A pictorial pilgrimage

Homyar Mistry’s magnum opus is both a work of art and a work of love. When art mingles with love it becomes divine. It is significant that he does not give the book a title. He opens it with a quotation and ends it with a quotation from Meher Baba who, an ever increasing number of people believe, is the Avatar of the age.
The book is centered around Meher Baba’s Samadhi which was once a barren wilderness and is now a beautiful place of devotion and worship attracting thousands of devotees from all over the world. At the bottom of the hill is the grave of a Sufi master by the name of Hazarat Gilory Shah. He said to his followers, "When I die bury me here for a master far greater than I will make this his abode, and in time to come the world will come to this place.” The prophecy has come true.
Using a series of his most beautiful photographs, Mistry, the lensman, unfolds the story of Meherabad and the Samadhi of the Avatar and deftly weaves in Meher Baba’s philosophy and teaching in the Avatar’s own words.
In the book is a picture of the Avatar’s tomb with a dome above the structure. At the corners of the roof, squaring the dome are models of a temple, a mosque, a cross and a sacred fire urn, the symbols of the world’s four great religions: Hinduism, Islam, Christianity and Zoroastrianism. It signifies that all religions belong to the Avatar during his different manifestations. In the universality of Meher Baba’s teaching there is no difference between a Hindu, Muslim, Christian, Parsi or Jew. It dawns on the novitiate that Meher Baba observed silence from July 10, 1925 till he dropped his body 44 years later. During this period he met with two severe car accidents, was badly injured but not a word escaped his lips. When Baba declared that he would not speak henceforth, a close follower Pandoba, pleaded with him saying that "the world will be deprived of your teachings.” Meher Baba replied, "I have not come to teach but to awaken.” These were his last spoken words. There is profound meaning in this sentence, which is inscribed on his tombstone and the author brings it out via a magnificent picture. Every page of this beautifully produced book is pregnant with thought. Those of us who are familiar with the surroundings of the Samadhi feel as if we are walking through the place as we turn the pages.
This is an excellent introduction to the Avataric concept that God manifests from time to time in human form to uphold truth and righteousness (also the basic concept of Zoroastrianism) and to give mankind a push towards his goal of God realization which, Baba says, is nothing but self realization.

Meher Baba’s tomb

Homyar Mistry

Mistry’s book which comes with an outer dust jacket and a decorated presentable box, brings Meherabad, the resting place of the Avatar, to life and the book becomes a pilgrimage in itself. It will remain as one of the major commemorations of the Avatar’s life.