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Śrī-Caitanya-caritāmṛta
of this ever changing material energy, he deviates from devotion to the Supreme Personality of Godhead. An actual follower of Vedānta philosophy is a devotee of Lord Viṣṇu, who is the greatest of the great and the maintainer of the entire universe. Unless one surpasses the field of activities in service to the limited, one cannot reach the unlimited. Knowledge of the unlimited is actual  brahma jñāna , or knowledge of the Supreme. Those who are addicted to fruitive activities and speculative knowledge cannot understand the value of the holy name of the Lord, Kṛṣṇa, who is always completely pure, eternally liberated and full of spiritual bliss. One who has taken shelter of the holy name of the Lord, which is identical with the Lord, does not have to study Vedānta philosophy, for he has already completed all such study.
One who is unfit to chant the holy name of Kṛṣṇa but thinks that the holy name is different from Kṛṣṇa and thus takes shelter of Vedānta study in order to understand Him must be considered a number one fool, as confirmed by Caitanya Mahāprabhu by His personal behavior, and philosophical speculators who want to make Vedānta philosophy an academic career are also considered to be within the material energy. A person who always chants the holy name of the Lord, however, is already beyond the ocean of nescience, and thus even a person born in a low family who engages in chanting the holy name of the Lord is considered to be beyond the study of Vedānta philosophy. In this connection the  Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam  states:
aho bata śvapaco'to garīyān 
    yaj jihvāgre vartate nāma tubhyam 
    tepus tapas te juhuvuḥ sasnur āryā 
    brahmānūcur nāma gṛṇanti ye te
“If a person born in a family of dog-eaters takes to the chanting of the holy name of Kṛṣṇa, it is to be understood that in his previous life he must have executed all kinds of austerities and penances and performed all the Vedic  yajñas .” ( Bhāg.  3.33.7) Another quotation states:
ṛg-vedo 'tha yajur-vedaḥ sāma-vedo 'py atharvaṇaḥ 
    adhītās tena yenoktaṁ harir ity akṣara-dvayam
“A person who chants the two syllables  Ha-ri  has already studied the four  Vedas—Sāma, Ṛk, Yajuḥ  and  Atharva .”
Taking advantage of these verses, there are some  sahajiyās  who, taking everything very cheaply, consider themselves elevated Vaiṣṇava but do not care even to touch the  Vedānta-sūtras  or Vedānta philosophy. A real Vaiṣṇava should, however, study Vedānta philosophy, but if after studying Vedānta one does not adopt the chanting of the holy name of the Lord, he is no better than a Māyāvādī. Therefore, one should not be a Māyāvādī, yet one should not be unaware of the subject matter of Vedānta philosophy. Indeed, Caitanya Mahāprabhu exhibited His knowledge of Vedānta in His discourses with Prakāśānanda Sarasvatī. Thus it is to be understood