In plain words
But when we inquire who it is that does this, it is settled here too, in gukāro guṇātītaḥ, rukāro rūpavarjitaḥ, that only one who is beyond the guṇas and free of form is fit to take up such an effort. Beyond the guṇas, free of form: in this no one is to be seen but God alone. Then we may ask what sort of people they are, all of them, who now pass themselves off under the word guru. All these may tell you something of matters that belong to the good path. Or they may give some kinds of good teaching. That much, and only that; the effort to dispel such Ajñāna and bring a person into radiant divinity is possible for Divinity alone, and for others it can never be. These gurus of the world are of two kinds. One is called the teaching guru, the second the tormenting guru. That is, there are some gurus who put the one who has taken refuge in them to troubles of many kinds, pull away his property and possessions, and afterwards make him a man fallen from both worlds, a destitute sannyāsī. There is another meaning too for the word guru. Gu means weight. Such gurus can be called gurus who are a weight on him. Then the second kind of guru teaches whatever Jñāna he knows to the disciples who have taken refuge in him, and so sets about the effort to develop somewhat both lives, his own and, through him, the disciple's: this is the mark of the second kind of guru. Precisely with these states in view,
The guru is Brahmā, the guru is Viṣṇu, the guru is the god Maheśvara; the guru is Parabrahman itself, made manifest: to that glorious guru, salutation,