Readers are requested to see my earlier posts on the Gita.
Chapter 2: Shloka 22
vasamsi jirnani yatha vihaya navani grhnati naro 'parani
tatha sarirani vihaya jirnany anyani samyati navani dehi
Transalation:
As a person puts on new garments, giving up old ones, similarly, the soul accepts new material bodies, giving up the old and useless ones.
Commentary:
Lord Krishna continuing his discourse to Arjuna on the battlefield now brings out the principle of transmigration or reincarnation. This is commonly said as transmigration or reincarnation of the soul.
Just as we change our clothes when our body has outgrown them, in the same way, the soul accepts new bodies when it outgrows the current body.
However in an earlier post, I have clarified that the soul(Atman) is not different from the universal consciousness(Brahman). Since Brahman is universal and exists everywhere, how can something that is there everywhere, move at all? Moreover since Brahman or Atman is everything, what should it outgrow of? Hence it is clear that in this verse, the Lord is not referring to the Atman as the entity taking up new bodies.
To understand this verse, we need to delve again into our own structure. The outer layer consisting of the physical body and the internal organs needed to sustain the physical body is called "Gross body" or "Sthoola shareera". The next layer of the body which consists of the mind and intellect which drive the gross body is called as "Subtle body" or "Sookshma shareera". The layer within it consists of the desires that drive the body/mind/intellect complex. We have seen in an earlier post that it is desires that drive us to do any action. This bundle of desires within us is referred to as "causal body" or the "Kaarana shareera". The causal body is that body enclosed by the gross/subtle bodies that really determines who we are, when we are born, why we are born, when we will die and how we will be reborn again as.
The causal body causes the subtle body to don relevant gross bodies to ensure that the desires are fulfilled. To make this clear, the accumulated desires are like trapped energy that lies deep under the earth. Similar to the way, when an appropriate environment is created, the trapped energy bursts out as a volcano expending part of the energy, a portion of the most pressing desires sprouts out at the opportune moment into a new body. So the driver of this transmigration is the vasana or the accumulated desires. But then, where do desires originate? They originate in the mind as sensual/emotional desires and the intellect as intellectual desires. Please note that desires do not arise in the senses or action organs. The sense organs sense the environment and detect sense objects and the action organs as directed by the mind with the guidance of the intellect, take action to acquire the sense objects. So the body consisting of the action organs and sense organs is just a vehicle through which the mind/intellect get an opportunity to fulfill their desires. So the vasana provides the necessary "motive" power to the mind/intellect to seek new gross bodies.
Just as a snake throws off its outer skin or we discard our old clothes, the mind/intellect(subtle body) acquires or sheds off the outer body(gross body) depending on its usefulness in making the subtle meet its desires. Once the subtle body realizes that the current external body is useless to help it achieve its objectives, it discards that outer body and goes into another body(determined by the causal body) that helps it meet its objectives. Just as we would remove our jeans and t-shirt and don a three piece suit, to go to a job interview, the subtle body discards whatever body it has and wears a new body depending on the objective. This act of the subtle body discarding the outer body, using the motive power of the causal body, is the phenomenon of death and the act of the subtle body wearing new outer body is the phenomenon of birth. This is the principle of birth, death and rebirth or the principle of transmigration or reincarnation.
To understand this principle of birth, death, rebirth and sudden death, I would like to tell a story and try to explain my understanding. Shyam is a simple village lad happy tending his goats and cows in the village. Being a typical boy who has just stepped into teenage, members of the opposite sex draw some of his attention. Into his life, now comes his uncle Prasad. Prasad is also from the village, but has since left it to work as a clerk in a bank in the city. He takes Shyam out for a walk and as he explains the city life, tells him about the charming actress Madhuri Dixit and her movies. The description of Madhuri's physical charms attracts Shyam who keeps thinking of her long after Prasad has left. Years go by, but in Shyam's mind, the thought of Madhuri is always there and desire keeps building up to see her movies. This desire acts as a major push and when he is in his 20's, he boards a train and reaches the city. Please note that the desire to experience Madhuri's movies propelled Shyam to leave his village where he could not satisfy his desire and take the action of coming to the city. So the connection between the village and Shyam was broken and a new connection between Shyam and the city was established. So, Shyam's relationship with the village died and his new relationship with the city was born. Similarly, the subtle body in order to fulfill its desires breaks its connections with the environment which does not fulfil its needs and moves to an environment where its needs can be met. Since it is only the outer body that experiences the world of objects, the subtle body in effect drops its current outer body to move to another outer body. So one physical body dies and the subtle body enters another physical body and a new entity is born.
Now, Shyam locates a video library and makes it a point to leave his home daily in the morning, walk couple of miles to the video library to pick up Madhuri's video cassette and returns home to watch the movie. So he is in an environment where his desires are met. Similarly, the causal body is in a state where the outer body is meeting its needs. Let us take a situation that Shyam sees all her movies and since the desire is over, returns to the village. So, the relationship with the city is broken and Shyam is back to his original state of a happy idyllic village boy. Similarly when the bundle of desires contained in the causal body are exhausted, there is no need for the causal body to take any further births. But is this reality? Shyam as he was watching Madhuri's movies, saw a movie in which the lovely actress Kareena was also there. He started desiring to see her movies and was overjoyed seeing that her movies also were in the library. So Shyam's routine continued with the exception that it was Kareena's movies that he was seeing. Similarly, though the subtle body takes a form to fulfill a set of desires, during the process of fulfilment of that desire, it acquires new desires, which make it keep on continuing the process of fulfilment of desires. Just as Shyam will not now return to his village till he fulfils this new desire, the subtle body now takes on more births to fulfill the new desires.
One day as Shyam was walking he fell down and broke his leg. In this situation, he is unable to go to his favorite store though his desire is still there. So, his connection with the video store is cut because of his inability to walk to the store. In a similar manner, for a subtle body, when it realizes that its outer body can no more meet its desires, it sees no use for the outer body and looks out for a body which will continue to meet its desires. Shyam also keeps looking for a way to meet his desires and luckily he is presented crutches which he uses now to go to the video store. So the normal walking Shyam is no more, but a crutch supported Shyam has come to meet the desire. In same manner, the subtle body acquires the best body to help it meet its desires. This is how we can explain why we were born in a particular environment to a particular set of parents. Why was I not born in famine devastated Ethiopia and was born in the country of milk and honey? So, there was some powerful desire, the fulfilment of which needed the environment of America and hence I was born here. Now the question, why would someone be born in a famine environment like Ethiopia?
The answer to this is that there is no single desire driving the subtle body. We know that a ball pulled in two different forces at 90 degrees moves at an angle of 45 degrees. Let us assume a situation where there are numerous forces of different magnitudes on a body. It is then impossible just based on the fact that we are exerting one of the forces to expect the ball to move the way we have applied the force. So it is very possible that the multiplicity of our desires act at cross-purposes and take us to a spot which is totally different from a perceived desire. So even though one of the desires could be to have a comfortable life in America, the numerous other desires simultaneously present in the causal body, forces the subtle body into donning of a body in a totally different environment.
Let us now examine the phenomenon of sudden death. We had seen in the news sometime back about a manhole exploding and a lady dying on the streets of New York. Now, the exploding of a manhole is a very rare occurrence. What caused that specific lady to be there at that point of time and embrace death ? That lady would not have desired to die on the streets of New York. Let us continue the same story of Shyam to explore this further. Shyam has gone to the video store to get a video of Kareena when he sees an advertisement on the television that Kareena is coming to a theater next door for the first show of her new movie. Shyam looks at the time and realizes it is in 10 minutes. He decides that he cannot spend time searching for Kareena's movie cassette and rushes out to stand in the line in the theater to catch a live glimpse of Kareena. So in effect, his connection with the video store has been abruptly cut and a relationship with the theater established in a jiffy. Similarly, the subtle body as it experiences its objects of desire in the material world suddenly experiences a desire(driven by the causal body) which is totally overwhelming and the current gross body can no longer meet that new desire. So the subtle body suddenly leaves its existing body and takes on a new body. This is the phenomenon of sudden death. But, just as Shyam's desire of seeing Kareena is instinctual and he will return to the video store after the desire to see Kareena in person is fulfilled, for the subtle body, after fulfilment of this instinctual desire which led to a new body is fulfilled, assuming no other new desires were added in the new body, it will take up the body to complete the earlier unfulfilled desires.
As readers may be aware, 3 of my books on spirituality are available on Amazon.com.
I invite readers of my blog to try any of the books and give me feedback so that I can make changes in the next edition.
1. My Humble Understanding Of Spirituality
My Humble Understanding Of Spirituality
2. Attain Infinite Bliss
Attain Infinite Bliss - A Spiritual Guide
3. The Spirit Of Spirituality
The Spirit Of Spirituality
Chapter 2: Shloka 22
vasamsi jirnani yatha vihaya navani grhnati naro 'parani
tatha sarirani vihaya jirnany anyani samyati navani dehi
Transalation:
As a person puts on new garments, giving up old ones, similarly, the soul accepts new material bodies, giving up the old and useless ones.
Commentary:
Lord Krishna continuing his discourse to Arjuna on the battlefield now brings out the principle of transmigration or reincarnation. This is commonly said as transmigration or reincarnation of the soul.
Just as we change our clothes when our body has outgrown them, in the same way, the soul accepts new bodies when it outgrows the current body.
However in an earlier post, I have clarified that the soul(Atman) is not different from the universal consciousness(Brahman). Since Brahman is universal and exists everywhere, how can something that is there everywhere, move at all? Moreover since Brahman or Atman is everything, what should it outgrow of? Hence it is clear that in this verse, the Lord is not referring to the Atman as the entity taking up new bodies.
To understand this verse, we need to delve again into our own structure. The outer layer consisting of the physical body and the internal organs needed to sustain the physical body is called "Gross body" or "Sthoola shareera". The next layer of the body which consists of the mind and intellect which drive the gross body is called as "Subtle body" or "Sookshma shareera". The layer within it consists of the desires that drive the body/mind/intellect complex. We have seen in an earlier post that it is desires that drive us to do any action. This bundle of desires within us is referred to as "causal body" or the "Kaarana shareera". The causal body is that body enclosed by the gross/subtle bodies that really determines who we are, when we are born, why we are born, when we will die and how we will be reborn again as.
The causal body causes the subtle body to don relevant gross bodies to ensure that the desires are fulfilled. To make this clear, the accumulated desires are like trapped energy that lies deep under the earth. Similar to the way, when an appropriate environment is created, the trapped energy bursts out as a volcano expending part of the energy, a portion of the most pressing desires sprouts out at the opportune moment into a new body. So the driver of this transmigration is the vasana or the accumulated desires. But then, where do desires originate? They originate in the mind as sensual/emotional desires and the intellect as intellectual desires. Please note that desires do not arise in the senses or action organs. The sense organs sense the environment and detect sense objects and the action organs as directed by the mind with the guidance of the intellect, take action to acquire the sense objects. So the body consisting of the action organs and sense organs is just a vehicle through which the mind/intellect get an opportunity to fulfill their desires. So the vasana provides the necessary "motive" power to the mind/intellect to seek new gross bodies.
Just as a snake throws off its outer skin or we discard our old clothes, the mind/intellect(subtle body) acquires or sheds off the outer body(gross body) depending on its usefulness in making the subtle meet its desires. Once the subtle body realizes that the current external body is useless to help it achieve its objectives, it discards that outer body and goes into another body(determined by the causal body) that helps it meet its objectives. Just as we would remove our jeans and t-shirt and don a three piece suit, to go to a job interview, the subtle body discards whatever body it has and wears a new body depending on the objective. This act of the subtle body discarding the outer body, using the motive power of the causal body, is the phenomenon of death and the act of the subtle body wearing new outer body is the phenomenon of birth. This is the principle of birth, death and rebirth or the principle of transmigration or reincarnation.
To understand this principle of birth, death, rebirth and sudden death, I would like to tell a story and try to explain my understanding. Shyam is a simple village lad happy tending his goats and cows in the village. Being a typical boy who has just stepped into teenage, members of the opposite sex draw some of his attention. Into his life, now comes his uncle Prasad. Prasad is also from the village, but has since left it to work as a clerk in a bank in the city. He takes Shyam out for a walk and as he explains the city life, tells him about the charming actress Madhuri Dixit and her movies. The description of Madhuri's physical charms attracts Shyam who keeps thinking of her long after Prasad has left. Years go by, but in Shyam's mind, the thought of Madhuri is always there and desire keeps building up to see her movies. This desire acts as a major push and when he is in his 20's, he boards a train and reaches the city. Please note that the desire to experience Madhuri's movies propelled Shyam to leave his village where he could not satisfy his desire and take the action of coming to the city. So the connection between the village and Shyam was broken and a new connection between Shyam and the city was established. So, Shyam's relationship with the village died and his new relationship with the city was born. Similarly, the subtle body in order to fulfill its desires breaks its connections with the environment which does not fulfil its needs and moves to an environment where its needs can be met. Since it is only the outer body that experiences the world of objects, the subtle body in effect drops its current outer body to move to another outer body. So one physical body dies and the subtle body enters another physical body and a new entity is born.
Now, Shyam locates a video library and makes it a point to leave his home daily in the morning, walk couple of miles to the video library to pick up Madhuri's video cassette and returns home to watch the movie. So he is in an environment where his desires are met. Similarly, the causal body is in a state where the outer body is meeting its needs. Let us take a situation that Shyam sees all her movies and since the desire is over, returns to the village. So, the relationship with the city is broken and Shyam is back to his original state of a happy idyllic village boy. Similarly when the bundle of desires contained in the causal body are exhausted, there is no need for the causal body to take any further births. But is this reality? Shyam as he was watching Madhuri's movies, saw a movie in which the lovely actress Kareena was also there. He started desiring to see her movies and was overjoyed seeing that her movies also were in the library. So Shyam's routine continued with the exception that it was Kareena's movies that he was seeing. Similarly, though the subtle body takes a form to fulfill a set of desires, during the process of fulfilment of that desire, it acquires new desires, which make it keep on continuing the process of fulfilment of desires. Just as Shyam will not now return to his village till he fulfils this new desire, the subtle body now takes on more births to fulfill the new desires.
One day as Shyam was walking he fell down and broke his leg. In this situation, he is unable to go to his favorite store though his desire is still there. So, his connection with the video store is cut because of his inability to walk to the store. In a similar manner, for a subtle body, when it realizes that its outer body can no more meet its desires, it sees no use for the outer body and looks out for a body which will continue to meet its desires. Shyam also keeps looking for a way to meet his desires and luckily he is presented crutches which he uses now to go to the video store. So the normal walking Shyam is no more, but a crutch supported Shyam has come to meet the desire. In same manner, the subtle body acquires the best body to help it meet its desires. This is how we can explain why we were born in a particular environment to a particular set of parents. Why was I not born in famine devastated Ethiopia and was born in the country of milk and honey? So, there was some powerful desire, the fulfilment of which needed the environment of America and hence I was born here. Now the question, why would someone be born in a famine environment like Ethiopia?
The answer to this is that there is no single desire driving the subtle body. We know that a ball pulled in two different forces at 90 degrees moves at an angle of 45 degrees. Let us assume a situation where there are numerous forces of different magnitudes on a body. It is then impossible just based on the fact that we are exerting one of the forces to expect the ball to move the way we have applied the force. So it is very possible that the multiplicity of our desires act at cross-purposes and take us to a spot which is totally different from a perceived desire. So even though one of the desires could be to have a comfortable life in America, the numerous other desires simultaneously present in the causal body, forces the subtle body into donning of a body in a totally different environment.
Let us now examine the phenomenon of sudden death. We had seen in the news sometime back about a manhole exploding and a lady dying on the streets of New York. Now, the exploding of a manhole is a very rare occurrence. What caused that specific lady to be there at that point of time and embrace death ? That lady would not have desired to die on the streets of New York. Let us continue the same story of Shyam to explore this further. Shyam has gone to the video store to get a video of Kareena when he sees an advertisement on the television that Kareena is coming to a theater next door for the first show of her new movie. Shyam looks at the time and realizes it is in 10 minutes. He decides that he cannot spend time searching for Kareena's movie cassette and rushes out to stand in the line in the theater to catch a live glimpse of Kareena. So in effect, his connection with the video store has been abruptly cut and a relationship with the theater established in a jiffy. Similarly, the subtle body as it experiences its objects of desire in the material world suddenly experiences a desire(driven by the causal body) which is totally overwhelming and the current gross body can no longer meet that new desire. So the subtle body suddenly leaves its existing body and takes on a new body. This is the phenomenon of sudden death. But, just as Shyam's desire of seeing Kareena is instinctual and he will return to the video store after the desire to see Kareena in person is fulfilled, for the subtle body, after fulfilment of this instinctual desire which led to a new body is fulfilled, assuming no other new desires were added in the new body, it will take up the body to complete the earlier unfulfilled desires.
As readers may be aware, 3 of my books on spirituality are available on Amazon.com.
I invite readers of my blog to try any of the books and give me feedback so that I can make changes in the next edition.
1. My Humble Understanding Of Spirituality
My Humble Understanding Of Spirituality
2. Attain Infinite Bliss
Attain Infinite Bliss - A Spiritual Guide
3. The Spirit Of Spirituality
The Spirit Of Spirituality
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