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I am the Soul
The body may be lying asleep but the atma learns of the troubles of the body, that is to say even in that state the dehatma attitude is not overcome. Thus due to the familiarity with the body for infinite time, it is now an adhyas that 'I am the body.
Now the question arises that didn't the atma ever live without the body in this infinite time? In reply, the scriptures say that the time gap while the atma travels from one body after its death to another is very short. If the atma were to go at a normal speed, it would take only one moment, i.e. one moment it would be in this body and in the next moment it acquires another. Therefore, it remains without a body only for a fleeting moment. But if it were to go in a round-about way, i.e. taking a few turns on the way, then it would remain without a body for 3 or 4 moments, before acquiring the next body. Thus at most, the atma would be without a body for maybe four moments. Yet the miniscule tejas - karmana body is all along with it. In the flow of eternal time four moments are absolutely insignificant. As a result the atma has developed an attachment with body. With the state of eternal memory that “The body and I are the same', the atma has presumed the characteristics of the body to be its own. Believing the relatives of the body to be its own relatives, the atma has lost the consciousness.
But body is not the atma. The consciousness that 'I am the Soul separate from the body' is lost. O Disciple! How can the body be the soul? The characteristics of the body and the soul are openly different. In Srimadji's own words : देह जीव एक रूपे भासे छे अज्ञान वडे,
क्रियानी प्रवृत्ति पण तेथी तेम थाय छे । sitait reft Bra T, nah, G:C, ar,
देहनां स्वभाव जीव पदमां जणाय छे । एवो जे अनादि एक रूपनो मिथ्यात्व भाव
ज्ञानीनां वचन वडे दूर थई जाय छे ।
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