I know some members of my family also very intolerant of worshiping Ganesha, etc.

My devotion to Krishna has not diminished just because I also love Ganesha or Shiva.

The exclusivity clause goes against not only Vedas, but also basic human natural experience. It's like saying "Only eat salt, not pepper"

@RamAbloh Right, there are similarities like that between Hinduism and "pagan" religions, but one can't deny that Hinduism has similarities with Abrahamic religions that pagan religions don't have like sin and merit, heaven and hell, creator God with specific properties like omniscience omnipresence, etc.

@RamAbloh Well I think the vishishtadvaita doctrine reconciles the duality and non-duality seen in the scriptures. And then there are texts like "the wind blows from fear of Brahman" and the ananda-mimamsa section of the taittiriya upanishad that show that the bliss of brahman far surpasses the bliss experienced by Indra, Brihaspati, Prajapati, and other Devas. So this shows that Brahman is different from devatas.

And Ramanujacharya provides a good reconciliation to calling all devatas brahman by saying that the Rishis spoke of antaryami of the gods; spoke of brahman through the devas.

Ramanujacharya interprets "dharmAn" in the gita verse as referring to the other means of attaining moksha like karma, jnana, and bhakti yoga. So then krishna is saying to abandon those means and just surrender to him. And this is because the context of the Gita is a discussion of the means of moksha.

Also I dont think the Gita is a non-Vedic text because it is part of the prasthana trayi Canon accepted by vedantic tradition to be in confirmity with the veda. Sure, veda has higher authority, but Gita simplifies the message of the vedas. I've heard that even shankaracharya accepted the saguna brahman to be Narayana.

@Ikshvaku Of course pagan religions have sin and merit, heaven and hell, creator God who is omniscient and omnipresent, etc. Those are common to all religions.

@Ikshvaku I agree Vishishtadvaita reconciles duality and non-duality as a theory, but how much does it actually correspond to experience, to the highest spiritual experience possible? Non-duality, where one completely becomes unaware of one's individuality, space and time, etc. is the highest experience possible. Any hint of duality is at a lower level experience.