Dr.ShuddhanandaBharati

Mehersthan Memoir

Tells you how the Andhras adore the Avatar

Meher Baba

ASSAEditions

Editor’s Notes

The great and vast knowledge of Dr. ShuddhanandaBharati appears again in this work. The life and history ofAndhra Pradesh with all these great characters includingMeher Baba is very rewarding to discover. With a beauti-ful picture.

Shuddhananda Bharati and Meher Baba

It is a real pleasure for me to present Mehersthan Memoir toyou. Thank you to Dr. Shuddhananda Bharati for havingtransmitted Mehersthan Memoir to us. With the blessing ofAum Shuddha Shakti Aum.

Christian Piaget

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Courage!

The night is through,The chain of slaveryIt is already broken -I am full of courage!

Peace in the morning,A golden sun risesLike a lion superhumanTo accomplish my dream.

A hopeful smile,Docile as a childWho plays in the infiniteWith a fiery star.

My journey is over;I enjoy time;The universe is my nest;Of eternal spring.

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Song of Unity

Unite. Unite, Unite, Oh SoulsUnite and play your rolesUnite in mind, unite in heartUnite in whole, unite in partLike words and tunes and sense in songLet East and West unite and live longTrees are many; the grove is oneBranches are many; tree is oneShores are many; sea is oneLimbs are many; body is oneBodies are many; self is oneStars are many; sky is oneFlowers are many; honey is onePages are many; book is oneThoughts are many; thinker is oneTastes are many; taster is oneActors are many; the drama is oneNations are many; the world is oneReligions are many; Truth is oneThe wise are many; Wisdom is oneBeings are many; breath is oneClasses are many; college is oneFind out this One behind the manyThen life shall enjoy peaceful harmony

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Peace Anthem

Peace for all, peace for allFor all the countries peaceJoy for all, joy for allFor all the nations joyA rosy morning peaceA smiling summer joy (Peace for all)

All for each and each for allThis is the golden ruleLife and Light and Love for allFor all that live our love (Peace for all)

Work and food and clothes for allEqual status for allHealth and home and school for allA happy world for all (Peace for all)

No idle rich, no more beggarsAll are equal workersNo more tears, no more fearsThe heart is full of cheers (Peace for all)

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No atom scare, no fat mammonNo room for war demonLike leaves in trees, like rays in the sunWe are one communion,One Divine communion (Peace for all)

The good in you is good for allYour life is life for allThe God in you is God for allYour love is love for all (Peace for all)

For he or she or it or restThis collective life is bestThis Universal Life is bestNorth or South, or East or West (Peace for all)

Peace for plants and birds and beastsFor hills and streams and woodsPeace in Home – land and air and seaDynamic peace we see

Peace for all, peace for all

Immortal Peace for All

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Swami Shuddhananda Bharati

There is but one God for the whole worldAll bodies are but temples of God

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Presentation of Dr. Shuddhananda BharatiMay 11, 1897 – March 7, 1990

The wise one to the cosmic ageAlthough more than 90 years old, in his school in the southof India, Kavi Yogi Maharishi (great divine visionary, wisepoet) Dr. Shuddhananda Bharati worked like a young manof twenty. When he was asked his age, he answered, “Myage is Courage!” The Yogi wrote several hundred works inEnglish, French, Tamil, Hindi, Telugu and Sanskrit; andfive thousand songs, and fifteen hundred poems in French.The magnum opus of the man conscious of the presence ofGod in him, Bharata Shakti, (in 50,000 verses) described hisideal: only One Humanity living in communion with onlyOne God in a transformed world! Bharata Shakti is a monu-mental and unique work. The Yogi depicts the essence ofall the religions, of all the prophets and saints, all theapproaches of yoga and all the cultures on an allegoricalfabric. It is a book for any age that all spiritual researchersand all nations should read and meditate on. His commit-ment is summarized in his book celebrating his life, L’AmePèlerine (Pilgrim Soul). The three poems mentioned in theopening express perfectly his ideal. His mantra, Aum Shud-dha Shakti Aum, nourishes our souls and guides our stepstoward the inner joy – Ananda. It means: the light of Graceand power of the pure supreme Almighty bless us withpeace, happiness and prosperity! Let the beauty and great-ness of the soul of Dr. Bharati Shuddhananda bloom andscent the entire Earth with its divine message and spiritualand unifying benefactor!

Editions ASSA

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Baba – Yogi Shuddhananda Bharati Communion

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Baba blesses all

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Mehersthan Memoirby

Yogi Shuddhananda Bharati

Editions ASSAChristian Piaget

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Mehersthan Memoir

1. Lost in love

We met in a choirAnd lost our hearts in love.Love has left this memoirFor a lovers’ introspective.

When I was lost in TheeWe rose to planes heavenhigh.

A light from the silent skyDazzled out things nearby.

The part and the whole,The origin and the goal,The body and the soul,O BeIoved, Thou art all.

Thou art a golden mountain,Thy Grace is a live-fountain,This life is a flowing stream,Edenising our inner dream.

Its flowers jump into my handsAs my fancy goes aroundAnd I weave wedding garlandsFor Thee, the soul’s love unbound.

This home is open for Thee;This heart of love is free;This flute is clean and readyTo play Thy symphony.

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For Thee I keep myself young.

For Thee I raise my tongue.

Every kiss is a blossomOf passion in my bosom.

I shall not sell my loveFor fame and name and gold;To none but Thee shall I bow,O life and light of the world!No flashing steel shall killMy life strong in love divine;No changing age shall chillThe warm faith pure and serene.

Yogi Shuddhananda Bharati

2. This book

This book is dedicated to the unique One who hasassumed a form and name to lead the play of universalexistence. He throbs in our loving heart; He breathes inour living soul. He sings in our fervent spirit and he thinksin our purified mind. That infinite Ancient One from hissupernal height, bends towards us to embrace us in hislove, and to feed our soul with the nectar of his bliss.

Blessed are they that have the mind to know him, the heartto feel him and the love to live in his consciousness!

He may have been born to human parents in Poona, stud-ied in a college, played cricket, left home, have seen greatsouls, sat alone silent, spoken in gestures, written books —

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but that is not his history. Many live such a life; manyscholars write books; many saints sit in contemplation;many monks leave home for mountain resorts; but theycannot be one like him. Millions of bulbs challenge in vainthe darkness of night. One sun rises and the night dis-solves into his golden light. We have seen monks, yoginsand saints. Some live alone for peace. Some open Ashramsand collect donations to run them. Some comercialise theirname and form. Some display miracles to surprise humanminds; some offer boons; some predict the future; somecurse you when you do not offer them what they want.Some seek pleasure and treasure. But who seeks God andfinds God in the self to awaken God-awareness in othermen and women? Who says “I am God and you are Godtoo”? Who rises above the prattle of words, the rattle ofweapons and battle of ideologies to the lofty peace ofsupersonic silence and pours his blessings from the dizzyheight of the soul in tune with God? Who is he thatembraces all in the heart and awakens the soul which hasnone of the human creations of caste, religion, race, pedi-gree nor colour?

In one word, Meher Baba; He is the unique manifestation oflove light and peace for which the human soul has longedfor ages. Beyond the perishing body, his is some body.

We have seen a psychic picture of his life in the last bookThe Silent Splendour.

This is a book which brings out his centrifugal and cen-tripetal force — the force that has touched the hearts of thou-sands all over the world and made them feel “Here is God.”

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Many Indians have felt it; many Americans and Europeanshave felt it; many Muslims, Christians, Parsees and Bud-dhists have felt the divine radiance of the Ancient One.

But it is given to a particular nation to know and follow amanifestation integrally. Such are the Andhras and wehail their noble traits and high traditions. This book isconsecrated to Baba’s awakening wandering seenamong the Andhras.

3. Such are Andhras

A is the starting sound of languages. We can very well sayAndhras are A — one in Baba love. Love for divine saintsis born with them. There are historic and psychic evi-dences which prove the utter sincerity, nobility, andserenity of the Andhras.

The great war of Mahabharata was waged between B.C.1500-1000. It was a terrible war between the Pandavas andKauravas. The Pandya King of the South helped the Pan-davas and the Andhras and Kalingas helped the Kau-ravas. The Kauravas were defeated; the Pandavas ruledover North India for a few years. After them, the countrybroke into petty states without any idea of national inte-gration and coexistence. The Andhras who lived on thebanks of the Jamuna River migrated to the South and set-tled in Telengana and on the banks of the Godavari andKrishna and freely mingled with Nagas and Yekshas ofthose parts. They followed the traditions set up by RishiApastamba. This was in B.C. 700. Gunadhya, the author of

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Brihat Katha (Book of Great Stories), was born to a Nagamother and Brahmin father. People from scarcity areasand dry plateaux migrated to fertile parts and mingledwith the inhabitants of those places. The settlers in Telen-gana, Rayalaseema1, Circars and people living on theGodavari and Krishna banks came to be known asAndhras. The word Andhra appears for the first time in aPallava edict as old as B.C. 250. The Andhra Kingdomflourished then under the rule of Satavahanas. The Greeksuzerainty established by Alexander in B.C. 325 was dis-appearing after his sudden death in Babylon. SeleucusNicator, the satrap of Babylon, crossed the Indus about theyear B.C. 305 to conquer India. By this time, the Hindukingdoms stood up to resist the alien intrusions. ChandraGupta, with the help of his able minister KautilyaChanakya (an Andhra), established the Maurya dynasty atPataliputra and extended his kingdom all over NorthIndia. He successfully resisted the ambitious incursions ofSeleucus who came to terms with the invincible Indianmonarch. Megasthenes, his ambassador, visited severalparts of India and gave a vivid picture of our country inhis famous notes.

Emperor Chandra Gupta organised his administrationafter the pattern ably laid down in the Artha Sastra of Kau-tilya, the master of state-craft. With equal acumen, theSatavahana kings too built up the Andhra Kingdom.Megasthenes gives a glorious account of Kalinga which hevisited in B.C. 322. The village was the unit of the empire,and the civil administration as well as military, spiritual as1 Rayalaseema (Rayalasima) is a geographic region in the Indian stateof Andhra Pradesh.

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well as temporal was ably managed and the people’srights were safeguarded. Chandra Gupta became a piousjain. His grandson Asoka invaded Kalinga and slew thou-sands of men in a ghastly fight. This filled him with horrorand remorse. Asoka flung away his sword and embracedBuddhism. His government was impregnated with thespirit of Buddhism. He brought out a synthesis of themoral and temporal interests. He sent trained Bikkus farand wide to propagate the teachings of Buddhism. His sonMahendra and his daughter Sanghamitra converted Cey-lon to Buddhism. He organised effective missions to radi-ate the light of peace and wisdom. His edicts show him asa moral ruler, easy to approach and ready to hear andredress the grievence of his subjects.

He was a strict vegetarian and he made his people acceptthe sanctity of animal life. The country enjoyed 37 years ofcontinuons peace and plenty under the Dharma Chakra ofAsoka. He convened a Buddhist Council to standardisethe religion and its scriptures. Religion, art, architecture,literature, medicine, commerce, industry, shipping —everything progressed during his life lime. It was thegolden age of Hindu India.

The halcyon days2 of peace and security disappeared withthe death of Asoka. Unity melted away before the vanity2 From Latin Alcyone, daughter of Aeolus and wife of Ceyx. When herhusband died in a shipwreck, Alcyone threw herself into the sea,whereupon the gods transformed them both into halcyon birds (king-fishers). When Alcyone made her nest on the beach, waves threatenedto destroy it. Aeolus restrained his winds and kept them calm duringseven days in each year, so she could lay her eggs. These becameknown as the “Halcyon days,” when storms do not occur. Today, theterm is used to denote a past period that is being remembered for beinghappy and/or successful.

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of self-assertive states struggling for supremacy in thedark inferno of selfish greed. India united was strong andinvincible. India divided became weak and fell an easyprey to invaders. The Andhras and Kalingas, whoacknowledged the supremacy of Asoka, now assertedtheir independence and went forward with a powerfularmy to expand their kingdoms. Invader after invaderbrought chaos into North India. Pliny, the historian, saysthat the Andhras and Tamils had a definite culture andcivilisation. They increased their trade and maritimeenterprise enormously.

The Andhras possessed thirty fortified towns and main-tained a huge army of 1,000 elephants, 20,000 cavalryand 100,000 infantry. The Andhra dominion extendedbeyond Ujjain to Videsa. King Kharavela of Kalingainvaded North India and totally defeated the King ofPataliputra. The Andhra Satavahanas subdued all tribaloligarchies and became a dominant nation. They issuedtheir own coins. The Satavahana Kingdom extended itspower beyond Guzarat and Malwa. The golden days ofAndhra supremacy continued even after the end ofSatavahana rule in 225 A.D. Even during the Guptaperiod, Andhra kings were powerful. Hiuen Tsang hasnoted the glory of the Andhras. The Chalukya andKakatiya kings, Kondaveeti Reddi kings and at last thegrand empire of Vijayanagar added to the fame andname of the Andhras. Kings like Pulikesi and KrishnaDeva Raya brought glory to the Andhras. The Andhrakingdom extended south as far as Tanjore, Madurai andRameswaram and with that, the Telugu language, litera-ture and culture widely spread all over India. There are

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plenty of coins, copper plates, monuments, travel notesand cultural reminiscences which stand testimony to theAndhra supremacy.

Telugu is one of the sweetest languages of the world, per-haps the most melodious among India languages. Thepoems contained in the Bhagavatam of Bommana Pothana,the Ramayana of Bhaskara and the thrilling Satakams andPadhyams popular in the Andhradesh are cascades of met-rical ecstasy thrilling into the soul of hearers and pleasingeven those who do not know the language.

Andhra produced the most valuable Koh-i-Noor diamond(756 carats). It was first found at Kollur on the bank of theKrishna river in 1656. It changed hands from Shah Jahanto Aurangazeb, from him to Nadir Shah, from him toTaimur, then to Shuja, then to Ranjit Singh and from hisson to Queen Victoria. Read Sewell’s Forgotten Empire,containing thrilling episodes of the last glory of theAndhra Empire at Vijayanagar. But it was not the lostglory. The destiny of the Andhras changed with that ofIndia. But all along the zigzag course of history, theAndhras maintained their natural majesty, serenity, nobil-ity, highminded intelligence and large-hearted charity.Whether it was Muslim or Christian or British rule, theAndhras, like the Tamils, held their heads up and raisedtheir standard of national integrity. They knew their dutyand how to fulfil it. Today the Andhra Pradesh has a widearea rich in mineral and agricultural wealth, nourished bythe waters of the Godavari and the Krishna.

Even in recent days, Andhra has produced great saints,poets, heroes and men of letters and artists. The world

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admires the frescoes of Ajanta, the ruins of Humpy, thesongs of Thyaga Raja. Even today the nation adores Vid-yaranya, Vallaba, Ramadas, Vemana, Pothana, and ourhomage goes to great personalities like K. Viresam Pan-tulu (1848-1919), Mahakavi G. Appa Rao (1862-1915),Kasinath Nageswara Rao (1867-1938), K. HanumanthaRao, Duggirala Gopalakrishnaiya, T. Prakasam and Pat-tabi Sitaramaiya.

Such is the Andhra culture developing on the banks of theGodavari and the Krishna, and such are the traits ofAndhra genius – true to conscience, faithful, trustful,noble, liberal and sincere. It is upon this historic back-ground that Baba-lovers are holding aloft the Vibgyorflag. Next, let us study the life of a few well knownAndhra saints and know the spiritual background toBaba’s moment.

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