When the mind becomes our friend, does it become the same as the intelligence?

Questioner: Madhavi Gauri Mataji

Answer Podcast:

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Question from Madhuri Gauri Mataji.
When the mind becomes purified, does it become the same as the intelligence? If not, then how do we differentiate at that time between the mind and the intelligence? Answer, the subtle body is not to be differentiated in its compositional terms. Just like we know there are the various elements, earth, water, fire, air, ether. They are made of different elements.
The mind, intelligence are largely differentiated in terms of their functions. The subtle elements are themselves subtle. So whether they are themselves compositionally different or compositionally one, that is difficult for us to understand because of their subtleness.
So we perceive the difference among these elements primarily in terms of their function, in terms of the way they act. So the mind, we usually say, is that which acts emotionally and intelligence is that which acts rationally. The mind tends to be impulsive whereas the intelligence tends to be more reflexive, thinking of things, reflective rather.
Reflective, thinking things through and then deciding what to do and what not to do. So now it’s not that these two functions will get coagulated into one when we become purified. No, even when we become purified, we will have an emotional side and we will have a rational side.
And roughly we can say that the emotions will stem from the mind and the intelligence and our thoughtful analysis will stem from the intelligence. Now Krishna talks even for pure devotees when he says that mayy arpitam nao buddhir yo mad-bhaktah same priyaha So he is talking about his exalted devotees, those who are very dear to him and he says that their mind and intelligence is devoted to him. That means for them also there is a differentiation between the mind and intelligence.
So currently we think of the mind as the enemy and the intelligence as the friend. So that’s why we may get the question that when the mind also becomes the friend, how will we differentiate? But we need to understand that it is not that just the mind is the enemy and the intelligence is the friend. It’s their action.
Krishna says lust is situated even in the intelligence. Indriyani mano buddhir asya dhishthanam uchyate etair vimohi yatyesham jnanavavrtti dehinam In 3.40 he says that lust is situated in the senses, the mind and the intelligence. So even the intelligence can be an enemy and that’s how we see that there are many people who use their intelligence to indulge in sensual activities and then cover their tracks so that they will not get caught.
So it’s not that we differentiate between the mind and the intelligence based on the fact that the mind acts inimically and the intelligence acts benevolently. But we differentiate between them based on which is more connected with our emotionality and which is connected more with our rationality. And that differentiation will continue to occur both in the impure stage and in the pure stage.
In the pure stage our mind will have emotions which are connected with Krishna. It will have nobler emotions which will take us towards Krishna. And at that time our intelligence being purified we will become like Munis who can think deeply and the deeper we go the deeper we connect with Krishna through our analysis.
So thus the difference between the intelligence and the mind remains and the difference will be in terms of the intelligence being our analytical faculty and the mind being connected with our emotional faculty.