Prabhupāda: I don't say that we are, some men here, or the whole universal souls combined together, still they are finite. They're not infinite. Yes, multi-billions of zeros cannot make one. So I don't say that. But the quality is there very minutely.
Jesuit: Imitation of the divine powers.
Prabhupāda: Not imitation. Actually we have got. Just like, another example: gold and a particle of gold, a small fragmentary, that will be called gold, but not the gold equal to the mine.
Jesuit: No.
Prabhupāda: Therefore the philosophy is acintya-bhedābheda, inconceivable one and different simultaneously. One in quality, but different in quantity. God's power . . . I have got some creative power, and God has got creative power. So the creative power is there. But God has created millions of the planets that floating in the air, and we have created a 747 airplane—we want to take more credit than God. That is our foolishness.
Jesuit: Oh, I see that is man's sin, if you like, is that he prides himself on his achievements.
Prabhupāda: That is false pride. The scientist, the modern scientist, they are taking false pride that, "There is no need of God. We are now creating . . ."
Jesuit: Some of them are, not all . . .
Prabhupāda: Some of the fools, not all fools, but some of the fools declaring themselves as scientist, "There is no God. We can do everything.".
Jesuit: Let me see if I can understand what you mean by God.
Prabhupāda: God means all-powerful, the great. You say also, "The great."
Jesuit: I'd say all-powerful, omnipotent, the great, yes.
Prabhupāda: That is God.
Jesuit: All-loving?
Prabhupāda: Yes, everything is great. Nobody can surpass His love.
Jesuit: I mean God is all-loving?
Prabhupāda: Yes. When you say "great," He's great in every respect.
Jesuit: Good. Do you . . . in Christianity we have sort of the Trinity, the Father, Son and the relationship of love between them, which we call three persons in one God . . .
Prabhupāda: Yes.
Jesuit: In your understanding of God . . .
Prabhupāda: God, God and His love towards us . . . because we are sons of God, therefore father has natural love for sons, therefore God comes. God sends His son or representative to canvass that "You come to God, you'll be happy there."
Jesuit: Who was the son He sent?
Prabhupāda: Eh? Just like Jesus, we say "son of God." So . . .
Jesuit: That's the second person made man . . . (indistinct) . . . human . . . (indistinct) . . . man.
Prabhupāda: Yes, he is very important, but he is son, a very important son. Just like father may have many sons, but one of them may be very important, very good assistant to the father, so Christ is like that. He is son of God, very important. He's helping God, coming down to reclaim these fallen souls that, "Come to God. Why you are suffering here?" So, he's very faithful and important son. But the others, they are also sons, but they have forgotten God. Therefore they are suffering. So sometimes He sends His son or His devotee, and sometimes He comes Himself. That is Kṛṣṇa.
Jesuit: And He comes in bodily form and shape?
Prabhupāda: Yes. God has . . . why, the son has got body then the father has got body. Your son has got body, so you have got your body. Without the father having body, how the son can get body?
Jesuit: I don't understand that.
Prabhupāda: If . . . suppose you are son, you have got this body, so your father must have body.
Jesuit: Yes, true.
Prabhupāda: Similarly, if the son of God has body, the God must have body.
Jesuit: Not necessarily.
Prabhupāda: Why? Can you show any example, a son is born from without body?
Jesuit: That is on a very human level, which. . .
Prabhupāda: Anyway, that your experience is on the human field. You have to give some example that, "Here is no body, but the son has body." Show me the example.
Jesuit: If you have a man who has a thing in what we would call super-eminence, and he has it on a higher form . . .
Prabhupāda: Higher form maybe, but there is form.
Jesuit: You take a musician like Beethoven, a musician . . .
Prabhupāda: We also say that the God has got form, but not form like this.
Jesuit: No, he hasn't got form in Aristotle's idea of the word "form" either, his hylomorphic theory of matter and form. In a sense, form there means spirit, and so . . . we can understand that you could say God has form . . .
Prabhupāda: Yes, spiritual form.
Jesuit: . . . but we're not using it in that sense. When you're using the word form, you mean a material form like a shape, a body. . .
Prabhupāda: No, no, I don't say material form; spiritual form.
Jesuit: Well, I haven't understood you, then. God, you say, has a form.
Prabhupāda: Spiritual form.
Jesuit: Aḥ, well, matter of words. I can understand that. He has a . . .
Prabhupāda: Not this form.
Jesuit: No, not material. He's not matter, He's pure . . .
Prabhupāda: No, no.
Jesuit: We would say He's pure spirit . . .
Prabhupāda: Yes, yes, yes, that is stated in the . . .
Jesuit: There's no form of passivity in God. There's no form of change in God; there's no, no limitations of any sort. Matter has limitations. The soul is immortal because it has no principle of corruption in it. Aristotle would say that matter has parts, outside parts, and so it can, it has in itself the power of dissolving and it would break up, corrupts. The soul never does.
Prabhupāda: We have got this material body and spiritual soul. That is in this material condition there is distinction between the spirit and matter. As soon as the spirit goes from this material body, it has no value.
Jesuit: No life. True.
Prabhupāda: It is matter only, lump of matter, combination of matter. Therefore the spirit is important even in this life.
Jesuit: Oh, I see that, of course.
Prabhupāda: Yes, spirit is important. But God is fully spirit. He has no material quality. Yes. We have got, in this material condition, difference between the matter and spirit, but God has not so, such thing. He is whole spirit. That is the difference between God . . .
Jesuit: And also, as a result, the human—you, I, all these—we're all persons separate from one another, distinct from one another, and distinct from God, who is a separate person.
Prabhupāda: Yes, yes, we admit that.