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The Son of Droṇa Punished
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completed by the influence of association. The Lord has suggested, therefore, that by the influence of the speeches of saintly persons who have actually realized the Supreme, men are engaged in His transcendental loving service. The conditioned soul gets a taste for hearing about the Lord, and by such hearing only he is gradually elevated to the platform of respect, devotion and attachment for the Lord. The whole thing is completed by the surrendering process. Herein also the same suggestion is made by the Lord in His incarnation of Vyāsadeva. This means that the conditioned souls are being reclaimed by the Lord both ways, namely by the process of punishment by the external energy of the Lord, and by Himself as the spiritual master within and without. Within the heart of every living being the Lord Himself as the Supersoul Paramātmā becomes the spiritual master, and from without He becomes the spiritual master in the shape of scriptures, saints and initiator spiritual master. This is still more explicitly explained in the next  śloka .
Personal superintendence of the illusory energy is confirmed in the  Vedas  (the  Keṇa Upaniṣad ) in relation to the demigods' controlling power. Herein also it is clearly stated that the living entity is controlled by the external energy in a personal capacity. The living being thus subject to the control of external energy is differently situated. It is clear, however, from the present statement of  Bhāgavatam  that the same external energy is situated in the inferior position before the Personality of Godhead or the perfect being. The perfect being, or the Lord, cannot be approached even by the illusory energy, who can only work on the living entities. Therefore it is sheer imagination that the Supreme Lord is illusioned by the illusory energy and thus becomes a living being. If the living being and the Lord would have been in the same category, then it would have been quite possible for Vyāsadeva to see it, and there would have been no question of material distress on the part of the illusioned being because the Supreme Being is fully cognizant. So there are so many unscrupulous imaginations on the part of the monists to endeavor to put both the Lord and the living being in the same category. Had it been so, then Śrīla Śukadeva Gosvāmī would not have taken the trouble to describe the transcendental pastimes of the Lord, if they were all manifestations of illusory energy.
Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam  is the  summum bonum  remedy for the suffering humanity in the clutches of  māyā . Śrīla Vyāsadeva therefore first of all diagnosed the actual disease of the conditioned souls, i.e. their being illusioned by the external energy. He also saw the perfect Supreme Being from whom illusory energy is far removed, though He saw both the diseased conditioned souls and also the cause of the disease. And the