Puttugam2

Sankarsanāya namah

Maharishi Kapila continues,

“When both body and the inner being lose the ability to perform action it is death. When they again join and obtain the ability to perform action it is birth.

That which enables the being to perceive external objects is ‘gross body’. At some point the gross body loses this ability. Then it is known as death.

Seeing the gross body with the feeling ‘this is me’ and seeing all objects through the medium of this gross body is ‘birth’!

When, due to defect in the eye, the ability to see objects diminishes, the inner sight-sense (chaksu-indriya) also loses its ability to see.  It should be understood that when both eye and the sense of sight fail, the individual also loses the ability to see. Similarly, when the gross body loses its ability to perceive the world, it is known as death. Understand that birth and death pertain only to the gross body (upādhi).

Tasmān na kāryaḥ santrāso na kārpaṇyaṁ na sambhramaḥ

Buddhvā jīva-gatiṁ dhīro mukta-saṅgaś cared iha

Therefore an intelligent person must not fear nor become mentally weak. He should not allow infatuation towards the world to enter into him. Realizing that he is the Self (atma) he should give up inclination towards the world.

This world and its bondages are purely illusory. Even this body is illusory. The aspirant should therefore practice differentiating between things permanent and impermanent (nitya-anitya vastu viveka) in this creation. Simultaneously along with this, he should practice detachment towards the world. In his day to day worldly activities, he should give up the false ego which he has towards his body.

With this the thirty first chapter of the third canto comes to an end.

Third Canto Chapter Thirty two.

In this chapter, the higher realms to which a person, who adheres to the path of goodness, ascends is described. In addition, the greatness of the path of devotion and the manner in which an ignorant person continues to rotate in the wheel of life are also described.

Kapila Maharishi continued, “A householder routinely engages in fruitive activities and enjoys their resultant benefits i.e. material prosperity (artha) and fulfillment of desires (kāma). He performs the same fruitive actions repeatedly and goes through the same cycle. Through the medium of desires he gets trapped in these worldly bondages.  (Fruitive actions are actions performed with some expectation of result).

Due to the intensity of desires, he deviates from offering worship to God with pure devotional love. Instead, due to attachment to sense gratification, he focuses upon performing rituals and Yagnas for appeasing Devatas and forefathers. Pleasing them with rituals becomes his way of life. He remains dedicated towards such actions.

Such person after leaving this gross body reaches Chandra-loka (Moon) and drinks nectar there. After exhausting his merit (punya) he once again is reborn on earth.

At the end of the kalpa i.e. at the time of dissolution, Srihari sleeps on his snake-bed. At that time all these different planes of existence, that a materialistic householder seeks refuge in, get absorbed into Him.

On the contrary are pure devotees, who do not seek to experience the fruits of their actions in the form of materialistic prosperity (artha) and fulfillment of desires (kāma)! They do not seek sense gratification and are disinclined towards this world!

Due to their pure inner mind, they are deeply dedicated towards sarva karma sanyasa (giving up fruitive actions in totality). They are devoid of egoism (I-ness) and attachments. They are eternally focused towards renunciation (sanyāsa). It is due to diligent adherence to their own dharma (swadharma) that such people obtain this pure inner mind!

After leaving this body, pure devotees travel through the path of the illumination (Sun) so as to merge into the all pervading Lord Srihari, who is the Lord for this entire creation. They reach Satya loka, the highest plane, and remain there worshipping Him.

This complete Lord is the material cause (upādāna kārana) for this creation. Through His intentions of creation and dissolution, He also becomes the instrumental/ efficient cause (nimitta kārāna).

Brahma, also known as Hiranyagarbha, has a lifespan of 2 Parārthās i.e. two sets of 50 years as per Brahma’s time calculation. After the completion of this lifespan, He too merges into the Supreme Lord.

The self-created Hiranyagarbha, the Lord of all Lords who has created this entire universe which is replete with the trigunas, enjoys his sovereignty for this period. Thereafter he determines to dissolve this entire creation which is full of egoism (I-ness) and consists of earth, water, fire, wind, space, mind, senses and subtle sensory perceptions. With this intent He merges into the absolute traitless, formless Supreme Entity known as Parabrahma.

When Hiranyagarbha merges into the Lord, these Yogis i.e. the residents of Satya loka, who are totally detached and who have conquered the life and mind, also give up their bodies and merge into the Lord. The remnant of egoism (I-ness) within them is the cause for their inability to merge into Him until now.

Atha taṁ sarva-bhūtānāṁ hṛt-padmeṣu kṛtālayam

Śrutānubhāvaṁ śaraṇaṁ vraja bhāvena bhāmini

O Mother! You have heard from me the glories of the Supreme Lord Srihari who resides within every heart. With total devotion please surrender unto Him.

Lord Brahma, the embodiment of Vedas who is the cause for all animate and inanimate objects, through the medium of selfless non-fruitive action (nishkāma karma) merges into Lord Narayana, the primordial being, the Supreme amongst all beings and the Lord with form and attributes. He merges into the Lord along with Marichi and other saints, along with great Yogeśwaras, eminent knowledgeable saints such as Sanaka and others and together with siddha puruśas who are accomplished in Yoga.

Yet in Him (Brahma) feelings of duality, false ego towards the body and doership of actions remain. For this reason, as soon as the equilibrium between the three attributes of Nature (trigunas) is disturbed at the commencement of creation, He, under the directive of the Supreme Lord begins the task of creation exactly as it was in the earlier period. He again manifests as the world”.

Vāsudevāya namah

Both in infancy and in childhood, the individual suffers. Due to non-fulfillment of desires, he has outbursts of anger during adolescence. This is another type of suffering. Along with age, lustful desires increase in the body. Simultaneously anger and grief also increase.

He mingles with other lustful, wicked persons and brings about his own downfall.  Ignorance, the evil sinful thoughts in his head and his extreme weakness towards wicked deeds cause him to believe that this gross body made up of the 5 elements is his true Self (atma). They intensify the feelings of ‘me and mine’ within him.

Tad-arthaṁ kurute karma yad-baddho yāti saṁsṛtim

Yo ’nuyāti dadat kleśam avidyā-karma-bandhanaḥ

In order to sustain the gross body, the living being engages in varied types of actions. However these actions, which he performs for the body, further bind him and throw him into the cycle of re-births. It is a perpetual cycle. Actions performed due to spiritual ignorance (ajnana) are the cause for the existence of the body. This body is nothing but the source of all suffering. It continuously follows him.

Even a virtuous pious person who interacts with wicked, unrighteous persons either for the sake of earning his livelihood or for fulfillment of his desires and who, through this association, succumbs to sensual lustful needs will end up in hell as before.

Due to bad associations, qualities such as truthfulness, cleanliness, compassion, silence, mental calmness, discriminatory knowledge, humbleness, wealth, fame, patience, mind-control, sense-control and good knowledge totally deplete. Due to extreme obsessions and passions, immoral persons never experience mental peace.

It is imperative to discard friendship with ignorant fools who consider this body to be the Self and who are puppets in the hands of women. Such persons are neither worthy of friendship nor compassion. Such friendships and associations should be given up in totality.

Amongst all, friendship with women is the worst. It is very important to distance from unethical women and from those men who associate with such women. It is dangerous. It is the most terrible noose. The type of bondage that is caused due to friendship with such women will not be obtained from any other object.

Once upon a time Brahma saw his daughter and was suddenly obsessed with her bodily beauty. Noticing this, his daughter transformed herself into a female deer and began to run swiftly trying to escape from him. Lord Brahma took on the form of a male deer and began to chase her. From this the caution to be exercised in this matter is to be understood. This story explains the dangers of excessive passion. Brahma is the creator. It explains how the creator got trapped into the illusion that he himself had created.

At the outset, Brahma created Marichi and other Maharishis. They created Kaśyapa and other Prajāpatis. These Prajapatis created Devatas and human beings. In such a creation, the only being who did not get infatuated with the illusion called ‘woman’ is Maharishi Narayana!

O Mother! Observe the power of illusion (maya) that I have created in the form of a woman. By the mere movement of her eyebrows a woman can control even the most powerful conquerors of the world. She can make them fall at her feet.

The person who is desirous of serving Me, obtaining discriminatory knowledge of things permanent and impermanent in this creation and who is desirous of reaching the pinnacle of Yoga should necessarily distance himself from evil minded women!

The same rule applies to woman as well and she should distance from such men. Such friendships are only gateways to hell.

When a man is approached by illusion (māya), which manifests in the form of woman, he should realize it to be a blind well covered with grass. With extreme vigilance he should distance from her. Deep pits are covered with grass and an image of female elephant is placed on it. This is a trap to catch male elephants. In the same way, men and women, due to attraction for opposite sex, fall into this deep trap called illusion.

Until now men were cautioned. In the below para, women are cautioned.

Due to attachment with a woman in the previous birth, a man is reborn as a woman in this birth. It is the outcome of attachment and sin. The woman should realize that the man, whom she looks up to as her husband and as the giver of her money, children, house and other needs, is nothing but illusion (māya) in a male form.

Here understand that both male and female forms are nothing but illusions (maya) to trap the person. A man should be cautious realizing that woman is nothing but illusion created to trap him; women also should understand that man is an illusion.

Enraptured by the hunter’s music, the deer falls into a deathly trap laid by him. Likewise illusion, which exists in the form of the husband, wealth and children, is nothing but death sent in those forms by God. Every woman should realize this.

A being travels from one plane to another and also from one body to another through the medium of his subtle body (sookshma śareera). On the one hand he experiences the results of his past fruitive actions and on the other he constantly indulges in newer actions, the fruits of which will need to be reaped later. This subtle body travels along with him till liberation.

This gross body made up of senses, 5 elements and mind is only a tool for enjoying worldly experiences! The body gradually shrinks and depletes. Both life and body eventually get destroyed. As long as the ability to perform action exists in the body, it does not die. When the body loses the ability to perform action, it is called death.

Sankarśanāya namah

Sankarśanāya namah

The 10-month fetus continues to pray, “Either because of the influence of the trigunās (sattva, rajas and tamo gunas) or because of actions which arise from these trigunās, the living entity is tightly bound to this samsāra i.e. unending flow of repeated births and deaths. Due to the Lord’s illusory power he forgets his real form. Facing unimaginable difficulties he traverses this path of samsara.

Except for the grace of the Lord, there is no other method by which this bonded being can ever realize his true form!

O Lord, at this point of time the past, present and future are clearly visible to me. Who has blessed me with this knowledge? That Supreme Lord, who resides as the inner Self within all moving and non-moving entities in the creation, has alone blessed me with this knowledge!

The living entity treads on the path carved out for him based on the results of his past fruitive actions. I, who belong to that category, am serving the Lord in order to relieve myself from the three types of afflictions.

O Supreme Lord! I, who have taken on a body, am struck within the womb of another living being who has also taken on a body and who is addressed as mother. Here I am trapped in the well consisting of blood, mucus, urine and feces. The gastric fire here torments me badly. My mind feels helpless and miserable. When will I get out of this torture? I am counting the days for my release from here. When will you help me, O Lord? When will You rescue me?

Yenedṛśīṁ gatim asau daśa-māsya īśa Saṅgrāhitaḥ puru-dayena bhavādṛśena

Svenaiva tuṣyatu kṛtena sa dīna-nāthaḥ Ko nāma tat-prati vināñjalim asya kuryāt

O Supreme Lord! I am only a helpless 10 month old fetus. Nevertheless, due to your limitless mercy you have granted me the knowledge of all my previous births. O Lord! You have no equal!  You are the ruler for all weak and helpless beings. May this kindness that You have shown bring joy to You! Except for joining the palms and praying, is there any other way in which I can express my gratitude towards You, O Lord?

Birds and other living beings are totally bound to this gross body made up of the seven components (dhatus). They experience only happiness and sorrows connected to their body. However the Supreme Lord has with his grace bestowed me with discriminatory intelligence.

The Self (atma) is the refuge for ahamkara (sense of I-ness). I am the Lord who, in the form of knowledge, shines as the Self. I can perceive this directly as well as invisibly. That eternal Self (atma) Himself illumines externally as the waking state!

So ’haṁ vasann api vibho bahu-duḥkha-vāsaṁ

Garbhān na nirjigamiṣe bahir andha-kūpe

Yatro-payātam upasarpati deva-māyā

Mithyā matir yad-anu saṁsṛti-cakram etat

O Lord! In this womb I am suffering miserably in the worst possible conditions. Even then I do not seek to exit from here and enter into the well known as the world as it is filled with darkness and ignorance. Your power of illusion will envelop me as soon as I enter that world. Hence I do not wish to go there. False ego will hold me tightly in its grip. I will thus fall into the wheel of repeated births and deaths and rotate endlessly.

Therefore I will now give up my sorrow. Using my intellect I will henceforth focus exclusively upon the feet of Lord Srihari in my heart. This alone will bring about my welfare! With this very quickly I will exit from this dark well known as repeated births and deaths. Then this sorrow called re-entering into a gross body, which is made up of 9 holes, will not arise to me”. In this way, the fetus implores and prays.

Maharishi Kapila continued, “O Mother! The 10 month fetus, with his discriminatory intelligence firmly decides to meditate upon the Supreme Lord and uplift himself. Ironically at that time, the winds that aid in child birth push the fetus and cause him to become downward facing, preparing him for birth.

During labor, the fetus is severely tormented due to the pressure of these winds. With his head tilted down he pushes and with great difficulty enters into this world. He becomes breathless. The memory of the past births is now erased. He falls down along with blood and urine and wriggles in them like a worm. Due to lack of supreme knowledge, he considers himself to be the body and he cries loudly.

The mother does not understand the mind of her new born. He now has to be raised by persons who do not understand his requirements. Not having the capacity to refuse, he has to accept that which is being thrust upon him forcibly and hence he wails all the time.

He has to sleep in dirty cots wherein bedbugs and other tiny insects bite him. He does not know to scratch and relieve himself of that itch. He does not even know how to sit, stand, rollover or move. When bedbugs, mosquitoes and others insects bite his tender skin, unable to protect himself he constantly cries.

Consequently, infancy and childhood constitute a period of suffering. During youth, when his desires are not fulfilled he boils in anger. He is now subjected to even more sorrows.

To the being, who has taken on a human form, at every stage there is only unhappiness and sorrows. Irrespective of whether he is aware or unaware of the reason behind his troubles, sorrow is inevitable. If that supreme knowledge, which he had in the last month of pregnancy, were to arise in him now even for a second, it would bestow wonderful results. But it doesn’t happen.

Sankarśanāya namah

Maharishi Kapila continued,

“Daivenāsāditaṁ tasya śamalaṁ niraye pumān

Bhuṅkte kuṭumba-poṣasya hṛta-vitta ivāturaḥ 

The person who walks on the path of adharma (unrighteousness) ultimately grieves as miserably as a person who has lost everything. The Supreme Lord ensures that the person who has maintained his family through unrighteous means suffers for these sinful deeds in the form of severe punishments in hell.

The person who relies purely on unrighteous or illegal activities to maintain his family reaches the worst portion of hell known as Andha-tāmiśra. The sinner experiences the worst possible punishments here.

After completing his suffering in hell, he will take birth again as animal and other lower forms of life and then gradually through purification, he progresses to human birth” said Kapila Maharishi.

With this the thirtieth chapter of the third canto comes to an end.

Third Canto Chapter Thirty-one

In this chapter, acquiring human birth as a result of the combination of merits and sins is explained.

Kapila Maharishi continued, “O Mother! Based on the Lord’s will and in accordance with his own past fruitive actions, the being is ordered to take human birth. He takes shelter in a cell of the semen of a particular man and through it enters into the womb of a woman.

On the first night, the being that has entered his mother’s womb, will be in a form which is a mixture of two cells.  By the fifth night it converts into a bubble. By the tenth day it hardens and is the size of a plum. Thereafter it transforms into a small ball of flesh.

By the end of the first month, head is formed. At the end of two months, hands, legs and other limbs begin to form. By the end of three months, nails, fingers, toes, hair, bones, skin and sense organs manifest.

In the fourth month, bone marrow and the other six primary body building components (dhātus) will form. By the time the fetus is 5 months old, he begins to experience hunger and thirst. In the sixth month skin and the innermost membrane known as amnion are formed. Within the womb the fetus turns towards the left. With the help of the food and water consumed by the mother, its dhatus are nourished.

In the womb, fetus lives amidst stools and urine. This place is infested by worms. Living in these despicable places he suffers horribly.

The worms repeatedly bite his delicate skin every second. Unable to withstand this pain he swoons every second. The sour, salty and spicy food consumed by the mother, reach the fetus and due to these in every organ he experiences agonizing pain and suffers horribly.

Within the womb, the fetus is covered with the membrane called amnion and outside by the intestines. He suffers with shortage of space. Retaining his head within the womb, he bends his neck and back. Like a bird in a cage, he is stuck and unable to move his limbs properly. He has no freedom.

At such hour, due to the Lord’s will, the fetus regains the memory of all its past births. Recollecting his varied actions across the many past births, for a long time he is shocked and then he laments. What happiness can he obtain in such condition, tell me?

From the seventh month the fetus is conscious. However due to the pressure of the winds preceding delivery he is tossed about here and there. Just like the worm that exists alongside him, he too cannot remain at one place.

Due to the knowledge of his previous births, he who is now bound to this gross body composed of the seven components begins to dread these worldly bondages. Folding his palms, piteously he prays to the Lord who had put him into this womb. He pleads,

“In order to protect this world that has sought shelter in Him, the Lord out of His free will, incarnates in numerous forms on earth. For all living beings on earth, His feet are the sole refuge. I surrender to such lotus feet.

As I am wicked He has awarded me this punishment of living in a womb. Nature undergoes transformation and manifests as body, senses and mind. The individual being mistakenly considers himself to be the body and senses. Due to this misconception he gets involved in actions. He then obtains bodies that are in accordance to his merits and sins and gets imprisoned within a mother’s womb. I offer obeisance to that Supreme Lord, who is unbound and is without a carrier.

That Supreme Lord, who is devoid of birth and other transformations, shines resplendently within my heart, which is presently undergoing severe turmoil. To Him, who is an embodiment of knowledge (jnana), differences such as knower and known do not exist.

Yaḥ pañca-bhūta-racite rahitaḥ śarīre cchanno ’yathendriya-guṇārtha-cid-ātmako ’ham

Tenāvikuṇṭha-mahimānam ṛṣiṁ tam enaṁ vande paraṁ prakṛti-pūruṣayoḥ pumāṁsam

The activities of Nature and its attributes (trigunas) manifest as the 5 gross elements. In reality I am unconnected with this body created by Nature. Nor am I connected with the senses, or with sound and other sense perceptions or with ahamkara (sense of I-ness) that reflects within the mind. However due to my false belief that I am connected to them, I am actually getting bound to them. I offer my obeisance to that Lord who is of unquestionable repute. He is beyond Nature (Prakriti)”.

Padmanābhāya namah