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Chapter 7
Appendix:—The man, who instead of seeing God, perceives (sees) Sattvika, Rajasa and Tamasa dispositions (modes), enjoys them and derives pleasure from them, he is deluded by those dispositions viz., is bound by God's Divine illusion, and the result'is that he follows the cycle of birth and death. It means that Sattvika, Rajasa and Tamasa dispositions (actions, objects, time, nature and modes etc.,) are transient while God is eternal. Those who enjoy the transient, get bound; but those who having renounced the transient, take refuge in God, get liberated (Gila 7/14).
In this verse the term `Jagata' has been used for the embodied soul. It means that the being by according reality, by valuing and by being attached to the entity which really does not exist, becomes `Jagata'. The sentient (by flouting Viveka) becomes insentient. The higher nature (prakrti) becomes lower nature. The soul assumes the origin and destruction of the world as its origin and destruction, and the profit and loss of the world as its own profit and loss. As a man, by becoming, obsessed with desire, becomes 'kamatmanah' viz., gets practically identified with desire (Gita 2/43); and by intimate kinship with God `manmayah' viz., gets absorbed in God (Gita 4/10); similarly the embodied soul (self) being deeply attached to the world becomes the world (Jagata). The only difference is that a striver's (the self) identity with God is eternal but identity with desire or 'Jagata' (world) is transient.
A man (the self) has assumed the existence of other entity besides God, by assuming its existence he regarded it as valuable, by valuing it he got attached to it and by being attached to it, he lost his independent existence and became `Jagata'. He who regards the existence of the world only, forgets one's own reality and becomes 'Jagata' which is unreal; and who assumes the existence of God, being oblivious of the independent existence of his own, becomes God—`mama sadharmyamagatah' (Gita 14/2) Who is real.
The Lord calls the embodied soul `Jagat' because of not cognising the fact that "I am sentient", man started assuming the insentient body as 'I' (his own self) and as `mine'. The self though attdbuteless and imperishable yet because of being 'Jagata' gets bound by Sattvika-Rajasa-Tamasa modes—'nibadhnanti mahabdho dehe dehinamavyayam' (Gita 14/5). In fact the self being a fragment of the divine God is divine only (Gita 13/31) but being attached to the mundane `Jagata' he becomes mundane (worldly). From ego (the elements) downward to the earth—all is `Apara Prakrti'—lower nature (Gita 7/4). Therefore as the earth is insentient (matter), so is ego also matter. When the self being identified with ego becomes `ahankaravimudhatma' viz., - assumes ego as the self, then having a gradual downfall it (he) becomes the insentient world viz., its divinity (sentience) is lost (forgotten) and it does not realize its divinity.
Those who don't get attached to the modes, the matter vanishes for them but they see only God everywhere—`Vasudevah sarvam' (all is God) (Gita 7/19). But those who are attached to modes, can't see God but see the world only, therefore they perceive God also as worldly. They perceive even the transcendental Lord, bound by modes and see immortal (imperishable) God as mortal (perishable) (Gita 7/24). A devotee sees nothing else besides God but the worldly people, attached to the modes, see only the world, nothing else. Therefore a devotee attains only bliss while a worldly person suffers only sorrow—'duhkhatayam' (Gita 8/15).
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