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Reincarnation
Uddhava said: “O Lord, how do those whose mind is not devoted to Thee take on and give up, through their own actions, bodies high and low? This point cannot be properly understood by creatures of poor understanding. Mostly there are none indeed in this world who know this as they are deluded by Thy Maya.”
The Lord said: “The mind of men imprinted with Karma or full of Karma of active tendencies due to past actions, moves with the five senses from body to body, from one plane to another. The Atman who is distinct from it follows the mind under the denomination of ‘I’ or force of egoism.
The mind after death, thinks of such objects seen or heard of as the Karma of men place before it. It awakes unto those objects it thinks of and sleeps over the past or previous objects. The memory that connects the present with the past states dies away in consequence. The new body is remembered and the old body is forgotten.
When one loses all thoughts of one’s body in the preceding life through his intense attachment to the present body through some cause or other, that utter forgetfulness is his death. Man obtains a Deva body or a low body which undergoes inflictions or tortures after his death. He entirely forgets his former body either through intense enjoyment in the former case or through pain in the latter case. This is the death of the Jiva who identified with his former body and not the annihilation of his body itself. The Jiva identifies himself with these new bodies and forgets entirely his former physical body. The connection with the former body is entirely cut off in his mind. This constitutes his death with reference to his former body.
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