creation; as God the Creator, Preserver, and Destroyer of the whole of creation; and as GOD who has accepted and transcended the limitations of creation. They experience constantly the absolute Peace, the infinite Knowledge, Power and Bliss of GOD. They enjoy to the full the divine sport of creation. They know themselves as GOD in everything and are, therefore, able to help everything, spiritually, and to make other souls realize GOD, either as Muktas, Majzoobs or Sadgurus . . . Spiritually Perfect Masters . . . as they themselves are called.

There are fifty-six Sadgurus* or Perfect Masters in the world at all times. They are always one in consciousness. They are always different in function. For the most part, they live and work apart from and unknown to the general public; but five, who act in a sense as a directing body, always work in public and attain to public prominence and importance. In Avataric periods, the Avatar, as a supreme Sadguru, takes his place as the head of this body and of the spiritual hierarchy as a whole.

Avataric periods are like the springtide of creation. They bring a new release of power, a new awakening of consciousness, a new experience of life . . . not merely for a few, but for all. Qualities of energy and awareness, which had been used and enjoyed by only a few advanced souls, are made available for all humanity. Life, as a whole, is stepped up to a higher level of consciousness, is geared to a new rate of energy. The transition from sensation to reason was one such step; the transition from reason to intuition will be another.

This new influx of the creative impulse takes, through the medium of a divine personality, an incarnation of GOD in a special sense . . . an Avatar. This Avatar was the first individual soul to emerge from the evolutionary process as a Sadguru, and he is the only Avatar who has ever manifested or will ever manifest. Through him, GOD first completed the journey from unconscious divinity to conscious divinity, first unconsciously became man in order consciously to become GOD. Through him, periodically, GOD consciously becomes man for the liberation of mankind.

The Avatar appears in different forms, under different names, at different times, in different parts of the world. As his appearance always coincides with the spiritual birth of man, so the period immediately preceding his manifestation is always one in which humanity suffers from the pangs of the approaching birth. Man seems more than ever enslaved by desire,

*In The Awakener Magazine Volume 3, Number 1, Page 45 paragraph 2 line 1 Baba's sister Mani refers directly to the above sentence, (which also appears on page 1, of Volume 1 Number 1 of The Meher Baba Journal) and says:

"Now we find there are places in the original Discourses where Deshmukh obviously misinterpreted the point, with the result that there are several important errors. Attention was drawn to them by Baba-lovers in Andhra, who wrote to Eruch, asking confirmation on the points. Eruch then asked Baba, reading out the points in question to him, and Baba said it had been incorrectly put, and gave the right explanation.

"I believe one point has been seen to by Adi in the later editions: Vol. 1, Page 3, Para. 2: it is not correct that there are 56 Sadgurus or Perfect Masters in the world at all rimes. There are 56 Perfect Ones (i.e., God-Realized Ones) in the world at all times, and this number includes the 5 Perfect Masters that are ever-present."

This Awakener was printeed in 1953 and used an earlier editon of Discourses for htis quote. The Sixth edition of Discourses reflects this change-webmaster 2006