It is time we stop bothering about karma or rebirth and instead practise soul-consciousness. By Rajyogi Brahmakumar Nikunj
As children we were told by our grandparents that when someone dies, they become a star in the sky. However, when we grow up to face the stark reality that everyone who takes birth has to die, we start to worry about the death of our loved ones. But what about the story after deathIJ Does one really become a star after they dieIJ That’s an unsolved mystery for every human being.
Every time we attend a funeral, we experience a cemetery induced reclusion which numbs our mind and body. It happens every time we see death from close quarters — particularly of our near and dear ones. This makes us question the very purpose of our lives — the determination of right and wrong, of ethics and morality. We start to think that if death is the ‘be all and end all’ and that it can kill anyone at anytime, why should we bother about doing good deeds and fear punishment for our sinsIJ
There are mainly two kinds of people with two different belief in this regard. The first kind believe in the rebirth of humans and strongly feel that the account of good and bad deeds will be settled on the day of judgment, when the dead would rise from their graves. Then there are the second kind who not only believe that human souls are reborn but they also feel that humans transmigrate into 8.4 million species before being born as a human again.
However, there is very little knowledge about the third kind of people who believe that human souls are always reborn in the human body. let us suppose if humans are not reborn. In that case what reason would be there to perform good deeds and to stay away from bad onesIJ When people perform charity they do it with a conscious or subconscious awareness that it will bring them merit in the future. Most of the time, they are themselves not aware of the future that they are accumulating the merit for. To them, that future lies beyond death.
On the other hand, if there were no rebirth there would be no fear of punishment for one’s bad deeds either and there would be little to stop people from doing as they pleased as long as they could evade the law. Moreover, if there were no rebirth, what is the purpose of the life of those infants who die soon after birthIJ The fruit of past actions is the only explanation of the fact that some babies are born healthy and remain so all their lives while others are born with fatal complications or diseases that they have to endure as long as they live.
We should understand that if there is no future after death, people would also not amass wealth or build houses in their old age. These efforts would be futile, in the absence of rebirth. Thus, our hopes of eternal prosperity and happiness, desire to earn merit by performing good deeds, fear of punishment in future births and feelings of eternal love and of patriotism, would not arise at all if rebirth were not a reality.
According to Hindu mythology, a soul never dies, it is body which dies and immediately after death the soul changes body as we change clothes. With modern techniques like past life regression, there are many cases around us where we see a child claiming to be experiencing visions of his/her previous birth. Many of these cases have been verified by experts and psychologists who have recorded the testimonies of people recalling their previous birth and then cross-checked the facts with official records and the people mentioned by them. Various cases of child prodigies, who can memorise voluminous scriptures at a young age or who excel at in particular academic disciplines from their peers, are also the result of the soul carrying its experiences and skills from one birth to another. Though many facts mentioned above are known to people, skepticism about the existence of souls and rebirth are widespread because of the lack of an experience of soul-consciousness. Such an experience requires spiritual effort for which one has to focus the mind and the intellect inward and then contemplate on it. Slowly one begins to sense the existence of a sentient entity within — the soul.