Showing posts with label shirdi sai baba. Show all posts
Showing posts with label shirdi sai baba. Show all posts

Tuesday, August 31, 2021

Installation of statues at new Shirdi Sai Baba Shrine


The upcoming Shirdi Sai Baba Shrine is planning to install statues of Ganesha, Murgan and White Nandi on September 10, 2021 the day of Ganesha Chaturthi. The Nandi statue has been created in the same white marble stone as the statue of Shirdi Sai Baba.


The photographs below were taken on August 23. First the statues are immersed in water, next the statues will be kept in individual boxes and fully covered in 9 types of grain. Finally the statues will be immersed in milk.



Facing the Shrine, Ganesha will be installed at left, Murugan at right and White Nandi on plinth in front of Shrine 





Lord Ganesha immersed in water


Lord Ganesha and Lord Murugan


Saturday, November 22, 2014

Shirdi Sai Baba at Arunachala


Up until 2008 there were no Shrines dedicated to Sri Shirdi Sai Baba here at Arunachala. Subsequently in 2014 we now have a Shirdi Sai Baba Shrine on the girivalam roadway near Adi Annamalai, a Shirdi Sai Baba Shrine close to the Hanuman Temple on the girivalam roadway and a bhajan hall dedicated to Sai Baba near the Durga Amman Temple in town.

The below photograph (which dates from 2008) is of a crate with a statue of Sai Baba inside, marking the place near Adi Annamalai that has now become a Temple dedicated to his name. 

To read more about the development of the Temple go to this link here.



Crate on land in 2008

Sri Shirdi Sai Baba at what will become a Shrine and his new home


2014 Shirdi Sai Baba Shrine at the same spot


Inside the Shrine

Perpetual flame from Shirdi alight in the Shrine's Dhuni

Pepetual flame from Shirdi

Development adjacent to Shirdi Sai Baba Shrine, girivalam roadway

In the above photograph, taken a few days ago, one can see the development of facilities connected to the Shirdi Sai Baba Shrine currently underway. It does seems a pity that the facility is being built so close to the Shrine. 


Shirdi Sai Baba Shrine, girivalam roadway near Hanuman Temple

Bhajan Hall near Durga Amman Temple, Tiruvannamalai

COMPLETE SURRENDER TO SHRI SAI BABA OF SHIRDI 
[Stories from Shri Sai Satcharitha by Hemad Pant]

Shri Sai Baba of Shirdi stressed the importance of complete surrender to Him to many of His devotees during His life in the flesh in the Dwarakamayi masjid. He said that he who remembers Him always, meditates upon Him all the time with love and devotion, he will soon see Him and merge with Him. To the devotee surrendering himself completely to Him, Sai Baba said that He was indebted to him and will repay his debt by giving him salvation (i.e., self-realization). 

Sai Baba further said, a devotee worshipping Him this way, becomes one with Sai - just as a river gets to the sea and merges with it. Sai urges devotees to leave out pride and egoism and then surrender themselves to Him, always remembering that Sai is not all far off and is in fact seated in our very hearts! Moreover, if we practice surrender with the feeling that Sai Baba is all-pervading (everywhere, in every creature, and in immovable objects as well), we will attain oneness with Him for sure. 

Hemad Pant advises us that to take refuge in Sai's feet with the feeling that the Self and Guru are one and the same and this will help us realize goals and remove difficulties quickly. Sai Baba assures us: "If you always say "SAI SAI", I shall take you over the seven seas. I do not need any paraphernalia of worships...I rest there, where there is full devotion." 

A few real-life incidents of total surrender by Baba's devotees to Baba's feet are discussed below. 

1. Bhimaji Patel of Narayangaon, Poona District, came to Shirdi in 1909 with serious chest diseases and tuberculosis having lost hope of any cure. He surrendered to Baba's feet crying out in despair. Baba was moved by his tears, blessed him and then cured him by means of two dreams. Through these dreams, he made Bhimaji experience the exact suffering required for removing the previous Karma that resulted in this disease. Bhimaji's sincere surrender to Baba showed all that Baba came to devotees' rescue, and expected nothing from His devotees except remembrance of His Name, unswerving faith and devotion. 

2. Dr. Pillai, who suffered from severe thirst and Cholera requested Baba for a remedy. Doctors would have said that the remedy prescribed by Baba would have aggravated this particular disease (and would have said no) - but this was given with Baba's grace and the devotee's faith, surrender and hence cured Dr. Pillai's disease! There are many more several real-life incidents of how diseases were cured by unusual remedies prescribed by Baba. There are also cases where Baba's mere words of grace removed virulent diseases including poisonous snake bites without any medicines at all! In all these cases, the absolute surrender by the devotees and total faith in Baba's words contributed to the speedy recovery. 

3. In one example, Madhavrao Deshpande (Shama) tried a medicine given once by Baba without consulting Baba at all - thinking that it worked once and so it will work again! But in fact the remedy made the disease worse and so he realized his mistake and surrendered to Baba again and got cured by His grace. Thus it was the attitude of complete surrender that made the real difference here. 

4. Ratanji Wadia of Nanded, a kind-hearted rich businessman pleaded to Gods for years to bless him with a child but it was not happening. On guidance from Das Ganu Maharaj, he surrendered to Shri Sai Baba at Shirdi. Sai tested his true faith and blessed him with his heart's desire with several children! 

Sai Baba assured us that even after MahaSamadhi: "Believe Me, though I pass away, My bones in My tomb would be speaking, moving and communicating with those who would surrender themselves whole-heartedly to me". Nishtha (Faith) and Saburi (patience) according to Baba are twin sisters. Baba expected only the above two qualities from devotees. Total surrender to Baba means that our very breath and activities in day-to-day life should be intertwined with Sai Baba in our breath along with Nishtha and Saburi as our very eyes guiding us. Only such complete surrender to Baba will get Baba's response quicker. 

Today's fusion of all cultures and technology-driven fast lives, we are more and more dependent on machines, servants, and external factors so much and so a significant portion of our commitments are left to the hands of forces outside our control unfortunately. Thus total surrender has become more difficult to us these days than in the simpler olden days. The solution lies in practicing seeing Sai in all these machines and helpers and trying hard to make our lives as simple as possible and by surrendering all outcomes to Sai who is "The wire-puller of the show of the universe" as He remarked. 

[Submitted by Bharathkumar K. 
With reference to Shri Sai Satcharitha] 

Tuesday, September 2, 2014

Life of Shirdi Sai Baba


In an earlier posting Mr. K. Bharath Kumar wrote about the “Similarities between two great Mahans,” namely Sri Seshadri Swamigal (of Tiruvannamalai) and Sri Shirdi Sai Baba. 

When I first arrived at Tiruvannamalai I was very surprised that at that time there was no Temple dedicated to the great saint Shirdi Sai Baba. However several years ago, at long last, a Temple was opened which is dedicated to this great Mahan. For an earlier posting I made on my Blog Arunachala Grace with information and photographs of the Shirdi Sai Baba Temple on the Arunachala girivalam roadway, please visit this link here

Below I am posting a narrative recently received from Mr. K. Bharath Kumar about the life of Shirdi Sai Baba. 



Statue of Shirdi Sai Baba at his Arunachala Temple


SHRI SAI BABA OF SHIRDI ­ A GOD WHO WALKED ON THIS EARTH ­ WHO TOOK THE LEAST BUT GAVE PLENTY BACK 


Sri Sai Baba of Shirdi was a great saint of India who lived about 100 years ago in Shirdi, Maharashtra. He lived a life of utmost simplicity and preached the message of love, unity, brotherhood, and kindness towards all living creatures. 

His date of birth, place of birth, parents, original name, religion and caste ­ none of these details have been found till date. He was well respected by all religions, especially the Hindus and Muslims. He was brought up for a few years among a Muslim family given to them by his real parents and later lived all His life in an old mosque that He named as "Dwarakamayee". He worked very hard for upholding Hindu­-Muslim unity during His lifetime. 

Sai Baba spent about sixty years in His Dwarakamayee mosque in Shirdi village in a most simple manner with least material possessions during His entire lifetime. He redistributed all the wealth that devotees showered on Him back to the needy poor and deserving villagers daily by the end of the day. He started everyday as a "fakir" (sanyasi without money and other attachments) in the morning and finished the day daily in the same state ­ even though very lavish sums of money and valuable items were presented to Him from His devotees daily. 

Even His name i.e., "Sai Baba" was given to Him by Shirdi villagers ­ such was His complete disowning of titles and possessions starting from His very name. His simple assurance "Why Fear When I am Here" has been a life­saving mantra for millions of devotees all around the world. Sai expected only two qualities from His devotees "Shraddha" (Faith) and "Saburi" (Patience) and did not differentiate anybody on the basis of their religion, caste, race or any other factor and behaved the same to beggars and to princely figures. 

He was different from all other saints that India has produced in that He did not establish an Ashram or institution ­ nor did He take any disciples until the end, nor did He preach any special mantras or theories, nor did He leave any successors or heirs. He was an unique "Samarth Sadguru" who guided devotees on every aspect of their lives by first solving their urgent problems (such as money, diseases, lack of child, averting dangers, etc.) while making them interested in following a spiritual path of life finally. Rephrasing His own words, "I give them what they want so that they will like what I give them". 

He retained His simple ways of begging daily for His food till the end ­ although devotees showered Him with choice varieties of food items ­ which He usually distributed to the deserving. Even though His devotees wished Him to be a King ("Maharaja") and provided several costly royal items to Him ­ he never used them till the end, he always wore His usual simple plain robe (torn on one side), never wore slippers, always walked on foot instead of taking any vehicles, and never took anybody's service for free, despite His all­-powerful image in the village. 

He maintained an ever­burning fire altar ("Dhuni") whose ashes called "Udhi" was given free to all devotees. Many diseases were cured by applying Udhi on affected area or by intake. Like Lord Shiva of the Hindus, He showed through these ashes "Udhi" that life was short and material possessions including the human body get reduced to ashes finally. So, Sai Baba reminds us of this fact through His practice. This Dhuni has been burning steadily in Shirdi to this day for over a hundred years. 

Sai Baba has performed innumerable superhuman miracles that even modern science is yet to explain ­ such as mind­reading, foretelling the past, present and future of devotees on seeing them for the very first time, averting dangers occurring in faraway places without physically leaving Shirdi, stopping natural calamities by His voice, and curing diseases given up by doctors ­ to name a few. He performed easily difficult yogic practices such as Kanda­yoga (complete disassembly of body and reassembly). Despite His clear superhuman powers. He claimed humbly that He was just a servant of God, even at the peak of His enchanting, divine life. 

His unique specialty was that He encouraged whatever good qualities devotees had with them and encouraged traditional practices that devotees followed without stopping them or converting them to new rituals. He prescribed appropriate remedies for each devotee depending on their unique situation ­ for some He proposed solitary meditation, for others group discussions and bhajans, for others He suggested continuing worshipping their family deities' idols and so on. He encouraged festivals, rituals and practices of both Hindus and Muslims in Shirdi and these evolved into big festival events attended by lots of people from all over. 

His constant utterances "Allah Malik" (God is the sole proprietor/master), "Sabka Malik Ek" (There is a single master for all) have been unifying phrases that has created a huge following amongst diverse communities in India and abroad ­ who see in Him the very personification of their favorite Gods ­ as Lord Shiva, Rama, Krishna, Venkateswara, Datta, Maruti, Allah, Christ, Nanak to name a few. 

Even after His passing away in 1918, the world is full of increasing instances of Sai Baba's invisible presence protecting and helping devotees across the world. His eleven assurances to all, especially the assurance that He is EVER­living to help those who surrender to Him ­ has been a life­giver to innumerable many ­ including this author. This author was taken into His protection 6 years ago and Sai Baba has always answered his calls for help. 


Written referring several Sai literature sources the author has read thus far, especially "Sai Sathcharita" from Shri Sai Baba Sansthan Trust, Shirdi by Bharathkumar K., Chennai, India