THE WIFE OF "DR. MICHAEL COCHSTEIN" DREAMS OF SAI BABA
-THE WELL-KNOWN OMNISCIENT SELF-CONTRADICTOR OF PUTTAPARTHI

 

Excerpt from The "Hindu" Andhra Pradesh 26 November 2004 By Staff Reporter Satya Sai trust to host global meet on divinity. PUTTAPARTHI, NOV. 25. The Sri Satya Sai Central Trust will organise a world conference on `unity, purity and divinity' as part of the Satya Saibaba's 80th birthday celebrations here next year. Two ardent devotees of Saibaba were given the opportunity to speak at the spiritual leader's 79th birthday function held here on Wednesday. Michael Cochstein, a practising physician from Southern California, USA, said he had found his spiritual divinity at Puttaparthi. "Swamy spoke to my wife in her dream one day when we were passing through a difficult phase and I had fallen in love with him immediately," Mr. Cochstein said. He claimed that Saibaba had taught him that selfless love was the key to happy life. Stating that Saibaba was an embodiment of selfless love, Mr. Cochstein said the greatest joy in life was knowing selfless love through Saibaba. Source: http://www.hindu.com/2004/11/26/stories/2004112606490300.htm

It is noteworthy that such a newspaper as 'The Hindu' gets the name of such an important Sai VIP wrong! ('Cochstein' is none other than the delightful Dr. Michael Goldstein).
Goldstein makes a point of "Swamy spoke to my wife in a dream one day". (Sounds like a daydream?) One has to commisserate with those who still believe fully in Sai Baba's pronouncements that no one can dream of him without His Will! For it has slipped their attention that SSB had again vastly modified his posititon on this recently. In the 2004 a public discourse noted above he denies most firmly that he ever enters anyone's dreams, as follows:-

Some people claim to have seen God in their dream. Where is dream? Where is God? In fact, dream experience itself is not real. It is only an illusion. They are deluded to think that way. You say that Swami appeared in your dream last night. This is not correct. I do not appear in anybody’s dream. When you intensely desire that Swami must appear in your dream and constantly think of the same, that intense desire will assume a form in your dream. God does not assume a form or change into another form. You have witnessed something in your dream. What is it? It is your own self, nothing other than that. You are visualising your own self in the dream state. Do not be under the illusion “Rama has appeared in my dream, Krishna has appeared in my dream, Swami has appeared in my dream”. This is a sign of ignorance. All these are dreams only. How can a dream be called a reality? The very word “dream” explains its nature. As long as you are in sleep, this experience may be true. The moment you wake up, the experience vanishes. (Source http://sssbpt.org/Pages/Prasanthi_Nilayam/25-10-04_Discourse.htm)

Compare these amazing revelations by the 'omniscient avatar' with his former well-known 'revelations'. That he intervenes in dreams has been believed by virtually every devotee. They have been told so by him on many occasions and believed him fully. In 'Vision of the Divine' he is reported verbatim telling Dr. Fanibunda that he comes into people's dreams, and only when he wills it himself. They have written countless articles and books about their dreams of SSB, which he has often reportedly confirmed they were true visits from him in person:-

“Dreams are nothing but the reflection of the subconscious mind. Swami appearing in dreams is very auspicious…Dreams are the reflection, reaction and resound of that which is within you. The same does not apply to dreams in which Swami appears. Swami appears in dreams only when He will it and not when you want.” (Sanathana Sarathi, April 1999, p. 98)

With his typical systemic inconsistency, he contradicts that one cannot dream of him at all without his will and changes it to only "very clear" dreams. However, even this he has now refuted! What a confusing deceiver he has been, and remains! He comes across as very confused himself.

“There are certain confusing dreams in which your feelings play an active role. You may be seeing Swami but at the same time your feelings get mixed up and cause confusion. You may see yourself in Puttaparthi at one point in time and in America at the very next, and so on and so forth. These dreams are not willed by Swami. These result from indigestion and improper food. Dreams which are willed by me are very clear and give no room for confusion or doubt.”

 

However, blaming indigestion or improper food is quite laughable in view of his saying that dreams reflect etc. the subconscious mind. He has said many other conflicting things through the years about how different kinds of dream arise. He quoted the sage Pippalada (Sathya
Sai Speaks Vol. 24, p. 144), who held that indigestion does NOT cause dreams, but sleep does. What sheer mastery of human wisdom and common sense this a-Sathya Sai Baba demonstrates!

My position on dreams has changed a lot since I wrote the book 'Source of the Dream' in 1994 (Bangalore Sun-Sky Publications, sold at Prashanthi Nilayam bookshop). Now I have just published a new book in India, 650-plus pages, entitled "End of the Dream". Dreams are, in my opinion, self-generated... even those which have precognitive elements which later occur. My views on dreams were formed after a long life of deep interest in this and related subjects, and a brief summary has been on-line for some years now as part of my work of human psychology, 'The Human Whole' (online). After having been involved in teaching at the Institute of Psychology at the University of Oslo, and formerly as staff in group therapy at two treatment homes in Scandinavia, and having recorded dreams and studied virtually the entire serious literature on them in psychology, psychoanalsysis both Freudian, Jungian, existential and many other theories and therapies etc., I have at least learned finally that what Sathya Sai baba has said about dreams contains so much unempirical nonsense as to be misleading and worthless.