MEHER BABA SPEAKS

Meher Baba in 1930s

By Malladi Rama Rao
The terrorist attacks on New York’s iconic twin towers of World Trade Centre in September 2001 were part of unfolding Avataric Divine Plan for global awakening and resurrection’, says a leading Indian academic.

Prof Jagadambi S. Rathore adds: “I reflected on 9/11 deeply. I am convinced that suffering of this magnitude had Avatar Meher Baba connection. It marked the unfolding of Avataric Divine Plan”.

Rathore is an authority on Meher Baba’s divine message. A scientist by training and temperament, and an academic by profession, he is heading the Meher Spiritual University, which is a first of its kind virtual university.

Elaborating his interpretation of the terrorist attack that shook the world, the professor speaks about a visit of Meher Baba to the Wall Street during his maiden visit to the United States in 1931. “No one was told the purpose of the visit. The great spiritual significance of Baba’s brief visit to the Wall St is now becoming clear”.

Wall Street in New York is the financial capital of USA. World Trade Center with its twin towers was the symbolic heart of Wall Street. It housed numerous international and American investment banks, brokerages law firms and service companies. Around 50000 people of different nationalities worked there, and on 9/11 as hijacked jets crashed into the towers, the edifice came down in a stroke taking the lives of the innocents.

It was the image of a bubble pricked by a needle, Prof Rathore, who had authored “The Shore to Shoreless”, avers.

I reflected on 9/11 deeply. I am convinced that suffering of this magnitude had Avatar Meher Baba connection. It marked the unfolding of Avataric Divine Plan – Prof Jagadambi Rathod.

That day, September 11, 2001, he was in Bhopal, a central India city visited by Meher Baba many times. As the sun was setting, he and his colleagues were getting ready to leave for Ahmednagar to participate the next day in the lighting of sacred fire at Meherabad. The practice of lighting fire, Dhuni, as it is called, on the 12th day of every month, goes back to several years. Meher Baba Himself had lighted the first sacred fire at Meherabad.

A news update on the TV drew their attention. ‘ As I saw a jet airliner hit one of the buildings of World Trade Center and its top engulfed by fire and smoke, the great spiritual significance of the tragedy struck me’, Prof Rathore said in an e-mail interview.

Meher Baba visited the US in 1931. He sailed into New York harbor on board S.S.Roma at two in the afternoon of Nov 6. Reaching there Meher Baba repeated his statement which he had made earlier before commencing his mystic silence on 10 July 1925: “I have come not to teach, but to awaken.”

Before leaving the Big Apple, Baba wished to be driven around Wall St. Jean Adriel drove him in a car around the place dotted with high rise buildings. It was a Saturday and the streets were virtually deserted.

“As Jesus came to impart spirituality to a materialistic age, so I have come to impart a spiritual push to present-day mankind. … America has a tremendous future and will become a spiritually-minded nation. … America is destined to lead the world spiritually.”

Jean was thinking to herself, “How ephemeral and unreal is this money madness” The next moment, pointing to the skyscrapers, Baba smiled at her and gestured, “It is all a bubble, so easy to prick!”

Says Prof Rathore: “Baba’s words were significant. What had happened on 11 Sept 2001 aptly fits the image of a bubble pricked by a needle”.

1931 was the year when Avatar Meher Baba, along with three companions, made his very first tour of the West. On 11 September 1931, Baba put His feet on the European soil at Marseilles at eight that morning.

Two days later on 13 September, an American scientist, Thomas Watson and his wife met Baba and on the 15th they invited Him to their country, saying, “America is the country for a great spiritual worker like you. You must go there”.

Thomas Watson offered to make arrangements for Meher Baba’s visit to the US. “If you permit me, I shall make all the necessary arrangements for you and your group to visit New York. On behalf of American people, I extend my heartiest invitation to you to come to the United States.”

Meher Baba accepted the invitation because in the unfoldment of His Divine Plan, ‘America has a major role to play’. He himself spoke of America’s destiny to lead the world spiritually.

In an interview with British journalist Paul Brunton (23 November 1930), Meher Baba said: “I shall change the history of the whole world. As Jesus came to impart spirituality to a materialistic age, so I have come to impart a spiritual push to present-day mankind. … America has a tremendous future and will become a spiritually-minded nation. … America is destined to lead the world spiritually.”

Brunton conducted the interview when Meher Baba was living in a cave dug by His followers atop Meherabad hill. It was called Panchvati cave. After Baba completed His work from the cave, Panchvati was pulled down. Today a plaque stands at the place.