Question: I would like you to clarify your concept of God. You jump from the Upanishads to the Bhagavad-Gita and over to the New Testament with this unifying element of God. But it seems to me that the Judeo-Christian concept of a God that is both personal and infinite is a little different from the idea of God as the Absolute, the One, the Supreme Being who is obviously infinite but, it seems to me, impersonal. Could you please clarify your concept?

Sri Chinmoy: Everybody has to define God in his own way. God is Personal. God is Impersonal. God is everything. Now, if somebody says that God is this and He cannot be something else, then you and I will naturally contradict him. What right has he to say that God is only this? He may say that God is Personal. No. I have experienced that God is Impersonal. Now, somebody will say that God is infinite Light. A third person will say that God is infinite Power or Energy. God, being the Infinite, has given us the opportunity to realise Him in infinite ways. Each one is right in his own way, on the strength of his realisation. So some of the spiritual Masters, including the Christ, say that God is a Personal Being, the Father. All right. Now, let us take Him as the Father, Divine Father, All-pervading Father. There, immediately you may think of Him as Personal.

Sri Ramakrishna used to call Him Mahakali, Mother Kali. In this case, He was seen as a personal Deity, or Transcendental Mother. Again, there are some spiritual Masters who did not meditate on God’s personal Aspect in this way. They meditated on God in His Impersonal Aspect, as the Infinite expanse of water or Light. They are also right. You, as a seeker, have to feel which aspect of God is best suited to you. Perhaps you don’t want to be satisfied with only one aspect of God. You want to realise God in various aspects. You want God the Personal, God the Impersonal, God the infinite Light, God the infinite Peace, Bliss and all that. So God, being All-Compassionate, is bound to fulfil your aspiration in that way too.

So, in our spiritual life, each seeker has to feel the necessity of realising God in his own way. In that way he will be most convinced and he will be most fulfilled. God defies all definition, but again each individual, when he meditates or prays to God, feels that there is a way for him to realise God. When he sees God in one aspect, he feels, “Oh, it is more than enough for me!” The Ganges runs all the way from the Himalayas, yet, at any one particular point, if you taste just a tiny drop of the Ganges, you can feel that you are drinking the water of the Ganges. So, in the spiritual life also, when you think of infinite Light or Peace or Bliss flowing down, you also feel that just an iota of this Peace, Light and Bliss is fulfilling you; at that time, God’s Impersonal Aspect may not or need not bother your aspiring soul. Right now, many people are afraid, if I may say, of the Impersonal Aspect of God. They want God the Personal. They want to see God, talk to God face to face, as a human divine Being. But again, there are some who want only God as an infinite expanse of Light, Peace and Bliss. They are perfectly right in their aspiration and when they realise God in that aspect, their realisation will be equally important and fulfilling.