View source for A yogi can touch the moon with his finger

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[[Category:Yogi]]
[[Category:Touch]]
[[Category:Moon]]
[[Category:With]]
[[Category:Finger]]
[[Category:The Nectar of Devotion Chapter 01 - Characteristics of Pure Devotional Service]]
[[Category:The Nectar of Devotion Chapters 01 to 51]]
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<h2>Other Books by Srila Prabhupada</h2>
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<h3>Nectar of Devotion</h3>
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A yogī can touch the moon with his finger. Though the modern astronauts go to the moon with the help of spaceships, they undergo many difficulties, whereas a person with mystic perfection can extend his hand and touch the moon with his finger. This siddhi is called prāpti, or acquisition. With this prāpti-siddhi, the perfect mystic yogī can not only touch the moon planet, but he can extend his hand anywhere and take whatever he likes.
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[[Vanisource:NOD 1 (1970)|Nectar of Devotion, 1]]
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The mystic perfections achieved by actually successful yogīs are eight in number. Aṇimā-siddhi refers to the power by which one can become so small that he can enter into a stone. Modern scientific improvements also enable us to enter into stone because they provide for excavating so many subways, penetrating the hills, etc. So, aṇimā-siddhi, the mystic perfection of trying to enter into stone, has also been achieved by material science. Similarly, all of the yoga-siddhis, or perfections, are material arts. For example, in one yoga-siddhi there is development of the power to become so light that one can float in the air or on water. That is also being performed by modern scientists. They are flying in the air, they are floating on the surface of the water, and they are traveling under the water.

After comparing all these mystic yoga-siddhis to materialistic perfections it is found that the materialistic scientists try for the same perfections. So actually there is no difference between mystic perfection and materialistic perfection. A German scholar once said that the so-called yoga perfections have already been achieved by the modern scientists, and so he was not concerned with them. He intelligently went to India to learn how he could understand his eternal relationship with the Supreme Lord by means of bhakti-yoga, devotional service.

Of course, in the categories of mystic perfection there are certain processes which the material scientists have not yet been able to develop. For instance, a mystic yogī can enter into the sun planet simply by using the rays of the sunshine. This perfection is called laghimā. Similarly, a yogī can touch the moon with his finger. Though the modern astronauts go to the moon with the help of spaceships, they undergo many difficulties, whereas a person with mystic perfection can extend his hand and touch the moon with his finger. This siddhi is called prāpti, or acquisition. With this prāpti-siddhi, the perfect mystic yogī can not only touch the moon planet, but he can extend his hand anywhere and take whatever he likes. He may be sitting thousands of miles away from a certain place, and if he likes he can take fruit from a garden there. This is prāpti-siddhi.

The modern scientists have manufactured nuclear weapons with which they can destroy an insignificant part of this planet, but by the yoga-siddhi known as īśitā one can create and destroy an entire planet simply at will. Another perfection is called vaśitā, and by this perfection one can bring anyone under his control. This is a kind of hypnotism which is almost irresistible. Sometimes it is found that a yogī who may have attained a little perfection in this vaśitā mystic power comes out among the people and speaks all sorts of nonsense, controls their minds, exploits them, takes their money and then goes away.

There is another mystic perfection which is known as prākāmya (magic). By this prākāmya power one can achieve anything he likes. For example, one can make water enter into his eye and then again come out from within the eye. Simply by his will he can perform such wonderful activities.

The highest perfection of mystic power is called kāmāvasāyitā. This is also magic, but whereas the prākāmya power acts to create wonderful effects within the scope of nature, kāmāvasāyitā permits one to contradict nature—in other words, to do the impossible. Of course, one can derive great amounts of temporary happiness by achieving such yogic materialistic perfections.
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