Square 64: Phenomenal plane (prakriti-loka)
Leela Atlas team · Updated
Square 64 in Leela is the Phenomenal plane, prakriti-loka in Sanskrit. It opens the eighth and top row, The Gods Themselves, which lies beyond the chakras. Johari describes it as prakriti, nature both divine and manifest, seen from within: the player now apprehends the gunas and the elements in their essence rather than through their surface forms.
What square 64 means
After seven rows that map the chakras of the body, square 64 marks a change of view. In Johari's commentary the player here apprehends the three gunas and the elements in their essence. Nature is no longer a set of objects to want or avoid; it is seen as one living process, divine and manifest at once.
Prakriti is the Sanskrit term for primordial nature, the source of everything that takes form, and loka means plane or world. In Indian thought prakriti is woven from the three gunas, sattva, rajas and tamas, and unfolds as the elements together with mind, intellect and ego. Johari reads the eight rows of the board in the same way: eight stands for prakriti, nine for the Absolute.
Its position is telling. Square 64 sits at the top right corner, the start of a row that holds the triad of Shiva, Vishnu and Brahma at 67, 68 and 69 and closes with the three gunas at 70, 71 and 72. Before reaching the gods, the player sees the stage on which the whole game has been played. The lesson is clear seeing: what looked solid is play, and behind the play stands a living principle.
On the board
No arrow or snake ends on square 64, so a player arrives only by count, moving up from the last squares of row 7, the Plane of Reality. It is a plain square with nothing to climb or fall. From here a throw of exactly four lands on 68, Cosmic Consciousness, and ends the game, while a five or six carries the symbol past the goal into 69 or 70.
The Bhagavad Gita and this square
Gita 7.4 belongs to square 64: Krishna's nature is eightfold, earth, water, fire, air, space, mind, intellect and ego. The episode of Krishna's cosmic form in the Kaurava court shows the whole of manifest nature revealed as one living play.
Krishna's nature is eightfold: earth, water, fire, air, space, mind, intellect and ego. All you see is its play; behind it stands a living principle.
Gita 7.4 · Krishna's cosmic form in the Kaurava court
Questions to reflect on
- What do I see when I look beneath the form?
- Which part of my situation is simply nature at play, and which part is mine to act on?
- Where can I sense the same living principle in people I usually see only from outside?
Questions
What happens when you land on square 64 in Leela?
Square 64, the Phenomenal plane, is a plain square at the start of the top row. Nothing moves you up or down. From here you need exactly four to reach Cosmic Consciousness at 68 and finish the game. A five or a six takes you past the goal into 69, Absolute plane, or 70, True nature.
What does prakriti-loka mean?
Prakriti means primordial nature, everything that takes form, made of the three gunas and the elements; loka means plane or world. Prakriti-loka is therefore the plane where nature is seen in its essence. In Leela it is the first square beyond the chakras, a vantage point over the stage on which the whole game unfolds.
Why does the top row of Leela start with the Phenomenal plane?
Johari reads the eight rows as prakriti and the board's nine columns as the Absolute. The top row begins by showing nature itself before the triad of Shiva, Vishnu and Brahma at 67, 68 and 69. The player first understands the world as play, then meets the gods and the goal.
Related squares
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