Devanagari
त्वं वा इदं सदसदीश भवांस्ततोऽन्यो
माया यदात्मपरबुद्धिरियं ह्यपार्था ।
यद्यस्य जन्म निधनं स्थितिरीक्षणं च
तद्वैतदेव वसुकालवदष्टितर्वो: ॥ ३१ ॥
Verse text
tvaṁ vā idaṁ sadasad īśa bhavāṁs tato ’nyo
māyā yad ātma-para-buddhir iyaṁ hy apārthā
yad yasya janma nidhanaṁ sthitir īkṣaṇaṁ ca
tad vaitad eva vasukālavad aṣṭi-tarvoḥ
Synonyms
tvam
—
You
;
vā
—
either
;
idam
—
the whole universe
;
sat
—
asat — consisting of cause and effect (You are the cause, and Your energy is the effect)
;
īśa
—
O my Lord, the supreme controller
;
bhavān
—
Yourself
;
tataḥ
—
from the universe
;
anyaḥ
—
separately situated (the creation is made by the Lord, yet He remains separate from the creation)
;
māyā
—
the energy that appears as a separate creation
;
yat
—
of which
;
ātma
—
para — buddhiḥ — the conception of one’s own and another’s
;
iyam
—
this
;
hi
—
indeed
;
apārthā
—
has no meaning (everything is Your Lordship, and therefore there is no hope for understanding “my” and “your”)
;
yat
—
the substance from which
;
yasya
—
of which
;
janma
—
creation
;
nidhanam
—
annihilation
;
sthitiḥ
—
maintenance
;
īkṣaṇam
—
manifestation
;
ca
—
and
;
tat
—
that
;
vā
—
or
;
etat
—
this
;
eva
—
certainly
;
vasukāla
—
vat — like the quality of being the earth and, beyond that, the subtle element of the earth (smell)
;
aṣṭi
—
tarvoḥ — the seed (the cause) and the tree (the effect of the cause) .
Translation
My dear Lord, O Supreme Personality of Godhead, the entire cosmic creation is caused by You, and the cosmic manifestation is an effect of Your energy. Although the entire cosmos is but You alone, You keep Yourself aloof from it. The conception of “mine and yours,” is certainly a type of illusion [māyā] because everything is an emanation from You and is therefore not different from You. Indeed, the cosmic manifestation is nondifferent from You, and the annihilation is also caused by You. This relationship between Your Lordship and the cosmos is illustrated by the example of the seed and the tree, or the subtle cause and the gross manifestation.
Translation (Visvanatha Cakravarti Thakura)
O Lord! You are the universe and its effect and the cause, and you are also different, since the conception of self and other, which is illusory, is a product of ignorance. The Lord from whom creation and manifestation arise, in which maintenance and destruction take place, and the universe itself, are like the seed and the tree, or fragrance and earth.
“Though the universe is māyā, since māyā is my śakti, if there is irregularity in the world, will that not mean irregularity in me?” It is true that you are the effect (sat) and the cause (asat) of the universe since you are the cause of pradhāna. The universe is not different from you. But you are different (anyaḥ) since you do not have beginning and end. But the conception that “this is my friend and this is my enemy” is ignorance (māyā), made of the jīva’s ignorance. This is false (apārthāḥ). Having shown that the cause is not different from the effect, an example is given to defeat the idea that the Lord has defects if the universe has defects. That from which creation and manifestation take place, that in which destruction and maintenance take place, is like the seed of the tree. The seed is the cause and the tree is the effect. Vasu refers to the sense object and kāla refers to the earth since the normal color of earth is black (kāla). The cause and effect or the seed and the tree are like the smell and the earth. Thus the universe with cause and effect has the Supreme Lord and pradhāna. The meaning is this. From smell comes earth. From the seed comes the tree. From the Lord comes pradhāna. From pradhāna comes mahat-tattva. From this come the devatās, animals and others. Just as the one sense object fragrance contains all cause and effects (products of earth), you alone are the cause and effect of all beings.
tad ananyatvam ārambhaṇa-śabdādibhyaḥ
The world is non-different from the Lord (tat). This is stated starting from the word ārambhaṇa in the Chāndogya Upaniṣad. Vedānta-sūtra 2.1.14
vācārambhaṇaṁ vikāro nāmadheyaṁ mṛttikety eva satyam
The name comes from the object called “clay” just as objects made of clay come from clay. The clay is real and the objects are real. Chāndogya Upaniṣad 6.2.1
Just as there is no inequality of fragrance, the cause of earth, though there is inequality in the material objects like stone and wood made of earth, there is no inequality in the Lord, though there is inequality in the world produced by him.
Purport
In
Bhagavad-gītā
(7.10)
the Lord says:
bījaṁ māṁ sarva-bhūtānāṁ
viddhi pārtha sanātanam
“O son of Pṛthā, know that I am the original seed of all existences.” In the Vedic literature it is said,
īśāvāsyam idaṁ sarvam, yato vā imāni bhūtāni jāyante
and
sarvaṁ khalv idaṁ brahma.
All this Vedic information indicates that there is only one God and that there is nothing else but Him. The Māyāvādī philosophers explain this in their own way, but the Supreme Personality of Godhead asserts the truth that He is everything and yet is separate from everything. This is the philosophy of Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu, which is called
acintya-bhedābheda-tattva.
Everything is one, the Supreme Lord, yet everything is separate from the Lord. This is the understanding of oneness and difference.
The example given in this regard —
vasukālavad aṣṭi-tarvoḥ
— is very easy to understand. Everything exists in time, yet there are different phases of the time factor — present, past and future. Present, past and future are one. Every day we can experience the time factor as morning, noon and evening, and although morning is different from noon, which is different from evening, all of them taken together are one. The time factor is the energy of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, but the Lord is separate from the time factor. Everything is created, maintained and annihilated by time, but the Supreme Lord, the Personality of Godhead, has no beginning and no end. He is
nityaḥ śāśvataḥ
— eternal, permanent. Everything passes through time’s phases of present, past and future, yet the Lord is always the same. Thus there is undoubtedly a difference between the Lord and the cosmic manifestation, but actually they are not different. Accepting them to be different is called
avidyā,
ignorance.
True oneness, however, is not equivalent to the conception of the Māyāvādīs. The true understanding is that the differences are manifested by the energy of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. The seed is manifested as a tree, which displays varieties in its trunk, branches, leaves, flowers and fruits. Śrīla Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura has therefore sung,
keśava tuyā jagata vicitra:
“My dear Lord, Your creation is full of varieties.” The varieties are one and at the same time different. This is the philosophy of
acintya-bhedābheda-tattva.
The conclusion given in
Brahma-saṁhitā
is this:
īśvaraḥ paramaḥ kṛṣṇaḥ
sac-cid-ānanda-vigrahaḥ
anādir ādir govindaḥ
sarva-kāraṇa-kāraṇam
“Kṛṣṇa, known as Govinda, is the supreme controller. He has an eternal, blissful, spiritual body. He is the origin of all. He has no other origin, for He is the prime cause of all causes.” Because the Lord is the supreme cause, everything is one with Him, but when we consider varieties, we find that one thing is different from another.
We may conclude, therefore, that there is no difference between one thing and another, yet in varieties there are differences. In this regard, Madhvācārya gives an example concerning a tree and a tree in fire. Both trees are the same, but they look different because of the time factor. The time factor is under the control of the Supreme Lord, and therefore the Supreme Lord is different from time. An advanced devotee consequently does not distinguish between happiness and distress. As stated in
Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam
(10.14.8)
:
tat te ’nukampāṁ susamīkṣamāṇo
bhuṣjāna evātma-kṛtaṁ vipākam
When a devotee is in a condition of so-called distress, he considers it a gift or blessing from the Supreme Personality of Godhead. When a devotee is always thus situated in Kṛṣṇa consciousness in any condition of life, he is described as
mukti-pade sa dāya-bhāk,
a perfect candidate for returning home, back to Godhead. The word
dāya-bhāk
means “inheritance.” A son inherits the property of his father. Similarly, when the devotee is fully Kṛṣṇa conscious, undisturbed by dualities, he is sure that he will return home, back to Godhead, just as one inherits his father’s property.