How are the living symptoms of consciousness manifestations of the subtle body as the Gita 13.6-7 purport says?

Transcribed by: Jyoti Shirasangi

Eddited by:

Question: The living symptoms represented by consciousness and convictions are the manifestation of the subtle body (Mind, Ego, and Intelligence). How do we understand this?

Answer: This question is based on BG 13.6 and 7. Prabhupada is saying apparently that, consciousness manifests from the subtle body. Also the word manifests has many meanings. E.g. Krishna manifests himself as the deity. That would mean that, there is Krishna, and the deity is his manifestation. So, in that sense, manifestation is the thing which manifests.

But, there are other places where, the thing through which something manifests. That is also called manifestation. That means, what is happening over here is that, the original consciousness of the soul is pure, but the way the consciousness is manifested at the conditioned level, that has very little or practically nothing to do with the soul.

So than, what is it, the characteristic of right now. The living symptoms here refer to the consciousness when it is conditioned. So, my conditioned consciousness has very little to do with the soul. Just the fact that, there is consciousness, which is coming from the soul. But when we talk about the nature of that consciousness, then we are talking about the Icha, Dvesha, Sukha, Dhuka, we are talking about the characteristics of that consciousness. So, these are, the generic fact of consciousness comes from the soul. But the specific features of the consciousness, they are not coming from the soul. They are coming from the subtle body. And in that sense, the conditioned consciousness is the manifestation of the subtle body.

That’s why we say, your consciousness and my consciousness, or Indian’s consciousness or Pakistani’s consciousness. They are all different, because their subtle bodies are different.

Now off course, the soul is also an individual, and every soul is also different, But, that soul’s spiritual individuality is not been manifested right now. The individuality that we have, does it really have to do anything with the soul’s svarupa in the Spiritual world? It is unlikely. So, that’s why, we right now focus on the fact that, our conditioned consciousness is manifestation of the subtle body. That’s why it is said that, it is manifestation of the subtle body.

Thank You.