True spiritual mastery is achieved through complete self-emptying and devotion.
"Becoming the sandals worn on the Master's feet"
Avatar Meher Baba Ki Jai
Countess Nadezhda (Nadia) Klimentevna Tolstoy, nรฉe Katulskaya
Russian-born; matron of the Meherabad maternity home; translated Baba's messages into Russian
โNadine (name given by Meher Baba; born Nadia)โ
Nadezhda (Nadia) Tolstoy was born in Odessa in 1884. She studied music at the University of Petrograd and spoke several languages. During the First World War she did Red Cross work on the Galician front, where she met Count Ilya Tolstoy, the son of the novelist Leo Tolstoy; both had been married before, and they later married in America. Living with Ilya outside New York, she read deeply in mystical literature and esoteric philosophy, but books had not satisfied her and she was searching for a living Master.
Through their friends Malcolm and Jean Schloss she came to Harmon on 19 November 1931 for Meher Baba's blessing. No sooner had she set eyes on him than she exclaimed, "My search is over!" Baba spelled on his board, "You have been waiting for me a long time and now I have come. I will help you." He told her that the kriya yoga she had been practising was not for her, and later named her Nadine. On Baba's 1932 visit she saw in him the incarnation of Jesus Christ and gave her life to his cause; she also brought Ilya, who wept and said that for the first time he had met a man who had divine love. Ilya died about a year and a half later.
In December 1936 Nadine sailed to India with Garrett Fort and the Grand Duchess Marie to join Baba's Western ashram at Nasik, where her duty was to translate Baba's life and messages into Russian and to help the others. In June 1938 she came again, with Hedi Mertens, Helen Dahm and Irene Billo, to live with the women mandali on Meherabad Hill. There she was made matron of the maternity home in the ashram hospital, where Baba told her he wanted her to learn the real spirit of serving, selflessness.
Nadine travelled with Baba and the women on the Blue Bus tours, kept periods of silence at his order, and in 1939 lectured about him in Bangalore with Dr. Deshmukh and Norina Matchabelli. In May 1941 Baba sent her with Norina and Elizabeth Patterson to America to spread his message. In New York she lived with them, but developed sclerosis and her health declined.
Nadine died in New York's Roosevelt Hospital on 14 April 1946, nursed to the end by Adele Wolkin. Baba cabled: "Tell Elizabeth, Nadia lives in me, with me and for me more than ever before." He had once called her "one of my rocks on whom I can depend." Her ashes were laid at Meherabad, where Baba had Pendu build her tomb.
โYou have been waiting for me a long time and now I have come. I will help you.
โ First meeting at Harmon, 19 November 1931, spelled on the alphabet board
โI will repay you for all your suffering. I will give you permanent bliss. You will see things as they are, as you can see things now, here, in this incarnation. You are a beautiful soul, and one day will receive what your father-in-law had longed for โ oneness with God.
โ New York, 1932, on learning of her financial and other hardships; her father-in-law was Leo Tolstoy
โTry to pull on till I tell you to do something else. Trials and hardships are stepping stones to spirituality.
โ Letter to Nadine, 22 November 1935
โThere are thousands of hospitals in the world. I could have thousands of nurses to work here. If I have given this work in the hospital to you, it is because I want you to learn the real spirit of serving โ selflessness.
โ To Nadine as matron of the maternity home on Meherabad Hill, 1938
โYou must observe silence, not only of the tongue, but of desires, of hatred, of bitterness, of greed, et cetera, too!
โ 1940, while Nadine was keeping silence on his order, after a quarrel with Norina Matchabelli
โI know all. โฆ It is not for the West โ not for you.
โ Harmon, New York, 19 November 1931: at their first meeting Nadine began to tell Baba about herself, and he stopped her. She had been practising kriya yoga under Swami Yogananda, and Baba told her with a very serious look that it was not for her.
โInstead of drowning, you would have been carried to the shore! Merging in the Ocean is not for those who disobey. They are tossed up on the beach like an old piece of dried driftwood, and there they die! โฆ With me, โฆ one has to live while dying, so that you can live eternally, after dying such a death. Do you follow?
โ Amboli, April 1940: to Kitty and Nadine, after Nadine argued that had a snake bitten them they would have died in his presence, and one of them added that they would have merged in his Ocean. At the end Nadine nodded that she understood.
At Nasik Nadine asked Baba what it is like for him to feel himself to be God. Baba answered: "You are now God, plus Nadia. When Nadia disappears, God remains. So, Nadia must go." The easiest way, he said, was to forget herself by thinking more of Baba, and safer still to merge in his orders by doing as he said.
As matron of the maternity home at Meherabad, Nadine cared for the poorest women of the district. Baba told her that he could have had thousands of nurses for this work, and that he had given it to her because he wanted her to learn the real spirit of serving, selflessness. She wrote that when medicines failed, Baba's appearance and loving embrace revived the patients' hope like a "holy wine."
When Baba returned to New York in 1932, Nadine waited a long time for her interview. Seeing him again, she later wrote, "I saw Christ before me as he was seated on the couch." Leaving the room she shouted aloud, "JESUS CHRIST!" and the onlookers turned to stare. Baba told her he would repay her for all her suffering and that one day she would receive what her father-in-law Leo Tolstoy had longed for, oneness with God. The next day she brought her husband Ilya, who asked Baba how one can love when there is so much evil in the world.
At Amboli in 1940, where poisonous snakes were plentiful, Baba ordered everyone not to move about in the dark without a lamp. Once Kitty Davy and Nadine forgot their lanterns, and the next day Baba took them to task. Nadine reasoned that had a snake bitten them, they would have died in his presence and merged in his Ocean. Baba answered: "Instead of drowning, you would have been carried to the shore! Merging in the Ocean is not for those who disobey." With him, he said, one has to live while dying, so as to live eternally after dying such a death. Nadine nodded that she understood.
In January 1941, during the travels with the women, Baba asked, "If someone asked you who is Meher Baba, what would you say?" Nadine answered, "God!" and Norina Matchabelli said, "The God-Man!" Baba agreed with Norina: "Not God, but God-Man. God-Man is more than God!" God is absolute, he explained, and one who manifests the absolute is the God-Man.
Nadine died in New York's Roosevelt Hospital on 14 April 1946, nursed to the end by Adele Wolkin. Baba cabled, "Tell Elizabeth, Nadia lives in me, with me and for me more than ever before." Her ashes were brought to Meherabad, and in 1947, before Norina and Elizabeth arrived in India, Baba was anxious that Pendu finish her tomb. On 13 June 1947 he wrote to Pendu to have these words carved on the headstone: "Nadine Tolstoy, her happiness was Baba."