Did Sathya Sai Baba suffer from epilepsy in his youth?

SSB has recently given another one of his odd discourses ( 05 July 2003 ). Now he teaches us (on “Doctor´s Day”) that there are “326 diseases that haunt man day in and day out”.
In the eighteenth century there was a Swedish scientist, who was called Linné, who publicized a book in 1763, “Genera morborum”, in which he named and classified 325 different diseases.
On this evidence, SSB´s level of knowledge of illnesses looks about 250 years out of date.

Even if you are not a doctor, anybody with normal intelligence will soon realize that there are many more diagnosed diseases in the world today. Surely this discourse of SSB must have been a little embarrassing at least for the doctors....
Nowadays there is WHO´s International Statistical Classification of Diseases, ICD-10.
In this classification system, only chapter IV, endocrine, metabolic and nutritional diseases, occupies 35 pages in the Swedish, electronic version. Chapter VI, diseases of the nervous system, occupies 33 pages and Chapter V, mental and behavioral disorders, occupies 57 pages in the classification system.

According to mental diseases and disorders, there is another classification system, DSM-IV, Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, which contains 80 differential diagnoses.
One of them, The “Narcissistic Personality Disorder”, fits SSB himself very well.

Talking of that, do you recognize him from the DSM-IV description below? (To get the diagnose you should have at least five of the nine manifestations.. and you should manifest a common feature of grandiosity and deficient empathy..... grandiosity is like living in an artificial self, invented from fantasies of absolute or perfect power, genius, beauty, etc. These people also act as if they are in love with themselves):

(1) has a grandiose sense of self-importance (e.g., exaggerates achievements and talents, expects to be recognized as superior without commensurate achievements)

(2) is preoccupied with fantasies of unlimited success, power, brilliance, beauty, or ideal love

(3) believes that he or she is "special" and unique and can only be understood by, or should associate with, other special or high-status people (or institutions) (SSB is so special that nobody can understand him!)

(4) requires excessive admiration

(5) has a sense of entitlement, i.e., unreasonable expectations of especially favorable treatment or automatic compliance with his or her expectations

(6) is interpersonally exploitative, i.e., takes advantage of others to achieve his or her own ends

(7) lacks empathy: is unwilling to recognize or identify with the feelings and needs of others

(8) is often envious of others or believes that others are envious of him or her

(9) shows arrogant, haughty behaviors or attitudes

But SSB doesn't suffer only from mental disturbance.... On this “Doctor´s day” SSB also tells us that the “indisposition” of his body, kept him from his devotees for a whole month.
That must have been awful for him, to get on without their admiration for such a long time! That is probably why he came out looking rather absurd on a golf buggy, something of a come-down from the golden chariot!
He also reveals to us the “truth” about his illness.
This time he has not taken upon himself the illness of anybody. And of course the illness hasn't emerged from his body, how could it; we must not forget that he is God!
No this time he “underwent all this suffering only to demonstrate that one should not be attached to the body”.
He is very inventive isn't he?
But at the same time I can't help getting a little confused. He underwent all this “suffering”, but actually the suffering was no suffering at all?
Even if “the pain was so excruciating that it cannot be described in words”... and “pierced the body as if it were an electric shock”, we must certainly not believe that he was suffering....
No, no - far from that... His devotees can just relax. "I was all smiles when I was being taken to the hospital”, their hero confides to them.

But as a matter of fact, it is beyond my comprehension when he says that he was “unaffected” by the pain, when at the same time “it was impossible to move this way or that way”, and it also prevented him from giving darshan to his devotees for such a long time..... Gods ways are inscrutable...

And actually there is no end to the oddities in his confessions this day.....for who would ever believe that his devotees would present him with such a strange thing as a hair-drier? And who would have had an idea that SSB also would use it!
And when he used the hair-drier “the power supply was cut of”..... So SSB had to take “a close look at the drier.”
But unfortunately at that very moment the power “was restored” and the “sudden gust of hot air ripped through” his “eye damaging the retina”...
That's why SSB has been blind on this eye for nine years and why the damaged retina, which was removed from his eye by Dr. Hemanth Murthy, “was as dark as charcoal”.
You may wonder why God exhibits such a strange behavior and what he wants to teach us by that.
I suppose that the omniscient God knew that he would burn his eye when he took a close look at the drier? So what is then the moral philosophy of this story?
Ah... he tells us that “one eye is sufficient to see this wide world”!
But it's easy for him to say who “has a thousand heads, eyes and feet”.......
Perhaps it is time for still more revelations from SSB now, when he has already begun. What is he going to tell us in his next discourse?

UNTRUTHS BY SATHYA SAI BABA ABOUT HIS EYE, HIS WEIGHT, HIS FOOD etc.

Comment on Åsa Samsioe’s article “It's getting more and more absurd...” by Robert Priddy

Date: 07-14-03

Email:

Website: http://www.saibaba-x.org.uk/

In Sanathana Sarathi, July 1995, page 171-2, we read SSB telling us:

“Doctors know that in the eye there are billions of cells which react to light rays. If any of these cells are affected, the vision is affected….” And “I am 70 years now. I can see even an ant that is far away. It is physical power. What is the reason? Diet control. My weight has remains the same for over 60 years – 108 lbs only.” (see also Sathya Sai Speaks Vol. 28 - p. 186).

Nine years ago when SSB claimed he did the hair dryer farce was July 1994, a year before this published statement! In November 1998 V.K. Narasimhan, the editor of Sanathana Sarathi, told me that Baba had told him that he has been 110 lbs. in weight without increase or decrease for 20 years. Where the extra 2 lbs came from is anyone's guess... a sound dinner, perhaps. He told me that SSB had just told him that he was in 100% good health. This was in late 1998! So how can he have had a damaged retina even then? He must be telling some massive fibs (i.e. divine untruths!).

It sounds highly unlike that hot air from a hair dryer would damage the retina…. a medical one-off freak accident? One might just understand it perhaps if it were the cornea which protects the retina but even that seems unlikely. Unless, of course, it was another ‘divine leela’ (LOL). Another thing V.K. Narasimhan told me in 1998 was that SSB had just told of some of the accidents he had suffered. One was in the 80s when Sai Geetha, the elephant, had pierced one of his eyes with one of the hairs on her trunk, which are as sharp as needles. This had caused him much pain at the time and a bloodshot eye, he had told N., but he said that it had healed naturally without medication. I saw he had a blood-red eye for some weeks early in 1985, and also again some years later.

In his discourse at the hospital in Whitefield (June 3, 1995) SSB also said: “Purity, patience and perseverance. With these three you are bound to acquire good health and bliss. You may believe it or not. But the truth is that these three are responsible for my health (Arogya) and bliss (Ananda). I am always happy. I should like to run but there is no place where I can do so. I can lift anybody at this age.” (Sanathana Sarathi July 1995, p. 173)

But no longer, only 8 years later … with his hip joint condition which reportedly is chronic and degenerative osteo arthritis. What went wrong? Did sexual impurity catch up with him? Or also having lost patience at Christmas 2000 with his accusers?

More fat 'porkies':

SSB has often insisted that his weight has remain at (the divine number of) 108 lbs (how quaintly absurd). He evidently forgot that he had also said in a discourse: “…Swami started eating rice food which students take. He lost 6 kg in weight during 20 days’ stay at Kodaikanal. In Puttaparthi, Satyajit was in the habit of taking My weight now and then. When Swami was in Puttaparthi He weighed 108 lbs. At Kodaikanal, when weight was taken, it showed a reduction by 6 kilos. Swami weighed less than 100 lbs.” (Sanathana Sarathi, June 1998, page 146.)

All typical stuff from SSB. Body weight also changes during each day, 2 lbs beings the difference between, say, before and after drinking water and eating a light meal? Water weights 2.2lbs. per litre, and SSB has also warned everyone that they should drink at least 6 glasses of water daily in the hot climate of Southern India.

In Sanathana Sarathi, Nov. 1998, he is quoted as saying in connection with fruit offerings to him at the Paduka pooja: “Do they think I am Kumbakarna? I do not even take meals, then what are the fruits for.” But those who doubt his appetite for food and fruit should take a look at the visual proof… pictures at http://members.tripod.com/saisat0/pics3.htm

SSB also told V.K. Narasimhan in 1998 that he had not had his hair cut for 20 years either. However, photos taken of SSB through that period show clearly that (around 1993/4??) his hair was suddenly seen to be about 1/3 or less of the volume it normally had. Then it slowly grew out again. I was present at the ashram at that time and observed this closer crop of his hair. So SSB can tell anything he likes, whether true or not, accurate or not, and get away with it… but only among his confirmed and fully paid-up followers!