Prabhupāda: Yes. So the thing is that if my life is based on false conception that, "I am this body," so the bodily appreciation of beauty or any other thing, that is also false. That is also false. If I am not this body, then anything conceived in relation with this body, that is false.
Professor Durckheim: (German)
Vedavyāsa: He says that usually we see the body in connection with beauty or health. But there is another possibility, to use the body as a transparent medium to conceive the Absolute Truth.
Prabhupāda: Yes, that is explained here, jīvasya tattva-jijñāsā. That means with this body you should not waste your time like the birds and beasts, but utilize it for inquiring about the Absolute Truth. That is reality.
Dr. P. J. Saher: Not only to the Absolute Truth, but to communicate together. Think of the smiling of a child, its first communication between man. It's not only the body as instrument for the eternal truth, but under, among us.
Prabhupāda: So that you have to learn, how with this body you can utilize your energy to understand the Absolute Truth and reestablish your relationship with the Absolute Truth.
Dr. P. J. Saher: (German)
Vedavyāsa: So he asks, is it a waste of our energy if we try to do good for others, if we smile and be kind . . .
Prabhupāda: But you cannot do good to others, because you do not know what is good. (laughs) You are thinking of good in terms of your body, but body is false; therefore your conception of goodness is also false.
Dr. P. J. Saher: I cannot accept that the body is false.
Prabhupāda: No, no. I withdraw that word "false." But it is not you. It is false in this sense, that you are accepting this body yourself, but that you are not. Just like . . .
Dr. P. J. Saher: I think so. I live my identity with the body.
Prabhupāda: With the body. But the body is false, false in this sense, that you are not this body.
Dr. P. J. Saher: I am only . . .
Prabhupāda: You are simply . . . just like I am occupying this apartment, but I am not this apartment; I am different from this apartment. This is understanding. So if you take interest of the apartment and you forget yourself, that is false. If I simply decorate this body, as the apartment, and I don't eat myself, then what is the . . . (chuckles) This is false attempt, that we are trying . . . this is called . . . in the Bhāgavata it is said that aprāṇasya hi dehasya mandanaṁ loka-rañjanam. Now, this body, just you or I, everyone, we are nicely dressed. But if the life is gone from the body, if you dress the body, is that very good intelligence? You have understood? That I am dressing . . . so long my life is there, I am dressing very nicely this body, but when the body is dead, if you dress the body or somebody or your relative dresses nicely, it is very good intelligence?
Dr. P. J. Saher: (German) (break)
Vedavyāsa: . . . example of this comparison with a room and the body is not very good because, he says . . .
Prabhupāda: But because he does not know that he is not this body.