Ādi-ñlā, Chapter 5
405
PURPORT
Śrīpād Śaṅkarācārya has misleadingly explained the quadruple from ( catur-vyūha ) in his interpretation of the forty-second aphorism of the Second  Khaṇḍa  of Chapter Two of the  Vedānta-sūtras  ( utpatty-asambhavāt ). In verses forty-one through forty-seven of  Śrī Caitanya-caritāmṛta , Śrīla Kṛṣṇadāsa Kavirāja Gosvāmī answers Śrīpād Śaṅkarācārya's misleading objections to the personal feature of the Absolute Truth.
The Supreme Personality of Godhead, the Absolute Truth, is not like a material object that can be known by experimental knowledge or sense perception. In the  Nārada-pañcarātra  this fact has been explained by Nārāyaṇa Himself to Lord Śiva. But Śaṅkarācārya, the incarnation of Śiva, under the order of Nārāyaṇa, his master, had to mislead the monists, who favor ultimate extinction. In the conditioned stage of existence, all living entities have four basic defects, of which one is the cheating propensity. Śaṅkarācārya has carried this cheating propensity to the extreme to mislead the monists.
Actually, the quadruple forms explained in the Vedic literature cannot be understood by the speculation of a conditioned soul. The quadruple forms should therefore be accepted just as they are described. The authority of the  Vedas  is such that even if one does not understand something by his limited perception, he should accept the Vedic injunction and not create interpretations to suit his imperfect understanding. In his  Śārīraka-bhāṣya , however, Śaṅkarācārya has increased the misunderstanding of the monists.
The quadruple forms have a spiritual existence that can be realized in  vāsudeva-sattva  ( śuddha-sattva ), or unqualified goodness, which accompanies complete absorption in the understanding of Vāsudeva. The quadruple forms, who are full of the six opulences of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, are the enjoyers of the internal potency. Thinking the absolute Personality of Godhead to be poverty-stricken or to have no potency—or, in other words, to be impotent—is simply rascaldom. This rascaldom is the profession of the conditioned soul, and it increases his bewilderment. One who cannot understand the distinctions between the spiritual world and material world has no qualification to examine or know the situation of the transcendental quadruple forms. In his commentaries on the Second  Khaṇḍa  of the  Vedānta-sūtra , Chapter Two, verses 42-45, His Holiness Śrīpād Śaṅkarācārya has made a futile attempt to nullify the existence of these quadruple forms in the spiritual world.
Śaṅkarācārya says (verse 42) that devotees think the Supreme Personality of Godhead Vāsudeva, Śrī Kṛṣṇa, to be one, to be free from material qualities and to have a transcendental body full of bliss and eternal existence. He is the ultimate goal of the devotees, who believe that the Supreme Personality of Godhead expands Himself into four other eternal transcendental forms—Vāsudeva, Śaṅkarṣaṇa, Pradyumna and Aniruddha. From Vāsudeva, who is the primary expansion, come Śaṅkarṣaṇa, Pradyumna and Aniruddha in that order. Another name of Vāsudeva is Paramātmā, another name of Śaṅkarṣaṇa is  jīva  (the living entity), another name of Pradyumna is mind, and another name of Aniruddha is  ahaṅkāra  (false ego). Among these expansions, Vāsudeva is considered the origin of material nature.