Shri Vasudevanand Saraswati Tembe Swami Maharaj

A compact Biography.

• The Medium and the Mediator

One more interesting aspect of this multifaceted relationship becomes apparent when we look at the role Shri Maharaj played in the reform of priests of Narsobawadi. Lord Datta Himself had cultivated the prestige and influence of Shri Maharaj in Narsobawadi. Shri Maharaj himself revered Wadi and the priests as the primal seat and servants of the Prabhu. Once, in Indore, a priest from Wadi arrived just at the time when the devotees there were planning to take out a procession of Shri Maharaj riding an elephant. As soon as he saw the Wadi priest, Shri Maharaj insisted that the priest and not himself should ride the elephant. The priests also had come to recognize the Divine mandate of Shri Maharaj and respected him as such. Gradually, a bond came into being whereby the priests would approach Shri Maharaj with their problems and request him to intercede with the Lord on their behalf. The Lord not only recognized this but also used the services of Shri Maharaj to communicate with he priests. We have had an occasion to examine an episode of this mediating role of Shri Maharaj under “The Conflicts.” Another illustrative episode is recalled here.

After spending three consecutive Chaturmaas in Brahmavart, Shri Maharaj arrived to Wadi in 1898. One evening, after the regular obeisance to the Padukas during the Palanquin ceremony, Shri Maharaj started climbing the steps to his room. Suddenly he went into the trance and the Kamandalu fell from his hand on the stone steps. However, it miraculously escaped any damage at all. Still in the trance, Shri Maharaj continued to walk and sat down in the temple of Shri Narayan Swami. “Call the priests of the four divisions!” exclaimed Shri Maharaj in a forceful voice. Soon the priests gathered and Shri Maharaj continued to speak thus: - “The Lord is weary of your present conduct and has brought me here to improve the same. You are not following the precedents laid down by your ancestors. If you do not still reform, you will invite further punishment, far severer than what you have been suffering these last three years.” The terrified priests prayed most humbly for forgiveness and guidance. After a couple of hours in the trance, Shri Maharaj returned to the normal state. When someone asked him as to the ways to pacify the anger of Shri Datta Prabhu, he answered, “I am just one of you. I don’t know anything.”

Shri Maharaj was in Wadi in the Deepavali festival of 1906 AD. In the five days of the festival, the Padukas are bathed with hot water.  On the first day (the dark 14^th of Ashvin), Shri Maharaj was also given hot water bath along with the Lord. However, the priests did not check the temperature of water poured over the Padukas. This resulted in Shri Maharaj passing blood in urine. When Shri Maharaj queried Shri Datta Prabhu about this, the Lord said, “If a single hot water bath has caused this to you, imagine what I must be suffering while the priests are pouring scalding water over me every day!” When questioned the priests confirmed that nobody checked the temperature of water before bathing the Lord. Shri Maharaj told them that he was receiving the punishment foe their mistake. On his advice the priests placed a coconut before the Lord and prayed pledging to test the temperature of the water in future. This relieved the suffering of Shri Maharaj.  

In a similar incidence in Kurugaddi, Shri Datta Prabhu caused some dead sparrows, eggs and other dirt to fall in the hands of Shri Maharaj. Even as he was throwing these away in disgust, the Lord remarked, “We have thrown these things on your body just to make you realize how we are suffering such filth to soil our place.”  The next day, Shri Maharaj actually saw a sparrow killed by a bat fall on the Padukas. He then made arrangements to repair the gaps in the roof of the Kurugaddi temple and to fix a door to the sanctorum.

It should be mentioned here in the passing that, Shri Maharaj was instrumental in reviving some major places of Shri Datta worship like Kurugaddi and Peethapur. At Peethapur the local residents were even not aware of the actual birthplace of Shripad Shrivallabh till Shri Maharaj pointed it out. Shri Maharaj has also installed several Datta idols in different parts of India.

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Beginnings/Householder/Mangaon Temple/Renunciation/Loksangrah/Seekers of Truth/Realized souls/Divine Encounters/Shri Gurudev Datta/ passage to Eternity