Description of Atomic Soul

INTRODUCTION This simple allegory is there to illustrate that In the previous chapter, we studied in detail mere saving of the body will NOT save the soul. how Lord Krishna is the Supreme person. His In the present day world, all are concerned personality transcends our experience of about the body, which is like the shirt for the space and time. His divine personality is technically called saccidananda (sat-chit- ananda). Being non-dual, His name, form, quality, abode and pastimes are all Absolute and hence transcendental (divine). We

Figure 2: A body is living because of the presence of the soul soul, while they have no concern about the soul at all. We all know that there is a difference between the living body and the dead body. A body is living because the consciousness pervades the entire body. Lord Krishna teaches us that the soul, a very tiny fragmental portion of Him, is the basis of this consciousness. A learned person must learn how to ascertain the difference between a Figure 1: Lord Krishna as the supersoul in every dead body and a living body. Technically, living being knowledge starts when one introspects the difference between the spirit (soul) and the discussed in brief the nature of the conscious matter. As Lord Krishna affirms in BG 2.17 that space and the material space as well as how it is the consciousness that pervades the whole both spaces have their origin in Krishna. In this body and is the basic principle by which a living chapter, we will discuss in detail the qualities body differs from the dead body. of the individual spirit soul, or the jiva, and how it can transcend from the material space avināśi tu tad viddhi into the conscious space. yena sarvam idaṁ tatam Once on a sea beach, a person named Gopal vināśam avyayasyāsya got swayed into the sea and was drowning. na kaścit kartum arhati When he asked for help, the nearby fisherman Translation: “That which pervades the entire dived in to search for him. Instead of saving the body you should know to be indestructible. No drowning person Gopal, he brought out the one is able to destroy that imperishable soul.” shirt of Gopal. All of us will certainly agree that the effort of the fisherman was in vain.

We will learn about the spirit soul as Lord Translation: “The living entities in this Krishna has taught in the second chapter of conditioned world are My eternal fragmental Bhagavad Gita. parts. Due to conditioned life, they are struggling very hard with the six senses, which THE SPIRIT SOUL include the mind.” Krishna and Soul are Co-Eternal: In the battlefield of Mahabharata, Arjuna became crestfallen after realising that he has to fight against Bhishma, Drona and likes who are dearer to him more than his own life. He could not decide whether he should fight or not. As he surrendered to Krishna seeking His instructions, the Lord said (BG 2.12): na tv evāhaṁ jātu nāsaṁ Figure 3: Being forgetful of Krishna, the embodied soul tries na tvaṁ neme janādhipāḥ to lord over the material nature na caiva na bhaviṣyāmaḥ The The soul (jiva) and Krishna are sarve vayam ataḥ param coeternal because jiva is part and parcel of Translation: “Never was there a time when I Krishna. Krishna is the father of each and every did not exist, nor you, nor all these kings; nor living being from a tiny insect to a large in the future shall any of us cease to be.” elephant. He alone is maintaining each and every living being. Krishna’s form is sat-chit- By this particular instruction, Krishna is ananda so also is jiva’s form. But while clearly saying that all of us are eternal, have Krishna’s form is infinite and inconceivable, always existed and will always continue to jiva’s form is minuscule. As jiva is part and exist. Though we die at some point of time, it parcel of Krishna, many divine qualities of is our body which perishes not the soul. In fact Krishna are there in jiva but in a minute both birth and death are only illusion as they quantity. Therefore Krishna is the master and pertain to different material bodies. There are we are all His servants. 8.4 million material bodies in which a soul is forced to dwell based on his past karma. We “I am soul, not the body. I am divine, not should thus recognise that we have already ephemeral.” This important knowledge is not taken birth among plants, aquatics, insects, being taught in present day education reptiles, birds, animals and human beings systems. Hence, our way of life has become many times. antithesis to our actual nature so much so that people are made to behave like robots. This Soul is Part and Parcel of Krishna has serious ramifications in our ecology as Lord Krishna emphatically tells that as spirit well. Lesser mortals such as plants, aquatics, souls we are part and parcel of Him (BG 15.7): hills and rivers are being destroyed. mamaivāṁśo jīva-loke jīva-bhūtaḥ sanātanaḥ In Vedic culture, all 8.4 million species manaḥ-ṣaṣṭhānīndriyāṇi – from plants and aquatics to human beings – prakṛti-sthāni karṣati are called ‘praja’. Since everybody is a soul, a part of Krishna, there is no difference between 56

plants, aquatics, birds and human beings. All transmigrated to a completely new body. So living forms are interconnected. Unless we death is the biggest illusion for those who are understand this, we cannot make our world ignorant. Krishna is telling this in the beginning peaceful. of Bhagavad Gita because Arjun was lamenting Transmigration of the Soul In Veda, the soul is referred to as jiva or atman. But in the impure state, the jiva is encaged in a physical body. This embodied soul is continuously migrating from one body to another including the present body. As Lord Krishna aptly states in Bhagavad Gita 2.13:

dehino ’smin yathā dehe kaumāraṁ yauvanaṁ jarā tathā dehāntara-prāptir Figure 5: The transmigration from one body to another dhīras tatra na muhyati Translation: “As the embodied soul that he has to kill his teacher and his continuously passes, in this body, from grandfather whom he loved so much. Krishna boyhood to youth to old age, the soul similarly is assuring Arjuna: “My dear friend there is passes into another body at death. A sober nothing called death, it's simply an illusion.” person is not bewildered by such a change.” Figure 5 depicts the transmigration of the soul from one body to another. Even from a human body one may transmigrate to a lower form of body such as plant, insect or animal. Now, what decides our next body? We are actually forced to take up another body according to our consciousness at the time of death.

In this context Srila Prabhupad gives this interesting example. In a prison house, prisoners are forced to wear a certain type of dress while their regular household dress and other belongings are taken away. Similarly in Figure 4: The Transmigration within the body this material world, we are forced to take different bodies/different dresses (8.4 million The soul is continuously transmigrating in this dresses) according to our consciousness. very body from boyhood to youth to old age So when the body perishes, it doesn’t (refer Figure 4). Learned men who understand mean that the person is gone. The person still the nature of the soul do not bereave as they exists. The embodied soul cannot see this, and see death as a process in which the soul has

thus, laments. A learned person sees this, and The chemical origin of life has been hence, does not lament. refuted in this statement of Lord Krishna. Life is never created, it is eternal. We were always Further Description of the Soul existing trillion and trillions of years back, and Jiva being part and parcel of Krishna is divine. we will continue to exist trillion and trillions Hence its qualities are inconceivable in terms years in the future as well. Only our garments of our mundane experiences. Here are some of (bodies) are changing. these properties: Bhagavad Gita 2.23: Bhagavad Gita 2.18: nainaṁ chindanti śastrāṇi antavanta ime dehā nainaṁ dahati pāvakaḥ nityasyoktāḥ śarīriṇaḥ na cainaṁ kledayanty āpo anāśino ’prameyasya na śoṣayati mārutaḥ tasmād yudhyasva bhārata Translation: “The soul can never be cut to Translation: “The material body of the pieces by any weapon, nor burned by fire, nor indestructible, immeasurable and eternal living entity is sure to come to an end; moistened by water, nor withered by the therefore, fight, O descendant of Bharata.” wind.” Bhagavad Gita 2.24: Even a super microscope better than an atomic force microscope cannot measure the acchedyo ’yam adāhyo ’yam size of the soul. The soul has a spiritual akledyo ’śoṣya eva ca dimension. nityaḥ sarva-gataḥ sthāṇur Bhagavad-Gita 2.19: acalo ’yaṁ sanātanaḥ ya enaṁ vetti hantāraṁ Translation: “This individual soul is yaś cainaṁ manyate hatam unbreakable and insoluble, and can be neither ubhau tau na vijānīto burned nor dried. He is everlasting; present nāyaṁ hanti na hanyate everywhere, unchangeable, immovable and Translation: “Neither he who thinks the living eternally the same.” entity the slayer nor he who thinks it slain is in Bhagavad Gita 2.25: knowledge, for the self neither slays, nor is avyakto ’yam acintyo ’yam slain.” avikāryo ’yam ucyate Bhagavad-Gita 2.20: tasmād evam viditvainaṁ na jāyate mriyate vā kadācin nānuśocitum arhasi nāyaṁ bhūtvā bhavitā vā na bhūyaḥ Translation: “It is said that the soul is invisible, ajo nityaḥ śāśvato ’yaṁ purāṇo inconceivable and immutable. Knowing this, na hanyate hanyamāne śarīre you should not grieve for the body.” Translation: “For the soul there is neither birth Soul has the Form, not the nor death at any time. He has not come into Matter: being, does not come into being, and will not Every living being has a form. Does the soul come into being. He is unborn, eternal, ever- have form? This is also answered in Bhagavad existing and primeval. He is not slain when the Gita 2.22: body is slain.” 58

vāsāṁsi jīrṇāni yathā vihāya have any form, its product will not have any navāni gṛhṇāti naro ’parāṇi form. tathā śarīrāṇi vihāya jīrṇāny The Living Body anyāni saṁyāti navāni dehī Translation: “As a person puts on new The Vedic literature provides a very illustrative garments, giving up old ones, the soul similarly idea of a living body while comparing it to a accepts new material bodies, giving up the old chariot as shown in Figure 7. We see in the and useless ones. Trousers that we wear have two legs and the T-shirt that we wear has two hands because of the fact that our body has two hands and two legs. Similarly every living being has legs, hands, nose, eyes, ears because the soul has these attributes. That is why Lord Krishna is saying that the body is the dress of the soul. So soul has an original spiritual form and assumes different garments based on his polluted consciousness.

Figure 7: The living body as the mind driven chariot

picture a chariot drawn by five horses, a chariot driver and a passenger. The chariot itself depicts our body. The five horses of the chariot are the five senses of the body i.e., visual sense, auditory sense, touch, smell and taste. The ropes/reigns represent our mind. The chariot driver is the intelligence. The Figure 6: The first version of the Car senses are to be controlled by mind through A photograph of the original Benz Intelligence. When a chariot is driven by patent motor wagon is shown in Figure 6. It uncontrolled horses, the passenger can only wait for his imminent death. That is how was first built in 1885 and awarded the patent disastrous our situation is when we allow our for the concept. The concept has the form, and senses to go uncontrolled. Those who are hence, the gross form of that concept in the sincere in realising that we are souls, must form of a car also has a form. Not only is the control their senses. When senses are car, any gross object from a house to a robot is controlled, the mind is controlled. The mind conceptualised first in the intellect. Its form is can be controlled by spiritual intelligence given there. Any activity, be it technical which is contained in the wonderful verses of research or cooking in the kitchen, we can Bhagavad Gita. experience that ideas come first and these ideas must have some form. If the ideas do not

The Subtle body carries the soul intellect and false ego are always with the soul. from one body to another Once soul becomes detached from mind, The body in which the soul resides may be intellect and false ego, then it is liberated. At divided into two categories: one is the gross that state, one can see Krishna directly. The body (consisting of earth, water, fire, air, process of liberation is to become dissociated ether) and another is subtle body (consisting from both gross and subtle bodies while of mind, intelligence and false ego). As we getting fully attached to Lord Krishna. This is transmigrate from one body to another body, the basic instruction in Bhagavad Gita. only the gross body perishes. The subtle body When death comes, all our subtle carries us from one body to another. We do desires dissolve in our mind, and that mind not change our mind, our intellect and our carries us to a new body. Just like the air false ego. These three things we always carry. You must have seen that when a child grows, carries aroma of a flower from one place to the he manifests certain behaviour. We see some other, the subtle body carries the soul from children are very peaceful yet others are very one body to the other. This is the reason why naughty. It is not that somebody has taught different people have different desires. Even if them how to become naughty. As the body two brothers are born in the same family, they will develop different tastes because they are carrying their own karma/ own impressions with them. This mind is different from the mind of the soul. So the physical mind and the mind of the soul are different. Soul has its own spiritual body comprising mind, ears, eyes, heart, and other organs. The material mind, intellect and false ego are the part of the subtle body while earth, water, fire, air, and ether constitute the gross body. We need to transcend our experiences beyond these gross Figure 8: J iva encaged in different layers of Matter and subtle bodies to be able to experience our- grows, many traits that manifest in the gross selves (the soul). That is why Lord Krishna body are derived from the subtle body. concludes the description of the soul as (BG Gopal and Ram are twins. They study together 2.29): and are brought up in a similar manner. Yet, āścarya-vat paśyati kaścid enam later Gopal goes on to become a professor in a āścarya-vad vadati tathaiva cānyaḥ reputed university while Ram excels in fine- āścarya-vac cainam anyaḥ śṛṇoti arts. śrutvāpy enaṁ veda na caiva kaścit Translation: “Some look on the soul as You will find such examples aplenty. Such amazing, some describe him as amazing, and examples are well understood when both some hear of him as amazing, while others, subtle and gross bodies are taken together. even after hearing about him, cannot Besides the environment, the gross body is understand him at all.” influenced by the subtle body. So the mind, 60

Answer the following in brief: of the sacrificial food to one of his queens named Krtadyuti. At the end of the sacrifice, 1. Why was Arjuna perplexed in the battle Angira muni told him, “O great king, you will field? now have a son who will be the cause of both 2. Krishna establishes the eternality of the soul in many verses of the second jubilation and lamentation.” Chitraketu was chapter Bhagavad Gita. Quote these overjoyed to know that he would finally get a verses with meaning. son, but he wondered about the sage’s last 3. What is the difference between words. He thought, “Angira must have meant Krishna and Jiva in terms of quality and that I will be greatly happy when my son is quantity? born. But what did he mean by the child being 4. Whom does the word Prajā refer to? the cause of lamentation? Of course, being my 5. What does transmigration of soul only son, he will automatically become the heir mean? to my throne. Therefore, he might become 6. When the body perishes, the soul does proud and disobedient. That might be a cause not. Explain. for lamentation. But a disobedient son is 7. Soul has a form. Explain. better than no son at all.” 8. What are constituents of the gross body? In due course of time, Krtadyuti begot 9. What are constituents of the subtle a son. King Chitraketu could not contain his body? joy. He raised his infant son carefully and his 10. Who carries the soul to another body? affection for queen Krtadyuti increased daily. 11. Can we kill someone giving the The other wives, who felt neglected, burned argument that ‘You are not this body with anger and envy. As their envy increased, but soul’? Justify your answer. they lost their intelligence, and their hearts 12. Animal slaughter is prohibited as per became hard like stone. They met secretly and the teachings of Bhagavad Gita. Why? decided that the only way to regain the love of 13. Soul has the form NOT the matter. their husband was to poison the child. Explain. Death of the Prince Learning from History One afternoon, as queen Krtadyuti walked in King Chitraketu's life story is very illustrative the courtyard of the palace, she thought of her to learn about the soul and its son sleeping peacefully in his room. Because transmigration. Please read this story she loved the child dearly and could hardly carefully and answer the following questions. bear to be without him for a moment, she King Chitraketu's Lamentation ordered the nurse to awaken him from his nap Once the world was ruled by a powerful king and bring him to the garden. But when the named Chitraketu. King Chitraketu had many maidservant approached the child, she saw beautiful wives, but he did not receive a child that his eyes were turned upwards, and there from any of them, as they were all barren. were no signs of life. Horrified, she held a swab Upon the advice of Angira muni, king of cotton beneath the boy’s nostrils, but the Chitraketu arranged for a special sacrifice to cotton did not move. In great agitation, she the demigods and then offered the remnants 61

struck her breast with both hands and wept your lunch. My dear son, I am most loudly. unfortunate, for I can no longer see your sweet smile. You have closed your eyes forever. You Some time passed, and the anxious have been taken from this planet to another queen approached the child’s bedroom. place, from which you will not return. My dear Hearing the nurse’s wailing, she entered the son, unable to hear your pleasing voice, I can room and saw that her son had passed away no longer maintain my life.” from this world. In great lamentation, her hair The king began crying loudly. As the and dress in disarray, the queen fell to the mother and father lamented, all their ground unconscious. When the King heard of followers joined them, bemoaning the his son’s death, he became nearly blind with untimely death of the child. Because of the grief. His lamentation grew like a sudden demise of the prince, all the citizens of conflagration, and as he ran to see the dead the kingdom were also grief-struck. child, he repeatedly stumbled and fell. Arrival of Angira Muni and Narada Muni Surrounded by his ministers and court When the great sage Angira understood that officers, the king entered the boy’s room and the king was almost dead being immersed in collapsed unconscious at the child’s feet, his an ocean of sorrow, he went there with his hair and dress scattered. When he regained friend, the saint Narada. The two sages found consciousness, he was breathing heavily, his the king, overwhelmed by lamentation, lying eyes were filled with tears and he was unable like a dead body beside the dead body of his to speak. son. Angira addressed the king sharply, “Wake When the queen saw her husband’s up from the darkness of ignorance, O king! suffering and again viewed the dead child, her What relationship do you have with this child? grief increased all the more. This increased the You may say that you are now related as father pain in the hearts of all the residents of the and son, but do you think that this relationship palace. The queen’s flower garlands slipped existed before his birth? Does it truly exist from her body, and her smooth jet-black hair now? Will it continue now that he is dead? O became tangled. Falling tears smeared the King, as small particles of sand sometimes cosmetics beneath her eyes. She began to come together and are sometimes separated curse the Supreme Lord, “O Providence! due to the force of the ocean’s waves, living During the lifetime of the father, you have entities who have accepted material bodies caused the death of his son. You are certainly sometimes come together and are sometimes the enemy of the living beings and are not at separated by the force of time.” Angira wanted all merciful.” Turning to her beloved child, she the King to understand that all bodily said, “My dear son, I am helpless and relationships are temporary. aggrieved. You should not give up my company. How can you leave me? Just look at Narada Muni Invites the soul back into the your lamenting father! You have slept for a Body of the Prince long time. Now please get up. Your playmates Then, Narada Muni, by his mystic power, are calling you to play. You must be very brought the soul of the prince back into the hungry, so please get up immediately and take dead body. Narada said, “O living entity, all 62

good fortune unto you. Just see your father son flatly denied that the king and queen were and mother. All your friends and relatives are his parents. In the material world, we come overwhelmed with grief because of your together as a family, stay together death. Because you died untimely, the balance temporarily, and get separated, never to meet of your life still remains. Therefore, you may again. enjoy the remainder of the years allotted to The soul continued, “In this material you in this body with your friends and world, which is like a swiftly flowing river, all relatives, and later you may accept the royal people become friends, relatives and enemies throne and all the opulences given by your in due course of time. They also act neutrally father.” and in many other relationships. But despite The Child gives a Transcendental Message these various transactions, no one is The child who had been dead sat up and began permanently related.” to speak, not with the childishness of a young Millions of living entities come to this boy, but with the full knowledge of a liberated world, and all of them are given a certain type soul, “According to the results of my material of body. A few living entities, say five or six, are activities, I, the living being, transmigrate from put in a group called a family and they stay one body to another, sometimes going to the together for a period of time. They are then species of the demigods, sometimes to the separated by death, never to meet again. It is species of lower animals, sometimes like meeting somebody on a train journey from incarnating among the vegetables, and one place to another. During the journey one appearing sometimes in the human species. In makes friends with others, but once the which birth were these two people my father destination comes, one goes one’s way and and mother? No one is actually my father and others go their way. This is the case with mother. I have had millions of so-called families also. But once a living entity is put in a parents. How can I accept these two people as particular family he becomes attached to my father and mother?” others as father, mother, brothers, sisters, The Vedas teach that the eternal living etc., because of falsely identifying himself with being enters a body made of material the body. This attachment makes the living elements. Here we find that such a living being entity undergo the cycle of repeated birth and entered a body produced by King Chitraketu death. and his wife. Actually, however, he was not Krishna Is The Real Father their son. The living entity is the eternal son of The soul continued to speak, “Just as gold and the Supreme Personality of Godhead, but other commodities are continually transferred because he wants to enjoy this material world, from one place to another through buying and God gives him a chance to enter various selling, so the living entity, as a result of his bodies. Yet the pure living being has no true karma, wanders throughout the universe, relationship with the material body he gets being injected into various bodies in different from his father and mother. Therefore, the species of life through the semen of one father soul who had taken the body of Chitraketu’s after another.”

The Bhagavad-gita explains that it is being is equal in quality to the Supreme Lord. not by any father or mother that the living Both are spiritual personalities. But because entity is given birth. The living entity’s true the living entity is so small, he is prone to be identity is completely separate from the so- illusioned by the material energy, and thus he called father and mother. By the laws of creates bodies for himself according to his nature, the soul is forced to enter the semen different desires and activities.” of a father and is injected into the womb of a The Vedas tell us that the soul is mother. She cannot directly control the kind of responsible for her lives in the material world, father she will get; this is automatically where she is trapped in the cycle of determined by her activities in previous lives. reincarnation, getting one material body after The laws of karma force her to go to different another. If she likes, she can remain suffering fathers and mothers, just like a commodity in the prison house of material existence, or that is bought and sold. she can return to her original home in the The living entity sometimes takes shelter of an spiritual world. Although God arranges, animal father and mother, and sometimes a through the material energy, to give the living human father and mother. Sometimes he beings the bodies they desire, the Lord’s true accepts a father and mother among the birds, desire is that the conditioned souls get off the and sometimes he accepts a demigod father miserable Ferris wheel of material life and and mother in the heavenly planets. As the return home, back to Godhead. soul transmigrates through different bodies, in Suddenly the boy became silent, as the every form of life – be it human, animal, tree, pure soul left the body of the child, and the or demigod – she gets a father and mother. body fell lifeless to the floor. Chitraketu and This is not very difficult. The real difficulty is to the other relatives were astonished. They cut obtain a spiritual father – a bona fide spiritual the shackles of their false attachments and master. Therefore, the duty of a human being gave up their lamentation. Then they is to search out such a spiritual master, for performed the funeral ceremony, cremating under his guidance one can become free from the body. Because King Chitraketu and his the cycle of reincarnation, return to his original queen had become fully cognizant of spiritual home and attain the original father, Shri knowledge, including the science of Krishna, in the spiritual world. reincarnation, they easily gave up the material attachment that leads to pain, fear, grief, and “The living being is eternal”, the pure illusion. soul continued, “and has no relation with so- Answer the following Questions based on the called fathers and mothers. He falsely accepts above story: himself as their son and acts affectionately. After he dies, however, the relationship is 1. It is the special affection of King Chitraketu finished. Under these circumstances, one for Kritady uti that resulted in the death of should not be falsely involved with jubilation his son. What do you learn from this and lamentation. The living entity is eternal incident for your own life? and imperishable; he has no beginning and no 2. Narrate your own experience of losing one end, nor does he take birth or die. The living of your near and dear ones. How did you 64

handle that experience then? How will you handle that experience now? 3. Prepare a brief that you will read out when you are asked to speak at a condolence meeting held for an important person in your community. 4. We are related to one another as mother, father, son, daughter, husband, wife, friend and so forth. What did you learn about the nature of these relations based on this story? 5. What do you learn about the nature of attachment from this story? How does attachment start, what does it bring with it and how does it end? 6. What is the importance of sadhu sanga like that of Sri Angira and Sri Narada? 7. Why did the son (Harshashoka) refuse to acknowledge King Chitraketu as his father? 8. Explain how one’s life is like a journey among 8.4 million species. How can you break this cycle? What is the ultimate journey? 9. What factors decide what next body you would get? What kind of body would you prefer to have in your next life and why? 10. Who is responsible for the pleasures and distresses in our lives? Who is responsible for the different bodies we have to wander through? 11. How can you achieve Lord Krishna, Who is your real father?