What is meant by knowing the soul?

[Shri Anil asked: Swami, in Your message on 26 August 2020, You have said, “The individual soul can be known and can even be seen through the latest equipment in the form of pulses of inert energy.” I wanted to know what the meaning of the statement ‘soul can be known’ is. The soul is basically a bundle of thoughts. By knowing the soul, can we say that we have known all these thoughts? Or that we have come to know it as the thoughtless pure-awareness? Or that we have known it as the inert energy, which produces the awareness? Or that we have known that the soul exists, as evidenced by the pulses of inert energy seen on the instrument? Please clarify this.]

Swami replied: The soul is pure awareness, without any thought. It is very close to the basic inert energy that creates the soul. Due to a lot of similarity between the thoughtless pure awareness and inert energy, the same word Ātman is used for both the pure awareness and the basic causal inert energy. In the second chapter of the Gītā, you find the description of Ātman and that description applies to both the thoughtless pure awareness as well as the inert energy since they both have a lot of similar characteristics. Both do not have the sense of doer-ship (kartṛtva) or enjoyer-ship (bhoktṛtva). However, this similarity in both is based on different reasons. Doership and enjoyership are absent in the inert energy due to its inert nature, while in pure awareness, they are absent due to thoughtless detachment. Doership and enjoyership are both thoughts. Pure awareness means awareness that is free of all thoughts including the thoughts of doership and enjoyership. The difference between inert energy and pure awareness is that the inert energy is not awareness at all, whereas, the pure awareness is awareness that is free of all thoughts.

In deep sleep, inert energy alone remains. Awareness disappears due to the non-functioning brain and the nervous system. By the non-functioning of the brain and the nervous system, we only mean that during deep sleep, the part of the brain-system that produces awareness and thoughts is not functioning. It does not mean that the brain is not functioning at all. Even during deep sleep, the brain continues to control the involuntary functions of the body. Pure awareness results in the state of perfect meditation. In the state of deep sleep, awareness is absent altogether and inert energy, which is the cause of awareness, alone remains in the nervous system. The ‘causal material’ out of which awareness is produced is inert energy itself. Awareness is just a specific work-form of the inert energy obtained from the oxidation of food.  The specific nature of awareness is the result of the functioning of the specific system (nervous system) in which it is produced. It is in the nervous system alone that inert energy can get converted into the specific work-form called awareness.

Since the soul (awareness) is basically inert energy (causal material), we can see the soul using the appropriate instrument (EEG). The thoughts, which are the result of the flow of electrical energy in the brain are displayed on the screen in the form of waves. If the waves are prominent, the thoughts are very strong. If the waves are mild, the thoughts are also very weak. The details of what the person is thinking is not known from the observation of waves. A lie detector may, at the most, give some information about the nature of the person’s thoughts. It can help the expert decide whether the person is speaking the truth or a lie. But further scientific research in this direction has to take place. From the development of the lie detector, there is some hope of even being able to know the details of the person’s thoughts. Already, some good developments have been reported in this direction of scientific research, but a lot more progress has to take place to know each minute detail about a person’s thoughts through such instruments.

This topic is only the study of imaginable items within the imaginable creation. It is not at all related to the unimaginable God. Since it is not related to the unimaginable God, this topic does not have much importance in spiritual knowledge. However, the research in this direction provides more and more support for the concept that awareness is totally related to the imaginable creation alone and that it is not related to the unimaginable God. The concept of a robot has already broken a new ground in this field. It goes to prove that awareness is just a specific work-form of inert energy and that it is neither God nor even a part of God.

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| Shri Datta Swami | What is meant by knowing the soul? | Aatman Giita Gita kartrutva bhoktrutva

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