Anugita Parva — The dissolution of the body and the acquirement of another. The attainment of the soul to Brahman

Touching the feet of that sage Brahmana asked him some very difficult questions. That foremost of all pious persons then described those duties that were referred to.

Kashyapa said How does the body dissolve away, and how is another is acquired? How does one become liberated after passing through a repeated round of painful re-births?

Enjoying Nature for sometime, how does the individual Soul cast off the particular body? How does the Individual Soul, freed from the body, attain to what is different from it, (viz., Brahman)?

How does a human being enjoy the good and bad deeds done by him? Where do the acts exist of one that is devoid of body?

The Brahmana said Thus urged by Kashyapa, the Liberated Sage answered those questions one after another. Do you listen to me, O hero of the Vrishni race, as I recite to you the answers he gave.

The Liberated Sage said, Upon the exhaustion of those deeds capable of prolonging life and bringing on fame which are done in a particular body that the Individual Soul assumes, the embodied Jiva, with the span of his life shortened, begins to do acts hostile to life and hcalth. On the approach of destruction, his understanding deviates from the proper course.

The man of inipure soul, after even a correct understanding of his constitution and strength and of the season of both his own life and of the year, begins to eat at irregular intervals and to eat such food as is hostile to him.

At such a time he does practices that are greatly harmful. He sometimes eats excessively and sometimes abstains altogether from food.

He eats bad food or bad meat or takes bad drinks, or food that has been made up of hostile ingredients. He eats food that is heavy and more than what is beneficial, or before the food previously taken, has been digested.

He indulges in physical exercise and sexual pleasure in excess, or through avidity for work, suppresses the urgings of his corporeal organism even when they become pronounced.

Or, he taken juicy food or indulges in sleep during daytime. Food that is not properly digested, of itself excites the faults, when the times comes.

From such excitement of the faults in his body, he gets disease ultimately bringing on death. Sometimes the person engages in unnatural deeds like strangling.

Through these causes the living body of the creature dissolves away. Understand correctly the manner as I declare it to you.

Urged on by the Wind which becomes violent, the heat in the body, becoming excited, and reaching every part of the body one after another, restrains all the vital airs.

Know truly that excited all over the body, the heat becomes very strong, and pierces every vital part where life may be said to live.

On account of this, the Individual Soul, feeling great pain, quickly takes leave of the body. Know, O foremost of twice-born ones, that when the vital parts of the body become thus afflicted, Individual Soul passes away from he body, suffering from great pain. All living creatures repeatedly suffer from birth and death.

It is seen, O chief of Brahman's, that the pain which is felt by a person when renouncing his bodies is like to what is felt by him when first entering the womb or when coming out of it. His joints become almost dislocated and he derives much distress from the waters.

Moved by (another) violent wind, the wind in the body becomes excited through cold, and dissolves away the union of matter into its five primal elements.

That wind which lives in the vital airs called Prana and Apana occurring within this compound of the five primal elements, rushes upwards, from a situation of distress, leaving the embodied creature.

It is thus that the wind leaves the body. Then is seen breathlessness. The man then becomes destitute of heat, of breath, of beauty, and of consciousness.

Deserted by Brahma, the person is said to be dead. By those canals through which he perceives all sensuous objects, the bearer of the body no longer perceives them.

The Individual Soul creates in the body in those canals the vital airs forned by the food.

The elements gathered together become in certain parts firmly united. Know that those parts are called the vitals of the body. It is said so in the Shastras.

When those vital parts are cut, the Individual Soul, rising up, enters the heat of the living creature and restrains the principle of animation forthwith.

The creature then, though still possessed of consciousness, fails to know anything. The vital part being all worked up, the knowledge of the living creature becomes overwhelmed by darkness.

The individual Soul then, who has been deprived of everything upon which to stay, is then agitated by the wind. He then, deeply breathing a long an painful breath, goes out speedily, making the inanimate body to tremble. Separated from the body, the Individual Soul, however, is surrounded by his deeds.

He becomes equipped on all sides with all his auspicious deeds of merit and with all his sins. Brahmanas gifted with knowledge and equipped with the certain conclusions of the scriptures, know him, from marks, as to whether he is possessed of merit or with its demerit. Even as men having eyes see the firefly appearing and disappearing in the midst of darkness, men having the eye of knowledge and crowned with success of penances, see, with spiritual vision, the Individual Soul as he leaves the body, as he is re-born, and as he enters the womb. It is seen that the Individual Soul has three regions assigned to him eternally.

This world where creatures live is called the field of action. Performing acts, good or bad, all embodied creatures attain to the fruits thereof.

On account of their own decds, creatures acquirc even here superior or inferiors enjoyments. Doers of evil deeds here, on ! account of those deeds of theirs, attain to hell.

This condition of sinking with head downwards, in which creatures are boiled is one of great misery. It is such that a rescue therefrom is highly difficult. Indeed, one should try hard for saving himself from this misery.

Those regions where creatures live when they ascend from this world, I shall now declare truly. Do you listen to me attentively.

By listening to what I say, you will acquire firmness of understanding and a clear apprehension of deeds. Know that even those are the regions of all creatures of righteous deeds, viz., the stellar worlds that shine in the sky, the lunar disc, and the solar disc as well that shines in the universe in its own light.

Upon the termination, again, of their merits, they fall away from those regions repeatedly. There is distinction of inferior, superior and middling happiness even in the celestial region.

There is discontent at sight of prosperity more burning than one's own even in the celestial region. Even these are the goals which I have mentioned in full.

I shall, after this, describe to you the attainment by the Individual Soul of the condition of residence in the womb. Do you hear me, with rapt attention, O twice-born one, as I speak to you.