The Five Sheaths

The sheaths that envelope the gross body

Every jeeva has five layers/sheaths known as annamaya kosha, praanamaya kosha, manomaya kosha, vignanamaya kosha and aanadamaya kosha. All of them are inter-dependent and have a bearing on the state of wellness of the others.

Annamaya kosha is the gross, physical body comprising flesh, blood, muscles, bones... It is made of the pancha-bhutas (five elements): earth, water, sky, fire, wind (prithvi, aapa, aakasha, agni, vayu). The gross body is made of seven dhaatus*... skin (as sense organ), skin (as epidermis), muscle, blood cells, fatty tissues, bone-marrow/joints, bone.

*seven vital parts present in the body

Praanamaya kosha is the layer of life force, “praana” (vital energy) which moves through it and permeates the gross body. This is the sheath where the naadis and chakras exist. The five types of praana are: praana, apaana, samana, udana and vyaana.

Manomaya kosha is the mental sheath which encompasses the mind and thought processes.

Vignanamaya kosha is the layer of wisdom, which includes conscience, will and intuition.

Aanadamaya kosha is the most subtle layer which when activated results in bliss/ joy/ aananda.

The Pancharoopi paramaatma (Naarayana, Vaasudeva, Sankarshana, Pradyumna, Aniruddha) exists in each of the layers.

*these numbers are derived from assigning a number to each letter of the name, reversing the order, and adding them up. Jagannatha Daasaru has made extensive use of “saankhya” (numerology) and has derived these numbers from assigning a number to each letter of the name, reversing the order, and adding them up.

*The numbers are arrived at by assigning a number to the letters of the kosha

The pancha-koshas (five sheaths) lie between these sapta dhaatus.

The visibility of the Praanamaya kosha

The Praanamaya kosha is said to give out an ‘aura’, representative of the spiritual energy of a person and envelopes the person’s physical body. The aura is typically said to be of colours associated with the seven chakras, with the addition of white. The aura is unique to each person but the colour may change according to the person’s state of being. Spiritually evolved people and clairvoyants can ‘see’ the aura which is invisible to untrained eyes. There are even online personality quizzes that claim to tell you the colour of your aura!

The idea of aura is depicted as a ‘halo’ around the heads of divine beings in paintings, across religions.

In 1939, a Russian couple serendipitiousy discovered that they could capture light from an object’s corona discharge* using a photographic plate placed very close to the object. The photographic plate captured the patterns formed by the fine details visible only in the electrified air around the object. This was called Kirlian Photography after its discoverers Semyon Davidovitch Kirlian and Valentina Kirlian.

*strong electric fields induced by high voltages of current results in ionisation of moisture and dust particles in the air which produce electrical discharge also known as corona discharge

Kirlian photography has been the subject of much debate. Kirlian photography cameras, also known as aura cameras, are available for sale (and experimentation) online :-)

Read more

https://www.sciencealert.com/we-emit-a-visible-light-that-vanishes-when-we-die-surprising-study-says