If God is unimaginable, why did we create so many forms of God, including forms with animal heads?

[An online spiritual discussion was conducted on November 22, 2020, in which several devotees participated. Some of the questions of devotees answered by Swāmi are given below.]

[A question by Smt. Sheela Prasad. Smt. Padmaram sang the following Telugu bhajan, “Nāmarūpamula rasamemunnadi nā sadguṇamula rasamāsvādiṃcumu …”.]

Swāmi replied: The unimaginable God merges with different mediums having different names and forms, so that we get many forms of the same God. The invisible electric current may be passing through visible golden, silver, copper and aluminium wires. The invisible current is like the unimaginable God and the visible wires of different materials having different colours are like the various forms of the same God.

Among human beings, some people’s faces resemble the faces of certain animals. Others scold them saying that they look like those animals, due to which these people feel hurt. The beauty of the face disappears in old age and the real beauty is the divine qualities in the person, which is called the personality. The beauty of the personality is permanent and should be appreciated, instead of the temporary beauty of the face, which is only of face value. In order to establish this concept, God entered into various forms having animal heads, so that God is praised due to His divine personality consisting of divine qualities and not due to the beauty of the face. Hanumān has the face of a monkey. But Hanumān was alone praised as ‘the Beautiful’ and the part of His story in the Rāmāyaṇam is called ‘the Sundarakāṇḍa, which means ‘The Story of the Most Beautiful Person’. Vālmīki did not name other parts of the story of Rāma by the word beautiful (sundara) even though the physical beauty of Rāma was astonishing. The personality (vyaktitva) means the divine qualities possessed by a person and not the temporary physical beauty that disappears in old age.

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