The eternal nature of all souls is to serve Krishna, not to dominate or merge into impersonal brahman.Listen — Srila Prabhupada Uvaca
Lecture — May 1, 1972, Tokyo 720501LE-TOKYO [43:23 Minutes] Lecture_720501LE-TOKYO Prabhupāda: So... [break] This material existence, which we are now passing through, is not our actual existence. There is a Bengali Vaiṣṇava poet, he says... Generally, the question is raised, "How the living entities became fallen in this material world?" The Māyāvādī philosophy, they say that we are the same with God, but we are now covered by māyā, and as soon as we are free from this māyā's covering, we become again one with the Supreme.
This is Māyāvāda philosophy. Practically the Vaiṣṇava philosophy also the same, but only difference is that the jīvātmā, he is eternal servant of the Supreme Lord. Actually, if we scrutinizingly study, our constitutional position is to render service. Any one of us who are sitting here, everyone is servant. Nobody can say that "I am master." We are thinking like master, but actually we are all servants—anyone.
Either you are servant of your family or you are servant of your country or you are servant of your senses... Everyone, at the present moment, we are servant of the senses, servant of this body. And gradually our illusion expands. Ataḥ gṛha-kṣetra-sutāpta-vittair janasya moho 'yam ahaṁ mameti [SB 5.5.8]. This material world, it is explained by Vaiṣṇava philosopher: kṛṣṇa bhuliya jīva bhoga vāñchā kare pāśate māyā tāre jāpaṭiyā dhare [Prema-vivarta] Māyā is nothing but an illusion which is covering my Kṛṣṇa consciousness.
That is called māyā. I am... Kṛṣṇa says that mamaivāṁśo jīva-bhūtaḥ [Bg. 15.7]: "All these living entities, they are My parts and parcel, sanātana, not that they have now become servant of Me by material contact, but they are eternally servant." Caitanya Mahāprabhu said, jīvera svarūpa haya nitya kṛṣṇa dāsa [Cc. Madhya 20.108-109]: "The real identity of the living entity is that he is eternal servant of God, or Kṛṣṇa." When we speak of Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa means God.
Kṛṣṇas tu bhagavān svayam [SB 1.3.28]. So actually, we are still servant, although we have rejected servitude of Kṛṣṇa. That is our rebellious condition. Every one of us, all living entities within this material world, they are more or less rebellious condition. We don't want to serve Kṛṣṇa; I want to become Kṛṣṇa.
That is māyā. That is the last snare of māyā. First of all, in our karmī life we want to become master of the world. I want to lord it over the material nature.
That is our struggle. Everyone is trying, "I shall become the master." Nobody wants to become servant. That is māyā. But actually he is serving.