Chapter Sixteen

Shrila Prabhupada - Mayavada Is Not Very Good Logic

In case the first generation of ISKCON devotees in their old age have forgotten the difference between Vaishnava sanatana dharma and the dreadful bleak illusion of Mayavada, this talk from Shrila Prabhupada (12 April 1969) might jog a few sleeping memory cells.

“What is the difficulty?”

Just in Los Angeles airport, one boy was asking .., some person in your country is declaring himself as God, Meher Baba. So he asked me, “Whether you accept Meher Baba as incarnation?” So I asked him, “What do you mean by incarnation?” So he replied that because Kṛṣṇa or God is everyone’s heart, therefore everyone is incarnation. Then he ... I said, “Then what is difficulty? Then we are all incarnation. What is the specific quality of Meher Baba?”

Because īśvaraḥ sarva-bhūtānāṁ hṛd-deśe 'rjuna tiṣṭhati (BG 18.61), the Lord is situated in everyone’s heart. 

The Lord is situated in the heart of cats and dogs also. Sarva-bhūtānām. Sarva-bhūtānām means all living entities. It is not that God is not situated in the cat's heart or dog's heart. He is there. Therefore he is also incarnation, if that is the formula. 

These impersonalists ... Because ... Just like in Ramakrishna Mission, they say, “Because Narayana is in everyone’s heart, therefore everyone is Narayana.” This is not very good logic. Even Narayana, or God, He is omnipotent, omnipresent, He can be present everywhere, that does not mean everyone is God. This is not very good logic. 

Anyway, then when I asked him that “If everyone is incarnation, then what is the speciality of Meher Baba?” Then, “He knows more than others.” Then next reply is that somebody may be more than Meher Baba. So if you go on searching like that, you will find Kṛṣṇa. Nobody is greater than Kṛṣṇa. 

Therefore He is the Supreme. By logic. You go on by logic. If everyone is incarnation, and if everyone ..., out of many, one who is still more advanced, he is accepted as God, then you have to search more—if there is any other person who is greater than that person. 

That has been searched in Vedic literature by Lord Brahmā, and he says, īśvaraḥ paramaḥ kṛṣṇaḥ (Bs.5.1) 

“We have searched out all types of gods—all types of gods—but the Supreme God is Kṛṣṇa.” “Everyone is God,” that's nice. But there is bigger God and little God also. So if you go on searching after bigger God, bigger God, bigger God, when you come to Kṛṣṇa you'll find nobody bigger than Him. Īśvaraḥ paramaḥ kṛṣṇaḥ (Bs.5.1). Mattaḥ parataraṁ nasti. In the Bhagavad-gītā you’ll find, Kṛṣṇa says that “Nobody is greater than Me.” 

And actually when Kṛṣṇa was present on this earth, there was no contemporary who was greater than Kṛṣṇa. Neither even at the present moment, there is anyone who can claim that “I am greater than Kṛṣṇa.” In opulence ... Greatness in six kinds of opulences: in richness, in reputation, in strength, in beauty, in wisdom and in renunciation. “