Uttamā-bhakti, first-class bhakti, what is that? Anyābhilāṣitā-śūnyam: without any kind of desire than to serve the Lord. And in the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam also, it is said, sa vai puṁsāṁ paro dharmaḥ. Paraḥ means transcendental, beyond this material conception. Kṛṣṇa, or the Absolute, Nārāyaṇa, that is para. Nārāyaṇaḥ paraḥ avyaktāt. Nārāyaṇa is not anything of this material world. Nārāyaṇa, Kṛṣṇa, Viṣṇu. The Absolute Personality of Godhead, He is not anything of this material world. When we use this word, nirākāra, that means His form is not anything of this material world. But He has got His form. That is a transcendental form. Sac-cid-ānanda-vigrahaḥ (Bs. 5.1). Nirākāra means He, He has no such form, as we have got this material form. This material form is neither of the three transcendental bliss, sac-cid-ānanda. This is asat, acit, and nirānanda.
Material form (Lectures)
Lectures
Bhagavad-gita As It Is Lectures
There is form. Just like this body is compared with the dress. Now, just like in your present material form you have got hand; therefore your coat has got hand. If you have got... You have got leg; therefore your pant has got leg. Therefore it is to be assumed that the spirit soul has got form, and it has developed into hands, legs, heads, everything. It is not formless; it has got form. But with our material eyes at the present, gross eyes, we cannot find it; therefore we say it has no form.
So, "O My dear son of Kuntī, anyone who knows perfectly about the Lord's incarnation, why does He come, what are His activities, and what is His original constitution, form, etc., the science of God—if anyone knows, simply by knowing, simply by knowing..., the theoretical knowledge..." What is his profit? Simply by knowing... Now, tyaktvā dehaṁ punar janma naiti: (BG 4.9) "Then for him the profit is that after giving up this body, he hasn't got to take birth again in this material form." Tyaktvā dehaṁ punar janma naiti mām eti: (BG 4.9) "He comes directly to Me." Simply by knowing.
So if I am a living entity, I have got a form, so why the supreme living entity will not have a form? This is poor fund of knowledge. He is not nirākāra. But we cannot estimate His ākāra. That is nirākāra. Nirākāra means to estimate. We cannot estimate how big He is. That means nirā... Nirākāra does not mean formless. When there is in the śāstra, nirākāra, this word is used, nirākāra means He has no prakṛta-ākāra, material form. That is nirākāra, not that he has no form. That is poor fund of knowledge. He is sac-cid-ānanda-vigraha (Bs. 5.1). Therefore Kṛṣṇa says in the Bhagavad-gītā, avajānanti māṁ mūḍhā mānuṣīṁ tanum āśritam: (BG 9.11) "My original form is like human being." And the Bible also it is said, "Man is made after the form of God."
Yes. Paramātmā is also personal. Everything is personal. Paramātmā is described as four-handed Nārāyaṇa with śaṇkha, cakra, gadā, padma, with, I mean to say, ornaments. That is the feature of Paramātmā. You have seen the Viṣṇu-mūrti. That is Paramātmā. This voidness is an imagination, voidness. Actually God or Paramātmā or Kṛṣṇa, They are all sac-cid-ānanda-vigrahaḥ, transcendental forms. They are not material forms. Transcendental forms. Īśvaraḥ paramaḥ kṛṣṇaḥ sac-cid-ānanda-vigrahaḥ (Bs. 5.1). Vigraha means form. If we, part and parcel of Kṛṣṇa, we have got individuality, forms, how we can say that the Supreme has no form, no individuality?
Everywhere he sees Kṛṣṇa. Sthāvara-jaṅgama dekhe nā dekhe tāra mūrti (CC Madhya 8.274). He is seeing on the seaside a great ocean, a great sea, but he is not seeing the sea, but he is seeing Kṛṣṇa. He's (seeing) Kṛṣṇa's energy, how Kṛṣṇa's energy is working, and it is producing such vast ocean and sea. He is thinking like that. That is meditation. Anywhere he goes, he simply thinks of Kṛṣṇa. Sthāvara-jaṅgama dekhe nā dekhe tāra mūrti. He does not see the material form of anything. Sarvatra haya nija iṣṭa-deva-sphūrti. Everywhere he sees Kṛṣṇa. This is called Kṛṣṇa consciousness.
In the material world everything is born, it stays for some time, it develops, it gives some by-products, then it dwindles and then vanishes. These six forms of changes of the material form—ṣaḍ-vikāra. This is called in Sanskrit word ṣaḍ-vikāra, six kinds of changes. But the spiritual world, avyakta, which is not manifested at the present moment before us, that is akṣara. Akṣara means it is eternal. It does not annihilate.
That is the difference between material world and spiritual world. Material world means... Although the varieties are there in the spiritual world... There are also trees, as we have got here trees. But there the forms are spiritual form, and here they are material form.
The difference is that just like a living being. I can ask any of my disciple to do something. He'll do it. But this microphone, it has also a form, but if I want microphone, "Please do this," he cannot, it cannot do because it is material. It can mechanical, give some mechanical service, one only, but it cannot do any other thing. A man can speak or he can dance or he can become a thief, he can become so many—because he's living. That is the difference between material form and spiritual form.
Therefore in the Bhagavad-gītā the material forms, they have been described as inferior, and spiritual forms... There is spiritual world also. That is called parā-prakṛti. There is another nature. So we have no information. But information means we have in the Vedic literature. In other literatures also there are slight information, but in the Vedic literature you'll find described information of the spiritual world.
So the same tattva, in truth, not superficially, if you understand Kṛṣṇa, then tyaktvā dehaṁ punar janma naiti (BG 4.9). After giving up this body, you'll not have to accept another material body. That is saṁsiddhiṁ paramāṁ gatāḥ. That is highest perfection of life. If you don't accept anymore the material form of body.
Just like if you say, "I am Indian," so there is no harm. But you cannot say that you are as big, as powerful as Indira Gandhi. She is also Indian. Similarly, you may become Brahman, but you cannot become Param Brahman. That is Kṛṣṇa, the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Similarly, ahaṁ brahmāsmi: "I am not this body, I am not this material form. I have got my spiritual identity." That is called ahaṁ brahmāsmi. And when one understands this fact, that he is not this material body, that is called brahma-bhūtaḥ.
Srimad-Bhagavatam Lectures
That is the statement of the Vedic literature: the supreme controller, the supreme leader, is Kṛṣṇa. Sac-cid-ānanda-vigrahaḥ. Kṛṣṇa is not formless. When Kṛṣṇa was present on this planet, He is not formless. He has His form. And what is that form? Sac-cid-ānanda-vigraha (Bs. 5.1). Ānandamaya-rasa-vigraha. Ānanda-cinmaya-rasa. That is not this vigraha. That we have to understand. Our vigraha, our form, at the present moment, material form, that is not sac-cid-ānanda. Sat means eternal, cit means full of knowledge, and ānanda means full of blissfulness.
So this is very important verse. Form and formless. When we speak of formless, we speak that God or even living entity, all of us, we have no material form. Just like we have got this form, but this form is temporary and it will never come again. As soon as this form is finished, I will have to take another form. That form may not be exactly like this. So this is the formula for everyone. But for Kṛṣṇa, He has no material form. He has got spiritual form. Therefore His form is eternal.
But those who are impersonalists, they cannot understand Kṛṣṇa, and being impersonalists, they do not believe in the activities of the Supreme. They think that when the Supreme Absolute Truth comes in the material world, in the material form, then "There is activity?" They cannot understand. Athāpi te deva padām... Therefore nobody can understand Kṛṣṇa without being trained up by a self-realized devotee.
Because in Upaniṣad the negating, that negation, negation of the material form... Therefore it is described in an impersonal form. These nonsense are sticking to that impersonal form. Impersonal—there is no form. Really, Veda says, apāni-pāda javano grahitā: "The Supreme Absolute Truth has no legs, has no hands, but He accepts whatever you offer." Now, how He accepts? He has no hand; then how He accepts? But they have no brain.
Similarly, material nature and spiritual nature, just opposite, but the same way: the electricity utilize for heating and electricity utilized for cooling. The energy is the same, but it is the manipulation of the engineer which can turn heat into cold and cold into heat. So therefore, for Kṛṣṇa there is no material nature. Everything is spiritual nature. Even Kṛṣṇa appears as material form, as stone, as matter, still, one who knows Kṛṣṇa, he can derive Kṛṣṇa's favor from any form. Otherwise the devotees are recommended to worship the Deity in the temple.
Kṛṣṇa showed Arjuna the virāḍ-rūpa, the gigantic universal form. So one side, He is universally represented, virāḍ-rūpa. And in another side He is within the aṇu paramāṇu, smaller than the aṇu, smaller than the paramāṇu. Aṇor aṇīyān mahato mahīyān. That is Kṛṣṇa. Mahīyān. But these are all material forms. In the Bhagavad-gītā, you will find in the Eleventh Chapter, Arjuna is requesting to come to His original form. So he was very much threatened, or frightened, and he requested, "This form is very much unbearable to see. Please come to Your original form." So Kṛṣṇa first of all came to His form, four-handed Viṣṇu form; then again He came into His two-handed Kṛṣṇa form, and that is the ultimate, real form of Kṛṣṇa.
Kṛṣṇa has got many forms. Every form is Kṛṣṇa's form. That's a fact. Advaitam acyutam anādim ananta-rūpam (Bs. 5.33). Some of the forms are personal, some of the forms are of His potencies, śakti, but all forms belong to Kṛṣṇa. So some of them are material forms, and whatever differentiation of forms we see in the material world, they are all Kṛṣṇa's form.
So if He has no body, if He is formless, if He is nirakara, then where is the question of aṅgam? He has aṅgam, samagrāṅgam, but He hasn't got a form like us. That is the meaning. When in the śāstra it is said that God has no form, it means that He has no material form. He has form; otherwise how can I think of His form? This Kṛṣṇa's form is not like us.
There is no question of formlessness. Nityo nityānāṁ cetanaś cetanānām (Kaṭha Upaniṣad 2.2.13). When there is such question, formlessness means that is not material form. But there is form. Īśvaraḥ paramaḥ kṛṣṇaḥ sac-cid-ānanda-vigrahaḥ (Bs. 5.1), vigraha means form. But that is sat-cid-ānanda, eternal, full of bliss, and full of knowledge.
Therefore Kṛṣṇa says, avajānanti māṁ mūḍhā mānuṣīṁ tanum āśritaḥ, paraṁ bhāvam ajānanto: (BG 9.11) "These rascals, they do not know what I am. Therefore he's thinking that My form and his form is the same." Avajānanti māṁ mūḍhā, unless one is mūḍha, he cannot say that God is formless. God has form. But His form is different from our form, this material form. Sat-cit-ānanda-vigraha. So therefore, we have to learn all these things by mahat-sevā dvāraṁ vimukteḥ. We can get out of all this ignorance when we are engaged in mahat-sevā. Otherwise we shall remain in the darkness. Kṛṣṇa has form, but His form is different from our, this material form.
God has His form. That I explained the other day. But His form is not like our form. His form is sac-cid-ānanda-vigrahaḥ (Bs. 5.1). His body is eternal, full of knowledge, and blissful. Our, this form is not eternal, neither full of knowledge, nor blissful. So it is not that God has no form. When it is described indirectly that "God has no form," means He has no form like us. Don't think that He has no form. He has no form, material form like us, which is not eternal, not full of knowledge, not blissful. So God has form. So God's form is realized in three different stages.
When one is powerful, all-powerful, how he can think that He has no good qualities? Is it possible to think like that? That means He has no material qualities. When there is nirviśeṣa, when there are such description, "The Absolute Truth has no form," that means He has no material form. As soon as there is question of form, we think of form like you have got a form, I have got a form, he has got a form.
Because they are convinced the Supreme Brahman is impersonal, brahmajyoti, so when brahmajyoti appears, He must take a form of this material world. Just like we are spiritual sparks, but we have taken this material form in this material world, so they take it also that God, when He comes, appears, He also accepts a material body. That is called Māyāvādī. But Kṛṣṇa says that janma karma me divyam: (BG 4.9) "When I come I do not accept a material body." Divyam, janma divyam. It is completely spiritual.
Revatīnandana: In the picture in the revealed book, Nāradajī is asking questions of Lord Brahmā. I was thinking that Nārada has actually an all-spiritual body, and Brahmā has a material form, material body. And yet Nārada appears to Brahmājī to ask questions from him as spiritual master. How is that?
Prabhupāda: Brahmājī also enters the spiritual kingdom at the time of annihilation with his persons.
Revatīnandana: Does he undergo a change of body at that time?
Prabhupāda: Yes. That automatically takes place. Just like Hiraṇyakaśipu's son is Prahlāda. It doesn't matter. And spiritual body, material body, that can be changed.
These Māyāvādīs, they cannot understand what is ātma-māyayā. Personally, ātma-māyayā. Ātma-māyayā means spiritual. He does not appear in material form. Those who are rascals and less intelligent, mūḍhās, avajānanti māṁ mūḍhā mānuṣīṁ tanum āśritam... (BG 9.11). "Because I come exactly..." He is also... His form is like man. Dvibhuja, (Sanskrit). Kṛṣṇa has two hands and Nārāyaṇa (indistinct) Kṛṣṇa is always carrying His flute, this is Kṛṣṇa's līlā, form.
Nectar of Devotion Lectures
Īśvaraḥ paramaḥ kṛṣṇaḥ sac-cid-ānanda-vigrahaḥ (Bs. 5.1). Vigraha means form, but not this form. Those who have no knowledge about Kṛṣṇa, they are thinking Kṛṣṇa is māyā. These bhaktas, they are worshiping the māyā form. Their philosophy is when Kṛṣṇa comes, when God comes, He takes a material form. No, that's not right. Kṛṣṇa says, sambhavāmy ātma-māyayā (BG 4.6). Sambhavāmy ātma-māyayā, the ātma-māyayā means cit potency. These Māyāvādī philosophers they have no information that cit potency. That is ahlādinī śakti, that is Rādhārāṇī. They have got experience of this material potency. External energy. Durgā. But they have no information of the cit potency. Therefore, they think that Kṛṣṇa appears in the form of māyā.
Sri Caitanya-caritamrta Lectures
So all these gopīs, they are expansion of Śrīmatī Rādhārāṇī, the original Lakṣmī. This is spiritual world. It is not impersonal, neither nirākāra, formless. Everything form, but that form is different from this form. That form is sat-cid-ānanda form—eternal, full of bliss, full of knowledge. This is not this material form. When we speak of formless, that means without any material form. Formless does not mean Kṛṣṇa and His expansion, they are formless. They are not of material form. Aprakṛta, not material. Here everything is prakṛta. It is not, neither, eternal nor blissful nor full of knowledge. It is temporary, full of ignorance and always miserable, this form. We can understand it.
That is oneness, one who can see. Even from material point of view, a paṇḍita, a learned man knows that "What is this material form, your body or my body?" Superficially it may look black, white or colored, but if you chemically analyze—the same ingredients: the same blood, the same muscle, the same stool, the same urine. When doctor examines the urine and stool, they do not examine differently a black man's urine and a white man's urine different, because they know the chemical composition is the same.
Just like ordinary man takes his birth and stay here for some time and then he goes away—no more, no trace of that particular man's activities. He's lost in the whirlpool of this material ocean. Neither exactly in a similar body, that particular living entity will again come back. Once. This form which you have got, material form, it is just like a bubble in the ocean. It is formed somehow or other according to our past actions and reactions, and it will stay for hundred years at most. Then it will disappear. And there will be no trace where that particular individual soul has gone.
Sri Brahma-samhita Lectures
This body is material. It is not ānanda-cinmaya-rasa. The material body is different from the spiritual body. That they do not know. So when the Vedas says nirākāra, "formless," that means He has no material form; He has got spiritual form. That spiritual form means full of bliss, ānanda. Ānandamayo 'bhyāsāt (Vedānta-sūtra 1.1.12). Vedānta-sūtra. By nature ānandamaya. There is nothing nirānanda. That is spiritual world, always full of bliss, full of knowledge, and eternity. That is spiritual. You live eternally and full of knowledge.
Initiation Lectures
So duration of life is very uncertain in this age. At any moment we can die. But this life, this human form of life, is meant for a sublime gain. What is that? To make a permanent solution of the miserable condition of our life. In this... So long we are in this material form, this body, we have to change from one body to another, one body to another. Janma-mṛtyu-jarā-vyādhi (BG 13.9). Repeated birth, repeated death. Soul is immortal, eternal, but changing, just like you are changing the dress.
This word is very popular, mukti, liberation. What is that liberation? Liberation means to come to this platform of Kṛṣṇa consciousness. That is liberation. Svarūpeṇa vyavasthitiḥ (SB 2.10.6). Mukti is defined in the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam: muktir hitvānyathā rūpam. Muktir hitvā anyathā rūpam. Anyathā rūpam. Rūpam means form. We are in a form which is not liberated form. Material form. This form which we have got just now, this form, when it will be finished, you'll never get this form. Another form.
General Lectures
Our conditional life of material existence is due to dirty things in our heart. Originally we are all Kṛṣṇa conscious living beings, but due to our long material association in different species of life, varying to 8,400,000 different forms of life, we are accustomed to transmigrating from one form of body or another. In such cycle of birth and death, I, you, and every one of us, although originally spirit soul and therefore qualitatively one in constitution with the Supreme Lord Kṛṣṇa, we have identified with this material form of life, subjected to various forms of material pangs, specifically in the shape of birth, death, old age and disease. The whole material civilization is a process of hard struggle of life, ending in birth, death, old age and disease.
We should remember this fact, that this human form of life is meant for going back to home, back to Godhead. That is the ultimate goal of life. This human form of life is not meant for working very hard like the animals. Nāyaṁ deho deha-bhājāṁ nṛ-loke, kaṣṭān kāmān arhate viḍ-bhujām ye (SB 5.5.1). Nāyaṁ deha, this body, nāyaṁ deho deha-bhājāṁ nṛ-loke. Every one of the living entities, they have taken this material form, and there are 8,400,000 species of forms. The best of the forms is this human form. But this form of life is not meant for working so hard like an ass and gratifying the senses like the hogs and dogs. That is the injunction of the śāstras.
Philosophy Discussions
Prabhupāda: Material forms have changed. The living force has not. The same example: the living force is there, the forms babyhood to childhood, childhood to boyhood, boyhood to youthhood, the form is changed, but the person whose bodies have been changed, he is permanent, he is spiritual, he is not changed. But when he identifies with the body, he thinks that "I am changed." The example is, just like in the rainy season, at night there is cloud, and the cloud is moving, but if you see, you see the moon is moving, moon is moving. But actually the moon is not moving, the cloud is moving. You have any experience?
Prabhupāda: Just like in unconsciousness one forgets his identity, but if he is dead then he cannot revive consciousness. Similarly, it is little difficult for the bodily concept of life persons, but there are many proofs and understanding that soul is eternal. He, of course, until he gets his freedom from this material existence, he is spiritually dead. Even though he is working in this material form, because he has forgotten his real identity, that is also a kind of death. Yā niśā sarva-bhūtānāṁ tasyāṁ jāgarti saṁyamī. This śloka explains how one is dead and how one is alive. When one is forgetful of his spiritual consciousness, God consciousness, he is supposed to be dead, and when he, one is alive to the spiritual consciousness or God consciousness, he is alive.
Hayagrīva: Aquinas believed that only God and the angels have form that is not material. There is no difference between God's form and His spiritual self.
Prabhupāda: Yes. As in the material world any form-man or beast or anyone—in the outward, external covering is matter, but within the matter there is the soul. The soul has form and God has form. That is real form. And the material form is simply shirting and coating over the spiritual body.
Prabhupāda: No. The form..., material body is imitation, is false. Real body is the spiritual body. Because the spiritual body has form, the coating of the spiritual body by matter takes a form, as I have already explained, that the shirt and coat originally has no form, but when the shirt and coat is cut by the tailor according the form of the man, it takes a form. So actually this material form is illusion. It is not form. It, it takes the form, and when it is old enough, no more use, it again comes to the original position, earth. "Dust thou art, dust thou beist." This form is made by the material nature. It is just like a machine. Kṛṣṇa says in the Bhagavad-gītā, bhrāmayan sarva-bhūtāni yantrārūḍhāni māyayā (BG 18.61). The soul has its own form, but he is given a machine, a particular machine, which is this body, and therefore he enjoys by wandering throughout the whole universe in different conditions of life.
| Page Title: | Material form (Lectures) |
| Compiler: | Visnu Murti, ChandrasekharaAcarya |
| Created: | 18 of Mar, 2010 |
| Totals by Section: | BG=0, SB=0, CC=0, OB=0, Lec=40, Con=0, Let=0 |
| No. of Quotes: | 40 |