Autobiography of a Yogi Part 2

Morning found me with a stalwart boil on the indicated spot; the dimensions of Uma's boil had doubled. With a shriek, my sister rushed to Mother. "Mukunda has become a necromancer!" Gravely, Mother instructed me never to use the power of words for doing harm. I have always remembered her counsel, and followed it.

My boil was surgically treated. A noticeable scar, left by the doctor's incision, is present today. On my right forearm is a constant reminder of the power in man's sheer word.

Those simple and apparently harmless phrases to Uma, spoken with deep concentration, had possessed sufficient hidden force to explode like bombs and produce definite, though injurious, effects.

I understood, later, that the explosive vibratory power in speech could be wisely directed to free one's life from difficulties, and thus operate without scar or rebuke. {FN1-12}

Our family moved to Lah.o.r.e in the Punjab. There I acquired a picture of the Divine Mother in the form of the G.o.ddess Kali. {FN1-13} It sanctified a small informal shrine on the balcony of our home. An unequivocal conviction came over me that fulfillment would crown any of my prayers uttered in that sacred spot. Standing there with Uma one day, I watched two kites flying over the roofs of the buildings on the opposite side of the very narrow lane.

"Why are you so quiet?" Uma pushed me playfully.

"I am just thinking how wonderful it is that Divine Mother gives me whatever I ask."

"I suppose She would give you those two kites!" My sister laughed derisively.

"Why not?" I began silent prayers for their possession.

Matches are played in India with kites whose strings are covered with glue and ground gla.s.s. Each player attempts to sever the string of his opponent. A freed kite sails over the roofs; there is great fun in catching it. Inasmuch as Uma and I were on the balcony, it seemed impossible that any loosed kite could come into our hands; its string would naturally dangle over the roofs.

The players across the lane began their match. One string was cut; immediately the kite floated in my direction. It was stationary for a moment, through sudden abatement of breeze, which sufficed to firmly entangle the string with a cactus plant on top of the opposite house. A perfect loop was formed for my seizure. I handed the prize to Uma.

"It was just an extraordinary accident, and not an answer to your prayer. If the other kite comes to you, then I shall believe."

Sister's dark eyes conveyed more amazement than her words.

I continued my prayers with a crescendo intensity. A forcible tug by the other player resulted in the abrupt loss of his kite. It headed toward me, dancing in the wind. My helpful a.s.sistant, the cactus plant, again secured the kite string in the necessary loop by which I could grasp it. I presented my second trophy to Uma.

"Indeed, Divine Mother listens to you! This is all too uncanny for me!" Sister bolted away like a frightened fawn.

{FN1-2} Spiritual teacher; from Sanskrit root GUR, to raise, to uplift.

{FN1-3} A pract.i.tioner of yoga, "union," ancient Indian science of meditation on G.o.d.

{FN1-4} My name was changed to Yogananda when I entered the ancient monastic Swami Order in 1914. My guru bestowed the religious t.i.tle of PARAMHANSA on me in 1935 (see ../chapters 24 and 42).

{FN1-5} Traditionally, the second caste of warriors and rulers.

{FN1-6} These ancient epics are the h.o.a.rd of India's history, mythology, and philosophy. An "Everyman's Library" volume, RAMAYANA AND MAHABHARATA, is a condensation in English verse by Romesh Dutt (New York: E. P. Dutton).

{FN1-7} This n.o.ble Sanskrit poem, which occurs as part of the MAHABHARATA epic, is the Hindu Bible. The most poetical English translation is Edwin Arnold's THE SONG CELESTIAL (Philadelphia: David McKay, 75 cents). One of the best translations with detailed commentary is Sri Aurobindo's MESSAGE OF THE GITA (Jupiter Press, 16 Semudoss St., Madras, India, $3.50).

{FN1-8} BABU (Mister) is placed in Bengali names at the end.

{FN1-9} The phenomenal powers possessed by great masters are explained in chapter 30, "The Law of Miracles."

{FN1-10} A yogic technique whereby the sensory tumult is stilled, permitting man to achieve an ever-increasing ident.i.ty with cosmic consciousness. (See p. 243.)

{FN1-11} A Sanskrit name for G.o.d as Ruler of the universe; from the root IS, to rule. There are 108 names for G.o.d in the Hindu scriptures, each one carrying a different shade of philosophical meaning.

{FN1-12} The infinite potencies of sound derive from the Creative Word, AUM, the cosmic vibratory power behind all atomic energies.

Any word spoken with clear realization and deep concentration has a materializing value. Loud or silent repet.i.tion of inspiring words has been found effective in Coueism and similar systems of psychotherapy; the secret lies in the stepping-up of the mind's vibratory rate. The poet Tennyson has left us, in his MEMOIRS, an account of his repet.i.tious device for pa.s.sing beyond the conscious mind into superconsciousness:

"A kind of waking trance-this for lack of a better word-I have frequently had, quite up from boyhood, when I have been all alone,"

Tennyson wrote. "This has come upon me through REPEATING my own name to myself silently, till all at once, as it were out of the intensity of the consciousness of individuality, individuality itself seemed to dissolve and fade away into boundless being, and this not a confused state but the clearest, the surest of the surest, utterly beyond words-where death was an almost laughable impossibility-the loss of personality (if so it were) seeming no extinction, but the only true life." He wrote further: "It is no nebulous ecstasy, but a state of transcendent wonder, a.s.sociated with absolute clearness of mind."

{FN1-13} Kali is a symbol of G.o.d in the aspect of eternal Mother Nature.

CHAPTER: 2

MY MOTHER'S DEATH AND THE MYSTIC AMULET

My mother's greatest desire was the marriage of my elder brother.

"Ah, when I behold the face of Ananta's wife, I shall find heaven on this earth!" I frequently heard Mother express in these words her strong Indian sentiment for family continuity.

I was about eleven years old at the time of Ananta's betrothal.

Mother was in Calcutta, joyously supervising the wedding preparations.

Father and I alone remained at our home in Bareilly in northern India, whence Father had been transferred after two years at Lah.o.r.e.

I had previously witnessed the splendor of nuptial rites for my two elder sisters, Roma and Uma; but for Ananta, as the eldest son, plans were truly elaborate. Mother was welcoming numerous relatives, daily arriving in Calcutta from distant homes. She lodged them comfortably in a large, newly acquired house at 50 Amherst Street.

Everything was in readiness-the banquet delicacies, the gay throne on which Brother was to be carried to the home of the bride-to-be, the rows of colorful lights, the mammoth cardboard elephants and camels, the English, Scottish and Indian orchestras, the professional entertainers, the priests for the ancient rituals.

Father and I, in gala spirits, were planning to join the family in time for the ceremony. Shortly before the great day, however, I had an ominous vision.

It was in Bareilly on a midnight. As I slept beside Father on the piazza of our bungalow, I was awakened by a peculiar flutter of the mosquito netting over the bed. The flimsy curtains parted and I saw the beloved form of my mother.

"Awaken your father!" Her voice was only a whisper. "Take the first available train, at four o'clock this morning. Rush to Calcutta if you would see me!" The wraithlike figure vanished.

"Father, Father! Mother is dying!" The terror in my tone aroused him instantly. I sobbed out the fatal tidings.

"Never mind that hallucination of yours." Father gave his characteristic negation to a new situation. "Your mother is in excellent health.

If we get any bad news, we shall leave tomorrow."

"You shall never forgive yourself for not starting now!" Anguish caused me to add bitterly, "Nor shall I ever forgive you!"

The melancholy morning came with explicit words: "Mother dangerously ill; marriage postponed; come at once."

Father and I left distractedly. One of my uncles met us en route at a transfer point. A train thundered toward us, looming with telescopic increase. From my inner tumult, an abrupt determination arose to hurl myself on the railroad tracks. Already bereft, I felt, of my mother, I could not endure a world suddenly barren to the bone. I loved Mother as my dearest friend on earth. Her solacing black eyes had been my surest refuge in the trifling tragedies of childhood.

"Does she yet live?" I stopped for one last question to my uncle.

"Of course she is alive!" He was not slow to interpret the desperation in my face. But I scarcely believed him.

When we reached our Calcutta home, it was only to confront the stunning mystery of death. I collapsed into an almost lifeless state. Years pa.s.sed before any reconciliation entered my heart.

Storming the very gates of heaven, my cries at last summoned the Divine Mother. Her words brought final healing to my suppurating wounds:

"It is I who have watched over thee, life after life, in the tenderness of many mothers! See in My gaze the two black eyes, the lost beautiful eyes, thou seekest!"

Father and I returned to Bareilly soon after the crematory rites for the well-beloved. Early every morning I made a pathetic memorial--pilgrimage to a large SHEOLI tree which shaded the smooth, green-gold lawn before our bungalow. In poetical moments, I thought that the white SHEOLI flowers were strewing themselves with a willing devotion over the gra.s.sy altar. Mingling tears with the dew, I often observed a strange other-worldly light emerging from the dawn. Intense pangs of longing for G.o.d a.s.sailed me. I felt powerfully drawn to the Himalayas.