The Hindu-Muslim compromise

Once Devadas went to live and meditate in a Muslim area. In the middle of the night he would blow a conch and ring a bell. The Muslims are dead against using conches and bells, and they warned the Hindu sadhu that they would punish him severely if he did not stop doing this. The following night he blew the conch and rang the bell louder than ever. The Muslim soldiers came to arrest him, but when they entered his room, to their wide surprise they saw that his head had been severed from his body and was lying on a chair, and his limbs were all scattered around the room. But there was no blood. The soldiers did not want to touch the body, so they left.

In a few minutes’ time they heard the same bell and the sound of the conch, so they rushed back, only to see the same scene again. Again they left, only to hear the conch and the bell once more. This time they were furious. When they returned to the room, Devadas was there in his normal human form.

“What can you do to me?” he said. “You have just seen twice what I can do. Before you arrest me, I shall disassemble myself.”

When the soldiers went to report the matter to the Muslim chief, the chief said to them, “It is not advisable to fight with a man who has such extraordinary spiritual power. The best thing is to surrender to him and ask him if he would like to have a temple built. I shall pay for it. Let him peacefully pray and meditate there and do whatever he wants to do.”

Devadas was extremely pleased with the Muslim chief’s offer. The Muslim chief erected a beautiful temple for him, and Devadas in deep gratitude stopped blowing the conch and ringing the bell.

Commentary: The Hindu and the Muslim are like two powerful branches of the reality-tree, which is all oneness-freedom. But the outer life of the human beings is so complicated that no matter what other persons do, they will get irritated or feel insecure or inferior.

The Master showed on the one hand that he had the body-reality of the Supreme to manifest the Supreme. On the other hand, he showed that he had the soul-reality of the Supreme to realise the Supreme. The Master disassembled and assembled his body in order to show to the naked eyes of human beings that medical science does not have the last word on God’s creation and man’s life and death. It is only the inscrutable Will of the Supreme that operates in and through the spiritual Master.

From:Sri Chinmoy,India and her miracle-feast: come and enjoy yourself, part 5 — Traditional Indian stories about Devadas Maharaj, Agni Press, 1977
Sourced from https://srichinmoylibrary.com/imf_5