Of a saint of God I have thought, again and again. He was a quiet man, pure and humble and true. He attended to the ordinary tasks of life as an ordinary man, and those who met him did not suspect that they stood in the presence of a holy man. But the angels knew it. And, one night, as he was rapt in the ecstasy of communion, the Angels visited him and took the dust of his feet. And as they were about to depart, they said to him, "O saint of God! Let us know what you desire. We fain would leave with you some gift!"
The saint smiled and said, "I have no desire at all. I have but the longing to love the Lord to distraction!"
And the angels said to him, "Do ask for something if only to make us happy. May we leave with you the wealth of the world? You look so poor!"
"Wealth is worry!" answered the saint. "What shall I do with it?"
And the Angels said, "May we give you the gift of reading the minds of men, of knowing their innermost thoughts and secrets?"
"I read the Book of the Heart," the saint answered. "That is enough for me. It contains the whole science of loving!"
"May we give you the gift of prophecy, of knowing what the future hides?" the angels suggested.
"There is no future for me,'' was the simple answer of the saint, "and there is no past. I live in the eternal now and here!"
"May we give the gift of healing?" the Angels asked.
"The name of my Master is a healer," the saint answered.
One after another, the proposals of the Angels were turned down. Then the angels conferred among themselves and decided to so bless the shadow of the saint that whenever it was behind him, it would radiate health and happiness, but if the shadow fell in front of him, so that he could see it, no such thing would happen. And the saint passed through life not knowing himself how much healing there was in his shadow.
Dada J P Vaswani was a humanitarian, philosopher, educator, acclaimed writer, powerful orator, messiah of ahimsa, and non-sectarian spiritual leader.
