About human body

The body of human being consists of:

1. Gross body (Sthula sharira) ‒ it includes the physical body, composed of five elements;
2. Subtle body (Sukshma sharira) ‒ emotions, images, dreams, etc., as well as the energy structure: chakras, nadis, adharas;
3. Causal body (Karana sharira) – contains person`s karma, information about one's reincarnations.

We are not one of these bodies, we are Atman, the Eternal Spirit, which being incarnated in human form, acquires experience and knowledge, information, using an instrument called Antahkaran. Antahkaran operates in the subtle body (sukshma sharira), receiving information from the external world via 5 sense organs. 

Antahkaran consists of:

• our ego – Ahamkara, namely that what identifies itself with the doer, with a particular image (a person) in this life;
• our spiritual intellect – Buddhi (it intuitively knows at inner level what is good and what is bad, although they are relative categories);
• and Manas – the sense mind, representing our ordinary mind difficult to control- our desires, thoughts, patterns and so on. Manas performs the important function of processing information, received through the sense organs.

In Vedanta Consciousness (Chitta) is comprised as well in Antahkaran and the founder of the Nath Tradition Gorakshanath apart from Citta includes also Chaitanya in Antahkaran, namely more subtle aspect of Consciousness.

In the Nath Tradition body is denoted by the term of Pinda, meaning "collection, total amount" in Sanskrit. According to Nathas, Pinda reflects the universe in itself ‒ all existing worlds (lokas), Deities, sacred places and even hells. Thus, cognizing this micro-universe in own body, Nath comes to the comprehension of the whole creation.