That is the difference (Books)

Expressions researched:
"that is difference" |"that is the difference" |"this is difference" |"this is the difference"

Notes from the compiler: VedaBase query: "this is the difference" or "that is the difference" or "this is difference" or "that is difference" not "difference between"

BG Preface and Introduction

BG Introduction:

The position of īśvara, the Supreme Lord, is that of supreme consciousness. The jīvas, or the living entities, being parts and parcels of the Supreme Lord, are also conscious. Both the living entity and material nature are explained as prakṛti, the energy of the Supreme Lord, but one of the two, the jīva, is conscious. The other prakṛti is not conscious. That is the difference. Therefore the jīva-prakṛti is called superior because the jīva has consciousness which is similar to the Lord's. The Lord's is supreme consciousness, however, and one should not claim that the jīva, the living entity, is also supremely conscious. The living being cannot be supremely conscious at any stage of his perfection, and the theory that he can be so is a misleading theory. Conscious he may be, but he is not perfectly or supremely conscious.

BG Chapters 1 - 6

BG 2.28, Purport:

From the earth, many varieties of manifestations take place. Take, for example, a big skyscraper manifested from the earth. When it is dismantled, the manifestation becomes again unmanifested and remains as atoms in the ultimate stage. The law of conservation of energy remains, but in course of time things are manifested and unmanifested—that is the difference. Then what cause is there for lamentation either in the stage of manifestation or in unmanifestation? Somehow or other, even in the unmanifested stage, things are not lost. Both at the beginning and at the end, all elements remain unmanifested, and only in the middle are they manifested, and this does not make any real material difference.

SB Canto 1

SB 1.9.32, Purport:

Such instruction is given not for any material purpose but only for going back home, back to Godhead (BG 10.10). For the ordinary man who wants to lord it over material nature, the Lord not only sanctions and becomes a witness of activities, but He never gives the nondevotee instructions for going back to Godhead. That is the difference in dealings by the Lord with different living beings, both the devotee and the nondevotee. He is leader of all the living beings, as the king of the state rules both the prisoners and the free citizens. But His dealings are different in terms of devotee and nondevotee. Nondevotees never care to take any instruction from the Lord, and therefore the Lord is silent in their case, although He witnesses all their activities and awards them the necessary results, good or bad. The devotees are above this material goodness and badness.

SB Canto 4

SB 4.8.57, Purport:

The conditioned soul is forced to accept a particular type of body according to his karma given by the laws of material nature under the direction of the Supreme Lord. But when the Lord appears, He is not forced by the dictation of material nature; He appears as He likes by His own internal potency. That is the difference. The conditioned soul accepts a particular type of body, such as the body of a hog, by his work and by the superior authority of material nature. But when Lord Kṛṣṇa appears in the incarnation of a boar, He is not the same kind of hog as an ordinary animal. Kṛṣṇa appears as Varāha-avatāra in an expansive feature which cannot be compared to an ordinary hog's. His appearance and disappearance are inconceivable to us. In the Bhagavad-gītā it is clearly said that He appears by His own internal potency for the protection of the devotees and the annihilation of the nondevotees.

SB Canto 7

SB 7.2.37, Purport:

For example, a big skyscraper is manifested from the earth. When it is dismantled, the manifestation becomes again unmanifested and remains as atoms in the ultimate stage. The law of conservation of energy remains, but in the course of time things are manifested and unmanifested—that is the difference. Then what cause is there for lamentation, in either manifestation or unmanifestation? Somehow or other, even in the unmanifested stage, things are not lost. Both at the beginning and at the end, all elements remain unmanifested, and this does not make any real material difference.