“I HAVE heard and read about the divine characterestics of the Motler. Could you tell me about her human aspect?”
“Yes. You will soon realise that truth is stronger than faith. Uusually one sees her for the first time while she is being worship ped with flowers or kumkum. That being unusual, it is difficult for one to reconcile himself to that sight. But never does one hear from her, words like “you can worship me just as you like.” She would no Say you can worship me just as you like’. She doesn’t feel that she is worshipped; she only accommodates for those who would use her as a symbol of the great Mother of the worlds,
“She invites every one of her visitors to have their meal in the anna poorna bhavan’ nearby. The meal that is served is cer tainly sustaining, if not statisfying every one’s taste. How are you able to feed so many, Mother?’ asked a donor of a feeding house at Sreesailam, we are struggling hard to accommodate just a hundred there! Mother replied: I do not feel I am feeding them. They are eating what is already their’s. You are worried because you feel that you are feeding them. Here, each one cats that which is his already and so, there is no worry for any body.”
“Do you say it is human to say so?”
Listen. Her reply is not complete yet. She added They (visitors) will have curd (and paayasam) if that is available. If that were not, they will have butter-milk. They eat rice with chutney if milk is not available, and with the river water if even chut ney is not to be found. If even that is not available for them, I would think that their meal for the day is not here but I would not feel that I could not feed them”.
“Oh my! this is shocking. A lady who is feeding so many to say this?”
“She feels that feeding or not feeding is already arranged by the Great Mother. One day an anxious father came to her and asked her if his run-away daughter had come to her. Mother said, ‘No. Not to me, child; but have you had your meal to-day?” He said “No”. “You haven’t eaten since yesterday, go and have your meal.” ‘I am trying to find my daughter’ he said. I know. But you must have strength enough to go about! Go and eat”. He did not heed her. He got up to go and said, She said two days ago that she would go to you. Please tell her to come home if she were to come here’, and he left. Mother was the least perturbed in that company. ‘Poor man! He is so worried that he would not even think of his meal,’ she said. Here is proof for her believing that his meal for that day is not in Jillellamudi. Isn’t that quite human?”
“I shall continue. One day, her eldest boy did not take meal for some reason. One of the girls there, a new recruit, said to her, Ma, Subbarao had not taken meal. Tell him to have it. Mother replied, “My dear girl, I have told him already. The girl insisted: “why don’t you tell him in a way he would heed? You don’t seem to be worried!” Mother said, ‘May be, I don’t have as much affec tion as you people here. what can I do? He is not the only one for me to take care of, is he?”
“What does she mean?”
“You know she addresses every visitor of her as ‘child’. She obviously means that he has to mind all her children but not worry about one only”,
“Does she treat all persons as her children?”
“A mother feeds all of her children and you see each visitor to have his meal. Whatever be the time of the day they see her. She comforts her visitors when they weep before her, wailing abo it their difficulties. She approves of any method of worship that they adopt; she does not lose a second to cover up their so-called slips in the worship.”
How about their mistakes committed ou side Jillellamudi? Does she justify them?”
“She does the same thing that a mother does, when her sons complain to her about one another. He is not vigorous now, as he was in the past said one about a former-brahmachari. aashram is altered!’ jeere I another. His aashraya’, said mother. His ‘He is not performing avadhanas now’ mocked a third; ‘only for want of vyavadhana’ said mtler. That sanyasi is not at all doing what is expected of a man in yellow robes!” criticised Sri Sarma. ‘He had at least sacrificed his love for rich dress, and took to saffron robes. We are not able to do even that much!’ said mother.”
‘Why condemn him so vehemently? He may be abusing his antagonists publicly from the platform. We abuse our opponents behind their backs. He is certainly better for his courage, isn’t he?’ She rejoined on another occasion.”
Wordy sympathy apart, does she treat all people- I mean people of all castes, alike?’
“Once she had been to Chirala. She slipped out of her lodging alone and went over to the huts of poor people. She entered a hut. The inmates, elders and children, had their meal just then and washed their plates into a bigger vessel. Mother entered at that moment. They made her sit on a mat, and did obeisance. (They had seen her being worshipped, the previous evening). When she was to leave, they felt puzzled and unhappy as they had nothing to offer her to eat or drink. Crossing over to the corner and seeing the big vessel she said, ‘Here is something to drink’ and she drank from the contents.”
“What!”
In another hut she scooped some cooked fish from a vessel with her finger and put it in her mouth. Isn’t this treating all alike?’
‘She used the end of her saree to wipe the stinking saliva from the lips of a patient in bed: she pressed and cleaned the leg of a leper in a hospital’
‘Please stop. I can’t stand it’
‘There is a lot I haven’t mentionel. She is never healthy, but never unhappy. She does not ask persons to come to her again: she never tells them to go. Nothing is good and not hing bad to her. She does not pray; she does not eat as we do but moves like air in any out-door function. She went over to the cremation ground when her father died, but didn’t jerk back, when a devotee put flowers on her feet and offered her a fruit there!
***
Where is the question of a good
way to Atman? When everything
you see is that, where is the
question of a way?
That which is all pervading is
Atma. Seeing Everything
Atma is Atma Sakshatkara.
– Mother