The Human Body Compared to a Mansion

One little point needs to be stressed here. The body is like a mansion. No matter how wonderful a mansion may be, even if it be made of marble and set with jewels, no one will be able to live in that mansion unless it has a kitchen and a bathroom and a toilet. Because, whatever man takes in, part of its goes to form his mind, part of it goes to form his body, and the remaining waste has to be eliminated. And waste is always foul-smelling. The impurities of the body are always foul-smelling. In the outer mansion they have to have a toilet, they have to have a kitchen. If there be no kitchen, no one can live there. You may construct any type of palace, but if there is no food, no lunch, no breakfast, no afternoon tea—even for a day—no one will live there.

But then, when a kitchen is there, you have to provide drainage also. Kitchen means garbage, left-over food, vegetable cuttings, fruit peels and all that. If all this is kept, it will begin to rot and so you have to have a garbage disposal arrangement. You have to have drainage and sewerage. In the absence of all these arrangements, it will not be possible to live in that mansion. Likewise, in the human body, in this mansion of Nine gates, in this नव द्वार कुटी  Navadvara Kuti, (Nine Doors House) where you have an entrance way and windows for light and air and knowledge, for the sake of drainage and garbage disposal, God has provided two holes.

Their real importance is that of drainage. They are only drains. This is the only right understanding of the matter. No doubt, the occasional function of reproduction is there, but to over-exaggerate that aspect is foolish. It betrays a lack of knowledge. Because, from birth until death, day after day, thirty days in a month, and three hundred and sixty-five days in the year, the constant function that these exit gates have to fulfil is drainage. And the occasional function that they have to fulfil is in cooperating with Brahma ब्रह्म, but that is only some rare occasional function and that also, only in a very short period of one’s life. In the first Ashrama आश्रम of Brahmacharya ब्रह्मचार्या, it has no place; in the third Ashrama आश्रम of Vanaprastha वानप्रस्थ, it has no place; and in the fourth Ashrama आश्रम of Sannyasa संन्यास, it has no place. Out of the whole life, it is only in one Ashrama आश्रम that that particular function of it is exercised. Otherwise, the main function of these outlets is only drainage of impurities.

If you change your Drishtikona दृष्टिकोण (Vision/viewpoint) and understand the body in the right perspective, then a great deal of your problem will be solved. It is taking a wrong view and giving a wrong emphasis which makes one to get into all sorts of difficulties. Secondly, take a look at it from the Vedantic वेदान्तिक point of view. The Adesha आदेश or Sandesha सन्देश (The Message or instructions) of Vedanta, the primary declaration of Vedanta, is that you are not this body, but that you are the Ajara Amara Avinashi Atma अजर अमर अविनाशी आत्मा. (Forever, for always, and cannot have destruction) Then, if you are not to identify yourself with your entire body, how can you identify yourself with one aspect of it? So, if your faith in Vedanta वेदांता is Pucca पक्का (Confirmed), is firm and genuine, if you are true to your Vedanta वेदांता, then, you have your solution in your own hand.