Text 37]
Answers by Citing the Lord's Version
533
deviated from the fixed conclusion the Lord taught him. The Lord was the teacher of the nucleus four verses of  Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam , and Brahmā was the receiver of the knowledge. Misinterpretation of the word  aham  by the word jugglery of the impersonalist should not disturb the mind of the strict followers of the  Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam .  Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam  is the text of the Personality of Godhead and His unalloyed devotees, who are also known as the  Bhāgavatas , and any outsider should have no access to this confidential literature of devotional service. But unfortunately the impersonalist, who has no relation with the Supreme Personality of Godhead, sometime tries to interpret  Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam  by his poor fund of knowledge in grammar and dry speculation. Therefore, the Lord warns Brahmā (and, through Brahmā, all future devotees of the Lord in the discipline succession of Brahmā) that one should never be misled by the conclusion of the so-called grammarians or by other men with a poor fund of knowledge, but must always fix the mind properly, via the  paramparā  system. No one should try to give a new interpretation by dint of mundane knowledge. And the first thing, therefore, in pursuance of the system of knowledge received by Brahmā is to approach a bona fide  guru  who is the representative of the Lord following the  paramparā  system. No one should try to squeeze out his own meaning by imperfect mundane knowledge. The  guru , or the bona fide spiritual master, is competent to teach the disciple in the right path with reference to the context of all authentic Vedic literature. He does not attempt to juggle words to bewilder the student. The bona fide spiritual master, by his personal activities, teaches the disciple the principles of devotional service. Without personal service, like the impersonalist and dry speculators, one would go on speculating life after life and would be unable to reach the final conclusion. By following the instructions of the bona fide spiritual master in conjunction with the principles of revealed scriptures, the student will rise to the plane of complete knowledge, which will be exhibited by development of detachment from the world of sense gratification. The mundane wranglers are surprised as to how one can detach himself from the world of sense gratification, and thus any attempt to be fixed in God realization appears to them to be mysticism. This detachment from the sensory world is called the  brahma-bhūta stage of realization , the preliminary stage of transcendental devotional life ( parā bhaktiḥ ). The  brahma-bhūta  stage of life is also known as the  ātmārāma  stage, in which one is fully self-satisfied and does not hanker for the world of sense enjoyment. This stage of full satisfaction is the proper situation for understanding the transcendental knowledge of the Personality of Godhead. The  Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam  affirms this: