What happens when a person dies is the next question. A very interesting question, one that... um... affects all of us in a sense. Not in… not in any… when I say "in a sense," I mean some people are worried about it and others are not.
But the truth is that you've had this sort of uh... protection over your feelings of a physical body and it's very difficult to feel joy or sadness um... it's at last confined within a physical body and within the hardness of matter. Now when that's removed, when your body's removed, your feelings become untrammeled you might say, and if you had feelings of anger and hatred and jealously and lust and all the problems that mankind is heir to, then those become um... unfettered and therefore much more intense. Therefore the suffering of that kind of mentality after death is much greater than you feel in this world.
There was uh… a strange episode that I read in a magazine many years ago -- I think it was the Reader's Digest but it's so unlike them that I can hardly believe it -- anyway, this American solider during World War II managed to go into Tibet and he was intrigued by talk of black magic. He must have had a penitent in that direction himself, I don't know. But he found a black magician and managed to talk this black magician into allowing him to come to one of their séances and the black magician said "Don't let anybody know that you're not Tibetan or you'll, you’ll be killed," but he said "put a cowl of your face," they all came cowled to this séance. And a large group of them all gathered together in a circle and they began swaying left and right, left and right and then singing "(something in Tibetian?)." And gradually as the power, he could feel it himself, it sort of gripped him, as the power of the concentration became very focused, demons began to appear. And he said it was horrible to see them because they were such gross and grotesque caricatures of negative qualities such as greed and lust and so on, anger. And then as their meditation reached a greater uh... intensity, gradually the god of death himself appeared there.
And then they began exerting all their energy and he was a part of it, he couldn’t take his mind away from it, to drive that entity back into the ether. This was Satan himself. And, uh, then they all went home. And I suppose that, uh, although the fear at the time and the reason they drove him away was that he was trying to take over their minds. None the less, I’m sure that what happened was that some of his power did take over their minds.
So there are satanic powers in this universe and there is a possibility of hell, but it won’t last. Sooner or later you’ll be reborn and you’ll keep on struggling up the path of evolution. If, on the other hand, you’ve lived a good life, then your joy after death is incredibly increased. You no longer have the thick walls of flesh to contend with and your bliss and happiness and everything are very much greater. What happens after death, first of all your heart stops and your energy begins to withdraw from the body and your senses, one by one, shut down. The last sense to leave is your sense of hearing.
This was an interesting story that (some name here?) told to a couple of his students many years ago. And, uh, the girl – they were brother and sister – and the girl died. And the brother, um, leaned down and into her right ear he kept calling to her, “Come back, sister, I still need you. You must come back.” And, uh, gradually she d- she woke up and came back and she said “Oh, I heard your voice from so far way.” But her sense of hearing was starting to slip also. And then when all the sense withdraw, the energy goes up the spine, and, in the case of worldly people, it goes out through the medulla into a sort of temporary lithe(?) or unconsciousness and, uh, if you’re a yogi then it will go out through the spiritual eye. And after that you will enjoy to varying degrees -- people have meditated even little bit in this life go to a very happy place.
This world is an imitation of the astral word. People say, oh it seems too neat for the astral world to look like this, well the truth is it’s this world that was based on the astral world. But in the astral world, in the higher heavens as their called, there are no, um, slugs, and beetles, and mosquitoes – all those inconveniences that can spoil a nice picnic and so on.
...There are no, umm, slugs and beetles and mosquitoes and all those inconveniences that can spoil a nice picnic and so on, and uh, you find that you get to mix with people of your own type. And it isn't often that somebody goes to the higher heavens, the highest heavens, but these are higher heavens, and uh you do feel great joy, and that period can last for a shorter or a longer period, depending on your good karma: how much you have shared your wealth and your fortune with other people; how much you have done for other people; how much you have lived for helping them; and above all, how much you have lived for God and given yourself to Him. But sooner or later, if you have any worldly desires, then those things gradually, in time, will wake up again when your good karma or that period of astral existence is exhausted, then you have to come back to this world and start all over again.
The "fallen yogi" as our journal describes him in "The Bhagavad Gita," he has very good karma. It is as if, because you've tried for a while and turned away from God, that you lose everything and God becomes angry with you. Quite the contrary. God doesn't become angry with you for anything! He's your own mother and father. He loves you eternally. And he's eagerly waiting for you to finally learn your lessons so you can go back to him.
But, in this state of temporary pause, if it's a temporary one, then you do enjoy it. But, then like, as I think I told the story recently of a Saint who was told by an angel or a [?] that your happiness begins to, like these leaves on a tree in autumn, begins to turn pale, yellow and dark and fall. And so your happiness begins to decline. And then you begin to become drawn. And you're drawn to those parents which have a similar vibration to your own or, at least, strong qualities of your own. [Name] said that a saint might be born to a criminal if they both have in common, a loving -- a love for peace, let's say. But usually the kind of person you're drawn back to, and Krishna says this in "The Bhagavad Gita," The kind of person -- couple you're drawn back to is usually people who are on the path that you are, the fallen Yogi. And well-to-do so that you fulfill your Earthly desires more quickly and come back to the path sooner.
The important thing where couples are concerned is at the moment of fruition is a very important moment when a soul is drawn into the body. And the quality of vibration that they have at that moment, it sends a flash of light into the astral world. And those souls of a similar vibration rush to get into that womb if it's their time to be born.
So remember to come together physically in an exalted state.
One couple came to Yoga [name]and asked him to help them to have a spiritual child. And he showed them a photograph of somebody that he felt was ready to come back into this world.
And he said, "Meditate on this child and don't have any sexual relations for six months. And after six months, invite the soul back into your womb -- into your family." And he said that in fact was the soul that was born into their family.
It's a very important thing to understand.
