During Baba’s stay in Sydney, he also gave an interview to a journalist named Donald Inram Smith. Their conversation was tape recorded, Eruch interpreting Baba’s gestures. Smith’s first question concerned intellectual conviction. Eruch began:
Meher Baba says it is not necessary to have intellectual conviction because it does not help at all. It is just a step. Baba says that after intellectual conviction there ought to be another step of having conviction through sight, which also is to be superseded by having actual experience of Union with God. It is not necessary that we must be intellectually convinced.
Now, for example, here is Francis Brabazon. Suppose that he is illiterate; he has not read anything and he does not want to read anything, but he knows one thing – he has heard somewhere, somehow, that there is a certain Being such as God, and with that he is convinced that there is God. He says: “I must see God, I long to see Him.” He is longing to see God and he loves Him very much; he is like a fish out of water. He loses his appetite. He has no sleep and his only thought is to see God. And he does see Him without having intellectual conviction because he has heart. In his heart he wants to see God.
Now, here is another man – he has read much, he is a very intelligent person, he has heard much and he is continually reading. Through reading he gets intellectual conviction. He is convinced intellectually. Now, after hearing and reading all this, he says: “I am convinced that there is nothing but God.” But that is only intellectual conviction. This man who is intellectually convinced has no love for God; he is simply convinced through his intellect, and there is the stalemate for him. He says: “Here I am, I have studied much, I have read much, heard much, and I am continuing to read books – Meher Baba’s book God Speaks I have read. I am intellectually convinced that there is God, and God is the only Reality.” Baba says over and above that he has to have the heart to love God. If intellectual conviction is there and love is also there, as well as the longing to see God and for union with God, it is that love and longing which helps him to attain his goal.
So, we have Francis who supposedly has not read anything and who has therefore no intellectual conviction, but who has love in his heart. And here this other gentleman, who is intelligent and who is intellectually convinced, but who has no love and no heart. Then there is another man who is intellectually convinced and also has the heart. He attains the goal, he can see God, become God. The person without heart, only intellectual conviction, can never see God. The one who is intellectually convinced and also has the heart can see God and can make others also see God; whereas he who has only heart realizes God for himself and does not help others to see God. That is the difference. Now do you follow what Baba wants to say?
–Date and place: Aug 1956;  Sydney
Lord Meher (First Ed), p5095
www.lordmeher.org (Revised 2014), p4097