Aatma

Atma simply means one's true Self. This is the root or fundamental entity of anything or any being that is eternal, unchangeable, unmodifiable and so on. Atma can mean different things depending upon the context it is used. For living beings like us, atma means the soul about which Shri Krishna explains in the Gita using the following verses:

For the soul there is neither birth nor death at any time. He has not come into being, does not come into being, and will not come into being. He is unborn, eternal, ever-existing and primeval. He is not slain when the body is slain. [BG - 2.20]

The soul can never be cut to pieces by any weapon, nor burned by fire, nor moistened by water, nor withered by the wind. [BG - 2.23]

But atma can even mean Brahman or God also as He is the soul of everything. So when it is said only the atma was there in the beginning, atma there means God:

ātmā vā idameka evāgra āsīt [Ait. Up -1]
- Atma alone was there in the beginning.

Jivatma

Atma which is quality-less and attribute-less when gets combined with prakruti, forms different kinds of senses (both subtle and gross) and gets different material natures. This combination of atma and qualities arising from prakruti is called as jivatma.

apareyam itas tv anyāṁ prakṛtiṁ viddhi me parām
jīva-bhūtāṁ mahā-bāho yayedaṁ dhāryate jagat [BG - 7.5]

Meaning
Besides these (insentient matter), O mighty-armed Arjuna, there is another, superior energy of Mine, which comprises the living entities who are exploiting the resources of this material, inferior nature.

It is the jivatma which resides in the physical body and in many other subtle bodies after casting off of the gross one. Jivatma or the jivas are sentient and eternal energy fragments of God:

mamaivāṁśo jīva-loke jīva-bhūtaḥ sanātanaḥ
manaḥ-ṣaṣṭhānīndriyāṇi prakṛti-sthāni karṣati [BG - 15.7]

Meaning
The living entities in this conditioned world are My eternal fragmental parts. Due to conditioned life, they are struggling very hard with the six senses, which include the mind.

Paramatma

Paramatma means supreme soul. If the self of the body is the soul, then Parmatma is the self of the soul. That is, the soul of the soul is the supreme soul:

ānandaṁ paramātmānam ātma-sthaṁ [SB - 11.26.1]
- Paramatma is the reservoir of all pleasure situated within the soul of every living being.

God basically has three forms or modes. Brahman, Paramatma and Bhagavan:

vadanti tat tattva-vidas tattvaṁ yaj jñānam advayam
brahmeti paramātmeti bhagavān iti śabdyate [SB - 1.2.11]

Meaning
Learned transcendentalists who know the Absolute Truth call this nondual substance Brahman, Paramātmā or Bhagavān.

Among these three, in Barhman no attribute, no activity, no power is exhibited. Parmatma exhibits only few more powers and dwells in the heart or soul of every being. But in Bhagavan all power, all lila(pastimes) and all attributes are exhibited.

And the major difference between Jivatma and Paramatma is that, Jivatma is mayadhin, that is, he is under the influence of maya. But Paramatma is mayadhis, that is, He is the Lord of maya. And both over the atma or jivatma and maya rules one Lord who is known as God, Bhagavan, parmatma, etc.

kṣaraṃ pradhānamamṛtākṣaraṃ haraḥ kṣarātmānāvīśate deva ekaḥ [Sve. Up - 1.10]
- Matter is perishable, immortal and imperishable is the soul. Both over the perishable and the soul rules one God.

God, being beyond space, is unimaginable. Justafter the creation of space or subtle energy, He expressed Himself as the FirstEnergetic Incarnation, which is known as Datta, Īśvara or Father of heaven orAllah or Yehawah.

He incarnated in a form so that the souls, who wereto be created later, could grasp Him. The three potencies of God namely,creation, maintenance and destruction of the world are expressed in the form ofthe three Divine Personalities namely, God Brahmā, God Viṣṇu and God Śivarespectively.

These three Divine Forms represent the three divinequalities called rajas, sattvam and tamas respectively.The word Datta simply means ‘given’ and it stands for the unimaginable God whohas ‘given’ Himself to souls in the form of the First Incarnation. Datta has noconnection with any specific religion. This eternal God Datta is the FirstEnergetic Form into which the unimaginable God has completely merged. He furthermerged with other Energetic Forms in the upper energetic worlds to form moreEnergetic Incarnations namely Brahmā, Viṣṇu and Śiva. The same God Datta alsomerges with selected human devotees on earth to become Human Incarnations ofGod.

Energetic Incarnations are relevant to souls in theenergetic worlds and the Human Incarnations are relevant to human beings. Thereis absolutely no difference between the unimaginable God and God Datta sincethe energetic form of the eternal God Datta is the permanent address of theunimaginable God.

The starting point is unimaginable God, who is oneonly (since two unimaginable items can’t exist) and existed before the creationin isolated state. Such unimaginable God (Parabrahman or Jehovah or Allah orGod indicated by silence of Buddha and Science or God negated by atheism)created some little imaginable space and the mechanism of this creation isunimaginable (Since in the world, we are aware of imaginable item creatingother imaginable item through imaginable mechanism.).

The space is not absolute ‘nothing’ since it issubtle energy. The unimaginable God created an energetic body with the help ofthis subtle energy occupying some space (A part of that original ‘some littlespace’ already created is used in the preparation of this energetic body. Otherremaining part of that original ‘some little space’ is used for the occupationby this energetic body created.). The unimaginable God merged with thisenergetic body and became the first energetic incarnation called as Datta orEshwara or Hiranyagarbha or Narayana or Sadashiva or Father of heaven.

The word Datta does not belong to any religionsince it means only ‘given’ (unimaginable God is given in imaginable form tothe future souls) and hence, Datta Swami is fascinated to use this word. Shankaraused the word ‘Eshwara’. Ramanuja and Madhva called this Datta as ‘Narayana’since Narayana is the name of God in the present time in which the world ismaintained by God. Other religions in the world called Datta as Father ofheaven.

After this, further creation was done by Datta.Datta is the unimaginable God mediated with this first energetic form and thecreation is always done by the unimaginable God viewed through this medium only.Datta has no end since the unimaginable God will never separate from Datta.Datta created the five elements (including creation of further space) fromwhich the plants were generated and from plants the food is prepared in theform of grains, fruits etc. From this food, the soul (awareness) is generated.

The energetic beings like angels (souls inenergetic bodies) exist in the upper worlds whereas human beings (souls inhuman bodies made of matter and energy) with materialised bodies exist onearth. God as Datta entered some energetic and human beings and identifiedHimself with them to become energetic or human incarnations. Even the humanbeing on this earth becomes energetic being since the soul from human bodyenters energetic body after death and goes to the upper worlds. The subtleenergy, originally created by unimaginable God is inert energy, called asMuulaprakruti from which matter and awareness were also generated by itsmodifications. Upper worlds are made of inert energy only, which along withenergetic beings are invisible to human beings on the earth due to will of Godhaving unimaginable power.

[The unimaginable God is the creator of every itemof the world and knows everything even though He is not awareness. He burnseverything in the end even though He is not the fire. He does everythingsince He is the creator of everything in this world. Such unimaginable Godbecame Datta or God given to the souls as imaginable form by merging with thefirst created energetic form or Lord (after creating space or subtle energy orthe root material of creation called as Mula prakruti. Hence, whenever youstart with the first energetic incarnation or Lord, the Mula prakruti co-existsas the material cause of further creation. Hence, the unimaginable God beforecreation is in unimaginable absolute plane whereas the Lord is always in therelative plane doing further creation using Mula prakruti.

Shankara refers the unimaginable God in absoluteplane before the creation of even the space or Mula prakruti. Ramanuja andMadhva always refer to the Lord, Who exists along with already created Mulaprakruti.). Such Lord Datta(Father of Heaven) is eternal since the unimaginableGod will never leave this first energetic incarnation called as Father ofheaven or Datta or Ishwara or Hiranyagarbha or Narayana or Sadashiva.

When the human incarnation(like Rama, Krishna,Jesus, Mohammad, Buddha, Shri Datta Swami etc) is formed, the unimaginable Goddoes not enter the human form directly. He enters the human form as Datta onlyto merge with it so that the merged human form becomes the human incarnation.Here, the medium of Datta (inert energy) is similar to the medium of humanincarnation (inert energy along with inert matter. Since the inert matter isanother form of inert energy, the inert matter can be also taken as the inertenergy. Not only the inert matter, but the awareness is also a special workform of inert energy only. Hence, the medium of Datta containing awarenessand inert energy is similar to the medium of human incarnation, which containsawareness, inert energy and inert matter).]

The energy of the body of the first incarnation isonly a part of cosmic energy and it is the same as the cosmic energy inqualitative sense and not in quantitative sense. The unimaginable God presentin the first energetic incarnation created further cosmic energy, which isqualitatively the same as that of the energetic body of Datta, but, differentin quantitative sense. The quantity of energy of the energetic body of Dattais very less compared to the quantity of cosmic energy. But, the littleenergy of the energetic body of Datta is omnipotent since the unimaginable Godmerged with Datta.

Adishakti is the entire cosmic energy, but, theGopika( a female closest devotee of God) is created by the same unimaginableGod representing this entire cosmic energy. Every human being is amini-representative model of Adishakti only like Gopika since the body and thesoul are modification of the cosmic energy only. The energetic body of Datta ishaving relative awareness (created by the modification of inert energy) withwhich the unimaginable awareness or unimaginable God is merged. The awarenessin the body of representative model of Adishakti (Gopika or any human being) isalso relative without unimaginable awareness, which is the soul.

The difference between Gopika andordinary soul is that Gopika is the real devotee of God and has the full graceof God on her. Such a real devotee of God becomes the master of God and hence,is praised as the divine Adishakti.

The first energetic incarnation(Eshwara or Datta) is again absorbed in three energetic forms called Brahma,Vishnu and Shiva to make them God Brahma, God Vishnu and God Shivarespectively. The first energetic incarnation is called as Datta because Datta meansthe first energetic form through which unimaginable God is donated to the soulsin energetic bodies in the upper world. Datta is also the first energeticincarnation that is introduced to humanity also because rarely for a very shorttime Datta appears to human devotees also.

Datta, the first energetic incarnation in humanform, is also called as Divine Father by Christianity. Islam takes this firstenergetic incarnation in formless lump of energy called as Allah. Christianityalso accepts this formless energy as Holy Spirit. In the Veda also thisformless first energetic incarnation appeared to angels in the name Yaksha orBrahma, for the sake of which, the king of angels (Indra) did penance forthousand years. In view of the energy being close medium of unimaginable God,this Yaksha is also told as Uma, who is very closely associated to unimaginableGod called as Shiva.

You need not doubt that the unimaginable God inthis lump or human form of inert energy has inert energetic medium only withoutawareness since nervous system (matter) was not yet created by the time ofexpression of Datta (Divine Father) or Yaksha (Uma or Holy spirit). The reasonis that the unimaginable God in the inert medium develops awareness by Hisunimaginable power.

If you analyze sharply, awareness is not an entitylike house, tree etc. It is only a specific mode of work and the work itself isa specific form of energy. Other modes of work are talking, walking, lookingetc. Awareness means just the process of knowing only and is not an entity tobe called as God. Hence, we can say that the formless energy or energy in humanform is not inert due to the presence of unimaginable God, who can do anythingincluding the process of knowing or awareness due to His unimaginable nature.

Therefore, Datta in Hinduism or Divine Fathercalled as Jehovah in Christianity (first energetic incarnation of unimaginableGod in human form) and Uma or Yaksha in Hinduism or Holy Spirit in Christianityor Allah in Islam is inert energy with form and without form respectively, whichare full of awareness due to the inner unimaginable God. Thus, the first type(Datta or Jehovah) and second type (Yaksha or Allah) are one and the same sincethe difference is only in having form or having no form only. This differenceis only a theoretical angle because form is not as real as the material cause.In this way, you can find the unity in Trinity, which is the Unity in thePhilosophies of Hinduism, Christianity and Islam.

Datta or Father of heaven isfirst energetic being and not human being.After merge with unimaginableGod, the first energetic being became Father of heaven or Datta. Adam and Eveare the first set of human beings created by God Datta or Father of heaven, whotold Adam and Eve not to touch a specific fruit. The Father of heaven testedthe human couple for its faith in Him.

Adiparaashakti is the Mulaprakruti created byunimaginable God as the first item of creation, but, the unimaginable Goddidn’t merge with Adiparaashakti. He merged only with the first energetic beingto become Datta or Father of heaven. Adi=first, Paraa=best and Shakti= power orenergy. This word can be used in different items based on its applied meaning.

1)

The first created subtle energy is first and bestenergy and hence, can be called as Adiparaashakti.

2)

The first created energetic being before the mergeof unimaginable God can be also called by this word because the first energeticbeing contains both awareness and inert energy. The word ‘paraa’ is fixed inawareness because awareness is the best created item. This first energeticbeing is first (Adi), contains awareness (paraa) and contains inert energy(Shakti) also.

3)

The first energetic being after merging withunimaginable God becomes God Datta or Father of Heaven, who is masculine form.God Datta is beyond gender and can appear as male Father, called as Eshwara andsimultaneously as female Mother, called as Adiparaashakti.

4)

Adiparaashakti can even mean the unimaginable God.Adi = it is the first item before the generation of second item. Paraa= it isbeyond the imaginable domain. Shakti = the unimaginable power. We should not beconfused with the words provided we are clear about the concept, which isbeyond the words. It is said that if you are caught in the forest of words, youwill not come out (Shabdajaala mahaaranyam…).

This concept is only to show that the Father ofheaven is beyond gender and also beyond any specific form. This means thatthe Father of Heaven (Datta) appears as Hiranyagarbha or Narayana or Sadashivaor Adiparaashakti or any form of ultimate God of any religion. The unimaginableGod is beyond gender and beyond any specific form looking in the form andgender as desired by the devotees. By this, the Father of heaven getsuniversality of all world religions and all sub-religions in a religion (likevarious divine forms of sub-religions of which Shakteya is one sub-religion inHinduism). Shankara brought unity in all the sub-religions like Shaiva,Vaishnava, Shaakteya, Gaanapatya, Skaanda and Saura having Shiva, Vishnu,Adiparaashakti, Ganapati, Skanda and Surya as the main deities in Hinduism. Hebrought unity in all the divine forms due to presence of same unimaginable Godin all those forms. In fact, all these forms appear simultaneously asdifferent forms of the same form, called as the first energetic incarnation,due to the unimaginable power of unimaginable God (Parabrahman) merged with thefirst energetic incarnation. It is just like the same photo of one form of Godlooking as different form of God by seeing in a different angle!

If you take Adiparaashakti as energetic being (notmerged with unimaginable God), She represents also the creation as productform. If you take her in the causal form, She can be the non-mediatedunimaginable God directly or God Datta looking as Divine female form, which ismediated unimaginable God. If you take her in product form, she is thecreation. In this way, Vedanta-line speaking about God Datta resulting fromParabrahman (unimaginable God) and the Shakteya-line speaking aboutAdiparaashakti are not at all different. In both the forms, the sameunimaginable God exists. Hence, whenever you use the word Adiparaashakti, youshall be cautious about your intention i.e., whether you like to mean the causeof the creation or the creation (product) itself.

1)

The first energetic incarnation, called as Dattameaning that the unimaginable God is given to the world through the expressedform, is universal satisfying all the religions in this world. Just like Yousee a photo (developed by a special photographic technology) with differentdivine forms through different angles, Datta is seen as different divine formsfrom the angles of various religions by the corresponding devotees due to theunimaginable power of unimaginable God existing in Datta in totally mergedstate.

2)

He looks as God Brahma, God Vishnu, God Shiva,Goddess Adiparaashakti and as any divine form of any specific religion in theworld. Hence, not only unity in the unimaginable God exists, but also, theunity in various forms of imaginable mediated God also exists due to theunimaginable power of unimaginable God existing in the mediated God. Theform, dress etc., appear as per the liking of the devotees of any religion.Universality is the main aspect of the policy of God since all the souls havingdifferent tastes are His issues only.

3)

There is no difference betweenunimaginable God and Datta because the merge is not only homogenous but alsoeternal. Dattamay leave the human incarnation at any time if the human being componentbecomes egoistic, but, unimaginable God will never leave Datta at anytime infuture. Due to this oneness, unimaginable God indicated by ‘that’ (tat)and Datta indicated by ‘He’ (Sah) are used as alternative wordsin wishing the creation of the world in the Veda as —‘That wished (tadaikshata)’and ‘He wished (sa iikshaam chakre)’. The word ‘that’ means unimaginableGod, who is beyond gender. The word ‘He’ means Datta in masculine gender eventhough He can appear in any gender due to His unimaginable power.

The unimaginable God is beyond space and time andHe remains unimaginable due to this reason only. From the unimaginable God,imaginable space etc., were generated, which form this entire imaginable world.In the worldly logic, there is no single example of generation of imaginableitem from unimaginable item because in the imaginable domain (world), there isno unimaginable item at all — like this, if one realizes, let him belong toEastern religion or Western religion, such a person is omniscient. This is Mylogical conclusion.

The unimaginable God created subtle energy or spaceso that an energetic body is created from subtle energy and remaining subtleenergy is in the form of space, which is occupied by the created energetic bodyto be called as absolute space since such first energetic body will neverdisappear. The unimaginable God enters this first energetic body called asfirst energetic incarnation or Eshwara or Lord or Father of heaven(Allah/Narayana/Yahewah etc) called as Datta meaning that the unimaginable Godis ‘given’ to the world for clear vision. Such incarnation is called asdescended God because the omnipotent unimaginable God can alone cross theunimaginable link between God and space to come down. This first energetic bodybound by space can’t cross this link to become ascended body. This firstenergetic incarnation enters other energetic bodies and human bodies to becomeenergetic and human incarnations respectively in future.

This Father of heaven merged by unimaginable Godcreates the five elements and souls gradually due to His unimaginable power,which form this entire world — like this, if one realizes, let him belong toEastern religion or Western religion, such a person is omniscient. This is Mylogical conclusion.

Neither the energy present in this form nor thisform is perishable and hence, this form is eternal like the unimaginable God.This indicates that there is no difference at all between Me and theunimaginable God (Parabrahman). You can say that I had birth (because Myenergetic form was created by unimaginable God) even though I am eternal likeunimaginable God.

The similarity is in present and future and past(non-existence of My energetic body with leftover single unimaginable God) willnever be repeated. If You think of repetition of the past time, it equals tothe unimaginable God committing suicide, which is the greatest sin as told byHim in the Veda (In suicide also, the soul doesn’t destroy itself and destroysits body only.). In the case of any other human being, body may be destroyed,but not the soul. In this case, body is never destroyed like the soul. Since Mydivine form alone looks like all other divine forms (just like a picture in thephoto looks like different pictures by special photography), You can treatevery divine form as eternal.

The first energetic incarnation along with mergedunimaginable God is the common item in every medium and thus, same God iscommon in all religions even though media differ. Hence, only one God exists inall religions. Religion is the path to please the same one God. Religionsdiffer due to the difference in the level, language, culture, etc., ofdifferent souls in different regions. The starting point or soul and endingpoint or God are same in every religion.Hinduism with many sub-religions isa mini representative model of world with various religions and in both(sub-religions of Hinduism and religions of world), we find internal unity inexternal diversity — like this, if one realizes, let him belong to Easternreligion or Western religion, such a person is omniscient. This is My logicalconclusion.

God, being beyond space, is unimaginable. Justafter the creation of space or subtle energy, He expressed Himself as the FirstEnergetic Incarnation, which is known as Datta, Īśvara or Father of heaven. Heincarnated in a form so that the souls, who were to be created later, couldgrasp Him. The three potencies of God namely, creation, maintenance anddestruction of the world are expressed in the form of the three DivinePersonalities namely, God Brahmā, God Viṣṇu and God Śiva respectively. Thesethree Divine Forms represent the three divine qualities called rajas, sattvamand tamas respectively. The word Datta simply means ‘given’ and itstands for the unimaginable God who has ‘given’ Himself to souls in the form ofthe First Incarnation. Datta has no connection with any specific religion. Thiseternal God Datta is the First Energetic Form into which the unimaginable Godhas completely merged. He further merged with other Energetic Forms in theupper energetic worlds to form more Energetic Incarnations namely Brahmā, Viṣṇuand Śiva. The same God Datta also merges with selected human devotees on earthto become Human Incarnations of God. Energetic Incarnations are relevant tosouls in the energetic worlds and the Human Incarnations are relevant to humanbeings. There is absolutely no difference between the unimaginable God and GodDatta since the energetic form of the eternal God Datta is the permanentaddress of the unimaginable God.

All the Incarnations of God are one and the same inthe sense that the same God Dattātreya (Datta) has merged into them. But morespecifically, the three Incarnations namely Shri Shirdi Sai Baba, Shri SatyaSai Baba, and the future Shri Prema Sai Baba are considered to be the Incarnationsof God Śiva. Here, God Datta is taken to be God Śiva. Shri Shirdi Sai Baba wasan Incarnation of God Śiva. Shri Satya Sai Baba was the Incarnation of God Śivaand Goddess Śakti. Śiva and Śakti together constitute the Divine Form calledArdhanārīśvara, which has the right half as God Śiva and left half as GoddessŚakti. The next Incarnation, Shri Prema Sai, will be the Incarnation of GoddessŚakti. As per the boon given by God Śiva and Goddess Śakti to sage Bharadvāja,these three Incarnations were to be born in the dynasty (gotram) of sageBharadvāja.

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