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http://www.jstor.org
Sathya Sai Baba's MagicAuthor(s): Lawrence A. BabbSource:
Anthropological Quarterly, Vol. 56, No. 3, (Jul., 1983), pp.
116-124Published by: The George Washington University Institute for
Ethnographic ResearchStable URL:
http://www.jstor.org/stable/3317305Accessed: 07/05/2008 14:36
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SATHYA SAI BABA'S MAGIC 1
LAWRENCE A. BABB Amherst College
This paper is an excursion in the anthropology of credibility.
Regarded as a living deity by his many followers, Sathya Sai Baba
is one of the most important of India's modern religious figures.
Thepaper explores the role of the miraculous in his cult. Miracles
attributed to the deity-saint are shown to be vehicles for
establishing and maintaining relationships between him and his
followers utilizing a transactional framework of general importance
in the Hindu world. The indeterminacy of the miracles, farfrom
being viewed as a disconfirmation of their author's claims, is
understood to exemplify an unaccountability that is a
necessaryfeature ofdivinity. Their ultimate plausibility and
persuasive energy derivefrom a link, established within the
symbolic world of the cult, between a devotee's belief in their
divine authorship and his or her commitment to a transformed sense
of identity. To the degree that the new sense of self is valued,
the miracles must be accepted as genuine.
It would be easy not to take the cult of Sathya Sai Baba
seriously. Centering on modern India's best known deity-saint,this
cult is certainly a highly prominent feature of the modern
religious landscape in India. But because of its veneer of jet-age
modernity and the apparent estrangement of its mostly bourgeois
adherents from "grassroots Hin- duism" (Bharati 1981:87) it would
be tempting to dismiss the cult as in some sense inau- thentic, a
less-than-best avenue to an under- standing of things Hindu. In my
view, however, this would be a mistake. Not only is this cult
deeply and authentically Hindu, as I hope to show, but the very
cultural alienation of its main constituency sets in bold relief
certain critical features of the Hindu tradition that we might not
otherwise see as clearly.
The materials with which I am concerned were gathered during a
program of field- research on Hinduism in an urban context
undertaken in Delhi in 1978-79. I was inter- ested in every aspect
of urban religious culture that I could find, and inevitably this
brought me into contact with various guru- centered cults of
middle- and upper- middle class Delhi. One such group was the local
(Delhi) following of Sathya Sai Baba. I began with an essentially
casual interest in this cult. However, as I began to attend
cult-related activities and talk to devotees I soon realized that I
was in contact with a religious style that is clearly very
meaningful to at least some members of a highly sophisticated and
cosmo- politan bureaucratic, political, commerical and academic
elite. And I also found myself con- fronted with what appeared to
be a puzzle, one having mainly to do with miracles.
The cult of Sathya Sai Baba seems to invert
what common sense would lead us to expect There is certainly
nothing new about the miraculous in the Hindu world. Indeed, in
this world the credibility of contraventions of expectations of how
the world normally works is never really the main issue; what
matters most is what such occurrences, in specific instances,
actually mean. However, as many observers have noted, the cult of
Sathya Sai Baba has a notably cosmopolitan constit- uency
consisting of many people who at least outwardly are as strongly
attuned as anyone to the more international cult of scientific
rationality. And yet the miraculous is absolutely central to this
religious move- ment. This circumstance pushes to the fore
questions that we might not otherwise ask From what, exactly, do
these miracles derive their convincingness, a plausibility so great
that it seems to pull people into convictions ostensibly at odds
with what their own sub- culture deems to be common sense and
considered judgment? What is the source of the energy of Sathya Sai
Baba's "magic," an energy that is apparently strong enough to have
life-transforming effects on his devotees? Does it arise merely
from cunning theatrics? Or is its true source something else?
Sathya Sai Baba was born in 1926 in the village of Puttaparthi
in what is now the state of Andhra Pradesh in southern India.
Accord- ing to the literature of the movement (see esp. Kasturi
1977) his birth was heralded by miracles and he exhibited uncanny
powers from childhood. In 1940, at the age of fourteen, he
proclaimed himself to be a re- incarnation of the celebrated Sai
Baba of Shirdi-a saint who became famous in the late nineteenth and
early twentieth centuries,
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SATHYA SAl BABA'S MAGIC 117
and who has continued to be the focus of a cult since his death
in 1918. Sathya Sai Baba's emergence from local renown into
national prominence was completed during the 1950s. In 1963, he
announced himself to be an avatar (incarnation, descent) of Shiva,
and is so regarded by his many followers today. It must not be
imagined that the acclaim is universal. He has many detractors and
is frequently accused of fraud and/or favoring only the rich and
powerful. However, the size and influence of his indigenous (as
opposed to international) following certainly justifies ranking him
among the most important of modern India's religious
personalities.
He is, among other things, a teacher, and there exists an
extensive literature in which his views on a great variety of
matters are presented. However, I think it is quite clear that
Sathya Sai Baba's teachings, as such,are not what is most important
about his cult. Devotee-informants rarely dwell on matters of
doctrine, which is not surprising, for in fact there is relatively
little to dwell upon, or at least nothing very distinctive. His
philo- sophical views are simplistic, eclectic, and essentially
unoriginal. His ethics are basically common-coin, though certainly
not to be dismissed on that account. Whatever else he might feel,
it is very difficult to imagine a Hindu auditor or reader of Sathya
Sai Baba's discourses reacting with surprise.
Rather, what is important about what Sathya Sai Baba says is not
its content, but the fact that he is the one who is saying it. When
devotee-informants talk about him one does not hear about theology,
but about the "pres- ence," in a variety of senses, of the deity-
saint himself in their lives. What emerges as a general theme in
these accounts is the same kind of visual, tactile, and even
alimentary intimacy that is so central to devotional Hin- duism
generally. His devotees long to see him, to hear him, to be near
him, to have private audiences with him, to touch him (especially
his feet) and to receive and con- sume, or use in other ways,
substances and objects that have been touched by him or that
originate from him.
The most striking feature of this cult, however, is the
extremely strong emphasis given to the miraculous. On this point
let there be no mistake: Sathya Sai Baba's miracles are crucial to
what this cult is all
about. One is sometimes told, I think defen- sively, that the
miracles are but a superficial aspect of his mission, but this is
not the view of most of my devotee-informants who took great
delight in telling of miracles they had experienced, witnessed, or
of which they heard. Nor is it the view of Sathya Sai Baba himself
who has characterized the miracles as "evidence" (nidarshan) of his
divinity (Kasturi 1975:139) and an important means for effect- ing
the kinds of inner changes in his devotees necessary for their
spiritual welfare. Nor indeed is it apparently the view of
non-devotee onlookers, to whom Sathya Sai Baba tends to be known
primarily as a miracle worker, and who usually linkthe question of
hiscredibility to the meaning and/or validity of his miracles.
The miracles in question are quite various. He is said to leave
his body to aid his devotees in distant places. He cures incurable
illnesses,and is even said to have raised the dead. He has turned
water into gasoline by dipping his hand in it. His most important
miracle-style, however, is the apparent materi- alization of
objects and substances, including such things as images of deities,
sweets, books, pictures of himself, amulets, jewelry, watches, and
much else besides. But of all of his magical productions, the most
significant by far is sacred ash (vibhuti), of which he is reported
to materialize an average of over one pound per day (Kasturi
1977:140). He usually does so with a wave of his right hand, and
the result is given to devotees which they consume, apply to their
bodies, or use in other ways. The ash is believed to have an active
power deriving from its source.
His physical presence is not necessary for miracles to occur.
Many involve his appearance in dreams. He has been reported, for
example, to have performed surgery on devotees while they were
dreaming. It is believed, indeed, that he appears in dreams only
when he wills it; thus, every dream of him is a kind of miraculous
communication. Moreover, there are several "miracle-house- holds"
in Delhi in which his magical influence is said to be manifested
from afar. Footprints of sacred ash appear on floors, mysterious
bites are taken out of edibles, garlands over his picture change
position, writing appears in closed notebooks, and his pictures
exude sacred ash,kumkum (a red powder) and amrit ('ambrosia,' a
sweet-tasting liquid). In one
SATHYA SAI BABA'S MAGIC 117
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ANTHROPOLOGICAL QUARTERLY 118
such household devotees deposit envelopes containing inquiries
and petitions at the family altar. In some of these sacred ash will
appear indicating an affirmative response.
What is the meaning of these miracles? In the remaining pages I
offer a few suggestions. My perspective is informant-oriented. I
have never met Sathya Sai Baba,but he is not my true subject in any
case. What interests me are his devotees and what they make of him,
themselves, and their relations with him, and I have tried to
distill from what they told me something of the inner rationale of
Sathya Sai Baba's magic.
To begin with, it is clear that the miraculous is often an
important factor in recruitment to the cult. Most of my informants
were highly voluble about their conversion experiences which they
tended to see as deeply important episodes in their life histories.
The religious "alienation" noted by Bharati (1981:87) is clear in
the self-portrayal of many of these informants. Their prior
acquaintance with Hindu practice and doctrine appears fre- quently
to have been relatively slight, and some characterize themselves as
having been worldly skeptics prior to their contact with Sathya Sai
Baba. Some of them were also very troubled people, though whether
or not they were more troubled than India's higher bourgeoisie
generally is impossible for me to say. Frequently, however, details
of truly serious life difficulties emerged in their dis- course:
illnesses, family problems, financial difficulties, and - something
that should never be dismissed as trivial - the ennui of retirement
from active professional life. I am certain that a significant
number of devotees were impelled into the cult as a result of such
difficulties.
But what seems to have been the critical precipitating factor in
many of these cases was a direct experience of the miraculous. A
powerful theme in these accounts is that of a passage from
indifference or skepticism to faith through a personal
confrontation with Sathya Sai Baba's powers. Thus, an ex-
beefeating former military officer reported that his attitude of
amused skepticism changed completely when a picture of Sathya Sai
Baba seemed to appear in one of his wife's earrings. For him this
was the decisive break with the past, although his faith was
further consolidated when Sathya Sai Baba materi-
alized ash on his behalf and demonstrated an apparent ability to
read his mind. Another informant, a U.S.-educated Panjabi business-
man, recalls accompanying his father-in-law, basically as a lark,
to see Sathya Sai Baba in Bangalore. Upon seeing an ash-material-
ization with his own eyes he became a staunch devotee. A Panjabi
chartered accountant tells of the anguish he and his wife felt upon
being told by the attending physician that their soon-to-be-born
child was dead in the womb. As a last resort he prayed to a picture
of Sathya Sai Baba while his wife's mother (a devotee) rubbed
sacred ash on his wife's body. This was the first time in his life,
he says, that he had ever "really prayed." The child was born
alive, and he and his wife subsequently became mainstays of the
Delhi community of "Sai" devotees.
In the literature of the movement there is a personal account of
a conversion that seems to be paradigmatic of the type. One of
India's most distinguished scientists, an erst- while director of
the All India Institute of Science, was jolted out of what was
evidently a case of moderate scientific dogmatism when, before his
very eyes, Sathya Sai Baba apparently produced for him a copy of
the Bhagavad Gita out of a handful of sand. Having witnessed more
occurrences of the same kind, he reports himself as having had to
admit that he was having experiences that were beyond the capacity
of his rational mind to explain; that, as he put it, Sathya Sai
Baba is "beyond science" (Bhagavantham, 1976: 233).
I consider this instance paradigmatic be- cause it seems to
exhibit features that are important in many conversions to the
cult. That the subject is a distinguished scientist is an
exemplification of the worldly sophistica- tion that seems
characteristic of many of Sathya Sai Baba's key followers. And the
attention given in his account to the tension between his
scientific training and his belief in Sathya Sai Baba is but a
particularly clear articulation of what seems to be a widely shared
perception among devotees, namely that scientific rationality is
fundamentally challenged and in some sense transcended by Sathya
Sai Baba's magic.
Moreover, this case also illustrates well what appears to be the
"threshold-crossing" or"bridge-burning" character of many
conver-
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SATHYA SAI BABA'S MAGIC 119
sions to the cult. For many there appears to be a moment, though
it may be a protracted one, of intellectual surrender, after which
what is taken to be evidence of personal experience is accepted in
a way that eclipses what are, perhaps, less immediate and less felt
scientific abstractions about what the world is like. It is
apparent from their accounts of themselves that many converts were
search- ing for something in which to believe in any case, and for
them the miraculous seems to have been essentially catalytic in its
effects. What is probably crucial in this process is the
acknowledgement that occurs when a changed view of things is
expressed in verbal or other forms of behavior (on this see Fest-
inger 1964). Having said, or acted as if he believed,that the
miracles are in some sense genuine, the believer is then held fast
in a net of behavioral and attitudinal consistency; he cannot turn
back without making nonsense of what is now a coherent pattern of
conviction and action visible to an audience consisting of himself
and others. At this point belief may become both stubborn and
defensive in a way that is likely to drive the believer into the
company of fellow believers.
But this does not advance matters very much. To suggest that
Sathya Sai Baba's miracles are essentially a recruiting device
would be quite misleading. For one thing, it would ignore the fact
that it is possible to "believe" in the miracles without believing
in Sathya Sai Baba. Many non-devotees are quite convinced that
Sathya Sai Baba can materialize ash and all the rest, but do not
see this as evidence of divinity. Indeed, some consider his powers
to be quite sinister. But even more important, to see the miracles
merely as a blandishment to potential converts would be to fail to
take into account the most crucial fact of all, that the miracles
have not only to do with the inception of belief, but also with its
consolidation and fulfillment. If devo- tees in some sense
"surrender," it isto some- thing that is apparently very meaningful
to them, and it is to this that I now turn.
On this point it is best to begin with the obvious, namely that
Sathya Sai Baba does not just produce impressive spectacles; he
also produces things, things that are usually given to others. And
even when physical items and substances are not involved, his
miracles usually have a context, and this context consists of
relationships between him and
particular devotees. As far as the things and substances as
such are concerned, it is obviously significant that Sathya Sai
Baba materializes more sacred ash than anything else. As White has
pointed out, this is a clear link with Shirdi Sai Baba, also an ash
dispenser, whose reappearance Sathya Sai Baba claims to be (White
1972:874). Sacred ash is also deeply implicated in the symbolism of
Shiva, and therefore, as Swallow has shown, the ash is a vital
element in Sathya Sai Baba's sacred persona as the "living lingam
in the yoni" (Swallow 1982:145, 147ff.).
However, what may be most important about his miraculous
productions is not what he materializes, but what he does with it,
for almost invariably he gives it to someone, which suggests that
what matters most is not the thing in itself but the way it
connects him with others - in short, its significance as a vehicle
for a relationship (see also White 1972: 874). Seen in this light,
it is clear that the passage of materialized objects and sub-
stances from Sathya Sai Baba to his followers mobilizes very
familiar patterns in Hindu devotional worship. The practice of
receiving a deity's or august personage'sprasad (grace-
as-leavings) has been too well described to require much comment,
save to note that among other things it seems to involve the
transfer of some desirable quality of the donor (the deity) to the
ingesting recipient who is thereby benefitted (Marriott 1976).
Uningestible objects can have the same properties; the garland or
garment recovered from the altar are examples. In the case of
Sathya Sai Baba the ash, the amrit, the sweets, and all the other
paraphernalia of his magic are obviously functional equivalents of
this. Produced by his power, they in some sense embody his power,
which is then trans- ferred beneficially, his "grace," to the
recip- ients. Thus, the ash cures illnesses, and the amulets and
all the rest, far from being mere souvenirs, protect the ingestors
and posses- sors from harm.
Indeed, these items and substances seem to be conceived as media
for their donor's actual presence. When Sathya Sai Baba presents
his devotees with materialized ob- jects he often says that through
them he will be close to the recipients. One informant recalled
that when "Baba" (what he is usually called in conversation; also
"Swami") pre-
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ANTHROPOLOGICAL QUARTERLY 120
sented him with a materialized ring he stated that between the
ring and himself there was a "golden thread" which would insure
that as long as the ring was worn he would always be there. This
same motif of "presence" seems to be involved in most of his
miracles. When he transports himself to other locations it is, of
course, to be near some devotee in a time of great need. And the
real meaning of the startling phenomena in the miracle-house- holds
- the footprints, the materializations of ash and amrit from
pictures, and so on- is that he is really there, even if he does
not appear to be. What all this suggests is that the power that is
carried or manifested by the substances and objects he gives to
others is not simply an impersonal force of some kind, but arises
in the context of interactions and relations between the
deity-saint and particular others; it is not power "as such," but
power-as-presence in the life of specific persons.:
But I have not yet touched upon another crucial feature of
Sathya Sai Baba's miracles, and indeed of most of his acts, and
this is their apparent indeterminacy. Though not as evident in the
literature of the cult, one of the most striking themes in
informants' accounts of their relationships with Sathya Sai Baba is
the apparent capriciousness of what he does. Nobody ever really
knows when or for whom he will produce ash or objects, or when or
on whom he will bestow other kinds of favors. He often does so when
least expected, "out of the blue." He surrounds himself with an
atmosphere of surprise; he is playful and mischievous (natkhat, a
word used by a Hindi- speaking informant), and even a bit of a
tease. For example, in early 1979 many devotees believed that he
would be coming to Delhi in March. One informant, a strong devotee,
recalled to me later that he had asked him to come and that "Baba"
had told him that he would. But he did not come, and when my
informant related this tale to some people who are quite close to
the deity-saint they laughed and said, "You didn't actually believe
him, did you?" This remark and the incident that occasioned it are
entirely conso- nant with the atmosphere of the cult. Another
informant told of how during a visit to the ashram at Puttaparthi
"Baba" had refused to allow him to touch his feet, but then later
quite inexplicably called him for that most
desirable of boons, a personal interview. This kind of thing, he
said, is "Baba's lial" (play, sport), then adding, "he does what he
wants." Such stories are extremely common.
Of course one might interpret such in- stances as simply the
inevitable consequences of the hubbub and confusion surrounding a
deity-saint with a national following - "Baba" forgetting to whom
he had said what. But this would be to miss an important point, for
within the tradition in which Sathya Sai Baba operates
unaccountability is an extremely important characteristic of
divinity.
In the Hindu world, the gods are playful. David Kinsley has
pointed out that divine play expresses the "otherness" of the
deities. The gods are free; they act, "...but their acts cannot be
understood simply within the struc- ture of theological orethical
systems. In their complete otherness, their actions can only be
called lila...'sport,'play,' or'dalliance' (Kins- ley 1979:xi). But
even as the play of the gods expresses divine otherness, it also
expresses nearness and intimacy. The gods "play with" their
devotees, and their play can therefore define a certain kind of
relationship. "Like a love affair, to which it is repeatedly
compared," Kinsley writes, "the devotee's relationship to God is
constantly changing, full of surprises, hidden delights and
ecstacies. It is unpredict- able and spontaneous. It is an end in
itself" (1979: 202).
Kinsley's phrasing, it seems to me, captures well a very
important aspect of Sathya Sai Baba's demeanor as perceived by many
of his devotees. When one devotee recalled feeling a nearly
irresistable urge to "pinch his cheek," I believe him to have been
expressing a sentiment arising from a powerful image of "Baba" as
playful child. His miracles are, of course, evidences of
extraordinary powers; but extraordinary powers are nothing new in
the Hindu world. However, the fact that his devotees usually refer
to his miracles as his "lilas," his sports, puts them in a
different perspective. They are not mere "wonders" (chamatkar),nor
are they to be likened to the magical "accomplishments" (siddli) of
human adepts. To understand them as lila is to raise them to a much
higher level. Their very essence is "play" and as such they are
expressions of divine unaccountability. At this level the very
haphazardness of his acts becomes a kind of evidence in support of
his
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SATHYA SAI BABA'S MAGIC
claims. Moreover, the emphasis on the play- fulness of his
divine character insists that his acts be understood within a
special context, that of relations with particular others, his
"playmates." These relationships are intimate, full of surprise and
delight (though sometimes pain as well), and, finally, ends in
themselves.
But are Sathya Sai Baba's acts unaccount- able in any simple
sense? Apparenlty not, for although informants portray an
essentially unpredictable "Baba," they also subject his acts to
certain kinds of interpretation, and this strikes me as an
extremely interesting fact. For example, one informant recalled
that Sathya Sai Baba once promised him a golden locket, but then
failed to deliver. He now realizes, this informant went on to say,
that the only reason he wanted the locket was to "show off," and
thus the apparently broken promise was a valuable lesson in
humility. Indeed, Sathya Sai Baba himself sometimes interprets his
own acts. As every- one knows, he can cure the apparently incur-
able. But he does not always do so, for as he himself said to one
of my informants, it is occasionally best that the heavy karmic
debts of the past be repaid. Therefore, the unaccount- ability of
his acts seems in essence to be prospective; one can never be quite
sure of what he is going to do next (though he of course knows).
But retrospectively his acts are at least susceptible to certain
kinds of interpretation.
His apparent capriciousness is obviously compelled by the
theodicy dilemma as it impinges on his relationships with devotees.
Human ignorance and divine omniscience are the essential conditions
for this. Sathya Sai Baba knows everything; we do not. "He knows we
are standing here now," one in- formant said to me. He therefore
knows, as devotees never tire of saying, everyone's "past, present
and future." His favors are certainly bestowed on some whom the
world regards as virtuous, but not always; nor is it always clear
that they are withheld from the less than virtuous. But it must be
remembered that it is not within the power of human understanding
to know who, in fact, is de- serving, particularly in a world
governed by karmic cause and effect extending beyond single earthly
lifespans. Not only do we not know what is hidden in the hearts of
others, or for that matter even our own, but we can
have no idea at all of the world-careers of the selves that we
are and that surround us. Knowing nothing of these things, even a
loving Lord's favor must seem inexplicable to us. All that we can
really conclude, in fact, is that even his apparent indifference is
his love. Stated otherwise, against the back- ground of the
misfortunes that occur even in the lives of devotees, it is
possible that Sathya Sai Baba's favor must be unaccount- able to be
believable. In this context the very opacity of his acts becomes
evidence of his divine omniscience.
Sathya Sai Baba's acts thus represent a curious amalgam of
determination and in- determination. It is a question of points of
view. From a limited human perspective he seems inexplicable. But
imbedded in the discourse of his cult seems to be an as- sumption
that there exists some frame of reference within which his acts are
but the visible exterior of an activity that is inwardly deeply
meaningful. This does not mean that his acts can ever be in any
human sense finally accountable. Although he may allude to his
purposes in explaining to a devotee why, say, the illness of a
child was not cured, I do not believe that the idea that "if one
only knew what he knows then everything he does would seem
inevitable" is really at the fore- front of devotees' minds. I, in
any case, have never heard such an idea deployed in talk about him.
But what is implicit in such talk is the idea that his acts are not
meaningless.
Hence, a paradox and an apparent con- tradiction in terms: we
are dealing, it would seem, with determined indetermination. But
somewhere in the conceptual chasm between the accountable and the
unaccountable there is another possibility which may be (as the
writings of Clifford Geertz suggest; see esp. 1966) uniquely the
domain of religious thought and experience. It is possible, that
is, for something to be meaningful without being fully accountable.
I think Sathya Sai Baba's play is an example of this. When an
informant says that the purpose of some instance of apparent
indifference is to demolish pride, the point is not only that where
Sathya Sai Baba finds pride he demolishes it (though this a major
theme in his relations with devotees), but that there is something
about his acts, however obscure they may seem to us, that permits
such explications - right or
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ANTHROPOLOGICAL QUARTERLY 122
wrong - reasonably to be made. What we do not know, he knows;
and thus even if his play encompasses its own ends, this does not
mean that it is pointless.
However, to present Sathya Sai Baba's divine persona as if it
were merely some kind of occasion for abstract karmic calculations
would be quite misleading. What would then be left out is what is
most present in in- formants' accounts of their relationships with
him: very powerful feelings. What must be stressed is the strong
emphasis on love-in- intimacy that is so characteristic of
devotees' accounts of their feelings about him, even when such
relations are to all outside ap- pearances far from intimate;
indeed, in the ideological framework of the cult such re- lations
can and do exist even when there has been no physical encounter
with "Baba" at all. Sathya Sai Baba does not so much have
relationships with devotees "in general" as he has specific
relationships with particular devotees for whom these relationships
are charged with deep personal meaning. But what is this meaning? I
believe it has in part to do with questions of identity.
In the South Asian religious milieu ques- tions of personal
identity are, of course, fundamental, and this, in turn, has to do
with the meaning of experience. Everyday ex- perience, the
experience of oneself as an organic being, and as an actor and
alter in social roles, supplies the basis for a certain conception
of self. But this self, defined and sustained through sensory
engagement with the world, is in some sense a false self, and the
aim of soteriological strategies is to "know" the real self that
lies hidden under the detritus of normal worldly endeavor and
attachment. Such knowledge, however, is not pure intellection,
remote from experience. Rather, it too is grounded in experience,
though of an utterly different kind, an exper- ience that is, in
many systems at least, intensely inward and achieved through ar-
duous cultivation of contemplative insight. Here the real truth
about the self is disclosed in a direct, unmediated apprehension.
Such an experience ideally leaves as its residue the conviction
that this more intensely, strik- ingly and intuitively experienced
identity su- persedes the person one previously thought oneself to
be.
The fact that human ignorance and divine
omniscience are implicated in the question of what Sathya Sai
Baba's acts mean, to- gether with the highly personal dimension
these acts seem to possess for many devotees, suggests to me that
similar questions of identity may be involved, though somewhat
differently modulated. Who is the devotee? The point is, the
devotee himself cannot really know. He knows neither the worst
about himself, nor in a kind of inversion of Puritanism, the best.
But Sathya Sai Baba does know. He knows the real devotee, "past,
present and future," that bundle of motives and inclinations
embarked on a trans- temporal world career. Or, rather, when he
interacts with his devotee the relationship in some measure defines
a self, as all social interactions do, but because of his unique
character, and especially his omniscience, the self so defined
cannot be the evident one. The self known to, watched over, and
loved by"Baba" is more inclusive, less partial, and in some sense
truer than the one of which the devotee- and all human others - are
normally aware.
Interaction with "Baba" is an experience, and a highly vivid
one, or at least so the accounts of informants suggest. And given
its context, such interaction has the potential to be an
experiential basis for a devotee's confidence that he is somehow
more than he seems to be, that the identity with which he is
familiar is not, after all, the one that matters most. But here the
revelation is apparently not, as in other instances, something
arising from a cultivated experience of the self, but rather occurs
by indirection, borrowed from what the devotees believed to be the
reaction to the self of a very special other. I am certainly not
suggesting that the result of this is something as simple as mere
self-esteem buttressed by apparent divine approbation. "Pride," as
we have noted, can be demolished by encounters with "Baba." Indeed,
what is remarkable about relationships between the deity-saint and
his devotees is that even his apparent indifference or neglect can
be seen as somehow positive in implication. Informants speak of
what is apparently a very common experieFnce of new devotees:
strong affirm- ative reactions from "Baba" at first, followed by
coolness and neglect. But this does not matter, for his
indifference is only apparent, and never a matter of neglect. The
point is,
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SATHYA SAI BABA'S MAGIC 123
beyond mere pride or self-esteem there is something else that
devotees, through "Baba," can come to feel about themselves
something that, for those who pass the test of his apparent neglect
or indifference, is seemingly more valuable than self-esteem.
But what is it? Or rather, who is this person who is in some way
"completed" through a relationship with "Baba"? It is not easy to
say; indeed, I am far from sure that devotees themselves have very
coherent ideas about this, and in any case the ultimate rewards of
devotion to Sathya Sai Baba are certainly idiosyncratic, depending
on highly specific features of individual life-experiences. At the
level of general symbolism, however, certain broad themes are
evident, at least in outer contour. Such a person is certainly a
safer person, being under the Lord's direct protection; but of
course this does not mean that such a person is unaffected by the
often painful vicissitudes of life as it must be in this world.
Such a person is also in some sense a more valuable person; but the
worth in ques- tion is not necessarily visible on the surfaces of
things, for it is fully realized only in the knowledge of an
all-knowing other. This is a knowledge the devotee cannot ever
share; his only possible communication with it comes from a sense
of that divine other's intimate, personal presence in his life.
Such a person is also a more loved person, for this love, being
all-knowing, is all-forgiving. Cer- tainly too, such a person may
have a basis for heightened salvationary expectations, but I must
add that there was very little talk of soteriological matters in
the discourse of my informants.
In fact I believe that many of his devotees are more serene
persons as a result of their relationship with "Baba." This would
be consistent with Sathya Sai Baba's own em- phasis on "courage"
(Kasturi 1977), and per- haps also with his promise that the
sincere devotee will have his darshan (sight) at the
moment of death. When informants speak, as they often do, of the
"peace of mind" they get from Sathya Sai Baba I think they are
referring to a genuine inner sense of security which the
deity-saint's presence, in whatever medium, confers.
In any case, I hope that these points may in some measure help
to explain what may seem at first glance to be a mere credulous
innocence in people who ought to know better. That such people seem
to be the ones who "ought to know better" has at least provoked our
query, and if nothing else we have learned that while Sathya Sai
Baba's magic is certainly in tension with scientific rationality,
it engages with it only obliquely. The so-called miracles seem to
derive their real energy from their role as media for deity-
devotee relationships. This being so, it is finally these
relationships for which the mir- acles are "evidence," and
therefore it is on the basis of a devotee's feeling about such
relationships that his final assessment of the "validity" of the
miracles is likely to be for- mulated. Put differently, the
deity-saint's acts, of which the miracles are considered by
devotees to be quintessential examples, have as much to do with a
devotee's feelings about himself as about Sathya Sai Baba and the
things he can or cannot do; or, rather, in this context his
feelings about himself and about "Baba" are conflated. This is
Sathya Sai Baba's true magic. Whatever the devotee's inner
understanding of himself may in the end turn out to be (and here we
must be agnostic) to the degree that this understanding is valued
by the devotee, he must believe that the miracles are genuine.
Therefore, as good as Sathya Sai Baba's theatrics may be, and by
all accounts they are very good indeed, the true source of the
verisimilitude of his self-presentation lies only partly in
physical appearances. At least as important is his devotees' assent
to their own hopefulness about themselves.
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ANTHROPOLOGICAL QUARTERLY
NOTES The research on which this paper is based took place
in Delhi between July 1978 and May 1979, and was supported by an
Indo-American Fellowship. I would like to thank colleagues at the
Department of Sociology, Delhi School of Economics, for the
hospitality, help and intellectual companionship so generously
given during my stay in Delhi. I would also like to thank the many
devotees of Sathya Sai Baba who aided me in my inquiries. A
previous version of this paperwas delivered to a panel at the
annual meetings of the American Academy of Religion in New York,
December 1982.
2 To this I must add, however, that the worship of Sathya Sai
Baba has collective, communitarian dimmensions too, as does the
worship of any Hindu deity. His devotees are a community of
believers, and the ties that bind them can, at least in principle,
transcend social boundaries of other kinds. On this point see White
(1972:875).
I think the principle of "borrowed" points of view may be more
important in Hindu religious culture than is generally realized.
See Babb (1982).
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BABB, LAWRENCE A. 1982 - Glancing: visual interaction in
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BHAGAVANTAM, S. 1976 - Lord of miracles. In Sai Baba and His
Message: A Challenge to Behavioural Sciences. S.P. Ruhela and
D. Robinson, eds. Delhi: Vikas, pp. 228-235
BHARATI, AGEHANANDA 1981 - Hindu viewsand waysand the
Hindu-Muslim interface: an anthropologicalassessment. New Delhi:
Munshiram
Manoharlal.
FESTINGER, LEON, H.W. RIECKEN, and S. SCHACHTER 1964 - When
prophecy fails. New York: Harper and Row (Torchbook Edition).
GEERTZ, CLIFFORD 1966 - Religion as a cultural system. In
Anthropological Approaches to the Study of Religion. M. Banton, ed.
London:
Tavistock, pp. 1-46.
KASTURI, N. 1975 - Sathyam, Sivam, Sundaram (Part III). New
Delhi: Bhagwan Sri Sewa Samithi. 1977 - Sathyam, Sivam, Sundaram
(Part I). American Edition. 4th Edition. Whitefield (Bangalore
Dist.): Vraj Brindaban Press.
KINSLEY, DAVID R. 1979 - The divine player: a study of Krsha
Lila. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass.
MARRIOTT, McKIM 1976 - Hindu transactions: diversity without
dualism. In Transaction and Meaning: Directions in the Anthropology
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Exchange and Symbolic Behavior. B. Kapferer, ed. Philadelphia:
Ishi. SWALLOW, D. A.
1982 - Ashes and powers: myth, rite and miracle in an Indian
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Anthropological Quarterly
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July 1983, Vol 56:3
Cover PageArticle
Contentsp.116p.117p.118p.119p.120p.121p.122p.123p.124
Issue Table of ContentsAnthropological Quarterly, Vol. 56, No.
3, Jul., 1983Front MatterCommunity Power Brokers and National
Political Parties in Rural Costa Rica [pp.107-115]Sathya Sai Baba's
Magic [pp.116-124]Male Sociability and Rituals of Masculinity in
Rural Andalusia [pp.125-133]Women in the Jewish Family in
Pre-Colonial Morocco [pp.134-144]Book Reviewsuntitled
[pp.145-148]untitled [pp.149-150]untitled [pp.151-152]
Books Received [p.153]Back Matter