How does the material body become spiritualized by bhakti?

From Keshava Nimai P:

SP explains in Raja Vidya book about the example of Iron Rod and Fire.

“As we begin to make spiritual advancement while in the material body, we begin to take on the qualities of a spiritual body. If we put iron into a fire, it becomes hot, and then it becomes red-hot, and finally it is no longer iron, but fire—whatever it touches bursts into flames. As we become advanced in Kåñëa consciousness, our material body will become spiritualized and will no longer be affected by material contamination.”

What it means  ” Our material body will  become spiritualized” ?

Answer Podcast:

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Hare Krishna. Question from Krishna Nimaya Prabhu.
Prabhupada says in the Raj Vidya, in the example of iron and fire, that just as iron by contact with fire becomes spiritualized, becomes fiery, similarly by the practice of bhakti, our material body will become spiritualized and will not be affected by material contamination. So how does the material body become spiritualized? Answer, it is your spiritualization is more in terms of intent, not in terms of content. That means that it is not in the body which is made of earth, water, fire, everything will become Satchitananda.
Just as it is not that the iron gets transformed literally into fire. The iron when it comes in contact with fire, it becomes, it assumes some of the qualities of fire. That means it becomes fiery hot.
So similarly, the more we engage in devotional service, the more we become purified and the more we choose to act purely and we start using our body, our mind, our senses, our everything in Krishna’s service and the more we do this, the more our habit to act in this way continues and more and more. So when Prabhupada says that our body becomes spiritualized, that means it loses its materialistic tendencies. So whatever we make as a habit, that’s what we get prompted to do again and again.
So if we develop a habit of serving Krishna, of engaging in devotional activities, of filling our life with devotional activities, then non-devotional, anti-devotional activities will get dropped away and they will not come to us and that way the body becomes spiritualized in the sense that it becomes used for spiritual purposes only and it is not used for material purposes and the tendency to get attracted to the sense objects and to drag us towards sense objects, that becomes lesser and lesser and that’s what Prabhupada says immediately after taking the body, the body becomes spiritualized. After that he says that we are no longer affected by material contaminations. So contaminations here refers not to only diseases, they are not contaminations, they are problems.
Contaminations are lust, anger, greed, envy, pride and illusion. So these contaminations affect us less and less because we become elevated by the practice of bhakti and we become elevated, we become purified and just as the earth has a gravity pull up to a particular level in the atmosphere beyond that the gravity pull doesn’t act. Similarly by the practice of bhakti the world’s consciousness becomes elevated more and more and then the gravity pull becomes lesser and lesser and the gravity pull of sensual desires, of the desires coming from the contamination becomes less and less and that’s how in intent the material body also becomes spiritualized and that’s why for the bodies of great devotees they are not cremated but because they become spiritualized they are considered sacred and that’s why their samadhi is done.
So the body becomes spiritualized in intent, in being used in Krishna’s service and this is talked about also in the So jivanmukti means that although the person is jivit, is in this world but because that person is fully engaged in the lord’s service Iha, in this world that person is there but is absorbed in service of lord Hari with all of one’s faculties So even if situated in this world the person is liberated So the spiritualization of the body refers to being in the body but no longer being in material existence in the sense of being in material consciousness so that is jivanmukti that is jivanmukti, being liberated while in the body and when we live in this way eventually we will get videha mukti that is we will get liberated beyond the body and attain our spiritual position in the kingdom of God Thank you. Hare Krishna