The Vedanta Sutras of Badarayana: Second Adhyâya. Fourth Pâda.: II, 4, 16

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The Vedanta Sutras of Badarayana, Commentary by Sankara (SBE38), tr. by George Thibaut [1896] at sacred-texts.com

16. And on account of the permanence of this (viz. the embodied soul).

This embodied soul abides permanently in this body as the enjoyer, since it can be affected by good and evil and can experience pleasure and pain. Not so the gods; for they exist in the state of highest power and glory and cannot possibly enter, in this wretched body, into the condition of enjoyers. So scripture also says, 'Only what is good approaches him; verily evil does not approach the devas' (Bri. Up. I, 5. 20).--And only with the embodied soul the prânas are permanently connected, as it is seen that when the soul passes out &c. the prânas follow it. This we see from passages such as the following: 'When it passes out the prâna passes out after it, and when the prâna thus passes out all the other prânas pass after it' (Bri. Up. IV, 4, 2). Hence although there are ruling divinities of the organs, the embodied soul does not cease to be the enjoyer; for the divinities are connected with the organs only, not with the state of the soul as enjoyer.

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