The swamis are working on the biography of our Kailasa Paramparai, a book that is tentatively titled “Seven Mystic Gurus.” Today we give TAKA Cybercadets a private glimpse into the chapter on the amazing siddhar Kadaitswami who lived from ca. 1804 to October 13, 1891. Here is the story as told for over 100 years in Jaffna, Sri Lanka.

One stormy evening Kadaitswami arrived shortly before dark at the house of a man who owned a fishing boat. The fisherman was not at home, so the wife was reluctant to let Kadaitswami through her compound gate. So forcefully did he insist that she relented. Entering the front yard, he went to a tree and sat down.

About two hours later, the wife, who was still waiting up for her husbandís return, noticed that the swami was holding a stout pole and sitting on the ground digging in the dirt beside him as if he were trying to push himself along with this makeshift oar. Yes, she thought, it looks as if he is pretending to row a boat, sitting in the dirt in the dark. She went out in the torrential rain and pleaded with Kadaitswami to stop, afraid of the weird goings on in here garden as much as what her husband would say when he came home to find the yard dug up. But Kadaitswami would not desist; in fact, amid the intensity of the storm and his work he seemed not even to hear her.

Three hours passed as the lanky sage performed this strange and strenuous drama. Unable to chase him away, she kept watch from the safety of her home. Finally the swami stopped, rose to his feet and disappeared into the darkened night.
The husband did not return until dawn, something that had never happened before.

Many local fishermenís wives had lost a husband to the turbulent sea. The wife was waiting anxiously at the gate when her husband approached, deeply relieved to see him but afraid of the scolding he might give her for allowing that man into their compound to dig trenches in the ground. She was mulling the most diplomatic way to explain what had happened when suddenly her husband prostrated full body at the spot where Kadaitswami had been sitting.

Dishevelled and exhausted, he went straaight to the open well to bathe. She brewed fresh coffee as he recounted that a severe storm had ravaged the sea just before dusk, capsizing his small boat. Struggling in the churning waters, he grew fatigued and felt death near, but wrestled with all his might to turn the boat aright. It was not working, and he grew weaker with every effort. Suddenly, one of the oars whacked him on the head, knocking him unconscious. He came to a few minutes later to find himself clinging to a plank, the boat right side up in a becalmed sea.

He told his disbelieving wife of a vision he had just when death seemed certain, a vision of Kadaitswami rowing the boat toward him, rescuing him from the sea. He had been saved, he said, by the grace of the guru. Hearing this, the wife found the courage to share her tale of the wild rowing episode witnessed in her own compound at just that hour.

Both marveled at the miraculous interconnectedness of their experiences. They knew they had been touched by something rare and beyond their understanding. For the rest of their lives, these two spoke of Kadaitswamiís supernatural efforts to save a drowning fisherman.