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THE PRACTICAL DHARMA
The third, or the animal form of life, is forced on the soul in consequence of a slavery to the senses, regardless of the means employed for their gratification. Sensual lust, deceit, the preaching of falsehood for procuring livelihood, excessive grief, intense aversion to any particular being or thing, giving free reins to imagination to dwell upon the details of past or expected future experiences of sexual and other kinds of bodily pleasures, and praying for future prosperity to indulge in the delights of the senses to the full, are some of the causes that lead to re-birth in the animal kingdom, and determine the longevity of the different types of animal life.
The fourth kind of āyuh, i.e., that peculiar to the residents of hells, is the consequence of the worst forms of falsehood, parigraha (attachment to the objects of the senses), passions, evil thoughts, himsā (injury) and the like.
The duration* of life in the four gatis (conditions of life, deva, manusya, etc.) is given by the Siddha Bhagavāns to vary from less than
* To understand the nature of the āyuh karma, it is necessary to bear in mind the fact that birth and death are two alternating phases of life of the soul involved in the cycle of transmigration. Neither pare spirit nor matter is, in any sense, liable to suffer death, since the unit of each is a simple, that is to say, indivisible and indestructible substance, and, therefore, not liable to disintegration.
The kārmāņa sarīra of the unemancipated soul which is the product of the union of spirit and matter, is the factor which determines the liability to birth and death, for so long as it exists--and it is only destroyed just prior to the obtainment of final emancipation--it remains liable to changes of form resulting from the processes of inflow of matter into, and of its removal from, the constitution of the soul. Time, the ubiquitous medium of change, aptly called kala (death), because of a change of condition being the essence of death, also tends to bring about a dissolution of form, in consequence of the operation of bodies on one another. Thus, while the bondage of the soul is prolonged by the fresh influx of matter, great changes take place periodically, qualitatively and quantitatively, in the composition and struoture of the kārmāna sarira. When the soul's association with its outer body is rendered impossible in consequence of these changes, or from any other cause, it departs from it, and is then said to die. Its death, however, is a signal for a fresh outburst of its organising activities elsewhere, for it is immediately attracted into a new womb, and at once proceeds to organise--mechanically, no doubt-a new onter body for itself. The force which determines the length of the period of the association between the soul and its outermost body is called the ayuh karma. This association is liable to come to an end either (1) naturally, as the culmination of the incessant processes of change and re-adjustment going on internally, or (2) by the separation of the soul from its gross body, in consequence of the impairment or des
