________________
159
In order to make the student focuss his entire attention on this sheath under discussion, the author is enumerating the characteristics, the various conditions, the different rules of conduct, etc. of the gross-body. Change is the characteristic of all things finite, and the body has its essential property (dharma) of undergoing modifications such as birth, growth, decay, disease and death. It is again the nature of the body to express itself as stout, lean, tall or short. The human form goes through its stages of growth such as childhood, youth and old-age, when the body gathers to itself new dimension sand looks.
It is with reference to the physical body and its relations with the world around, that the social codes of behaviour are prescribed and strictly followed by the cultured. The various regulations of communal living and standards of behaviour laid down for the various orders-of-life asrama are all prescribed for the discipline of the body, and they have a sanction only with reference to the embodied. It is the body that becomes the seat of all diseases. It is, indeed, for the body all worship (pūja ) is offered, all honour ( māna ) given all dishonour apamāna shown.
With these indicatives sure strokes of his poetic pen Acharya Sankara has brought the student's mind focussed upon the gross physical body (annamaya-koșa) which is the abode of the individual-ego who experiences his world of joys-and-sorrows through this physical body.
बुद्धीन्द्रियाणि श्रवणं त्वगक्षि
घ्राणं च जिह्वा विषयावबोधनात् । वाक्पाणिपादा गुदमप्युपस्थः ।
कर्मेन्द्रियाणि प्रवणेन कर्मसु ॥१२॥
buddhindriyāni śravaņam tvagakși
grāņam ca jihvā vişayāvabodhanāt vākpāņipādā gudamapyupasthah
karmendriyāņi pravaņenā karmasu
92.
