The Subtle Body (Sūkṣma-Śarīra)
The fine vehicle of mind and karma that outlasts the body and travels on to the next birth.
Alongside the gross physical body that dies, Hindu thought posits a 'subtle body' — a finer vehicle made of the mind, the vital energies (prāṇa), the senses in their subtle form, and the residue of past actions. This is what carries on at death and travels to the next birth, so that rebirth is not the wandering of the bare self but the migration of this subtle equipment until liberation dissolves it. It anchors the mechanics of karma and rebirth.
How it traveled
- VivekacūḍāmaṇiŚṛṅgeri (Sringeri) · 1400explains
Key passages(14)
Vivekacūḍāmaṇi · Śaṅkara (traditionally ascribed; authorship doubted)
Vivekacūḍāmaṇi · Śaṅkara (traditionally ascribed; authorship doubted)
When the Lord obtains a body and when He leaves it, He takes these and goes, as the wind takes the scents from their seats (the flowers).
Tap to expand
Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad · Vedic Revelation (śruti)
'On this there are these verses: 'After having subdued by sleep all that belongs to the body, he, not asleep himself, looks down upon the sleeping (senses). Having assumed light, he goes again to his
Tap to expand
There are a hundred and one arteries of the heart, one of them penetrates the crown of the head. Moving upwards by it, a man (at his death) reaches the Immortal; the other arteries serve for departing
Tap to expand
Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad · Vedic Revelation (śruti)
'Now that which in the shape of a person is in the right eye, is his wife, Virag . Their meeting-place is the ether within the heart, and their food the red lump within the heart. Again, their coveri
Tap to expand