Question: I have gone through several websites for ‘DASAVATAR’ (ten incarnations), and there is confusion whether Lord Krishna is an avatar or Sri Hari (the original Supreme Lord) Himself Who came down on earth. At a few sites, Krishna is shown as an avatar, and Balarama also as an avatar of Ananta Sheshanaag (also Lakshmana); while on some others Balarama is presented as an avatar and they treat Krishna as Sri Hari Himself, the original Avatari, not an avatar.
Answer by Romapada Swami :
The Gaudiya Vaishnava understanding, as presented in the conclusions of Srimad Bhagavatam, Brahma Samhita, etc., is that Krishna is non-different from Lord Hari, and He is the source of all other incarnations. (Cf. Srimad Bhagavatam 1.3.23,26,28)
It is described that Lord Krishna expands Himself into many equally powerful forms. Lord Balarama is the first expansion of Krishna. Through Lord Balarama, He then expands into the catur-vyuha, viz., Vaasudeva, Sankarshana, Pradyumna and Aniruddha, and from the catur-vyuha expands Narayana, who in turn expands into innumerable other plenary expansions such as Rama, Narasinga, Vamana, Janardana, etc. (Note that the incarnations of Krishna are not limited to ten in number, although we often speak of Dasavatara, famous from the song of Jayadeva Gosvami). All of these different plenary portions preside eternally in one of the innumerable Vaikuntha planets in the spiritual world. Sri Brahma Samhita explains that this is like lighting many candles from one source candle, and that original source is Lord Krishna, Govinda. (Cf. Brahma Samhita 46, 39, 47, 48).
Furthermore, for the affairs of material creation, Lord Narayana manifests as Maha-Vishnu. Krishna is not directly involved with the creation and maintenance of the material world, but Maha-Vishnu is in-charge. Thus when the Supreme Lord Krishna or any of His plenary portions descend from the spiritual sky, the incarnation emanates from Vishnu; thus, in that sense, it is right to say that all the incarnations come from Vishnu. (Cf. Krsna book, Intro.) And some devotees of the Lord worshiping His Vishnu feature worshiping Him as such, an incarnation coming through Vishnu. Thus Krishna is also included as an avatar sometimes because He descends by His causeless mercy (avatar = one who descends); yet He is distinguished from the avatars as the avatari.
