Akin to atheism
Visakha Devi Dasi: One morning, a few of us went with Prabhupada to the home of Dr. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, an elderly Indian scholar and a former president of India who, in his commentary on the Bhagavad-gita had written that it was not to the person Krishna to whom we should surrender but to “the unborn, beginningless, eternal who speaks through Krishna.” When he had heard this statement in 1966 at the first Hare Krishna asrama on Manhattan’s Lower East Side, Prabhupada had called Radhakrishnan an impersonalist, someone who thinks God’s form is material and beyond God is the formless, senseless energy of the Supreme Absolute Truth. In Radhakrishnan’s view, God was subordinate to that energy.
Impersonal philosophy, according to Prabhupada, was akin to atheism. In Bhagavad-gita Krishna says he is the Supreme Person. His body, mind, and self are spiritual, and everything and everyone is subordinate to him, including his all-pervading, effulgent energy, his white light. Krishna asks for surrender to him, the Supreme Person, not to his effulgence. To deny God’s form and personality was to deny God, his completeness.
Referring to Radhakrishnan, Prabhupada had spoken strongly, “This rascal commentator says, 'It is not to the person Krishna that we should offer obeisances but to the soul within Krishna.' Just see how ignorant he is! He does not know that for Krishna there is no such division between his self, or soul, and his body. This fool is rascal number one, and yet he has written a commentary on the Bhagavad-gita and is accepted as a scholar. And this nonsense is going on all over the world."
After a few minutes’ waits at Dr. Radhakrishnan’s home, a slight, short, bent old man with a cane in one hand and the other resting on the arm of a prim nurse, entered with shuffling steps. With his nurse’s help, he sat near Prabhupada, wordless. Prabhupada leaned forward and gently addressed the doctor, explaining how he was traveling widely to present the teachings of Bhagavad-gita As It Is throughout the world and receiving good reception. "People were hankering for this knowledge, taking it seriously and becoming devotees of Krishna," Prabhupada said. Prabhupada quoted Krishna in the Bhagavad-gita: “I am the source of all spiritual and material worlds. Everything emanates from Me. The wise who know this perfectly engage in My devotional service and worship Me with all their hearts.”
Krishna, Prabhupada went on, is a person. Not a person like us, for we are embodied souls; Krishna’s form is all spiritual. We could personally relate to him by serving him with love and devotion.
As Prabhupada spoke, Dr. Radhakrishnan raised his head and looked at Prabhupada attentively. Then, after just a few minutes, his nurse interrupted, “The doctor is tired now and must rest. He thanks you for kindly visiting him.” With his nurse’s help, Radhakrishnan stood and shuffled to a back room.
To me, an appeal, bright desperation amid much sorrow was in Dr. Radhakrishnan’s eyes. Inside the lonely prison of his body, something was alive and hungry. I felt his hunger, for I had been similarly hungry. But now, somehow or other, Prabhupada, unassuming and uncomplicated, was offering me nourishment, making Krishna’s presence known, making his culture accessible. And Prabhupada was offering his gift—Krishna—to others as widely as he could.