Why is sleep considered to be a characteristic of intelligence in the Bhag 3.26.30?

samsayo ‘tha viparyaso niscayah smrtir eva ca

svapa ity ucyate buddher laksanam vrttitah prthak

Doubt, misapprehension, correct apprehension, memory and sleep, as

determined by their different functions, are said to be the distinct

characteristics of intelligence.

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Great. The question In the Srimad Bhagavatam, third canto When the characteristics of the intelligence Are described, why is Sleep described to be A characteristic of intelligence? Answer, because Sleep enables us to Perceive the higher realities Of life, not by sleeping But by analyzing The experience of sleep.
And this Verse 326.30 In the chapter Fundamental Principles of Material Nature, which is the teachings of Lord Kapil Dev To Devahuti The verse is So, the five characteristics Of intelligence are described to be Samsaya, doubt Viparyaso, misapprehension Nishchayaha, correct Understanding or assert Correct apprehension, assertment Smriti, remembrance Memory And Swap is sleep Or dream Swap is related with Sapna Now, firstly, intelligence Itself is subtle. It is a part Of the subtle body And when we say that Intelligence has some features Those features are also subtle They are not like the parts of a machine Certainly not like the Say the parts of Computer chip Where A particular area of a chip is Doing a particular function and other area is doing a Particular function. So, these Are more of The Faculties that enable Intelligence So, by Utilizing these Five faculties Or abilities One can become intelligent Or rather Intelligence acts, expresses Manifests itself Through these five things So, let’s see how this happens.
Srila Prabhupada explains in the Purport that Samsaya, doubt Is a sign of intelligence. Only a Intelligent person can have Doubts When a person is not intelligent The opposite of intelligent is Foolish And one character of a foolish person is Gullibility A person just easily believes whatever is told Advertisements tell that Cigarette smoking is cool And people believe it. So, they don’t have The intelligence To doubt.
How can fire Be cool? So, Samsaya Is the characteristic of intelligence. Of course, it is not The only characteristic of intelligence There is, by Samsaya We start, that’s the first step I understand, okay, this Seems to be wrong Or at least this may not be Right. Let me, I have my Questions about the Correctness of this particular Statement or assessment or Whatever we are trying to Understand.
So, then from doubt One moves to the next step That is Samsaya Viparyasa That is false Apprehension. That means one understands Okay, this is false Srila Prabhupada gives the example That by doubting Whether I am the body, one can come to The conclusion, actually I am not the body And then after that There is Nishchaya Nishchaya means correct assessment That means, okay, I analyze If I am not the body, then what am I? Then, one gradually uses one’s Intelligence. In general, to come to Samsaya and Viparyasa Can happen by Just one’s intellectual faculties By one’s analysis But for Nishchaya Usually Scriptural knowledge is required Without the Guidance of Guru Sadhu Shastra It is generally difficult to come to Nishchaya.
Some Nishchaya People who are in goodness or people Who have some perceptiveness from Their Past lives Might be able to come to some level of Assertment. But in general, Nishchaya Will be greatly facilitated by Guru Sadhu Shastra. It is not that Just one dogmatically or Thoughtlessly accepts what Guru Shadhu Shastra is saying But that, after one starts Doubting, so The whole advertisement industry Is telling us that The world is a place of happiness There is enjoyment if you just purchase this particular product Or do this particular activity So an intelligent person will have some skepticism, some Share doubt.
Then, one will Understand, actually There are so many diseases and dangers and Misunderstandings and natural calamities And there are So where is the Question of happiness? So one will realize that The idea that there is enjoyment in this World, that this world is an enjoyable place Is a It is a false understanding And we will realize that it is false But then, after that When I study the scripture and I understand, yes Nishchaya, scriptures also give further Description of how I am, this world is a Place of misery. And after that Further, the scriptures also give us Knowledge of the spiritual world which is a true place Of happiness. So that Nishchaya, it is generally difficult to come to Justify our independent Analysis.
Then Smriti. Smriti here refers to Remembrance. Even when we Study something, hear something Analyze or even realize Something, it is not that Automatically in the future We will be able to Recollect it when we need it So in general, in our Today’s education system The capacity to remember facts Is considered to be a sign of intelligence And That is a characteristic Of intelligence, an important characteristic of intelligence But it is not the only characteristic Of intelligence.
Here Smriti Refers more fundamentally To the capacity To Recollect our understandings So Vishal Prabhupada Also other places would give the example That I remember That I was still existing but my body Was entirely different. When I was a Small child, I had such a tiny body Now I have a big body I was small, I have become big but I am still the same So this is also one example of Smriti Where The recollection Of the past Events Or insights or Experiences helps us To Approach the Present with Greater perceptiveness, in a sense With greater intelligence. So Smriti Is also a characteristic of Intelligence.
In the Bhagavad Gita also in 2.62 And 63 when Krishna Talks about how temptations overpower us He says Smriti Brahmashad Buddhi Nashod that Once the Smriti is destroyed Buddhi collapses So In a functional sense Actually Our intelligence on a day to day basis Is largely dependent on Smriti If I am going to Drive a car or operate a computer I have to have some Smriti subconscious at least That how do I operate the car, how do I type On a computer. So without That we will not be able to do anything And then now why I gave All this background analysis to come to the point That these are all subtle faculties So The phenomena Of sleep enables Us to infer That The physical Or the bodily reality that I experience And that I consider To be real is not All that Of a solid reality that it seems to be Because I just have to Lie down and I Go to sleep and as I go to sleep I just forget everything That on a day to day basis I am so worried about Imagine If somebody had A disease during Which Every day for a few hours that person Would have a memory blackout We would consider that to be a very alarming disease If you go and Approach a person and that person is not able to respond To any question, not able to even recognize us They are completely blacked out We consider it to be a very alarming thing But because sleep happens to us Every day so frequently And to everyone We don’t realize How extraordinary The ramifications The implications Are of how our Perception of reality gets altered By the Simple experience of sleep So what we consider as a Rock solid reality disappears Just by closing our eyes and lying down And switching off the consciousness And then we enter into an entirely Different realm Now we may say that it is not real Because every time we wake up that reality disappears But actually Every time we go to sleep also The waking reality disappears And although every day when we wake up we return to the waking reality It is not that Eternally we will be returning back to this waking reality When we die We will no longer return back to this reality So that’s why we have a 6 hour dream When we sleep at night And we have a 60 year dream when we are awake in the day time But both are in a sense Dreams So again what is the inference From all this So in general The Awareness of the world Around us Is not there in sleep At least not the Daily world And at least not the daily world As it is moving about And functioning at that particular time when we are sleeping So and we don’t have Often the awareness of our body Our body is sleeping Peacefully on the bed But we may Imagine that we are travelling somewhere And we are in a crowded train or we are in a Luxurious plane Or whatever So That means We have self-awareness Without body awareness During dreams And this itself indicates That Self-awareness is not Dependent on body or body awareness The self-aware Capacity for self-awareness is different From the body And by this we infer That the self is different from the body So just by Swap if we analyse Seriously the phenomena of sleep We will understand that Actually I am not my body When I dream and I Experience say the Pleasure of a beautiful sight My eyes Bodily physical eyes Are closed and I am asleep And my eyes are not experiencing anything So I experience But my body doesn’t experience That indicates That the experiencer Or I is not the body The I is Somebody else So that’s how the whole phenomena Of swap Enables us To perceive higher realities So that’s how Sleep itself Is a Characteristic of intelligence In the sense that Sleep everyday reminds us That what we consider Of as reality is not Permanent reality and there are Alternate realities and there may be A highest reality which we can Find out through guru sadhu shastra So therefore The Swap which causes a Temporary amnesia Temporary forgetfulness of our Daily identity Daily of our normal making Identity gives us An indication of higher Realities and that’s how it Is a characteristic of the intelligence