparaging thought about saints came to me, I would feel a sense of fear and try my best to dispel that thought.

O universally-pervading Papa! Even then, sometimes when the elders talked among themselves about certain happenings in relation to saints, their words would fall into my ears.

The saint who had come to Bhatkal was getting his disciples under his power and was treating them harshly. He would tell them, “When a Guru says in the day that it is night, and in the night that it is day, the disciple should implicitly agree to it. The persecution by the Guru should not be considered by the disciple as persecution. If you have any doubt about the Guru you are sure to go to hell.”

In this way he was instructing his disciples in strong words. He was also giving no end of trouble to his female disciples. After waving Arati before the deity he would place the hot Arati plate on their thighs. Still the disciples would patiently bear the pain inflicted by him, having in view the one aspiration to have the Darshan of God. After coming to know about all this I was afraid of saints. If you happened to come in the forms of these saints to the temple I would flee from there.

O Papa, who is an ocean of grace! By the time I reached the age of twenty-five I had heard about many saints of this type. The reports about them produced in my heart a feeling of disgust for them. Fearing that by harbouring such thoughts I might be committing a sin, I would try my best to keep away such thoughts. The more I was afraid of bad thoughts about them, the more I used to hear from my elders about their unrighteous ways. If anyone praised a certain saint, then, after he got up and left the place, another would come and, sitting in the same place, speak of the evil doings of the same saint. Listening to all these talks I felt that I should not have either reverence or irreverence for saints. I was afraid that if I conceived veneration for them I might go to them and get entangled in their nets. Therefore, whenever I saw Sadhus or saints, without going near them I would do Namaskar to them from a distance.