A: The living entities are of three varieties: 1. Baddhas, 2. Mukthas and 3. Nithyas.
There are four classifications of baddhas:
1. Devas or the heavenly entities,
2. Human beings,
3. Thiryaks consisting of birds and animals and
4. Sthaavaraas or Plants.
The above said baddhas take different births cyclically based on their past deeds of good and bad, being subject to the natural elemental influences like, sound, touch, form, taste, scent etc, they get involved in the wordly life. Their physical bodies obscure their consciousness of the soul within and are affected by their ego of ‘I’ and ‘Mine’. They have
been experiencing joy and sorrow of life from time immemorial. We belong to this category of baddhas and are countless.
A baddha, at some point of time, through the Grace of the Lord, begins to realize the presence of the Super-Soul, gets liberated from the cyclical worldly connections imposed by ‘karma’, ‘samsaara’ and the mundane sport (‘leela vibhoothi’) and reaches the abode of Lord Vishnu to become a ‘muktha’, which means that he has attained ‘mukthi’, a state of liberation. These mukthas are also countless.
The nithyas are never associated with ‘karma’ and always dwell in the abode of the Supreme Lord like, the great serpent called, ‘Anantha’, the great bird called ‘Garuda’, ‘Vishwaksena’, the chief attendant and a countless number engaged in the service of the Lord.
The Q&A of the day is an excerpt from "Two-fold Vedic Vision", a Sri Vaishnavite handbook based on Sri Sudarsanar’s 1008 Catechisms in Tamil written by Sri. Kidambi Sridharan. The collection contains invaluable information on the Vedas, Upanishads, Puranas, Ithihasas, the lives of Alwars, Acharyas from Sriman Nathamunigal to Sri Manavala Mamuni, the 108 Divya Desams and answers to various other related questions. This book is available for kindle in e-book format for purchase on Amazon.
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