rightfully his, and the Lord shows such benevolence, that He will grant to each the particular body to which he aspires.
The innumerable bodies material that embodied beings in this world must take on originate from the false concepts of “je” and “mien”. The material concept of existence, which in the conditioned soul is reflected in politics, sociology, philanthropy, altruism, etc., therefore rests entirely on this notion of “je” and of “mien”, which arises from a powerful desire for material enjoyment. This identification of being with his body and his place of birth, that is to say the place where he has put on this body, which manifests itself in various material notions, such as socialism, nationalism, family or other attachment, has for sole cause the forgetting of the true nature of the individual soul. But let the being thus conditioned come into contact with an authentic spiritual master, and all illusion will be swept away.
Logos 115
Immersed in illusion, the spiritual being distinct from God, that we are, takes on innumerable forms, material bodies conferred on it by the external energy of the Lord, the material nature.
The various bodies that the distinct spiritual beings borrow are so many costumes that they are attributed by the external energy and illusion of the Lord, in order to satisfy their desires for material enjoyment according to one or other of the three gunas, the modes of influence of material nature; virtue, passion, ignorance. Indeed, material energy, or external energy, is constituted by the three gunas, virtue, passion and ignorance. Even when he acts within the material nature, the distinct being enjoys a certain free will by which he can choose to clothe one or the other of the material bodies which the external energy offers him.
In truth, there are 900,000 aquatic species, 2,000,000 plant species, 1,100,000 species of reptiles and worms, 1,000,000 species of birds, 3,000,000 d species of mammals and 400,000 human species, together comprising the 8,400,000 varieties of bodies found in various planets in countless galaxies. This is how the wanderings of the distinct being continue, the human being, through the effect of innumerable transmigrations, thus responds to the call of the various forms of material desires which inhabit him.