Avatar Meher Baba
AVATAR MEHER BABA gesturing and using an alphabet board in 1937 at Meherabad near Ahmednagar, India. Photographer: Faredoon (Padri) Driver. Source: Meher Nazar Publications.
Meher Baba stated that God incarnates in human form every 700 to 1,400 years. Each incarnation is referred to as the Avatar.
Earlier incarnations of the Avatar include Muhammad, Jesus, Buddha, Krishna, Rama, and Zoroaster.
Meher Baba declared that He is that same Avatar who comes age after age, not to found a new religion, but to renew love for God.
He was born Merwan Sheriar Irani in Pune, India, on February 25, 1894, into a Persian Zoroastrian family. He was later called Meher Baba, meaning “Compassionate Father,” by His early disciples.
After a series of events with other spiritual teachers, He went through a profound spiritual awakening in his late teenage years.
By the early 1920s, people from all walks of life were drawn to Him, creating a spiritual community named Meherabad near Ahmednagar, India.
He fostered a universal message of love, truth, and selfless service.
“I have not come to establish any cult, society or organization; nor even to establish a new religion. I shall revitalize all religions and cults, and bring them together like beads on one string,” Meher Baba said in the book God Speaks.
“I am equally approachable to one and all, big and small, to saints who rise and sinners who fall, through all the various paths that give the Divine Call… and also directly through no medium or ‘ism’ at all,” He said.
AVATAR MEHER BABA in 1954 at Wadia Park in Ahmednagar, India during the Three Incredible Weeks. Photographer: Bhaiya Panday. Source: MSI Collection.
On July 10, 1925, Meher Baba began a lifetime of complete silence, lasting 44 years.
He communicated first through an alphabet board and later through His own unique hand gestures.
He explained that His silence was not a spiritual discipline, but a profound act of universal suffering for the spiritual upliftment of humanity.
Through His communication methods, Meher Baba gave talks about spirituality and dictated several books, including God Speaks and Discourses.
Meher Baba traveled all over the world, making several trips to the West, including the United States. He visited various places in the U.S., including Meher Mount in Ojai, California, on August 2, 1956.
During that visit to Meher Mount, He spent time under the canopy of the Coast Live Oak known as Baba’s Tree.
On January 31, 1969, Meher Baba dropped His physical body.
His Samadhi (Tomb Shrine) at Meherabad, India, is now a global pilgrimage site, along with places like Meher Mount, where His presence is still deeply felt.
“The religion I impart to all is love for God, which is the truth of all religions. I have only one message to give, and I repeat it age after age to one and all: Love God.”
Quotes in Tree of Fire: A Story of Love and Resilience from Avatar Meher Baba
“Through endless time, God’s greatest gift is continuously given in silence” ~Avatar Meher Baba
“You try your best, but remember to leave the result to God and not to worry about it.” ~Avatar Meher Baba
“Love can attain what the intellect cannot fathom.” ~Avatar Meher Baba
“True love is unconquerable and irresistible. It goes on gathering power and spreading itself until eventually it transforms everyone it touches.” ~Avatar Meher Baba
All quotations from Avatar Meher Baba Copyright © Avatar Meher Baba Perpetual Public Charitable Trust, Ahmednagar, India.