Service to the Lord
97
attaining devotional service to the Lord, they are unable to award the desired results. Therefore, in  Srimad Bhagwatam , Sukadeva Goswami offered his respectful obeisances to the Supreme Lord, Who is the only One Who can award such success.
It is accepted by all classes of philosophers and transcendentalists that no one who lacks knowledge can be liberated from the material entanglement. Still, knowledge without being mixed with devotional service holds no possibility of awarding liberation. In other words, when  Jnana , or the cultivation of knowledge, opens the path of devotional service, then alone can it give one liberation, and not otherwise.
In the  Srimad Bhagwatam  this is also stated by Brahma: “My dear Lord, devotional service unto You is the best path for self-realization. If somebody gives up that path and becomes engaged in the cultivation of knowledge, or in speculation, he will undergo a troublesome process, without achieving any desired results. Just as a person who beats the empty husk of the wheat cannot get the grain, so those who are engaged simply in speculative knowledge cannot achieve the desired result of self-realization. Their only gain is trouble.”
The  Bhagavad Gita  says, in the Seventh Chapter, 14th verse, that this material Nature is very strong, and not surmountable by an ordinary living entity. Only those who surrender unto the Lotus Feet of Krishna can cross over the ocean of material existence. The self-forgetfulness of the living entity—forgetting that he is eternally the servitor of Krishna—is the cause of his bondage in conditional life, and the cause of his being attracted by the material energy. That attraction is the shackle of material energy. It is very difficult for a person to become free as long as he desires to lord it over the material Nature. It is recommended, therefore, that one should approach a Spiritual Master who can train him in devotional service, and thus he can get out of the clutches of material Nature, and achieve the Lotus Feet of Krishna.
There are divisions of human society, like the  Brahmins , or intellectuals; the  Kshatriyas , administrators; the  Vaishyas , businessmen; and the  Sudras , or laborers; and there is the  Brahmachary , or student, the  Grihastha  or householder, the  Vanaprasthas , retired; and the  Sannyasis , renounced life. And, in every case, if the individuals lack engagement in devotional service, Krishna Consciousness, even though engaged in their prescribed duty, they cannot get release because of their material consciousness. On the contrary, even by discharging their prescribed duties, they glide down to hell. Therefore, all persons engaged in their prescribed occupational duties must cultivate Krishna Consciousness in devotional service, if they want liberation from the material clutches.