Tea For One Hundred People (S., India)

In the beginning, when Maharajji used to visit my city Jagraon, he would give satsangs in different houses of devotees. One day, he said to my father,
“I will come to your house to give a satsang there”
“I have no space because my house is too small !” replied my father.
“I will only take up a little space”
“No, I have no space” replied my father, who did not agree to this .
“So I will come alone” said Maharajji.
“Under this condition it is Ok” concluded my father.

After few days, Maharajji came to our house and he sat in our guest room. Then he said to my father,
“Hey, look, you say that you have no space but I have taken up very little space”.
A little later, Maharajji added :
“I will go onto the roof of your house for a certain time”.
So he went onto the roof which was like a terrace.
Our neighbours saw him on the roof and came to our house to have his darshan. Shortly after that Maharjji started the satsang and about hundred people came to attend this satsang on the roof. Maharajji asked my mother to give chai to all these people especially as we were in winter. I must explain that in India, what we call chai is usually prepared with about two-thirds tea and one-third milk. This is the way Indians make tea. But the problem was that we had only around one litre of milk at home and normally, it was far insufficient to prepare chai for all these people. But she accepted to prepare this chai without telling Maharajji about the milk.

Surprisingly, she was able to prepare the chai for all the people with this little quantity of milk while keeping to the proportions of one third of milk to two thirds of tea for each of the participants. This feat was due to Maharajji’s grace.

Are There Still Saints in India ? Part 3 (End)

Part 1

Part 2

This defied all the laws of physics !

Now, when I went back to Delhi, I started doing this mantra japa. Then one day, after coming back from Dubai, I started doing small havans (a type of fire ceremony) in my room and I started doing this mantra more seriously. One day during the afternoon I felt tired. I lay down on the bed, and with a particular awareness, I could see a God and Goddess on the roof of our flat with a book in front of them. The pages of this book were being turned over by the wind which was blowing. The whole atmosphere was charged with divinity.

Another day, I saw that through some astral process I had again come into Mahatma Hans Rajji’s room. Before going in, through the roof I saw a boy lying on the floor sleeping; and then the boy told Mahatma Hans Rajji that some ghost had come into his room. But he replied,
“Oh no, there is no ghost here. It is only one of my devotees, but in his spiritual body.”
So he took out a little piece of prasad, a piece of burfi (a type of Indian sweet) and dropped it. I took it and came back.
While coming here to the ashram through this astral process, near the room, I saw Lord Shiva on the sandy beach, and then I saw Mahatma Hans Rajji in the form of Lord Shiva. So I was quite surprised and it developed my devotion to him.

So I continued my japa and various things started happening. I had a lot of visions of Lord Shiva and many other things. Then one day, the entire process culminated, during the night. It must have been about one thirty in the morning because all the lights were off and I was sleeping in my room. Suddenly, I felt something moving my eyelids, while I was asleep. I wondered who could be trying to disturb my sleep, who wanted to open my eyes? So I opened them to see who was moving my eyelids, and I saw a whitish-bluish light, and it was focused on a particular photograph of a saint called Swami Shivananda (great saint who lived in Rishikesh up to 1963) which was in my room.

I remember that suddenly the light took the form of a bearded saint. And out came the face of Mahatma Hans Rajji. I was so surprised. This defied all the laws of physics! Moreover, I had studied physics as a student, and so I wondered how it was possible that such a light could be focused in such a way without any tungsten wire or without a bulb, or without any particular medium. And suddenly out of Mahatma Hans Rajji’s two eyes flashed a small whitish-blue light which entered my eyes. When it entered me, I closed my eyes suddenly, and when I opened them again, I saw that the light which had been focused on Swami Shivananda’s photograph had gone. Suddenly I felt a command, “Go and sit in the next room.”

So I obeyed and got out of bed and went to the next room. I sat there in padma asana (sitting on the floor, cross-legged) Suddenly I lost total consciousness of the outer physical world and of my body; my mind had stopped. I had an experience which lasted for about two and a half hours because at about four thirty the birds started singing and my consciousness became externalized.

This is how the experience usually goes. When the Guru’s grace dawns, the mind stops and the breath is stilled. Sunyatha (absolute stillness) occurs and then the Self Being - the swyambhu (the Self-Existent) flashes forth in all its divinity as existence, conscious awareness and bliss, bringing forth everything in divine love. That was my experience which I wrote down when it happened. (End)

Are There Still Saints in India? Part 2

Oh, my God, this man is a true saint !

I was quite surprised because the next morning when I went to his room, I saw the shivaling, symbolising the cosmic creation of the universe, which is on the mantelpiece in his room, and I had a feeling that somehow Mahatma Hans Rajji had been able to stop my mind and give me an answer to the second question I had asked the day before, within my own mind. So I stayed at the ashram for three days. I wanted to stay longer but then Mahatma Hans Rajji told me later on that I should go back to Delhi and then he would answer my first question regarding the existence of saints in India nowadays.

I went back to Delhi, and within a week, on a Sunday afternoon after having lunch, I lay down for a snooze - an afternoon siesta. Suddenly, I saw that my own consciousness had been drawn back into Mahatma Hans Rajji’s room in Rishikeskh. I saw Mahatma Hans Rajji sitting on his bed as usual and his entire body became light. And in that light I saw Guru Nanak there. I was shocked. Suddenly I opened my eyes in my afternoon siesta, and I woke up. And I said, “Oh my God! This man is a true saint! How can he catch my consciousness in Delhi and bring it to his room in Rishikesh?”

So as soon as I could, after two or three days I caught a bus and came back to Rishikesh and I told Mahatma Hans Rajji that I wanted to be initiated. He replied that he would do so, but he first had to go to Dehradun. As promised, I was initiated by Mahatma Hans Rajji when he came back. He gave me a particular mantra, as well as specific recommendations concerning this mantra. (Continued in Part 3)

Are There Still Saints in India? Part 1

The mysterious attraction

My name is Premi. In 1993 I had come down to Rishikesh and I went and sat at Mastram Baba’s place on the left bank of the Ganges. I was doing some japa (reciting a mantra) and meditation on this rock where Mastram Baba’s small mud hut is, and when I saw the tree near the platform on the other side of the riverbank, there was an attraction. It was a sort of magnetic attraction. So in the evening I walked along the Ganges from Mastram Baba’s place up to the Laxman Jhulla bridge which I crossed, and I came to the place where the people have their baths.
When I came up to the spot I was looking for, there was a swami (one who dedicates his life to God) called Midhaji drying his clothes on the clothes line. He saw me, and I saw him, and I asked him,
“What is this place?”
“This is Sacha Baba’s place,” he replied.
So I asked him who Sacha Baba was. He then invited me to his room to have a cup of tea, and said he would show me Sacha Baba. So he took me to the temple after tea, at about four o’clock in the afternoon, and I pranammed (bowed) to the statue of Sacha Baba in the temple. But I was still not satisfied, and I told him that I wanted to meet the real Baba. (Baba means a sage, a saint)
“There is one real Baba here,” he explained. “His name is Mahatma Hans Rajji. He is in his room, and he will open his door at about five o’clock. Then you can have his darshan.” (meeting a Master)

The two questions

So at five o’clock he took me to Mahatma Hans Rajji’s room. He had opened his door so Swami Midhaji went in and told him that someone had come for information. So he sent me in, and when I saw Mahatma Hans Raj Baba, I felt that I had met him previously, maybe from a previous life, but it was very difficult to say at that time.
When I sat down, I looked at him and kept looking at him, and I still felt there was some sort of connection which I was unable to explain. The first thing the Mahatma (Mahatma literally means a great soul, a saint ) asked me was where I had come from, so I told him I had come from Delhi. I told him I liked his place very much and that I wanted to stay there. I also said I wanted to ask him one or two questions.
He replied,
“Yes, you ask me.”
“I was reading about Guru Nanak (great Indian Saint born in the 15th century and who founded the religion of Sikhs), and he said that if you meet a true saint it is a great blessing. But how can it be possible to find a true saint in our time? There are no true saints in this country anymore!”
“Acha!” (Ah yes !)
Then I asked him how this world had come about, because according to science, there is this “big bang” theory, whereas when we read the Upanishads and the Indian Shastras (Upanishads and Shastras are holy Texts), they talk about something else.
“That’s so !” he replied. Then he added, “Listen, first of all go and sit on that particular platform where Sacha Baba used to sit. Then stay here at the ashram for two or three days.”

And the “big bang” ?

I accepted and went and sat on the platform. And when I was sitting there, at about six o’clock, I found that suddenly my thoughts had stopped. No thoughts were coming anymore. But I could still see the Ganges, all that was around me, and I was aware of everything. And suddenly, in that awareness, a word came. The word was sankalpa ( a sankalpa is a thought-force, a decree, directed will power used to materialise something or a new situation or event). So I immediately realised that I was reading something that might have happened sometime in the past, that this entire world is a “notion” or a “thought” which takes form in the great cosmic world. It is known as sankalpa. (Continued in Part 2)

A Reservation for Five (Amrit, India)

Some years ago I learned that Maharajji was ill, so I decided to pay him a visit. As I lived in Punjab more than 300 kilometres away, I had to organise a trip for this, and my two daughters accepted to go with me to see him. However the day before we left, I thought of inviting my neighbour to come with us. When I spoke to him, he hesitated, and said he would let me know the following morning if he was coming, the very day we were leaving.
When the day came, he informed me that not only would he come, but so would his own daughter. In the end, five of us were going on this trip to Rishikesh. Neither my neighbour and his daughter, nor my daughters and I had told Maharajji about our visit. We were going to give him a nice surprise! We left very early, because Rishikesh was quite far.
When we arrived, we were received by Maharajji and while we were speaking to him, Swami Baldev came into the room. Maharajji then told him,
“Baldev, here are the five people for whom I told you to reserve rooms this morning !”
We were completely dumbfounded. And how we had been looking forward to giving Maharajji a surprise!
We then learnt that in the morning, here at the ashram in Rishikesh, Maharajji had called Swami Baldev and given him precise instructions to reserve rooms for five people who were going to come. He had insisted that on no account should the rooms be given to anybody else. It must be said that at the time, the ashram could loge very few people.

He Listens to Our Hearts (Liloue, France)

On the last day of one of my stays at the ashram, I told my husband how disappointed I was to be going back without the peace of mind which I had hoped to find on coming here. My heart was still not at ease, for I was still worried about certain things. I was not completely happy.
We went to say goodbye to our Master before taking the taxi for Delhi, and without our having expressed any request or the least regret in front of him, Maharajji spoke to us and during the conversation, he told us that our hearts would surely find peace, but little by little. I was very astonished, because our Master had read my thoughts and seen the trouble in my heart, and had just given the answer I needed to put an end to my sadness.

Your Light Has Lit Mine (Keshav, India)

My wife used to suffer from a heart problem and the lady doctor had forbidden her to go upstairs. She could only stay on the ground floor of our house. In this house, we had a special room reserved for our Guru Maharajji Shri.
One day, my son and daughter who live with us came here to Rishikesh, and since I too was absent, my wife was alone at home. In the evening time, at about 6:30 p.m. she thought, “There is no light in Maharajji Shri’s room. I should go and switch it on.” But she was much too weak and she remembered the doctor’s interdiction as that room was upstairs. So she was extremely worried about this situation and thought all the time “How can I switch on this light ?” So thinking, she fell half asleep for about two or three minutes. When she woke up, she was surprised to discover that the light in Maharajji Shri’s room had been switched on !
After this event, when we came to the ashram a few days later, my wife spoke to the Master about what had happened, and he replied,
“You should not disclose these things to anyone! As in special circumstances, when there is no other solution, I have to do such work exceptionally.”
Then he added,
“Don’t worry! I am always with you !”
Later on, my wife’s heart problem was healed.

Selective Rain (Gandhi, India)

Some time in the past, Maharajji used to come regularly to Punjab where he gave satsangs. One evening, one of the satsangs took place at one of my brothers’ house, which was far away.
But unfortunately it started to rain very heavily in the town during the satsang. My wife and I were at a complete loss because we had left the wheat to dry outside in the yard. My wife asked me to go and put this wheat away because not only was it going to get wet, but the water running through the yard would wash it away if we did nothing. But I found the atmosphere at the satsang so captivating that I did not want to miss one word of what Maharajji was saying. I therefore retorted that it was raining so hard, and the house was so far away that however hard I tried, I would still arrive too late; and not only was the wheat already spoilt, but I would also lose the spiritual manna that the Guru was giving out. I had carefully weighed up the situation and had chosen to lose the wheat and keep the Master’s spiritual food. So I stayed until the end of Maharajji’s talk.
Then we went back home to see what damage had been done. And, to our surprise, the wheat was still there, perfectly dry and not a grain was missing. It had rained all around it and the ground was drenched, but some mysterious force had protected just the spot where the wheat was ! So we hurried and put it away - the wheat which had caused us so much worry. And as soon as we had finished, heavy rain poured down again, but this time it no longer spared the place where the wheat had been drying a few seconds before!
Later on, when I was alone with Maharajji I reported these strange happenings and the miracle which had taken place. He touched me on my head and added,
“Hush! It’s a secret and make sure you tell no one about it. When you were at the satsang you were doing my work - work for the Sacha Mission and work for God Almighty. It was therefore my duty to do something for you !”

The Dutch Nun (From a Dutch disciple)

I am from Holland and am a disciple of Maharajji. I have an aunt who is a nun in the Catholic Church. She has a very understanding nature, but when I announced to her one day that I was about to leave for India and spend six months with my Master Maharajji, she did not appreciate it at all. “How is that? A Guru? While we ourselves have a religion!” Those were her remarks.
Nevertheless, I left for India and once I was with Maharajji, I kept up regular correspondence with her. I related to her in detail all that was happening to me and in general in the ashram. In this way the habits and the life in the ashram became familiar to her and interested her deeply. After all, she said to me, she did not see much difference between life there and life in her own Catholic monastery.
After the six months, I returned to Holland and visited her. On this occasion, I showed her pictures of Maharajji, Sacha Dham ashram, the people who were living there and the Ganga, etc. One of the pictures of Maharajji in particular, pleased her.
“Could you give me this one?” she asked.
“Of course, it is yours!” I answered.
And she put this picture near Jesus, on her altar.
After having worked for five months in Holland, I returned to India for six months. In her first letter, my aunt explained to me that even though she didn’t write often, she thought of me every day, especially because the picture of my Master was on her altar. And, she added, she was very grateful to Maharajji that he took very good care of me.
One afternoon a few months later, I was sitting on the verandah in front of Maharajji’s room, when Swami Midhaji brought me a letter from my aunt (I received all my mail at the address of the ashram). After the news, she wrote,
“Oh yes, I forgot to tell you before, but your Guru has become my spiritual guide. I ask him everything and he always answers me in my heart.”
I was so touched that I couldn’t hold back my tears. At that moment Maharajji opened his door. He looked at me with a big mocking smile so I stood up and started to speak to him about my aunt, but he did not listen and continued his way. Just before he disappeared around the corner of the verandah, I called out loudly,
“Maharajji!”
“Yes,” he answered and turned to me.
“Maharajji, you have many Western disciples, don’t you?”
“Yes, many!” he said with emphasis.
I understood that Maharajji took care of all of those who were in the hearts of his disciples. This story is all the more remarkable since Maharajji left his room that day at a time when he never usually went out. He certainly knew of my aunt’s letter from the beginning.

Mahatma Hans Raj Maharajji

Extremely Rare...

Shri Hans Raj Maharajji is a very great saint in India, who lives in Rishikesh. Some call him Mahatma Maharajji, the title “Mahatma” meaning “Great Soul” and is given to those who have reached a very high state of spiritual realization, which goes beyond enlightenment, the first stage. Sacha Dham, his ashram, is situated on the bank of the Ganges, at the foothills of the Himalayas. What is unusual is that he became enlightened the very next day after meeting in Allahabad the one who was going to become his Master, Shri Sacha Baba Kulanandji. This happened on October 3, 1955 and he was thirty-three years old.

Experiencing God Directly

From them on, his work was to help spread the teachings of his Master throughout India, around which he travelled for decades. And that was how little by little, thousands of men and women gathered around him and became his disciples. He did not just give theoretical teachings since for Maharajji, oral teachings, however important they may be, are not enough to bring about the desired progress in a seeker. For him, the latter must experience God directly in his own inner consciousness. That is why he gave and still continues to give his disciples a precise technique which, if applied with perseverance and regularity in daily life, ensures their spiritual growth. Moreover, for decades up to the 1980s, he would regularly organize what is called sadhana camps. These camps were in fact spiritual retreats, each lasting about ten days, to which he invited disciples who had a sure potential, and would give them intensive training which enabled them to experience their inner divinity and contact the higher planes during that very retreat.

Graceful Simplicity
Shri Hans Raj Maharajji is characterized especially by true simplicity and very pure, unconditional, limitless love for all beings whatever their origin, religion, race or social class may be. He makes no difference between rich and poor, wise and ignorant. He loves each one as he is for, as he says, “I only see souls in front of me, in other words children of God, all equal. The outer differences are of no importance.” In his presence, the visitor feels purer, closer to his soul, and provided that he is a little sensitive psychically, he will feel a very strong, harmonious vibration which will bring inner peace and calm his spirit. This visitor can also feel that true power, God’s power expresses itself through this being. One then understands why great instructors have always recommended being in the company of saints if one want to progress spiritually, for not only does one benefit from their teachings, but one is also purified and raised spiritually by their presence.

Work in the Universal Soul

After the death of his Master Shri Sacha Baba Kulanandji in 1983, the heavy responsibility of continuing the work of this great line of saints called the Sacha Lineage (Sacha means Truth, God) to which his Master belonged, was passed on to Maharajji. From a historical point of view, this lineage began at the beginning of the 20th century when two very great saints of exceptional stature met and worked together. They were called respectively Shri Kacha Baba and Shri Sacha Baba Girnari. Kacha Baba lived near Benares and was said to have been an avatar of Vishnu, while Sacha Baba Girnari was a travelling saint who often made long or short stays on the Girnar mountain in Gujarat, and who was said to have been the incarnation of Devarishi Narada, the great messenger of God and a glorious character who can be found throughout the Hindu Scriptures. They were two great yogis who God caused to meet for the benefit of the human race.

The aim of this lineage is two-fold : on the one hand to help the entire humanity to turn to spirituality, for humanity is now entering a delicate era which holds the most exalting promises in store, but also terrible perils if humanity continues to walk blindly forward without giving due importance to spiritual values; on the other hand to lead all sincere, worthy disciples to the state where they will become workers for what is usually called the Common Good, the Universal Good or the General Good, in short, people who will work for the benefit of the entire human race. For this Maharajji, since he has taken up the torch, only goes out very rarely for short visits. He works especially in what is called the Universal Soul, a high spiritual plane from which one can reach the entire humanity. His work is therefore not at all aimed at trying to get disciples to come to him, but rather that each person, wherever he is on the planet, will adopt a religion or a personal path which he will follow sincerely by putting God in the centre of his life, so that God’s Purpose for humanity can be achieved in the best conditions.

Two Simple but Powerful Techniques

Because of this universal work, Maharajji no longer gives satsangs (a meeting where Master and disciples discuss spiritual topics) today or any oral teachings, and has given up holding sadhana camps himself. Since then, his technique for each student can be globally summed up as meditation and the reciting of the Gurumantra (all mantras have intrinsic power, however with the Gurumantra, the power of the Master who transmits it is added to this intrinsic power) which he gives when he accepts a new disciple. From then on, he is always with this disciple spiritually, although he may not be visible to physical eyes, but those who are intuitive or clairvoyant will see him.

The sincere and regular practice of these two powerful techniques – meditation and Gurumantra will not only bring about the spiritual growth of the disciple, but will also allow him to be in contact inwardly with Maharajji in order to receive spiritual direction, specific teachings or even help if necessary, for a personal problem which is not connected to spirituality. Moreover, from time to time he gives personalized advice when it is needed.

One must not be taken in by the apparent simplicity of the technique which Maharajji uses to guide his disciples. Indeed, certain people like complicated spiritual practices so as to convince themselves that they are using an efficient method, thinking that complexity is a sign of excellence. In fact, the more one develops spiritually, the more things become simple. For example, for meditation an ordinary disciple needs to sit alone in a specific posture so as to establish contact with his inner Self, whereas a more advanced disciple only needs to think of this connection for it to be done instantaneously, wherever he may be; he may be sitting down, walking, having his meals or speaking to someone, this is not important.

Do Everything With Your Heart

So the only thing Maharajji asks of his students is that whatever they do, especially their sadhana (spiritual practice), they should do it with their heart, since for him, the heart plays an essential role in the relationship with the Self, with God and with the whole creation. Maharajji is simplicity itself, and everything he gives or does always bears this stamp of simplicity, which is the mark of those who have attained the essence of life and of all things, that which bears names like God, Truth, the All! He does not restrict his disciples to a particular form of yoga either, or to any particular path. Each person follows his own inclination and his own path, be it Bhakti Yoga, Karma Yoga, Jnana Yoga, Raja Yoga or any other Eastern or Western path; Maharajji only gives the powerful instruments to progress, provided that the student is sincere in his practice.

This is how things go because when a being has attained enlightenment (you may use the name you wish), he has become one with what Indians call the “Atma” and Christians call the “Spirit”, the pure Ray of God in him, and this Atma is one with the Divinity and with all that exists. From then on, he is in harmony with all the paths leading to realization and is one not only with each individual, but also with the profound teachings of each religion and each mystical path. That is why he is beyond religions for he is one with the source of all religions. Maharajji has said, “My work has nothing to do with the promotion of a particular religion.

They Have Come from Everywhere

Little by little, starting from the 1980s, foreign disciples from the five continents came to Maharajji to be guided also, and today they are still coming. This had been predicted by Sacha Baba Kulanandji who had said that those who had been Maharajji’s disciples in other lives and who were now incarnated would come back again to be with him and be guided by him. He had also predicted that the work of the Sacha lineage, known as the Sacha Mission, would spread throughout the world. Today, Maharajji has a few thousand disciples from different religions in the world (Buddhist, Christian, Hindu, Islam, Jewish, Sikh etc.). Some of them had no particular faith or were even atheists before meeting Maharajji. He never advises disciples to definitively retire to monasteries, temples, caves or forests since for him, one must find God wherever one has his duties to carry out to the society and one’s family. The time when one would completely cut oneself off from society is now a thing of the past.

It is necessary for a disciple to be responsible and autonomous, for Maharajji will never ask him if he puts into practice the teachings received. Once he has let his disciple know what he has to do, he leaves him completely free to do so or not; the disciple is the one to decide if he wants to progress or not. He respects each one’s absolute liberty and never interferes with his free will, although he knows what each disciple is doing. That is why he sometimes encourages certain disciples, which is an indirect way of congratulating them and letting them know that he knows quite well what effort and progress they are making.

It must also be mentioned that during the 1990s, Maharajji no longer wanted to accept disciples in order to devote himself to his work in the world, but he could not refuse those who continued to come and knock at his door in search of inner light and peace. Consequently, up until today, men and women continue to seek his guidance. Let us also add that those who, for one reason or another, cannot go to India, can be guided by Maharajji if they pray sincerely and so connect with him through inner aspiration. There are examples of this all over the world. Maharajji is not limited by space or time. He manifests himself wherever his disciples and sincere hearts are in search of divine light.

Centres of Light

Generally, his foreign and Indian disciples go to the ashram for a short stay and then return home. However, there are permanently with him a few swamis (people who have decided to dedicate their lives to finding God under the direction of a Master) and other Indian disciples who carry out the activities usually done in an ashram, both from the social and spiritual point of view; indeed ashrams are also institutions which feed the poor free of charge. Each of his swamis and disciples, while following their spiritual practice, is in charge of a specific task at the ashram.

In addition to Sacha Dham ashram, Maharajji has founded other ashrams in India, which constitute centres from which divine light shines, allowing each seeker to go and quench his thirst. In addition, two of his most advanced disciples, ShantiMayi and Prem Baba, have each founded an ashram, respectively “Terre de Sacha” in the Pyrenees in France (not far from Spain) and Sacha Mission near Sao Paulo in Brazil. It must also be mentioned that ShantiMayi’s disciples, scattered everywhere on the five continents, and Maharajji’s have also opened secondary centres which carry on the ideals and teachings of Maharajji and the Sacha lineage here and there on the planet. ShantiMayi herself travels a lot around the world to personally transmit these teachings.