Chapter 4§
Meeting My Guru
One day, I was invited to go to Yogaswami. Jnanaguru Yoganathan, affectionately known by the people of the area as Yogaswami, was a magnificent man. No one approached him unless they were in the right mood. Some were literally afraid of him.§
When within the radius of him, one could feel the atmosphere scintillating. One felt electricity in the atmosphere. Devotees would prepare themselves on the inside so everything was all right before visiting this guru. Just to take him a little bit of fruit, they would sometimes prepare themselves for three or four days. If asked when they would be seeing the guru, they would say, “Well, I’m not quite ready yet to see Yogaswami today... maybe tomorrow.” Or, “I will go on a very auspicious day.” This was because they didn’t want him to look through them and point out something that they saw in themselves that they thought he might see. He always knew when people were coming to him before they arrived.§
My meeting with him was unusual because I was introduced, and he said, “Come on in and sit down.” Everybody else prostrated before him. In the Orient, devotees prostrate in front of a guru, placing the entire body face down on the floor. He said to me, “You come in and sit down. You don’t have to do that. You and I are one.”§
On the way to visit Yogaswami, Gurudeva and his hosts stopped to worship at Nallur Temple. There, in the inner sanctum, where a Vel is enshrined to invoke Murugan, he had a vision of the white-haired master.§
Before going to Yogaswami at Columbuthurai, young Robert’s host, Kandiah Chettiar, took him to the Lord Subramaniya Temple at Nallur before dawn.§
They proceeded to Yogaswami’s hut. As soon as they arrived, Yogaswami asked Robert in a loud voice, “Did you see me anywhere?” He replied, “Yes, at the Nallur Temple.”§
“You are in me,” Yogaswami then said.§
“You are in me,” the American mystic replied.§
“I am in you,” said Yogaswami.§
“I am in you,” Robert boldly answered.§
Others wondered and spoke in whispers. How daring of the young American, to speak like this to the fiery sage. But no one else had seen Yogaswami at the temple. Only Robert had the inner sight to see the swami at the temple, silently blessing his arrival.§
From Alaveddy, the American was taken by bullock cart to Yogaswami’s thatched hermitage. Yogaswami, age 77, called the youth to sit at his side, which was a rare gesture, and asked that grapes be squeezed into juice for his youthful guest.§
That same day, during our first meeting, Yogaswami started asking me the deepest of philosophical questions. I must have given the right answer each time; he seemed very pleased. As soon as he had asked the question, without hesitation I spoke the answer. Then he gave me the name I hold today, Subramuniya. Subra means “the light than emanates out from the central source.” It just emanates out. Muni means a silent teacher, and ya means restraint. Subramuniya means a self-restrained soul who remains silent or speaks out from intuition, one who speaks out from the inner sky.§
The scintillating sage showed me the book he had on Patanjali’s yoga aphorisms—I had studied Patanjali, too! We had just a wonderful, deep and inner meeting. He treated me more like a brother. This did not surprise me, though, because I was so far within and not in the consciousness of being surprised, but it surprised everybody else. He was my guru, my master.§
He made me eat food with him, and we parted. Before leaving, I mentioned to my newfound guru that I had established an ashram in nearby Alaveddy and would like to have his blessings. He said, “Fine, good. It will one day become a three-story building. You are going around the world, and you will feed thousands of people. You are going to build palaces.”§
Yogaswami began giving me many different kinds of instructions, such as “You will return to America, and you will roar. And when you come back here, nothing will be gained and nothing will be lost.” He said, “Now you go and teach the realizations that you have had.” I was used to being told what to do by my six teachers on the path, so I was happy to have this positive instruction. After I left my guru’s presence, everyone started relating to me differently.§
On the second visit with my guru, we had a beautiful time together, just meditating and enjoying a beautiful flow. Many people came and he had grape juice made for me. On the third visit, we had a beautiful conversation about the path. Then, as I was leaving his ashram and he was seeing me out, he gave me the hardest slap on the back that I had ever felt from anybody. With all his might he reached out and cracked me on the spine between the shoulder blades. It was tremendous. I would have fallen on my face if I had not been so tall. Some of the Hindu devotees were startled, too, because that is one of the most powerful ordination initiations ever given. After this initiation, he gave me some powerful instructions.§
One day, as the “American brahmin” was leaving the hut, Yogaswami snuck up to perform the “coronation,” slapping his disciple on the back with an initiatory blow that would be heard around the world.§
There are four ways that a guru will initiate or ordain. One is through talking, a very mild way. Another is by a look, and another is through thought. The most powerful initiation is through touch combined with the actual inner power, for through this contact, with intent, he begins to feed and transmit all of his inner knowing and inner power to the disciple. In this way, Yogaswami gave to me all his knowledge of how to be a guru. It later began to unfold within me from him, then from his guru and then from his guru’s guru. This is how the spiritual power in a line of gurus is transferred and increased.§
After receiving his final initiation from Chellappaswami in 1910, Yogaswami took up residence under an illupai tree in Columbuthurai village. In 1914 or so, he moved into a nearby hut, which is where, in 1949, he received his American visitor.§
Gurudeva in 1949, after his return to America§