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Chapter 13
Distinction between The Self And The Not-Self
69. Attachment To The Body Wastes Life
13. To sum up, the body is a means and not an end. Once this is deeply realised, man will not make much ado about nothing. Life will then appear markedly different. Man would not then revel in decorating the body. Indeed an ordinary cloth is sufficient to cover the body. But we want the cloth to be soft; we want various designs on it. For the sake of this, we make a number of people labour. What is all this for? Does not God, the Creator, know His job? Had the human body needed designs or colours on it, would not God have designed stripes on the human body, as He has done for the tiger? Would He not have given plummage to human beings like the peacock? Was it impossible for Him? But He has thought otherwise. Man, as he is, is beautiful. God does not want his body to be decorated. Is not there marvellous beauty in nature? Man should be content in beholding it. But he has been deluded by artificialities. We accuse Germany of driving natural Indian dyes out of the market. Dear friend, you first lost your real colour—your true nature—and got enamoured by artificial dyes. As a result, you became dependent on others. You have been lured by the superfluous idea of decorating the body and that has led you astray. You should be concerned about making the mind and the heart pure and beautiful, about developing the intellect; but that has been lost sight of. |
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