"There was no one else like him," Sai Baba declared. "His value only I know. His merit is such that if the whole world were put on one side and he on the other, he would be greater!"
It was the year 1890. Outside Nasik, India, a 20-year-old seeker named Kashinath despaired, and in his sorrow and hopelessness he decided to fast to death. He bypassed the city and ventured into a forest where he came to some rocky hills. It was an ideal place to await his death; no one else was around and there was no food or water anywhere nearby.
Kashinath climbed a precipice and entered a small cave where he spent two days and nights without food, water or sleep, longing for death — challenging it to come. And if death did not come soon, he would throw himself off a precipice. On the third day, he wondered why he was wasting his life calling for death instead of thinking of God. Silently, he began repeating God's name and continued for days. Kashinath gradually became absorbed in his divine contemplation and forgot everything — his despair, his family, his worldly life. He entered into a deep samadhi and remained in a state of bliss and enchantment for several months.
But Kashinath could not spend the rest of his life thus absorbed; much more was destined for this young man than to remain unknown, entranced in divine contemplation in an isolated cave. Kashinath was awakened out of his samadhi by the figure of a man standing over him. He was startled when the figure grabbed him and apparently ripped his skin from his body! Soon after, the figure disappeared. The frightening apparition brought Kashinath back to bodily consciousness. He touched his body and was relieved to find his skin intact.
Kashinath's next physical sensation was of intense thirst; he felt as if his tongue was being pulled out of his mouth. He was about to die of thirst, but he could not cry out, and even if he could, who would hear him in this remote, desolate place? His whole body was so stiff from nine months of sitting in one position that he could not move. Dying of thirst, he passed into semi-consciousness and in another vision saw himself die. The death he had sought when he entered the cave was now imminent.