All right, I herewith present: Queenie’s A Brief History of the Great Guru.
Are you with me, bubba?
By the late-’60s, the enlightened tobacconist had achieved a level of fame commensurate with Ramana Maharshi and was informally admitted into the League of Superheroes of Nondualism. His followers — or shall I say far-flung legions of the desperate, the curious and the dilettantish, not to mention the usual pastiche of pop stars, paupers and spiritual tourists — traveled at great expense to be in his presence. He was genuinely delighted to greet them (the rishi could be downright chatty) though to call him gregarious would be naïve. Still, the question remained: Why was he so relentless in his public teachings if his philosophy defined quote-unquote enlightenment as a state of being that was not only impossible to earn or solicit but one that could only “happen”? (Or not.) He was known to say that a fly was as likely to land on shit as it was on honey, meaning, the rara avis of satori found its way to the shoulders of vagrants and birdwatchers alike. It was his view (“My concept,” as he used to emphasize) that all the meditation, chanting and scripture studying in the world meant nothing, including a trek to Bombay to sit at the feet of the Master. Because all was predetermined.
At the end of the day, I suppose the Great Guru gave satsang simply because he enjoyed it. Such enjoyment was “already written,” and part of his nature. He was in full agreement with the Bhagavad Gita, which advised that action was the thing, not the fruit of one’s action. He was also fond of telling disciples he was busy “fishing.” “I am looking for that big fish,” he’d say, a waggish glint in his eye. “The one that swims faster and deeper than the rest.” This cryptic declaration never failed to make him giggle; if his dentures fell out, he laughed even harder with what he called his “beggar’s mouth.” By this remark, one could wrongly infer he was trolling for a successor, but a proper saint has no interest in the tropes of lineage and continuity. Indeed, it might be said that a common thread among enlightened men was a certitude that none of their students had ever understood a word they uttered.
The loneliness of the long-distance bodhisattva…
In 1963, the Great Guru’s fishing pole received an enormous tug on the line.
While visiting a dentist in Miami, a blond, middle-aged gentleman picked up a Reader’s Digest with a wealthy woman’s account of her passage to India to meet a renowned “tobacconist saint.” He was intrigued. Gossip had it that for one week the American ruminated intensely on the article before tragedy intervened. Apparently, he was in the middle of an ugly divorce when his wife murdered their two young children. She attempted suicide but survived. During the trial, he left the States for good.
He was 48 years old when he landed in Bombay.
The Great Guru immediately noticed something different about the new arrival, a quality transcending the cold anarchies of grief. He knew he’d found a true adept, one whose self-realization was foretold — satori a priori! — just as he, the Great Guru, was predestined to be his guide. But it would take some work. The American’s behavior was erratic. He’d vanish for days, sometimes weeks without notice, before reappearing to claim his usual spot at the foot of the sadhu’s chair. Sometimes after those mysterious layovers, he was disheveled and disoriented. The Great Guru would order the Kitchen Cabinet — those roly-poly sister-aunties — to bathe and feed the Big Fish, spruce up the aquarium if you will. Other times he alighted from his travels impeccably dressed in linen suit and tie, as if fresh from Hong Kong, Johannesburg, Genève. After months of obliviously submitting to his artful guru’s grooming, the American at last steadied his course.
In the year it took for the arriviste to settle, the Great Guru’s focus on him never wavered. The proprietary denizens of the inner circle dug in their heels, girding for the long haul, cynically reassuring themselves that teacher’s pets came and went and the newbie would be no exception. Others laid down odds the American was “next in line” and began kowtowing early. Through it all, the old sage cackled with delight. The idea of cultivating a favorite tickled his beggar’s mouth pink, because it was no longer possible for him to have a personal relationship with anyone he encountered along the journey. For he had ceased being a person.
None of which meant he wasn’t delighted upon learning his chela was a racetrack bookie on the side, nor that the two couldn’t regularly share a glass of whiskey in the cool, early evenings. Nor did it mean he wasn’t grateful for the acumen the American lent to the fledgling publishing enterprise on Mogul Lane. It was the expat who had suggested satsang be taped (it would have been reel-to-reel back then) and transcribed for wider dissemination. The Great Guru was enchanted by the idea and impishly rebuked his minions for not having thought of it first. How he enjoyed stirring the pot!
Sorry to interrupt myself but I probably haven’t said enough to set the scene. I know I’m all over the place… maybe you can clean it up when you — I really do think I should get a little into how things worked. Not that it was all that mysterious, it’s just that people really have no idea about what goes on in the life of an ashram. Mogul Lane wasn’t really an ashram, strictly speaking… I promise this won’t take too long.
You see, the Great Guru had been a householder and family man. Two of his five children died; his wife and him had 12 grandchildren and a ton of great-grandkids between them. She was a piece of work. Her three sisters — the “aunties”—did all the cooking (hence, the “Kitchen Cabinet”) and had final say over any controversies that arose among the extended family, which occupied the two floors above the shop. All the tenants had been with “Baba” in excess of 40 years, loosely comprising what I’ve been calling the inner circle. Mrs. Great Guru kept a firm hand on the finances, which were robust on account of the steady stream of rupees donated each satsang day from attendees and local merchants; sent through the post, and so forth. A second ring of the inner circle looked after Baba’s daily needs — laundry, grooming, medicines, that sort of thing. Last but not least was the outer ring of enthusiasts living in rooms scattered across the city, the typical patchwork of loners, zealots and malcontents who wash up on any rishi’s shore. Each ring was needy in its own way, the wife and aunties being the scrappiest, most demanding of the lot. The Great Guru took pleasure in every skirmish he secretly set in motion—