Bhakta's answer to a question in satsang

O Lord, if in my ignorance I have praised your Limitlessness through the spoken word, forgive me!

In satsang You appear as a sAdhaka with a sincere mind that get doubts through interaction with others in the external world. When the different lokas (worlds that are perceived through the senses) are described according to the tradition (in the Vedas and Upanishads) and from direct experience, still doubts arise in Kali Yuga. Through Your Lila (play) You have given faith of different levels to different minds. Some who claim to worship You as KRShNa, but who do not know You in Truth, claim that there exists a KRShNa loka that is Nondual and beyond the lokas described in the Vedas. Not directly knowing You who are the Source of the Veda, nor even having studied the Vedas, bereft of buddhi and logic to understand that the word loka in Sanskrit cannot admit a Nondual experience (being as it as an object of perception), such minds destabilize the thinking of even pure sAdhakas. And again it is Your gift of buddhi (intellect) to sincere sAdhakas that generates a desire in the mind for consistency and integration of different schools of thought.

Even when You expounded the Bhagavad GItA to Arjuna, in all the eighteen chapters You did not mention KRShNa loka even once! Yet You constantly affirmed that both the jnAni and the true bhakta attain You by mergence into You. How can one explain to the deluded mind that if one were to attain mergence with KRShNa, then that mind is KRShNa, the act of knowing is KRShNa and the object of knowing is KRShNa. What world or loka will be left to be perceived in that state of samAdhi? And then again, only attaining that savikalpa samAdhi with the bIja or seed of KRShNa, how can the mind that has truly attained that State not realize that the Name and bIja (seed) are irrelevant in samAdhi? If all is indeed KRShNa, then what need is there for that name? The name exists only in the realm of the mind, for direct experience in meditation validates the Upanishadic statement (Chand. Up.) that the mind is nothing but speech and form.

Did You not give the RShis the vision of the Self in the Upanishads that proclaim that Your State is beyond name and form? Are You not beyond Speech and Word!

The Nameless is Your true nature, and the name is only for reaching savikalpa samAdhi. It is not the end of the practice. Otherwise what need would there be for nirvikalpa samAdhi and sahaja samAdhi?

Do we wake up every day and say "I am so and so?" There is no need to affirm one's existence in this way! So too it is with the Self. In different lives or manifestations does each mind wake up and say "I am X?" No! The Self does not need a Name. The Name is important in a certain stage of practice to fix the mind. Once the mind dissolves in the Name it must then transcend name and form. So the name is secondary once the Nameless has been known.

In many Kali Yugas past too You gave faith and also samshaya (doubt) and moha (delusion). Deluded devotion to Name creates distinction. This has generated the so-called Christians, who do not truly know You as Christ, and condemn those who do not follow the name of Christ as heathens. What do the deluded followers of KRShNa then make of the non-believers in KRShNa believers? Have we not seen the delusion of taking ViShNu to be different from Shiva? Who are those who cannot understand the beauty of MD Ramanathan's rendition of 'Hariyum Haranum onre enru aRiyAdavar uLaro? civar uLare! (Are there those who do not know that Hari and Hara (Shiva) are one and the same? Yes, there are a few!).

If Your Ultimate State were to be associated with a Name, then should we reject Allah and Jehovah, when You Yourself appeared as these to many minds, and as Sri RAmakRShNa showed that all these are the same One Self?

But You have also given viveka (discrimination). The discriminating mind chooses Limitlessness over limitations.  Such is your Lila!

The discriminating mind learns to seek Kingdom of God within and not listen to conflicting opinions from unripe minds.

And once Your true nature is known does not the pure mind acknowledge you as ViShNu, Shiva, Ganesha, SUrya, and Devi in the excellent shanmata worship that You established through Your incarnation as SrI Adi ShankarAcArya?

And yet, such is Your Lila that a jnAni may say "aham brahmAsmi" and a bhakta may call You by Name in whom he has merged.

Even so Your Lila (play) is there so that we may celebrate Your various glories. For the sincere teacher never tires of narrating Your glories nor does Your sincere devotee ever tire of hearing them.

Om Tat Sat SrI Krishnarpanamastu
Om Tat Sat Brahmarpanamastu