View source for The personified Vedas continued, "Although it is not befitting to say that You do not know Yourself, it is practical to understand that because You have unlimited qualities and energies"

<div id="compilation">
<div id="facts">
{{terms|"Although it is not befitting to say that You do not know Yourself, it is practical to understand that because You have unlimited qualities and energies"}}
{{notes|}}
{{compiler|HanumanIC}}
{{complete|ALL}}
{{first|2017-04-26T11:57:17Z}}
{{last|2017-04-26T11:57:17Z}}
{{totals_by_section|BG=0|SB=0|CC=0|OB=1|Lec=0|Con=0|Let=0}}
{{total|1}}
{{toc right}}
[[Category:Personified Vedas]]
[[Category:Continue]]
[[Category:Although]]
[[Category:It Is Not]]
[[Category:Befitting]]
[[Category:Say]]
[[Category:You Do Not]]
[[Category:Know]]
[[Category:Yourself]]
[[Category:Practical Understanding]]
[[Category:Understanding God]]
[[Category:Because]]
[[Category:You Have]]
[[Category:God Is Unlimited]]
[[Category:God's Qualities]]
[[Category:God's Energies]]
[[Category:Krsna Book Chapter 87 - Prayers by the Personified Vedas]]
[[Category:Krsna Book Chapters 01 to 90]]
</div>
<div id="section">
<h2>Other Books by Srila Prabhupada</h2>
</div>
<div id="sub_section">
<h3>Krsna, The Supreme Personality of Godhead</h3>
</div>
<div class="quote">
<div class="quote_heading">
The reason is that You are unlimited. Although it is not befitting to say that You do not know Yourself, it is practical to understand that because You have unlimited qualities and energies and because Your knowledge is also unlimited, there is unlimited competition between Your knowledge and Your expansion of energies.
</div>

<div class="quote_link">
[[Vanisource:KB 87|Krsna Book, 87]]
</div>
<div class="text">
The personified Vedas thus worshiped the Supreme Personality of Godhead in different ways. Offering worship to the Supreme Lord by praying means remembering His transcendental qualities, pastimes and activities. But the Lord’s pastimes and qualities are unlimited. It is not possible for us to remember all the qualities of the Lord. Therefore, the personified Vedas worshiped to the best of their ability, and at the end they spoke as follows.

“Dear Lord, although Lord Brahmā, the predominating deity of the highest planet, Brahmaloka, and King Indra, the predominating demigod of the heavenly planets, as well as the predominating deities of such planets as the sun and the moon, are all very confidential directors of this material world, they have very little knowledge about You. Then what can ordinary human beings and mental speculators know of You? It is not possible for anyone to enumerate the unlimited transcendental qualities of Your Lordship. No one, not even the mental speculators and the demigods in higher planetary systems, is actually able to estimate the length and breadth of Your form and characteristics. We think that even Your Lordship does not have complete knowledge of Your transcendental qualities. The reason is that You are unlimited. Although it is not befitting to say that You do not know Yourself, it is practical to understand that because You have unlimited qualities and energies and because Your knowledge is also unlimited, there is unlimited competition between Your knowledge and Your expansion of energies.”

The idea is that because God and His knowledge are both unlimited, as soon as God is cognizant of some of His energies, He perceives that He has still more energies. In this way, both His energies and His knowledge increase. Because both of them are unlimited, there is no end to the energies and no end to the knowledge with which to understand the energies. God is undoubtedly omniscient, but the personified Vedas say that even God Himself does not know the full extent of His energies. This does not mean that God is not omniscient. When an actual fact is unknown to a certain person, this is called ignorance or lack of knowledge. This is not applicable to God, however, because He knows Himself perfectly. But still, as His energies and activities increase, He also increases His knowledge to understand them. Both are increasing unlimitedly, and there is no end to it. In that sense it can be said that even God Himself does not know the limit of His energies and qualities.

How God is unlimited in His expansion of energies and activities can be roughly calculated by any sane and sober living entity. It is said in the Vedic literature that innumerable universes issue forth when Mahā-Viṣṇu exhales in His yoga-nidrā and that innumerable universes enter His body when He inhales. We have to imagine that these universes, which according to our limited knowledge are expanded unlimitedly, are so great that the gross and subtle ingredients—the five elements of the cosmic manifestation, namely earth, water, fire, air and sky, along with the total material energy and false ego—are not only within the universe but cover the universe in seven layers, each layer ten times bigger than the previous one. In this way, each and every universe is very securely packed, and there are numberless universes. All these universes float within the innumerable pores of the transcendental body of Mahā-Viṣṇu. It is stated that just as the atoms and particles of dust are floating within the air along with the birds and their number cannot be calculated, so innumerable universes are floating within the pores of the transcendental body of the Lord. For this reason, the Vedas say that God is beyond the grasp of our knowledge. Avāṅ-mānasa-gocara: to understand the length and breadth of God is beyond the jurisdiction of our mental speculation. Therefore, a person who is actually learned and sane does not claim to be God but tries to understand God, making distinctions between spirit and matter. By such careful discrimination, one can clearly understand that the Supreme Soul is transcendental to both the superior and inferior energies, although He has a direct connection with both. In the Bhagavad-gītā, Lord Kṛṣṇa explains that although everything is resting on His energy, He is different or separate from the energy.
</div>
</div>
</div>