To some of us, death brings existence to an end. There is nothing beyond death. To others, however, some core aspect of the individual will continue – in some form, in some un-specifiable manner. Amongst these are those who believe that we go to heaven or to some comparable place.
In a presumed existence of some kind after death on Earth, will believers meet their God? Those who believe in the reincarnation process, and in a Creator God, may however have a problem, if they are metaphysical Hindus. For, the Hindu God is said to be ‘unknowable,’ a very difficult concept indeed. Perhaps that applies only on Earth. If so, the clairvoyant who advised his client not to expect to meet God after death may have been in error.
Are the others who believe in a knowable god, possibly an interventionist or even a personal god, within a framework of reincarnation, on firmer ground? That is, will they meet or experience their God after their Earthly demise?
Or could it be that Heaven (a final destination) or a Way Station (or Recycling Depot) for those who believe in reincarnation (or sequential rebirth), is actually Home (a home base) for all humans? And that, at death, we all come together, irrespective of our beliefs or non-beliefs!
In the event, any contention, especially within the three major ‘desert’ religions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, and the manifold sects within them, about the nature of Heaven and what will be found there should also be resolved on arrival there. That is, all current autocratic assertions offering scenarios based purely on speculation or hope should then be sorted out speedily. Or, will they?
For those who believe that death involves only a passing into another phase of existence, there is a crucial question. What would Home or the Other Side be like? Those who arrive at the Other Side would have left their bodies behind. That is, they would be ethereal; insubstantial. Their destination need not therefore be one of ‘substance’ as we know it; it could be in any one of the dimensions that the cosmologists of science refer to in their attempts to explain the Universe mathematically.
It could be ‘here’, so to speak, considering the easy access that some (insubstantial) members of the spirit world would seem to have to our substantial material world.
‘Where now, old sow?’ might have been the question asked of his companion by that sceptical Oriental philosopher whose name is not relevant.
RAJA ARASA RATNAM 