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Aptavani-8
49
Dadashri: It is separate, it is not bound. It is the vyavahar atma (the atma which interacts with the world), that is bound, but the real Atma is not bound. The word atma that you use in worldly interaction (vyavahar) is the one which is bound.
Questioner: When another birth is taken, is it the subtle body that takes birth?
Dadashri: Yes, why not just say that it is the ego that takes birth! We do not know the subtle body, nor have we ever seen the subtle body. You learned how to say the word, sookshma sharira, but even that is just from reading in a book. So it is the ego itself that takes birth, just say that! Do you know the ego or not? It is the ego that acquires a new body, again and again. There is the atma of worldly interaction (vyavahar atma) and there is the real Atma. The real Atma is unbound and indeed pure.
All these problems are the problems of the ego. If the ego goes away, you attain liberation (moksha). That is all there is to it. You will be able to understand this in short, will you not?
The subtle body (sookshma deha) that we talk about is what goes into the next life. You understand that fact, do you not? Otherwise how else can the subtle be known? The subtle is something different; only the Gnanis can understand it. People merely say subtle body, subtle body, because they have read it in books. But when they do not understand even the sthool (gross), how are they going to understand the sookshma (subtle)?
Who Is Stuck onto Whom? Questioner: Is the Atma stuck to the body (pudgal) or is the body (pudgal) stuck to the Atma?
Dadashri: The fact is; nothing is stuck to anything. Everything is instrumental (naimitik). Only in worldly interaction (vyavahar) do people say, 'the soul has stuck to it'. That is why people say things like, 'why don't you just let go of this tree you
