"O Lord of the Universe! You are neither a young girl, nor a woman, young or old; You are neither masculine nor feminine, neither female nor neuter gender. You are neither god nor demon nor a male or a female; Thou art the One without a second, known as the Brahman Supreme." -- Mahakala Samhita Purana

This prayer's universal nature is obvious. It answers our questions about whether God is male, female, or neither. An all encompassing God acceptable to all creatures makes sense.

This prayer tells our self appointed male dominated society and religions that females are equal to males. Man creates inequality out of his arrogance, vanity, pride, and self-love, which stems from his ignorance.

As a river abandoning its name, form and location dissolves in an ocean, so do we named creatures subject to place, time, form and the laws of karma ultimately dissolve into an infinite ocean known as Brahman. In the Shreemad Bhagavad Gita, Lord Krishna often speaks of "himself" as the Supreme Brahman, neither a male, female, or neuter.

As long as we are in the field of maya, or ignorance, our view and concept of God will be based on our level of purification. A child thinks his of mother or father as providers of toys or chocolate because that is all he needs. We, as spiritual children, think of God according to our level of understanding, beliefs, traditions and ignorance. Nevertheless sooner or later all of us will have to come to the ultimate understanding that eternal joy, peace and love are ours only if we can learn to see and feel unity in diversity and diversity in unity.

--Swami Radhanandaji