Shiva Bala Yogi Virtual^* Darshan
* (Virtual: non physical, but being such in essence or in having the power or practical effect)

Beginning of Tapas

Sathyaraju remained absorbed in the Shivalinga and the divine light that were constantly before him in his samadhi. A small crowd of curious gathered where he was sitting by the canal. Different explanations were offered, none of them accurate: he was acting; it was another of his practical jokes; he had some stroke; or he was possessed by a ghost or a spirit.

The villagers did not want to allow him to meditate. They were afraid that he would again be troubled by the nearby bad spirits. He would not move, so they picked him up, cross-legged and all, and carried him back to his house. His eyes remained closed and his legs crossed. They forcibly tried to bend his legs so they could take him through the door, but they had to give up and set him outside on the verandah.

By tradition, those who take up the path of tapas never set foot in the home again. To do so would be like making a vow and breaking it. From the time he first became immersed in samadhi and experienced enlightenment, there was no more Sathyaraju. He had become a samnyasin, a swami who has renounced worldly attachments to pursue spiritual life. His conventional ties to family, house and community were severed when he took up the path of a yogi. Through his commitment and by the intervention of his divine guru, Swamiji never entered Sathyaraju’s house. He was prevented on this first day when the villagers tried to take him inside his mother’s house, and on a later occasion, his guru directly intervened to prevent him from returning.

Return to the Canal

At midnight, the young swami regained some ordinary consciousness and found himself alone on the verandah in front of his house. He got up and returned to the place by the canal where he had been initiated. When he resumed his meditation, he found he could not close his eyes. This did not trouble him because he could still see the divine light and hear the cosmic aum sound, so his ability to concentrate was unaffected. There were torrential rains that night, but he was undisturbed.

Late that night, some Harijan (outcaste) boys who were passing by heard a loud sound of aum from where the young swami was meditating. They ran to tell others in the village who came and also heard the divine sound. It continued for forty-five minutes as they listened from a distance, afraid to get too close.

Increasing numbers of people gathered from Adivarapupeta and nearby villages to see what was going on. A woman came to offer worship, convinced that he had become a balayogi, one who undertakes tapas while still a boy (“bala” means child). She broke a coconut, offered the halves with flowers at his feet, burned incense, then distributed pieces of the coconut as blessed food. There were many people there, far too many to be fed from a single coconut, but the blessed food was miraculously sufficient. The incident suggested that Swamiji had powers upon enlightenment, and the blessings for the people were an indication that his spiritual austerity was not intended for his own benefit.

Swamiji's Mother

Swamiji mother and grandfather had been away from the village all this time. When they returned were told of the strange things that happened to their beloved Sathyaraju, they rushed to the canal bank and found him immersed in samadhi. They spoke to him, then pleaded with him to answer and get up, but he did not respond.

Parvatamma was frightened and became hysterical. She cried and wailed, and her anguish brought Swamiji to some ordinary consciousness. She pleaded with her son to get up and come home. He calmly told her that he would not leave. Parvatamma continued to plead and cry, but he was unmoved. The conventional attachments of the mother-son relationship had been severed by the divine guru’s touch two days earlier.

Parvatamma remained by her son’s side, sobbing and wiping her tears in her saree. In the moonlit darkness of that night, she looked towards her son and was surprised to see three divinely radiant beings. She recognized them as the Trimurthy, the divine trinity of the gods Brahma the Creator, Vishnu the Sustainer, and Shiva the Destroyer of Illusion. She thought she was dreaming or hallucinating, so she rubbed her eyes. Still the vision was before her, and no matter where she looked, she saw only the three gods. Then she realized the gods were conversing with her son. The vision seemed to last for a long time, but she could not tell. The experience calmed her mind and she was able to return home and get some rest.

Parvatamma continued to spend long hours by her son’s side, waiting to feed him some milk or sleeping nearby. One night, the Trimurthy again appeared and gave her instructions that neither she nor anyone else should sleep near him at night. “You will distract him. You cannot bear the sight. He is sitting in tapas.” She had no choice but to comply.

She began to understand that Sathyaraju was no longer her son. Her relationship to him changed from mother to that of first devotee. Throughout his difficult, twelve-year tapas, Parvatamma served Swamiji without