Shri Swami Samarth of Akkalkot

7/29/2019 Shri Swami Samarth of Akkalkot

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shreeswami.org http://www.shreeswami.org/about-shree-swami-samartha.htm

|| SHREE SWAMI SAMARTH OF AKKALKOT || Shri Swami

Samarth of Akkalkot, Sri Swami Samarth of Akkalkot

Shree Swami Samarth of Akkalkot

Believed to be an incarnation of Shri Dattatreya the nameof this spiritual master, popularly called Swami Samarth, is ahousehold word in Maharashtra and the region around. Asthis Perf ect Master chose to res ide at a place called

Akkalkot f or 22 years where he took Mahasamadhi (lef t hismortal body) in 1878, he is also known as the Maharaj of

Akkalkot, Akkalkot is situated in dis trict Solapur ofMaharashtra state of India.

For the devotees o fShri Shirdi Sai Baba, it would beinspiring to learn about the life and deeds of 'SwamiSamarth'. A comparative picturisation of the lives of thesetwo great Saints, i.e. Swami Samarth and Shri Sai Babaof Shirdi would establish a surprising amount ofcommonness in their lives and deeds which includes theirmethods of teaching, the universality of their approach andthe miracles they perf ormed. Even a critical approach by a

non-conformist would ultimately lead to the assertion thatthe over-all role of these two spiritual masters during thesecond half of the nineteenth century was similar, if no tsame. One, who is capable of making f iner spiritual analysis,would be f aced with a bewildering reality.The reality is that Swami Samarth and Shri Shirdi SaiBaba were t he manife stations of the same Divine Spiritin two gross bodies

Many published writings on bot h these Saints by dif f erent writers authenticate about t he interactionbetween these two Sadgurus both in the gross, and the subtle planes. Just be fore Mahasamadhi,Swami Samrath advised one of his disciples to worship Shri Sai at Shirdi saying that he (theSwami Samarth) would stay at Shirdi in future.

The early lif e o f Swami Samarth like that of Shri Shirdi Sai Baba is shrouded with mystery. For thatmatter, even Shri Shirdi Sai Baba's advent and early lif e has not been established. Yet it does notreally matter f or those who have f aith in Him and continue to experience his benevolence in dif f erentways. How does it matter if Christ was born o f a virgin mother! He took the pain of the suf f eringhumanity and led them in the path o f spirituality. That is what t he world needs.

Shri Narasimha Saraswati, about three centuries bef ore t he advent of Swami Samarth is believedto be the earlier incarnation of Shri Dattatreya. The 'Guru Charitra' one of the most famousbooks gives lo t of info rmation about Him. As per the most popular belief , Shri Narasimha Swami,

af ter helping and spiritually uplif ting a large number of people over a few decades, went away to theHimalayas f or penance and went into Samadhi. In the Samadhi st ate He remained for about threehundre d years. With the passage of time a huge anthill grew over him and he was lost t o theoutside world. One day accidentally a woodcutters axe fell on the bushes grown around the ant hill.He was shocked to f ind blood stains on the blade of the axe. He cleared the anthill and Lo, he f ounda Yogi in meditation. The Yogi s lowly opened his eyes and consoled the dumbf ounded woodcutter
http://www.shreeswami.org/about-shri-dattatreya-datta-guru-dattavtar.htmhttp://www.shreeswami.org/intro-shri-guru-charitra.htmhttp://www.shreeswami.org/about-sri-sai-baba-of-shirdi.htmhttp://www.shreeswami.org/about-shree-swami-samartha.htmhttp://www.shreeswami.org/intro-shri-guru-charitra.htmhttp://www.shreeswami.org/about-shri-dattatreya-datta-guru-dattavtar.htmhttp://www.shreeswami.org/about-sri-nrisimha-narasimha-saraswati.htmhttp://www.shreeswami.org/about-sri-sai-baba-of-shirdi.htmhttp://www.shreeswami.org/about-shri-dattatreya-datta-guru-dattavtar.htmhttp://www.shreeswami.org/about-shree-swami-samartha.htm


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saying that it was the Divine Will f or Him to re-appear in the world to resume His mission.This Yogi, in his new role came to be known as Swami Samarth.

Prior to his set tlement at Akkalkot , Swami Samarth visited f ar and wide. While moving in theHimalayan region he visited China. Thereaf ter, he visited places like Puri, Benaras, Hardwar, Girnar,Kathiawad and Rameswaram in the South. He also stayed at Mangalvedha, a town near Pandharpurin Solapur district Maharashtra, which had been inhabited earlier by f amous saints like Domojipantand Chokhamela. He came to Akkalkot in 1856 where he continued his physical existence f o r22years.

He came to Akkalkot on the invitation of one Chintopant Tol and stayed at a place on the outskirtsof the town.

What we call miracles are the normal ways of funct ioning of the God realised one s. TheRisaldar of that area, a Muslim person, wanted to test the Swami by of f ering him a 'Chilum' (anearthen smoking pipe) without to bacco in it and asked him to smoke. Swami Samarth startedsmoking the empty Chilum af ter lighting it as if nothing had happened. Realising him to be anadvanced spiritual perso n, the Risaldar apologised and made arrangements f or his st ay in the houseof one Cholappa. It is in this small house that Swami Samarth lived upto his last .

Soon, the name of Swami Samarth as a Spiritual Master spread all around and devotees came f ortaking his bless ings. The ordinary people did not understand many of his gestures and myst icstatements , which he used to make cryptically, although their meanings became apparent o n laterdates.

He treated Muslims, Christians and Parsees all alike. His Kindness was always bestowed on thepoor, needy and the people at the lowest rung of the society. Both Hindus and Muslim festivalslike Dusshehra and Moharram etc. used to be celebrated by Him. As in Shirdi, Thursdaybecame a special day of celebration at Akkalkot. Like Shirdi Sai Baba, Swami Samarth o f Akkalkotwas f ond o f mass f eeding. Once, on his visit to a place called Rampur, a devotee named Rawaji, tocelebrate his visit , cooked foo d f or 50 people. However, hearing the news o f Swami Samarth's arrivalhundreds o f people f rom the neighbouring villages started rushing to the village. Seeing such a largenumber of people at his doorst ep Rawaji became visibly panicky. Moved by his plight, Swami Samarthasked Rawaji to get so me empty baskets . When the baskets were brought f rom the market, idols o f

all the deities like Khandoba, Annapurna, etc were put in them and f oo d materials like chapatis(bread) etc. were piled over them. Bawaji and his wife were asked to carry these baskets and takethree rounds around the Tulsi plant. Af ter that, they were asked to serve food f rom these basketsto the guest without looking into them. When fo od were being served, Rawaji and his wife wereamazed to see that the baskets never exhausted even after a few hundred people had been served.After all the people who had come finished their meal, Swami Samarth t ook his meal. This isknown as 'Annapurna Siddhi'.

Swami Samarth had t he capacity to read the minds of all the people coming to him and alsowas able to know about their past and future. Baba Saheb Jadhav, one of his great devot eesone day came to meet the Master. Seeing him suddenly Swami Samarth said "Oh Potter! There is asummon coming in your name. The pot ter being in the close circle of Swami Samarth understoo d themeaning of this sentence and begged of the Swami to save him f rom the approaching death so that

he could continue to serve him (the Master). Moved by his devot ion Swami Samarth looked-upto wards the sky and muttered something as if he was address ing to someone who was invisible.Suddenly, he pointed his hand towards a bull passing nearby and said in a loud vo ice "go to the bull".In the presence of a large number of devotees, the bull instant ly fell dead. Jadhav, with a f resh leaseof life, devoted himself totally to the service of Swami Samarth thereaf ter. Similarly, A Europeanenginee r f rom Solapur visited the Swami with the earnest hope of having a son. As heapproached Swami Samarth, the latte r just looked at him and told that he would have a sonwithin a year. That is what exactly happened.

The Sadgurus or the Spiritual Masters always endeavors to change the quality of men thatencounte r them. Besides bestowing material benefit , they t ry to uplift t hem spiritually. Oncea Jewish docto r, who was working as an eye specialist in the J.J. Hospital, Bombay met SwamiSamarth. The doctor was very proud of his prof ess ional competence. Seeing him Swami Samarthasked "tell me docto r, how many of the eye patients you have treated have lost their eye sights forever"'. This sentence made a tremendous impact on the doctor. He realised that many people hadlost their s ights f orever even if they had been treated by him. His ego immediately vanished andthereaf ter he became a devotee of Swami Samarth. Af ter ret irement the docto r sett led-down at

Akkalkot and served the Master t ill his last.


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It is said that a touchstone can convert an ordinary met al to gold. The Spiritual Masters aresuch touchstones that they can convert any ordinary met al not to that of gold but to that ofa touchstone . The y are capable of giving spiritual life to any person in a fraction of asecond by a touch, a look, a word or even by a mere thought. A person like Ramanand Bidkarwho had lived an immoral lif e f or a long period was converted to a Saint called Bidkar Maharaj by thekind grace of Swami Samarath, who by one grace i.e. Drishti Diksha evolved him spiritually. Underhis guidance Sri Balappa Maharaj, Shri Gangadhar Maharaj, Sri Gajanan Maharaj and manyothe rs rose to spiritual eminence and contributed a lot to the societ y.

Af ter serving the poor, curing the sick and helping the spiritual seekers over a f ew decades , SwamiSamart h one day suddenly announced that the t ime had come f or him to go o ut of his physicalexistence. By Hindu calendar It was Chaitra Sudha t rayodasi, Shaka 1800 i.e. the year1878 ADTuesday at 4 PM. At this time he seated himself in Padmasana (Lot us Pos ture) and uttered his lastwords - "no one should weep I shall always be present at all places and I shall respond toevery call of the devotees"". Shri Sai Baba of Shirdi had also said exactly the same thingbefore his Mahasamadhi.

Just before he had lef t his gross bo dy, one devotee named Keshav Nayak who was emotionallycharged, asked "Maharaj, since you are going, who will give us protection?". Swami Samarth gave hima pair of his sandals to worship. He to ld him "in future I will be staying at Shirdi in dist rict

Ahmednagar". Anot her devotee, Krishna Ali Bagkar decided to go to Akkalkot and worship thepadukas of Swami Samarth. Thereaf ter he got a dream appearance o f Swami Samarth who to ld him"now I am staying at Shirdi, go there and worship me". Bagkar went to Shirdi where he stayed f or sixmonths. Later, when he wanted to take leave of Shri Sai and go to Akkalkot again Shri Sai told him"what is there in Akkalkot, Maharaj of Akkalkot is staying here". Bagkar realised t hat t here is nodif f erence between Swami Samarth and Shri Sai Baba of Shirdi as he recalled his earlier dream.

The divine game (leela) of Swami Samarth did not end with his Maha Samadhi (shedding hismortal coil). His devotees continue to experience the miracles of his visible and invisiblehelp even till today. It is exactly like the experience received by the devotees of Sai Baba of Shirdiaf ter his Mahasamadhi in 1918. Many people have authenticated his appearance in physical f ormbefore them. These people are not the f aith-blind rural folk. Many of them are well educated people

like doctors, educat ionis ts etc. For example, Dr. S.V.Marathe, a private medical practitio ner of Puneonce underwent treatment in a chest Hospital at a place called Aundh in 1964. Many of his f riendswere anxious to come and visit him. At this juncture, Swami Samarth appeared bef ore many of hisf riends in a dream and gave the same message to all of them. He asked them not to worry aboutDr.Marathe, as he was under His (Swami Samarth's) protect ion and also not to come to Aundh.

Hundreds of devotees continue t o have miraculous experience about the Perfe ct Mastereven today.But his miracles and those of Shri Sainath are so alike that one would be drawn to t heconclusion that they are not two maste rs but are one , and the ONLY ONE TRUTH.

Dattavtars: Shripad SriVallabh Sri Narasimha Saraswati Shree Swami Samarth Sri SaiBaba of ShirdiThe Perfe ct Masters - SadGurus:Gajanan Maharaj of Shegaon , Shankar Maharaj , Hazrat Tajuddin Baba , Narayan Maharaj ,Meher BabaShri Upasani (Baba) Maharaj , Shri Manik Prabhu Maharaj , ParamSadguru Shree GajananMaharaj of AkkalkotShri Krishna Saraswati Swami, Swami Swaroopanad of Pawas, Shri Vasudevanand SaraswatiSwami Maharaj

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Shri Swami Samarth of Akkalkot