Sathya Sai Baba The World-Avatar Teaching and Revelations

This Iron Age is praised in the scriptures as incomparably conducive
to the salvation of man, for he can attain the highest through the mere
thought of God and remembering his name. So, of all the Age, this Age
is described as the most holy, the most beneficial. Meditation was prescribed
as the means of liberation for men in the Golden Age, discipline
as the means during the Silver Age and ritual worship for the
Copper Age. But, for people of this Iron Age, the simple remedy prescribed
is just recitation of God’s names, the constant awareness of
the name. In spite of this, men do not care for this path and render their
lives barren wastes. 3.10.81, (25-162)
The Ages are classified on the basis of the dominant mental role. In
the Golden Age, Divine law walked about on four legs, happy and safe.
In the Silver Age, Divine law had only three legs, while in the Copper
Age, it had to totter about on just two! In the present Iron Age, Divine
law has only one leg. The four legs are truth, goodness, spiritual discipline
and compassion. If one has all these four, then he can be said
to be in the Golden Age, whatever may be the Age on the calendar. If
truth is not steady in a person but, if he has the other three qualities,
he is in the Silver Age. If truth and goddness are both absent, but spiritual
discipline and compassion persist, individuals who in this predicament
can be said to be in the Copper Age. If however only compassion
remains out of the four, it is as if Divine law is standing on one leg
and the person who is sticking to compassion, in spite of everything
else having disappeared, is in the Iron Age, even if he exists in the
chronological Age, called Golden Age. The Ages change only with
change in Divine law, not with the mere passage of time. The wicked
Hiranyakasipu and the purehearted Prahlada both lived in the selfsame
chronological Age; the same Age saw Dharmaja, the personification
of righteousness and peace, as well as the archcheat, Duryodhana.
So, Divine law is what makes the Age for each; one can always
be in the Golden Age, if only one has all the four qualities of Divine law.
It is the conduct of man that makes or mars history and changes the
Golden Age to the Iron Age. (8-55)
Avatars of the Lord, in different forms, have been manifesting themselves
for aeons and aeons. This may astonish to children of today.
For instance, when they hear about the state of things in the Golden
Age they will feel that they are amazing and incredible, human beings
in that Age used to live for hundreds of years. Moreover, their bodies
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