Category:God and the Human Beings
Theme Analysis
The distinction between a human being and an animal lies solely in spiritual intelligence. According to Śrīla Prabhupāda, animals lack the developed consciousness needed to recognize the Supreme Lord, but human life is specifically meant for understanding God and becoming God conscious. According to Vedic civilization, a human being must inquire into the nature of the Absolute Truth, the material world, and their own identity. This pursuit is the only truly auspicious activity (śreyas). The supreme duty of the perfect human being is to satisfy the Lord through their occupational duties and to surrender fully unto His lotus feet, as instructed in the Bhagavad-gītā and Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam.
To facilitate this realization, the Supreme Personality of Godhead maintains an incredibly intimate relationship with all living beings. As the Paramātmā (Supersoul), the Lord is seated within the hearts of everyone—not just human beings, but even cats, dogs, and trees. However, out of His causeless mercy, the Lord also frequently descends to the material world, sometimes acting as a human being to perform wonderful, uncommon pastimes. These pastimes are designed specifically to attract conditioned souls and invite them back to the spiritual world as His eternal servitors, friends, parents, or lovers. Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu descended in the exact garb of a devotee to practically demonstrate how human beings should surrender to Kṛṣṇa.
Human society is broadly categorized into two classes based on their relationship with the Lord: devas (the godly) and asuras (the demons). The devas are those human beings whose lives are dedicated to the realization of the Supreme Truth and who always aim at the lotus feet of Lord Viṣṇu. To achieve this perfection, human beings must adopt tapasya (voluntary penance) and acknowledge their complete dependence on God's supply of food and resources through gratitude and sacrifice. Ultimately, the highest perfectional stage for any human being is achieved by sincerely chanting the Lord's holy names, which elevates the soul to the platform of pure, ecstatic love of God.
- The Purpose of Human Life: Unlike animals, humans have the developed intelligence required to understand God, the universe, and their own spiritual identity.
- The Lord's Intimate Presence: God is seated in the hearts of all living entities and frequently descends in human-like forms to attract and reclaim conditioned souls.
- The Two Classes of Men: Human beings are divided into devas (who strive for God realization) and asuras (who ignore the Supreme Lord).
- The Path to Perfection: Through tapasya, gratitude, and the chanting of the holy names, a human being can attain the highest perfection: unalloyed love of God.
- Explore the synthesized essence of this category in this Vanipedia article: God and the Human Beings - The Purpose of Human Life.
Pages in category "God and the Human Beings"
The following 34 pages are in this category, out of 34 total.
A
- According to Vedic civilization, a human being must be God conscious. He should understand what God is, what this material world is, who he is, and what their interrelationships are. This is called sreyas, or ultimately auspicious activity
- Actually the king should be the representative of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. For this reason he is called nara-devata, the Lord among human beings
- Animals do not have developed consciousness by which to recognize the Lord, but a human being is sufficiently intelligent to take lessons from the Vedic literature and thereby know how the laws of nature are working and derive profit out of such knowledge
- Anyone who sincerely chants this holy name is quickly elevated to the platform of love of God and becomes mad after God. This madness arising from love of God is the highest perfectional stage for a human being
- As a matter of gratitude, they (human beings) should feel obliged to the Lord for their supply of foodstuff, and they must first offer Him food in sacrifice and then partake of the remnants
- As King Rsabha advised His sons, tapasya, or voluntary acceptance of penance for realization of the Transcendence, is the only duty of the human being; it was so done by the Lord Himself in an exemplary manner to teach us
- At the end of this Kali-yuga, the Lord will appear as the incarnation of Kalki, and His only business will be to kill all human beings on the surface of the globe. After that killing, another golden age will begin
F
- For performing occupational duties of life the leg is the most important instrument of the body because without the help of the legs one cannot move from one place to another, and therefore the Lord has special control over the legs of all human beings
- From the sastra we learn that the Lord takes birth not only in the family of human beings but also in the families of demigods, aquatics, animals, and so on
H
- He, the Personality of Godhead, as the maintainer of all in the universe, appears in different incarnations after establishing the creation, and thus He reclaims all kinds of conditioned souls amongst the humans, the nonhumans and the demigods
- Human being, human life, is meant for understanding God and become God conscious
I
- In the sruti-mantras it is also said that although the Lord has no hands and legs like ours, He has a different type of hands and legs, by which He can accept all that we offer Him and run faster than anyone
- In this way, my Lord, You appear in various incarnations as a human being, an animal, a great saint, a demigod, a fish or a tortoise, thus maintaining the entire creation in different planetary systems and killing the demoniac principles
N
- Narayana is catur-bahu, but the Supreme Person resembles a human being. This is also confirmed in the Bible, where it is said that man was made in the image of God
- Neither the three modes of material nature (sattva-guna, rajo-guna and tamo-guna), nor the predominating deities controlling these three modes, nor the five gross elements, nor the mind, nor the demigods nor the human beings can understand Your Lordship
- Not only is He (God) seated in the heart of the human being, but He is also within the hearts of cats and dogs. Bhagavad-gita certifies this fact by the declaration of the Lord, isvarah sarva-bhutanam hrd-dese - BG 18.61
T
- The above statement of the qualities of the Lord is just to estimate His qualities as far as a human being is able to see Him. But even if it is so, the above qualities can be divided into many subheadings
- The Bhagavatam says, that the prime duty of the human being is to satisfy the Supreme Lord by the performance of one's occupational duty (SB 1.2.13)
- The external energy is a background, but the Supreme Lord by the expansion of His plenary portion as Paramatma is situated everywhere. He is the Supersoul of all demigods, all human beings, all animals, everywhere. BG 1972 purports
- The human being and all other living beings are products of His internal energies. Thus the living being is also identical with the Lord. But he is never equal or superior to the Personality of Godhead
- The less intelligent deride the Lord because He comes as one of us and plays with us as a human being
- The mahatma is always engaged in different activities of devotional service, as described in the Srimad-Bhagavatam, hearing and chanting about Visnu, not a demigod or human being. BG 1972 purports
- The same Lord Sri Krsna, in the garb of a devotee of Sri Krsna, descended to this mortal world to reclaim the fallen human beings who had misunderstood the Personality of Godhead even after the explanation of the Bhagavad-gita
- There are two kinds of human being all the time: asura and deva. Deva means human beings who are connected with the Supreme Lord. Their life is for realization of the Supreme Truth. They are called deva
- This is intelligence, that God has provided for everyone for these facilities, so human being, why he should not have this facility from God? It is already there. There is no doubt about it
- Throughout the universe there are only these two types (suras and asuras) of human being. In the Rg Veda it is stated that the suras always aim at the lotus feet of the Supreme Lord Visnu and act accordingly
W
- When the Lord appears on different lokas, or planets, or on this planet of human beings, He displays His transcendental pastimes just to attract the conditioned souls to become His eternal servitors, friends, parents and lovers in the transcendental world
- When the Personality of Godhead appeared before them (flowers, waterfalls, trees, fruits, hills, caves, birds, beasts, & human beings) they all became spiritually inclined, and by natural affection they wanted to serve the Almighty in various capacities