Glimpses of His first World Tour: The Master in 1955

I. The Background

The Spiritual heritage of western man has come down to us in a very distorted form. The full Truth was revealed by Jesus the Nazarene, building on a long preparatory period including the work of the great Jewish prophets and His own Guru, John the Baptist; but the Life-Impulse passed on by Him remained in the East, embodied in men little known to us except under such labels as Ebionites, Gnostics, etc., and eventually disappeared as such, merging with the Islamic Sufi tradition. The Christianity that was carried to the western world had a very different emphasis and direction than the original teachings of Jesus.

The Truth was not entirely forgotten, of course; many of the writings and biographies of the greatest Christian Saints, Catholic and Orthodox, reveal the depth of their Inner Experience and genuine Love for God, not to mention the huge compendium of esoteric knowledge contained in the Jewish Kabbalah and the lives of the Great Hasidic Masters; and here and there, in the stories of the Holy Grail and especially in the writings of the great Lutheran mystic Jacob Boehme, we get glimpses of the Highest Teaching of all. But as the world moved into the modern era, the West sank deeper and deeper into the darkness of materialism, chauvinism and intellectual arrogance, sowing seeds that are only now bearing fruit; and the accessibility of genuine Spirituality became almost non-existent.

Finally, after a long preparatory period, during which the basic ideas of mysticism, this time in their Indian form, were reintroduced into the main stream of western thought, the most powerful seed of all was sown: in 1911 an initiate of Baba Sawan Singh Ji came to America and initiated a Port Angeles, Washington, dentist named Dr H.M. Brock. Thus the history of the Masters’ Path in the West was begun. Dr Brock, now passed on, served his Master for many years as His representative in the West, and after Baba Sawan Singh left His body, he served the present Master in the same capacity.

His long lifetime of devotion to the Saints reached a climax in 1955 when, at the age of 83, he met a Master in the flesh for the first time. Here are his own comments:

It was in the year 1910 or 1911 that Mr Kher Singh Sasmas came to us and told us of the then Living Master – Sawan Singh. We were given the initiation by Mr Sasmas under the directions of the Master. In our correspondence, I at one time asked (the Master),

In case He passed on before I did, would I know Who the new Master would be?

and He said I would.

So I was quite satisfied when Mr Khanna put me in touch with Sant Kirpal Singh.

In India there is a background of thousands of years of recognising the spiritually Enlightened Ones, while to us in this country the coming of such a One is new and of great importance, and we hope to have the Master back again at an early date. In Sant Kirpal Singh, I think everyone recognises the unbounded spirit of Love that permeates Him and everything He does, regardless of who or what people are or may have been.¹

During Baba Sawan Singh’s lifetime, the work in India grew at a tremendous rate, but the number of initiates over here remained very small. With the advent of the ministry of the present Master, the pace began to increase, and through the devoted labours of Mr T.S. Khanna, Mrs Dona Kelley, Mrs Gordon Hughes, Dr Brock, and others, regular centres were established and Satsang was held in Washington, Louisville, and other places. Thus the ground was prepared for the arrival of the Living Master in person in May, 1955.

America then was very different than it is now. In many ways a more pleasant place, since many of the seeds that have since born bitter fruit were still lying dormant, spiritually it was a desert.

Nevertheless, the Master had compassion on us all and came anyway, thus blessing even those – such as the present writer – who were totally ignorant of His presence, even though they may have moved about within a few blocks of Him. And so the Gospel of Truth that had been revealed to the West by Jesus the Nazarene and then forgotten and ignored, was brought back to us by the Living Christ of our time. Basing what He said squarely on the Bible, the Master gave talks that must have seemed revolutionary to His listeners. One such talk is included in this issue; to understand its True Significance, we must bear in mind the complete newness of what He was saying to the minds of His audience.

The impact of the Master on those who were ready to receive Him was nothing less than stunning. Shortly after the tour, a small book, ‘As they saw the Master,’ containing brief accounts of the experiences of a number of western disciples with Him, was published. Here is an extract from the testimony of Walter Paul Baptiste, one of the few authentic American yogis, which gives some indication of the extent of the Grace that was being poured out:

When Master Kirpal Singh came to our vicinity, we noted and accepted Him at first as a really healthy ideal type of Spiritual Stature and character. […] Then one day I looked into His eyes, and within that instant, I reviewed all that I knew and had a glimpse of the more that He was. The depths of His eyes as He exposed Himself to me on three or four occasions are with me, even in my meditations. […] One night, in a room with Him […] I was aware of His body breathing very fast and then suddenly I could detect no breath. Suddenly thru me ran a feeling that I was in the presence of death […] the strange thing at that time was that I also felt this from Bibi Hardevi, who was sitting in posture covered from head to toe with a light blanket about eight feet from the foot of the Master’s bed. A fear ran thru me, penetrating deeply into my awareness. I wondered, what had I gotten myself into? Then […] the illuminating thought came thru me that here I was in the very midst of what I had been practising to masterfully attain. At this moment thru me, like an avalanche and flood, my whole being was absorbed in the same intense condition of Divine Love. […] This Love is so intensely dynamic and ecstatic and overwhelming that it cannot even be compared to the love that we feel for those we love. […] And in me, every part of me, I was again torn apart into a nothingness, and I was swept up into the most complete surrender, saying with the greatest feeling within and thru myself, ‘Father! What have I done! Forgive me for not recognising You!’ […] I kept saying uncontrollably within myself, ‘I love thee Father, I love thee Father’ – over and over. But to me at that time – and as now – when I said Father, it meant God, and when I said God, it meant Kirpal Singh. All these names were one and the same […]²

But the highlight of the book, and the account that gives the most insight into the day-to-day reality of what must be the single most important event of our era – as far as we in the West are concerned – is the detailed report of the late Dr Ann Martin of Nashville, Tennessee, the major part of which follows.

The Editor

II. Nine Days with the Living Master

Dr Martin begins her article with a long account of her search for Truth, culminating with her contact with the Master’s teaching. Asking the Master by correspondence for initiation, He told her to meet Him in person in Louisville during His stay there. We pick up her account at that point.

In Louisville she (the writer) took a room at a hotel, and contacted someone whose address had been given her. She was told to go direct to the house where the Master was in residence, which she did. As she walked up on the porch, a man met her saying the Master was busy at the moment, but would see her soon, and asked her to have a seat and wait there. She sat down in a swing, and she doesn’t mind telling you that her thoughts were beginning to pile up on her. All at once, as she sat there on this strange porch, in this strange town, amid people whom she had never seen or met before, she began berating herself. Her thoughts went on a rampage, and she asked herself, half angrily, what was she doing there? Had she suddenly taken leave of her senses, to leave home on a mission of this sort, when she knew that every attempt she’d ever made fell flat? What did she expect to find here?

About this time she glanced up, and walking towards her was a Godman. She was first stunned by the sheer beauty of the person approaching her. His gleaming white finely-woven garments, His bearing, His eyes, His smile, His very expression of all-embracing understanding and Love seemed to swamp her. It swept over her like a sudden storm of inexpressible joy! Before she could get close enough to put her hand in His, she knew her search was ended! […] There are no words adequate to use in describing one’s first meeting with the Master. All the joys one can conjure up in one’s mind vanish when compared to the actual joy that is there. Words are of no use here at all, they fall like spent bullets, when one tries to tell of his feelings when he first comes face to face with the Great Beloved Master. Everything seemed to come to a complete standstill for the writer. She felt bathed in the purest Holy Light imaginable, and earth – even time itself – seemed no more. All she can remember of this meeting is that she got up out of the swing and met the Master.

She heard herself say,

Oh! You are the Master!

Any other words, if there were, she does not recall. There must have been other words, but her heart suddenly was so full of joy and gladness that she could hardly stand it, for she felt surely it would burst within her for the joy that was hers at this sacred moment in her life. […]

Shortly afterwards she went back to her hotel with instructions to be back early in the morning for initiation. After initiation, which the writer knows was her Real Birth into the Kingdom of Heaven, the Master asked her where she was staying, and when she recovered from a surprise that busy as He was, He could be concerned with a single individual, she told Him she was staying at the Brown Hotel. He asked her to come to His place and stay, but she demurred, saying she was a complete stranger there and felt she might intrude.

The man who first met her and told her to wait for the Master quickly stepped to her side and said:

It is a Great Honour that the Master has asked you to stay under His roof! Do not refuse Him.

She immediately sent for her bags and remained in the Master’s house the balance of her time up there. […]

People address Him as His Holiness. Some resent this title, yet even this is not good enough for one so holy as He. For those of us who have met Him and sat at His blessed feet know that He is most holy. He does not ask that He be so addressed, but He will not deny one the privilege to address Him what one wishes. […]

One evening, He was invited into a beloved disciple’s home and cookies and lemonade were served as refreshment. The dear little hostess did not offer the Master a cookie, and the writer suggested that she do so.

But, I thought he would eat only foods prepared at His own residence,

she said apologetically, but held the tray of cookies towards Him, and with the most beautiful smile ever to grace a human face, He said,

Is it your wish that I take one?

– Oh, yes, Master,

she said.

And He took a cookie and ate it. Such is the Master. His kindness envelops you like a cloak. He is the most benevolent, the most gracious, the most humble, yet the Greatest Personality, ever to walk on this earth.

The writer was so deeply impressed with the fact that no matter how many people happened to be at His residence where He held Satsang every day, they were always fed at meal time, and there was always a crowd. […] No one was allowed to go away hungry or unfed. It was a miracle, no less. To have crowds coming and going, all the time, as was the case here, and to be completely cognisant of everyone’s comfort and well being. It is a task for a large well-equipped ménage, but not so here. Two or three at the most kept a smooth-running household and all were supplied food regularly. The writer recalls that several times she was busy somewhere off in a corner by herself, forgetful of food itself, but she was always sought out and called in to eat. Even those who were quietly out doing secretarial work or meditating were not overlooked. Aware of the fact that she was partaking of food and lodging without paying, the writer attempted to do something about it. She decided that she would go every day and bring in a basket of groceries. Accordingly, she secured the services of a car and went and bought some groceries.

Mr Khanna, the Master’s representative, met her and asked her what she had brought and she said,

Some groceries.

He reprimanded her severely, yet very gently and sweetly.

This sort of thing is not done in the Master’s house. He provides everything! All is free, free as the air you breathe! Do not do this again, please.

– But I feel I should pay a little something,

she remonstrated.

The Master does not accept gifts or money from anyone! He gives, He does not take,

the man said, and so the writer obeyed, with untold wonder growing in her heart. There was nothing to pay. No one to whom anything could be paid. There was no one to take any money. The writer tried vainly to reimburse someone for the days she spent there, and to no avail. And when Mr Khanna told her of the man who had sent a cheek for $5,000, that the Master returned to the sender because He does not accept gifts, she understood what he was trying to tell her.

The Master is not interested in money or gifts. All He is interested in is your soul, and that you do the things that He teaches you to do,

said Mr Khanna, and the writer turned away with the wonder of things growing and growing in her heart. In these days of fee and money grabbing and stress and turmoil, here was One Who did not love money, Who is only interested in your soul and your happiness and well-being! Strange things these, – almost too much for one to believe, and the writer doubts if she could have believed all these things had she not witnessed them with her own eyes and ears, and experienced them in her own life.

Wherever the Master went, carloads of people followed Him. I mean those of us who would not be parted from Him, who clung close to His beloved side, and there were many of us who would not stay a moment longer than necessary out of His blessed presence. Did this bother Him? No, His patience never seemed to run out. If the writer got a little impatient, His loving eyes would seek her out and one look into them made her want to fall at His feet for forgiveness. His eyes sought you out, not to correct you, or to chide you, but to lend you aid in your own little struggles, which He knew were going on inside His beloved ones nearby.

The writer recalls with vibrant memories the many wonderful things about her Beloved Master that are impossible to put on paper. His complete indifference to people’s shortcomings. The time He always had for all who came to Him. His graciousness in granting audiences to all who asked for interviews. There were times when the writer herself felt chagrined at her inflated ego, taking up the Master’s precious time by insisting on pouring out a gushing stream of her own importance and discoveries, etc., and never giving the gentle Master an opportunity to say a word. How many times has this disciple looked into the kind, gentle, love-filled eyes of her beloved Master as He sat patiently through some person’s verbal catalogue of all he’d read and found and concluded about religion, listening, giving complete audience as though he were the only other man in the world beside himself. Did the Master try to deflate one’s ego? He did not. People would come and take up the Master’s time, not to listen to Him, but to talk about themselves. Yet the Beloved Master always had time to attend to them. And this disciple saw the True Greatness of her Master in all these things.

The writer would have thought nothing of it had the Master said, ‘I am too busy. The man must get rid of his own importance before I can talk with him. I cannot waste precious time on him,’ and she was surprised that this did not happen, for the Master truly was very busy always. A man once showed up when the Master was extremely busy and this disciple thought, surely now the Master will tell him he is too busy, and she watched the Master’s face for perhaps a fleeting shadow denoting His displeasure, for this was surely an intrusion. You see, she was taking dictation from the Master to assist in the heavy correspondence, but, as though His own favourite or most beloved son demanded a moment of His time, He gently laid down His pencil, weighted His mail so it would not blow away, excused Himself – we were sitting out in the garden among the trees – and followed the man to a distant nook of the garden, and there they sat for over an hour. From time to time the writer glanced up from her work to see the man’s hand flailing the air, and to hear his voice droning on and on. It is the greatest lesson in patience and humility ever taught.

As the writer looks back over those eventful days of her life, the thing that seems to stand out the most in it all is that the Master seemed to be Love itself, Love personified. His absolute magnificence, as He moved about among us, is indescribable. His graciousness, His impartiality, towards us all alike was something unheard of. You knew when He looked at you that He was seeing another child of God, no matter how you may feel about yourself. He did not look at you, nor Jane, or Mary, nor John, nor Bill, for personality means nothing to Him. But He looked at you as though He were looking at a child of God […] No tongue can tell, no words can express, the absolute serenity and peace that was and is the writer’s because of her short association with the Great Master.

One day a trip was suddenly planned. We piled into cars and there was quite a parade of us, all our cars keeping close together. We were to visit the Hermits’ Tunnel, a place on a mountain side that had been blown out of solid rock for a railroad tunnel, then finally abandoned for some reason. The man now owning the place invited the Master to visit his place, which really was unique.

It was here that the writer saw the Master in a different setting. The summer was hot, and the lowlands seemed to sizzle with the dry heat, but up there it was cool and pleasant.

We were all more or less like children, tramping all over the place, so glad to escape the heat and rush of things, and the Beloved Master seemed to enjoy the fun as much as the rest of us.

In fact, this writer cannot recall one instant that the Beloved Master’s face was not all bathed in a most pleasant, happy, peaceful expression. He was always like a proud, loving, happy father with an adored and adoring family about Him all the time, and the constant sweetness of His expressions of all-embracing Love is beyond human description …

Of course, everyone wanted to make the Master most comfortable, but He would have none of it. He found Himself a place to sit down with the rest of us, and became one with our pleasure and sweetness that day. Someone handed Him a bottle of soft drink and asked Him if He would hold it while she took His photograph. He smilingly obliged. I should say He happily obliged, because there was not the least bit of condescension about Him. Whatever He did to make another happy was done in all Love and humility, and He always considered the desire of others where He Himself was concerned.

The writer was never critical, but here she was at the apex of her whole life, she felt, and naturally she was on the alert for the least fault or imperfection to show up. Too much in her was at stake. She had too much to lay at the feet of just anyone. Could she be blamed for being watchful and careful? Was there any discord about this Godman? About Him maybe a little, but in Him? Never! Like a beautiful, calm, white lily He was there in His own serenity and peace; no matter what swirled at His blessed feet, He was perfect. The world troubled Him not. He knew those ready for Him would find Him, and so His calm spread over all about Him like a mantle. No wonder people flocked about Him. No wonder they followed Him in crowds wherever He went. The writer recalls with much pleasure a trip the Master made to a local firm – on business. We all followed Him. Carloads of us. It would be impossible to tell how many there were, but the writer recalls that someone had to get out and direct the parking of all the cars. We trooped into the store with this illustrious, this magnificently white-garbed, tall and exceedingly handsome man at the lead, and we just stood around quietly waiting for Him to complete His business, only to follow Him out and back to His residence. We did this simply because we could not be separated from Him even that long. Such was our Love and adoration for Him. And in all this, not one time did the writer catch a glimpse of impatience or displeasure. Nothing but perfection ever showed up in the Master, and this perfection was as natural as the radiance to the sun itself. But how can it ever be described? One may as well try to describe the perfection of the sun, or to watch for the very sun to make a mistake or to prove itself unworthy.

_______________

Footnotes: 1) ‘As they saw the Master,’ Delhi: Ruhani Satsang, 1956, p. 18. 2) ‘As they saw the Master,’ pp. 13-15.