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Shiva 141
you have seen the generation and manifestation of this lingam. What you have really seen is the secret of creation. (Sathya Sai Baba)
No wonder one would want to see this great event for himself. And as an added incentive, it so happened that that year Mahashiva- rathri fell at the time of my 40th birthday. I could think of no better way of bringing in my new decade. I would fast and sing myself into oblivion and with luck merge myself into the Godhead as a birthday present.
I was also prompted to make the trip by feelings that this could be the last time Baba would preside over the public observance of this holy day. So many thousands were pouring into Prasanthi Nilayam for the event that it seemed unlikely Baba could continue it for long. Then too, there was the initial reason for going. I had so wanted to share my experience with colleagues, knowing that Baba would have such meaning for them. By some “coincidence” a group of respected American psychiatrists would be going to India at this time, and I had arranged to meet with them to talk about Baba and take some to him for a visit. There would be no better time for this to take place, as Mahashivarathri was all about the strengths and limitations of the mind. And although Baba’s teachings directly challenged modern psychiatry’s thinking about the mind, this was a subject in which psychiatrists should have great interest.
Notes
1. Mahashivarathri—AHinduholidaydevotedtotheworshipofLordShiva.
2. The apparent miraculous creation of a shower of materialized ash from an empty upturned urn, in a ritualistic bathing of a sacred statue. The inner meaning of this act relates to the kinds of purified inner personal qualities, devoid of selfishness, which we must offer to the Lord.
3. The apparent miraculous materialization of a Shiva Lingam, an egg-shaped stone considered a symbol of Shiva, and containing within its form the attributes and power of Lord Shiva. This act is a symbolic reenactment of the creation of the cosmos by an act of God’s will.


































































































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