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Recently, I’ve been coming across some passionate Hindus on social media who are convinced that Vaiṣṇava institutions such as ISKCON are teaching an “Abrahamic” form of Hinduism, largely due to their emphasis on monotheism. They claim that Hinduism, in allowing plurality of beliefs, was also inherently polytheistic, and that any assertion of a supreme deity was equivalent to an imperial, Abrahamic imposition on Hinduism. Their words carry an air of indignation, resignation, and of wanting to check the influence of such corrupting ideas.

I want to reproduce some of what I’ve seen below:

“ISKCON cult of Krishna worshippers basically turned into a monotheistic Abrahamic religion 😹😹😹😭”

“However, many Hindus nowadays are turning Hinduism into a Monotheistic faith, that resembles the likes of Abrahamic Faiths.”

“Of all labels, monotheism is the least fitting on Hinduism(monotheism as defined by abrahamic standards). hindus who are adamant to be considered monotheist are insecure and illiterate on hinduism.”

These are, of course, barely a drop in the ocean of what seems to be a widespread conviction amongst many Hindus.

For the sake of keeping this article short, I want to define my terms and state that by “Hindu” I mean the religious and spiritual traditions that are based on Vedāntic texts, such as the four Vedas, the Upaniṣads, the Purāṇas and the Itihāsas (histories). Going forward, I’ll call these Vedāntic religions, as my dislike for the term “Hindu” warrants another article.

Far from the claim that monotheism is an Abrahamic influence on Vedāntic traditions, I would argue that Vedāntic-monotheism is not only far more ancient than the Abrahamic religions, but also far more developed than the Abrahamic religions. In another article perhaps I’ll discuss how even pantheism, polytheism, etc. are also far more developed in Vedāntic traditions than in other polytheistic, pantheistic traditions.

First, I want to explain what it means for a God to truly be Supreme. Then, I’ll provide evidence of such a Supreme God (capital G) in the presence of other gods (lowercase g) across various Vedāntic texts. Thirdly, I want to showcase the purposeful use of terminology and the depth of theology in the terms used to describe the Supreme in Vedāntic texts. Lastly, I want to demonstrate how Vedāntic monotheism, specifically Vaiṣṇava monotheism, is unparalleled in all of history, going far beyond what any other tradition has to offer. No other religious system, including the Abrahamic traditions, comes close to the sheer aesthetic beauty and depth to which the Vaiṣṇava traditions develop monotheism.

What does it mean for a God to be Supreme?

I often ask people if they believe in God. Some say they do, and to them I ask, “why?” Their response is often along the lines of, “There’s so much complexity and beauty in the world, how can someone not have designed all of it?”

There’s no good or bad argument for belief in God (provided the belief is helpful). However, an intelligent designer is not necessarily a Supreme God, since the presence of design only entails that the designer exists. Design does not entail that the designer be a Supreme Godhead, or even be more complex than the design itself. A Supreme Godhead has unique characteristics that cannot be attributed to any other being.

A God is Supreme when He is the source of everything, including existence itself. He is not simply the intelligent designer of complex phenomena, but the reason why existence exists at all. In other words, if God doesn’t exist, nothing can exist. He is the cause of all causes, the unmoved mover, and all that exists is in one sense that Supreme God, since nothing apart from Him exists. One may ask why a male gender is ascribed to such a being, but we can discuss this in another article.

This idea is well expressed in the arguments for the existence of God that arise from contemplations of contingency, i.e. dependence. Such arguments are found across traditions in the world that believe in a Supreme God, in their various forms. A quick summary of such an argument is:

  • If something exists, say an iPhone or a table, is there anything about that object that necessitates its own existence? In other words, is it a necessity that the iPhone exist the way it does, or is it also possible for the iPhone to not exist?
  • We would argue that there is nothing about an iPhone that necessitates its own existence. Rather, we know for a fact that it was created in a factory, and thus its existence depended upon the factory, i.e. it has contingent existence.
  • Does the factory have any necessary existence? Clearly, it does not.
  • In this way, we can work backwards and conclude that there is nothing in this world that necessarily explains why it must exist the way it is.
  • However, if this were to be accepted, then nothing at all should exist! We’d form an infinite chain of dependent objects, and infinities don’t end. If such an infinite dependency were to exist, then nothing in the world would exist.
  • But since contingent objects, such as iPhones and this universe, do exist, there must exist something that doesn’t depend on something else for its existence.
  • This “thing” is the original cause, that which necessarily must exist.

Arguments from contingency do well to point to an original, necessary being that doesn’t depend on anything else for its existence. However, they cannot be used to argue for what the nature of that necessary being must be. Historically, many arguments have been put forth to convert a necessary being into a God with a personality, or further into a Christian God, a Muslim God, etc. For instance:

  • If the necessary “thing” is the source of all that exists, it must have personality, since the creation has personality.
  • It must also have supreme intelligence.
  • Since nothing else exists, it must have supreme agency, and agency entails a mind, consciousness, etc.

Nevertheless, a Supreme God fits perfectly as a necessary being, as God by definition is the being due to whom existence itself exists, and hence is the cause of the existence of all other things. While it may be difficult to prove ex nihilo that a Supreme God must exist using argumentation alone, revelation of the existence of a Supreme God who is the cause of all causes easily solves this issue.

Does Scripture Speak of a Supreme God?

Ignorant and unresearched Hindus may find it borderline conspiratorial that all of the major Vedāntic texts speak very clearly and consistently about a Supreme God.

What is especially interesting is that the Vedāntic traditions define the Supreme Lord with very distinct and consistent features:

  • The Lord is referred to as janmādy asya yataḥ (He from whom the universe arises, within whom it is maintained, and into whom it is destroyed).
  • The cause of all causes (sarva-kāraṇa-kāraṇam).
  • He due to whom all of existence exists (Viṣṇu Sahasranāma).
  • He who creates, maintains and destroys all that exists, and yet remains throughout (yaḥ tasya pare ‘bhivirājate vibhuḥ).
  • He who is the source of all that exists (ahaṁ sarvasya prabhavo mattaḥ sarvaṁ pravartate).

I want to stress that there are so many such proclamations that if I were to recite all of them, it would take me at least 3 hours. There are countless verses across śāstra that describe very precisely the existence and characteristics of the Supreme Lord.

Ṛg Veda (1.22.20)

oṃ tad viṣṇoḥ paramaṃ padaṃ sadā paśyanti sūrayaḥ |
divīva cakṣurātatam ||

Translation The wise and enlightened seers constantly behold that supreme abode of Viṣṇu, like an eye fixed steadily in the heavens.

Although the import of this text is quite deep, poetic and interesting, I won’t elaborate too much here since the meaning of the text is very clear as far as our topic at hand is concerned.

Puruṣa Sūkta

sahasra-śīrṣā puruṣaḥ sahasrākṣaḥ sahasrapāt |
sa bhūmiṃ viśvato vṛtvātyatiṣṭhad-daśāṅgulam ||

Translation The Puruṣa has a thousand heads, a thousand eyes, and a thousand feet. Pervading the entire universe on all sides, He yet exists beyond it by a distance of ten fingers.

In Vedic Sanskrit, sahasra literally means “thousand,” but it is used here to represent infinity or limitlessness. It suggests that all heads, eyes, and feet in existence actually belong to the one Cosmic Being. The verse establishes two crucial aspects of the Divine. By “pervading the earth,” the Puruṣa is immanent (present in everything). By “standing beyond it by ten fingers,” He is transcendent (existing beyond the physical world).

Daśāṅgulam is a famous symbolic measurement. It often represents the heart (the seat of the soul) or simply signifies that no matter how vast the universe is, the Divine source is always greater and remains distinct from its creation.

Even Western academia (which holds non-traditional views on the development of Vedic thought) contends that this is one of the oldest and earliest signs of monotheism in the Vedic traditions. The puruṣa-sūkta is found in all of the Vedas, and the Ṛg Veda is dated conservatively to at least 1500 BCE, far preceding Christianity, Islam, and other forms of developed religious thought as far as documented evidence goes.

Further to this, in presenting the oneness and difference of the Lord and the world, it is presenting a very advanced understanding of monotheism. Theism can be graded as follows:

  • There is no god (atheism)
  • There are some gods (polytheism)
  • There is one Supreme only (monotheism)
  • There is only God (oneness-and-difference)

The puruṣa-sūkta thus mirrors the teachings of Kṛṣṇa in the Bhagavad-gītā (9.4-5) by showing how the Lord is in this world, beyond this world, and also different from the world.

Śvetāśvatara Upaniṣad 6.7–8

tam īśvarāṇāṁ paramaṁ maheśvaraṁ
taṁ devatānāṁ paramaṁ ca daivatam
patiṁ patīnāṁ paramaṁ parastād
vidāma devaṁ bhuvaneśam īḍyam
na tasya kāryaṁ karaṇaṁ ca vidyate
na tat-samaś cābhyadhikaś ca dṛśyate
parāsya śaktir vividhaiva śrūyate
svābhāvikī jñāna-bala-kriyā ca

Translation
“The Supreme Lord is the controller of all other controllers, and He is the greatest of all the diverse planetary leaders. Everyone is under His control. All entities are delegated with particular power only by the Supreme Lord; they are not supreme themselves. He is also worshipable by all demigods and is the supreme director of all directors. Therefore, He is transcendental to all kinds of material leaders and controllers and is worshipable by all. There is no one greater than Him, and He is the supreme cause of all causes.

“He does not possess a bodily form like that of an ordinary living entity. There is no difference between His body and His soul. He is absolute. All His senses are transcendental. Any one of His senses can perform the action of any other sense. Therefore, no one is greater than Him or equal to Him. His potencies are multifarious, and thus His deeds are automatically performed as a natural sequence.”

In these two beautiful verses in the triṣṭubh meter we find repeated assertions of the existence of a Supreme divinity amongst other divinities, a Supreme controller amongst other controllers, etc. Further still, we find that the Supreme divinity is described as having multifarious energies, such as the ability to create, to have strength and to have knowledge, i.e. the Supreme Divinity is inherently variegated, not a monistic monolith of consciousness.

Īśopaniṣad

oṁ pūrṇam adaḥ pūrṇam idaṁ
pūrṇāt pūrṇam udacyate
pūrṇasya pūrṇam ādāya
pūrṇam evāvaśiṣyate

Translation The Personality of Godhead is perfect and complete, and because He is completely perfect, all emanations from Him, such as this phenomenal world, are perfectly equipped as complete wholes. Whatever is produced of the Complete Whole is also complete in itself. Because He is the Complete Whole, even though so many complete units emanate from Him, He remains the complete balance. (Invocation of the Īśopaniṣad)

Often celebrated for being one of the first definitions of infinity in history, the Hindus who decry genuine expressions of Vedāntic-monotheism as “Abrahamic” are the same as those who rejoice at the greatness of their supposed culture in having made such great advancements in “mathematics”. In reality, of course, the Īśopaniṣad (which literally means “sitting near the Lord”) is not a textbook on mathematics or philosophy, but rather a beautiful instruction on how to know and come closer to the Supreme Lord of all that is. This Supreme Lord is glorified as pūrṇa, such that we may reflect on His Completeness as the source while receiving the upcoming mantras in the Īśopaniṣad:

īśāvāsyam idaḿ sarvaṁ
yat kiñca jagatyāṁ jagat
tena tyaktena bhuñjīthā
mā gṛdhaḥ kasya svid dhanam

Translation Everything animate or inanimate that is within the universe is controlled and owned by the Lord. One should therefore accept only those things necessary for himself, which are set aside as his quota, and one should not accept other things, knowing well to whom they belong. (Īśopaniṣad Mantra 1)

The depth of this verse relies on the īśa being the Supreme, otherwise the remaining assertion doesn’t work. Everything animate and inanimate cannot be under the control of a non-Supreme entity, since that entity would be a part of the set of animate and inanimate entities.

Bhagavad-gītā

There are too many texts in the Gītā that showcase the absolute Supremacy of Kṛṣṇa. Hence I will only quote a few here:

BG 10.8
ahaṁ sarvasya prabhavo
mattaḥ sarvaṁ pravartate
iti matvā bhajante māṁ
budhā bhāva-samanvitāḥ\

I am the source of all spiritual and material worlds. Everything emanates from Me. The wise who perfectly know this engage in My devotional service and worship Me with all their hearts.

In fact, since we are quoting Bhaktivedānta Svāmī’s translations here, let me also quote his commentary to the above text, where he quotes a galaxy of texts from various Vedas and Upaniṣads to establish the above conclusion:

In the Atharva Veda (Gopāla-tāpanī Upaniṣad 1.24) it is said, yo brahmāṇaṁ vidadhāti pūrvaṁ yo vai vedāṁś ca gāpayati sma kṛṣṇaḥ: “It was Kṛṣṇa who in the beginning instructed Brahmā in Vedic knowledge and who disseminated Vedic knowledge in the past.” Then again the Nārāyaṇa Upaniṣad (1) says, atha puruṣo ha vai nārāyaṇo ’kāmayata prajāḥ sṛjeyeti: “Then the Supreme Personality Nārāyaṇa desired to create living entities.” The Upaniṣad continues, nārāyaṇād brahmā jāyate, nārāyaṇād prajāpatiḥ prajāyate, nārāyaṇād indro jāyate, nārāyaṇād aṣṭau vasavo jāyante, nārāyaṇād ekādaśa rudrā jāyante, nārāyaṇād dvādaśādityāḥ: “From Nārāyaṇa, Brahmā is born, and from Nārāyaṇa the patriarchs are also born. From Nārāyaṇa, Indra is born, from Nārāyaṇa the eight Vasus are born, from Nārāyaṇa the eleven Rudras are born, from Nārāyaṇa the twelve Ādityas are born.” This Nārāyaṇa is an expansion of Kṛṣṇa.

It is said in the same Vedas, brahmaṇyo devakī-putraḥ: “The son of Devakī, Kṛṣṇa, is the Supreme Personality.” (Nārāyaṇa Upaniṣad 4) Then it is said, eko vai nārāyaṇa āsīn na brahmā neśāno nāpo nāgni-somau neme dyāv-āpṛthivī na nakṣatrāṇi na sūryaḥ: “In the beginning of the creation there was only the Supreme Personality Nārāyaṇa. There was no Brahmā, no Śiva, no water, no fire, no moon, no heaven and earth, no stars in the sky, no sun.” (Mahā Upaniṣad 1.2) In the Mahā Upaniṣad it is also said that Lord Śiva was born from the forehead of the Supreme Lord. Thus the Vedas say that it is the Supreme Lord, the creator of Brahmā and Śiva, who is to be worshiped.

In the Mokṣa-dharma section of the Mahābhārata, Kṛṣṇa also says,

prajāpatiṁ ca rudraṁ cāpy aham eva sṛjāmi vai tau hi māṁ na vijānīto mama māyā-vimohitau

“The patriarchs, Śiva and others are created by Me, though they do not know that they are created by Me because they are deluded by My illusory energy.” In the Varāha Purāṇa it is also said,

nārāyaṇaḥ paro devas tasmāj jātaś caturmukhaḥ tasmād rudro ’bhavad devaḥ sa ca sarva-jñatāṁ gataḥ

“Nārāyaṇa is the Supreme Personality of Godhead, and from Him Brahmā was born, from whom Śiva was born.”

Lord Kṛṣṇa is the source of all generations, and He is called the most efficient cause of everything. He says, “Because everything is born of Me, I am the original source of all. Everything is under Me; no one is above Me.” There is no supreme controller other than Kṛṣṇa. One who understands Kṛṣṇa in such a way from a bona fide spiritual master, with references from Vedic literature, engages all his energy in Kṛṣṇa consciousness and becomes a truly learned man. In comparison to him, all others, who do not know Kṛṣṇa properly, are but fools. Only a fool would consider Kṛṣṇa to be an ordinary man.

Viṣṇu Sahasranāma

The entirety of the Viṣṇu Sahasranāma is centered on Viṣṇu being the Supreme. Śrī Bhakti Vikāsa Svāmī has a large and elaborate YouTube series on the Viṣṇu Sahasranāma names, in which he describes what each name means.

Scripture and the conceptual sophistication of divine supremacy

Please read Part 2.