Bhagavatam-daily 274 – 11.13.7 – Guided destruction facilitates regeneration

Spiritual growth. Thank you Krishna instructing Uddhava over here and he is talking about how one can from material existence attain spiritual existence through cultivating goodness and then transcending goodness so in the previous verses he has talked about cultivating goodness now in this verse he will talk about transcending goodness so Venu Sangharsh Jo Vahaneer Venu we often are familiar with this word as referring to flute you see how Krishna plays the flute yes but Venu also means in a broader sense bamboo flutes are usually made of bamboos so here Venu refers to bamboo. Venu Sangharsh, Sangharsh means conflict here it refers to friction so by the friction of bamboo sticks quite often Jo Vahaneer the fire that is born that forest is destroyed by the fire that is created from the constituents of that forest itself that is the bamboo trees so similarly with the body by directing the body spiritually one can create a fire that can destroy the body itself Tat Kriya the result of that will be the body will be destroyed.
Now this may seem to be a very destructive analogy but liberation is also a form correlated with destruction at one level we get liberated when our body is destroyed and then we attain the spiritual world. Another level spiritual existence requires destruction not just to the physical body but at a deeper level destruction even of our mind of our subtle body because the physical body will anyway be destroyed at the end of life but that doesn’t take us to liberation it is the destruction of the subtle body that will get us liberated and that destruction happens by sustained spiritual practice so here Krishna is stating that we don’t have to artificially distance ourselves from the body to become distanced from the body to become distanced means that when we are liberated then we and the body become separated so as of now although we and our body are not integrated but we are connected we are connected just like say a engine is connected to a bogie or a horse is connected to a cart or a chariot. Now we are connected with the body but our sense of identification has become integrated into the body that’s why when two things are connected the two things have their separate existence still but when two things are integrated when the two things become one just as say for example if we put sugar in water the sugar gets dissolved and integrated into the water so like that two things can even become integrated totally and that also happens at times when when two substances which are mixable and integrable they come together but in the case of the body and the soul there is a radical difference between them and so integration is not possible but still there is the connection which leads to within our conception integration and that’s why quite often we don’t understand that we are different from the body we often act as if we are our very body itself now what Krishna is saying here is that this body with which we are connected that can be destroyed by the action of the body itself so now there is a process by which this needs to be done there are people who commit suicide although it involves destruction of the physical body it doesn’t at all destroy the subtle body because it is motivated very strongly by desire situated in the subtle body and to fulfill those desires one will have to take up some other body eventually one may not get a body immediately because one has destroyed one’s present body and so one will have to stay in a ghostly existence but the point is there is a process for destruction and that is through purification just like in a war one soldier may lop off the arm of another soldier of an opponent soldier and in surgery a surgeon may cut off the arm amputate the arm in both cases cutting is the same but not only is the intention different but also the whole context is different so there can be there can be random destruction and there can be well thought out destruction so what is being talked about liberation essentially means that sort of well thought out carefully understood destruction where we know what is happening and we understand how it is to be made to happen and accordingly we make it happen that means by understanding that the subtle body is attachments and misconceptions that need to be destroyed we live in a way that in goodness that brings about purification and gradually we understand that not only do I not need to fulfill the desire of the subtle body but I don’t need the subtle body itself for my happiness as we understand that the soul and the soul is transcendental to material existence the soul is eternal the soul is eternally pure and the soul is eternally connected with Krishna soul has no intrinsic connection with the body and the soul’s eternal connection with Krishna can take it to liberation soon if the soul becomes detached from the body-mind complex and with this understanding and the redirection of one’s heart from the body-mind complex and from enjoying material things with the body-mind complex to serving and loving Krishna and delighting therein by this one can become purified and being thus purified when one gives up the body at that time the fire that is kindled that fire destroys the body in such a way that there is no need for any further body so when we live in goodness we recognize the need for detachment we understand the process for detachment and then we bring about the detachment and so the destruction of the body-mind complex that is brought about in goodness is like a surgical amputation which promotes health not like a warrior cutting off an opponent’s arm which is meant to cause death or at least injury so by living in goodness by using the same body which we have and which although it resulted from our past karma and although which could have perpetuated our material existence we can use it to end our material existence if we live in such a way that we transfer all our desires from the body-mind to the soul that means the soul has the original capacity for thinking, feeling, willing for loving and when our desires become pure to love and serve Krishna then all our desires are stored and activated with the soul’s latent faculty for thinking, feeling, willing, desiring, acting perceiving everything and with the soul spiritually activated we don’t need the body and then the body when it is destroyed, the physical body is destroyed at the time of death but along with that the subtle body also becomes redundant and thus the soul becomes liberated Thank you Shri Bhagavatam, 11.13.8