One morning, at about 11:00 A.M., Baba tried to get up from his chair by himself as usual, but he could not do so. He tried two or three times but failed.
Looking at Feram, he remarked, "This is the beginning of a personal tragedy for me."
On Wednesday, 13 November 1968, Baba declared to the mandali:
The days of my manifestation are nearing fast and only to Mehera have I mentioned the time of breaking my silence. My manifestation period will last for fourteen years before I drop the body.1 Therefore, this Avataric manifestation will be the greatest.
Seeing Baba's immense suffering, Feram was wondering how it would be possible for Baba to manifest himself with such a broken body. Baba asked what he was thinking and Feram told him.
Baba remarked, ""When I manifest, it will be in my youthful form when I was strong enough to throw off four persons at a time!"
In the afternoon of the 13th, clarifying the meaning and status of the mandali, Baba stated:
Only those few male and female lovers who have been with me all these years through thick and thin are my mandali. All others outside Meherazad and Meherabad are my lovers.
I rank my mandali second only to Mehera; then there are the lovers, and then the world. Daily, without fail, I am invoking myself about Mehera, the mandali, the lovers and the world, in that order.
Baba did not mention what he was invoking himself, but he emphasized:
I am the Greatest of the Great. Goher tells me to allow Bhau to stay with his family for one month in Ahmednagar. I do not agree to this because Bhau belongs to the mandali, and my mandali are something special. Similarly, I do not allow Francis to go back to Australia to look after Avatar's Abode and the attached property, considering that Francis is of the mandali and with me for so many years in my service.
Kaikobad too is of my mandali, despite his divine visions and physical disability. That is why I have not sent him to Meherabad to stay with his family on the hill.
All these years, I have held on to the mandali and the mandali have served me and are serving me splendidly. They will not let me down like the apostles of Christ did.
I am the greatest of the Avatars, because my manifestation will be while I am in the body. During the next six months, there will be occasions for the mandali to forsake me, but I will not allow that to happen. Similarly, I want the mandali to hold on to my daaman.
Footnotes
- 1.On 23 January 1926, when a few devotees from Ahmednagar came to Meherabad, having heard a rumor that Meher Baba had died, Baba remarked, "Even if the heavens and earth should come together for that purpose, I am not going to give up my body for the next 26 years. After that, whether I drop my body or not will depend upon my wish, but I will not keep a connection with this body after I am 90." On occasion in the 1960s, Baba indicated that he would live to be 90 years old. Perhaps what he meant was, although he dropped his body, he continued to work physically for the universe as if he were in the body.