- tad-vijñānārthaṁ sa gurum eva abhigacchet
- samit-pāṇiḥ śrotriyaṁ brahma-niṣṭham
- (Muṇḍaka Upaniṣad 1.2.12)
Śrotriyam, śrotriyam means one who has accepted the Vedic literature, the śāstra, scripture, as the guidance. He can be . . . not a extravagant upstart, he makes some group and religious principle of his own and become a guru. No, he's not guru . . .
So Lord Caitanya advises . . . Sanātana Gosvāmī's enquiry is how to know that he . . . here is a avatāra. So Caitanya Mahāprabhu says the medium is śāstra and direction is the guru. Śāstra . . . also, we cannot understand any book, what to speak of the scripture. Sometimes we find contradiction in the scripture. That is not contradiction; that is my poor fund of knowledge. I cannot understand; therefore assistance of guru, a spiritual master, is required.
So, so far incarnation is concerned, here Lord Caitanya says that we have to see through the śāstra whether a person is incarnation or not. We should not blindly accept anybody as incarnation, because there are, nowadays, numberless incarnations.
- avatāra nāhi kahe-'āmi avatāra'
- muni saba jāni' kare lakṣaṇa-vicāra
- (CC Madhya 20.354)
This is another significance of incarnation. Incarnation never says that, "I am incarnation of God." I have read one book about a big avatāra in India. He was canvassing his students, "Do you now accept me as incarnation?