Swami Prakashanand Saraswati provides insightful explanations on the nature of Divinity through his teachings. In his speech, he articulates the concept of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, illustrating how Krishna’s divine persona is a unique and transcendent reality that surpasses all earthly manifestations, guiding seekers towards deeper spiritual understanding.
The Divine Souls!The personality of the Godhead is the topic for today. When I say personality of the Godhead, we should never imagine the personalities as we see on this Earth. This maya is entirely opposite to the personal power of Godhead. So, whatever is the manifestation on this Earth, in no way can it be compared to anything of the Divine world. But we have to use the same words to express the Divine facts. Words are very weak to express things, but we have to use the same words.
However, according to our scriptures, Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, the descension of Krishna,himself said, “The Supreme form of the personality of the Godhead Krishna has uncountable powers. Out of those, three are main: maya shakti, jeev shakti and chit shakti.” The supreme form of the personality of the Godhead Krishna has uncountable powers; out of those, three are main:the jeev power (all the souls), the mayapower(the external potency of the Godhead), and God’s personal power called chid shakti. Chid shakti is the personality of God. Againit is of three kinds:sat-chit-anand.
Mahaprabhu ji says from Sad shakti sandhini power is seen. Chid power is called samvid. And anand is Divine love. So, all the almightiness of God is a form of sadshakti of the personal power of the Supreme form of Godhead personality. This is the main point which we have to understand. The minds of many intellectuals fail to comprehend the existence of God. Many people say, “God is God, how can He be personified?” Although He is not personified like us, He has His own personality.I say, why can He not be? If God is Almighty, He is everything; He can become anything, He can appear in any form because He is Almighty. You cannot say God has all the ‘mights’ except one – that He cannot be personified. But if someone says like this, then they think thathe has lost his head. Those people do not believe in the personified form of God.
From the writings of Yamunacharya, the master of Jagadguru Ramanujacharya, to the Gita, Vedas, Shreemad Bhagwat, Ramayanam, Patanjali Yog Sutra, and Brahma Sutras, all say that God has His Divine personality because He has a mind.How can a thing which has no personality have a mind? Have you seen any personality on this Earth without the existence a mind or any existence of mind on this Earth without a personality?Could anyone say that there could be aliving personality without a mind and a mind without a personality? Could any scientist, any genius, any intellectual tell me that you have ever seen a mind without a personality? If you begin to think that there’s a mind without a personality, you would be double insane, not single insane! Every being has a physical body and a mind. The mind works through the personality. Your mind is material and your body is material; you are a material being. God’s mind is Divine, God’s form andHis personality is Divine; God’s actions are Divine.Again, when all the scriptures are telling the same truth then why doesn’t a person believe in that truth? It is because of his intellectualism. The only reason is that his mind is perfectly impure, and his heart has become so hard because of spiritual transgressions that his mind cannot accept the truth although he cannot argue it.He has no logic, but his mind does not accept. Why? Because his mind is impure.
So, those people, cults, cultures, intellectuals, yogis, and gyanis – whoever they are – if they are not accepting the truth of the Divine personality of the Godhead, it means their hearts are impure. They cannot accept this because their hearts have become so hardened due to past and present spiritual transgressions that they may become anything, gain any height.
You see, in our scriptures, during the time of Ram and Krishna, which was only 5,000 years ago,there were lots of demons who came to kill Krishna. All those demons and demonesses had all those yogic powers,like the power of yoga where you could be one miletall or you could be small and subtle like a bacteria.You could be light as a feather and fly. They are all sidhis, powers of yoga:you could start fire, you could start rain, you could vanish into thin air, disappearing. All of these great powers were seen in the demons and demonesses who came to kill Krishna.What I mean is that a person can be very educated, and a big great scholar, a yogi, or a gyani of the superficial words of the scriptures, or he can be a big millionaire with a big name and fame. You can attain any of these things, but all of these are material. Worldly entertainments up to psychic entertainments of the sidhisare all material. So, when they are material, then the heart of that material being, if he is not accepting the personality of the Godhead, is impure.
There is no reason for not accepting the personality of the Godhead when all the scriptures and all the Saints are saying the same thing. You take any important spiritual personality, even Christ. He referred to God as “He”. Although the people of those days were not so evolved to accept the higher theory,so he simply said, “Just love God”. He is He; that’s enough.It was enough for those people at that time.But all the big Saints of India, each and everyone, even Nanak who said Ram and Krishna thousands of times in his Guruvani. And all the big Jagadgurus, Shankaracharya, Ramanujacharya, Madhvacharya, and Nimarakacharyaexpressed surrender to the personality of the Godhead. Madhvacharya says, “Oh souls of the world, with both hands raised, I am telling you the truth! Come to the Godhead personality if you want to save your life!If you want to be happy, come to the personality of the Godhead!”
All those Saints,Roop Goswami, Sanatan Goswami, Jeev Goswami, Bhatta JI, are the greatest Divine personalities. When they are all saying the same thing, why is a worldly person trying to cancel it, “No, I don’t accept!” Okay, so don’t accept. You will suffer if you don’t accept. I’m telling all these things for those who are willing to accept, not for those who are not willing to accept, because they will have to suffer the consequence of their own karmas.Saints and descensions, and God when He comes on this Earth, tell the truth. Those who accept come close to God. Those who don’t accept, they remain in the world. This is the cycle of life and death. This will go on forever. So, teachings are for those who are willing to accept, not for those who are not willing to accept.So, all those Saints tried their level best to explain, “Oh souls, come to the Godhead personality. Don’t be in the illusion.”
There are three kinds of illusions in the world: the first kind of illusion is the whole sensual illusion and the illusory charm of this world; the second kind of illusionare the psychic powers; the third kind of illusion is the ideology of the abstract form of God or impersonal form of God.So,these three kinds of illusions relate to maya. The first kind of illusion which you know, is that the world is all charming but good for nothing. The second kind of illusion are thepsychic powers,the sidhis, but your ambition and desire remain,which makes you mentally sick. The third illusion is the abstract truth of God.
If I compare the intensity of the first, second and third illusions, the second illusion is greater than the first one, and the third illusion is the greatest. Why? In thefirst kind of illusion a person could imagine, “Oh, this world is not satisfying.” He understands sometimes. But in the second kind of illusion because he has seen the whole world and he has not seen all the fields of psychic evolution, he might think, “There must be something beyond.” So, he remains in that illusion.But again, it may also break sometime, if he finds a true master. If he finds a true master, he (the master) may explain, “As you are dissatisfied in this world, and you are dissatisfied in your psychic world, so come to God.” He may come to the right path. But those who are in the third kind of illusion which is a kind of brainwash because it is a constant transgression. Because of those transgressions, his heart is every day being hardened – harder and harder and harder.And for that reason, it is very, very difficult for that person to come back to accept the personality of the Godhead. Nevertheless, these are the three kinds of mayic illusions. One has to get rid of all of these to accept God,because his soul is longing for God and is longing for love. It’s very obvious.
You see in the world, you feel love.With whomdo you feel love? It is with somebody orwith some object;for example, there’s a nice painting.You like it. You may even love it.“Oh, I love my friend, I love my mother, I love my father.” So, this is all relation. The object you have is physical. There is some relation with the person you love. Where there is no relation there cannot be love. It is impossible. First there is relation and then there is love. The kind of relation produces that kind of love.So, you experience love or you give love to your personality, to an object, or to something. How could you love the open sky which is abstract? You can love a cool breeze, but you feel the breeze. Unless you feel something (and there is some object) you cannot love. You cannot love an abstract thing, and it cannot give you love. And you need love; you need peace; and you need happiness. So, love, peace and happiness can never be received from any abstract existence. This maya is also abstract. From that abstract form you cannot receive any love.But our heart is aching to receive love; it can only be received from a personality. So, it’s very simple to understand. You see, you receive material love from material people, you receive Divine love from a Divine form, a Divine personality. It’s very clear. Material love for material personalities. Divine love from Divine personalities.When there is no material personality, there is no material love andwhen there is no Divine personality, there isno Divine love. This is your psychology. Without the personality of the Godhead, no soul can receive Divine love because love exists in the personality of the Godhead. So, God has a personality which isHis main form, and that personality of the Godhead has many powers. It also has a radiance, but the main form is the personality of the Godhead.
For this reason the Gita sometimes describes the impersonal form, but that does not mean that the Gita cancels the personal form. The path of yoga describes the ‘light of God’, butit does not mean that it cancels the personality of God. It means that the radiance of Godhead personality can be His light or His absolute form. So, the main form is His personal form.Gita says that all the real, Divine Gyanis and Yogis expressed that the absolute truth which exists within meis Krishna. It’s like light radiates from somewhere, and perfume comes from somewhere. These are the ‘qualities’ of something. So, the‘quality’ of those things has to stay somewhere. The ‘quality’ cannot stay on its own. Itoriginates fromsome-thing. Sunlight, moonlight, and electric lighthas come from somewhere. You cannot hold the light rays, but you can hold a torch.You can hold the object that produces lightbut cannot hold light itself. They are almost impersonal with a very subtle form.So, any kind of radiance, any kind of every object in the world radiates. All the radiant energies are produced from somewhere. So, any kind of radiance has an object from where it is produced. You have radiance, and your mind has radiance. You can record it on an EEG meter, all the alpha, beta, thetawaves. If there’s a brain, it will radiate. No brain, no radiation.So, what is the radiation of the personality of the Godhead? That is called absolute Brahm. Absolute Brahm means the radiation of the personality of the Godhead. So, personality of the Godhead is the prime thing, and from that prime substance the radiance of that personality is called absolute truth or nirakarBrahm. Brahm means God. Nirakar means the radiance of the personality of the Godhead and sarkar is the personality of the Godhead.So, personality of the Godhead is the personality, and the radiance of that personality is simply radiance. Radiance is called nirakar Brahm; nirakar means that which has no form.It is a fact that radiance has no form and the formless radiance has come from the personality of the Godhead. This is the fact that all those Jagadgurus tried to establish, from Shankaracharya to Chaitanya Mahaprabhu. This is the fact. Chaitanya Mahaprabhu Ji says, “Oh Krishna, the radiance of your Divine body which those great Divine Gyanis and Yogis experience, andfrom which becomeso pacified, think they have found God, but they have only found the radiance of Your personality!”So, for that reason, when King Janak, who was absorbed in perfect peacefulness,and who was experiencing the radiance of the personality of the Godhead, saw the original personality of Lord Ram, he exclaimed, “Oh, this form is snatching my heart! My gyan is gone, and I am falling in love with Bhagwan Ram!” Why? Because his mind was established in absolute impersonal truth or radiance of Bhagwan Ram but when he saw the original form, then he loved that form. There are many examples in our history that explain this truth.
Now there remains one more question: When you accept that the Godhead has a personality, but according to Indian scriptures, there are many forms which are personified forms, what is the significance of those forms? I’ll explain tomorrow.