Sathya Sai says: "Love My uncertainty"
This means one must accept whatever he does, however unpredictable, because it supposedly has a deeper meaning than is obvious.In this quote
we see Sathya Sai Baba's perfect prescription for blind belief, unquestioning acceptance
of anything he says or does and complete self-brainwashing. A divine command
not to question anything, and ideal for covering up everything untoward.
It seems Sathya Sai Baba first made the vague statement, 'Love my uncertainty' to
Arnold Schulman (Baba by A. Schulman, Viking Press, 1971). Imaginative
interpretations of this have been bandied about by devotees in books and
talks. Since then the words have been re-quoted constantly as a sort of
mantra against all the broken promises, gaps between word and action,
and all the self-contradictions and factual untruths that Sathya Sai Baba utters.
It is very poor English, too, for what the words express literally is
that Sathya Sai Baba suffers from uncertainty (which fact we should love?), but it
is doubtless intended instead to convey that one should love the fact
that Sathya Sai Baba is unpredictable. Unreliable is probably the more correct term!
The Sathya Sai Baba-initiate takes this limp saying to be wisdom indicating yet again
that "He is the unfathomable Lord", "His inscrutable ways
cannot be plumbed" and so on... all well-meant explanations no doubt,
but actually only proof of being mind-programmed by Sai propaganda.
Sathya Sai Baba is a past
master at spreading maximum uncertainty and confusion through such vague
statements, semi-intelligible comments, conflicting directions to different
(or even the same) people. Part of his game is telling devotees supposed
'secrets' not to be divulged, while getting his machine to deny the same in cases where the leak proves unfortunate (despite
his warnings and his 'omniscient will'... or maybe precisely because of
it!) Numerous egs, can be given, as I do here later. It is said that 'Swami
knows everything'. Well, one thing I reckon he 'knows' with a high degree
of likelihood, is that what he tells in the interview rooms will leak
out and create all kinds of weird beliefs and enthusiasms about himself.
There are more instances of this than I could be bothered to record, though
I shall have a try at making accurate summaries of some of the worst and
more widespread instances. Many stories that have come to me via such
'confidential' means are often more fabulous even than those published.
A
disaster averted? Outwardly, Sathya Sai Baba generally refuses to answer questions
about current stories nowadays. He does an
absolute minimum to deny or stop rumours - even the wildest ones -, and
he only extremely seldom comments clearly or denies the factuality or
accuracy of stories, and not more than a few times in any public way in
at least the last 30/40 years. However, his apparatchiks are known to
have made a private approach to central persons involved to stop certain
reports of what Sathya Sai Baba said in interviews from coming out. Such was the case,
for example, with the 1998 scare about airline navigation due to a shift
in the earth's magnetic pole. Sathya Sai Baba warned interviewees not to fly at a
period near the end of the year. The ashram was alive with this rumour
when I was there. Connected to this rumour was a report published in Mr.
Padmanabhan's 'Spiritual Impressions', but when Sathya Sai Baba found out about it,
it I was told by an ashram source that his officials hot-footed it to
make him withdraw the issue. He was made to remove this report by a messenger
from SB, whom the same source told me informed Padmanabhan that what Swami
had said was specifically meant only for the benefit of those who heard
it! However, before reprinting the issue, Padmanabhan evidently tried
to save money by pasting over the offending paragraph. This was easily
removed and the concealed text was read by many. Of course, someone -
probably Sathya Sai Baba, realised that he had gone too far and that the falsity of
this prediction would very soon become evident. In this case, much too
soon for comfort, even knowing how most Sathya Sai Baba devotees are so well-trained at quickly forgetting, rationalising or denying things that show up their
guru's dishonesty.
Article as it appeared
in Sai Towers' monthly magazine 'Spiritual Impressions' (March/April
1998, p. 37).
A photo of Sai Baba was pasted over the text in most of the edition.
When steamed off, the report headed "Kodai Sessions" stated
what he said in a discourse at Kodaikanal, as follows:-
From the
14th of April, Tamil New Year's Day, Swami gave continual discourses.
There was the absolutely stunning news (and so because it was from
Swami) in the very first 15th of December 1998, Swami declared the
axis of rotation of Earth shall shift.
In other discourses Swami mentioned the effects of the embalance;
melting of glaciers at the poles, rising of water level on the planets
surface, earthquakes.
Never before has Swami spoken so directly about a future event.
Another
false disaster story That Sathya Sai Baba creates the most unfounded
rumours himself is shown by what he told New Zealanders at an interview
in 1995. Mr. Arthur Hillcoat informed us what Sathya Sai Baba said at this interview
when we met briefly at Prashanthi Nilayam in 1995 through Robert and
Rita Bruce, who also heard this. Recently I have learned that the same
facts were written down and circulated among the group from Australia
led by Lorinda and Rick Prescott (22 persons in the group) on November
6th 1995. (On the paper was written 'Phone 059 836414 for further information').
"All coming from the French Bomb tests is over New Land." [You mean
New Zealand, Baba?] Yes, New Zealand. The mutton eat the grass, the
cows eat the grass, all contaminated. All butter, cheese, curds and
other dairy products all contaminated. Many witnesses in New Zealand.
In New Zealand a glass of wine is better than a small teaspoon of milk.
Fish in the oceans is contaminated. In Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia,
Japan, and China, if people eat fish they will get cancer. Early in
October Baba told the New Zealanders that the bombs have weakened the
earth’s crust and will cause a chain of volcanic eruptions. There could
be up to 8 more bombs. All oceans are contaminated. [This has now happened]."
From a person
who claims to know everything about everyone and everything, the above
would be a tissue of direct lies. However, it proves beyond doubt for
any reasonable person that Sathya Sai Baba is a charlatan soothsayer.
Those highly unscientific predictions have not come to pass and the potential
dangers of nuclear pollution from French tests have long ago passed by.
How he can be so uninformed as not to realise that he will be found out,
and that this will become known to anyone who cares to investigate, is
something of a brain teaser. One
possible explanation is that he has been surrounded for so long by people
who would not say boo to a goose (as it seems to lay golden eggs), that
he overestimates his knowledge, confuses his presumed extrasensory visions
with truth and has simply lost touch with reality as we know it. (V. K.
Narasimhan was at that time the very last person in his entourage who
even dared to put a relevant question to him, though even Narasimhan was
very careful not to challenge too much.). The 'absolute power' that Sathya Sai Baba
enjoys over his mini-realm, surrounded exclusively by his devotees and
insulated from the wide world, has evidently gone to his head more and
more, corrupting his judgement as if absolutely. However, the power is
not absolute even there, for he could not stop police executions taking
place in his bedroom, unless, of course, he ordained and ordered them
personally. Take your choice.
From
fiction into fact Many of the unconfirmable and uncontrollable
rumours are an important part of the basis of belief for many devotees
I have met through two decades. The Sai movement thrives and expands on
the basis of rumours about Sathya Sai Baba, his doings in the flesh and in the spirit,
every fresh bit of hearsay is eagerly awaited in the Sai movement and
is devoured whole - hair and all - with unquestioning
acceptance and uncritical servility. Many otherwise quite intelligent
followers come to believe the substance of some rumours of the strangest
sort, often most 'incredible' (that is, to non-believers). They become
accepted facts or - at best - part of the huge mass of uncontrolled information
that makes up the overwhelmingly greater part of a Sai-believers' belief
system. Of course, the transition to this condition is gradual - often
imperceptibly so - and is usually speeded on its way by some few genuine
experiences connected to Sathya Sai Baba... as well as many imagined or projected
'experiences'. The appetite for fabulous stories, incredible miracles,
blessing by 'signs and wonders' is common to a large proportion of humanity
- and a large proportion of persons whose own lives are unfulfilling,
drab or otherwise empty of meaning. This hunger is fed and overfed in
the Sai movement. Here are some of the 'tasty meals' as a sample:-
In
January 1994, a story began to make the rounds about how a group of
13 Australians went into the interview room but came out with only
12 persons! The tale varied according to who told it, but the main
version seemed to be that an Australian had travelled to see Sathya Sai Baba because
his wife, who was believed to be close to death from cancer, asked
him to do so.. He was in tears during the interview. Sathya Sai Baba asked him
why etc., then tapped the wall on his left side and a picture of a
garden and a house, with doors and windows etc., appeared there. "Is
that your house?" Sai asked. "Yes". Then Sathya Sai Baba supposedly tapped again
and an actual wooden door took the place of the picture. Sai took
the man by the hand, went through the door with him and returned without
him. The next day a telegram arrived in P.N. from the man who had
arrived safely at his home with his wife, and both his luggage and
his hand baggage were there too!
Naturally I asked Narasimhan about this and he said he would ask Sathya Sai Baba.
A day later VKN told me that "No comment" was the answer.
This is not the end of it though... for Sathya Sai Baba was asked by some people
for permission to publish this story - such as in Sanathana Sarathi - because it was so convincing about Sathya Sai Baba's divine nature. Sathya Sai Baba is reported
to have replied that it should not be published for it was no miracle
of his, but it was the man's faith alone that had caused it!
'The
Case of the Dematerialising Australian' is also just hearsay from
close servitors whose lives are already bound up and dependent on
Sathya Sai Baba and for whom the illusion (i.e. Maya) has become
deeply habitually, being their own projections onto Sathya Sai Baba,
who is their Lord and Master, which they admit openly and often proudly.
The
follow-up to this "story" for me was that it was 'privately
confirmed' to a close Indian friend I had at the time by his friend,
Mr. Prasad of the Central Trust. V. Ramnath reported to me how this
friend of his (Prasad) had told him that some days after the incident
he and two other persons were in Sathya Sai Baba's car with him driving to the
Speciality Hospital i Puttaparthi. They asked Sathya Sai Baba for permission to
confirm the incident by publishing it in Sanathana Sarathi.
Sathya Sai Baba said "No. It was only that man's faith that did that". They persisted,
saying that many devotees were talking about it and that it was such
a major Sai miracle etc. Then Baba said, "Do you want to see a miracle?
Stop the car". Just there was a very old lady in a wheelchair beside
the vehicle. Sathya Sai Baba got out, stood before her and held out his hands
saying "Amma, Amma... come on. Up. Up." She got up and walked. Sathya Sai Baba
got back in the car and said, "Now that was a miracle".
So
Sathya Sai Baba's 'no comment' was now spun into an affirmation that the event
took place. This seems a rather crafty attribution, for devotees would
surely attribute it a Sathya Sai Baba miracle nevertheless, saying that it was
only Sathya Sai Baba's humility that made him say it was not his doing etc. (Unfortunately,
any genuine humility Sathya Sai Baba might once have shown has since evaporated
completely and the most exaggerated boasting about himself has taken
its place in a growing number of his published discourses). Now, the old woman apparently did not have this faith, then, but was
still allegedly the recipient of glorious grace! This is how devotees
perceive such things. No one has produced any evidence that the story
of the Australian is based on any evidence, for no one present has
come forward to announce it. The rumour was circulated without any
reliable source and was sustained by Central Trust persons in the
same underhand way. This is a method of wilfully and/or unwittingly
creating great wonders and myths.
So Sathya Sai Baba impresses his
close servitors by humility, 'it was not I' - followed by the exact
opposite... declaring his doing 'a miracle' the next minute. How far
did the Amma walk, after Sathya Sai Baba had left her alone, I wonder? It is so
easy to assume this to be a miracle once one believes he is what he
claims to be. But one conveniently forgets that many people who use
wheelchairs can manage to walk a bit, and even bad cases may do so if
pressed or if they are moved make a special effort. According to what
the US devotee, Joy Thomas, wrote in one of her many rambling books (Life is a Challenge... p. 161), Sathya Sai Baba seemed to 'cure' her temporarily
or partially of her painful walking disability when she had to leave
her wheelchair before steps up to the Kodiakanal interview room. However,
all could observe that she remained tied to her wheelchair for many
years until the end of her days, when she bled to death without due
treatment while under the care of of Sathya Sai Baba's medical doctors. (A blessing
in the eyes of the devoted, but not in that of certain others).
Something similar concerning
physical improvement occured to me during my first visit, as I have
written up in my book Source of the Dream. However, I now see
that the improvements in my spinal condition were due to other factors
than Sathya Sai Baba and his 'making vibuthi' for me, such as the climate change,
the stretching of unused muscles by sitting cross-legged and much more
physical movement generally. Another person met while I was at the ashram
had also had to struggle out of his wheelchair in a similar way to Joy
Thomas because Sathya Sai Baba wanted him to walk, whereupon his wheelchair was
then spirited away without him being asked by Seva Dals. It had already
been given to the pool for other needy invalids and -because he was
not cured and could not live without it - he had a real struggle to
get it back from the ashram authorities. Sathya Sai Baba is keen on making us believe
he too can do the "Take up thy bed and walk" act. I witnessed
in 1987 how much the same was done to a crippled Venezuelan lady carried
about by her husband. Sathya Sai Baba made her stagger from the interview room,
to the huge amazement of all who had seen her carried in. She went on
forcing herself to stagger around (literally stagger!) as much as she
could for some time after this, and it looked extremely painful. Sathya Sai Baba
had promised she would be fully cured, but no more was heard of her
after she left the ashram. V.K. Narasimhan, a seasoned reporter and
journalist, told me he had watched such things for two decades but never
seen anyone really cured by Sathya Sai Baba, and I could not convince him otherwise!
(However, please note that I am still much inclined to believe in a
number of dramatic healings connected to Sathya Sai Baba... it is of course well-known
that such things also occur in many other connections and with many
other persons as catylysts).
Turning
boys into girls for doubting his predictions? In 1990, we spent
a long period at the ashrams. An elderly and well-placed Seva Dal servitor
I had known well for years told me that Sathya Sai Baba had recently told a class
of students some amazing 'facts'. My notes made at the time record:
"Prashanthi Nilayam would become vast within ten years, 38 English
miles in circumference. Puttaparthi village would be bulldozed away
before year 2000. It would extend as far as Dharmavaram" (where
the nearest railway station was at that time, 40 English miles distant
- which distance can't be reconciled with the other figure anyhow! Either
figure would make it the size of a major world metropolis.) "Two
students at the rear of the class had scoffed between themselves that
this was another of Sathya Sai Baba's 'bhajans' (i.e. tall stories)! Sathya Sai Baba called
them out and insisted that he had never been more serious. If they doubted
it he would change them into girls for ten years, then they could see
how the girls suffer."
I
asked V.K. Narasimhan about the prediction during one of our marathon daily
conversations. This is what I noted at the time about the prediction of the ashram's size. He confirmed that Sathya Sai Baba made it but bemoaned the
thought of it happening - the commercialisation it would bring etc., also
spiritual tourism. It would be bigger than the whole of the area called
'Sathya Sai Taluk' (at least dozens of square miles). He said that the Andhra
Pradesh government had designated the Prashanthi area
as a special choice for developments of all kinds. Puttaparthi village
still exists and the Prashanthi Nilayam ashram is nowhere near to twice
the size it was in 1990 even, which was under a mile in circumference. What
further comment is required?
Finally,
'another small story',
unconfirmed and qualifying as a tall tale even among fables of giants
and demons: Sathya Sai Baba's driver (Radhakrishnan - who was killed in the mandir
assault in 1993, aged about 40) and a
student were driving from Puttaparthi to Madras. They had just got
onto the open road outside Puttaparthi when Sathya Sai Baba said to both of them,
"Close your eyes and do not open them until I say so". Radhakrishnan
was driving, but did so implicitly. When Sai said they could open
their eyes, they were confused indeed. It turned out that the car
was already on the outskirts of Madras. Believe this those who can.
Note that this tale circulates but its source cannot be investigated,
of course.
Other Sai Baba miracle stories are Sai Baba's claims to be Krishna - Alleged incredible miracles by Sai Baba
Claimed miracle of saving a passenger jet over the Atlantic