The five bodies

The basic underpinnings of astrology go back to the vedantic wisdom gleaned by the great yogins of India. The sages discovered that a human is not just one physical body, but is composed of 5 bodies, of which a normal person is familiar with just two. These five in order of subtler to finer are given as follows
1) Causal body
2) Shared causal body
3) Mental body
4) Energy body
5) Physical body

The causal body is the vehicle for causality. It carries the experiences and consequences of the deeds you have done in the past.

The shared body is also a vehicle for causality, but it pertains to a whole group of people. It is their shared Karma, which they all reap. For example some countries are rich and some are poor, which affects individuals born in those countries. We all reap the fruits whether good or evil that our ancestors planted.

Mental body is something we are familiar with, it is essentially our mind.

Energy body (prana) is what distinguishes a live body from a dead one. The former is animated by the energy body, while the the energy body has left the latter, and it is a lump of dead physical matter.

Physical body is something which needs no further exposition.


Out of these five bodies two of them the physical and the mental are directly experienced by us all. The pranic body can also be experienced relatively easily. The shared causal body, or shared karma nobody can deny. The only thing remaining is the causal body which continues through death and carries previous impressions forth. For an ordinary person it is not easy to apprehend this causal body.