(Originally given under the name Chinna Kistna Rajasaheb Bahadur B.A., LL.B.)
Saraswath, aged about 50, Interior of India 11th June, 1936.
I look upon Sri Sai Baba as the Creator, Preserver and Destroyer. I did so before His mahasamadhi in 1918 and I do so now. To me, He is not gone. He is, even now.
To me, he had no limitations. Of course, when he was with us, there was the fleshy tabernacle. That was prominently brought to our notice at times. But mostly the infinite aspect of His was what remained before me. I thought of him as a mental or spiritual image, in which the finite blended very perfectly - yet allowing the finite to appear before us at times. Now that the body has been cast off, the infinite alone remains, as 'Sai Baba'.
I am not after metaphysics and philosophical conundrums. Sai Baba occasionally talked in mystic language and used parables freely - which, however, were construed in widely different ways by different listeners. Once he talked to me in the mystic way and asked me whether I understood him. I said 'No'. Others were present then. After they left, I told him that I did not grasp mystic utterances and that if he intended that I should grasp anything he should speak to me in plain terms. After that he spoke to me only in plain words and not in parables.
A short account of myself is necessary to show how I came to Sai Baba and how he filled my life and became my all in all.
Our family God is Durga - Santa Durga of Goa - a Bhadra form and not a Rudra form. I used to worship her and pray that she might ever keep me happy. Later when I was about eight years old, I had my sacred thread initiation and learnt my Gayatri and Sandhya. These I had regard for. I was thus naturally led on from Durga to another form of God. i.e., Narayana or Vishnu. Vishnu as pictured in "Dhruva- Narayana" made a deep impression on me, and I constantly meditated on that picture. When I concentrated or tried to concentrate on Vishnu, Dhruva's figure frequently obtruded and so I cut off that portion of the picture and continued my meditation. I made a special appeal that in that blank space in the picture, (i.e., in that vacancy) Vishnu should place me. I had even as a boy practised Asana and Pranayama. I could pass one or two hours sitting in Padmasana or Siddhasana and concentrate for at least fifteen minutes, a single picture holding the entire field for my attention. I did all this without a Guru. I succeeded in Pranayama also to some extent. In this way my meditation on Vishnu or Narayana was fairly intense. This continued till my twenty-first year. Then (i.e., 1910) one day, I was either sleeping and had dreams or I had trance visions - I cannot say what they were. But the following three experiences I had in the course of one night.
As I was in the lying posture on my bed, I felt a change. I was perceiving that the body lay separate and I was disengaged from it - disconnected or unconnected. I was different from the body; and in front of me stood the figure of Vishnu Narayana. This ended; and about an hour later, a second incident followed. Again my body lay there on the bed. I was outside it. Sri Vishnu Narayana was standing before me. And by his side stood another figure. Sri Vishnu addressed me and pointing to the other figure said "This Sai Baba of Shirdi, is your man; you must resort to him".