Text 9] Fundamental Principles of Material Nature 1075

world is the subtle mahat-tattva, and from that mahat-tattva the material
manifestation has emerged.

In the Vedic literatures it is said that by the glance of the Supreme
Lord the total material energy is impregnated, and then everything
is born of material nature. It is also confirmed in the Ninth Chapter of
Bhagavad-gita that under His glance, adhyaksena—under His direction and
by His will—nature is working. It is not that nature works blindly. After
understanding the position of the conditioned souls in relation to material
nature, Devahtti wanted to know how nature works under the direction of
the Lord and what the relationship is between the material nature and the
Lord. In other words, she wanted to learn the characteristics of the
Supreme Lord in relation to the material nature.

The relationship of the living entities with matter and that of the
Supreme Lord with matter are certainly not on the same level, although
the Mayavadis may interpret it in that way. When it is said that the living
entities are bewildered, the Mayavadi philosophers ascribe this bewilder-
ment to the Supreme Lord. But that is not applicable. The Lord is never
bewildered. That is the difference between personalists and impersonalists.
Devahiti is not unintelligent. She has enough intelligence to understand
that the living entities are not on the level of the Supreme Lord. Because
the living entities are minute and infinitesimal, they become bewildered or
conditioned by material nature, but this does not mean that the Supreme
Lord is also conditioned or bewildered. The difference between the
conditioned soul and the Lord is that the Lord is the Lord, the master of
material nature, and He is therefore not subject to its control. He is con-
trolled neither by spiritual nature nor by material nature. He is the supreme
controller Himself, and He cannot be compared to the ordinary living
entities who are controlled by the laws of material nature.

Two words used in this verse are sat and asat. The cosmic manifestation
is asat—it does not exist—but the material energy of the Supreme Lord is
sat, or ever-existing. Material nature is ever-existing in its subtle form as
the energy of the Lord, but it sometimes manifests this nonexistent or
temporarily existent nature, the cosmos. An analogy may be made with
the father and mother: the mother and the father exist, but sometimes the
mother begets children. Similarly, this cosmic manifestation which comes
from the unmanifest material nature of the Supreme Lord sometimes
appears and again disappears. But the material nature is ever-existing, and
the Lord is the supreme cause for both the subtle and gross manifestations
of this material world.
