Bhagavad gita

[Satsangi]

1) I don't want to get into a debate about what is what but souls that are fully free in God and born out of freewill to help enlighten the world are avatars. Babaji Krishna is widely known and unmistakenly as a Avatar. Lihiri Mahasaya, Sri Yukteswar, and Paramahansa Yogananda are all Avatars as well. The lives they lived and the deep spiritual wisdom they exemplified are nothing but what an Avatar could exemplify. They are as bonafide as it gets because they are manifestations of pure God. God was the only thing that is expressed in their consciousness.

While I agree that the God is fully expressed in such free souls who come to the world for people's benefit, I clearly draw a line between the Avatar who is God Himself (e.g. Lord Krishna) manifested in such Saints and the Saints who are the body through which God is manifested (e.g. Sage Narada, Shukdevji etc)

Regards,

 

[Kriya Yogi]

While I agree that the God is fully expressed in such free souls who come to the world for people's benefit, I clearly draw a line between the Avatar who is God Himself (e.g. Lord Krishna) manifested in such Saints and the Saints who are the body through which God is manifested (e.g. Sage Narada, Shukdevji etc)

Regards,

You are correct not all Gurus or spiritual teachers are Avatars. Reason being is although some of them may have overcome the physical universe of Maya on this plane they may still have to overcome the astral and causal planes as well. Some still have karma to work out on this plane as well. It is said some experience samadhi but until they reach nirbikalpa samadhi they have not fully overcome their ego. Once a soul however becomes fully one with God and overcomes all three veils of ego the last being the ideational or causal plane they are then rightfully called Avatars. Krishna is not the only Avatar to bless this planet. Jesus Christ, a few others, and the three others I spoke of before are. As the fully enlightened Yogananda said Babaji is a Mahavatar (Great Avatar). Lihiri Mahasaya is a Yogavatar (Incarnation of Yoga). Swami Sri Yukteswargiri is a Jnanavatar (incarnation of wisdom). Yogananda is as well and later called Premavatar (incarnation of love). Others who are fully free have come to earth as well, but they are very rare. That is why Kriya Yoga and its reawakening and dispensation that started in the early 1800s was one of the most blessed times of our current earthly cycle. There were four avatars that incarnated for the spread of the enlightening technique of Kriya yoga and to inspire the world once again of our divine natures. To say Krishna is the only avatar to ever incarnate is like the christians saying Jesus is the only son of God. We all have the potential to be avatars.

 

[atmarama]

While I agree that the God is fully expressed in such free souls who come to the world for people's benefit, I clearly draw a line between the Avatar who is God Himself (e.g. Lord Krishna) manifested in such Saints and the Saints who are the body through which God is manifested (e.g. Sage Narada, Shukdevji etc)

Regards,

Agreed. Avatar means God directly - Self realized souls are just that, jiva's(individual living entities) who have realized their constitutional position as servants of the supreme Lord, and are qualified therefore to impart knowledge unto others ie Ramanujacharya, Madhvacharya, Jesus Christ etc etc... Qualitatively one, but quantitively different. Lord Krishna (God Himself) says in Gita 2.12:

na tv evaham jatu nasam
na tvam neme janadhipah
na caiva na bhavisyamah
sarve vayam atah param

"Never was there a time when I did not exist, nor you, nor all these kings; nor in the future shall any of us cease to be."

Thereby indicating that we are eternally individual living entities, even while we are part and parcel of the Lord ie inconceivable simultaneous oneness and difference