Sathya Sai Baba on the 2004 Tsunami disaster

One would expect Sai devotees to turn to their know-all guru and God for illumination as to the causes of the undersea earthquake and consequent tsunami calamities. What would they find?

So it is all the fault of 'man', not least 'scientists' seeking 'unrestricted enjoyment'. However, since such major earthquake calamities took place for millions of years before and during humanity's emergence and are known to be caused by the regular releases through aeons of vast pressures built up in the gradually-moving continental tectonic plates, Sai Baba's connection to "man's conduct" it is really a tough conundrum to solve! This kind of talk may satisfy (and misinform) poor peasants or cringing servitors, but no one with a smattering of education can rationalise this away. Click here to see 'Stark Effects of a Seismic Shift' by Ian Sample, 'The Guardian's science correspondent.

But wait, could it have been a wrong translation or misquote by Sai Baba's translator/editor at the time, V.K. Narasimhan? Definitely not, for I often saw Narasimhan working on translations of Baba's Telugu and Sanskrit and he explained his process in detail. He was very thorough and generally very accurate. However, he also told me of numerous things he he omitted and modified to suppress the worst of Sai Baba's mistakes, confusions of facts and theoretical absurdities when translating. He was worried about his reputation if he were found out. This can now be told since poor old Narasimhan died in 2000.
Just to show that Sai Baba really meant what he said, consider his following statement about one year later:

The kind of conduct, to which Sai Baba attributes all the ills of the world, is "spiritual lapses", don't you know. How spiritual lapses cause Nature to cause calamities is what Sai Baba cannot explain. He can tell of no observable or other precise connecting links which anyone can believe in (except perhaps Indra worshippers and the like). It is all postulation and arises from the primitive pre-scientific misunderstanding of causes of man's afflictions, whether it be illnesses like leprosy, or otherwise avoidable accidents, or anything the empirical causes of which were unknown to our relatively very ignorant and superstitious forefathers and the many and various faulty 'religious tenets' they have handed down to us.

Still uncertain whether Sai Baba can be so ignorant, vague and pompously absurd? Try the following for size then:-

"What is the cause of droughts and floods which occur in the world? Man seeks to enjoy the benefits of Nature which has grave consequences. Here you have a globe. If you hit it one way, its balance is disturbed. We should always see to it that the utilisation of natural resources a proper balance is kept. Excessive use in one direction will result in harm in another direction."
p. 282, Sanathana Sarathi November, 1997 -- or - p. 241-242, Sathya Sai Speaks Vol. 30.

Such a gifted account of how droughts and floods occur! This super-simplistic distortion of the idea of ecological balance would not even be accepted by elementary school students nowadays. One could forgive Sathya Sai Baba his profound ignorance of undisputable facts and lack of standard education were it not for the arrogant and all-knowing manner with which he uses these falsehoods to try to impress his listeners and even to cow people into submission to his 'spiritual teaching'. He has also pointed out that "the Lord" sets examinations! See how he justifies calamities....