LOVE AND MISERY

 
Q. Baba, what is the number of followers you have all over the world?

A. Would you want to count the number of hairs on your head?

 
Q. Baba, you are God and you know everything and yet why should you ask so often whether I love you? Of course, I love you very much.

A. It is my delight to hear from my lovers that they love me. There is no doubt that I know everything, yet I ask. I feel delighted when my lover says, 'Baba, I love you very much.' As, for example, in everyday life, one comes across a very loving couple. Each loves the other very much and each knows it, and yet the husband or the wife would very often ask, 'Dearest, do you love me?' Invariably the obvious answer would be, 'I love you very much!' It is my pleasure to ask and my delight to hear from my lovers their oft-repeated answer, 'Baba, I love you very much.'

 
Q. Why should misery perpetually exist on earth in spite of God's Infinite Love and Mercy?

A. The source of Eternal Bliss is the Self in all, and the cause of perpetual misery is the selfishness of all. As long as satisfaction is derived through selfish pursuits, misery will always exist. Only because of the infinite love and mercy of God can man learn to realize, through the lessons of misery on earth, that inherent in him is the source of infinite bliss and that all suffering is his labor of love to unveil his own infinite self.