Baba frequently cleaned the masts’ pan-type toilets. All of the waste material from the iron pans was dumped into a deep soakpit, some distance from their compound. One day it rained heavily, and the pit filled with water. Pappa told Krishna to empty the water from the pit with a bucket tied to a rope. While cleaning it, Krishna slipped and fell into the pit. He shouted to Venkoba Rao, who pulled him out. Baba came by and saw Krishna covered with the filth. “Why were you cleaning the pit?” he asked. Krishna said that Pappa had told him to do it.
Baba became upset with Pappa. “Why did you tell him to clean the pit without my permission?” he asked. Subsequently, Baba ordered Krishna to bathe sixteen times! He handed Krishna sixteen small stones, with which to count, so he would not make a mistake. After doing as Baba instructed, Krishna told Baba that his skin felt very tight. Baba went to the women’s room and brought him some oil to apply to his body.
Baba asked Krishna, “Did you feel bad while cleaning the pit?”
He replied, “No.”
Baba spelled out, “You, yourself, are full of unclean matter. Do you realize that? Why do you live in such filth? Don’t you feel dirty? Start feeling unclean because of the filth of the desires that cover you from head to toe, and begin to clean them as you have cleaned the pit today.”
—www.lordmeher.org, p2122
June, 1940;Â Meherabad