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andhaṁ tamaḥ praviśanti
ye ’sambhūtim upāsate
tato bhūya iva te tamo
ya u sambhūtyām ratāḥ

SYNONYMS

andham—ignorance; tamaḥ—darkness; praviśanti—enter into; ye—those who; asambhūtim—demigods; upāsate—worship; tataḥ—than that; bhūyaḥ—still more; iva—like that; te—those; tamaḥ—darkness; ye—who; u—also; sambhūtyām—in the Absolute; ratāḥ—engaged.

TRANSLATION

Those who are engaged in the worship of demigods enter into the darkest region of ignorance, and still more so do the worshipers of the impersonal Absolute.

PURPORT

Sambhuti is a name of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, who is the completely independent Absolute Truth. The Sanskrit word asambhuti, translated here as “demigods,” refers to those who have no independent existence. The Absolute Personality of Godhead, Sri Kṛṣṇa, clarifies the relationship between sambhuti and asambhuti as follows:

na me viduḥ sura-gaṇāḥ
prabhavaṁ na maharṣayaḥ
aham ādir hi devānāṁ
maharṣīṇāṁ ca sarvaśa

“Neither the hosts of demigods nor the great sages know My origin or opulences, for in every respect I am the source of the demigods and sages.” [Bhagavad-gita 10.2]

The Supreme Personality of Godhead delegates a small portion of His inconceivable, unlimited power to the demigods, great sages and mystics for their service unto Him. Although their powers and intelligence are far beyond those of ordinary human beings, they are still limited. It is very difficult even for the demigods and great sages to understand how Kṛṣṇa, the unlimited Lord, can appear in this world in a human-like form. So it is commonplace for ordinary human beings to misunderstand Him, and mistakenly worship demigods or the impersonal aspect of the Absolute Truth.

Philosophers, theologians and even many Vedic rsis, or mystics, attempt to discriminate the Absolute from the relative by their own speculative intellectual power. This inferior process can only reach a negative conception of the Absolute: “It is not this, it is not that.” Definition of the Absolute by negation leads one to imagine a formless Absolute without qualities. Such a nihilistic conception is simply the antithesis of relative material qualities, and is therefore also relative.

Definition of the Absolute by negation is incomplete. It is powerless to reveal the positive aspect of the Absolute, defined in Mantra 1 of Sri Isopanisad as the Complete Whole. By searching for the Absolute through negation of the relative, one can at most realize the impersonal spiritual effulgence of Brahman. But one cannot progress to realizing the indwelling Paramatma or Bhagavan, the Personality of Godhead, or uncover one’s original eternal spiritual identity, without positive knowledge of transcendence.

Therefore people addicted to the speculative process of negation of the relative cannot realize the complete Absolute Truth. They do not know that the Supreme Personality of Godhead is Kṛṣṇa, that the impersonal Brahman is the expansive effulgence of His transcendental body, or that Paramatma is His all-pervading plenary expansion as the Supersoul. They cannot understand that Kṛṣṇa has an eternal form of perfect bliss and knowledge, and that they also have an eternal spiritual identity. The asambhuti, dependent demigods and great sages, mistakenly assume Kṛṣṇa to be a more powerful demigod. They consider the Brahman effulgence to be the Absolute Truth. So what to speak of ordinary human beings who worship the demigods or the impersonal aspect of the Absolute Truth? Kṛṣṇa says,

“Those whose minds are distorted by material desires surrender unto demigods and follow the particular rules and regulations of worship according to their own natures. I am in everyone's heart as the Supersoul. As soon as one desires to worship the demigods, I make his faith steady so that he can devote himself to some particular deity. Endowed with such a faith, he seeks favors of a particular demigod and obtains his desires. But in reality these benefits are bestowed by Me alone.” [Bhagavad-gita 7.20-22]

Unintelligent persons bewildered by strong desires for sense gratification worship the demigods for temporary relief from material problems. Actually it is Kṛṣṇa who awards their benedictions through His servants, the demigods; but materially entangled living beings cannot understand this.

Permanent relief from material suffering is available only in the spiritual world of eternal life, complete knowledge, and perfect bliss. Therefore Sri Isopanisad counsels us that worshiping dependent demigods, who can bestow only temporary benefits, is a waste of time. Rather, we must worship the all-powerful, all-attractive Absolute Personality of Godhead, Kṛṣṇa. The devotees of Kṛṣṇa realize that He is the Absolute Person by surrendering unto Him with unalloyed devotion. Such devotees continuously render loving service unto Kṛṣṇa, the independent fountainhead of everything. The ability of Kṛṣṇa to reciprocate our loving service directly from within the heart is well known to such surrendered devotees. He also can bestow complete freedom from material bondage and suffering by taking us back home, back to Godhead.

antavat tu phalaṁ teṣāṁ
tad bhavaty alpa-medhasām
devān deva-yajo yānti
mad-bhaktā yānti mām api

"Men of small intelligence worship the demigods, and their fruits are limited and temporary. Those who worship the demigods go to the planets of the demigods, but My devotees ultimately reach My supreme planet.” [Bhagavad-gita 7.23]

Human beings with advanced consciousness naturally want to visit other planets and stars, either by demigod worship, mystic powers or spaceships. The easiest way to reach other planets is by worshiping the demigod presiding over a particular planet. In this way one can go to the moon planet, the sun or even Brahmaloka, the highest planet in the universe, in the next life. However, all planets in the material universe are temporary; the only permanent planets are found in the spiritual sky, where the Personality of Godhead Himself predominates:

ā-brahma-bhuvanāl lokāḥ
punar āvartino ’rjuna
mām upetya tu kaunteya
punar janma na vidyate

“From the highest planet in the material world down to the lowest, all are places of misery wherein repeated birth and death take place. But one who attains My abode, O son of Kunti, never takes birth again.” [Bhagavad-gita 8.16]

Sri Isopanisad correctly points out that from the point of view of the spiritual world, even one who attains to the heavenly planets by worship of the demigods still remains in the darkness of the material universe. This enormous material universe is covered by a still more gigantic shell of material elements, like a coconut with a very thick shell. Since this material covering is sealed, the interior is completely dark; therefore the sun and the moon are required for illumination.

Outside the material universe is the unlimited brahmajyoti effulgence, or spiritual sky, filled with innumerable Vaikuntha planets. The greatest planet in the spiritual sky is Kṛṣṇaloka, or Goloka Vrndavana, the residence of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Sri Kṛṣṇa. Although Lord Sri Kṛṣṇa dwells there with His eternal associates, He is also omnipresent throughout the material and spiritual cosmic manifestations. This has already been explained in Mantra Four of Sri Isopanisad. The Lord is present everywhere although situated in one place, just as the sun spreads its rays everywhere although it is located in the center of the solar system.

The real problems of life—birth, old age, disease and death—cannot be solved by going to any planet in the material universe. Even Lord Brahma, the secondary creator, has to leave his body at the time of universal dissolution. Therefore Sri Isopanisad advises us not to aspire to any destination within this dark material universe, but to try our best to attain the self-effulgent kingdom of God. There are many pseudo-spiritualists who pose as teachers, but actually present whimsical speculative nonsense only for the sake of their own material advancement. Such phony spiritualists have no desire to leave the material universe and reach the spiritual sky; they have no idea that the spiritual sky even exists.

Atheists and impersonalists cheat such foolish pseudo-spiritualists by preaching atheism, misleading them into the darkest regions. Atheists foolishly deny the existence and power of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, and impersonalists support such atheistic views by misinterpreting the Vedas and Upanisads to stress the impersonal aspect of the Supreme Lord.

However, all such misinterpretations are based on ignorance of the real context of the Upanisads. All the Upanisads are led by Sri Isopanisad, the first Upanisad, and none of the mantras of Sri Isopanisad deny the supremacy of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. In fact, Mantra Fifteen clearly states:

hiraṇmayena pātreṇa
satyasyāpihitaṁ mukham
tat tvaṁ pūṣann apāvṛṇu
satya-dharmāya dṛṣṭaye

“O my Lord, sustainer of all that lives, Your real face is covered by Your dazzling effulgence. Kindly remove that covering and reveal Yourself to Your pure devotee.”

The impersonal misconception of the Supreme is a very dangerous form of nescience derived from misinterpreting the Vedic knowledge, motivated by material benefit. The impersonalists are certain to enter into the darkest regions of the universe in the next life, because they mislead their followers and divert them from actual spiritual truth. The impersonalists even falsely pose themselves as incarnations of God to cheat people who have no Vedic knowledge of the actual qualifications of divine incarnations. Therefore, a little Vedic knowledge in their hands of such foolish rascals is far more dangerous than mere ignorance of spiritual life.

The real question we need to solve is how to obtain a permanent life in the spiritual world. The Lord states that anyone who reaches Him attains complete freedom from the bondage of birth and death. The path of devotional service given in the Esoteric Teaching is the only way to approach the Personality of Godhead successfully. Salvation from material entanglement depends fully on the principles of knowledge and detachment derived from the process of devotional service revealed in the Esoteric Teaching.

The mundane religionists have neither knowledge of the soul nor detachment from material activities. They want to remain locked in the golden shackles of material bondage under the guise of mundane philanthropy disguised as religion. They maintain a pretense of ritualistic religious services while covertly indulging in immoral activities. Thus they masquerade as spiritual masters and devotees of God by hiding their sinful activities behind a false display of religious sentiments.

Such devious perpetrators of religious fraud have no respect for the actual holy teachers in disciplic succession from Lord Kṛṣṇa Himself. They ignore the Vedic injunction acaryopasanam: “One must worship the spiritual Master Teacher as My plenary representative.” [Bhagavad-gita 13.8] And who is the bona fide spiritual Master Teacher?

Kṛṣṇa clearly states: evam parampara-praptam, “This supreme science of God is received through disciplic succession.” [Bhagavad-gita 4.2] Instead of following this instruction and accepting a spiritual Master Teacher in the lineage from Kṛṣṇa, the mundane impersonalists become so-called gurus themselves, but they follow neither the spiritual standards nor moral principles of the actual Master Teachers.

These rogues in the guise of so-called spiritual teachers are the most dangerous elements in human society. They escape punishment by the law of the state because in the present historical era of Kali-yuga, there is no religious government. But they cannot escape punishment by the law of the Supreme Lord, who has clearly confirmed this mantra of Sri Isopanisad in the following words:

“Those who are envious and mischievous, who are the lowest among men, are cast by Me into the ocean of material existence, into various demoniac species of life. Attaining repeated birth amongst demoniac species of life, such persons can never approach Me. Gradually they sink down to the most abominable type of existence.” [Bhagavad-gita 16.19-20]

Thus Sri Kṛṣṇa and Sri Isopanisad agree that the impersonalist pseudo-religionists are headed toward the most horrible destination in the universe because they conduct their phony spiritual master business simply for materialistic sense gratification.