The Supreme And His Servants

For those who are more intelligent, however, Bhagavad-gita directs: "One who discards scriptural injunctions and acts according to his own whims attains neither perfection, nor happiness, nor the supreme destination. Therefore one should understand what is duty and what is not duty by the regulations of the scriptures. Knowing such rules and regulations, one should act so that he may gradually be elevated." (Bg. 16.23-24)

Spiritual life, then, need not be confusing. It can be quite simple to understand, but one must understand spiritual life from reliable authorities. Specifically, to understand the Supreme one should accept the instructions of the Supreme as found in revealed scriptures. If we examine the various scriptures of the world, we will indeed find agreement among them, for the Bible, the Koran, and not only Bhagavad-gita but all Vedic literatures agree that the Supreme Truth is ultimately the Supreme Person. In Bhagavad-gita the Personality of Godhead affirms, aham sarvasya prabhavaḥ: "I am the origin of everything." Similarly, in the Bible, Lord Jesus Christ repeatedly refers to the Supreme as "the Father," a personal form of address. Logic also supports the same conclusion. The universe is full of people, and where but from a person could they have come? The intelligent order of the universe indicates the existence of a supremely intelligent person.

Understanding God as the Supreme Person, we may next rightly question, "What is our position?" Good sense will tell us, as will the scriptures, that if God is the Supreme Person and we are also people, although definitely not supreme, we should be His servants. Lord Caitanya, the scripturally foretold incarnation of Krsna (God) who began the Hare Krsna movement five hundred years ago, summarized all the Vedic scriptures in the conclusion jivera 'svarūpa' haya-krsnera 'nitya-dasa': "The eternal position of a living being is that of Krsna's servant."

Accepting the Lord's supremacy and one's own subordinate position, one can understand that the best spiritual process is that which most fully develops one's desire to render loving service to the Lord. But to avoid still another pitfall in recognizing genuine spiritual life, one must discriminate between those who factually engage in the Lord's service and those who merely talk about it. In other words, one should not be a hypocrite who talks about love of God but does not follow the instructions of God. One should not live a day-to-day life of materialism and yet claim to be God conscious. Nevertheless, many such hypocrites say they accept God as the Supreme Father and say they have love for God, yet they do not follow His instructions, and they level narrow, sectarian criticisms at those who do, denouncing them with quotations taken out of context from scriptures they themselves do not live by. In different parts of the world they call themselves Christians, Muslims, Hindus and so on, but in fact their own scriptures condemn them as the lowest of rascals.

But even if one is sincere in wanting to practice devotion to God, most scriptures do not tell us much about Him. The Bible, for example, says that God is great, but it does not tell us in detail of His greatness. We may accept our position, which is to serve the Supreme Great, but unless we know who He is and unless we have a practical process for offering our service to Him, advancement in faith and love will be difficult. Does God have a residence? Is He alone? What does He do? What does He look like? And how may we go on living and working in the world and yet devote all our actions in service to Him? May we inquire about Him at all, or is He too great for us to know more about Him than "God is spirit"? These are all legitimate questions, and to dedicate oneself to the Absolute Truth as the Personality of Godhead, one must have the answers.

Not having received such transcendental information about God, even though they acknowledge Him as the Supreme Father, people often suppose that ultimately He has no face or personality they can relate to or know anything about. This scarcity of knowledge exists because the world's great scriptures limit their teachings according to time, place and the ability of people to understand them. For example, an important principle in the Koran's teachings is that no one should have sex with his mother. Since Mohammed gave stress to such a principle, we can understand that the people to whom he was speaking, to be in need of such instruction, must have been quite degraded. Similarly, Lord Jesus Christ taught the people of his time, "Do not kill." In other words, people who had to be instructed not to have sex with their mothers or not to kill or murder were not told the complete glories of the personal pastimes of the Supreme Person, Krsna, because they could not appreciate them.

But in Bhagavad-gita and other Vedic literatures Krsna reveals confidential and scientific knowledge of God to His intimate devotees, and through them all mankind can benefit. Thus the Vedic literature is like a complete, unabridged dictionary among scriptures, whereas other scriptures, like pocket dictionaries, are equally valid but less informative. Through the Vedic literature, therefore, one can not only become a more learned scholar in the techniques of the science of God, but also gain a personal understanding of God.

Unless one understands God as the Supreme Transcendental Person, with whom one can exchange love through devotional service, one will not be able to defend himself against the attacks of cheaters and impersonalists. The Vedic literature therefore champions personalism on behalf of all true devotees. Those who truly seek love of God should turn to the Vedic literature to receive strength in transcendental knowledge and learn how to practice devotional service (bhakti-yoga) unto the Personality of Godhead.