The All-Merciful Lord

We were originally in the spiritual world serving the Supreme Lord with love. Because He is supremely independent and because we are part and parcel of Him, we share to a minute degree his quality of independence. We therefore have the independence to decide whether we would like to serve Him or not. In order for us to truly love the Supreme Lord this free choice is necessary because without free will there is no question of love. If we use our independence wisely, we remain eternally serving the Lord in His wonderful transcendental abode. And if we misuse our independence and become envious of His position as the Supreme Person, we are given a place of residence where we can consider ourselves to be the Supreme, i.e. we are sent to this material world. However, the all-merciful Lord does not abandon us. He takes all care to rescue us from our fallen condition by always trying to convince us to return to our original position in His loving service in that amazingly wondrous spiritual sky.

Sankarshan Das Adhikari

Answers According to the Vedic Version:

Question: Connect with Guru Through the Internet?

Hare Krishna Gurudeva,

Please accept our humble obeisances.

Gurudeva, when you say we need to seek out the association of a bona fide spiritual master and take shelter of him, can we use the Internet?

In this information age doesn't the Internet represent Krishna? It is not possible for most of us to come to Texas to live with you, although we would really like to.

Your humble servants,
Aarti and Deodat

Answer: Vibrational Connection is the Best

Srila Prabhupada describes that there are two forms of the spiritual master. One form is his vapuh, his physical presence. And the other form is his vani, his vibrational presence or his teachings. Of these two forms the vani is more important because while we sometimes have access to vapuh and sometimes do not have such access, we always have access to the instructions of the spiritual master. If we always faithfully carry out the instructions that we have received from the spiritual master, we live constantly in the shelter of this divine association.

Such instructions can be communicated via the Internet, via printed materials, via audio or video recordings, or by word of mouth. Regarding taking the Internet as a representation of Krishna, since Srila Prabhupada has written in purport to the Bhagavad-gita, "Anything extraordinarily opulent should be considered to represent Krishna's opulence," the Internet can be taken as a representation of Krishna's opulence.

Sankarshan Das Adhikari

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