Stories by Sri Chinmoy's students and friends
A few months after seeing Sri Chinmoy for the first time, during small talk in the teachers’ lounge at school, I was lamenting that I needed to buy a new scarf to wear with my winter coat. About a week later, my disciple friend approached me in the lounge and said, “I saw this scarf and it reminded me of you. I don’t know if you’ll like it or not. If not, it’s okay, I can take it back.” With that, she showed me a scarf that was quite bright, with yellow-gold rectangles on aqua sky-blue. I had been thinking of something darker, but she was offering it as a gift, and I really needed a scarf.
There was something about the scarf that drew me to it, but the colours were not a combination that I would ever have chosen for myself. Also, something about the scarf put me off. I felt uneasy about it and couldn’t figure out why.
In the subway on the way home, I closed my eyes and imagined Jesus, with me showing him the scarf. Suddenly, in the inner vision of my mind’s eye, Jesus was there, concretely, with me. I showed him the scarf, and inwardly questioned him about it in a way that was wordless. He took it from me and held one end of the scarf in one hand and the other end in the other hand. Standing in front of me, he looped the middle of the scarf over my head and onto my neck and shoulders, letting the ends hang down the front of my body, while saying, “It is a mantle upon thee.”
I remember thinking, “What’s a ‘mantle’?” I thought this word might refer to some kind of medieval cloth drape or embroidered hanging, but I didn’t know for sure, as it was certainly not a word I used in my daily language. When the subway arrived at my station, I walked quickly to the house where my apartment was. I was in a hurry to get back to this experience.
I sat down in my room and went into prayer. I saw myself with Jesus, again with the scarf. Immediately, the image returned as strong, as vivid and as concrete as the first time. I knew that this was a special experience. In my mind’s eye, I was standing with Jesus, with the scarf draped around my neck. He repeated, “It is a mantle upon thee.”
Then, feeling perplexed, I told him that I was uneasy about this scarf and I didn’t know why.
Jesus turned his head slightly away and extended his left arm straight out. I looked where he was pointing, and in the distance, some ways off, I saw Sri Chinmoy sitting in a dark blue, cushioned armchair, with various disciples coming and going around him. There was a lot of light around Guru and the chair and the whole scene. The disciples were all very happy as they came in and out of the scene.
Jesus looked at me and said, “What do you see?” I said, “I see … Light, … and Joy, … Light, and … Love.” Then he dropped his arm to his side, looked straight at me and said, “And are you afraid of … that?”
The image disappeared. I was back in my room.
Obviously, I decided to keep the scarf. I did not tell my disciple friend about this inner experience. It seemed a personal message and not to be shared at the time. I merely told her, when next I saw her, that the colour combination in the scarf was not what I would usually wear, but that I really did like the scarf. She said, “Well, you know, this blue and gold, they’re the Sri Chinmoy Centre colours.” Instantly, a series of understandings cascaded through my brain. (I later learned, Guru had said that blue is the main colour in his aura and gold is the colour of God’s manifestation on earth.)
After my inner image experience, I had looked up the word ‘mantle’ in the dictionary. It said, “in heraldry, the representation or drapery of a coat of arms.” A ‘coat of arms’ was defined as a “light garment worn over armour, generally emblazoned with the insignia of a person, family or institution.”
Jesus Christ had mantled me in the colours of the Sri Chinmoy Centre.
My Absolute Lord Supreme!
Today You are asking me
To be a passenger
Of Your Eternity's
Blue-gold Dream-Boat.
My gratitude-heart
I place at Your Feet.Sri Chinmoy 1
