By Satyanarayana Dasa: It is common experience that to achieve something in the material world one has to work very hard. Based on this knowledge, it is very hard to believe that one can attain anything, spiritual or material, merely by chanting some sounds, even if they are identified as Holy Names.
By Satyanarayana Dasa: In his Bhagavata-sandarbha, Śrīla Jīva Gosvāmī establishes on the basis of various Vedic scriptures that the birth and actions of the Lord are transcendental and distinct from those of mortal beings. Jīva Gosvāmī furthermore verifies that Kṛṣṇa’s names are also spiritual. The Lord is called anāmā (lit. nameless), because He does not have material names.
Question: Is free will an illusion?Answer: Yes, more or less. Unless one has spiritual knowledge, it is an illusion only.Question: Sometimes in shastra there are references to free will and that human life is the only with free will, but it seems also that many times in shastra there are statements that indicate that KRSNA is really the only actor.
Updated with new software! Welcome to the first edition of Jiva Digital Library software. This platform is the brainchild of Dr. Satyanarayana Dasa who... Read More
Question: Jiva Goswami writes in his tika of Bhakti Rasamrita Sindhu 1.1.22 that the dog-eater needs to take another birth to qualify for the soma yaga, and quotes Sridhara Swami who says that his immediate qualification for sacrifice means that he is given the respect due to a qualified person ...
The Status of Haribhakti Vilasa Question: I have a few questions about the status of Haribhakti Vilasa. Was it written for both devotees and... Read More
Based on Śrīla Jīva Gosvāmī’s Bhagavat Sandarbha. By Satyanarayana Dasa. The Lord has two types of energy: parā and aparā. Parā means distant, beyond, superior, and so on. The energy is called parā because it is superior to, or beyond, the material energy, which is thus called aparā, i.e. near or inferior. In the Bhagavad Gītā, Kṛṣṇa states that the living beings can be counted as parā, because of their conscious nature:
