Sri Ramakrishna had prophesied that he would return to this terrestrial plane after residing in his subtle body in the hearts of his devotees for a hundred years. Now, we cannot for sure ascertain the exact date of his prophetic statement and, hence, cannot for sure know exactly when the period of his hundred-year stay in his devotees' hearts has ended. If it be assumed that even at the latest it is from the date of his demise, then he ought to have returned amongst us in 1986. Holy Mother Sri Sarada Devi has said that the Master would return after a hundred years when a lot of white-skinned devotees of his would visit this land. Is it possible then that Thakur was reborn in the year 1986, the year of the 500th birth anniversary of Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu when in point of fact thousands of white-skinned Western devotees had flocked to Kolkata and Mayapur in connection with the anniversary celebrations. True it is that in 1986 Kolkata and Mayapur were literally inundated with Western devotees, Vaishnavs ordained in the Iskcon Movement. It is phenomenal that Holy Mother had spoken of the fact that at this time many white-skinned devotees of Thakur would flock even as the like of Nivedita, Christine and MacLeod were then assembling in Thakur's name. But, surely, Holy Mother could have had no inkling about Mahaprabhu's 500th birth anniversary as coinciding with Sri Ramakrishna's 100th year from his great disappearance. And herein lies the significance of her remarkable statement.
Holy Mother described Thakur in his new incarnation as one dressed in the garb of a Baul with a broken stone-pot in his hand and a hubble-bubble and walking along the path leading to Burdwan, oblivious of surroundings. On the way there would be a boy excreting by the wayside. Clad in the ochre robe and sporting a long beard, Thakur would be walking seemingly endlessly and eating likewise as he trudged along. He would be born once more a Bengali and would appear in the direction of Bali and Uttarpara, two districts to the north-west of Dakshineswar. When Holy Mother had remonstrated that she would under no circumstance come to this Earth again, Thakur had laughingly retorted that she had no way to escape for the eternal companions of Thakur were all inextricably bound to him even as the stalks of the Kalmi creeper and a single tug by him would bring them all to the terrestrial plane with Thakur in his next incarnation. Even Laksmi Didi, Thakur's niece said that she would not come even if she were cut to shreds like tobacco leaves but met with a similar response.
Swami Saradananda has however claimed to have heard that Thakur would return after the lapse of 200 years and this piece of information he has recorded in his magnum opus biography of the Master, 'Sri Sri Ramakrishna Leela Prasanga' (Sri Ramakrishna and his Divine Play). Thus, there is a confusion as to the lapse of time from the last incarnation when the Master will reincarnate himself.
In the Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna the Master boldly announces that he will be reincarnated in the Vayu-Kon, a specific direction among the ten directions of the Hindu astronomical system. He says that he has not imparted total knowledge to his disciples as then they will refuse to come with him when he reincarnates. Those of his inner circle of devotees will not be liberated as they will have to accompany him when he is embodied again in the Vayu-Kon.
In America one afternoon Swami Vivekananda suddenly brought up this subject and said that he would have to once more come to planet Earth with the Master after a lapse of 200 years. When queried as to why he would have to come just because Sri Ramakrishna had so determined it, Swamiji said,"You do not know the power of these souls madam. When the Master comes, he brings his entourage along."
Swami Vijnanananda has said that the Master will reincarnate after 100 years and then and not until then will his movement rapidly spread. This he said in response to a devotee's query as to why there was such a paucity of spiritual awareness in the world and so much of material meanness despite the fact that the Master had just the other day conducted his terrestrial play.
So from all these accounts it seems that there are two plausible timelines of the the Master's reincarnation---100 years and 200 years. Well, 100 years have passed since his death in 1886 and if he has been born in 1986 then he is now 28 years of age and in all probability in the midst of his spiritual austerities. It is for us then to wait for his emergence on the human stage sooner or later to bring to it the fruit of his realizations. We anxiously wait on.
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