Generally when a person is asked about his guru, he would like to be recognized as a disciple of only one guru. But Dattatreya likes to be known as the disciple of not only one guru but of many gurus. Dattatreya believes that knowledge from only one guru is not sufficient to be the best person. Therefore, a person should acquire knowledge from many gurus.
According to Bhagwat Purana, Dattatreya had 24 gurus. There are two types of gurus. There are two types of gurus. Deya and Upadeya. Deya means to be left and Upadeya means acceptable. The Deya guru preaches that don't act like me, otherwise you will have to suffer like me. While the Upadeya guru does the best work by himself and also preaches other to do like this. The gurus of Dattatreya include not only living persons but non-living object also. Thus, it should be remembered that only a living person can not be a guru, we can acquire knowledge from anything.