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## Mind Purity and Means to Protect the Mind from Strong Attachment and Aversion - Means to Destroy Karma
**From the Fourth Light of the Yoga Shastra, verses 49 to 52:**
Who becomes lowly and who does not attain liberation? Everyone attains it. Aversion alone cannot exist without attachment, and attachment alone cannot exist without aversion. By abandoning one, both are abandoned.
Actions like lust are servants of attachment, and false pride, etc., are the family of aversion. The father, leader, seed, and supreme lord of attachment and aversion, inseparable from both and protected and nurtured by both, is delusion, the grandfather of all vices. Thus, these three vices are the main ones. There is no other vice that cannot be included in these. These three cause all beings in the world to wander in the forest of samsara.
The soul (jiva) is naturally pure like a crystal, but due to these attachments, it is called the embodiment of attachment. Alas! These thieves of attachment steal the soul's spiritual wealth in the blink of an eye. Due to them, the world is chaotic; or, the soul, situated in its own nature, is robbed of all knowledge by these robbers of attachment in front of its own eyes.
All the beings in the world and those who are about to attain liberation in a short time are under the control of this ruthless army of delusion. Oh! Vices of attachment! Do you have enmity with liberation or with those seeking liberation that you obstruct their union (ratnatrayamaya)? Only the Arihants are capable of destroying you (vices of attachment). There is no one else as capable. They have extinguished the fire of vices that burns the world. Just as a muni does not fear a tiger, snake, water, or fire when they are nearby, similarly, the muni does not fear the harmful attachment, etc., in both worlds, in this life and in future lives. In fact, a lion of attachment and a tiger of aversion sit with them, because these yogis have chosen the path of great hardship.
Now, the means to conquer attachment and aversion are explained:
**Verse 49:**
**Meaning:** Therefore, yogi men who desire the state of nirvana should conquer the enemies of attachment and aversion through equanimity, abandoning drowsiness (inattentiveness) and being vigilant.
**Verse 50:**
**Meaning:** Just as bathing in water removes dirt, so too, the dirt of attachment and aversion is quickly removed from men who bathe in the water of equanimity, which is extremely joyful.
**Verse 51:**
**Meaning:** Equanimity destroys in a moment those karmas that a man cannot destroy even by intense austerities for countless births.
**Verse 52:**
**Meaning:** Karma and the soul are intertwined; the virtuous one who has attained certainty about the nature of the soul separates them with the stick of Samayika.
**Explanation:** Karma and the soul are connected; they are separate; they are not one. Thus, the muni who has known this with certainty separates the soul and karma with the stick of Samayika. Just as a stick is used to separate vessels stuck together by adhesive substances, similarly, the soul and karma, which are connected by the bond of association, can be separated by Samayika. This is called the destruction of karma; it is the attainment of the state of nirvana. The complete and total destruction of pudgalas never happens, because substance is eternal. The separation of karma-pudgalas from the soul is called the destruction of karma.
Here, there is a doubt: "The statement that the virtuous ones separate karmas with the stick of Samayika is only..."