Offering everything to the Supreme Personality of Godhead, as enjoined by the Bhagavad-gītā and Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, is better than impersonally making the Supreme Lord subject to our work, but it is still short of surrendering to the Supreme Lord. A worker's identification with material existence cannot be changed without proper guidance. Such fruitive activity will continue one's material existence. A worker is simply instructed here to offer the results of his work to the Supreme Lord, but there is no information given to enable one to get out of the material entanglement. Therefore Lord Caitanya rejected his proposal.
After having his suggestions rejected twice, Rāmānanda proposed that one should forsake his occupational activities altogether and by such detachment rise to the transcendental plane. In other words, he recommended complete renunciation of worldly life. To support this proposal he cited evidence from Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam (11.11.32) wherein the Lord says, "In the scriptures I have described the ritualistic principles and the way one can become situated in devotional service by giving them up. That is the highest perfection of religion." Rāmānanda also quoted Lord Kṛṣṇa's similar statement in the Bhagavad-gītā (18.66):
- sarva-dharmān parityajya mām ekaṁśaraṇaṁ vraja
- ahaṁ tvāṁ sarva-pāpebhyo mokṣayiṣyāmi māśucaḥ
"Give up all kinds of religiousness and just surrender unto Me, the Supreme Personality of Godhead. I shall protect you from all sinful reactions, and you will have nothing to be aggrieved over."
Lord Caitanya also rejected this third proposal from Rāmānanda Rāya, for He wanted to demonstrate that renunciation in itself is not sufficient. There must be positive engagement. Without positive engagement, the highest perfectional stage cannot be attained. Generally there are two kinds of philosophers in the renounced order of life. The goal of one is nirvāṇa, and the goal of the other is the impersonal Brahman effulgence. Such philosophers cannot imagine that they can reach beyond nirvāṇa and the Brahman effulgence to the Vaikuṇṭha planets of the spiritual sky. Because in simple renunciation there is no conception of spiritual planets and spiritual activities, Lord Caitanya rejected this third proposal.