Hare Krsna, AGTSP,
There are many discrepancies between scriptures like:-
1. Hindu religion believes in reincarnation, while Christianity and Islam does not.
2. Islamic followers eat meat as if there is nothing wrong about it, while Hindu people find it sinful.
3. In some puranas, Vishnu is supreme, in some Shiva or Brahma or Ganesh are considered supreme God. Why did Vyasadeva wrote puranas in this way which could lead to conflicts among people and confuse people?
Why are such discrepancies? People's faith in scriptures go down seeing these differences and they end up believing that scriptures are man-made.
Replies
In addition to what Rashmi Mataji has said we have to understand that other demigods are described in scriptures are great which is contextual, but no scripture describes demigod as supreme above all.
Like in a particular state CM has highest power, but outside his state not much, so his powers are limited to his state. Similarly demigods. Scriptures never say demigods are unlimitedly supreme. Even in shiva purana etc. glories are given but Shiva is not called Supreme
It is only in Bhagavad Gita and Bhagavatam that Supreme personality of godhead is clearly described
Hare Krishna
Hare Krsna Prabhuji,
PAMHO.
You will agree taht everyone is not at the same level of intelligence or consciousness. Now someone who is studying (say) engineering need not be taught that 2 + 2 = 4, whereas a Class 2 student needs to be taught.
That same way, there are different levels of consciosness taht all living entities in the world are in at any given point of time. Depending on the level of consciousness, the teachings are given.
For example, followers of Kali and Shiva eat meat, as do followers of all the other religions of the world. In fact, even in Christianity, it is mentioned - Thou Shall Not Kill. That has been misinterpreted as Thou Shall Not Murder and followers of Christianity are happily eating meat.
There are 18 puranas - 6 in sattva guna, 6 are in rajo guna and 6 are in tamoguna. Again this is as per the level of consciousness of the person. There are enough scriptures and authorities by acharyas over various yugas to prove that Krsna is Supreme.
In fact, just yesterday, HH Bhanu Swamy Maharaj was asked in a lecture yesterday that if Krsna is Supreme, then what was the need to create so many demigods ? Maharaj replied that not every soul in the material world wants to go back to Godhead. Most people are interested in getting material gains, therefore the lord has created so many demigods to fulfill so many material desires of so many people.
Please do not get confused prabhu. Why faith goes down by seeing so many scriptures? Its like saying by seeing the book of calculus and the amount of practise it requires, people's faith in mathematics is going down. One reason it is so complicated is to bewilder people to weed out the sincere seeker from insincere souls. Dont we face obstacles in the material world prabhu? Has a traffic jam prompted you to give up your efforts to reach the airport to catch any flight prabhu? Dont you go sufficiently planned and with more determination to surmount the traffic and reach your goal? Then why for spirituality we all want the easiest, least resistant path? This is the highest goal, attaining it cannot be that easy na.
Please feel free to ask any further questions that you may have.
It is always better to ask your doubts and clear them than to keep them in the mind and not develop faith. We tell people to stop asking for doubts when the philosophy has been explained to them, still they find it difficult to accept. At taht stage, we tell them to take a rest from questioning and let time/ sadhana/ sadhu sanga teach them.
Haribol,
Best of luck,
Your servant,
Rashmi
Hare Krsna mataji,
Thanks for replying. Now, much of my confusion is clear.
Hare Krishna..
You are not supposed to get such doubts. You just have to accept them that way. Choose your preference and just follow that.
;-)
Regards,
Subash
Hare Krsna,
My obeisances to all devotees, guru and gauranga.
Subash prabhu,
The very first line of Vedanta-sutra (1.1.1) states, athato brahma jijnasa: Accepting something on faith is good but it shouldn't be like accepting and following blindly. There are so many questions, and the person who is actually intelligent should simply inquire about the supreme source of everything. Scriptures/other religions and traditions also come under the same umbrella as Supreme Personality of Godhead is everything. Every question is about him, his past times and his ways.
So, there is nothing wrong in getting doubts and getting it clarified as Rashmi mataji has already stated. Every question (no matter how silly it is) should be answered.
Yes, one has to choose a path towards Krsna but we also have to understand why things are the way they are. We cannot understand everything but we can to a degree use the intelligence in understanding few essential things. This will also provide us the confidence to discuss Krsna with other devotees as well as non-devotees.
Hare Krsna.
Hare Krishna,
Krishna dasa prabhu, thank you for your warm and humble words :)
Regards,
Subash