Chapter 11: Jada Bharata Instructs King Rahûgana

(1) The brahmin [Jada Bharata] said: 'Lacking in experience using the terms of the experienced ones, doesn't make you better than the ones with experience! These matters of mundane and social behavior are not discussed by the intelligent ones along with reflections upon the Absolute Truth. (2) Because of this oh King, one finds among those who notably in combination with the Vedas [veda-vâdî] take interest in the endlessly increasing concern for the rituals of a material household, as good as never the actual spiritual science [tattva-vâda] that manifests itself so clearly with the ones advanced in purity. (3) Despite of being [materialistically/moralistically] sufficiently versed in the words, the very exalted vision of the real purpose of the Veda is not directly theirs, for the happiness of a worldly life compares to a dream of which one personally [only] later on realizes that it is to be abandoned. (4) As long as someone's mind is under the control of the mode of passion, goodness or ignorance, actions - auspicious or otherwise - are by the [impelling] power of the senses of action and perception automatically the result, just like it is with an independently roaming elephant. (5) That mind endowed with so many desires [vâsanâs] is, being driven by the modes of nature, attached to material happiness. As the chief of the sixteen elements typical for a material existence [the material, the active and the perceptual ones plus the mind] the mind cut loose wanders around with many names manifesting itself in different physical appearances of a higher or lower quality [compare B.G. 3: 27]. (6)  Brought forth by the illusory of matter which envelops the original living being, the mind creates for itself the vicious circle [the false order] of material actions and reactions [karma] so that in the course of time the happiness, the unhappiness and the other very severe result is obtained that differs from these two [viz. immoderation]. (7) As long as that mind exists the outer characteristics - of e.g. being fat or slim - always manifest themselves that attest to [the quality] of the knower of the field [the individual soul]. For that reason the learned ones speak of the mind as the cause of the in higher or lower conditions of life being entangled in the gunas, the modes of material nature, or their counterpart. (8) Bound to the gunas the living entity is conditioned, but free from the modes there is the ultimate benefit [of beatitude].  Just like the wick of a lamp burning produces smoke or else being properly positioned enjoys the clarified butter [and burns brightly], the mind bound by the modes takes shelter of different material activities or else is [bright] in its true position [of being directed at the soul].

(9) There are the eleven engagements of the mind with the five senses of action, the five senses of knowing and the self-conceit. The learned, oh hero, speak of the fields of action of those eleven practices as being the different duties, the different sense objects and the  different places [one's private place, public places, one's workplace and one's preferred association or club, see B.G. 13: 5-7]. (10) Smell, form, touch, taste and hearing [the knowing senses]; evacuation, sexual intercourse, movement, speech and manual control [the senses of action] with the eleventh element of accepting the idea of 'mine', thus gives the 'I'  [or ego-awareness] to this body of which some have said that it is the twelfth element. (11) These eleven engagements of the mind are by the material elements, by nature itself, by culture, by the karma and by time modified into the many hundreds, thousands and millions [of considerations] that do not follow from one another nor from themselves, but [are caused by] the knower of the field. (12) The pure knower of the field perceives all these different activities of the mind which, manifested [during waking hours] and then again not manifested [during sleep], occur in the abundance [the endless streaming] of the impure mind of the living being bound to karmic actions, a restlessness which since the earliest days is created by the [because of Time always changing] external energy. (13-14) The knower of the field is [originally] the all-pervading, omnipresent, authentic person, the Oldest One who is seen and heard of as existing by His own light. He is never born, He is the transcendental Nârâyana, the Supreme Lord Vâsudeva. He is, just like the air present within the body, the one who by His own potency exists in the soul as the controller of the moving and unmoving living entities. He is the Supersoul of expansion who has entered and thus is of control as the Fortune One in the beyond. He is the one who is the shelter and knower of everyone in every field. He is the vitality itself that appeared in this material world [see also B.G. 9: 10 & 15: 15].

(15) As long as the embodied one oh King, is not free from this influence of the material world by in freedom from attachments establishing the spiritual rule and conquering the six enemies [the mind and the senses of perception], he will have to wander around in this material world. (16) For as long as one has this mind which, as the symptom of the soul its fixedness [in the linga], for the living entity is the breeding ground for all the worldly miseries of lamentation, illusion, disease, attachment, greed and enmity, one has to face the 'I' and 'mine' [of egoism] that is the consequence. (17) This mind, that formidable enemy which grows by neglect, is very, very powerful. He who free from illusion applies the weapon of worshiping the lotus feet of the spiritual teacher and the Lord, conquers the falsehood of the personal interest that has covered the soul.'