Prayers by the Personified Vedas 263

The conclusion of the atheistic Sankhya philosophy is that because the
effects of the material worlds are temporary or illusory, the cause is
therefore also illusory. The Sankhya philosophers are in favor of voidism,
but the actual fact is that the original cause is the Supreme Personality
of Godhead and this cosmic manifestation is the temporary manifestation
of His material energy. When this temporary manifestation is annihilated,
its cause, the eternal existence of the spiritual world, continues as it is,
and therefore the spiritual world is called sandtana-dhama, the eternal
abode. The conclusion of the Sankhya philosopher is therefore not valid.

Then there are the philosophers headed by Gautama and Kanada.
They have very minutely studied the cause and effect of the material
elements and have ultimately come to the conclusion that atomic combina-
tion is the original cause of creation. Present material scientists also follow
in the footsteps of Gautama and Kanada, who propounded this theory
of paramdnuvada. This theory, however, cannot be supported because the
original cause of everything is not inert atoms. This is confirmed in
Bhagavad-gita and Srimad-Bhdgavatam as well as in the Vedas, wherein
it is stated eko nardyana dsit, only Narayana existed before the creation.
The § rimad-Bhagavatam and Vedanta-sittra also say that the original cause
is sentient and both indirectly and directly cognizant of everything within
this creation. In the Bhagavad-gita Krsna says, ahari sarvasya prabhavak:
“I am the original cause of everything,” and mattah sarvam pravartate:
“From Me everything comes into existence.”” Therefore, atoms may form
the basic combinations of material existence, but these atoms are generated
from the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Thus the philosophy of
Gautama and Kanada cannot be supported.

Similarly, impersonalists headed by Astavakra and later on by Sankar-
acarya accept the impersonal Brahman effulgence as the cause of every-
thing. According to their theory, the material manifestation is temporary
and unreal, whereas the impersonal Brahman effulgence is reality. But this
theory cannot be supported either, because the Lord Himself says in the
Bhagavad-gita that this Brahman effulgence is resting on His personality.
It is also confirmed in the Brahma-samhitad that the Brahman effulgence
is the personal bodily rays of Krsna. As such, impersonal Brahman cannot
be the original cause of the cosmic manifestation. The original cause is the
all-perfect sentient Personality of Godhead, Govinda.

The most dangerous theory of the impersonalists is that when God comes
as an incarnation He accepts a material body created by the three modes of
material nature. This Mayavadi theory has been condemned by Lord
Caitanya as most offensive. He has said that anyone who accepts
the transcendental body of the Personality of Godhead to be made of
