Richard Kerr <R.Kerr@perspolicy.usyd.edu.au> wrote:
>madhudvisa@krishna.org (Madhudvisa dasa ) wrote:
>[Story deleted]
>> This is the story of liquid beauty, and it is a fact. That is
>> actually the beauty of the material body, it's simply a bag of
>> pus, stool, urine, blood, mucus, horrible things. And we are just
>> attached to the skin and as soon as the skin is no longer
>> beautiful we are not attracted any more.
>Charming story. And really trivially wrong. The princess induced an
>illness in herself and kept the results of the illness in a bucket.
>If she called the contents of the bucket "beauty" wasn't being profound,
>just wrong.
The story is not wrong. It shows the body which we are so attached to
is a combination of things which are not at all attractive in
themselves... You can't argue against this. If we are only attached to
someone because of their beautiful body [or "skin"] we are attached to
a temporary combination of matter which is only manifest for a fleeting
moment in time... But we have a desire for permanent happiness. So when
that fleeting moment ends [when the "skin" is no longer beautiful] we
become frustrated...
Of course not all relationships are based on the skin only. Some people
have intellectual relationships based on the mind... But that is not
being encouraged any more. The powers that be want us to have more sex,
because that fuels the economy...
>Physical beauty is the interplay of the parts of the body. If any of
>the parts are taken in isolation of course it will not be beautiful,
>you have removed it from the interplay.
Exactly. That is my point! Material beauty is very fleeting.
>> This is why in Western society, which is simply going on the basis
>> of this "skin disease," there are so many divorces and so many
>> marriages.
>I agree that we are too concerned with physical beauty.
Good. That's the main point. We are not the body, we are the eternal
spirit soul, the person "driving" the body. The body is a machine and
we are the driver of that machine. Trying to become satisfied by
satisfying the body is like trying to satisfy the driver of a motorcar
by putting petrol in the car!
>[...]
>> Everything is based on the skin, and the skin is temporary. We can
>> never be satisfied, we can never be happy with a relationship
>> based on the skin only because our skin is a very temporary thing.
>> A beautiful girl is beautiful for a few years only, young girls
>> sixteen, seventeen are very beautiful, twenty, twenty-one, twenty-
>> two, twenty-three, twenty-four, twenty-five, then finished. She's
>> not beautiful any more. So this is a fleeting moment only. It's
>> the same with a man, a man is beautiful, sixteen, seventeen,
>> eighteen, nineteen then the beauty is gone.
>The older I get the less beautiful young women look to me. I am
>usually attracted to women around my age. I think you are being
>unnecessarily pessimistic.
You are not an ordinary man then! Young men and young women are
physically beautiful, there's no doubt about it. Not only are they
beautiful but the have so much energy and enthusiasm... Physically an
18 year old man or women is a much more attractive proposal than a 40
year old or a 50 year old!
You are an exception. Perhaps you are more interested in the person
than the body. This is a higher platform. You may have already realized
the futility of trying to catch that fleeting moment when the "skin" is
beautiful.
Of course, while the spirit soul is in the body, the beauty of the
person shines through. An old person is not different from a young
person... The "person" doesn't get old, only the body. If one is on the
bodily platform, however, he can't see this, he is preoccupied with the
"skin disease".
>[...]
>> In the beginning we have a child's body, then we get a boy's body,
>> then a man's body then we get an old man's body, so the time of
>> death is simply another change of body. A self-realized soul can
>> understand this, he can see this.
>Since I'm about to argue that you are fundamentally mistaken, I guess
>I am not self-realised. On the other hand you might just be wrong.
No I am not wrong. The body is changing. The body I have now is
completely different from the body I had as a child. There is no room
for argument, it has changed completely. But it's still me inside!
>> This is a fact. Our bodies are
>> always changing. You can see. No one can argue with this. It's
>> simply a statement of a very plain fact. I have this man's body
>> now, previously I had a boy's body, prior to that I had a child's
>> body and before that a babies body. They are all different bodies.
>Nope. They are all one single subtly impermanent body.
This doesn't make any sense at all! The body is clearly changing. My
childs body is gone, my baby's body is gone... But I am still here. And
what's this nonsense about "subtly impermanent". There is nothing
subtle about it. It is impermanent! What is subtle is the changing. The
body is changing at every moment [subtly].
>The atoms and
>molecules that go into your body have changed
The material body IS the atoms and molecules that constitute it! If the
atoms and molecules [the components of the body] have changed then of
course the body has changed.
>over time and the shape
>of your body has changed
See you agree your self. "The shape of your body has changed..." If the
shape has changed the body has changed!
>because of the way that process is carried
>out. There isn't a single atom in your body that won't be replaced
>in five years (although some cells, such as eye cells, stick with you
>to your grave.)
So it's changed!
>It is the pattern of the atoms of which you are made
>that is important.
The "pattern of atoms" has also changed. If the "pattern of atoms"
didn't change my "replacement body" would be the same as my "original
body". I would never have changed from a childs body. I have changed
bodies ONLY because the pattern of atoms HAS changed!
>Like beauty you are not any single thing
You are the person, the spirit soul, the occupier of the body, the
driver of the body... You are eternal, you are spiritual, you never
die, you never get old, you never get sick... All these things happen
to the body and because we think we are the body. But this is not our
natural position.
There is another world beyond this material sky where we can exist in
our original spiritual body... there everything is eternally youthful,
full of knowledge and full of pleasure. This is our natural position.
To be in this material body and be full of anxiety, to be forced to get
old and die and to be full of ignorance is NOT NATURAL. We will find
real happiness, real permanent beauty in the spiritual world. But to
get there we have to give up this "skin disease" first.
> , you are
>the result of the interplay of all your parts.
You are NOT the "result of the interplay of all your parts"! THE
INTERPLAY OF ALL YOUR PARTS IS THE RESULT OF YOU. This body is
constructed according to my consciousness. There are 8,400,000 types of
bodies and depending on my consciousness at the time of death I am
placed into the womb of my next mother. If I'm in animal consciousness,
I am put into an animals womb, if I am in human consciousness I a
placed in a human mother's womb but if I am God conscious, Krishna
conscious I don't have to come back to this material world again.
Instead of being placed within the womb of a mother in this miserable
material world, I go back home, back to Godhead, to the spiritual world
and regain my original, eternal spiritual nature...
>You don't have a
>different body now
I think you can see by now that you certainly do.
>you have the same body in a different point in
>the process of that interplay.
This is nonsense. The "process of interplay" is just another way of
saying "the change of the body".
>The difference is subtle but important,
>you are too attached to the notion of the body as a "thing".
>[...]
There is no difference, you are just trying to support your own "faith"
that there is no soul, everything is chemicals, there is no God...
>> This is the process of life in the material world. The bodies are
>> changing but the soul is not changing. I the person, I am the same
>> person I was in the babies body, I'm the same person I was in the
>> child's body, I'm the same person I was in the boys body. I can
>> remember things, I can remember my childhood body, I can remember
>> my boys body. I can remember the activities I performed in these
>> bodies. These activities are performed by me, but the body I had
>> then is gone. So we can understand that I, the self, the person, I
>> am permanent, I am eternal, but the body is always changing.
>You sound very sure of that.
It's a fact. Any thoughtful person can see it [you can easily perceive
that "you" are different from "your" body. "You" are also different
from "your" mind.. This is going on in another thread with Marian. You
might also be interested in that.
>When you get right down to it, though. Your mind, the bit which thinks
>of itself as "me",
Well at least you accept there is a mind and a "me". That's a relief.
But even the mind is not "me". There is matter, higher than matter is
the senses, higher than the senses is the mind, higher than the mind is
intelligence, higher than the intelligence is the spirit-soul. You are
the spirit-soul. And higher than you, the spirit-soul, is the Supreme
Personality of Godhead, Krishna. So ultimately our business is to serve
God, to serve Krishna.
>displays the same kind of subtle impermanence that
>your body does. Far from being the same person that you were 20 years
>ago, you are less recognisable mentally than you are physically.
The mind is also material and it does, as you have noted, change.
There are three bodies. The "gross" body consists of earth, water,
fire, air and either. It is the gross body we have concentrated on in
this presentation. It is changing at every moment. It is changing
BECAUSE OF changes in the subtle body. The subtle body is the mind,
intelligence and false ego [identifying the body as the self]. Changes
in the subtle body [ie: mental changes] are REFLECTED as changes in the
gross body.
What you have said here is completely correct. You have come to the
point of understanding the mental platform which is a great advance
from the physical platform. Now you just have to contemplate the
intellectual platform and the spiritual platform.
>Even
>your memories, which you think are so permanent, turn out only to be
>clever reconstructions from primitive clues.
Yes. We have memories stored from many, many lifetimes, but we can't
"remember" those life times. The data is there but we can't access
it. A symptom of our material existence is forgetfulness. We have to
be able to forget to continue our quest for happiness in the material
world. So we forget all the difficulties, all the suffering in the
past... It makes it easier for us to believe we can be happy in the
future....
>As beauty is, so is your body and so is your mind. All of it displays
>subtle impermanence.
Not everything! Only everything MATERIAL. Spiritual things are of a
completely different nature. Sat, cit, ananda. Eternal, full of
knowledge and full of pleasure. Matter is the opposite: asat, acit and
nirananda; temporary, full of ignorance and full of anxiety.
>Everything is constantly in a process of change
Not the soul.. The soul is unchanging.
na jayate mriyate va kadacin nayam bhutva va na bhuyah
ajo nityah sasvato 'yam purano na hanyamane sarire
"For the soul their is neither birth nor death at any time. He has not
come into being, does not come into being, and will not come into being.
He is unborn, eternal, ever-existing and primeval. He is not slain when
the body is slain." (Bhagavad-gita 2.20)
>and as beaty fades and bodies die there is absolutely no reason to
>suspect that your mind will transmigrate.
The process is not to "suspect". What is the use of your suspicions? If
there are 100 students in a lecture theater and there is a sound coming
through the roof from outside they may all "suspect" it was caused by
different things. But someone outside on the roof can tell us ACTUALLY
what happened. So if you want to find out what the position really is
your "suspicions" are not very useful. You have to find a proper
authority. I recommend you read "Bhagavad-gita As It Is" with
translations and purports by His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami
Prabhupada. I'm sure you will find it an amazing book.
>If you survive death at all
>it will be by the intervention of something outside of our normal
>experience.
In the material world we are normally in the "bodily" concept of life.
We think "I am an Australian man..." But my body is an Australian man's
body. I'm the person, the eternal spirit-soul within the machine of the
body. I am controlling the body. I AM NOT THE BODY. I am not an
Australian man. My next body could be a womans body! I'm not a man, I'm
not a woman, I'm not an Austrailan. I'm the spirit-soul, the living
force and my business is to serve Krishna of God. Because I didn't want
to do that, I wanted to be an independent god, I am now here, in the
material world. BUT IT'S NOT VERY COMFORTABLE HERE! It's not my home. I
belong in the spiritual world.
So chant Hare Krishna and be happy in this life and then go back home,
back to Godhead!!!
vasamsi jirnani yatha vihaya navani grhnati naro 'parani
tatha sarirani vihaya jirnany anyani samyati navani dehi
"As a person puts on new garments, giving up old ones, the soul similarly
accepts new material bodies, giving up the old and useless ones."
(Bhagavad-gita 2.22)
Thank you very much.
Thank you. Hare Krishna!
Madhudvisa dasa
(madhudvisa@krishna.org) /sudarsana
All glories to His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada!
Sudarsana Home madhudvisa@krishna.org