Prabhupāda: Because spiritual master has to be accepted sākṣād-dhari, directly the Supreme Personality of Godhead, therefore the so-called spiritual master should not be puffed up, that "Now I have become God." This is Māyāvāda. This is rascaldom. He is most confidential servant of God, Kṛṣṇa. Therefore the disciple accepts him as good as God. Therefore the conclusion is simultaneously one and different. Acintya-bhedābheda. Bheda, different, means the spiritual master is a confidential servant, or the servant God. To the disciple he is servant God. Just like in Christian philosophy, they say, "The father and the son, the same." Is it not?
Devotee: Yes.
Prabhupāda: Yes. So similarly, here the father and son, or the spiritual master and God, they are same, but at the same time not same. It is simultaneous. This is called acintya-bhedābheda-tattva, simultaneously one and different. I think the Christian philosophy is like that. Son . . . Christ, son, and God, Holy Ghost—they are simultaneously one and different? Is that? So that is the position. Sākṣād-dharitvena samasta-śāstrair uktas tathā bhāvyata eva sadbhiḥ, kintu prabhor yaḥ priya eva tasya.
So we can interpret . . . when the Christian people say that . . . just like they say "only son." So we can interpret . . . of course, we are not going to interpret. We can take it that anyone who becomes confidential . . . just like father position. He has got many sons. One son who is very obedient, he says: "He is my only son, and others not sons." Does he not, father say, sometimes? "Actually he is my son." Sometimes father says like that. But that does not mean that he has got only one son. He has got many sons, but all of them are useless, worthless. He is only bona fide.