Pancha Koshas

The Five Sheaths

The human body, which is a representative of every living being on the Universe is a chink of energy covered by five layers. These layers are not one over the other, like five sheets of cloth of varying thickness, but one layer with all the five elements intermingling, moving from the gross to the most subtle.
If the five kosha's are contemplated upon thoroughly, one can realise that we are all not individual persons but are like a wave in the mighty ocean of creation.
The grossly visible layer is the Annamaya Kosha: The physical body that is made up of the food we eat. The body is like a container that holds water. Or rather it is like ice in the shape of a vessel, holding water in it. The body that is born out of food, is nourished, grows and sustains with the help of food and when it falls, it becomes food. There is no profit, no loss. Taken from the Poornam and goes back to the Poornam.
The next comes the Pranamayakosha: While the Annamaya Kosha makes us feel that we are all independent entities, different from each other in colour, complexion and features - the Pranamayakosha is subtler than the Annamayakosha and is the first step towards understanding oneness. The prana in America may be inhaled through the breath in Australia. What is exhaled in India might travel to Africa! Breath is neither your's nor mine, but belongs to everybody. The breath is the container of the prana, which is the life energy that keeps every cell of the body alive. When this Prana leaves its hold on the body, then death happens and the cells disintegrate.
Manomayakosha is the Mind. We have often felt that without knowing a language, we can feel the emotions expressed by another. This is a subtler element than the Prana, that is housed in the human body. There is a constant transaction happening in the world of emotions, expressing and impressing, impressing and expressing. Many a time when you are cheerful, for no reason the throat might choke with sadness. This happens because the emotion of sadness from another has impressed upon you silently and make you feel the same way.
Vignanamayakosha: This is subtler than the mind or emotions. It is the intelligence body. This intelligence body is also uniformly spread out and transmission of intelligence constantly happens. The scientific developments of the west have always reached the east and the spiritual realisation of the eastern mystics have always been available to the west. Just like the breath, mind and intellect are common for all and not confined to bodies.
The last is the Anandamayakosha. It is the body of bliss which pervades the entire universe, living and non-living. A mountain blissfully remains a mountain, an ocean is in a blissful state of being...Dhyayativa Prithivi, Dhyayativa Parvataha, Dhyativa Sagaraha.
Anandamaya Kosha is the body of the human and the Universe that is always in Meditation. The purose of all our meditative practices is to find out our real being, that is the Anandamaya Kosha.
When Adi Sankara says in the Nirvana Shatkam 'Nava Pancha Koshaha.' - I am not the Pancha Kosha's he is talking of the Supreme Being that is the most subtle 'Param' which is the unsplittable, indivisible Brahman, which also we are.
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