Can I Live Forever?
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Can I Live Forever?
Complied by
Radheshyam Das, M.Tech. (IIT Mumbai)
Director, VOICE
‘Life after death’, ‘Transmigration’, ‘Reincarnation’, ‘Astral-travel’ - These are topics which were once hardly mentioned but are now much talked about.
‘Is there a soul? Can the soul live outside the body? What happens to the soul when the body dies?
‘Many people have their theories, but ancient India’s Vedic literatures have the facts.
This book contains six short lessons, which explain clearly the most secret yet most essential knowledge required for achieving the highest perfection of life.
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Lesson One
EACH OF US IS A LIVING SOUL
WITHIN A MATERIAL BODY
At every moment our bodies are changing. Just contemplate on your present body. You are in the prime of youth now. How did your body look like twenty years ago? Try to comprehend how this body will be after fifty years. In the course of our life we actually have many different bodies – infant, child, youth, adult, and so on – but we remain the same person.
Am I a Lump of Chemicals?
According to Dr. Harry Monsen, Professor of anatomy at Illinois College of Medicine, your body is worth only Rs. 110/- if the cost of all the chemicals that constitute your body is considered. Do you think you are worth only Rs. 110/-? Will your parents sell you off even if someone pays them 50 crore rupees? When a living person looses his small finger or has to get his kidney replaced, he is ready to spend lakhs and lakhs of rupees. What is there in a living body that makes it so valuable? And why is a dead body utterly valueless, although all the chemicals are still there in it?
The most fundamental knowledge delivered by Sri Krishna to Arjuna in Bhagavad-gita is that we are not these bodies; we are spirit souls. The body is only mere temporary covering or dress. The soul (living force) is present in the plants, animals and human beings. Wherever there is life there must be a soul, because the soul is life. Whether it is an amoeba or an elephant or a human being, the soul is present within each body.
What Exactly is the Soul?
The soul is the spark of life that activates every body and enables it to function, just as electric current activates a device and enables it to function. The soul can be compared to a driver and the body to a vehicle. The soul is the spark of life that makes the body appear alive and when the soul leaves the body, the person is said to be dead.
Scientific Proof of the Soul’s Existence
We are accustomed to understanding the term ‘science’ only in relation to matter and energy. There is however, a higher dimensional science that deals with the subject of the soul and spiritual energy. By nature spirit is ‘transcendental’ to matter. In other words, the soul is intrinsically beyond material sense perception. The techniques of material science are inadequate to ‘prove’ the existence of the soul in as much as the ear is incapable of detecting light. The soul can however, by realized as a higher reality by following the laws of spiritual science. Ultimately, all spiritual truth is revealed and ‘proved’ from within, by experience. Yet the following points may help us better understand the presence of soul.
Common senses
When a person dies we say, “He has passed away.” Now who has passed away? The body of the person still lies there. The fact is that the source of life, the soul, has passed away from the body and therefore the person is now called dead.
Intuitive Understanding
We have an intuitive understanding the the real self, the ‘I’, is distinct from the body, mind and intelligence. We speak in terms of ‘my hand’, ‘my head’ etc. This way we can start from the top of the hair down to the tip of the toe and say every part of this body is ‘mine’. This indicates that these things belong to somebody, an owner. The eyes, ears and brain are merely organs, through which we see, hear or think. These organs in themselves cannot do any activity. There are eyes, ears and a brain even in a dead body. The activities have stopped because the driver, the soul, has left the body.
Consciousness
There is consciousness in a living body, Just like the sun spreads heat and light all around, the soul spreads consciousness all around the body, from the tip of the toes and fingers to the top of the head. It is this consciousness that enables us to think, feel, move and so on. Thus, consciousness is the symptom of the soul. Consciousness is what distinguishes a dead body from a living one. A machine can easily be built to respond to red light with the statement, “I see red light”, but does the experience of seeing red light accompany this mechanical response? As Thomas Huxley rightly said, “There is a third thing in the universe, to wit, consciousness, which I cannot see to be matter or force.” Consciousness gives the proof of the soul.
Near Death Experience (NDE)
NDEs, as the name suggests, involve people who have a close call with death. Many people having NDEs also have Out-of-Body Experiences (OBEs) in which they report observing their physical body and events relating to it from a perspective outside the body during severe illness or physical trauma resulting in unconsciousness. A typical case might involve a person who is resuscitated from a heart attack and reports that he observed, from a point outside his body, the medical personnel endeavouring to revive him. At such times, according to standard medical opinion, the normal functioning of the brain, as indicated by certain brain waves, is impaired, and the patient should be unconscious, if indeed consciousness is a manifestation of the brain.
There is enough research work in NDE presented by individuals with impeccable scientific credentials. For example, Dr Michael B Sabom, a cardiologist and professor at the Emory University Medical School, was openly skeptical of NDEs but changed his mind after investigating them. Based on rigorous research, Sabom writes: “If the human brain is actually composed of two fundamental elements – the ‘mind’ amd the ‘brain’ - then could the near death crisis event somehow trigger a transient splitting of the mind from the brain in many individuals... The out-of-body hypothesis simply seems to fit best with the data at hand... Could the mind which splits apart from the physical brain be, in essence, the soul, which continues to exist after final bodily death, according to some religious doctrine? As I see it, this is the ultimate question that has been raised by reports of the NDE.”
Past Life Memories
Rigorous, unbiased studies have been carried out by serious researchers on past-life memories. Dr Ian Stevenson, Carlson Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Virginia, has extensively investigated spontaneous reincarnation memories recounted by children. In such cases he has been able to positively corroborate what the child has claimed by thorougly investigating details of the place and people they describe, including the dead person they claim to have been. Stevenson has assembled numerous accounts and verified them, always taking great care to screen out fabrications. His studies give convincing evidence that the conscious self can travel from one physical body to the next.
Clearly, when one body dies, the contents of its brain are destroyed, and there is no physical process by which they can influence the contents of another brain. The simplest interpretation is that the conscious self must be an entity distinct from the brain.
Is Man Just a Powerful Computer or Robot?
A computer is controlled by a series of instructions (written in suitable computer languages like C, C++, VB). It is evident that a computer has to be programmed by an intelligent human being. Whatever ability a computer has, be it number crunching, object identification, natural language processing etc. is imparted to the computer by a sentient conscious human being. In other words, if the programmer programs his computer system to sum two plus two as five it would do so. Similarly if a computer system hooked with a vision system is programmed to recognize a square object as round it would do so. A computer cannot understand anything by itself. By itself, without bring programmed, it is a dumb machine.
For example, consider a drama, which is being observed by a panel of judges and is also being recorded by a video camera. The judge is using his eyes to record the scene being enacted and the video camera is recording all the incidents using the lenses, which are the machine analog of the eyes. Both the machine and the human observer record the data and information, but the human observer also ‘experiences’ the phenomenon. The judges, for instance, go through a whole range of emotions like elation, sorrow, anger etc. while they view the play. The video camera, on the other hand, merely records the play visually. At the end, the judges make a decision as to which actor was the best based on the series of images projeted in front of the eye. However the video recorder cannot make any such judgements, although it has recorded every scene of the drama.
The difference is that although, both the human observer and the camera are watching the play, the human being is ‘conscious’, whereas the camera is devoid of any consciousness. Hence the main difference between man and machine is consciousness.
A Clear Understanding of Life and Death
The Gross Body and the Subtle Body
According to Bhagavad-gita you are not this body. You are not the mind. You are not the intelligence. You are not the false ego. You are beyond the constituents of this mortal form. You are the consciousness that pervades this body. You are the imperishable soul.
The soul has two coverings – the gross body and the subtle body. The gross body, also known as the ‘sthula sharira’ is made up of five elements – earth, water, fire, air and ether. Earth represents all solids, water represents all liquids, fire represents light and radiation, air represents all gases and ether represents space and sound.
The mind, intelligence and false ego constitute the subtle body. The subtle body is also called as the ‘sukshma sharira’. ‘True ego’ is to understand that ‘I am spirit soul, eternal servant of God’. ‘False ego’ is to think in illusion that, ‘I am this body’. The subtle body and the gross body are coverings on the soul. Such a soul entrapped in these subtle and gross bodies is called a ‘conditioned soul’. One who becomes free from these covering and attains spiritual consciousness is called a ‘liberated soul’.
Relationship Betweeen Body and Soul
The body is compared to a car and the soul to the driver. If an unintelligent puppy sees a big car coming on the road, it may be scared thinking a big animal is coming on four wheels. But a knowledgeable man will know that it is only a dead car, which is driven by a driver. There are headlights in the car to see the road, you also see with your eyes. The car produces sound with the horn, you also speak. The car has four wheels, you also have two hands and two legs. The car moves from place to place and you also do the same. But once the driver gets down from the car, the car cannot budge even one inch after 100 years. Similarly when a person dies, his body becomes completely inactive. It is exactly liek a car without a driver. The body that we see is actually dead. It appears to be lively because of the presence of the soul. When the soul leaves the body, the body becomes inactive.
“The Unseen Driver of Bodily Car”
Mouth to Speak = Horn to Produce Sound
Eyes to See = Headlights to See
Heart to Pump Blood = Radiator to Supply Water
Hands and Legs to Move = Four Wheels to Move
Car Cannot Budge One Inch Without The Driver = Body Cannot Do Any Function Without The Driver i.e. Soul
What Happens at Death?
The Bhagavad-gita (2.13) explains: “As the embodied living soul continuously passes, in this body, from boyhood to youth to old age, so the same soul passes into another body at death.”
Our bodies grow and change because the living soul is present within the heart. But when the soul leaves the body, then all physical activities cease. The eternally living soul transmigrates to another body. This experience is known as death.
At the time of death, the gross body lies down, and the soul covered by the subtle body, according to the dictation of nature, occupies another body. The Bhagavad-gita (1.22) explains transmigration with an analogy: “As a person puts on new garments, giving up the old ones, similarly, the soul accepts new material bodies, giving up the old and useless ones.”
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Lesson Two
THE LIVING ENTITIES ARE
EVOLVING THROUGH
VARIOUS SPECIES
Transformations of the Body
Every living body in this material world undergoes six changes: birth, growth, maintenance, production of by-products (chemicals, offspring), diminution and destruction. These changes happen to all living bodies, whether they be plants, animals or human beings. For example, a child is born, grows into youth, remains young for a few years, produces a child, gradually ages and finally dies. We cannot stop this by our so-called material science. Sometimes people foolishly think that by scientific advancement human beings will become immotal. We cannot even stop these six changes in the body, where is the question of stopping death?
Complete and Perfect Knowledge of Evolution
Darwin’s evolution theory is an imperfect understanding of the real spiritual evolution, which takes place by the transmigration of the soul from one body to another. Originally, the living entity is a spiritual being, but when he desires to enjoy this material world, he falls down from the spiritual world. First, the living entity accepts a body that is human in form, but gradually, due to his degraded activities he falls into lower forms of life – into the animal, plant and aquatic forms. By the gradual process of evolution through 8.4 million species of life, the living entity again attains the body of a human being and is given another chance to get out of the process of transmigration. If he again misses the chance in the human form to understand his position, he is again placed in the cycle of birth and death in various types of bodies. This is the complete and perfect knowledge of evolution. (Srimad Bhagvatam 4.29.2).
The Padma Purana also says:
jalaja nava lakshani
sthavara laksha vimshati
krmaya rudra sankhyakah
pakshinam dasa lakshanam
trimsal lakshani pashavah
catush lakshani manavah
“There are 900,000 species of aquatic life; 2,000,000 species of plants and trees: 1,100,000 species of insects; 1,00,000 species of bird life; 3,000,000 species of beasts, and 400,000 species of human life”.
The meaning of “species” understood by biologists is different from the meaning implied here. The meaning of “species” used by biologists applies to the gross physical appearance of the gross morphological feature of the living material bodies. The Vedic meaning, however, is based on the level of consciousness of the living being. For example, biologists say that all human beings belong to one species, whereas the Vedic literatures list 400,000 human species.
In other words, there are 400,000 grades of human beings on different levels of consciousness. In the lower levels of consciousness, a living entity, although in a human body, behaves just like an animal. In a higher level, his consciousness may be slightly evolved and he may be selfish for his family. In a still higher level, he is concerned about his community, then about his state/country. At a higher level, one may become an altruist/philanthropist. And after many lifetimes one starts to enquire about God. The living entity still develops several conceptions about God in many, many lifetimes, until he comes to understand that, “Lord Krishna is the Supreme Personality of Godhead and surrendering to Him is the highest goal of life”. To stop the repetition of birth and death in different forms of life, we must transcend the covering of material nature and come to the platform of pure consciousness. But if we do not learn the transcendental science of Krishna consciousness, then at death we must transfer to another body, either better or worse than our present one.
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Lesson Three
ACTIONS WE PERFORM IN THE
HUMAN BODY DETERMINE OUR
FUTURE BODIES
This vast universe is filled with untold billions of eternally living spiritual souls or sparks of life and all of them are transmigrating from one body to the next. From the tiny one-celled amoeba to the great blue whale, all living organisms consist of two basic components: the material body and the spiritual soul. The material body is a lifeless yet complex arrangement of physical elements and the spiritual soul is a spark of life – a spark of supreme life, God. Though only one ten-thousandth the tip of hair in size, the soul animates one body after another. In its evolutionary course, the soul transmigrates from one species to another. In some species he remains only a few seconds, in others for as long as several thousand years. When a particular body is no longer fit for habitation, the soul leaves it and enters a seed, egg or womb to begin developing his next body.
Does the soul’s transmigration from body to body take place randomly or does some higher authority supervise? In one lifetime the spiritual soul may enjoy as a lusty rogue, and in the next lifetime he may be kicked as a street dog. What determines a particular soul’s next body?
According to Bhagavad-gita, each soul receives punishment or reward for the sinful or pious acts he performs during his human lifetime. This is known as the law of karma. Every act a human being performs is either in accord with or contrary to the universal laws that God gives in the revealed scriptures. God’s scriptural laws govern only those souls who are in the human form, because unlike the dull creatures in the lower species, the human being has sufficient intelligence to freely obey or reject the Lord’s scriptural instructions. However, along with that freedom comes accountability. Thus a sinful soul – one who breaks God’s laws – may be born as a dog in his next life, a pious soul may take his next birth as an aristocrat, and a self realized soul may break free from the bonds of karma altogether and enter into the deathless spiritual world.
The Bhagavad-gita further explains that a living soul receives a particular kind of body according to his particular desires. The subtle body, which accompanies the soul during the transitional state between death and rebirth, contains a record of all his thoughts, desires and activities, and these determine the kind of gross body the living entity will inhabit in his next life.
When you go to a cloth shop you find varieties of clothes – shirts, suits, pants, jeans etc. Similarly there are 8.4 million species for us to choose. We may acquire any of them to fulfil our desires. Even amongst human beings there are so many varieties – asuras, civilized, devas etc. Krishna is capable of fulfilling every living entity’s desires.
Mental activities or psychological activities of thinking, feeling, and willing are also activities on the platform of ethereal existence. That subtle forms exist in the ether has been proven by modern science by transmission of television, by which forms/photographs of one place are transmitted to another place by the action of the ethereal element. Within the Srimad Bhagavatam is the potential basis of great scientific research work, for it explains how subtle forms are generated from the ethereal element, how the tangible elements namely air, fire, water and earth are manifested from the subtle from.
Mental existence transforms into tangible form as soon as there is an opportunity. So, the soul being carried by the subtle body occupies a womb depending on the unfulfilled desires stored in the subtle body.
Think of any desire.
Do you know someone who likes to sleep a lot?
Nature can award him a polar bear’s body so that he can peacefully sleep for 6 months in a year without being ridiculed by his friends or scolded by his parents.
Do you know someone who likes to eat flesh and drink blood? Nature will say: “Come On! Take the body of a tiger or a lion and eat flesh the natural way!”
Do you know someone who likes to be in water always and keep swimming? (Some swimmers are mad: they want to swim from the Palk Strait to the English canal!) Nature will say: “Come on! Take the body of a fish and swim to your heart’s content”.
Some people don’t want to wear proper clothes on their body. They want to expose major part of their body and draw the attention of opposite sex. Nature says: ‘Take the body of a tree, and stand naked to your heart’s content in all seasons.’
In this way each species represents a different ways of enjoyment. So these are allotted to the living entities based on their desires.
So we may think of the body either as the soul’s vehicle for expressing his material desires, or as the end result of good or bad acts the soul performed in his last human birth. Both concepts are correct.
But in either case, we see that there must be a witness and controller who fulfils the particular desires of each spiritual soul, and who rewards or punishes each soul as he deserves. That witness, controller, and judge is the Supersoul.
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Lesson Four
IN THE HUMAN BODY THE SOUL
CAN DISCOVER THE SUPERSOUL
Who is the Supersoul? The Bhagavad Gita (13.23) says, “Besides the atomic spiritual soul. In this body there is another enjoyer a transcendental enjoyer who is the Lord. He is the supreme proprietor, oversee, and perimeter, and He is known as the Supersoul.” In other words, within each body there are two souls – the atomic soul (the individual spark of life) and the Supersoul (the supreme source of all life). The atomic soul and the Supersoul reside together within the heart of each and everybody throughout the universe at the time of death the Supersoul accompanies the atomic soul to his next body.
But the Supersoul is not an ordinary living entity. Only by the Supersoul’s arrangement does each atomic soul receive his proper body, only by the Supersoul’s sanction can the atomic soul fulfils his desires for happiness. The Supersoul is the personal expansion of Lord Krishna, the Supreme Personality of Godhead. The atomic soul dwells within the material body, and he suffers and enjoys the various pains and pleasures arising from his particular body. But the Supersoul, although fully aware of these pains and pleasures, is aloof from them.
Because He is aloof from the changing body, whether He accompanies the atomic soul within his insect body, his dog body, or his human body, the Supersoul stays in the same situation – in transcendence.
As the constant companion of each individual atomic soul, the Supersoul fulfils the desires and awards the particular material bodies of every living entity. And he accompanies them on their course of birth, old age, disease, and death – life after life. Lord Krishna explains in the Bhagavad-gita (13.28): “One who sees the Supersoul accompanying the individual soul in all bodies and who understands that neither the soul nor the Supersoul is every destroyed he actually sees.”
One may wonder, “If the Supersoul – God – is always with the individual atomic soul, why is the atomic soul suffering? Why doesn’t the Lord in the heart divert the atomic souls from their suicidal course of repeated birth and death? If the Supersoul is actually our well wisher, why doesn’t He end our suffering?” The Upanishads answer this question with the analogy of the two birds in the tree.
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Lesson Five
THE SOUL AND THE SUPERSOUL
ARE LIKE TWO BIRDS IN THE TREE
OF THE BODY
The Upanishads compare the body to a tree and the soul and Supersoul to two friendly birds sitting within the tree. The first bird (representing the atomic soul like you and me) is eating the tree’s fruits, which are of two kinds – happiness and distress. The second bird (representing the Supersoul) is self satisfied, so He doesn’t bother with the fruits. He simply watches his friend, the first bird.
Krishna is the witnessing bird, and Arjuna is the eating bird. Although they are friends, one is still the master and the other is the servant.
Forgetfulness of this relationship by the atomic soul is the cause of his changing his position from one tree to another or from one body to another. The atomic soul is struggling very hard on the tree of the material body, but as soon as the agrees to accept the other bird as the supreme spiritual master – as Arjuna agreed to do by voluntary surrender unto Krishna for instruction in Bhagavad-gita – the subordinate bird immediately becomes free from all lamentations. Both Katha Upanishad and Svetasvatara Upanishad confirm this:
samane vrkse puruso nimagno
‘nisaya socati muhyamanah
justam yada pasyaty anyam isam
asya mahimanam iti vita-slokah
“Although the two birds are in the same tree, the eating bird is fully engrossed with anxiety and moroseness as the enjoyer of the fruits of the tree. But if in some way or other he turns his face to his friend who is the Lord at once the suffering bird becomes free from all anxieties.”
Unfortunately, very few souls within this material universe desire to serve the Supersoul, break free from the bonds of karma, and return home back home to spiritual world. Although this material world is always miserable and dangerous, most people’s hearts are filled with so many desires to enjoy this world that they doom themselves to stay here. Everyone has this freedom and the Supersoul within the heart perceiving each spiritual soul’s desires, helps him try to enjoy the material world as he wishes birth after birth.
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Lesson Six
THE EVOLUTION OF THE SOUL
CULMINATES IN KRISHNA
CONSCIOUSNESS
As we can clearly see, the Supersoul is our dearest friend. And since the Supersoul is but an expansion of Lord Krishna, that means Krishna is our dearest friend. Who is Krishna? The Sanskrit word word ‘Krishna’ means ‘all-attractive’. One who possesses all beauty, all knowledge, all fame, all strength, all riches and all renunciation only can be addressed as ‘Bhagavan’ or Supreme Lord. Because Krishna possesses all these in completeness, Krishna is the all-attractive Supreme.
God beyond this material creation, whose association all the souls are craving for. (How Krishna can be called God is a subject matter beyond the scope of this small presentation and it can be explained properly and authoritatively if you kindly send a request letter to us.
Krishna is our dearest friend. However, although Krishna always want us to return to Him – so that we can become free from the suffering we’ve been going through in one material body after another – He will not interfere with our minute free will. Without any freedom, we can’t develop any real love for Krishna, and without developing love for Krishna, we can’t break our attachment to things of this world and go back to the spiritual world.
It is only by surrendering to Lord Krishna and accepting His instructions that the spiritual soul can evolve to the highest state of existence – pure Krishna consciousness, pure love of God. The Bhagavad-gita explains that the soul who has attained love for Krishna doesn’t again take birth in this material world after leaving his present body. Such a pure soul attains a spiritual body in the spiritual world.
Covered by illusion, we have been desiring and obtaining body after body in this miserable material world. Now, if we awaken our spiritual desires, our love for Krishna, He will award us an eternal spiritual body in the spiritual world. The spiritual world has none of the disappointment, despair, fear, and pain that plague the world. That is because in the spiritual world every soul is engaged in his eternal, natural activity – rendering loving devotional service to Lord Krishna, the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Unlike the so-called loving relationships of this material world, which are mere shadow relationships, our loving relationship with Krishna in the spiritual world is our original, eternal relationship, and it alone can give us real satisfaction and solace. Having now attained a human body, we should all take up the process of developing our love for Krishna as our most important task – and reach the pinnacle of evolution within this lifetime.
One can achieve that perfectional stage by chanting:
Hare Krishna Hara Krishna
Krishna Krishna Hare Hare |
Hare Rama Hare Rama
Rama Rama Hare Hara ||
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Dedicated to
His Divine Grace
A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada
Founder Acharya: International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON)
Compiled by
Radheshyam Das, M. TECH., IIT MUMBAI
Assisted by:
Jai Gopal das, B. Arch
Daujipriya das, Aniruddha das
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6th Printing: Jan-2008, 5000 Copies
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Noetic experiences are not for everyone…the deepest realm could not be helmed when one sees the real horrified and most painful truth of living and the dead…
There are some who went too deep into themselves without return…meditations are not for anyone as well….
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TS.. can summarize the text...
