Is it wrong to hear and read about God from multiple sources, like disciples of Srila Prabhupada?

From: Amit

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Question from Amit. Is it wrong to hear and read about God from multiple sources like disciples of Srila Prabhupada? No. Multiple sources can give us understanding from different perspectives.
Srila Prabhupada wanted us to study the philosophy in that way. At the same time, the multiple sources that we use should not just give us multiple perspectives of the same issue, but rather they give multiple perspectives with different philosophical and devotional affiliations or rather intellectual affiliations. That means that in general, if we read a book by a devotee and then we read a book by an atheist and then we read a book by an agnostic.
So if we have multiple sources and we try to find out for ourselves whose arguments are best, we will have to devote a lifetime for that. And not only will we have to devote a lifetime for that, at the end of it also, we ourselves will be confused. Because in general, every school of thought will come up with an aggressive presentation of its own ideas.
And it takes one to know one. So only when we are strongly rooted in our philosophy can we identify the limitations and the weaknesses and the false arguments that are being advanced by the proponent of some other philosophy. It’s just like a soldier from one army meeting the commander of another army in battle.
The soldier may be sincere, the soldier may be virtuous, but if he’s not competent enough, and the commander on the other side may be vicious. But if he is trained and skilled and competent, then it will be a complete mismatch. So therefore, multiple sources should mean multiple sources that are having the same devotional and intellectual affiliation as Shila Prabhupada.
So if we are reading Shila Prabhupada’s disciples, that is perfectly okay. At the same time, it is best for us to focus on Shila Prabhupada’s books as our primary reading. Because Shila Prabhupada is the exalted sampradaya acharya, sort of, for us.
He’s a preeminent shiksha guru for all ISKCON devotees. And nobody in ISKCON can ever match his depth of understanding and especially his potency and his purity to infuse faith in Krishna and the desire to love Krishna and spread Krishna’s message to others. So that’s why, while keeping Shila Prabhupada’s books as our primary focus, if we want, we can read other books so that we can get understanding from different perspectives.
But these other books should also be having the same intellectual and devotional affiliation as Shila Prabhupada’s books are having. Then we can get a broader and deeper understanding. If we go to just multiple sources, from multiple people with multiple conceptions, entirely different and sometimes contradictory, then we will end up confused by that.
It’s better that we focus on becoming deeply rooted in our philosophy and then, if our service so demands, when we are sufficiently intellectually and devotionally strong, then we can ourselves focus on reading other sources which may often contain contradictory views and pointing out the deficiencies in those views. Not in an arrogant, egoistic way, but in a compassionate, awareness-spreading way, so that people can know what is the truth and what is less than the truth. How other things, how other ideas fall