16
Aptavani-2
to wash away prakruti; doing this makes the prakruti light. A
person can spend his entire life time washing away his prakruti
(the non-self complex) but if in his next life he falls into bad
company, his prakruti can become very dense again. The Lord
has equated this to an elephant bathing in a muddy pool. When
an elephant bathes in water, he becomes nice and clean but the
moment he comes out of the water, he dusts his body with mud.
Such is the state of the human being. Atmagnan is rare,
extremely, extremely rare. Liberation is merely a word and any
reference to it is mere talk because it is not so easy to attain.
Everyone with prakrutgnan believes, ‘I know everything’. The
pitiful ones! All they know is prakrutgnan; it is all relative
knowledge. What they need to know is atmagnan (knowledge
of the Soul). For so many lifetimes all you have attained is
prakrutgnan and what do you claim? All along the prakruti has
been the doer and yet you claim, ‘I did it’. Prakruti makes you
dance, it makes you wake up in the morning, but you claim, ‘I
woke up’. Even when you sleep, it is the working of the
prakruti. Sometimes you cannot sleep even when you want to
and when the prakruti makes you sleep, you claim, ‘I fell
asleep!’
‘We’ are telling you this with absolute assurance that the
entire world is caught up in prakrutgnan. Whether a person is
reading the scriptures, or reciting Lord Mahavir’s forty-five
Agams or reciting the four Vedas, ‘We’ would still tell him that
he is under the spell of prakrutgnan. The difference between
atmagnan and prakrutgnan is like the difference between milk
and buttermilk; they both look white. But prakrutgnan increases
one’s ego (keyf) whereas atmagnan decreases it. That which
decreases the ego is atmagnan.
Questioner : Does the ego increase by studying scriptures?
Dadashri : Yes, because it is prakrutgnan, it serves to
increase the ego of, ‘I know’. For heaven’s sakes what do you