SHORT STORIES… a quake, the spread of Subud and an eye-opener

A WEIRD ADVENTURE… from Maynard MacDonald in Christchurch

I had a weird adventure. There is a Chinese film called Aftershock which is about the quake in 1976 that killed 240,000 in one city. I had just put the film on and the little girl sitting in their old truck remarked to her daddy how strange it was that there were suddenly thousands of locusts in the air. You just knew that this was the peaceful family scene before the disaster that was going to come any minute, and sure enough it did. The TV set was rocking back and forth smashing into the wall and I was being thrown about with my chair. For one astounding moment I thought the roar was coming from the speakers and the whole room was shaking in response (great speakers) and then I realised it was the real thing – not special effects leaking out of the TV.

 

THE SPREAD OF SUBUD… from Emmanuel Elliott

He writes…Clearing out a stack of old compter files, I came across the following, which you may well find of interest:

A couple of days ago, a dear old friend in the U.S. had an experience of the presence of Bapak, in the midst of which the following understandings arose within him; that back in the late 50s, when Subud first came to the west, there was a place already prepared for it in the shape of the Bennett/Gurdjieff movement. Right now, however, the world had become so systemized that there was no place in it for Subud and that for that reason it was very, very hard for it to spread. Another reason for its rapid spread at the beginning was that the Gurdjieff followers had earned it with the preparatory work they had done. People nowadays also need to earn access to the latihan.

AND AN EYE-OPENER…from David Likas

David Likas as a child.

This is my account about how the origin of an old eye problem was resolved after editor Harris Smart published my article ‘Experiences with Bapak’ – (in Aug 10 issue of Subud Voice). This eye mystery began to unravel because Harris had decided on his own volition to include a photo he already had of me as a child. e)

This unfolding mystery continued after Rita Langer from Subud Vancouver had sent me an enlarged e-mail copy of the S-V photo, where we could see in more detail that there was no sign of a left eye problem that appeared only later.

One night as I pondered about this, I heard a thought in my head – “You can ask!” I did ask and vividly remembered being vaccinated at age 4 by a country doctor in Lithuania, who used a scalpel dipped alternately in 3 different open saucers, then made 3 separate ‘X’ scratches on my left shoulder. My left arm became infected with running sores and the left side of my face became inflamed, also the hair on the left side of my forehead fell out. I recovered and soon came to Canada when the left eye became painful at age 7. By age 12, I was finally diagnosed with a mysterious ‘juvenile glaucoma’.

Last year, I mentioned my vaccination history to my Aviation eye specialist Dr. M. Miller who approves my vision for a Pilot Licence exam. He remarked “That would confirm a vaccinitis infection – you are lucky it did not get to your brain!” He then said the left eye is still working fine enough to pass a pilot licence eye exam at 82. (Except I lost interest in flying and went back to much slower sailboats!).

I recall taping Bapak’s talk in Montreal, in May 59. I had stopped my recorder to change the tape when Bapak looked straight into my eyes and appeared to ‘see something’. In a later talk he suddenly said “Once the knife is used, it may have to be used again… but the hand of the physician can also be guided by God.”  I was never sure what knife he was talking about until now.

The ‘first knife’ was the vaccination that  caused the ‘eye problem’, and the ‘second knife’ was used 30 years later by Dr. S. Adams, an eye surgeon recommended by Bapak, who found a way to fix the eye with a technique not found in any medical textbook, also as confirmed by Dr. Miller.

Now I have my proof that problems caused by mankind, can be corrected by human beings who can receive help from God. My story also confirms that in the Association of Subud, we are all connected to the same spiritual dimension.