The Difference between Body and Soul

Baladeva Vidyabhusana then says that the body undergoes six kinds of transformations.

 

In the continuation of the verse of the Bhagavatam (11.3.39), Pippalayana Muni continues his reasoning and says that prana, the vital air that enables one to live, in every state of existence causes the atma to keep one’s consciousness intact. This also happens during sleep or when it is forced to transmigrate across all four body types. Therefore, prana is also immutable.

 

Therefore, the atma also remains always the same. When we are “awake” in the material world (i.e., interested in the phantasmagoria of the deceptive world) it seems changeable, but it is only an appearance. On the other hand, when it re-enters its transcendental consciousness, it becomes obvious that it is kutastha, immutable. In any case it was, but in the state of realization the atma is situated in its own original and real consciousness, so that its immutability becomes evident.

 

But how does the liberation of the soul occur? When it is freed from the superfluous and unreal superstructures of the subtle body. At that point it becomes kutastha, free from the upadhis, the main causes of imprisonment.

 

An objection may arise: when everything, including the self, is immersed in the Absolute, only emptiness remains. So how can one speak of immutable atman?

 

The Buddhist matrix of this objection is evident. Jiva Gosvami responds in section fifty-four:

“When we become aware of ourselves, we remember the atma and maintain the sense of self.” 

When we sleep in transcendental consciousness we do not remember our spiritual identity and believe that we are part of matter. When we finally become self-actualized, we don’t lose the feeling of being something. In other words, spiritual perfection does not consist in entering a state of emptiness, in nirvana (i.e., in total extinction), but in the perfect remembrance of who we have really always been. Therefore, individuality is eternal and can never be lost. It can only be forgotten for a certain period of time. The Buddhist theory, for the Acarya Vaishnavas, is therefore an unacceptable heresy.

 

Jiva Gosvami continues: 

Atma, which is pure cognition, possesses the power, or, the ability to know that is based on oneself, as luminous objects possess the power to illuminate.

 

In other words, the ability to know (cit-sakti) is inherent in the nature of the spirit soul, just as the power to illuminate is inherent in the sun. Gosvami Maharaja quotes a verse from the Brhad-aranyaka Upanisad (4.3.23), which says:

 

“And when in deep sleep he does not see, yet he sees, although he does not see objects sensitive to sight: the reason is that there can be no separation of the visual sense from the subject capable of seeing.”

 

Baladeva Vidyabhusana explains the implications of this verse: 

“It is said that the self-conscious agent does not see when it is in the deep sleep state, but this happens because in the deep sleep state there are no spiritual objects and it does not mean that the subject capable of seeing is absent.” 

In other words, that the sleeping soul does not see transcendental objects does not mean that they do not exist or that the subject is absent, but that in material consciousness spiritual objects cannot be perceived.

 

Therefore, based on the established, it is possible to conclude that the atma is distinct from the body, since the latter is evanescent, objective, witnessed element and place of supreme suffering. This is the conclusion of Sri Baladeva, who comments on the teachings of Sri Jiva with the utmost fidelity and clarity.

 

In the conclusion of section fifty-five we find summarized the four arguments that have been used to prove the difference between body and soul:

 

1. a) The body is built and destroyed, while the soul is not. 
2. b) The body is the object of vision, while the soul is the subject that receives vision.
3. c) Their manifested qualities differ quite clearly
4. d) The suffering of the conditioned soul is in stark contrast to the joy of the liberated soul.

This is a section of the book “Tattva Sandarbha”, in English.

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