JSR: Prana seems such a mystery. It is not money, but money can represent it. It existed before money existed, and yet it is a shadowy thing, not made of atoms and molecules, not existing here nor there. I cannot see it; I cannot touch it; and yet I know what it is to have it or lack it. Tell me, what is this Prana, what constitutes stealing it, what constitutes giving it?

Some men say,

"What I cannot see, what I cannot touch,

what is not made of atoms, what cannot be examined with the senses

cannot be anything at all."

And yet they say when they suffer,

"Ease my suffering,"

and they say when they are joyful,

"My joy is real."

Ezekiel: When a man insults a man,

he steals Prana,

receiving pleasure at the consternation of his fellow.

When the young man commits suicide,

he steals Prana,

finding a moment of rest,

at his parents’ expense.

And when a man has many comforts and pleasures:

servants, maids, a spacious house,

fine meals, fine clothes, fine jewelry,

he steals Prana, taking all he can for himself

at the expense of his poor fellows.

We cannot see it, but it is the most obvious fact about us:

we lack it when we weep,

we have it when we sing,

it is the cornerstone of all economics,

and wherever one is conscious, there it is also.

Some have wealth enough to last them the rest of their lives. How can they own the food they will eat when they are eighty now, if that food hasn’t been grown yet? The grain has yet to sprout, the meat has yet to be born; and yet they own it already. It cannot be that they own enough money to buy it, if money is really only made of paper that can be produced on any machine, or if money is really only numbers printed on statements and accounts. Those numbers would be worthless if they did not represent something else, something that is not money. Prana is the basis behind our currency, the phantom stuff that backs up all our currency; but it is not a mere social convention—for without it our bodies will wither and we will die. Long ago gold stood for Prana; and men were deceived by the shiny, pretty stuff so that they believed it was actually the metal that held value within it, by its intrinsic nature. But gold merely represented Prana by social convention, and was really only a worthless thing someone had dug out of the dirt. But Prana itself is not merely what it is by social convention; or otherwise we would have a social convention that dollars shall stand for a social convention that . . . that what?—there would be nothing solid at the bottom of it. Prana is purely nonphysical; it sustains our bodies and pleases our souls; it is the hard mattress for the one who likes a hard mattress, though this same mattress for one who hates these is its lack. It is political power, fame and fortune, the ability to guide the nation and control men and women, the joy of one when his baby is born, and the pleasure found in a good night’s sleep. Some think it is absurd that our currency is backed by the secret power of human consciousness to feel pleasure and pain. But if no one felt pain at having acne, acne medication would not be worth any money; and thus acne medication has monetary value only to the degree that consciousness feels pain at having acne. And heroin is only worth money insofar as it gives pleasure; if it gave no pleasure, people would say of the opium poppy, "What is it? What is it? It is nothing, just a little weed." And when someone gives money for heroin, that person is exchanging Prana for Prana—giving the power for the dealer to get what pleases him, in exchange for what pleases the addict. Prana is the basis for all our moral and economic systems at once: when the murderer steals Prana from his victim, we take Prana from the murderer by imprisoning or killing him, and this to us is justice. Prana arises out of consciousness, and its capacity to suffer and feel joy. The man with little money, cockroaches infesting his apartment, no cable TV, no good food—if he sings with joy, if he does not want what he does not have, if he is happy and content where he is, he is rich in Prana, and he has Prana that will not be lost should he give and give, as they do in the heavens. Prana is not inside a human being, for it can go from one human to another. It is not outside a human being, for it is everywhere and nowhere at once. It is beyond space, beyond matter and energy; it can never be studied by physicists or naturalists. It is the light in the gardens in the stars, and its lack is the darkness of hell.