Prabhupāda: God is person, then? What did he say?
Jyotirmayī: Then he said that so is it not that God, the person, this divine essence, is a superperson, an evolved person, and not exactly somebody impersonal. Like he said that in Śaṅkarācārya's philosophy there is the conception of tat. So is not this tat conception, this divine essence, this superperson...
Prabhupāda: Yes, He is divine essence. God is divine essence, just like you have volumes of milk and you churn it, then you get so much butter. So the butter is the essence of the milk. Similarly, the spirit is vast, all-pervading. The example, another example, is just like the sunshine universally spread, very big. Then you concentrate the sunshine, it is sun globe. And if you still concentrate, you will see within the sun globe there is sun-god. So he is the essence of this light, the sunshine light, the sun globe light, and the person—sun-god, Vivasvān, he is person—he is the essence among all this light. That is explained in the Brahma-samhitā, yasya prabhā prabhavato jagad-aṇḍa-koṭi (Bs. 5.40). The whole creation means expansion of the bodily rays of Kṛṣṇa. Yasya prabhā prabhavato (Bs. 5.40). By expansion of the bodily rays of Kṛṣṇa, this Brahman, yasya prabhā prabhavato jagad-aṇḍa-koṭi-koṭiṣv aśeṣa-vasudhādi-vibhūti-bhinnam, tad brahma (Bs. 5.40). That Brahman. Brahman is..., just like the sunshine is the expansion of the bodily rays of sun-god.
Jyotirmayī: (French)
Prabhupāda: And in Bhāgavata also it is stated,
- vadanti tat tattva-vidas
- tattvaṁ yaj jñānam advayam
- brahmeti paramātmeti
- bhagavān iti śabdyate
- (SB 1.2.11)
The Absolute Truth is one, but it is realized in different angles of vision: Brahman, Paramātmā, and Bhagavān.
Jyotirmayī: (French)
Prabhupāda: And that is confirmed in the Bhagavad-gītā, ahaṁ sarvasya prabhavaḥ (BG 10.8), "I am the origin of everything—Brahman, Paramātmā, everything, Bhagavān." Ahaṁ sarvasya prabhavaḥ. Sarvasya means including everything: Brahman, Viṣṇu, myself, the world manifested, everything.