God's Enjoying - The Supreme Pleasure of the Absolute Truth
When people hear that God is the "supreme enjoyer," those conditioned by material life often project their own selfish, exploitative tendencies onto the Absolute Truth. In the material world, enjoyment usually means exploiting others for personal sense gratification, leading to suffering and eventual frustration. However, the Vedic literatures explain that God's enjoyment is completely transcendental. As the supreme reservoir of all pleasure, His enjoyment is absolute, pure, and actually creates the foundation for the happiness of all living entities. Śrīla Prabhupāda meticulously explains that the Supreme Personality of Godhead is eternally engaged in blissful pastimes, and that He expanded Himself into the innumerable living entities specifically to share this joy. By understanding the true nature of God's enjoyment—from His cosmic sporting to His intimate relationships in the spiritual sky—we can discover our own constitutional position and achieve the perfection of eternal happiness.
The Nature of Supreme Bliss
The Vedānta-sūtra establishes the fundamental nature of the Absolute Truth with the aphorism ānandamayo 'bhyāsāt: the Supreme is by nature joyful. Śrīla Prabhupāda explains that the Lord is not a static void, but a dynamic person who is eternally enjoying full, transcendental bliss through His internal potencies.
- In the Vedanta-sutra the Absolute Truth is said to be always enjoying the pleasure potency.
- Because the Lord's body is full of knowledge, He always enjoys transcendental bliss. Indeed, His very form is paramananda. This is confirmed in the Vedanta-sutra: anandamayo'bhyasat.
- Everything done by Him is ananda-cinmaya-rasa, full transcendental bliss. Thus Krsna factually enjoyed.
- The Lord is the cause of all causes. In other words, since there is nothing that caused Him, He is the original cause. Consequently He enjoys His own Self by manifesting His own internal potency.
The Purpose of the Living Entities
Why did God create the universe and the innumerable living beings? The answer is profound in its simplicity: for reciprocal enjoyment. Śrīla Prabhupāda clarifies that the living entities are meant to assist the Lord in His pastimes; we are not the enjoyers, but the enjoyed.
- God became many for His enjoyment, and thus our position is that of the enjoyed. That is our constitutional position and the purpose for our creation.
- God expanded Himself as the living entities for enjoyment, reciprocal, not that God's own enjoyment. When there is question of enjoyment, all the parties who participate in a particular type of enjoyment, they enjoy.
- Factually we are related to the Supreme Lord in service. The Supreme Lord is the supreme enjoyer, and we living entities are His servitors. We are created for His enjoyment.
- The infinitesimal living entities are not the enjoyers of Visnu, but they are enjoyed by Visnu. Only the greatest offender thinks that Visnu is enjoyed.
Enjoying Through Supreme Power and Fighting
The Lord's enjoyment is not limited to peaceful interactions; because He possesses all tendencies, He also enjoys the thrill of a fight. Śrīla Prabhupāda describes how the Lord eagerly engages in combat with powerful demons, experiencing the attacks as an exhilarating sporting match.
- It is natural that sometimes Lord Visnu wants to fight. Just as He has the tendencies to create, to enjoy, to be a friend, to accept a mother and father, and so on, He also has the tendency to fight.
- The Lord felt Hiranyaksa's striking on His body to be like flowers offered for worship. In other words, the Lord desired to fight in order to enjoy His transcendental bliss; therefore He enjoyed the attack.
- The Lord enjoyed the striking on His transcendental body, just like a fully grown-up father fighting with his child. Sometimes a father takes pleasure in having a mock fight with his small child.
- Because He (God) is all-powerful, He is not subject to the conditioned soul's arguments regarding His existence or nonexistence. He is pleased to protect His devotees by killing their enemies. He enjoys both the killing and the protecting.
Intimate Enjoyment with Devotees
While the Lord manages the cosmos and fights demons, His highest pleasure is found in intimate, loving exchanges with His pure devotees. Śrīla Prabhupāda beautifully illustrates how the Lord enjoys playing with His cowherd friends, joking with His queens, and dancing with the gopīs.
- The Lord enjoyed in the company of Lord Baladeva and the other cowherd boys and sometimes sat with them on the same stone slab. While sitting they ate simple food like rice, dal, vegetables, bread, and curd, which they had brought from their homes.
- The Lord enjoyed His pastimes, both in this world and in other worlds (higher planets), specifically in the association of the Yadu dynasty. At leisure hours offered by night, He enjoyed the friendship of conjugal love with women.
- Somewhere Lord Krsna was found enjoying the company of a particular wife by exchanging joking words with her. Somewhere else He was found engaged with His wife in religious ritualistic functions.
- The full-moon night of Asvina is called sarat-purnima. It appears from the statements of Srimad-Bhagavatam that Krsna had to wait another year for such a moon before enjoying the rasa dance with the gopis.
The Enjoyment of Dependence and Chastisement
Perhaps the most astonishing aspect of the Absolute Truth is His willingness to subordinate Himself to love. Śrīla Prabhupāda explains that the supreme controller derives His greatest happiness not from awe and reverence, but by becoming dependent on His devotees and relishing their affectionate chiding.
- Although the Lord is full with all energies and is thus self-sufficient, He enjoys transcendental pleasure by subordinating Himself to His unalloyed devotees.
- The Supreme Personality of Godhead becomes dependent on His devotee. The Lord is invincible, yet He is conquered by His pure devotee. He enjoys being dependent on His devotee, just as Krsna enjoyed being dependent on the mercy of mother Yasoda.
- Everyone worships the Supreme Lord with great reverence; therefore the Lord sometimes wants to enjoy the chastisement of His devotees. In this way the relationship eternally existing between the Lord and His devotees is fixed, just like the sky overhead.
- Only out of pure love does the subordinate lover of the Supreme Personality of Godhead chide Him. The Lord, enjoying this chiding, takes it very nicely. The exhibition of natural love makes such activities very enjoyable.
Perfecting Our Own Enjoyment
Because we are part and parcel of God, our desire for enjoyment is natural. However, Śrīla Prabhupāda concludes that trying to enjoy independently is the source of material bondage. The only way to achieve true happiness is to cooperate with the Lord and participate in His supreme enjoyment.
- Our enjoyment can be perfected when we participate in the enjoyment of God. There is no possibility of our enjoying separately on the bodily platform.
- If we participate in that eternal enjoyment with the Supreme Personality of Godhead, we become happy. We cannot become happy otherwise.
- Purusah purusam vrajet: when the living entity enters into the kingdom of God and cooperates with the Supreme Lord by giving Him enjoyment, he enjoys the same facility or the same amount of pleasure as the Supreme Personality of Godhead.
- A Krsna conscious person has no desire for any kind of self-enjoyment. He is always engaged for the enjoyment of the Supreme.
Conclusion
A deep and systematic study of the Vedic literatures completely purifies our understanding of the Absolute Truth, elevating God from a mere cosmic administrator to the supreme enjoyer of transcendental bliss. As Śrīla Prabhupāda repeatedly emphasizes through the Vedānta-sūtra, the Supreme Personality of Godhead is ānandamayo 'bhyāsāt—by His very nature, He is overflowing with joy. He has absolutely nothing to do; His only business is to enjoy. To expand this spiritual pleasure, the Lord manifested His internal potencies and expanded Himself into the innumerable living entities. Therefore, the constitutional position of the soul is not to be the enjoyer, but to be the enjoyed—to assist the Lord in His pastimes. The Lord’s capacity for enjoyment is infinite and beautifully variegated. He enjoys the tranquil beauty of the spiritual sky, the thrilling mock-battles with powerful demons like Hiraṇyākṣa, and the sweet, simple meals shared with His cowherd friends in the forests of Vṛndāvana. Most remarkably, the supreme, unconquerable Lord derives His greatest pleasure by stepping down from the throne of awe and reverence to become willingly conquered by the pure love of His devotees. He relishes being dependent on Mother Yaśodā and enjoys the loving chastisement of His intimate associates. Ultimately, the conditioned soul must realize that all attempts at independent, material sense gratification will inevitably end in frustration. Real happiness—the bliss we are desperately searching for—can only be achieved by re-entering our constitutional position. When we stop trying to imitate God and instead dedicate our lives entirely to giving Him enjoyment, we are immediately granted the facility to perfectly participate in the eternal, blissful pastimes of the Supreme Personality of Godhead.
Dive Deeper into Śrīla Prabhupāda's Vani
Śrīla Prabhupāda lives within his instructions. This article is a summary of the profound truths found in the Vaniquotes category God's Enjoying. We invite you to visit this link to study the complete compilation and experience Śrīla Prabhupāda's teachings in their direct, verbatim form.