Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 18, Verse 55

By devotion he knows Me in reality, what and who I am; then having known Me in reality, he forthwith enters into Me.

Devotion is named here as the real, actual door to knowing this source as it truly is, not one path among equals.

Krishna states plainly that love, not effort or intellect alone, is what actually opens this specific kind of knowing. Real intimacy is shown requiring real devotion first.