THE BLISSFUL DEVOTEE AND HIS COSMIC ROMANCE
“Little sir, please be seated. I am talking to my Divine Mother.”
Silently I had entered the room in great awe. The angelic
appearance of Master Mahasaya fairly dazzled me. With silky white
beard and large lustrous eyes, he seemed an incarnation of purity.
His upraised chin and folded hands apprized me that my first visit
had disturbed him in the midst of his devotions.
His simple words of greeting produced the most violent effect my
nature had so far experienced. The bitter separation of my mother’s
death I had thought the measure of all anguish. Now an agony at
separation from my Divine Mother was an indescribable torture of
the spirit. I fell moaning to the floor.
“Little sir, quiet yourself!” The saint was sympathetically
distressed.
Abandoned in some oceanic desolation, I clutched his feet as the
sole raft of my rescue.
“Holy sir, thy intercession! Ask Divine Mother if I find any favor
in Her sight!”
This promise is one not easily bestowed; the master was constrained
to silence.
Beyond reach of doubt, I was convinced that Master Mahasaya was in
intimate converse with the Universal Mother. It was deep humiliation
to realize that my eyes were blind to Her who even at this moment
was perceptible to the faultless gaze of the saint. Shamelessly
gripping his feet, deaf to his gentle remonstrances, I besought
him again and again for his intervening grace.
“I will make your plea to the Beloved.” The master’s capitulation
came with a slow, compassionate smile.
What power in those few words, that my being should know release
from its stormy exile?
“Sir, remember your pledge! I shall return soon for Her message!”
Joyful anticipation rang in my voice that only a moment ago had
been sobbing in sorrow.
Descending the long stairway, I was overwhelmed by memories. This
house at 50 Amherst Street, now the residence of Master Mahasaya,
had once been my family home, scene of my mother’s death. Here
my human heart had broken for the vanished mother; and here today
my spirit had been as though crucified by absence of the Divine
Mother. Hallowed walls, silent witness of my grievous hurts and
final healing!
My steps were eager as I returned to my Gurpar Road home. Seeking
the seclusion of my small attic, I remained in meditation until
ten o’clock. The darkness of the warm Indian night was suddenly
lit with a wondrous vision.
Haloed in splendor, the Divine Mother stood before me. Her face,
tenderly smiling, was beauty itself.
“Always have I loved thee! Ever shall I love thee!”
The celestial tones still ringing in the air, She disappeared.
The sun on the following morning had hardly risen to an angle of
decorum when I paid my second visit to Master Mahasaya. Climbing
the staircase in the house of poignant memories, I reached his
fourth-floor room. The knob of the closed door was wrapped around
with a cloth; a hint, I felt, that the saint desired privacy. As
I stood irresolutely on the landing, the door was opened by the
master’s welcoming hand. I knelt at his holy feet. In a playful
mood, I wore a solemn mask over my face, hiding the divine elation.
“Sir, I have come-very early, I confess!-for your message. Did the
Beloved Mother say anything about me?”
“Mischievous little sir!”
Not another remark would he make. Apparently my assumed gravity
was unimpressive.
“Why so mysterious, so evasive? Do saints never speak plainly?”
Perhaps I was a little provoked.
“Must you test me?” His calm eyes were full of understanding. “Could
I add a single word this morning to the assurance you received last
night at ten o’clock from the Beautiful Mother Herself?”
Master Mahasaya possessed control over the flood-gates of my soul:
again I plunged prostrate at his feet. But this time my tears welled
from a bliss, and not a pain, past bearing.
“Think you that your devotion did not touch the Infinite Mercy?
The Motherhood of God, that you have worshiped in forms both human
and divine, could never fail to answer your forsaken cry.”
[Illustration: Master Mahasaya, Ever engrossed in his blissful
cosmic romance.—see mmahasaya.jpg]
Who was this simple saint, whose least request to the Universal Spirit
met with sweet acquiescence? His role in the world was humble, as
befitted the greatest man of humility I ever knew. In this Amherst
Street house, Master Mahasaya {FN9-1} conducted a small high school
for boys. No words of chastisement passed his lips; no rule and
ferule maintained his discipline. Higher mathematics indeed were
taught in these modest classrooms, and a chemistry of love absent
from the textbooks. He spread his wisdom by spiritual contagion
rather than impermeable precept. Consumed by an unsophisticated
passion for the Divine Mother, the saint no more demanded the
outward forms of respect than a child.
“I am not your guru; he shall come a little later,” he told me.
“Through his guidance, your experiences of the Divine in terms of
love and devotion shall be translated into his terms of fathomless
wisdom.”
Every late afternoon, I betook myself to Amherst Street. I
sought Master Mahasaya’s divine cup, so full that its drops daily
overflowed on my being. Never before had I bowed in utter reverence;
now I felt it an immeasurable privilege even to tread the same
ground which Master Mahasaya sanctified.
“Sir, please wear this champak garland I have fashioned especially
for you.” I arrived one evening, holding my chain of flowers. But
shyly he drew away, repeatedly refusing the honor. Perceiving my
hurt, he finally smiled consent.
“Since we are both devotees of the Mother, you may put the garland
on this bodily temple, as offering to Her who dwells within.” His
vast nature lacked space in which any egotistical consideration
could gain foothold.
“Let us go tomorrow to the Dakshineswar Temple, forever hallowed
by my guru.” Master Mahasaya was a disciple of a Christlike master,
Sri Ramakrishna Paramhansa.
The four-mile journey on the following morning was taken by boat
on the Ganges. We entered the nine-domed Temple of Kali, where the
figures of the Divine Mother and Shiva rest on a burnished silver
lotus, its thousand petals meticulously chiseled. Master Mahasaya
beamed in enchantment. He was engaged in his inexhaustible romance
with the Beloved. As he chanted Her name, my enraptured heart seemed
shattered into a thousand pieces.
We strolled later through the sacred precincts, halting in a
tamarisk grove. The manna characteristically exuded by this tree
was symbolic of the heavenly food Master Mahasaya was bestowing.
His divine invocations continued. I sat rigidly motionless on the
grass amid the pink feathery tamarisk flowers. Temporarily absent
from the body, I soared in a supernal visit.
This was the first of many pilgrimages to Dakshineswar with the holy
teacher. From him I learned the sweetness of God in the aspect of
Mother, or Divine Mercy. The childlike saint found little appeal in
the Father aspect, or Divine Justice. Stern, exacting, mathematical
judgment was alien to his gentle nature.
“He can serve as an earthly prototype for the very angels of
heaven!” I thought fondly, watching him one day at his prayers.
Without a breath of censure or criticism, he surveyed the world
with eyes long familiar with the Primal Purity. His body, mind,
speech, and actions were effortlessly harmonized with his soul’s
simplicity.
“My Master told me so.” Shrinking from personal assertion, the
saint ended any sage counsel with this invariable tribute. So deep
was his identity with Sri Ramakrishna that Master Mahasaya no longer
considered his thoughts as his own.
Hand in hand, the saint and I walked one evening on the block of his
school. My joy was dimmed by the arrival of a conceited acquaintance
who burdened us with a lengthy discourse.
“I see this man doesn’t please you.” The saint’s whisper to me was
unheard by the egotist, spellbound by his own monologue. “I have
spoken to Divine Mother about it; She realizes our sad predicament.
As soon as we get to yonder red house, She has promised to remind
him of more urgent business.”
My eyes were glued to the site of salvation. Reaching its red gate,
the man unaccountably turned and departed, neither finishing his
sentence nor saying good-by. The assaulted air was comforted with
peace.
Another day found me walking alone near the Howrah railway station.
I stood for a moment by a temple, silently criticizing a small group
of men with drum and cymbals who were violently reciting a chant.
“How undevotionally they use the Lord’s divine name in mechanical
repetition,” I reflected. My gaze was astonished by the rapid
approach of Master Mahasaya. “Sir, how come you here?”
The saint, ignoring my question, answered my thought. “Isn’t it
true, little sir, that the Beloved’s name sounds sweet from all
lips, ignorant or wise?” He passed his arm around me affectionately;
I found myself carried on his magic carpet to the Merciful Presence.
“Would you like to see some bioscopes?” This question one afternoon
from Master Mahasaya was mystifying; the term was then used in India
to signify motion pictures. I agreed, glad to be in his company in
any circumstances. A brisk walk brought us to the garden fronting
Calcutta University. My companion indicated a bench near the GOLDIGHI
or pond.
“Let us sit here for a few minutes. My Master always asked me
to meditate whenever I saw an expanse of water. Here its placidity
reminds us of the vast calmness of God. As all things can be
reflected in water, so the whole universe is mirrored in the lake
of the Cosmic Mind. So my GURUDEVA often said.”
Soon we entered a university hall where a lecture was in progress.
It proved abysmally dull, though varied occasionally by lantern
slide illustrations, equally uninteresting.
“So this is the kind of bioscope the master wanted me to see!” My
thought was impatient, yet I would not hurt the saint by revealing
boredom in my face. But he leaned toward me confidentially.
“I see, little sir, that you don’t like this bioscope. I have
mentioned it to Divine Mother; She is in full sympathy with us
both. She tells me that the electric lights will now go out, and
won’t be relit until we have a chance to leave the room.”
As his whisper ended, the hall was plunged into darkness. The
professor’s strident voice was stilled in astonishment, then remarked,
“The electrical system of this hall appears to be defective.” By
this time, Master Mahasaya and I were safely across the threshold.
Glancing back from the corridor, I saw that the scene of our
martyrdom had again become illuminated.
“Little sir, you were disappointed in that bioscope, {FN9-2} but I
think you will like a different one.” The saint and I were standing
on the sidewalk in front of the university building. He gently
slapped my chest over the heart.
A transforming silence ensued. Just as the modern “talkies” become
inaudible motion pictures when the sound apparatus goes out of
order, so the Divine Hand, by some strange miracle, stifled the
earthly bustle. The pedestrians as well as the passing trolley cars,
automobiles, bullock carts, and iron-wheeled hackney carriages were
all in noiseless transit. As though possessing an omnipresent eye,
I beheld the scenes which were behind me, and to each side, as
easily as those in front. The whole spectacle of activity in that
small section of Calcutta passed before me without a sound. Like
a glow of fire dimly seen beneath a thin coat of ashes, a mellow
luminescence permeated the panoramic view.
My own body seemed nothing more than one of the many shadows,
though it was motionless, while the others flitted mutely to and
fro. Several boys, friends of mine, approached and passed on; though
they had looked directly at me, it was without recognition.
The unique pantomime brought me an inexpressible ecstasy. I drank
deep from some blissful fount. Suddenly my chest received another
soft blow from Master Mahasaya. The pandemonium of the world burst
upon my unwilling ears. I staggered, as though harshly awakened
from a gossamer dream. The transcendental wine removed beyond my
reach.
“Little sir, I see you found the second bioscope to your liking.”
The saint was smiling; I started to drop in gratitude on the ground
before him. “You can’t do that to me now; you know God is in your
temple also! I won’t let Divine Mother touch my feet through your
hands!”
If anyone observed the unpretentious master and myself as we walked
away from the crowded pavement, the onlooker surely suspected
us of intoxication. I felt that the falling shades of evening
were sympathetically drunk with God. When darkness recovered from
its nightly swoon, I faced the new morning bereft of my ecstatic
mood. But ever enshrined in memory is the seraphic son of Divine
Mother-Master Mahasaya!
Trying with poor words to do justice to his benignity, I wonder if
Master Mahasaya, and others among the deep-visioned saints whose
paths crossed mine, knew that years later, in a Western land,
I would be writing about their lives as divine devotees. Their
foreknowledge would not surprise me nor, I hope, my readers, who
have come thus far with me.
{FN9-1} These are respectful titles by which he was customarily
addressed. His name was Mahendra Nath Gupta; he signed his literary
works simply “M.”
{FN9-2} The Oxford English Dictionary gives, as rare, this definition
of BIOSCOPE: A view of life; that which gives such a view.
Master Mahasaya’s choice of a word was, then, peculiarly justified.