Cables of Love to Meher Baba for His Birthday
Meher Mount
“I will be with you all who gather for My birthday to celebrate My being among you. I am wherever My lovers are. I give my love blessing to each of my lovers.”
AVATAR MEHER BABA in Andhra, India, in 1954. (Colorized by Jim Kirkpatrick) Courtesy of Meher Nazar Publications, Ahmednagar, India.
On February 25th, Avatar Meher Baba’s birthday is celebrated at Meher Baba centers, gatherings, in homes, and in hearts around the world.
In honor of Meher Baba’s Birthday, here’s a delightful story shared by Mani S. Irani, Meher Baba’s sister and close disciple, in the Family Letters in 1963. In her letter, Mani is referring to long-time disciple Feram Workingboxwala.
The excerpt from the Family Letters:
Feramroj, an old Baba-lover who is one of the main pillars that sustains Baba’s office at Ahmednagar, is a thin man whose looks belie his age and whose serious demeanour fails to hide his inexhaustible store of wit.
One of Adi’s* helpmates for years, he always has his nose to the grindstone of Baba-work. On Baba’s Birthday this year [1963], the deluge of telegrams and cables to Baba came from all over the world and lasted for nearly a week!
This has been too much for the small and meagerly staffed Telegraph Office [T.O.] at Ahmednagar, and an extra rush of work for Feram who was kept legging it to the T.O. all day long for confirmation or correction of the speedily deciphered contents, or to check the accuracy of the reply-paid forms.
Feram’s note to Meherazad** spoke volumes and I can't help reproducing it here:
"My dear Eruch***, the local T.O. is in a hustle and bustle, as also, I hear, the Poona T.O. Even Bombay is wondering who Meher Baba is, because for an individual this rush of cables and telegrams is unprecedented.
“The local T.O. is hard pressed and the clerk told me that for the last few days they are dealing only with ‘Meher Baba’. So much the better, as their sanskaras+ will be lessened.
“Even with my over-growth of hair on the chin, I was sirred and stooled (meaning I was addressed as 'Sir' and offered a stool to sit on, which is a rare honour for a shirt-pant-sandalled individual as I am). But I am not flattered because I have had no rest! However I look forward to better days."
“I have come to sow the seed of love in your hearts, so that in spite of all superficial diversity which your life in illusion must experience and endure, the feeling of oneness through love is brought about amongst all the nations, creeds, sects and castes of the world.”
Notes
*Adi K. Irani (also known as Adi Sr.) was Meher Baba’ secretary.
**Meherazad, India, was Meher Baba’s final home. He lived there with His mandali, close men and women disciples.
***Eruch B. Jessawala was one of Meher Baba’s closest disciples and primary translator of Meher Baba’s gestures and use of the alphabet board.
+Sanskaras: (Vedanta) Impressions. Also impressions which are left on the soul as memories from former past lives, and which determine one’s desires and actions in the present lifetime.
Sources
Bhau Kalchuri, Lord Meher: The Biography of the Avatar of the Age Meher Baba, Online Edition, pg. 5263, accessed February 18, 2025. (c)Avatar Meher Baba Perpetual Public Charitable Trust.
Mani S. Irani, 82 Family Letters to the Western Family of Lovers and Followers of Meher Baba, page 160. (Myrtle Beach, SC: Sheriar Press, Inc.) (c) Avatar Meher Baba Perpetual Public Charitable Trust, Ahmednagar, India.
82 Family Letters is available in paperback from Meher Baba Books in Los Angeles, Sheriar Books in Myrtle Beach, SC, and online at the Avatar Meher Baba Perpetual Public Charitable Trust, Ahmednagar, India.
Charles Purdom, The God-Man, pg. 274 (South Carolina: Sheriar Press, Inc.) ©1971 Meher Spiritual Center, Inc., Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.