Is this proper? Wanting to do things according to your will and not mine is the way of the world. But it is not your fault. Very, very few surrender.
I wanted outward entertainment for the children and Self-Realization for you. Christ did the same thing. To the masses he declared that God was above — in heaven. To his outer circle Christ declared that he was God, but to his inner circle he disclosed that they were God.
Each man asked for Baba's forgiveness. It was natural for the mandali to feel as they did; but as a result of Baba's work, he freed his close ones from the sanskaric impressions of mechanically observing religious holidays. He made them keenly aware that they had to sever all bindings — religious and communal. They were being freed to worship the only One, and worshiping Him means burning in fire! He is light, and His real worship means to become ash.
Baba was awakening the desire for this type of worship in the mandali through the medium of these conflicts among themselves. By creating particular situations, Baba gradually awakened the awareness of worshiping only him and following his orders. The Master embraced the religion of love, and through his nazar (gaze), it was automatically born in the mandali.
Arjun was granted a four-day leave and left Meherabad for Poona on the afternoon of 30 July. The next day, Baba's maternal uncle Faredoon Masa visited Meherabad from his home in Loni, a few hours from Poona.1
A wandering fakir from Ajmer showed up to take the Master's darshan on Sunday, 1 August 1925. Baba instructed him to observe a complete fast every Sunday, to offer namaz five times a day and to repeat Allah 5,001 times each day. But the fakir quietly left Meherabad the following day without informing anyone. Wherever he had gone before, the fakir was well fed, respected, and given money. But in Meherabad he found the regime of fasting and the repetition of God's name too strict. It turned out that the man had become a fakir not to be rid of desires but to fulfill them.
On 3 August, two goats wandered away from Arangaon and were hit by a passing freight train. Baba sent the mandali to investigate the matter and they returned with one of the goats whose legs had been broken.
Footnotes
- 1.Dowla Masi and Faredoon Masa had opened a country liquor store in Loni.