Pudgala
I
- You say: “’person + Indriya + Manas is the Bhokta’ renders the sentence meaningless to me.” While that could be true, that sentence makes (and made) perfect sense to millions (over the last two millennia) on earth. Would it help if it read instead: “soul + Indriya + Manas is the Bhokta; ” or “my inner self + Indriya + Manas is the Bhokta” or “ the pudgala + Indriya + Manas is the Bhokta” or any such combination? If it does, then I do not see why ‘person’ would make the sentence meaningless; person is used as a synonym here. Moreover, if using ‘atman’ makes the sentence meaningful (irrespective of, as you put it, “whatever it be’), what is the problem if the word ‘person’ is used to translate ‘atman’? If the meaning problem re-emrges, it must lie in what you think the ‘person’ is, is it not?
- Are you raising a translation issue (how to translate dehinaH) here? It means ‘bodied’, ‘that which is bodied” (whatever that may be, to use your phrase). If you have knowledge of what ‘that’ (tat) is, you might say that it ‘has’ a body, it ‘possesses a body’, it ‘owns’ the body, it is ‘in’ the body, etc., depending on whether ‘thatness’ (tatva) is capable of ‘having’, or ‘owning’ or ‘possessing’ and is ‘indwelling’ and so on.
- As you can see, it is actually a knowledge issue about ‘tat’ (that) and ‘tatva’ (thatness). You can be a tatva darshi (one who has seen ‘thatness’) but yet not be a gyaani (i.e., not have the knowledge of what tatva is).
- In my talk that you refer to, I raise a question about a knowledge issue. Is atman ‘inside’ the body, i.e., does dehinaH mean ‘embodied’ or is it merely ‘the bodied’ in the second chapter of the Gita?
II
Regarding the Katha Upanishadic verse 1.3.3-4 : multiple ways of glossing that passage exist. Consider this simple version: Aatma( = Dehin) +Indriya+Manas = Bhokta. RHS says ‘the enjoyer’, which refers to an entire complex of the LHS (let us say) consisting of the ‘person’ that X or Y is, plus his/her sense organs, plus mind, plus whatever else you care to add (its past, genetic tendencies, proclivities and skills, etc.). What is the problem? If there is any, it arises from some strange assumption about what Krishna and Arjuna could refer to. Krishna plus his eyes (or his legs or his intestines, etc.) is Krishna. Why should this sentence create any problem of understanding? Krishna plus his wives or wealth remains Krishna too.(How many times have you not heard people exclaim, ‘after all these years, you have not changed and are still the same”, etc.? To parse it properly, one must put the ‘you’ on the LHS and RHS. Such sentences are not difficult to understand, are they?)
Please do not use the wood and fire analogy to claim that fire is “inside” the wooden sticks (in this age and time). If you do, a middle school kid can show that you are not making sense. There are more interesting ways of looking at the analogy.
III
While I do understand your desire for enlightenment, assuming you are serious, I suggest that you put in the hard work required to acquire knowledge. In exactly the same way you cannot learn quantum gravity by reading a few sentences in an e-mail, you will learn nothing about ‘atman’, ‘Brahman’ etc., by reading a short post or two. Such exercises might help you get more followers on Twitter or Facebook because you can write ‘intelligent’ one-liners but it does no more.
Note:
आत्मान्ँ रथिनं विद्धि शरीर्ँ रथमेव तु ।
बुद्धिं तु सारथिं विद्धि मनः प्रग्रहमेव च ।। 1.3.3 ।।
इन्द्रियाणि हयानाहुर्विषया्ँ स्तेषु गोचरान् ।
आत्मेन्द्रियमनोयुक्तं भोक्तेत्याहुर्मनीषिणः ।। 1.3.4 ।।
ātmānam̐ rathinaṃ viddhi śarīram̐ rathameva tu |
buddhiṃ tu sārathiṃ viddhi manaḥ pragrahameva ca || 3 ||
indriyāṇi hayānāhurviṣayām̐ steṣu gocarān ।
ātmendriyamanoyuktaṃ bhoktetyāhurmanīṣiṇaḥ ॥ 4 ॥