Ashariratvam is the state of not being identified with the body. Sharira means the body (literally, that which is subject to destruction). It has a three-fold nature, namely, sthula (gross), Sukshma (subtle) and karana (causal). The gross body is made up of five elements – earth, fire, air, water and ether – and after their pancakarana (grossification), it is subject to the modifications of existence – birth, growth, maturity, decay and death. The subtle body is composed of the five elements before their grossification, which are called tanmatras. It is made up of five karmendriyas (organs of action), five jnanedriyas (organs of perception), five pranas, manas (mind) and buddhi (intellect). Karana sharira or the causal body is the ignorance, which is the cause of the other two bodies.
Sthula/Sukshma sharira can be broadly stated as the
mind-body complex, upadhi (adjunct) that conditions or limits the all-pervasive
consciousness. This conditioning, caused by ignorance, leads to superimposition
of attributes of the body onto the self and vice versa. Thus the feeling of
being embodied leads to wrong identification of the self with the body. On the
other hand, the knowledge of dis-embodiedness is the absence of such false
self-identification with the body, rather than loss or destruction of the body.
Hence the knowledge of dis-embodiedness is associated with a realized soul even
while living, since vidya (self knowledge) destroys avidya (non-liberating knowledge)
as well as its effect such as false identification. This is the phenomenon of jivanmukta.
While shariratva (embeddedness) denotes bondage due to the
confinement of the all-pervasive consciousness to a limited mind-body complex,
ashariratva denotes liberation from the false superimposition and the manifestation
of the true nature of the self. The dawn of such discriminatory knowledge leads
to the realization of the true self. Thus dis-embodiedness and embodiedness of
the self are the consequences of discriminatory knowledge and its absence, rather
than the result of the presence or absence of the body.
As Chandogya Upanishad states, ‘the bodiless transcends the
duality of joy and sorrow, while the embodied cannot escape the web of alternating
sorrows and joys.’