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If we want to make progress towards spiritual advancement of knowledge, this preliminary knowledge we must have that, - I am not this body

Expressions researched:
"if we want to make progress towards spiritual advancement of knowledge, this preliminary knowledge we must have that, "I am not this body"

Lectures

Bhagavad-gita As It Is Lectures

Anyone who has got conception the identification of this body, he's not a learned man: he's a fool. He may be, in the calculation of academic education, he may be B.A., M.A., Ph.D., D.A.C., or something like, doctors and . . . but if he has got his identification with this body, he's not a learned man according to Bhagavad-gītā. Not only according . . . according to whole Vedic literature. This is the first instruction. This is the . . . if we want to make progress towards spiritual advancement of knowledge, this preliminary knowledge we must have that, "I am not this body." "I am not this body." This is the preliminary standing of spiritual knowledge. This is not advancement. This is simply A-B-C-D, A-B-C-D of spiritual life.

Suppose if, reading that description of the place, I think of going there, so I prepare myself, "Oh, I must go there." So just like I, I was describing that cintāmaṇi-dhāma, what sort of trees are there. And you were very much pleased that "I must go there." So we have to hear. Unless we hear what sort of God He is, what sort of God's place is, what is the mode of life there, we cannot be attracted. We cannot be attracted.

So here they say that gatāsūn agatāsūṁś ca. There are two . . . two sort of bodies in which we are now entered. Now, suppose this gross body appears to be now dead and gone, stopped, but one must know that subtle body has carried him to another body. So subtle body is not lost life. The life is there. So here Kṛṣṇa says that either of the gross body or of . . . subtle body has to be also left. When you get liberation, when you get liberation, that subtle body, that egoistic life, has also to be left. Now, at any condition, the body has to be left. So why one should cry for this body?

Therefore Kṛṣṇa says that, "A learned man does not lament over this body." The whole question, that a soul is different from this body, the whole question is solved in one verse. You see? Gatāsūn agatāsūṁś ca nānuśocanti paṇḍitāḥ (BG 2.11)

"One who is actually learned, he does not . . . he has no concern of this body. He's concerned with the activities of the soul. So you are speaking of so many things that 'If these my friends die, the, I mean to say, their wives will become widow.' These are all according to the bodily relation you are speaking. And you are posing yourself just like a very learned man, but you are a fool number one, because your whole conception is on the body. Your whole conception of argument with Me was of the body, but you are . . . you are posing himself just as if you are very learned man."

So anyone who has got conception the identification of this body, he's not a learned man: he's a fool. He may be, in the calculation of academic education, he may be B.A., M.A., Ph.D., D.A.C., or something like, doctors and . . . but if he has got his identification with this body, he's not a learned man according to Bhagavad-gītā. Not only according . . . according to whole Vedic literature. This is the first instruction. This is the . . . if we want to make progress towards spiritual advancement of knowledge, this preliminary knowledge we must have that, "I am not this body." "I am not this body." This is the preliminary standing of spiritual knowledge. This is not advancement. This is simply A-B-C-D, A-B-C-D of spiritual life.

In the Bhāgavata there is a very nice verse in this connection in which it is stated:

yasyātma-buddhiḥ kuṇape tri-dhātuke
sva-dhīḥ kalatrādiṣu bhauma-ijya-dhīḥ
(SB 10.84.13)
Page Title:If we want to make progress towards spiritual advancement of knowledge, this preliminary knowledge we must have that, - I am not this body
Compiler:Soham
Created:2023-02-28, 05:38:57
Totals by Section:BG=0, SB=0, CC=0, OB=0, Lec=1, Con=0, Let=0
No. of Quotes:1