Meher Baba ( or ; born Merwan Sheriar Irani; 25 February 1894 – 31 January 1969) was an Indian spiritual leader who said he was the Avatar, the reincarnation of Muhammad, Buddha, Jesus, Krishna, Rama and Zoroaster, or the total manifestation of God in human form.Discourses, 7th edition, 1987. pp. 268-9 "This new influx of the creative impulse manifests, through the medium of a divine personality, an incarnation of God in a special sense-the Avatar... Being the total manifestation of God in human form, He is like a gauge against which man can measure what he is and what he may become. He trues the standard of human values by interpreting them in terms of divinely human life." A spiritual figure of the 20th century, he had a following of hundreds of thousands of people, mostly in India, with a smaller number of followers in North America, Europe, South America, and Australia.
Meher Baba's map of consciousness has been described as "a unique amalgam of Sufi, Vedic, and Yogic terminology". He taught that the goal of all beings was to become conscious of their own divinity, and to realise the oneness of God.
At the age of 19, Meher Baba began a seven-year period of spiritual transformation, during which he had encounters with Hazrat Babajan, Upasni Maharaj, Sai Baba of Shirdi, Tajuddin Baba, and Narayan Maharaj. In 1925, he began a 44-year period of silence, during which he communicated first using an alphabet board and by 1954 entirely through hand gestures using an interpreter. Meher Baba died on 31 January 1969 and was entombed at Meherabad. His tomb, or "samadhi", has become a place of pilgrimage for his followers, often known as "Baba lovers".
Overview of teachings Meher Baba's teachings concerned the nature and purpose of life. He described the phenomenal world as illusory, and taught that the universe is imagination. He taught that God alone exists, and each soul is God passing through imagination in order to realise its own divinity.God Speaks, 2nd edition, 1973. p. 170 He advised followers wishing to attain God-realisation, emphasizing love and selfless-service.Discourses, 7th edition, 1987. p. 315 His other teachings included discussion of Perfect Masters, the Avatar, spiritual aspirants, and the various stages of the spiritual path, which he termed involution. God Speaks and Discourses are regarded as among his most important written works.
For decades he declined to speak and later refrained from communicating via written language. This practice has remained a topic of discussion among some of his followers.Purdom (1964) p. 407 "Why he ceased to speak and write Baba has explained only vaguely, though much natural curiosity is aroused; the first question asked when people come to know about him or to see him is why he does it. That both silence and nonwriting are of great significance is certain; not surprisingly Baba does not explain. Silence is the answer to silence."Meher Baba's Silent Semiotic Output, José Sanjinés, Signs and Society, Vol. 2, No. S1, Supplement 2014, The University of Chicago Press, p. S121
Wider influence His legacy includes the Avatar Meher Baba Charitable Trust he established in India, and a handful of centers for information and pilgrimage. He has influenced pop culture creators and introduced the slogan "Don't worry; be happy". This was used in Bobby McFerrin's hit 1988 song of the same name. Among his followers were well-known musicians such as Melanie Safka and Pete Townshend, as well as journalists including Sir Tom Hopkinson.
In 1971, Meher Baba's following in the United States was estimated at 7,000 people. Some commentators have suggested that the size of the movement has been underestimated due to the rarity of proselytising by Meher Baba's followers, and that in 1975, the movement was larger than the more visible Hare Krishna movement.
Meher Baba was accepted as the leader of a Sufi organization based in California which he renamed Sufism Reoriented. Meher Baba's Sufi influence is said to have drawn from Sai Baba of Shirdi, whom Meher Baba designated as a Qutb. However, some commentators have asserted that Meher Baba's interpretation of Sufism shared very few similarities with the Sufi Movement apart from universalism and anti-dogmatism.
Life and works Early life
Meher Baba was born to Irani Zoroastrian parents in 1894 in Pune, India (formerly Poona).In an Indian context, an Irani is a member of one of two groups of Zoroastrians of that subcontinent, the other being the Parsis. They are called Iranis by other Indians because they spoke an Iranian language. "Those who left Iran soon after the advent of Islam to escape persecution, reached the shores of Gujarat 1,373 years ago. Their descendants are the Parsis. While the Zoroastrians who migrated to India from Iran relatively recently -- 19th century onwards -- are called Irani Zoroastrians." (Quote from Padmaja Shastri, TNN, "What sets Zoroastrian Iranis apart", The Times of India, 21 March 2004. Retrieved 11 July 2008.)Sutcliffe (2002); p. 38. He was named Merwan Sheriar Irani, the second son of Sheriar Irani and Shireen Irani. Sheriar Irani was a Persian Zoroastrian from Khorramshahr who had spent years wandering in search of spiritual experiences before settling in Pune.Purdom (1964), pp. 15–17
As a boy, Baba formed the Cosmopolitan Club, which was dedicated to remaining informed on world affairs and donating money to charity.Kalchuri (1986) pp. 186–188 He was a multi-instrumentalist and poet. Fluent in several languages, he enjoyed the works of Hafez, William Shakespeare, and Percy Bysshe Shelley.Kalchuri (1986) pp. 190–192Purdom (1964), p. 20Haynes (1989), p. 37
His spiritual transformation began when he was 19 years old and lasted for seven years.Hopkinson, Tom & Dorothy: Much Silence, Meher Baba Foundation Australia, 1974, p. 24Purdom (1964) p. 20 At 19, he met Hazrat Babajan, an elderly Muslim saint. He was cycling past a tree that she had made her abode, when she called to him. When he approached her, she kissed him on the forehead, causing him to enter a nine-month-long trance which he described as "divine bliss", with a lack of consciousness of his body. Babajan predicted that he would become a spiritual leader. He then encountered Upasni Maharaj, who he later said helped him to integrate his mystical experiences with ordinary consciousness, thus enabling him to function in the world without diminishing his experience of God-realisation.Listen Humanity, ed. D. E. Stevens, 1982. pp. 247–250
Over the next several years, he encountered other spiritual figures, namely Tajuddin Baba, Narayan Maharaj, and Sai Baba of Shirdi, who, along with Babajan and Upasni Maharaj, Baba later said were the five "Perfect Masters" of the age.Purdom (1964) p. 270 By early 1922, at the age of 27, Baba began gathering his own disciples.Haynes (1989) pp. 38–39 They gave him the name Meher Baba, which means "compassionate father".Haynes (1989) p. 40
In 1922, Meher Baba and his followers established Manzil-e-Meem (House of the Master) in Mumbai. There, Baba commenced his practice of demanding strict discipline and obedience from his disciples.Purdom (1964), pp. 29-30 A year later, Baba and his mandali moved to an area a few miles outside Ahmednagar which he named Meherabad.Kalchuri (1986) p. 501 This ashram would become the center for his work. During the 1920s, Meher Baba opened a school, hospital, and dispensary at Meherabad, all of which were free and open to all castes and faiths.Purdom (1964), pp. 49–50
From 10 July 1925 until the end of his life, Meher Baba maintained silence.Encyclopedia of Religion, Macmillan Publishing Company, 1995, vol. 9, p. 346Haynes (1989) p. 2Baba (2007) p. 3 He communicated first through chalk and slate, then by an alphabet board, and later via a unique repertoire of gestures.Haynes (1989) p. 41 On 1 December 1926, he wrote his last message, and began relying on an alphabet board.Purdom (1964) p. 66 With his mandali (circle of disciples), he spent long periods in seclusion, during which he often fasted. He also traveled widely, held public gatherings, and engaged in works of charity with lepers and the poor.Haynes (1989) p. 70
1930–1939: First contact with the West Beginning in 1931, Meher Baba made the first of many visits to the West. Throughout that decade, Meher Baba began a period of world travel and took several trips to Europe and the United States. It was during this period that he established contact with his first close group of Western disciples.Kalchuri (1986) p. 1405ff He traveled on a Persian passport, as he had given up writing, as well as speaking, and would not sign the forms required by the British government of India.Kalchuri (1986) p. 1249
On his first trip to England in 1931, he traveled on the SS Rajputana, at the same time as Mahatma Gandhi, who was sailing to the second Round Table Conference in London. Baba and Gandhi met three times on board. One of these exchanges lasted for three hours.Purdom (1964) p. 95. The British press publicized these meetings,See articles from the Daily Herald, 4 April 1932 (quoted in Kalchuri (1986), p. 1573) and from Sunday Express, April 1932 (quoted in Purdom (1964), p. 99) but an aide to Gandhi said, "You may say emphatically that Gandhi never asked Meher Baba for help or for spiritual or other advice."Landau, Rom: God Is My Adventure: A Book on Modern Mystics, Masters, and Teachers, Faber & Faber, London, 1936. p. 111.Indian Mystic in New York, Associated Press, 20 May 1932, The Lowell Sun
In the West, Meher Baba met with a number of celebrities and artists, including Gary Cooper, Charles Laughton, Tallulah Bankhead, Boris Karloff, Tom Mix, Maurice Chevalier, and Ernst Lubitsch.Landau, Rom: God Is My Adventure: A Book on Modern Mystics, Masters, and Teachers, Faber & Faber, London, 1936. p. 108 Available as a Google book On 1 June 1932, Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. held a reception for Baba at Pickfair at which he delivered a message to Hollywood.Purdom (1964) pp. 103–105 As a result, says Robert S. Ellwood, Meher Baba emerged as "one of the enthusiasms of the '30s".Ellwood 1973 p. 281
In 1934, after announcing that he would break his self-imposed silence in the Hollywood Bowl, Baba changed his plans abruptly, boarded the RMS Empress of Canada, and sailed to Hong Kong without explanation. The Associated Press reported that "Baba had decided to postpone the word-fast-breaking until next February because 'conditions are not yet ripe'."Associated Press, 13 July 1932, as cited Kalchuri (1986), p. 1670 He returned to England in 1936,Kalchuri (1986) p. 2040ff but did not return to the United States again until the early 1950s.Kalchuri (1986) pp. 1661–1668
In the late 1930s, Meher Baba invited a group of Western women to join him in India, where he arranged a series of trips throughout India and British Ceylon that became known as the Blue Bus Tours. When the tour returned home, many newspapers treated their journey as an occasion for scandal.Kalchuri (1986) pp. 2338–2421 Time magazine's 1936 review of God Is My Adventure describes the US's fascination with the "long-haired, silky-mustached Parsee named Shri Sadgaru [sic] Meher Baba" four years earlier.
1940–1949: Masts and the New Life
In the 1930s and 1940s, Meher Baba worked with masts, or those "intoxicated with God".Donkin (2001) p. vff According to Baba, these individuals are disabled by their enchanting experience of the higher spiritual planes. Although outwardly masts may appear irrational or insane, Baba claimed that their spiritual status was elevated, and that by meeting with them he helped them to progress spiritually while enlisting their aid in his spiritual work.Donkin (2001) p. 9 One of these masts, Mohammed, lived at Meher Baba's encampment at Meherabad until his death in 2003.