Am I God?

[Gauracandra]

This week’s Srila Siddhaswarupananda television program deals with the question: “Am I God?”

 

Many people in the world teach that each of us is God. Just about every yogi and swami these days is putting forward this idea that we are each God but that we have forgotten that we are God and thus we experience this wheel of birth and death.

 

This lecture will look at why this is flawed. First, here is a quote from Swami Muktananda from his ‘Siddha Meditations’. Swami Muktananda is very popular these days and he says [note: I’m paraphrasing as I couldn’t write the exact wording]: “Meditate on yourself, worship yourself, God dwells within you. God forgets his own nature and searches for God. God meditates on God, God is searching for God.”

 

Now the process in which God forgets He is God is never exactly explained. However, he (Swami Muktananda) does try to describe it as follows: “The Supreme Lord separates into differences. When Shiva splits into the variegated entities, He creates a consciousness of imperfection. God is overcome by a sense of distinction. Now He can only accomplish certain things. Now He creates good and bad deeds. The highest consciousness becomes bound. Its omniscience, everlastingness, and perfection are reduced. He feels helpless and attached. The eternal being cries aloud from fear of death regard Itself as mortal. He grieves because of shakti-poverty.”

 

This comes from Muktananda’s ‘Siddha Meditations’. He is saying that God becomes covered up. By differentiating Himself in the forms of a dog, a cat, a maggot in stool, He loses His perfection and because of differentiation becomes overwhelmed. These are Mayavadis. They believe that illusion is more powerful than God. They say that the origin of all loses His power. He comes under control.

 

This is nonsense. That God comes under illusion. What kind of God is this, who is bouncing on his ass trying to increase his kundalini, regulating his diet, practicing breathing. You have God being hit by cars, chasing cats… What is this nonsense?

 

This is not God. So many people are falling for this nonsense. “Swami such-and-such said that I am God.” They never stop to think “How am I God?” This is fatally flawed. How is it that God forgets? It means that illusion is more powerful. This is materialism. This is atheism.

 

They try to say that God forgets until he goes to the guru who tells him who he is. The guru is God too but he knows he is God. If there is only one being, how is it that one knows they are God but the other doesn’t?

 

So they are speaking nonsense. Absolute nonsense. The conclusion of all scriptures and saintly persons is that God is a person. Srila Rupa Goswami says [paraphrased] “God is always free of false ego. It is not possible for him to fall into misconception.”

 

You are a spark of God. The same in essence – yes. I am part and parcel of the Supreme Soul. But to try to say that you will become God or were God, this is crazy. You cannot explain it.

 

Now sometimes they try to explain this problem away. They say that God does it on purpose. Why? He can do whatever He wants. He wanted to become a dog or a maggot for His lila (divine pastimes). They say that God is not a person but rather an impersonal spirit void. So to enjoy Himself, He divides Himself into many differentiated beings. He creates this world for His enjoyment.

 

There are important flaws in this. First, this world is not a place of enjoyment. It is mostly suffering, with a bit of enjoyment. Birth, disease, and death. There is so much suffering that these very Swamis are teaching that we should leave this wheel of birth and death. Why isn’t it a place of enjoyment? And why are they teaching that we should leave?

 

They say that God was not happy when He knew He was God. So to enjoy He separates Himself. Then He suffers. Then He tries to remember that He is in fact God. What they are actually saying is that God is never satisfied. This is why so many yogis go up and down, up and down. They are never happy. This is the conclusion.

 

God is a person. He never comes under His energy. We the living entities are not all powerful. We can come under illusion. So this teaching makes it possible to understand reincarnation. If a person denies a Supreme Spirit then they cannot leave this wheel of birth and death.

 

You must give up your enviousness of God. The first step is to understand that you are spirit. The second step is to understand your position as the servant of God. God is the Supreme dominator. Anyone who tries to get off this wheel of birth and death must understand that they are not God. Anyone who teaches otherwise is guaranteeing that you will remain trapped on this wheel. This “I am God” philosophy must be given up. It is absolute atheism. Absolute nonsense.

[Guest guest]

Is he that mukthanandha who got into sex scandal by having illicit sex with his female devotees and harassing them. I too have heard that he gives excellent lecture on one side, but dont have any morals on other side on his own.

HOnestly howmuch ever one may talk great, when he calls himself as a guru and advise others, first he must be pure to his words.

If not, such people need not be resepcted as a guru.

then what about the philosophy they talk?

anyways the good things are already spoken in Gita and whatever good things anyone talk is in Gita.

Do we have to follow such immoral people as Guru?

No we dont have fall again and again.

 

Is this mukthanandha the sex scandal one or a different one? We have to be aware of the right and wrong guru's since wrong guru's never succeed even if they talk right.

[Guest guest]

 

I was an Atheist until I discovered that I was god.

[theist]

Although there is some partial realization of Brahman, impersonalism must be the grand daddy of self delusions. Just like the sunlight also reflects to a degree off the mud puddle we accept the amount of light that is offered and leave the rest.

 

At least they know there is more than birth and death. But when they start claiming to be the speaker of Bhagavad-gita that really is too much.

[Guest guest]

I WAS AN ATHEIST UNTIL I DISCOVERED THAT I WAS GOD.

[anadi]

"I WAS AN ATHEIST UNTIL I DISCOVERED THAT I WAS GOD"

 

you were an atheist, now you made some progress and realized that there is something beyond the dull mater, and this ist the spirit.

 

Some day you will realize that God is a Person... that has many things that you don't have, and you will never have. For example God never suffered or will suffer under the miseries of the material Modes of Nature (ignorance, passion and goodness)

 

Some day you will realize His majesty.

 

And maybe some day you will realize His sweetness.

 

Please follow the thread about the nature of the soul

 

 

[gHari]

I am!

 

[Guest guest]

yeah, but are you krsna. Of course we are all gods. We just forget. We are the forgetful gods. Thankg god for the reminders, but what have they forgotten.

 

But we are god. If a person could be seen, that is the real essence of the living entity, not only would it make all the trident submarines with all their missiles going of at once, seem to be a water baloon. In fact, if the self were to be seen, it is described like 10,000 suns rising at the same time.

 

So we's gotta be careful, especially because we always forget. Even Arjuna, who made real gods do his bidding, has no idea what he did as Nara, even associated with Lord Narayana, arjung is limited god in that he forgets.

 

Krsna doesnt forget. He needs no self-realization, technique, philosophy, or lifestyle as a tool to his divinity. Ever see a little Baby whup up on giants li dat. No, Krsna doesnt forget, he causes us little gods, each infinitely more powerful that universal matter combined, to forget. Some, he makes us forget everytrhing, others, he uses this talent of causing amnesia on his unalloyed servants, making them forget that Krsna is God, so that they can wrassle him down or henpeck him at home

 

But it think it is that we forget, and Krsna never forgets and also causes all our forgetfulness, this fact makes us sub-gods, and the only place to place our crowns is under that straw in the street.

 

Hare Krsna, ys, mahaksadasa