D.: Even as the hand is cut off, one must remain unaware of it because Srimad Gita declares that the Self is different from the body.
M.: Does consist in being unaware of the pain of injury?
D.: Should he not remain unaware of pain?
M.: Major operations are performed under anaesthetics, keeping the patient unaware of the pain. Does the patient gain , too, at the same time? Insensibility to pain cannot be jnāna.
D.: Should not a (a sage) be insensible to pain?
M.: Physical pain only follows body-consciousness; it cannot be in the absence of body-consciousness. Mind, being unaware of the body, cannot be aware of its pains or pleasures. Read the story of Indra and Ahalya in “Yoga Vasishta”; there death itself is said to be an act of mind.
Pains are dependent on the ego; they cannot be without the ‘I’, but ‘I’ can remain without them.