Due
to ignorance (avidyA) arising from past karma that has resulted in yet
unburnt vAsanas (tendencies) this individual's mind emerges from that state
of Bliss and starts to identify with a limited aspect of the Universal
Mind (mahat) and identifies with a body. Due to impurities in this mind
this individual is subject to kAma (desire) and when this desire gets
frustrated he experiences krodha (anger). On attaining his desire
through the senses he also becomes subject to mada (intoxication).
Attracted to the desirable and pleasurable aspects of the senses,
identifying as a man he is also attracted to woman and to the
acquisition of wealth to satisfy those desires. Occasionally he is also
subject to lobha (greed). All this deludes him so completely that he
comes under the sway of the sense objects presented as the external
world which he knows in truth is nothing but a combination of name and
form. Unable to see his true Self in others he names them as mother,
father, sister, daughter and various friends etc. This
delusion is moha and personified as the beautiful Mohini whose form
VishNu assumed when the devas (gods of the senses) churned the ocean
which is inside his body using the meru danDa (which is the canalis
centralis or sushUmna) through the awakening of kuNDalini. All his
demonic tendencies which are the asuras get easily deluded by Mohini and
he is so attracted by the world as sense object that he loses all sight
of Immortality that the beautiful Mohini is bringing to the devas. By
grace of Guru and past austerity he sometimes remembers his true nature
and the scripture and is able to conquer the asuras temporarily in
meditation and then he enjoys the temporary bliss of heaven, sometimes
even on earth. By further austerity of restraining the senses (devas
themselves) he is able ascend and reach his true nature. There he sees
that all other manifestations such as you and others are but his
essential nature who have assumed other minds and bodies just by
following different tracks from the source based on different karmas.
But when this vision is not steady he is tossed and turned on the ocean
of samsAra and takes them to be different.
When
the time comes for the prANas to leave his body his mind will depart
with them and depending on the thought uppermost in his mind at that
time it will either take on a new body eventually or merge permanently
with the Absolute. If mergence is not in this incarnation then this individual will enjoy the pleasure of heaven for as long as his good karmas are
exhausted and take another body and remembering his past austerity will
begin again to purify the mind. Even merged in the Absolute he will be
constantly manifesting as the embodied to the ignorant portion of the
Universal mind that manifests as different minds and sees diversity. And
yet it is also true that none of this is happening and it is all as unreal as the
horn of a hare because he is always in samAdhi and in a non-changing
unmoving state even if his mind does not perceive it so always owing to
its forgetfulness of Devi, which allows Time to begin its play. For
eternity is not a very long time but a state that is truly beyond and prior to the emergence of Time itself, while also being the substratum of Time.
The only difference
between the embodiment of the Absolute as me or you and that as Sri KRShNa is this: SrI KRShNa remembers and
knows all his incarnations even while embodied, while the others do not.
Therefore, the other embodiments cannot claim to be God in the waking
state, whereas Sri KRShNa could.
