The “fall” of the jīva: the question of free will

There is no force that propels the soul in the direction of the material energy other than free will. Free will is the essential characteristic of the soul that makes love for Krsna possible.

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This is the second article on the topic of the “fall” of the jīva:

How eternal spiritual souls can come to this miserable material world is a mystery. After all, who, in a sane state of consciousness, would desire to trade a comfortable life in a developed country for an uncertain life in a miserable war-torn place like Yemen or Ethiopia, for example? Well, actually, we see that some people do so, despite the risks and inconveniences. Some change their minds after a little while and return home, while others continue on the dangerous trip for long. As long as people are free to make their own choices, some will take the risk.

As Srila Prabhupada explains, there is no force that propels the soul in the direction of the material energy other than one’s own free will. As Srila Bhaktivinoda Thākura explains in his Jaiva Dharma (ch. 16), free will is the essential characteristic of the soul that makes possible his relationship with Krsna. Sincere love must be based on choice, as soon as there is no choice, there is also no love.

If a big guy with a gun were to bind me to a chair and start asking if I love him, I would certainly say with all my might anything he would want to hear, but this certainly would not be love. Similarly, if the souls did not have the free will to love Krsna or not, it would not be true love. Bhaktivinoda Thākura goes beyond, saying that if the souls did not have a tinge of independence, they would not be different from inert matter, which one can manipulate at will. Certainly, it would not be interesting for Krsna to have relationships with inanimate objects.

It’s exactly that independence and free will that makes possible the “fall” of the jīva to this material world. At a certain point in eternity, we became somehow averse to serving Krsna, and since then, we are here trying to be God ourselves.

However, as Srila Prabhupada explains in his article “Crow and tall fruit logic”, our spiritual form is actually not lost, but just forgotten. He goes far enough to declare that, actually, we are still with Krsna; it’s just that our attention is in another place. As soon as we can bring our consciousness back to its initial status, we will understand that actually we never left.

An example can be given in this connection. Imagine someone seated in a chair, playing a video game on his computer. His attention becomes completely focused on the game, and he forgets himself. He becomes a knight in shining armor, fighting orcs. He rejoices when he defeats a boss and becomes distressed when he suffers a defeat. This continues for some time until some event brings him back to his external consciousness. He then notices that he is again seated in the chair. Actually, he never left the chair; it was just his consciousness that went somewhere else.

Another dimension to this question is that the more one wants to understand it using material logic, the more one is propense to come to the idea that the jīva does not have an eternal relationship with Krsna. If one concludes that the jīva comes from the brahmajyoti and does not have an intrinsic love for Krsna, the next logical conclusion is that we should just go back there. Another possible logical conclusion is that since the soul does not have an innate relationship with Krsna, this relationship needs to be established, which leads to the practice of the imaginary process of siddha-praṇālī that is prevalent amongst a certain class of sahajiyās. Both can cause serious damage to one’s spiritual life.

That’s why Srila Prabhupada (and other ācāryas) recommended we not spend time discussing this problem. We simply can’t understand it in our current condition. We are like small children trying to understand how a nuclear reactor works. A devotee who is intelligent will just accept the teachings given by Mahāprabhu in the Siksastaka and become concentrated on how to leave this material world instead of understanding how he came here.

“O Son of Maharaj Nanda, I am Your eternal servitor, and although I am so, somehow or other I have fallen in the ocean of birth and death. Please, therefore, pick me up from this ocean of death, and fix me as one of the atoms of Your Lotus Feet.” (Śrī Śikṣāṣṭakam 5)

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