kasalt
27-09-2007, 05:55 AM
I offer the following simply as information, for those who are interested...
Vaishnava Philosophy: A Definition of God
Modern man's concepts of God are many and varied. Children tend to imagine an old man with a white beard. Many adults regard God as an invisible force or a mental concept or as all humanity, the universe, or even oneself. Some people think that God is the Brahman, or the formless and eternal manifestation of spiritual energy. They say everything is one and God is therefore everything and everything is therefore God. This is one conception of the Supreme, but the devotees of the Lord, called Vaishnavas, accept that Krishna is not only the Brahman but a person.
Krishna is God, the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Krishna is the original name for God. Krishna has many other names according to the country, culture and language of different peoples. To the Jews He is Yahweh, to the Christians He is Jehovah, to the Muslims He is Allah. To all He is God, the supreme being. He is the original and primeval person who is simultaneously expanded everywhere throughout existence and yet is still situated in His eternal abode in His original, transcendental form. He is the all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-merciful being. He is the chief eternal living entity amongst all eternal living entities who are His parts. He is responsible for fulfilling all the desires of the subordinate living entities since time immemorial.
We do not say that Krishna is a person like you or me, on the contrary, He is the supreme person who is all-powerful and unlimited, whereas we living entities are in every way, limited. Krishna is the infinite source of all living beings and we are His eternal infinitesimal parts and parcels.
Parasara Muni, a great sage and the father of Vyasadeva, who compiled all the Vedic literatures, gave the following definition of God:
"Bhagavan, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, is thus defined as one who is full in six opulences -- who has full strength, fame, wealth, knowledge, beauty, and renunciation." (Visnu Purana 6.5.47)
Krishna possesses qualities. He possesses all opulent qualities in the infinite degree. He is the most beautiful personality. Since He is the Supreme, He has the supreme form and personality. No one is more beautiful or attractive than He. Krishna attracts everyone. Therefore He is called "Krishna", meaning, the all-attractive one. Except for the liberated souls, everyone in the material world is attracted by Cupid. But Krishna is so attractive that He not only attracts the liberated souls but He attracts Cupid as well.
Krishna is the strongest personality. By His desire alone all the universes are created and destroyed by one portion of a portion of His personal form. He can do anything and everything as He likes. He has no limitations.
Krishna is also the wealthiest person since all wealth in all worlds everywhere come from Him. Everything animate and inanimate within all creation is owned and controlled by the Lord, who is the actual proprietor of everything. One who knows this perfectly well never claims anything as his own but uses everything in the service of the Lord.
Krishna is the most learned personality for He possesses all knowledge. As He describes in the Bhagavad-gita, "I know everything that has happened in the past, everything that is happening at present, everything that will happen in the future, and I know all living entities. But Me no one knows." There is nothing in existence outside of Krishna since everything is the energy of Krishna, and therefore there is nothing He cannot know at any time. He is also existing within the hearts of all living entities as the Supersoul and therefore He knows everything which they do or desire.
No one is more famous than God. Although people of this world know Him in His different forms and names, everyone is aware of the Lord. Some know about Him by worshiping Him in love and service, and some know Him by negating His existence (the atheists) but everyone knows about God. Someone may be famous for some years on this Earth planet, but he certainly may not be known on other planets or at other historical times. Krishna, God, is known about in all planets in all universes throughout all time.
And finally, Krishna is the most renounced personality. He is not attached to anything in this world. The only thing which can bind Him is the loving devotional service of His devotees. And even then, if it will expand the devotee's love, He is capable of temporarily renouncing them as well as He did with the gopis in the famous rasa dance in Vrindavan.
Sometimes God appears in this world just to show the people His original, eternal form. Sometimes He appears in other forms according to the requirements of His pastimes. More than 5,100 years ago, Krishna appeared in His original, transcendental form just to please His devotees, annihilate the miscreants, and reestablish the principles of religion. During this time on Earth, the Lord spoke Bhagavad-gita, which is one of the most famous books on this planet. In this literature, He gives the practical method to attain devotional service to His lotus feet.
The perfection of life is to attain pure, loving devotional service to the Lord. This is the real goal of all living entities. When one is perfected after a life of pure service, often attained after many, many births and deaths of endeavoring to attain real knowledge, one becomes eligible to go back to the spiritual world, the eternal abode of the Lord, which is far beyond the material realm of birth, death, old age and disease.
Vaishnava Philosophy: The Absolute Truth in Three Phases (Brahman, Paramatma, and Bhagavan)
The Non-dual Absolute Truth
Contrary to most modern-age, relativistic philosophies, the Vedic philosophy says that there is an Absolute Truth.
Although we daily perceive that the objects and activities around us are not absolute, it does not logically follow that everything, everywhere is relative. As they say, "One man's food is another man's poison." This is valid for almost everything within the phenomenal, material world. Still, it would be false to conclude from this observation that absolutely nothing is absolute.
Absolute means "free" or "independent" (from the Latin absolvere, "to make free"). Its philosophical meaning is that something absolute has to be free from and untouched by any influence of the transient, relative world. In this sense, absolute is synonymous with transcendental (from Latin transcendere, "going beyond the limits of matter").
But what is absolute? What is transcendental? Certainly not us. We are at the moment completely under the influence of flickering material things, such as thoughts, feelings, and desires. We cannot even claim to be independent of matter, for we are fully dependent on air, water, sunlight, and food to maintain our bodies. Whatever we do, say, or want is under the dominion of the matter that surrounds us. The absolute, on the other hand, must be something outside the influence of material time and space -- something eternal, omnipotent, and omnipresent.
Usually, when we hear of these qualities, we immediately think of God or "the Divine." If anyone or anything is transcendental, absolutely true, and fully independent, it is God.
Vedic philosophy discusses three phases, or aspects, of the Absolute Truth, in Sanskrit: brahman, paramatma, and bhagavan. It is important to understand that these three aspects are actually one. They are the same substance, non-dual Absolute Truth, seen from different angles of vision and according to different grades of spiritual realization. The Bhagavata Purana states:
"Learned transcendentalists who know the Absolute Truth call this non-dual substance brahman, paramatma, or bhagavan."
In other words, the very same substance we call the Absolute Truth can be realized as the impersonal Brahman light, the localized Paramatma, or the Personality of Godhead, Bhagavan.
Brahman
Brahman refers to the impersonal, all-pervasive aspect of the Absolute Truth. The multifarious manifestations of the cosmos, moving and nonmoving -- matter, atoms, bodies, planets, space -- are not ultimate causes, nor are they eternal. They come from the eternal Brahman, the origin of everything within the material world of duality.
Brahman is mainly realized by the students of the Vedic Upanisads. The Upanisads describe it as the brilliant light of lights, the shining effulgence of the divine. Modern, New-Age philosophies also refer to this aspect of the Absolute Truth. They claim that everyone and everything is ultimately "one," and after realizing the truth we all "merge" into that divine oneness, leaving all qualities and individuality behind. In the sparkling light of the divine Brahman effulgence, everything seems to be "one." No visible distinctions between the individual souls nor any personal emotions, qualities, or activities manifest. But we should not forget that this is only one aspect of the Absolute Truth.
Paramatma
Vedic philosophy distinguishes the atma from both the gross (physical) and subtle (mental) bodies. Atma is the eternal, individual inner self, and it is not destroyed when the body is destroyed. But this atma is distinct also from the Paramatma.
Paramatma means "the Supreme Self" or "the Supreme Soul," (atma means "self or soul," and parama means "transcendental, absolute or supreme"). Usually, paramatma is translated as "the Supersoul."
In the Upanisads, the Paramatma and the individual atma are compared to two friendly birds sitting in the same tree (the material body). One bird (the individual soul) is eating the sweet and sour fruits of the tree (the pleasures and pains of material life), and the other bird (the Supersoul) is watching His friend. Although these two birds are the same in quality, one is captivated by the fruits of the material tree, and the other is witnessing the activities of His friend.
The Supersoul is the localized aspect of the Absolute Truth. In other words, God dwells within our hearts and accompanies us throughout our journeys from one material body to another. He gives us good advice and fulfills our desires by awarding us the karmic results of our actions. Therefore the Supersoul is our unknown friend, our best friend.
The ultimate goal of the yogis' mystic meditation is to realize this Paramatma, the Personality of Godhead within their hearts.
Bhagavan
Bhagavan refers to the Personality of Godhead. According to Vedic philosophy, God is not only impersonal light or all-pervasive divine consciousness but also a person. Yet He is not a person like us, for He is free from vice and bad qualities, neither influenced by illusion nor fettered by a material body. Nonetheless, He is a person, possessing individual consciousness, intelligence, and personal qualities. The Personality of Godhead, Bhagavan, is the absolute, transcendental, perfect, original, and supreme person. How could we be persons unless our origin, God, is also a person?
The word Bhagavan means "the person who possesses all the divine attributes or opulences (bhaga)," all wealth, all power, all fame, all beauty, all knowledge, and all renunciation. Bhagavan is thus the personal God aspired to and worshiped by the devotees of monotheistic religions like Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Vedic theology ascribes to God unlimited personal qualities and therefore unlimited personal names, and each name describes one of His qualities or activities. The most prominent Sanskrit names of God are Krishna, Rama, Govinda, Vishnu, Narayana, and Hari, and they all refer to the same Supreme Person.
Bhagavan is the highest feature of the Absolute Truth, the source of both Brahman and Paramatma. Therefore, when the religious inquirer realizes Bhagavan by personal devotional service to the Supreme Personality of Godhead, simultaneously he realizes Brahman, the glowing effulgence of the Personality of Godhead, and Paramatma, the partial representation of the Personality of Godhead. Realized sages have seen that the three phases or aspects of the Absolute Truth are all present within Bhagavan, the source of all existence.
Conclusion
The three divine aspects of Brahman, Paramatma, and Bhagavan can be understood by the example of the sun, which also has three different aspects: the all-pervasive, effulgent sunshine; the localized surface of the sun planet; and the personality of the sun, the sun-god. Experienced transcendentalists know well that these three features of the Absolute Truth are nothing but different perspectives seen from different angles of vision.
Vaishnava Philosophy: A Definition of God
Modern man's concepts of God are many and varied. Children tend to imagine an old man with a white beard. Many adults regard God as an invisible force or a mental concept or as all humanity, the universe, or even oneself. Some people think that God is the Brahman, or the formless and eternal manifestation of spiritual energy. They say everything is one and God is therefore everything and everything is therefore God. This is one conception of the Supreme, but the devotees of the Lord, called Vaishnavas, accept that Krishna is not only the Brahman but a person.
Krishna is God, the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Krishna is the original name for God. Krishna has many other names according to the country, culture and language of different peoples. To the Jews He is Yahweh, to the Christians He is Jehovah, to the Muslims He is Allah. To all He is God, the supreme being. He is the original and primeval person who is simultaneously expanded everywhere throughout existence and yet is still situated in His eternal abode in His original, transcendental form. He is the all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-merciful being. He is the chief eternal living entity amongst all eternal living entities who are His parts. He is responsible for fulfilling all the desires of the subordinate living entities since time immemorial.
We do not say that Krishna is a person like you or me, on the contrary, He is the supreme person who is all-powerful and unlimited, whereas we living entities are in every way, limited. Krishna is the infinite source of all living beings and we are His eternal infinitesimal parts and parcels.
Parasara Muni, a great sage and the father of Vyasadeva, who compiled all the Vedic literatures, gave the following definition of God:
"Bhagavan, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, is thus defined as one who is full in six opulences -- who has full strength, fame, wealth, knowledge, beauty, and renunciation." (Visnu Purana 6.5.47)
Krishna possesses qualities. He possesses all opulent qualities in the infinite degree. He is the most beautiful personality. Since He is the Supreme, He has the supreme form and personality. No one is more beautiful or attractive than He. Krishna attracts everyone. Therefore He is called "Krishna", meaning, the all-attractive one. Except for the liberated souls, everyone in the material world is attracted by Cupid. But Krishna is so attractive that He not only attracts the liberated souls but He attracts Cupid as well.
Krishna is the strongest personality. By His desire alone all the universes are created and destroyed by one portion of a portion of His personal form. He can do anything and everything as He likes. He has no limitations.
Krishna is also the wealthiest person since all wealth in all worlds everywhere come from Him. Everything animate and inanimate within all creation is owned and controlled by the Lord, who is the actual proprietor of everything. One who knows this perfectly well never claims anything as his own but uses everything in the service of the Lord.
Krishna is the most learned personality for He possesses all knowledge. As He describes in the Bhagavad-gita, "I know everything that has happened in the past, everything that is happening at present, everything that will happen in the future, and I know all living entities. But Me no one knows." There is nothing in existence outside of Krishna since everything is the energy of Krishna, and therefore there is nothing He cannot know at any time. He is also existing within the hearts of all living entities as the Supersoul and therefore He knows everything which they do or desire.
No one is more famous than God. Although people of this world know Him in His different forms and names, everyone is aware of the Lord. Some know about Him by worshiping Him in love and service, and some know Him by negating His existence (the atheists) but everyone knows about God. Someone may be famous for some years on this Earth planet, but he certainly may not be known on other planets or at other historical times. Krishna, God, is known about in all planets in all universes throughout all time.
And finally, Krishna is the most renounced personality. He is not attached to anything in this world. The only thing which can bind Him is the loving devotional service of His devotees. And even then, if it will expand the devotee's love, He is capable of temporarily renouncing them as well as He did with the gopis in the famous rasa dance in Vrindavan.
Sometimes God appears in this world just to show the people His original, eternal form. Sometimes He appears in other forms according to the requirements of His pastimes. More than 5,100 years ago, Krishna appeared in His original, transcendental form just to please His devotees, annihilate the miscreants, and reestablish the principles of religion. During this time on Earth, the Lord spoke Bhagavad-gita, which is one of the most famous books on this planet. In this literature, He gives the practical method to attain devotional service to His lotus feet.
The perfection of life is to attain pure, loving devotional service to the Lord. This is the real goal of all living entities. When one is perfected after a life of pure service, often attained after many, many births and deaths of endeavoring to attain real knowledge, one becomes eligible to go back to the spiritual world, the eternal abode of the Lord, which is far beyond the material realm of birth, death, old age and disease.
Vaishnava Philosophy: The Absolute Truth in Three Phases (Brahman, Paramatma, and Bhagavan)
The Non-dual Absolute Truth
Contrary to most modern-age, relativistic philosophies, the Vedic philosophy says that there is an Absolute Truth.
Although we daily perceive that the objects and activities around us are not absolute, it does not logically follow that everything, everywhere is relative. As they say, "One man's food is another man's poison." This is valid for almost everything within the phenomenal, material world. Still, it would be false to conclude from this observation that absolutely nothing is absolute.
Absolute means "free" or "independent" (from the Latin absolvere, "to make free"). Its philosophical meaning is that something absolute has to be free from and untouched by any influence of the transient, relative world. In this sense, absolute is synonymous with transcendental (from Latin transcendere, "going beyond the limits of matter").
But what is absolute? What is transcendental? Certainly not us. We are at the moment completely under the influence of flickering material things, such as thoughts, feelings, and desires. We cannot even claim to be independent of matter, for we are fully dependent on air, water, sunlight, and food to maintain our bodies. Whatever we do, say, or want is under the dominion of the matter that surrounds us. The absolute, on the other hand, must be something outside the influence of material time and space -- something eternal, omnipotent, and omnipresent.
Usually, when we hear of these qualities, we immediately think of God or "the Divine." If anyone or anything is transcendental, absolutely true, and fully independent, it is God.
Vedic philosophy discusses three phases, or aspects, of the Absolute Truth, in Sanskrit: brahman, paramatma, and bhagavan. It is important to understand that these three aspects are actually one. They are the same substance, non-dual Absolute Truth, seen from different angles of vision and according to different grades of spiritual realization. The Bhagavata Purana states:
"Learned transcendentalists who know the Absolute Truth call this non-dual substance brahman, paramatma, or bhagavan."
In other words, the very same substance we call the Absolute Truth can be realized as the impersonal Brahman light, the localized Paramatma, or the Personality of Godhead, Bhagavan.
Brahman
Brahman refers to the impersonal, all-pervasive aspect of the Absolute Truth. The multifarious manifestations of the cosmos, moving and nonmoving -- matter, atoms, bodies, planets, space -- are not ultimate causes, nor are they eternal. They come from the eternal Brahman, the origin of everything within the material world of duality.
Brahman is mainly realized by the students of the Vedic Upanisads. The Upanisads describe it as the brilliant light of lights, the shining effulgence of the divine. Modern, New-Age philosophies also refer to this aspect of the Absolute Truth. They claim that everyone and everything is ultimately "one," and after realizing the truth we all "merge" into that divine oneness, leaving all qualities and individuality behind. In the sparkling light of the divine Brahman effulgence, everything seems to be "one." No visible distinctions between the individual souls nor any personal emotions, qualities, or activities manifest. But we should not forget that this is only one aspect of the Absolute Truth.
Paramatma
Vedic philosophy distinguishes the atma from both the gross (physical) and subtle (mental) bodies. Atma is the eternal, individual inner self, and it is not destroyed when the body is destroyed. But this atma is distinct also from the Paramatma.
Paramatma means "the Supreme Self" or "the Supreme Soul," (atma means "self or soul," and parama means "transcendental, absolute or supreme"). Usually, paramatma is translated as "the Supersoul."
In the Upanisads, the Paramatma and the individual atma are compared to two friendly birds sitting in the same tree (the material body). One bird (the individual soul) is eating the sweet and sour fruits of the tree (the pleasures and pains of material life), and the other bird (the Supersoul) is watching His friend. Although these two birds are the same in quality, one is captivated by the fruits of the material tree, and the other is witnessing the activities of His friend.
The Supersoul is the localized aspect of the Absolute Truth. In other words, God dwells within our hearts and accompanies us throughout our journeys from one material body to another. He gives us good advice and fulfills our desires by awarding us the karmic results of our actions. Therefore the Supersoul is our unknown friend, our best friend.
The ultimate goal of the yogis' mystic meditation is to realize this Paramatma, the Personality of Godhead within their hearts.
Bhagavan
Bhagavan refers to the Personality of Godhead. According to Vedic philosophy, God is not only impersonal light or all-pervasive divine consciousness but also a person. Yet He is not a person like us, for He is free from vice and bad qualities, neither influenced by illusion nor fettered by a material body. Nonetheless, He is a person, possessing individual consciousness, intelligence, and personal qualities. The Personality of Godhead, Bhagavan, is the absolute, transcendental, perfect, original, and supreme person. How could we be persons unless our origin, God, is also a person?
The word Bhagavan means "the person who possesses all the divine attributes or opulences (bhaga)," all wealth, all power, all fame, all beauty, all knowledge, and all renunciation. Bhagavan is thus the personal God aspired to and worshiped by the devotees of monotheistic religions like Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Vedic theology ascribes to God unlimited personal qualities and therefore unlimited personal names, and each name describes one of His qualities or activities. The most prominent Sanskrit names of God are Krishna, Rama, Govinda, Vishnu, Narayana, and Hari, and they all refer to the same Supreme Person.
Bhagavan is the highest feature of the Absolute Truth, the source of both Brahman and Paramatma. Therefore, when the religious inquirer realizes Bhagavan by personal devotional service to the Supreme Personality of Godhead, simultaneously he realizes Brahman, the glowing effulgence of the Personality of Godhead, and Paramatma, the partial representation of the Personality of Godhead. Realized sages have seen that the three phases or aspects of the Absolute Truth are all present within Bhagavan, the source of all existence.
Conclusion
The three divine aspects of Brahman, Paramatma, and Bhagavan can be understood by the example of the sun, which also has three different aspects: the all-pervasive, effulgent sunshine; the localized surface of the sun planet; and the personality of the sun, the sun-god. Experienced transcendentalists know well that these three features of the Absolute Truth are nothing but different perspectives seen from different angles of vision.