The Lord And His Energies

Lord Brahma's third question-"How does the Lord play with His different energies?"-is answered as follows: "O Brahma, please know that the universal elements enter into the cosmos and at the same time do not enter into the cosmos; similarly I Myself exist within everything, and at the same time I am outside of everything." Bhagavad-gita explains that the material creation consists of different elements such as earth, air, water, fire and ether. The earth, trees, mountains, humans and animals are all made up of different combinations of these elements, yet these elements themselves exist independently. Similarly, the Lord is within everything by His energy yet at the same time outside of everything. To give an example, in a monarchy the different governmental departments work as the energy of the king, yet the king is not personally present in every department, although they work by his power. Impersonalists however, perceive only that God is all-pervading, within everything, and so mistakenly conclude that He does not have a form in the kingdom of God (Vaikuntha-loka), which is beyond the material manifestation.