Incarnations of God - an essential subject

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The Supreme Personality of Godhead appears in different incarnations, but His appearance in the role of a devotee is more beneficial to the conditioned souls than the other incarnations, with all their opulences. Sometimes a conditioned soul is bewildered when he tries to understand the incarnation of Godhead with full opulence. Lord Kṛṣṇa appeared and performed many uncommon activities, and some materialists misunderstood Him, but in His appearance as Lord Caitanya He did not show much of His opulences, and therefore fewer conditioned souls were bewildered. Misunderstanding the Lord, many fools consider themselves incarnations of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, but the result is that after leaving the material body they enter the species of jackals. Persons who cannot understand the real significance of an incarnation must attain such lower species of life as punishment. Conditioned souls who are puffed up by false egoism and who try to become one with the Supreme Lord become Māyāvādīs.

Srila Prabhupada's books, lectures, conversations and letters offer a comprehensive presentation of this essential subject as seen in the Vaniquotes Incarnations of God category. An introduction from his books is given below in the following 8 quotes.

Quotes from Srila Prabhupada's books


vanipedia.org 		The Lord descends to reclaim all of these fallen, conditioned souls, to call them back to the sanatana eternal sky so that the sanatana living entities may regain their eternal sanatana positions in eternal association with the Lord. The Lord comes Himself in different incarnations, or He sends His confidential servants as sons or His associates or acaryas to reclaim the conditioned souls. (Bhagavad-gītā, Introduction)



vanipedia.org 		The most dangerous theory of the impersonalists is that when God comes as an incarnation He accepts a material body created by the three modes of material nature. This Māyāvāda theory has been condemned by Lord Caitanya as most offensive. He has said that anyone who accepts the transcendental body of the Personality of Godhead to be made of material nature commits the greatest offense at the lotus feet of Viṣṇu. (Kṛṣṇa Book, Chapter 87)



vanipedia.org 		The Personality of Godhead and His different incarnations and forms played the parts of devotees to instruct the conditioned souls how to approach the transcendental stage of devotional service. Advaita Ācārya especially intended to teach the conditioned souls about devotional service. The word ācārya means "teacher." The special function of such a teacher is to make people Kṛṣṇa conscious. (Caitanya-caritāmṛta, Ādi-līlā 6.28)



vanipedia.org 		Possessed of perverted intelligence, the demons, rascals, and fools can never surrender to Lord Kṛṣṇa. Similarly, Lord Kṛṣṇa never shows them His mercy. The most munificent incarnation of Godhead, Lord Caitanya, repudiated the sinner Gopāla Cāpala because he was envious of the Lord's devotee. (Renunciation Through Wisdom, Chapter 2.3)



vanipedia.org 		The sages of Naimiṣāraṇya (at present, Nimsar, in Sitapur District, U.P.), who assembled under the presidency of Sūta Gosvāmī, discussed in detail all the various incarnations of the Absolute Truth. They came to the conclusion that Kṛṣṇa is the Supreme Personality of Godhead, and that all other incarnations are either His plenary portions or else portions of plenary portions. (Message of Godhead, Chapter 2)



vanipedia.org 		The spiritual soul is more important than the gross body, and the Supersoul, Paramātmā, is still more important than the soul. The Supreme Godhead is absolutely independent, and His incarnations are transcendental. The prayers of the demigods glorify and exalt devotees and explain the fate of persons who superficially consider themselves liberated from the conditions of material nature. (Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 10.2 Summary)



vanipedia.org 		The spirit soul is one, the Supreme Personality of Godhead. He is manifested in svāṁśa and vibhinna-ṁśa expansions. The jīvas are vibhinnāṁśa expansions. The different incarnations of the Supreme Personality of Godhead are svāṁśa expansions. Thus there are different potencies of the Supreme Lord, and there are different expansions of the different potencies. In this way, for different reasons there are different expansions of the same one principle, the Supreme Personality of Godhead. (Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 4.22.29)



vanipedia.org 		An incarnation of the Supreme Godhead cannot be indebted to anyone in this material world. Caitanya Mahāprabhu is never satisfied by such a contradiction, which is technically called rasābhāsa, or overlapping of one humor (rasa) with another. This is the same type of idea as the contradiction that Nārāyaṇa is poverty-stricken (daridra-nārāyaṇa). (Caitanya-caritāmṛta, Ādi-līlā 12.49)


Incarnations of God - explore more within this category.

Vanipedia has now over 903 introductory articles compiled from Srila Prabhupada's books under the series titled Essential Subjects. All these articles can be seen in the Table of Content on the right side of this article and also here in this Umbrella Category. Browse through them to relish the breadth and depth of Srila Prabhupada's teachings - There is a subject for everyone.


   
 

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