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A Mirror of the Moon
Bhagawan Sri Sathya Sai Baba
A riveting account of a
transcendental miracle of Divine as chronicled by Dr. John
Hislop in Sanathana Sarathi, May 1974.
Early on the morning of Dec. 8,
1973, Swami departed Prasanthi Nilayam for Brindavan. After an
hour or so of driving, he directed the three accompanying cars
to turn off the road to a clearing in an uninhabited area of the
forest. Everyone got out. Baba was in a delightful mood, moving
about among the party and cracking jokes with the men.
Beside the picnic area was a wood-apple tree with a few large
wood-apples in view in the upper branches. The men tried to
knock some of these to the ground by throwing stones, but
without success. One small wood-apple, about two inches in
diameter, did fall to the ground, and Baba picked it up.
Holding the small wood-apple between thumb and forefinger
against the morning sun, Baba said, "Here is the moon."
Then he closed the small object in his hand for a moment, and
when his hand opened, the wood-apple had disappeared, and in its
place there was a most extraordinary object.
The object was a translucent disk (of stone?) thin at the edges
thicker at the centre. It reflected light in a brilliant way,
and throughout its body there was a puzzling variety of
modifications. There were dark areas of uneven shape and size;
there were short and longer veins of luminous mineral-like
materials of all shades of colour; there were specks and dots of
colour that reflected brightly in the sunlight. The total effect
of the disk was one of great beauty.
Everyone gazed at the object with intense interest and
wonderment. Holding the disk to the sun, Baba said that it was
the moon in miniature, comprised of the moon's matter; that it
was a mirror of the moon." Nobody understood what he meant, and
we started to ask questions. At length, we understood that the
two sided disk was an accurate miniature in stone and minerals
of the two sides of the moon.
It was as if one were to photograph the moon as it is seen from
Earth, and then to journey to the opposite side of the moon and
photograph that side. Each side photographed would appear on a
photographic plate as a circular disk. Thus, one side of the
translucent disk created by Baba mirrored one side of the moon,
and the other side of the translucent disk mirrored the opposite
side of the moon. The darker, unevenly shaped areas on the disk
were the very large features of the moon's surface; the brightly
reflecting specks and dots were individual mountains and smaller
mountain ranges; the shorter and longer veins of brilliant
varicoloured minerals were additional features of the moon's
landscape.
Indeed, the visual modifications to be seen in the disk were so
complex that we did not readily understand them. Baba said that
the mineralized appearance of the luminous features of the disk
were in fact moon minerals, that they could be seen in the disk
because it was thin and therefore translucent, and that the same
mineralization was in the moon itself. The miniature moon was
exact and fully accurate, and were there to be a photographic
enlargement, scientists would at once recognize all the
landscape features with which they were familiar.
At this point, food taken from the cars was ready, and the
ladies of the party served a delicious breakfast. I had the
moon-disk in my hand, so I put it in the pocket of my jacket and
kept it there. After breakfast, with a smile, Baba held out his
hand, and I reached in my pocket and returned the moon-disk to
him. He again held the disk up to the sun, and all along the
edge of the disk there was the rich golden light. Baba said,
"See there is the sunrise!."
After every one admired the golden light, Swami again closed his
hand, the moon-disk was gone, and in its place was the original
small wood-apple.
From: Sanathana Sarathi, May 1974.
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