Chapter 2: Merwan Is Born
1917· Baba age 23Page 180 of 5,444
One cannot experience love by reading books —
Love can never be described in words.
I have never read about real love — for it cannot be written.
Portray love with the blood of your heart and it will be yours!
O God! Grant me the gift of Your union —
I have died in Your separation.
But in Your ledger You need not count the torments I am feeling away from You.
Blood is spilling from my heart which has become like minced meat!
But missing is that salt which You sprinkle in the wounds of the heart.
Why should one question the lovers of God about Him?
One should long to ask God directly!
O God! You are found in the question as well as in the answer.
I have seen the same God everywhere!
His abode is in every heart.
God is the wine–seller in the house rich in purity, And He is ever-present in the house of ruination.
Why should one feel restless experiencing misery, cruelty and the difficulties of the world?
O Huma, if God showers His mercy upon you, then pleasure is felt in pain.
Merwanji considered this ghazal to be special, and after composing it, he mailed it to the well-known Gujarati author, Soma (Sorabji) Desai of Navsari. Merwanji enclosed this note:
Soma, I am sending you my humble ghazal which I composed yesterday. Please accept it.
A lover of God, Huma
This ghazal was to have a profound effect on Soma Desai, as will be seen later on.
During 1917, Merwanji suggested to Behramji that they become partners and open another toddyshop in some village, where besides doing business, they could do public and social service and also meditate in solitude.1
Behramji would usually act in respectful accordance with Merwanji's dictates and guidance in everything he did, and in this way, he can be considered as the first of Merwanji's close disciples or mandali . Merwanji's proposal appealed to Behramji, who applied for a liquor license soon after. However, when it was granted, Merwanji refused to go through with the business arrangement since the liquor license was not in Behramji's name, as he had instructed, but was in Behramji's brother's name. This was a hard lesson for Behramji, and he remembered to always follow Merwanji's words literally from then on.
In April 1917, an ardent devotee of Upasni Maharaj invited the Master to attend the foundation-laying ceremony for a medical dispensary he was opening for the poor in the Sion area of Bombay.
Footnotes
- 1.At no time was it necessary for Merwan to "meditate in solitude," because he had experience of the Supreme Reality. But for the sake of creation — and especially for seekers after Truth and those connected with him — he had to do it.