Live the Bhāgavatam · SB 3.27.22
Mukti· LiberationDevotion Needs Knowledge and Steady Detachment
“This devotional service has to be performed strongly in perfect knowledge and with transcendental vision. One must be strongly renounced and must engage in austerity and perform mystic yoga in order to be firmly fixed in self-absorption.”
What the purport teaches
- Devotional service in Kṛṣṇa consciousness should not rest on blind material emotion or mental invention. It must be performed with knowledge and vision of the Absolute Truth.
- Advancement in Kṛṣṇa consciousness is shown by proportionate detachment from material enjoyment. This renunciation should be strong, not temporary or artificial.
- Austerity and control of the senses and mind help one become fixed in devotional service. Through knowledge, one understands one’s constitutional relationship with the Superself and develops unshakable faith.
Try this today
Set aside one optional sense enjoyment today and use that time to study this teaching attentively.
Ask yourself
Is my devotional understanding helping me become less attracted to material enjoyment?
Carry the question through the day, then answer it in your own words before sleep.
The study points, practice and question are short summaries drawn from Śrīla Prabhupāda's translation and purport. Read the full purport to go deeper.