Krishna gave to Arjuna, at the latter's request, a vision of his true Self separate from, and infinitely higher than, the humble and illusive garb of his incarnation. And it was to him "as if in the heavens the lustre of a thousand suns burst forth all at once." And what a vision! Gazing upon it, Arjuna exclaims, "O God! I see within your body the gods, as also all the groups of various being; and the lord Brahm seated on his lotus seat, and all the sages and celestial snakes. I see you, who are of countless forms, possessed of many arms, stomachs, mouths, and eyes on all sides. And, O Lord of the Universe, O you of all forms! I do not see your end, middle, or beginning.... I believe you to be the eternal being. I see you void of beginning, middle, or end--of infinite power, of unnumbered arms, and having the sun and the moon for eyes, and having a mouth like a blazing fire and heating the universe with your radiance. For this space between heaven and earth and all the quarters are pervaded by you alone. Looking at this wonderful and terrible form of yours, O high-souled one! the three worlds are affrighted. For here these groups of gods are entering into you.... Our principal warriors, also, are rapidly entering your mouths, fearful and horrific by reason of your jaws. And some with their heads smashed are seen stuck in the spaces between the teeth. As the many rapid currents of a river's waters run toward the sea alone, so do the heroes of this human world enter your mouths blazing all around. As butterflies, with increased velocity, enter a blazing fire to their destruction, so too do these people enter your mouths with increased velocity, only to their destruction. Swallowing all these people, you are licking them over and over again from all sides with your blazing mouths!" Here we verily have a fine combination of the sublime and the ridiculous! The Apostle of Jesus was given to witness a vision of heavenly things such as could not be uttered. This disciple of Krishna does not hesitate to paint in such glowing terms a vision of the divine, that, to all but a Hindu, the picture seems not only incongruous but highly absurd and disgusting. One can hardly imagine that any mortal, to whom a vision of the divine being had been granted, could fail so utterly to furnish us with an edifying description of the same. In this Song, Krishna claims to be, at the same time, absolute Deity and the supreme incarnation. In nothing do the East and the West differ more radically than in their teaching concerning incarnation or "descent." In Christianity, God only once became incarnate; and in that Incarnation every believing soul has found its needs fully satisfied. Never, in all these two thousand years, did our Lord Christ satisfy more completely the human soul and bring rest to more human hearts than at the present time.