Extraordinary events in the life and grace of Maharajji
Maharajji's devotees called his miracles "leelas" โ divine plays. He himself rarely acknowledged them, often deflecting with humor or silence. Yet the accounts are consistent, numerous, and recorded by credible witnesses from all backgrounds โ Indian villagers, Harvard professors, doctors, and government officials alike.
The foundational miracle of his public life. When a ticket collector removed him from a train at Neem Karoli station for travelling without a ticket, the train's engine stopped and refused to start again โ despite all technical attempts. Only when the TC brought Maharajji back on board did the train resume. This miracle, witnessed by an entire trainful of passengers and railway staff, gave him his name and began the public story of his extraordinary power.
When Richard Alpert (later Ram Dass) first met Maharajji in 1967, Maharajji demonstrated knowledge of things no one present could have known โ including Alpert's thoughts from the previous night, details about his deceased mother, and his secret experiments with LSD at Harvard. Alpert had not spoken to anyone about these things. The encounter shattered his Western rational framework and opened him to a completely different understanding of the nature of consciousness.
Multiple accounts describe occasions at the ashram when Maharajji would declare a feast for hundreds or thousands of people when there was no food in the kitchen and no time to arrange any. Despite all reasonable expectations, food would somehow appear โ through devotees unexpectedly arriving with provisions, through donations that arrived at exactly the right moment, or through apparent multiplication of existing food. These bhandara miracles are among the most frequently reported of Maharajji's leelas.
Maharajji repeatedly demonstrated foreknowledge of future events โ telling devotees about accidents that hadn't happened yet (which they were then able to avoid), predicting the exact time of his own mahasamadhi, knowing when devotees were arriving before any communication was possible, and knowing about events happening thousands of miles away in real time. These incidents are recorded in multiple independent accounts and were witnessed by people with no reason to fabricate such stories.
Numerous healings are attributed to Maharajji's grace โ both direct (in his physical presence) and at a distance through his photograph or through the prayers of his devotees. These include healings from serious illness, recoveries from accidents that doctors had declared fatal, and the sudden resolution of chronic conditions. Maharajji himself never claimed credit, always attributing any healing to God or to the faith of the devotee.
Several accounts describe Maharajji appearing to devotees at locations physically impossible for him to have reached โ appearing to people in distant cities while he was known to be at the ashram, or being simultaneously seen by different people in different locations. Such accounts of bilocation appear across spiritual traditions and in the case of Maharajji are reported by multiple independent witnesses in different circumstances.
In one of the most remarkable accounts recorded by Ram Dass, Maharajji was given a massive dose of LSD โ far beyond what would affect any ordinary person โ and showed absolutely no effect whatsoever. He sat serenely, fully present, fully himself, and then asked for more. This incident, witnessed by multiple Western devotees including Ram Dass, led to deep reflection on the nature of consciousness and states of being that transcend chemical alteration.
Perhaps most remarkably, accounts of Maharajji's continued presence โ in visions, in dreams, in physical appearances โ are reported by devotees decades after his mahasamadhi in 1973. These are not isolated accounts by ungrounded individuals but by sober, thoughtful people from multiple cultures and backgrounds. Steve Jobs is reported to have described continued experiences of Maharajji's guidance after his India visit. Ram Dass spoke of Maharajji's continuing presence throughout his life until his own death in 2019.
Steve Jobs visited Neem Karoli Baba's ashram in 1974 on a spiritual quest. While there, he adopted the then-Indian practice of eating only fruit (particularly apples) as a spiritual discipline. When he returned to America and co-founded Apple, he named it after this spiritual period โ and the apple logo (with a bite taken) has been interpreted by some as referring to the bite of forbidden knowledge, the bite of awakening. Whether intentional or not, it connects Silicon Valley's most iconic symbol to a Himalayan ashram.