Text 27] Prayers by Queen Kunti 405

Advancement of material vision or material civilization is a great stum-
bling block for spiritual advancement. Such material advancement entan-
gles the living being in the bondage of a material body followed by all
sorts of material miseries. Such material advancement ts called anartha or
things not wanted. Actually this is so. In the present context of material
advancement one uses lipstick at a cost of fifty cents and there are so many
unwanted things which are all products of the material conception of life.
By diverting attention to so many unwanted things, human energy is
spoiled without achievement of spiritual realization, the prime necessity
of human life. The attempt to reach the moon is another example of
spoiling energy because even if the moon is reached, the problems of life
will not be solved. The devotees of the Lord are called akificanas he-
cause they have practically no material assets. Such material assets are all
products of the three modes of material nature. They foil spiritual energy.
and thus the less we possess such products of material nature, the more we
have a good chance for spiritual progress.

The Supreme Personality of Godhead has no direct connection with
material activities. All His acts and deeds, which are exhibited even in
this material world, are spiritual and without affection of the modes of
material nature. In the Bhagavad-gitd the Lord says that all His acts, even
His appearence and disappearence in and out of the material world, are all
transcendental, and one who knows this perfectly shall not take his birth
again in this material world, but he will go back to Godhead.

The material disease is due to hankering after lording it over material
nature. This hankering is due to an interaction of the three modes of
nature, and both the Lord and the devotees have no attachment for such
false enjoyment. Therefore, the Lord as well as the devotees are called
nivrtta-guna-vrtti. The perfect nivrtta-guna-vrtti is the Supreme Lord be-
cause He never becomes attracted by the modes of material nature, whereas
the living beings have such a tendency. Some of them are entrapped by the
illusory attraction of material nature.

Because the Lord is the property of the devotees and the devotees are
the property of the Lord, reciprocally the devotees are certainly tran-
scendental to the modes of material nature. That is a natural conclusion.
Such unalloyed devotees are distinct from the mixed devotees who ap-
proach the Lord for mitigation of miseries and poverty, inquisitiveness
and speculation. The unalloyed devotees and the Lord are transcendentally
attached to one another. For others, the Lord has nothing to reciprocate,
and therefore He is called atmarama, self-satisfied. Self-satisfied as He is,
He is the master of all monists who seek to merge into the existence of the
