Now, there are Vedas, four Vedas—Sāma Veda, Atharva Veda, Yajus Veda, Ṛg Veda. And there are Upaniṣads, the Vedānta-sūtra, the Purāṇas, Rāmāyaṇa, Mahābhārata—there are so many things. That is in India. And outside India or outside Vedic culture, there are many scriptures. Therefore it is said, śrutayo vibhinnā. There are innumerable Vedic scriptures. So we cannot come to the conclusion what is right or wrong, because sometimes you will find contradiction from one . . . of course, there is no contradiction, but because we are not advanced in knowledge, sometimes we find contradiction.
Just like in India there are two classes of transcendentalists: the impersonalist and the personalist. That is not contradiction. The Absolute Truth is both impersonal and personal, but somebody is stressing on the impersonal point of view and somebody is stressing on the personal point of view. But we Vaiṣṇava, we know what is the meaning of impersonalism and what is the meaning of personalism.
We take it for understanding, as it is stated in the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, brahmeti paramātmeti bhagavān iti śabdyate (SB 1.2.11). The Absolute Truth is simultaneously Brahma, Paramātmā and Bhagavān. It is simply different stages of understanding. In the first stage, it is Brahma realization. In the second stage, it is Paramātmā realization. And at the last stage, it is Bhagavān realization.
So it is a great science. Bhāgavata-tattva vijñānam. It is not that you can create your Bhagavān by concoction, imagination, just like the Māyāvādī philosophers say that sādhakānāṁ hitvārthāya brahmaṇo rūpa-kalpanaḥ, for the benefit or for the facility of the neophyte progressing in the spiritual knowledge, we have to imagine some form of the Brahma. That is not the fact. We do not find these things in the Vedic literature. We find in the Vedic literature that the Absolute Truth is realized in three features—Brahma, Paramātmā and Bhagavān. The substance is one, but according to our capacity, we understand differently.
Just like example, if you see a great mountain, say Himalayan mountain. Just like the other day when I was coming from Calcutta to Delhi, the Himalayan mountains were seen from the plane, and it appeared just like a great city. But that is my shortage of vision. I cannot see what is Himalaya. Similarly, as we see imperfectly the Himalayan mountain from a distant place, similarly, when the Absolute Truth is realized by the speculative process, he can simply understand the Supreme Personality of Godhead by His effulgence as impersonal. And if you make further progress, then we can see . . .
The same example: We are seeing the Himalayan mountain from a distant place, but if we make further advance, further, nearer, we see different thing. And when actually in the Himalayan mountain, the thing is altogether different. Similarly, when you understand the Supreme Personality of Godhead from distance . . . just like you cannot understand the sun globe from here. Although sunshine is light, sun globe is light, still we cannot understand what is sun globe from distant place.