Question: Is the body as important as the soul?

Sri Chinmoy: The soul is infinitely more important than the physical body. The soul has to be realised first; then only can the Light of God be revealed to the world through the body. Since the soul is inside the physical, we have to give the necessary importance to the physical. But if we show undue concern for the body all the time, then we shall lead a most ordinary human life. We shall simply exist on earth like some farmers in the Indian villages who live to be one hundred and fifty or even two hundred years old but have no aspiration.

Just to live here on earth and count the years on the calendar is of no avail. But if we can stay on earth for forty or fifty years and bring the soul’s light and other divine qualities to the fore, then our life will be meaningful. In order to do this, we have to live in the soul, not in the body. If we live in the body, we become victims to teeming desires.