Umapati Swami's Blog

Can God fall in love? Does he have friends? Does he ever do anything naughty? And if He does the same things we do, is He still God?The Vedic scriptures say yes to all of these, but to see this side of God to the fullest, one must worship Him as Krishna.

The Vedas tell us that God Himself has come to this world many times. He came as Rama, the perfect king; as Vamana, the small boy who recaptured the universe with just three steps of his feet; as Narasimha, half-man half-lion, the protector of His devotee; and many others.

So far, I haven't read of any incarnation who just sat around all day and night. God is active. He does extraordinary things, and He comes into this world to let us see Him.

"Although I am unborn and My transcendental body never deteriorates, and although I am the Lord of all living entities, I still appear in every millennium in My original transcendental form." [Bhagavad-gita As It Is, 4.6]

But we get the most intimate view of God when He comes as Krishna, the original source of all incarnations.

"All of the above-mentioned incarnations are either plenary portions or portions of the plenary portions of the Lord, but Lord Sri Krishna is the original Personality of Godhead." [Srimad Bhagavatam, 1.3.28]

Does Krishna fall in love? Yes. He loves the cowherd girl Radha. "Well," you may ask, "What's extraordinary about that?"

But Radha is not an ordinary girl. She is the embodiment of love of God, and She is as divine as Krishna. Her body, mind, and senses are made of love of God, so Krishna's love for her is a normal reciprocation. And although the love of Radha and Krishna looks like a romance of this world, there is no sex desire in it. Great sages who have no interest in sex stories spend lifetimes trying to fathom the profundity of the relationship between Radha and Krishna.

When Krishna danced at midnight in the forest with Radha and thousands of her girlfriends, each girl thought she was alone with Krishna. Hardly an ordinary romance.

And during the day, Krishna would go with thousands of cowherd boys and calves into the forest. When the demigod Brahma stole away the calves and boys by his mystic power, Krishna expanded Himself into as many forms as there were boys and calves and imitated each one so perfectly that even their mothers could not tell. Thus Krishna defeated the mystic power of even the great Brahma.

As a small child, Krishna would eat the butter and yogurt stored in His house and the houses of the neighbors, just like a naughty little boy, but at the same time he defeated and killed powerful demons who had come to make him their victim.

All this is simply the tip of the iceberg, but it just goes to show that you don't need some thriller-diller to make God interesting. He doesn't need any help.

© Umapati Swami

I have just read that The Da Vinci Code has been banned in Pakistan at the request of both Christians and Muslims. The million-seller book and the movie made from it tell the story of a Harvard professor who teams up with a beautiful woman cryptologist in Paris to solve a murder and stumbles upon a secret the Roman Catholic Church has hid for 2,000 years: that Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene and they had a daughter whose descendants are now living somewhere in a French château.

The story may seem convincing enough, but it is just a work of fiction, and many of its premises are false or at best inaccurate. The biggest mistake of all, however, is not in The Da Vinci Code  but in the minds of the Christians.

Clerics, both Catholic and Protestant, fear that people may believe the story and lose faith. If Jesus married and gave in to the desires of the flesh, they argue, then he could not be divine and the very foundation of Christianity would be shaken.

Now I have always understood that the divine nature of Jesus was proved by his Resurrection, not by his marital status. I have no reason to believe The Da Vinci Code, but neither is there any reason to believe that a divine incarnation, or avatar, cannot marry. If Jesus stayed single, that was his choice, but a choice nonetheless.

The Bible speaks of only one avatar—Lord Jesus Christ—but the Vedic scriptures speak of many, both single and married. Marriage and sex, say the Vedas, are not lowly or bad in themselves even though people may make bad use of them. Lord Krishna even says that He is present in sex that follows religious principles:

"I am the strength of the strong, devoid of passion and desire. I am sex life which is not contrary to religious principles, O lord of the Bharatas [Arjuna]." —Bhagavad-gita As It Is, 7.11

Sri Nityananda Prabhu and Sri Advaita Acarya both married and had children. Sri Vishnu is married to Srimati Laksmi. Lord Caitanya was married but had no children. Lord Krishna married 16,108 women and fathered ten sons and some daughters with each of them, something only God could manage.

Banning the movie will not stop people from finding out what is in it, but a little Vedic knowledge would solve the whole problem. "So you think Jesus was married, do you? So what?"

By the way, if you want a little laugh, check out some of the errors in The Da Vinci Code at this site: http://entertainment.howstuffworks.com/davinci-code.htm

© Umapati Swami
June 4, 2006