When Krishna is unlimited how can he be a person?
Answer Podcast
Transcript
This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
If we are going to be fulfilled by loving Krishna and he is unconditioned, we are conditioned, then how can he be a person? See, the personality itself is not the cause of conditioning. It is material personality that is the cause of conditioning.
God himself is unlimited. No, that’s what I am saying. He is unlimited, but our conception of what causes limitation.
We often think of, okay, I am a person. Say, you are sitting here, you are sitting there, I am sitting here. If you are sitting there, you cannot be in your house.
So, you are limited. So, now we think of limitedness as associated with personality. But actually, limitedness is associated with material form.
It is not necessarily associated with personality. Give a simple example. So, we think that for something to be unlimited, it should not have any form, it should not have any personality.
But say, now we are in a building. This building has a particular form. If, say, this building is destroyed, it will crumble into a formless heap.
Now, will the heap be limited or unlimited? Limited. So, it is not that form causes limitation and formlessness brings unlimited state. Limitedness is a feature of matter.
Material things, whether they are with form or without form, they are limited. God, by his very nature, is not material. God by nature, he is not material, he is spiritual.
And spirit has the capacity to be both universal and localized. So, God has many aspects. Just like the sun is situated at one place.
At the same time, sun radiates its rays everywhere. So, like that, God has a personal manifestation which is localized. At the same time, God has his power and presence spread everywhere.
So, the limitedness of personality that limits us, that is because of the material level of reality at which we are. Spiritual level of reality, it has the potential to have form, it has the potential to have personality, but be unlimited. Because otherwise, if we look at it, if we say God to be unlimited, should not be a person.
But not being a person, not having a form, is also a limitation. Isn’t it? To say that God does not have something, that is a limitation. So, in that sense, the conception of limitation that we have, that itself is a limiting conception.
So, we need to change our conception of what comprises limitation. God being an omnipotent being, he can have a form and still he can be unlimited. In Krishna Leela, there are many examples.
Krishna was a small child on his mother’s lap. He thought he is a small child. But Krishna, Yashodama asked Krishna to open his mouth and he opened his mouth and she saw the whole universe in his mouth.
And in the universe, she saw herself and she saw Krishna in that universe also. So, even when God is inside the universe, the universe is inside him. Thank you.