[Advaita-l] Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi - Annamalai Swami

[Divya Meedin]

On the 70th Aradhana of Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi, an excerpt from
'Living by the Words of Bhagavan' (Conversations with Sri Annamalai Swami,
pages 211-212):


Bhagavan gave me his grace and then severed the personal relationship
between us. The bond of love and devotion was not separated; it was just
restricted to the mind and the heart.

When Bhagavan became very sick at the end of the 1940s I was sorely tempted
to visit him. I never succumbed because I knew that Bhagavan had instructed
me to stay away from his presence. Some people who were not aware of what
Bhagavan had told me thought that I was being disrespectful by staying
away. One devotee even asked Bhagavan about this.

'Annamalai Swami served Bhagavan for a long time,' he said, 'but he is not
coming to see Bhagavan now that Bhagavan is seriously ill.'

Bhagavan, detecting a certain self-righteousness in the questioner,
remarked, 'He is the one who is not causing any trouble.'
Then he added, 'You people are here but your minds are elsewhere. He is
elsewhere but his mind is here.'

Rangaswami, Bhagavan's attendant, reported this to me later that day. It
was good to hear that Bhagavan was consciously aware that I was constantly
thinking and worrying about him.

During the last year of Bhagavan's life I suffered from a continuous,
severe stomach pain. Some of the doctors who came to treat Bhagavan treated
me as well but none of them was able to relieve the pain. I was unable to
eat anything except gruel, and even that only in small quantities. If I
tried to eat a lot of gruel, or any different kind of food, the pain in my
stomach would become unbearable. In the last days of Bhagavan's life the
pain got much worse.

It got so severe that I remember thinking, 'Let me give up this body before
Bhagavan gives up his. I cannot stand this pain any longer.'

I finally decided to pray to Bhagavan, not for good health, but for death.
At that time there were some steps going up to my flat roof. I climbed up
them very slowly and painfully and looked in Bhagavan's direction.

'Please Bhagavan,' I prayed, 'let me attain Samadhi before you attain
Samadhi.' At that moment I saw the great light in the sky, the light that
signified that Bhagavan had died. Many people saw this light and most of
them reported that it resembled a meteor. It appeared to me in a different
form: I saw a great column of light about twenty feet high and 1 1/2 feet
wide in the middle of the sky. While it was manifesting for a period of
about two minutes it was slowly descending towards the ashram. A few
minutes later a Saadhu came and told me that Bhagavan had passed away. At
the exact moment when he told me the news, my stomach pains vanished and
never reappeared again.


*****An except from Diary Extracts (in the aforementioned book), page 231:

Question: I am thinking of leaving my village to go into a forest to
perform Tapas. I have decided to go with the permission of Bhagavan.

Bhagavan: One may leave the village but one cannot leave oneself. If the
village exists apart from oneself, it may be left. To live alone at the
place of Self is like living in the forest. If you leave the Self, even if
you go and live in a forest, it will be the same as living in a city.
The one who thinks he is a sannyasin is not a sannyasin. The householder
who does not think he is a householder is a sannyasin.
The one who does not think that he is the one who is doing all his actions
is superior to the one who thinks that he has renounced everything.