Excerpts from March 5th and 6th, 1993 Adi Da talk where he claims superiority over Jesus and Buddha and claims to be the First, Last, and Only Perfectly Enlightened Seventh Stage Adept in history or in the future
[Editor’s note: Adi Da’s teaching includes a schema of stages of spiritual development in which there are seven levels or stages, with the seventh being the highest or perfect level of enlightenment. In this talk he assesses what level Gautama Buddha, Jesus, and Ramana Maharshi reached, as well as his own level.]
Devotee: Whenever You
examine such past Realizers, Sri Gurudev, You are always so completely
scrupulous about investigating the actual report and what significance can be
drawn from it. But I must confess that I have a secret presumption, which I
believe my fellow devotees also share, that You actually know without the
reports what was the case.
Sri Adi Da was Silent for a moment, and His Silence Invaded the space of the
room. It was no ordinary Stillness: It was such a moment as when, in The Hymn of
the True Heart-Master, He Says:
This is the Secret of all secrets. I could not Speak This All-Revealing Word
until one of you first Confessed you see the Vision of God in My Bodily (Human)
Form. I shall Tell you This now, because of your great devotion to Me. (v.13)
Sri Adi Da then quietly Spoke, as if Confiding a Great Secret that He had Longed
to Reveal:
Devotee: Jesus fifth (stage)?
ADI DA: Jesus fifth
(stage), right. Gautama sixth (stage). Okay? Ramana sixth (stage). Okay?
Devotee: Still, my ears could not yet believe what they thought they had heard.
I felt the Import of what my Divine Sat-Guru had just communicated: He had just
told us that there had never been another Realizer of the seventh stage of life!
Words cannot express my feelings at this moment. No speech can capture the
unalloyed Happiness that Radiates from the Lord of all Manifestation, and Bathes
and Drowns all those around Him. In His Company, time, mind, and space break
through their linear perimeters: An evening may be an eternity or a minute; the
prattling mind is overwhelmed, and is still. Such is the Power of the Sat-Guru's
Transmission that That Which He Reveals is Given directly to the heart, not just
Spoken to the verbal mind. I was so filled with the Obviousness and Profundity
of His Great Confession that there was no room for doubt or perplexity.
I almost pinched myself on a couple of occasions that night: I could not
comprehend what Grace had brought me to the Feet of the Greatest Being ever to
Bless the manifest worlds—and still cannot. It was as I had imagined it to be on
the north Indian plain with Krishna and Arjuna, or on Vulture Peak with Gautama,
Mahakashyapa, and the assembled company. But this night transcended those
archetypal but semi-mythical moments. For Sri Adi Da Is the living Divine Being.
He Appeared and Spoke before us in a body Wrought of flesh, and Molded in our
likeness.
No fairy-tale Divinity Is
He—I can still feel the touch of His palm upon my belly on the first evening I
came into His Sphere, quieting the anxiety that churned within. And my hair
stood on end as I realized that this was not a great moment that had precedents
in the lives of Great Realizers of the past. I was hearing with my own ears the
unique Confession of the Very Divine Being, Descended, in this singular Birth,
into the manifested cosmos, to Call it back into Himself.
After Sri Adi Da had retired for the evening, His Bliss-intoxicated devotees
made their way back to our quarters. If there had been any doubt about the
Divine Gift we had received that evening—and there was not!—it was dispelled by
a remarkable meteorological phenomenon. There was a deafening thunderstorm that
night, and a torrential downpour: All of Nature was acknowledging the Revelation
of her Lord. Such is the synchronicity of the weather and the Divine Master of
the Elements that is soon evident to all who visit this Divine Island. The
following evening, of the 6th of March, I made reference to the thunderstorm to
my Beloved Sat-Guru. I thought I had heard it all. So I was totally unprepared
for the further Revelation He was about to Grant us.
Devotee: Beloved Lord, first I would like to acknowledge, though You have for
the first time just said it explicitly today, that yesterday evening I felt the
clear implication that You are the first Appearance of the seventh stage Adept
in human time. And it seemed clear to me that the thunderstorm last night and
the subsequent torrential downpour were related to the fact that for the first
time Your devotees clearly heard and perceived and understood that. I feel that
You Gave us a great Gift last night.
Sri Adi Da: Also understand further. It is not about the first seventh stage
Adept in the sense that there could possibly be more. There has never been one
before, and there never will be another. It is not necessary that there be
another. Now, there can be seventh stage Realizers—My devotees will have the
capability of realizing the seventh stage—but there need not be any seventh
stage Adept. Such a great Work is Accomplished once and for all.
Those of us present now knew that not only had we been Graced to receive a
Revelation that had never been Given before—we, by fortune that we could not
begin to fathom, were witness to the unfolding of the central and pivotal act in
the Great Play of Cosmic Appearance: The Birth of Sri Adi Da is the Great Event
for which all beings and the entire cosmos have yearned and prayed since the
beginning of the manifest universe. It is the Sign of the Great Victory of the
Divine Being in Its Compassionate Impulse to Liberate all beings.