Text 7]
The Perfect Society: Four Social Classes
29
PURPORT
As stated by Yamarāja,  dharmaṁ tu sākṣād bhagavat-praṇītam . Yamarāja, the representative of the Lord who takes care of the living beings after their death, gives his verdict as to how and when the living being will change his body. He is the authority, and he says that the religious principles consist of the codes and laws given by God. No one can manufacture religion, and therefore manufactured religious systems are rejected by the followers of the Vedic principles. In  Bhagavad-gītā  (15.15) it is said,  vedaiś ca sarvair aham eva vedyaḥ : Vedic knowledge means to understand the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Kṛṣṇa. Therefore, whether one speaks of the  Vedas , scriptures, religion or the principles of everyone's occupational duty, all of them must aim at understanding Kṛṣṇa, the Supreme Personality of Godhead.  Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam  (1.2.6) therefore concludes:
sa vai puṁsāṁ paro dharmo yato bhaktir adhokṣaje ahaituky apratihatā yayātmā suprasīdati
In other words, religious principles aim at learning how to render transcendental loving service to the Lord. That service must be unmotivated and unchecked by material conditions. Then human society will be happy in all respects.
The  smṛti , the scriptures following the principles of Vedic knowledge, are considered the evidence of Vedic principles. There are twenty different types of scripture for following religious principles, and among them the scriptures of Manu and Yājñavalkya are considered to be all-pervading authorities. In the  Yājñavalkya-smṛti  it is said:
śruti-smṛti-sadācāraḥ svasya ca priyam ātmanaḥ samyak saṅkalpajaḥ kāmo dharma-mūlam idaṁ smṛtam
One should learn human behavior from  śruti , the  Vedas , and from  smṛti , the scriptures following the Vedic principles. Śrīla Rūpa Gosvāmī in his  Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu  says: