Radhe Shyam - I am Harmony

The following day Mahendra Maharaj left for Vrindaban. As he was sitting in the bus, he blessed Shastriji again and assured him that he could write whatever he wanted. This started Shastriji on his first book, "Sadguru Stuti Kusmanjali," a book of prayers to and verses about Shri Babaji. The whole book was written in seven or eight days. It was written in Sanskrit verse and translated into Hindi, also in verse form. When it was completed, Giridhari Lal read it and became very excited, asking how such an excellent book could be written in such a short time. He insisted that he and Shastriji take the manuscript to Mahendra Maharaj, so they went to Vrindaban the next day.

They found Mahendra Maharaj sitting by a small pond, in meditation. They sat down before him and after two or three minutes he opened his eyes. Immediately, he asked what they had brought, and Shastriji handed the manuscript to Mahendra Baba. Mahendra Baba had Shastriji read the book to him as they sat there. Shastriji read until about 3 p.m., when Mahendra Baba interrupted and apologized for not having given them tea, even yet, but this day was closing day for shops in this part of Vrindaban and what could he do? "Well," he said, "you go on reciting and we'll see about food later." Shastriji continued to read. About twenty minutes later, a young girl, carrying a tray of sweets and tea, came up and put the tray before them and went away.

After he heard the whole book read to him, Mahendra Maharaj commented that Shastriji wrote excellent Sanskrit verse, but that his Hindi verse should equal that of Tulsidas, Kabir, and other great poets. That time will come, he said; but, until then, you should write only in Sanskrit.

About six weeks after this, Mahendra Baba sent word to Shastriji that he should take leave from his teaching duties and come to Vrindaban immediately. Shastriji found Mahendra Baba in a small room at Shyamji s house, above a sweet shop. Mahendra Baba was sitting in front of a photograph of 'Old Haidakhan Baba.' Shastriji made a pranam to the photograph and told Mahendra Baba that he had never before seen a photograph of Haidakhan Baba but that he had seen that form in his dreams. In 1940, in the temple to Laxman in his home in Rajgarh, Shri Laxmanji had given Shastriji a vision, or dream, of Babaji in the same form as he now saw in the photograph, and told Shastriji that "He [Babaji] can give you everything."

Mahendra Maharaj then told Shastriji that the time had come when he could write such beautiful compositions that they would excel those of Tulsidas, Kabir, and everyone. Shastriji made a pranam to Mahendra Baba and asked him how to proceed with the writing. Mahendra Baba protested, "How can I give these blessings?" He removed the jasmine garland that was hung on Babaji's photograph. He gave the garland to Shastriji, saying, "Your daughter is the incarnation of Saraswati [the Goddess of Knowledge and artistic inspiration]. You give this mala to her and she will give you the outline of what has to be written." (At that time, Shastriji's daughter was four years old.)

When Shastriji returned home from Vrindaban, the whole family came to greet him and to inquire what Mahendra Maharaj had wanted. The four-year-old daughter came, too, so Shastriji took the garland and put it on her, as directed by Mahendra Maharaj. The girl took the pen from Shastriji's pocket, found a piece of paper and started scribbling on the paper. Each day, the little girl scribbled on a number of pages, and each day Shastriji wrote exactly the same number of pages of poetry (slokas). If she scribbled on ten pages, he wrote ten pages of slokas; if she scribbled on twenty-five pages, he wrote twenty-five pages of slokas. Occasionally, she would return for a second session of scribbling and Shastriji wrote more pages of poetry.

The book Shastriji was beginning to write was "Shrisadashiv Charitamrit," the book which chronicles the "Babaji leela" from discussions among the gods, through His manifestations in the eras of Lord Ram and Lord Krishna, and on up through that of 'Old Haidakhan Baba' (and now - as of December 1983 - the latest manifestation of Shri Babaji). While Shastriji was writing this book, Mahendra Maharaj used to come to Shastriji's home every week or ten days to check on the progress of the writing.

One evening, as Shastriji was reciting to Mahendra Baba what had been written recently, he came to a description of the Divine Mother. As Shastriji recited this, he saw Mahendra Maharaj's body turn into that form of the Divine Mother that his slokas described. Suddenly, there was 'Ma,' wearing a red sari, with a big red spot of kum-kum in the middle of her forehead, wearing a jeweled nose-ring - altogether a beautiful form beautifully adorned. Shastriji was greatly frightened, but he could not stop his recitation. This experience continued for a full twenty-five minutes, while Shastriji recited, by the end of which he was drenched in sweat from his nervousness. When the recitation ceased, the familiar form of Mahendra Maharaj was straightening out his beard and mustache; he slapped his right thigh and said to Shastriji, "You got scared by just this much?"

The following day Mahendra Maharaj enriched Shastriji's powerful spiritual experience by directing the family to a Hanuman temple some miles outside of Rajgarh where Mahendra Maharaj sat, with Shastriji at his side, and sang a religious song to Lord Hanuman three times. By the time Mahendra Maharaj had repeated the song the third time, Shastriji saw the statue of Hanuman come alive and begin to expand immensely. Shastriji was so frightened that he fainted. When Mahendra Baba brought Shastriji out of his faint, Mahendra took the family on to an ancient and particularly holy Shiva temple. There, both Mahendra Baba and Shastriji took ritual baths and then Mahendra Baba directed Shastriji in giving the Shiva lingam at the temple a ritual bath.

The result of this series of powerful experiences was to put Shastriji into such a trance that for a full six months thereafter he had no feelings: he did not experience hunger or thirst; he did not feel like temple worship because if he went to a temple or to a Shivalingam he saw only Babaji standing there blinking His eyes.

Shastriji had no desire to speak and he remained silent. His wife became quite worried about Shastriji and called some doctors to examine him; they reported that he was perfectly all right, he was just not speaking.

Throughout this six months, Shastriji 'saw things' - "like a whole show, going on and on." He watched these 'visions' and wrote what he saw - whatever passed before his eyes. He had never gone to Haldwani or been in that area, but, during this period, he had visions of how Haidakhan started (early in Creation), how it changed and grew. He saw the Haidakhan Cave formed, saw the trees as they grew. He saw the similar growth of each of Shri Babaji's ashrams. He 'saw' Lord Shiva and other gods and 'listened' to their conversations; he saw Shiva/Babaji play His role in Lord Ram's time and in Krishna's time. And what he saw, he wrote - in Sanskrit verse, in the same meter in which the Ramayana was written. And when, years later, he went to Haidakhan, Siddhashram, Kathgharia, and other Babaji ashrams, he saw that his descriptions were accurate. 58

The visions were received by Vishnu Dutt Mishra in 1954 and 1955, and he wrote then the Sanskrit slokas which describe what he saw. In the following two years, Shastriji composed Hindi verse translations of the Sanskrit slokas and added commentary in Hindi. The book, with eight chapters, was published in 1959, and the Rajah of Alwar had a limited edition printed in gold leaf.

The second chapter of "Shrisadashiv Charitamrit" relates a number of conversations between Lord Shiva and other gods and goddesses. One of these conversations, between Lord Shiva and His Shakti (called Jagadamba, the Universal Mother, in this instance) contains the following statements.