Shri Vasudevanand Saraswati Tembe Swami Maharaj

A compact Biography.

• Relief to the distressed (+ÉiÉÇjÉÉhÉ)
  Maximum number of people sought relief from some suffering or the other. If we even cursorily view the life of Shri Swami Maharaj, the amount of suffering he underwent is phenomenal. He never seemed to resist it at all. He himself was afflicted once by plague, thrice by cholera, twice by leprosy, once by leukoderma, twice by snakebite and lifelong by dysentery. However he never took any medicines and placed himself unreservedly at the disposal of Divine will. His family life was full of tensions and tribulations. He neither complained nor made any efforts to change it. In fact he utilized it to intensify his detachment. There are several events that illustrate his indifference to physical sufferance. Once, towards the conclusion of the Narasi Chaturmaas, after the ritual shave (IÉÉè®ú) , at the suggestion of a devotee the barber inspected the feet of Shri Swami Maharaj and removed twenty thorns stuck in it! Shri Swami Maharaj himself had never even given any indication of this. During one of his long stays at Brahmavart, Shri Maharaj used to stay in a hut on the bank of Ganges. That being the summer season, the river stream was thin and far receded from the bank. Because of dysentery, Shri Maharaj had to frequently relieve himself. Each time he used to take a bath, treading the 500 metre stretch of scorching hot sand to the stream, in the manner of a person walking in moonlight, and return in the same fashion afterwards. The Late Shirlolkar Swami, Shankaracharya of Karvir and Sankeshwar seats, who had watched Shri Maharaj then, used to express his sense of blessedness at having set eyes on such a holy person so totally immersed in the Divine and so unaffected by the physical. 
  In glaring contrast, Swami Maharaj was very sensitive to the suffering of the others. He not only listened sympathetically to the people bringing their sorrows and pain to his notice but also provided counsel which if followed would almost invariably relieve their suffering. According to the Vedic tradition all sufferings arise from three sources.