Śrīla Bhakti Rakṣak Śrīdhar Dev-Goswāmī Mahārāj describes the eliminative, yet accommodating nature of progress.
The Absolute cannot admit any secondary position. He cannot tolerate that He will be second to someone, because He is absolute. He is not second to anyone, so no partnership is conceivable there. “I am such.” In logic we read, “as connotation increases, denotation decreases. When denotation increases, connotation decreases.” This religious conception is there everywhere.
muktānām api siddhānāṁ nārāyaṇa-parāyaṇaḥ
(Śrīmad Bhāgavatam, 6.14.5)
jñānibhyo ’pi mato ’dhikaḥ, karmibhyaś chādhiko yogī
(Śrīmad Bhagavad-gītā, 6.46)
yoginām api sarveṣāṁ mad-gatenāntar-ātmanā
śraddhāvān bhajate yo māṁ sa me yukta-tamo mataḥ
(Śrīmad Bhagavad-gītā, 6.47)
The gradual development of sraddhā: elimination and improvement. Improvement means elimination. Improvement means elimination, so those that are very particular about quality cannot mix with the mass, and hankering of mass qualification or capacity. They are always trying to go higher in an eliminative nature. They are ruthless. They are ruthless in their progressing, eliminating nature.
While Yudhiṣṭhir Mahārāj was making advancement in his mahāpraṣṭhān, Draupadī, Sahadev, and Nakul were all falling down, and asking why it is so: “We are so intimately connected with you Maharaj, and you are going up, while we fall down.” Carelessly Yudhiṣṭhir Mahārāj was going up, “Oh you had such defect, so you fell down.” One by one, Draupadī, Sahadev, Nakul, Arjuna, Bhīma. “Why I am falling down?” “You had such defect of this nature, so you fall down.” Without caring he is marching onward.
Should we mark that this is a type of selfishness? No. To advance towards truth, it cannot be so. Truth is distributed by Himself. Truth is not only wholesome, but it is also distributive, self-distributive in nature, so I am going only to enhance that. By serving Him I am going to help Him in His self distribution. It is universal. Apparently, in the worldly sense, in the external sense, it may be thought to be very narrowed, but it is more universal from the qualitative difference.
Eliminating stone, earth, and water we are going to ether, but ether is more extensive than the earth. Water is more extensive than the earth, then the air is more extensive, spacious than the water. In this way, the gross is being eliminated and we are approaching towards sukṣma, subtle. We are going from subtler to subtlest, and in one sense that is more accommodating. Svayaṁ Bhāgavan Kṛṣṇa, the whimsical, absolute good, is at the back of every form of truth, so approaching Him is outwardly eliminating, but inwardly accommodating. Hare Kṛṣṇa. Nitāi Gaura.
This post is a continuation of No Partnership.
Source
Spoken 16 January 1982