Chapter 4 - Comparative Study of Religion

Empiric History is a narrative of events occurring in time and is, therefore, necessarily limited by ascertained chronology. The ascertainment of the chronological order of events has suggested and supplied the materials for a science of growth or evolution deduced from the chronological sequence of actual occurrences. Attempts have been made to apply the method of chronological evolutionary treatment, in the face of oblivious difficulties, to the subject of religion by a growing number of learned scholars resulting in an apparently surprising degree of unanimity as regards the conclusions reached. It is necessary at the outset of theistic history to attempt a valuation of the speculations with reference to the worship of Sri Sri Radha-Krishna to bring them into line with the Absolute Truth. The wide gap that separates the worship of Sri Sri Radha-Krishna from the conclusions of empiric religion requires to be explained in a systematic manner in the light of transcendental history which is not limited by any limited chronology to a limited world.

Sri Sri Radha-Krishna is the eternally coupled Divine Pair, Sri Radha being the predominated, and Sri Krishna the predominating aspect, indissolubly joined together, of the complete, active, Absolute Personality. Radha-Krishna or the Absolute is thus a composite of two persons of whom One predominates over the other. Neither of them is a Person of any exclusive or limited sense. The Personality of the Divinity in either aspect is Absolute and, therefore, also, All-inclusive. The impersonal view gives a partial and, therefore, misleading aspect of the Absolute. Hastiness of judgment due to inherent defect of understanding is responsible for mistaking the impersonal view as being superior to that of Divine Personality. The Personality of the Absolute should not also, on the other hand, be gratuitously confounded with the personality of our defective empiric speculations, in which the truth is obscured by the predominance of limiting, delusive, material reservations. Radha is not the female of our perceptual or conceptual experience derived from the observations of the phenomenal world by means of defective senses. The Absolute can be neither male nor female of our experience for the simple reason that such male or female can be but one of a number of mutually exclusive entities and cannot, therefore, accommodate the rest of them. It is the intention to avoid this difficulty arising from the defective nature of our senseexperience that has led the empiric philosophers to hit upon the barren and logically untenable notion of impersonality to indicate the nature of the Absolute. This has only landed them in far worse difficulties.

The whole issue hinges on a right understanding of the nature of the Absolute. If God were really a zero we could be saved the trouble of attempting to describe His nature. If God is not zero, He should logically be both everything and no particular thing, at one and the same time. Everything is in RadhaKrishna; but Radha-Krishna is not identical with anything except Themselves. In other words Radha-Krishna has a specific individual existence of Their own, simultaneously with Their external all-pervasive existence. The external entities in their individual aspect, are not constituent parts of Radha-Krishna as the Absolute cannot be made up of a number of particulars nor even of the aggregates of individual entities. As a matter of fact individual entities as well as their aggregations are manifestations of Sri Krishna in and by the plenary Divine Power Sri Radhika. The manifestations are neither outside, nor identical with their Source.

The question how Sri Radhika can accommodate the material universe or other persons partially similar to Herself occurs naturally enough to the speculative mind whose activities are confined within the limits of three dimensions But it would be sheer dogmatism and perfectly illogical to try to squeeze the Absolute within the narrow mental scope for the reason that the mind is incapable of conceiving existences of more than three dimensions or of less than one.

There cannot be such a thing as a comparative estimate of different creeds without postulation of a standard of value. It is, of course, possible to find out the values of the different creeds in terms of one of them. Let us suppose that this is done with every one of the creeds by turn with conscientious impartiality and sound judgment. Will it take us nearer the Absolute? Certainly not. The Absolute could be approached only by means of the Absolute. If none of these creeds be of the nature of the Absolute, the permutation and combination of any number of relative entities can never yield any knowledge of the Absolute. The method that should be applied is that of assigning local values to the fractional parts by relating them to the Integer. Those who adopt the moral principle as the standard by which to judge the local value of a creed, seek to arrange the creeds in an order of moral superiority. As an instance, we may take the methods of Dr. R. G. Bhandarkar, Barth and their followers. They try to evaluate the worship of Sri Sri Radha-Krishna by the moral standard. They consider the worship of Rama and Sita as superior being more moral than the worship of Sri Sri Radha-Krishna. Such estimations assume the absolute validity of the ill-defined moral standard of empiric thinkers. Those extremely well informed writers could not have been wholly unaware of this radical philosophical weakness of their standard of value in arriving at any really dependable conclusion in regard to the relative worth of the different creeds.

Idolatry is the proper logical denial of the worship of the Absolute. Idolatry is the result of despair to find out the real truth. When the empiricist finds it impossible to discover the Absolute by means of his abortive speculations, but is anxious to provide a working hypothesis for good conduct, he dresses up his known erroneous idea to do duty as the spurious substitute of the inconceivable Absolute.

The moral principle cannot be clearly defined by those very persons who do not scruple to proclaim it as the only safe test for the valuation of religions. Such a method amounts really to nothing higher than a perverse advocacy of a particular whim. The conclusions thus reached are also never claimed to be unchangeable or absolute. The tentative and inconclusive nature of the performance is held to be part and parcel of the law emanating from the conscious will of a Person possessing the supreme power and governing the cosmic evolution. This establishes the validity of the principle by shifting the responsibility by way of self-contradiction to the shoulders of the Absolute Himself. The irrational acquiescence of despairing individuals provides its other sanction. As a matter of fact the method which is the fabrication of a particular fallible human mind is confidently offered for the convinced tentative (?) acceptance of all human minds on grounds indicated above. Morality is nothing but an empiric fiction leading to no definite goal. It makes its votary move perpetually in a vicious circle impelled by the desire to discover rational support for the conduct of the average man after performance, on grounds of expediency. Expediency is not, however, the acceptance of’ but the refusal to accept, any definable principle of general conduct.

But the aspirations of the physical body and mind refuse to be satisfied even by being allowed a free scope which cannot be realised in practice. The moral philosopher ignores this ugly circumstance and makes a show of sticking heroically to the worship of his idol which cannot save him from constant and irremediable transgressions against itself! If this is not appreciated by the victim, he is charged with the unpardonable crime of pessimism on-the, ground that it is our moral (?) duty to try to make the best of a bad job. But are we sure that the job is really bad and that it has not been made so by our bungling and hypocritical method of approaching it?

The worship of Sri Sri Radha-Krishna is condemned by certain empiric moralists because it seems to them to idolize promiscuous sexuality. But is promiscuous sexuality really undesirable? Is it undesirable for the reason that it is likely to prevent the realisation of the maximum sensual and other pleasures derivable from regulated sexual act? Who is to be the judge? If the attainment of the maximum pleasure by the individual be the desirable object, has promiscuity been really proved to be incompatible with such object? The ethical repugnance to promiscuity after all amounts to nothing more serious than this that it is not in conformity with the status quo, and not that it may not be made the status quo with proper and reasonable safeguards.

The empiric moral idea is no higher than the above. Lest my monopoly of enjoyment of a particular male or female, whom I choose to like for the time being, be jeopardized I become an advocate of monogamy (with or without divorce?) and worshipper of Rama-Sita. If sexuality is bad, how can even monogamy be good? If promiscuity is bad in itself, how can monogamy be good in itself? By what test is goodness or badness itself to be determined? It has never been possible for aspirations of the flesh endowed with a pseudoconscious form by the mild to satisfy the genuine demands of our reason.

All speculations of the mind are inconclusive and erroneous. The moral notion is, indeed, only one of those inexplicable entities that demand to be explained. Those who erroneously think that the worship of Sri Sri Radha-Krishna is immoral forget that no mental speculation has any access to the Absolute Who is the Object of worship in this case.

What consolation does a mentalist expect by worshipping Rama-Sita? Is he, thereby, likely to be encouraged in cultivating his monogamous nuptial relations with assiduity? Can such a conclusion be regarded as logically tenable. If God happens to be monogamous, am I likely to become so, by contemplating His conduct? Can also the very notion of monogamy or marriage apply to the Absolute? We may not want to be promiscuous for absence of unlimited sexual and other powers. It is only a counsel of possible discomfort. Why should we suppose that God’s power is limited by any adverse condition, The attempt to judge the Absolute by a limiting standard set up by ourselves for our regulation is opposed to the notion of the Absolute. The Absolute is located beyond the scope of our mental activity. The phenomenal world exposed to the view of our senses is only an abrupt and unintelligible section of the whole Truth. We stand powerless in the presence of the Infinity of Smallness and the Infinity of Greatness that spread at either end beyond this limited span of the visible world and refuse to show themselves to us. This is the tantalizing condition of the existence of three dimensions into which we find ourselves securely imprisoned. If any merciful being tries to communicate the tidings of the Absolute to us, he is bound to fail completely unless he is also capable of imparting to us the necessary receptive faculty. This is the position of the Agnostics to a certain extent, as they are conscious of their limitations and are accordingly unprepared to commit themselves to any opinions, favourable or unfavourable, regarding the Absolute. It is a more consistent attitude than the self-sufficiency of Barth or Bhandarkar.

The Skeptics disbelieve the possibility of the Absolute taking the initiative and communicating Himself to us in a way that is beyond the comprehension of our present limited faculties. The Skeptics, therefore, want to sit still in sheer despair. The Atheists, indeed, speak only the language of delirium when they positively deny the existence of the Absolute. They do not deny the fact of relative existence or relative knowledge. How can they, therefore, consistently refuse to admit the logical necessity of absolute existence and absolute knowledge? Error can have, rationally speaking, no absolute existence and even its seeming existence can only be a reflection of an absolute existence erroneously apprehended by, our defective cognitive faculty. Atheism represents at its very best only the crude cogitations of the undeveloped intellect regarding the Inconceivable.

As a matter of fact the worship of Sri Sri Radha-Krishna or of Rama-Sita, if they are regarded as historical entities located on the-mundane plane, is rightly liable to the charge of anthropomorphism. By the mere assertion that a form of such anthropomorphic worship is moral, its absolute nature is only still further ignored. Those who choose unnecessarily to get engrossed in the manipulation of relative speculation regarding the Absolute and declare it as the only method of approach to the Absolute, owe a cautious hearing to any one who does not muddle the real nature of the issue.

Almost the first thing that requires to be settled clearly and at the outset of any so-called historical inquiry regarding religion, is whether the object of our quest is, indeed, the Absolute. Those who are not prepared to admit that religion should be identical with the quest of the Absolute, have an undoubted right of criticizing the conclusions of those who accept the religion of the Absolute. This is what the empiric thinkers have been indefatigable in doing all along. But is it irrelevant to opine that empiric criticism is bound to be altogether wide of the mark in such a case for the reason that the attempt to judge of the Absolute, or of what is even claimed as the Absolute, is, by the fact of this very reservation, removed wholly outside its self-admitted jurisdiction?

The Absolutists rest their case on the fact that the Absolute can and does communicate Himself by imparting to us the capacity of receiving Him. They go further and assert that we are already eternally endowed by the Absolute with such faculty, but are free to wilfully neglect to make the proper use of the same. That the Absolute is, nevertheless, trying continuously to persuade us to be willing to know Him by making the proper use of those faculties. These are the fundamentals of every religion.

The Absolute is always speaking to us regarding Himself and we are always deliberately shutting our ears to His Voice. The Absolute has been eternally appearing to us in the Form of the Spiritual Scriptures as the testament of His utterances. He is also sending down His agents in the human form to speak to us with the human voice to make the same perceptible even to, our sealed ears. All this is super-rational. The agents of the Absolute appear among us in order to make the meaning of the spiritual Scriptures perceptible to our dormant understanding. The Scriptures require to be interpreted to us by those who know.

Those who are not prepared on principle to listen to the voice of the Absolute, need not decide that it is not the voice of the Absolute, before giving it their impartial and full hearing. Of course there is every risk of wasting our time on scoundrels personating as agents of the Absolute bv dint of their sheer impudence. It should not, however, take much time or trouble for an honest enquirer to find these out. It is always possible to find the right teacher of the Absolute, provided one really wants to find him. The agent of the Absolute must also be eternally existent in the available form to all who want to find him at all.

Very few of us really want to find the teacher of the Absolute even if we know that it is easy to find him. Most of us have no interest for the Absolute. This is partly due to our traditional wrong conception regarding the nature of the Absolute. It is our purpose in this chapter to try to invite the attention of the reader to certain widely prevalent misconceptions regarding the nature of the Absolute, by an examination of the extent of their deviation from the absolute standard.

The creeds that prevail n the world are divided naturally into two exclusive groups according as they happen to follow the method of empiric search of the Absolute or that of revelation.

The empiric creeds may be broadly grouped into four divisions, viz.,

1. Theism,
2. Agnosticism and Skepticism,
3. Pantheism, and
4. Undifferentiated Monism.

The revealed religions show the following order of evolution, viz.,

1. worship of Godhead realised as a male Person (Vasudeva),
2. as Couple (Lakshmi-Narayana, Rama-Sita),
3. as served by many married consorts (Dwarakesha Krishna), and
4. as served spontaneously by many consorts who follow no conventional matrimonial regulation in the coupled form of Sri Sri Radha-Krishna.

The instinct of the service of the Absolute is innate in human nature. It is, however, ordinarily overlaid with the negative dominating impulse of selfgratification. According as the one or the other impulse proves stronger, a man makes his choice as between the two broad divisions of religion. A person who has full confidence in his own powers in attaining the Truth, follows the empiric method. One who is convinced of the utter inadequacy of the human intellect to find the Truth, is inclined to follow the method of revelation.

The empiricist worships (?) the mixed product resulting from his actual sensuous experience. The word experience, as used in connection with empiricism, should be understood as referring exclusively to knowledge of the external world derived through the process of sense-perception. Senseperception is the material or limiting condition of all mental process. The mind is the meeting-ground of the principle of animation with the inanimate material principle supplied by the senses. Mental activities. The reaction of the animate principle on the inanimate. It is a composite of two apparent incompatibles. No mental activity is possible unless both principles are present. The principle of animation is mixed up with or overlaid by that of inanimation, in the mental function.

It follows that empiric worship is bound to be either acceptance or rejection of the material principle, in one or more of its aspects. In this case the mind is the accepting or rejecting agent. The mind cannot function except by way of acceptance or rejection of materials supplied by the senses. But the mind cannot cease to function. It must either accept or reject and must also continue to do so alternately. It cannot accept or reject for good. That would tantamount to its own destruction.

Atheism represents the temporary rejecting function of alternatives by the mind. The mind refuses to accept as true or desirable, because the two are really identical in this case, any stationary condition, for the reason that it is afraid that it would be suicidal. Atheism wants to live on the state of everchanging activity. It is the proper negation of the Absolute conceived as Inaction. It is justified in disbelieving the Absolute by the evidence of its actual sense-experience. But it should by parity of reason be equally prepared to extend the bounds of its experience by any and every method. This, however, it is not always prepared to do. For instance, it refuses to accept the method of submission to the Truth for His realisation as enjoined by the revealed Scriptures. Atheism is thus proved to be an exclusive partisan of the method of empiric self-sufficiency in spite of its profession of. freedom from all bias to creed and dogma. Its sterility is due to this hypocritical reservation. Its exclusive attachment to self gratification is the cause of its disinclination to seek for the Truth and its consequent failure to find Him.

Agnosticism and Skepticism deny the existence of possibility of the Knowledge of the Absolute. Both do so on the strength of their limited experience and without due consideration of the method proposed by the Scriptures. Both have an attitude of disbelief towards the method of revelation by their overconfidence in their own conclusions. This is really self-contradictory as neither professes to be able to know the Truth. The Skeptic is the greater sinner of the two, because he is not even prepared to admit the very existence of the Absolute. Both really depend on the method of narrow dogmatism in their own cases although appearing to condemn the attitude in the case of others. The explanation of this irrational attitude is to be sought, as in the case of atheists, in undue attachment to the prospects of this transitory world which is father to the thought that it would be heroic not to seek to fly from the state of ignorance and misery which is supposed by them to be unavoidable. The argument that is used by the theists is that ignorance and misery is due to the self-elected folly of the votaries of worldly vanities whose position is psychologically unsound and is also opposed to the moral principle. It is the Nihilistic attitude that becomes the worst of nuisances if it be allowed to pass itself off as a constructive ideal.

The pantheistic attitude is the most treacherous of all as it wears the mask of theism although in principle it is identical with atheism. The pantheists profess to see God in phenomenal Nature. This is the concrete denial of the Absolute. The theists do not counsel the worship of the limited and transitory. The pantheists affect to find no difference between this world and the spiritual realm. The pantheistic school appears in a variety of forms in this world. The most common group being that which bears the name of Smartas in India. The Smartas hold that the object of all worship enjoined by the Scriptures, is the improvement of our worldly felicity, present and prospective. The view finds its psychological support in the current literatures of the world which are busy in vindicating the ways of the world. What the atheist is really afraid of, is that he might be called upon to modify his worldly activities out of deference to any transcendental consideration which in his opinion cannot possess any present worldly value and may merely and falsely deprive him of a present felicity. This is met by the pantheist with the assurance that the transcendental would be of no use if it did not serve the plans of the worldling better than otherwise. The pantheist, however, cannot really adduce sufficient rational grounds for his contention except the testimony of experience of following the performance, in blind faith, of the ceremonials laid down in the Shastras. The pantheists are, therefore, more grossly worldly minded than even the professed atheists. They are often confounded with the genuine theists with whom they have nothing in common except their externals to a certain extent. The pantheists, themselves, however, oppose the bona fide theists tooth and nail in the matter of the proper interpretation of the Scriptures. It may be well to mention in this connection that the Scriptures do contain a large body of injunctions the performers of which are promised the reward of increased worldly felicity. There are also text books that are specially devoted to the vindication and glorification of the worldly point of view. The reason of this, according to theistic interpreters, is that the Scriptures want to produce faith in the transcendental even in those who value nothing but worldliness. These worldlings are, therefore, promised what they want wrongly, on condition that they should submit to certain regulations. These regulations have been so framed as to serve the purpose of moderating their passion for present worldly enjoyment by promoting the attitude of reflection towards the past and future.

Karma or worldly activity is the starting point of all pantheistic thought. It has been analyzed in all its bearings in special treatises of the Scriptures. Those treatises do not purposely go beyond the limit of the phenomenal world in those discourses, which are intended exclusively for the edification of those who are incapable of believing in anything higher than worldly activity. But any impartial examination of the subject is bound to lead to a clearer apprehension of the defects as well as the merits of the view that worldly activity can supply all our needs.

It is not my intention to suggest that whatever is contained in the section,of the Scriptures dealing with rituals is necessarily true even from the worldly point of view. The Smartas, indeed, hold that the rituals if properly performed, are really efficacious. This may or may not be so. The Shastras contain numerous statements to the effect that the promise of worldly reward, is meant to induce persons with a childish judgment to be moderate in the matter of their sensuous enjoyment. This may mean that the spiritual object is alone true while every other prospect is fleeting and illusory. But the fleeting and illusory result itself is valued by worldlings above every other thing. Whether the proper performance of the rituals also actually yields the worldly results promised by the Scriptures, is not relevant for our present purpose and the matter may, therefore, be left open for those who want to speculate about it. This last is what the Smartas and their school have been indefatigable in doing all over the world. These empiricists have also produced a Science of Theology which is wide of the mark for the spiritual purpose, although it may be more intelligible to and at the same time be fully exposed to the attacks, of other sections of empiric thinkers.

The pantheists are worshippers of mundane objects possessing definite material form and quantity. For this reason they are condemned as idolaters by those who prefer more refined and intellectual forms of worship. It is, however, philosophically impossible to draw any, line between one form of empiric worship and another. All empiric schools ultimately depend on one's individual judgment for the ascertainment of Truth. It has been shown above that the stuff of all such judgment is sense-perception which is thus the common object of worship in a gross or refined form of all empiric worshippers.

The pantheists are led by their particular predilection to appreciate the objects and relationships of this phenomenal world for their own sake in the light of their empiric judgment. They are not prepared to admit the possibility of the uselessness of such a quest not directed to a higher purpose. In other words, they confound matter with the soul on principle. This is inevitable inasmuch as and so long as they are not repelled from their conclusions by the actual experience of the essential triviality of all worldly pursuits for their own sake. This is a disposition which only experience can teach. The pantheists are those who are in the heyday of their career of worldliness with an increasing belief in its worth and prospects. The Scriptures lead these people gently by the hand by seeming to agree with their conclusions and trying to modify their cause by pleading the advantages of moderation even in the case of worldly activity for its own sake. This is naturally and honestly construed by those who are genuine believers in Pantheism as a confirmation of their view by the Scriptures. But once the value of spiritual support begins to be really cherished even those sections of the Scriptures that are apparently devoted to the elucidation of the pantheistic position, offer sufficient material for our serious consideration leading to increasing modification of the pantheistic view-point based thereon. The raw teachers of pantheism do incalculable harm by their narrow sectarian advocacy of the principle of worldly felicity on the authority of the Scriptures.

The unspiritual pantheistic view falls pat with the theory of Darwinian evolution and has accordingly captured the hearts of those modern scholars who are still under the spell of that theory. They are not, of course, prepared to admit their partiality for materialism, thanks to the way of escape that has been cleverly provided for them by the subtleties of the idealists who require careful attention from all students of the Absolute. The pantheism of Sri Sankaracharya is the typical case. He is the intellectual protagonist of the pantheistic view, basing his conclusions on apparently rational interpretation of the Scriptures. The view, which has really been in existence from a period long anterior to the time of Sankara, in its present current form professes to follow mainly the exposition of Sankara. But Sankara himself is not capable of being properly understood by a materialist. The big literature of commentaries that has been brought into being by the pseudo-followers of Sankara presents not Sankara’s view but that of the commentators themselves.

Sankara seems to justify the worship of Nature in order to be able to get beyond Nature to Nature’s God Who, he declares, is unintelligible to the limited reason except as the incomprehensible reality identical with the cognitive principle. This analysis contains an encouragement to idolaters (pantheists) with a view to wean them ultimately from the worship of any form of mental concoction.

The real difficulty that is experienced in accepting fully the philosophy of Sri Sankaracharya is that it is not possible to agree with his proposal in favour of the worship of Nature without discarding the purely spiritual point of view which the theory ultimately professes to seek to establish. By material means it is never possible to attain to the spiritual vision. Sankara does not also say so. He was forced to recognize the forms of pantheistic worship in order to get a hearing at all from idolaters. In this sense only his seeming advocacy of the cause of pantheism can be regarded as consistent with the spiritual standpoint.

But Sankara has been exploited for a quite different purpose by the school of undifferentiated cognitive Monism. They want to make the ultimate Reality devoid of all activity. They also want to make it a Unity that is unintelligible and inexpressible. To this conclusion they try to arrive by following mainly the dialectic method of Sankara and secondarily by idealistic interpretation of the Scriptures. This is really empiricism pure and simple, the reference to the Scriptures being merely to fortify the conclusions of mental speculation. The objections to mental speculation as the method of quest of the Absolute, therefore, apply fully to this school. It is in fact in order to escape from this unanswerable charge that the believers in the undifferentiated Brahman are constrained to make their inconsistent appeal to the Scriptures.

Looked at from the point of view of material thought the activity or existence of the spiritual principle is only capable of being negatively suspected by it. There can be no actual touch between material thought and the transcendental Absolute. This is admitted by Sankara who looks at the Absolute from His plane. But the words of Sankara are not comprehensible to those who do not possess the transcendental altitude of his vision. The seemingly negative conclusion of Sankara is accepted without its all-important reservations by the egoistic disposition of empiric thinkers who can follow Sankara only to a certain distance in the negative way. This is not their fault. It is inevitable. The spiritual issue can never be approached by mental speculation. It is the purpose of Sri Sankaracharya to demonstrate this to all open-minded persons by argument that is also intelligible to mentalists. But those who do not possess the requisite openness of judgment necessarily misunderstand the purpose of the great Acharya.

The above four groups with their variants into which the empiric creeds are divided have been eternally occupied in propagating views that are calculated to lead us away from the quest of the Absolute. Unless one is prepared to cease to be guided by the accumulated load of misconceptions that have been sedulously impressed upon him by every empiric institution of this world it is not possible to be able to be disposed to catch the real meaning of the genuine teacher of the Absolute. That which I am going to relate next is, therefore, categorically different from the subject-matter treated by the empiric creeds. The Absolute is claimed to be the Reality proper that is eternally located beyond the scope of all experience of the limited and transitory available through the physical senses. The very first question that has to be answered before actually beginning a narration of the Absolute, is whether it will be possible for ordinary people of this world to catch the true meaning of such a narrative. The answer is given by the Scriptures. They say that the ordinary human being, provided he at all believes in the Absolute and is prepared to give Him his unconditional hearing, can by listening to the exposition of the activities of the Absolute recorded in the Scripture from the lips of self-realised souls attain to the knowledge of the Absolute, by the grace of the latter. This method is different from that of empiric quest and leads to a definite and thoroughly dependable result.

The personal factor which is capable of being done away with in empiric epistemology, is the central and abiding feature of the method of the quest of the Absolute enjoined by the Scriptures. The Guru is the pivot of the whole process. The Scriptures regard the quest of the Absolute as identical with the quest of the spiritual preceptor. As soon as the spiritual preceptor is found the negative quest gives place to the positive knowledge.

Therefore the question is resolved into the quest of the spiritual teacher. He is to be sought also by the spiritual method. There must be no empiric reservation in the quest which must be an exclusive search for the Absolute. This is the definition of shraddha (faith). The necessity for it is not properly realised by everybody. Those who do not experience the necessity will not find the spiritual preceptor. Those who really feel it, will also find him. Till the spiritual preceptor is found it is idle to waste one's time on the study of the Scriptures. It is not possible to understand the narrative of the Absolute without the help of personal exposition by the preceptor. The preceptor and the disciple have to be brought into personal contact with one another if the latter is to benefit by the teaching. The personal relationship is that of absolute submission to the teacher on the part of the disciple. This must be so because the Predominating Absolute cannot be approached except by the method of absolute submission on the part of the predominated atomic particles. This absolute submission must not be fictitious. It must also be personal.

The following narratives of the Absolute are found in the Scriptures. Their real meaning cannot be realised except by following the Scriptural method stated above. This discourse should be regarded as helpful in arousing faith in the Absolute by its rationalistic presentation of some of the grounds of such faith. It has a negative and symbolic value. It loosens the hold of empiric prejudices and thereby enables the Truth to be mirrored in our hearts opened to receive Him. After the soul has got tired of the death-like monotony of mental speculations regarding the Truth and has also had sufficient experience of the delusive nature of both empiric knowledge and its promised prospects, he is inclined by a sense of sheer helplessness and misery to turn to the method of absolute submission to the spiritual preceptor, and the Scriptures for relief. This negative attitude is turned into one of positive and earnest inquiry by accidental association with sadhus. It is for the reason of finding the sadhu that a person who is utterly disgusted with worldly living and the method of mental speculation, renounces the world and sets out on pilgrimage to holy places in search of self-realised souls who are supposed to reside at such places. It is rarely, indeed, that the true devotee of God reveals himself to the fortunate seeker. The sadhu is himself a transcendental being. To really know the sadhu is to be endowed with the spiritual vision. It is only by the Grace of God that the transcendental nature of His devotee can be realised.

It is only after the sadhu has been found that spiritual pupilage can really begin by the process of unconditional submission to his guidance. Then the disciple has to pass through the period of novitiate. If he does this with a guileless heart he is rewarded with the sight of God Himself and with His transcendental and eternal service. This last is the summum bonum. There is, however, gradation in the transcendental service of Godhead. It is not possible for the soul liable to conditioned existence to have the full knowledge of the Absolute. The jiva-soul is delicately poised on the border-line that separates the limited from the spiritual. He has the potentiality of affinity for either. His affinity for the limited is due to freedom of initiative inherent in all animation conjoined to absence of perfect vision by reason of his tiny magnitude. Such affinity is, however, really opposed to his proper nature which is essentially spiritual. The affinity of the soul for the spiritual can, therefore, be maintained only by the help of souls who are not liable to affinity for the limited. These eternally free souls are the inseparable associated counterparts of the Supreme Soul or Godhead Himself. The sadhus have no mundane affinity. By the help of sadhus the conditioned soul is enabled to attain to the plane of the Absolute.

But the novice has to pass through definite grades of progressive revelation. The full view of the Divinity is the last to be attained. The service of Divinity attains its perfection only on attainment of the complete vision.

The first Appearance of Godhead to the view of the spiritual novice is as Vasudeva or the Transcendental supreme single Male Person. This dissipates his empiric error that the Truth is an abstract principle. The appearance of Vasudeva also frees the novice from the error that mistakes the Personality of the Absolute as having any mundane quality or reference.

Vasudeva is self-revealed in the unobstructive cognitive essence of the pure soul. He is the positive Reality as distinguished from the abstraction of the mental speculationists from the fleeting impressions of deluding entities limited by material space and broken up by the operation of passing time. Vasudeva is located above and beyond this unwholesome mundane plane. The realisation of His Transcendental Personality is possible only to the spiritual cognitive principle, which is the essence of the soul, as distinguished from material or limiting principle. Vasudeva is the One Person without a second. He is a Person with a Transcendental figure resembling the actual form of a male human being but, inconceivably to us, free from all limited or unwholesome characteristics of the human form that is familiar to us. Vasudeva appears as the Sole Recipient of our service. He is realised as comprehending all existence including that of His servitors. He is Male but free from all mundane associations of sex. These opposite qualities are spontaneously reconciled in His Transcendental Personality.

This is the first positive spiritual experience of the progressing novice. The worshipper of Vasudeva is, therefore, a truly spiritual devotee. He is categorically different from the atheist, agnostic, skeptic, elevationist or salvationist who are all of them strictly confined to the mundane plane. The worship of Vasudeva is performed by the spiritual essence of the pure soul on the transcendental plane. Vasudeva can be worshipped only by the process that is absolutely free from all mundane reference. Therefore, the worship of Vasudeva is also a gift of Vasudeva Himself. Vasudeva is identical in essence with His worship and with His worshipper. All of them belong to the same plane of the soul which is located beyond the scope of our limited mental faculties. Vasudeva manifests Himself to the pure essence of the jiva-soul as soon as the latter is at all disposed to serve Him in the proper way. It is rarely that a conditioned soul can attain to the spiritual service of Vasudeva. The conditioned soul is ordinarily prepared to be content with negative speculation. Very few persons of this world realise the necessity of search for the Supreme Personality Who is revealed to us by all the Scriptures.

Everything concerning Vasudeva is purely spiritual. His name, servitors, paraphernalia, abode, form, activities are an inseparable part and parcel of Himself. No amount of description can enable the reader to realise the nature of Vasudeva so long as one is not freed from the fetters of his limited faculties of apprehension. Vasudeva can be realised only by the grace of His devotee if we are really prepared to follow his instructions in every act of our life. The devotee of Vasudeva can alone properly instruct us regarding the nature of the receptive attitude that is the natural position of the pure soul in regard to the Absolute and which can be restored to the conditioned soul only by the grace of Vasudeva if its attainment is sincerely desired by him, by the grace of His devotee.

The sight of Vasudeva disposes of all the doubts and difficulties of atheists and agnostics and skeptics, as a matter of course. The sight of Vasudeva also destroys the idols of the pantheists and the nihilism of the pseudo-monists. The Truth is actually found to have the figure of a human being. This is not in any way derogatory to the Truth. Man is located in the middle position. There extend on either side of him, above and below, two infinite gradations of superior and inferior beings. Godhead would, therefore, be conceived by our limited understanding as occupying the highest position in the series. But would this assumption be also logical? The prevailing notion in favour of making Godhead something altogether unlike man is no less fanatical than the opposite notion cherished by the anthropomorphists of making Him identical with man. It is not impossible to steer clear of this double fanaticism. The Scriptures declare that Godhead possesses a Form that is identical with Himself and that the Divine Form is ultimately like that of man. Godhead has an infinity of Forms but His Human Form is His Fullest, Highest and His Own Specific Personality.

So Vasudeva is not to be confounded with any object of Physical Nature nor with any product of mental speculation. He is located beyond Physical Nature and beyond the mental scope. Yet Vasudeva has the Form of a human being. He has an infinity of Forms who are secondary extensions of this original Divine Form. The Scriptures fully support the Biblical dictum that man is made after God’s own image. It is needless to labour the point further at this place.

The sight of Vasudeva, therefore, shatters all idols and substitutes of Divine Personality by revealing the real Object of all worship. This is the beginning of positive theism. Vasudeva, by His Human Form, pervades the whole world. Hence He is Vishnu. But Vasudeva pervades the mundane world without being of it. As pervading Physical Nature Vasudeva bears the name of Vishnu. Those fortunate souls who realise this fact are called Vaishnavas or worshippers of Vishnu. No one who is not a Vaishnava can be a theist. The Vaishnava is endowed with the experience of the transcendental plane and is thus in a position to understand how Godhead pervades all Physical Nature without possessing any mundane organs or forms. The enlightenment is imparted by Vasudeva Himself.

The soul of man can know Vasudeva by His grace. The corresponding attitude in the recipient of His Grace is that of the unconditionally submitting disposition. If a person is not prepared to submit unreservedly for being enlightened by grace he cannot attain to the sight of Vasudeva and is doomed by his own vain choice to grope endlessly in the dark, unwholesome labyrinths of Physical Nature. By such unspiritual activity the soul may attain all conceivable conditions on the higher and lower mundane planes, but he can never attain to the vision of Vasudeva. Vasudeva has strictly reserved the right of not being exposed to the view of the conditioned soul who is not prepared to render Him willing and unconditional service. Vasudeva manifests Himself to the unclouded cognition of the soul in his perfect state of causeless, spontaneous, submissive devotion to Himself. So the two processes are simultaneous without being in any way related to one another as cause and effect. This is inconceivable to the limited experience of men but need not be logically considered as impossible in the Divinity. It ensures the reconciliation of perfect freedom of initiative on the part of the individual soul with the necessity of unconditional dependence on the Divinity for all real well-being. The empiricist's contention that as all language is a product of the limiting energy in the form of mundane Nature the very terms used to denote a spiritual entity only prove the inevitable mundane origin of an idea, does not apply to the case of the revealed vocabulary. It is not the contention of the transcendentalist that the Reality is more than one. What the transcendentalist declares is that there is possibility of suppressed, blurred and misguided vision of the Reality. The Energy that causes this distortion necessarily creates the mundane world of the distorted vision as the complement of such vision. The whole affair is not also unrelated to the Reality. It is the deluding face of the Reality Who is undoubtedly One. There is thus a running correspondence between the mundane and the transcendental as far as there is no actual suppression of the latter. The vocabulary of this world is, therefore, applicable also to the transcendental realm but only in the transcendental sense.

The real difficulty is that the transcendental sense cannot be possessed by any one who is not favoured by the Grace of God. The actual number of such persons in the state of grace is very small in this world. The voice of this infinitesimal minority is liable to be ignored by those whose object is to proclaim views arrived at by their limited experiences. Once the necessity of the transcendental vision is properly aroused in any person he is not likely, to urge these empiric objections against the transcendental position.

The name ‘Vasudeva’ is identical with the Divinity. But this is true in the transcendental sense only. In the transcendental sense, however, it is really true. Nay more, Vasudeva is the only real Truth. He is the Absolute Truth Himself. The empiric limited, relative apprehension of the name Vasudeva is not Absolute Truth. It is the product of the distorted view of the Truth Who can be but Absolute. In this distorted sense the empiric realisation is not untrue. But it is not given to those who are themselves under the delusion to realise this actual state of affairs. The person who possesses the absolute vision can alone understand the real position of the empiricists. He does not ignore the empiric view nor denies its existence. He only says that it is real, but distorted, view of the Truth Who is one and the same in Himself.

It is of course not possible to push the empiricists up to the transcendental level by the force of controversy alone. Because all appeal to the empiricists on behalf of the Absolute is ultimately based on the realisation of the Absolute as the only Reality. So long as a person does not possess the actual experience of the Absolute he can but look through the false glasses that are alone available to him. The empiricist can have no real Sight of the Absolute as He is, till he is favoured by the Grace of God. At the most he can only admit the necessity of Divine Grace for obtaining the view of the Absolute, Real or Substantive Truth. It is only then that he can really understand the true meaning of the proposition regarding the Absolute, viz., that the Name Vasudeva is identical with Godhead Himself.

Therefore, those who may be disposed to accept in principle the worship of Vasudeva but are opposed to the phraseology and ritual that are actually employed in His worship, still continue to flounder in the empiric bog. Such blind assent will do them no real good. Their assent is assent in the empiric sense which is no assent to the Absolute. But there is also such a thing as real assent to the Absolute. This assent is the attitude of the awakened soul. This assent is identical with the whole process of worship of Vasudeva, including its ritual and vocabulary.

The objection to detail under the cover of a general assent to principle, is a dangerous ruse that is often resorted to by self deluded mentalists for avoiding. the clear confession of the Truth. The attitude is really at the far end the product of that radical insincerity of disposition which feels an abnormal perverse joy in opposing the Truth at all costs. The objection against the vocabulary and ritual should be perfectly untenable if it is made to rest, as it really is, on such thin casuistry. There does exist the legitimate objection against lifeless ritual and pseudo-exhibitions of irrational orthodox. But even condemnation of the hypocrite however justifiable in itself is liable to degenerate into the most subtle and dangerous form of insincerity if it does not proclaim a stronger inclination to the Truth Himself.

As a matter of fact the Truth is one and indivisible. But He is not therefore, really zero. When we think of Him we require to be on our guard against worldliness on the one hand and hypocrisy on the other. The one leads to worship of Physical Nature or Pantheism in all its forms and the other to Nihilism which is only the negation of Pantheism and can exist at all only in a relation of contradiction to it. Both Pantheism and Non-ism are accustomed to profess its identity with Monotheism. The followers of both creeds are worldlings of opposite schools who have no intention of acting up to their professions. Neither is it practicable for them to do otherwise. It is possible for them to be relieved of these anomalous conditions only by the actual realisation of self-consistency by the attainment of the real knowledge of the Truth which none of them possesses. The empiric ignorance of Truth is not one of degree. It is one of category. The empiricists can form no idea of the nature of the Truth as He really is. For such a person to set up as a critic of the Truth, is sheer folly and malice. To try to mask one's foolishness and malice under the garb of a kind of a hollow ethical prejudice, makes it doubly worse. The empiric critics of the worship of Vasudeva formulated in the Scriptures, should not ruthlessly sin against these universal canons of sound constructive criticism.

It is for this very reason that the study of the Scriptures is forbidden to those who do not possess the necessary preliminary knowledge that should effectively prevent the assumption of an attitude of profanity. There is nothing to be gained by any form of real opposition to the Truth. Even the empiricists should be able to see this although in their distorted manner.

The different creeds and Scriptures as interpreted by the empiric judgment, tend to the elaboration of a hybrid theology that is neither here nor there. Empiric theology is a sheer contradiction in terms. The Absolute comprehends everything but is Himself ever incomprehensible. The empiric judgment is not honestly prepared to admit that the Absolute is the only Substantive Existence. The moment that we admit this we realise the necessity of waiting on the pleasure of the Absolute in all our activities. Vasudeva is pleased to reveal Himself to this purified submissive state of the soul. The pure soul fully recognizes the causeless Grace of Vasudeva as the sole sufficing cause of the realisation of the Incomprehensible by our present otherwise limited faculties. The pure soul deduces all his conclusions regarding proprietv of his conduct from this fundamental admission.

Once this position is really taken up by the soul he ceases to quarrel with the Scriptures even when he does not understand. He now knows that it is not possible nor necessary to understand the Truth in the empiric sense of the term. There is such a thing as real understanding which can be only a gift from the living Truth and identical with Him. The appearance of the Truth on His own initiative is both the cause and result of all real knowledge. These processes are one and indivisible. They only manifest themselves to the receptive consciousness of the submissive soul by their own free choice. The empiric attitude is that of revolt against this unconditional supremacy of the one living Truth. It stands in the way of unreserved faith in the Scriptures as the necessary preliminary condition of the right understanding of the Absolute. The attitude of submission to the Absolute is neither blind nor slavish nor a gross form of superstition. It is the awakening of the real rational function of which all mental activity is but disloyal, hideous caricature.

The spiritual guide who imparts the knowledge of the Absolute is then found to be part and parcel of the true rational existence. The rituals of the spiritual Scriptures are realised as the eternal function of the soul who is by his real nature free from all worldly taint and weaknesses.

The fool's paradise is the one that all persons possess by the inalienable right of mundane birth. It is superfluous to carry the same into the real paradise. It is necessary for the attainment of this latter purpose to desist from the building of Babel. It is necessary to desist from all speculation on the subject as it is obstructive of the advent of the Truth. The Truth is ever seeking entry into the heart that is really open to welcome Him. The closed heart alone is busy in the fool's paradise and with its own disloyal fancies. Till one really knows Him one need not proclaim that he does. This rule is admitted by all but is observed by very few persons when they try to talk about the real Truth. The Truth can never be mastered by our puppy brain. It is the puppy brain that should be allowed to be mastered by the Truth for its own benefit. But it is the Nature of Truth to accept only perfectly willing service. It is, therefore, only necessary to reject all untruth and to await the coming of the Truth. This can be done if we only choose to do it. When one wishes to render such unconditional homage to the Truth his wish is fulfilled by the Truth Himself. The cobwebs of a deceptive moral code cannot then any longer bind his eyes and stifle his heart's sincerity. Vasudeva then manifests Himself to the pure essence of the soul of His loyal devotee.

As soon as a person is really established in the worship of Vasudeva by His Grace he is endowed with the disposition that opens up to his vision the definite vista of the Divine Realm. He is conducted by the Light of Vasudeva into the Realm of the Absolute. He finds it inhabited by the servants of Vasudeva. Vasudeva now presents His fuller Aspect in the coupled Form of Lakshmi-Narayana, the Eternal Lord and His one eternal Consort ever linked to His side as His Counter-Whole. Lakshmi is found to be the medium of all wellbeing.

Personality is conjoined with sex in the experience derived through our limited senses. The principle of sex need not, therefore, be dismissed as necessarily inapplicable to the Absolute. Male and female run through all physical Nature binding together its jarring elements in a union of wonderful harmony. Why should the sex be regarded as less indispensable in the Realm of the Absolute? The principle of personality implies the co-existence of a specific free will and its possessor. Thus stated it would seem to exclude all reference to sex. The will is found to be the same in both male and female in this world. Sex does not seem to modify the specific nature of the individual will. It is perfectly possible to conceive a female form being endowed with the will of a male or vice versa. The factor of the sex seems to lie on the surface. As Godhead and the individual soul are ordinarily identified as regards their essence with the cognitive principle itself it is imagined to be in keeping with such identification not to admit the presence of the sex principle in Godhead.

This is, however, merely the psychological explanation of the genesis of the view that ultimately favours the idea of impersonality. But impersonality cannot stand on its own legs; it necessarily implies the personal. God should include both. He should be both personal and impersonal. But He could not be positively real without being personal. The negative quality can be but a background but cannot itself be the picture. The impersonal idea is at best of the nature of an inferential surmise of the Reality from an unrecognisable distance. The closer view relieves us from the necessity of retaining the dogmas of impersonality and abstraction.

Why should not Godhead be a Person. Why should He not be Male or Female? Why should He be only sexless? As a Person why should He possess no Form corresponding to our physical body? And corresponding to these arise the questions “Why have I a sex. Is the sex a constituent of my present personality? Would my personality suffer by elimination of sex? What connection has the principle of sex with the physical body? Will my personality be modified by any change in the physical body? These and similar questions lie at the very basis of the individual life.

The rational attitude should be to recognise the fact of the sex and to admit the existence of a corresponding spiritual principle. But it is not possible for a person on the strength of mundane knowledge to form any idea of the nature of the spiritual principle We are sometimes disposed to think that it is given to us to approach the Absolute by way. of service in certain forms. The issue of sex gives the direct lie to any such supposition. It shows clearly that it is never possible to rise from the physio-mental plane to the spiritual. This of course holds also in the case of similar empirical assumption regarding any other principle of spiritual service.

But we can understand by the parity of reason that the principle must exist in an inconceivable form. We are supported by the Scriptures. Srimad Bhagavatam makes the subject its central topic, round which all other topics are made to turn. The principle is found to occupy a correspondingly important position in the life of man in this world. So there is nothing peculiar or objectionable about the position. The objection of purists is due to the ignorance of the full claim of the Absolute.

By means of argument alone we cannot go beyond the point that we have now reached. The sex is found to be admissible in the Absolute. But the nature of the Personality of the Divine Couple, Sri Sri Lakshmi-Narayana, is other wise unintelligible to the limited understanding. Its knowledge can only be received by grace and is, therefore, a matter of actual realisation on the path of spiritual endeavour.

We, therefore, reach the conclusion that the Divinity is a Transcendental Person. His Personality manifests Himself to us at first as that of a Male. This is the rcalisation of Divinity as Sri Vasudeva. Rut on closer acquaintance we find His fuller Form of the Eternal Couple, viz., Sri Sri Lakshmi-Narayana. Sri Narayana appears as the Lord, Sri Lakshmi as His Consort. Sri Narayana is the Wielder and Sri Lakshmi is the Executrix of the Divine Will. Sri Narayana manifests all His Activities through His Counter-Whole. This is the nature of relationship between the Divine Couple.

The Sanskrit word “Shakti" expresses the spiritual principle that corresponds to the female. The word may he rendered as "Energy" "Potency" or "Power". Sri Lakshmi is Divine Power. The personality of Power is feminine, that of the Possessor of Power is Masculine. Godhead is the Possessor of infinite Power. Power is not dissociable from her Possessor. In this sense Divine Power is identical with Godhead. But Godhead is more than His Power. He is the Source and Wielder of Power. In exercise of His Power Godhead is realised as Couple. Godhead is fully realised as co-existing with His eternal Consort. The nearest physical analogy is that of the Sun in the embrace of the assemblage of heat and light. Neither light nor heat is the Sun who is their otherwise unknowable Source. They are manifestations of the potency of the Sun. It is not possible to describe the relationship of Power with the Source of all Power in terms of any mental or physical experience. It is possible only to indicate it by way of an extremely imperfect analogy.

The Eternal Consort of Godhead co-exists with Godhead. She is the predominated moiety of the Absolute. The predominating moiety is her Lord and Master, Godhead Himself. This is the fuller idea of the Divine Personality. In the soul of man there also exists will in the embrace of power but both of them in an infinitesimally small measure. This smallness of his magnitude is realised by the individual soul by the service of the Divine Couple. It is possible for the soul of the jiva to try to live on his own paltry resources. This leads to a wrong estimate of his place and function in the Absolute. The point of view that such a course produces is responsible for the misdirection of the soul's activities in the state of self-elected willful ignorance that is to be found in this world.

So there is progressive revelation of the nature of the Divinity on the path of pure spiritual service. The upward tendency is towards realisation of the nature of the full scope of all the concrete relationships imperfectly mirrored in the deluding correspondences of this world, by the soul of man. In this world it is given only to man to have a corresponding existence. The soul of man is thus truly the centre of the phenomenal cosmos. This is not the case with any other sentient being, either higher or lower, of this world. The beings of apparently more favoured mundane worlds live under conditions that are less favourable for the realisation of the Absolute. This is due to the fact that they find their position more enjoyable. For the opposite reason the beings of lower worlds or stages are also placed in a worse position than man with reference to the Absolute.

These infinite gradations of life also exist as their corresponding realities in the realm of the Absolute, enveloping the human personality by their serving activities and affording necessary guidance for the realisation of the most perfect service that is found also here on the plane that corresponds to that of humanity. Sri Sri Lakshmi-Narayana are Objects of worship of this spiritual human plane. They enable us to attain the realisation of the concrete relationship of human service in its diffident forms. The development of the serving principle leads gradually to the inner and more concrete planes of the worship of Rama-Sita, of Sri Krishna in Dwaraka, of Sri Krishna in Mathura and finally of Sri Krishna in Brindabana. The word "rasa" means that which produces the sensation of "taste";in its most comprehensive sense. That which imparts to human life the quality of being tasted by its possessor is the most fundamental of all principles of value of life. The-range and quality of the realised taste-imparting principle is the cause of the desire for and bliss of existence. Man lives here in this world on the sweets and bitters of his mundane sojourn. If he is deprived of this faculty of taste life is rendered meaningless and contemptible.

The leavening principle points to the sexual relationship as one of its cardinal references. This is consciously realisable by most persons in their actual relationships in this world. But the sexual relationship, although capable of being reached by way of argument as forming directly or indirectly the basis of all sweetness and bitterness on the mundane plane, is itself apprehended as a dangerous, delicate and unintelligible subject. It is also the basis of the taste of grossness in its most unwholesome forms.

The worship of Godhead is realisable in terms of the quality of spiritual taste evoked and fostered by His service. The relationships of this world, supplied by their deluding correspondence, give a clue to the spiritual quality but they can never give any substantive idea of the reality which is free from all possibility of unwholesomeness. In fact it is the attitude of the individual soul that is the cause of all experience of unwholesomeness born of limited vision. As the scope of vision of the individual expands he realises an increasing freedom from the sense of unwholesomeness. But this does not apply to the mundane plane where the so called expansion of empiric knowledge (?) tends to multiply ignorance and the possibility of unlimited grossness.

The conclusion to which such considerations tend to lead may be stated in the following manner. Spiritual life is categorically different from the mundane. No activity on the mundane plane by its mere dimension or manipulation, can ever lead to the Absolute. The difference between the mundane and spiritual function, may be indicated by the corresponding difference of attitude towards the Absolute on the part of the individual soul. The mundane attitude is that of a desire to lord it over the Absolute. The spiritual attitude is that of service by the process of unconditional enlightening submission to the Absolute. In proportion as submission to the Absolute tends to be perfected by practice under the guidance of the Absolute, the scope of the spiritual vision of the individual expands and produces a corresponding progressive excellence of the tasting process. Judged by this standard the service of Sri Sri Radha-Govinda is the perfection of bliss attainable by the individual soul.

Not that Sri Sri Radha-Govinda is essentially different from Lord Vasudeva. They are one and the same, being the Divinity Himself. But the worshipper of Lord Vasudeva does not possess the full scope of spiritual vision. He can, however, obtain the expanded vision only by the faithful service of Lord Vasudeva and by His grace.

The faithful servant of Lord Vasudeva will find in the Object of his worship Sri Sri Lakshmi-Narayana, Sri Sri RamaSita, Sri Sri Dwarakesha-Rukminisha-Krishna, Sri Sri Mathuresha-Krishna and finally Sri Sri RadhaKrishna in Brindabana.