182
Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam
[Canto 10, Ch. 2]
Only by the mercy of the Supreme Personality of Godhead can one understand Him. Those who are in the modes of material nature, although speculating for thousands of years, cannot understand Him. The Lord has innumerable forms ( rāmādi-mūrtiṣu kalā-niyamena tiṣṭhan ), and unless these forms, such as Lord Rāmacandra, Nṛsiṁhadeva, Kṛṣṇa and Balarāma, were transcendental, how could they be worshiped by devotees since time immemorial?  Bhaktyā mām abhijānāti yāvān yaś cāsmi tattvataḥ  (Bg. 18.55). Devotees who awaken their transcendental nature in the presence of the Lord and who follow the rules and regulations of devotional service can understand Lord Kṛṣṇa, Lord Rāmacandra and other incarnations, who are not of this material world but who come from the spiritual world for the benefit of people in general. If one does not take to this process, one imagines or manufactures some form of God according to material qualities and can never awaken a real understanding of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. The words  bhaktyā mām abhijānāti yāvān yaś cāsmi tattvataḥ  signify that unless one worships the Lord according to the regulative devotional principles, one cannot awaken the transcendental nature. Deity worship, even in the absence of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, awakens the transcendental nature of the devotee, who thus becomes increasingly attached to the Lord's lotus feet.
The appearance of Kṛṣṇa is the answer to all imaginative iconography of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Everyone imagines the form of the Supreme Personality of Godhead according to his mode of material nature. In the  Brahma-saṁhitā  it is said that the Lord is the oldest person. Therefore a section of religionists imagine that God must be very old, and therefore they depict a form of the Lord like a very old man. But in the same  Brahma-saṁhitā , that is contradicted; although He is the oldest of all living entities, He has His eternal form as a fresh youth. The exact words used in this connection in the  Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam  are  vijñānam ajñāna-bhidāpamārjanam .  Vijñāna  means transcendental knowledge of the Supreme Personality;  vijñāna  is also experienced knowledge. Transcendental knowledge has to be accepted by the descending process of discipline succession as Brahmā presents the knowledge of Kṛṣṇa in the  Brahma-saṁhitā .  Brahma-saṁhitā  is  vijñāna  as realized by Brahmā's transcendental experience, and in that way he presented the form and the pastimes of Kṛṣṇa in the transcendental abode.