Sharira Athma Bhaavaa..

[Guest guest]

"Shree Bhoomi Neela Sametha Shree Lakshmi Nrusimha Parabramaneya Namaha"

 

Dearest Baagavadhothamaas,

 

Adiyen have been wanting to know the exact defination of the term "Shariram"

 

Can anyone kindly throw light on this and go on to explain what "Shariram" is??

 

regards

Dhaasaanu Dhaasan

Venkataraghava Dhaasan

[Guest guest]

Venkat asks:

> Can anyone kindly throw light on this and go on to explain what

> "Shariram" is??

 

'SarIra' literally means 'body'. All that exists is said

to be the 'body' of God, including all conscious selves

and matter. This means that God is the AtmA or Self,

and everything that exists is one with God, united with Him

as the body is to the self.

 

Ramanuja defines what 'body' means in his comment on Brahma-Sutras

2.1.9:

 

Any substance which a conscious soul is capable of

completely controlling and supporting for its own

purposes, and which stands to the soul in an entirely

subordinate relation, is the body of that soul.

 

Our body is completely under our control and we shape it

and use it for our purposes. When the soul departs from

a body, what remains is lifeless and soon starts to decay,

and shortly thereafter it is clear it is not a body at all.

 

When we see a soul united to a body, we conventionally do not

distinguish the two, and treat the two as indivisible parts.

 

In the same way, everything that exists is completely

supported and controlled by the true Self, God. In this

way, everything is said to be God's body; without God

nothing could conceivably exist. The other side of this

coin is that if anything is to exist, God is inseparably

associated with it as its Self, supporter, and controller.

 

[ This is how to understand the various statements of the

Vedanta which say, "All this is indeed Brahman", "You are

that Self", "Meditate on the enjoyed, the enjoyer, and

the controller as being different", etc. ]

 

This is the SarIra-AtmA bhAva, the body-soul relationship

that is Ramanuja's single biggest contribution to understanding

the Upanishads. What existed conceptually in the Upanishads

and Alvars' poems was first articulated philosophically

by Yamunacharya; it was left to Ramanuja to fully develop

this idea in convincing fashion and show how it is the key

to understanding the Vedanta, and consequently, the nature of

the Universe.

 

rAmAnuja dAsan

Mani