Who was Shirdi Sai Baba? Baba lived all his adult life in Shirdi, a small village in India. To the unknowing, He seemed a simple beggar, dressed in torn clothes, having no need for any material item. Claiming neither the Hindu nor Muslim religion, nor any religion. He lived in an abandoned Mosque with no roof and every day took his food from a few people, making his rounds with his begging bowl, door to door.What really was happening; He was burning the karmas of everyone who came to Him, in the dhuni (Divine Fire) Baba kept burning at all times. Healing and giving guidance on every level. Hundreds of thousands of miracles are attributed to Him in His life and they have multiplied now after His Mahasamadhi. Baba left His physical form in 1918, but his Divine Energy and Intention and Power is always available and at work in the world.The Shri Sai Satcharitra is a discourse based on experiences Baba’s devotees had with Him during His life on earth. It is said that Shirdi Sai Baba caused it to be written through Shri Anna Saheb Dabholkar - Hemadpant - by giving inner motivation to him. Baba had clearly told him: I Myself write my own life. Hearing My stories and teachings will create faith in devotees’ hearts and they will easily get self-realization and bliss…. Every chapter is a mixture of philosophy, anecdotes, and teachings. His book is akin to the Vedas for Sai’s devotees. To many people, The Divine Truth imparted by this book is even greater than the knowledge contained in the Vedas and the Gita, because all the characters and events in it are real and authentic and have been recorded in detail by many devotees.We have attempted to remain true to N.V. Gunaji’s original English translation. While some of the sentence structure and references may be slightly obscure for the Western reader, what is clear is that since the original English translation by N.V. Gunaji was published, that it has in its unaltered state, been a core component of the spread of knowledge and devotion to Shirdi Sai Baba in the English-speaking world. To help the reader with some of the obscure Hindi words and references in the Satcharitra, we have added an extensive Glossary.
