Samnyasa is not a mere physical escapism but a mental withdrawal from things that are unintelligent and thoughtless. It is a mental attitude and not an external symbol. Therefore, he who is a self-controlled individual and who has brought all his sense-appetities under perfect control, and renounced all his ego-centric and desire-prompted actions, comes to experience and live in a nameless joy, contentment and peace which well up from the very depths within him. He thus remains contented and happy, in the “City-of-nine-gates.”

This is a famous metaphor used in the Upanishads, to indicate the physical body of the seeker. The body is considered a fortress city, having nine main gates, which are the nine apertures in the physical structure, seven of them on the face (two eyes, two nostrils, two ears and one mouth) and the two apertures on the trunk, the genital organ and the excretory organ. Without these nine holes or at least a majority of them, life within the body is impossible. Just as the King, remaining in the fortress, rules over his kingdom through his ministers, giving them the encouragement, strength and sanction by his mere presence, so too, the Atman, within the physical structure, though Itself doing nothing, by Its mere presence, vitalises the various instruments of cognition and action, within and without and governs the “life” in them all.

This famous metaphor is used here by Sri Krishna, and he says that a self-controlled man lives within the physical body, a nameless joy of pure Divine life, ever watching over the activities of the matter-envelopments around him!! Such an individual, ever identifying with the Self, observes-on, unaffected, unattached and without agitations, all the thrilled activities in the layers of matter, but “neither does he act nor does he cause others to act.”

MOREOVER:

Aste, he continues; sukham, happily; sannyasya, having given up; sarva-karmani, all actions-nitya, naimittika, kamya and nisiddha (prohibited actions); [See note on p. 128.-Tr.] manasa, mentally, through discriminating wisdom-i.e. having given up (all actions) by seeing inaction in action, etc. Freed from the activities of speech, mind and body, effortles, placid in mind, and devoid of all external wants which are different from the Self, he continues happily. This is what has been said. Where and how does the vasi, man of self-control, i.e. one who has his organs under control, remain? This is being answered: Nava-dvare pure, in the town with nine gates, of which seven [Two ears, two eyes nostrils, and mouth.] are in the head for one’s own experiences, and two are below for urination and defecation. As possessed of those gates, it is called the ‘town with nine gates’. Being like a town, the body is called a town with the Self as its only master. And it is inhabited by the organs, mind, intellect and objects, like citizens, as it were, which serve its needs and which are productive of many results and experience. Renouncing all actions, the dehi, embodied one, resides in that town with nine gates.

Objection: What is the need of this specification? For all embodied beings, be they monks or not, reside in bodies to be sure! That being so, the specification is needless. The answer is: The embodied one, however, who is unenlightened, who perceives merely the aggregate of the body and organs as the Self, he, in his totality, thinks, ‘I am in a house, on the ground, or on the seat.’ For one who experiences the body alone as the Self, there can certainly be no such conviction as, ‘I am in the body, like one’s being in a house.’ But, for one who realizes the Self as distinct from the aggregate of body etc. it becomes reasonable to have the conviction, ‘I am in the bdoy. It is reasonable that as a result of knowledge in the form of discriminating wisdom, there can be a mental renunciation of the actions of others, which have been ignorantly superimposed on the supreme Self. Even in the case of one in whom has arisen discriminating wisdom and who has renounced all actions, there can be, like staying in a house, the continuance in the body itself-the town with nine gates-as a consequence of the persistence of the remnants of the results of past actions which have started bearing fruit, because the awareness of being distinct (from the body) arises while one is in the body itself. Form the point of veiw of the difference between the convictions of the enlightened and the unenlightened persons, the qualifying words, ‘He continues in the body itself’, do have a purpose to serve. Although it has been stated that one continues (in the body) by relinquishing actions of the body and organs ignorantly superimposed on the Self, still there may be the apprehesion that direct or indirect agentship inheres in the Self. Anticipating this, the Lord says: na eva kurvan, without himself doing anything at all; and na karayan, not causing (others) to do, (not) inducing the body and organs to activity.

Objection: Is it that the direct or indirect agentship of the embodied one inheres in the Self and ceases to be after renunciation, as the movement of a traveller ceases with the stoppage of his movement? Or, is it that they do not exist owing to the very nature of the Self? As to this, the answer is: The Self by Its nature has neither direct nor indirect agentship. For it was stated, ‘It is said that…This (Self) is unchangeable’ (2.25). ‘O son of Kunti, although existing in the body, It does not act, nor is It affected’ (13.31). And it is also stated in the Upanisad, ‘It seems to meditate, as it were; It seems to move, as it were’ (Br. 4.3.7).