DEATH .... ?!

[[moondance]]

I am just curious about different ppl's opinions about death / afterlife .... being brought up christian I was obviously taught about hell / heaven ... if you do bad you go to hell etc .... I also know a bit about re-incarnation ... I think that again depends on how good you were or werent ... !? anyway, would love to hear diff ppl's beliefs and experiences with this ... i do feel there is something afterwards .... but dont believe in the hell / heaven concept I was brought up believing ... thanks xx

[Addalaide]

I dont belive in Hell, but i belive in a heaven like place, just an afterlife i guess, i havent given it much thought really. I have had some experience with death, my brother died when i was a child.

My mothers Chatholic friends belives in reincanation, she told my mom she was from the civil war era, and i was from the middle ages. Witch is kinda intresting, because after a fue weeks of serching, i found out my name hasnt been used sence the middle ages ( spelling wize ). Most spell it Adelaide or something....Addalaide is somewhat my name, it isnt legalaly my name, but it was sposta be, long story, i consider it my craft name thought because of a chain of events that happend.

So yeah, i am prety much undesided on reincanation, and havent worried about what happend when i pass on.

[[SanityIsLost]]

Hmmm... I have thought about this subject a bit. I believe that when we die we go to a summerlands/heaven type of place and I'm not sure how but we are reincarnated. By "how" I mean that I can't decide if I believe we get to stay in "heaven" as long as we want and choose when we go or if the Goddess and God choose our time. It might sound silly but that's what I believe.

[Comus]

i don't believe in a traditional 'heaven-esque' place..but I do believe we go somewhere in spirit form...some other dimension inhabited by ethereal entities and energies. I feel that we can't comprehend what it would be like as we are trapped in our bodies and this material dimension at the moment, and, as a consequence have a very narrow realm of experience.

It's just a nice idea. I have no grounds whatsoever to believe it is true. LOL.

[Sobek]

this may sound a bit "Sci-Fi" but i believe that we just go to another plane of existance adjacent to this world, much like the astral plane but different because in a certain view this could account for the appearance of ghosts or thier "limited" appearance to be more specific.

[WolfWitch]

I remember someone posting this very question a while back in the "Spirituality" heading. I will repost what I wrote there.

I believe that the energy within us is the same as the primal energy of the universe itself. I know that Energy can't be destroyed or created. It just is. This tells me that the electricity and baser energy in me is the physical manifestation of that divine energy. As I travel through life, I learn, discover and experiance life in my own unique way, as does everyone else. This changes the paterns in my mind and as a result, the energies within it. When I die, this body will cease to contain the energies and as a result, it flows back to the universe becoming one with the everflowing field. Think of it as pouring a glass of water into a bowl containing more water. The glasses contents becomes one with the water in the bowl. I believe that, in that moment when you merge back to the universal flow, all sence of self disapear, as the glass's water looses itself in merging with the water in the bowl, it simply becomes more water. We become simply, more energy in the field. All of our experiances and knowlage flow out into the field, mixing and merging with other knowlage and experiances. Eventually, as a new body is formed in the material, a ceartain measure of energy is drawn into the body and becomes isolated from that field and forms an individual. A self. It's like drawing a glass of water from the bowl. Yes it's water, yes it's the same amount as was poured in, but it's not the same water. It may have a little of the same water but it is fundamentally different water. This is why, I think, that so many people can accuratly recall having been a ceartain person from the past. (like say, Napolean, just to pull a name from somewhere.) When you weed out the ones who aren't telling the truth, the ones left may all simply have a small amount of the energy that once made up the "self" that was Napolean. I have not dove into my past lives but I believe that I have, lurking in the inky depths of my mind, several distinct fragments of "others" thought's, experiances, and even opinions. I am fairly ceartain that a measure of the energy that makes up my "self" was at one time housed within a female. I have ceartain thoughts and rememberences of experiances that could only have been femenine. I believe their are other "fragments" in my minds depths but I have yet to solidly latch onto them.

I know one day, I will die. This is an inevatability. It bothers me, even scares me to an extent that this has to happen. But it's just a fear of the unknown. I know my theory, I know that it is based in sound theory and thought, I beieve it to be sound. But the fear is of the simple variable that I could be way wrong.

Beyond this fear, in the light of concious and rational thought, part of me is awaiting my after death experiance with a quiet anticipation. The thought of sheading my inhabitions and merging with what "is", no more wondering, or unanswered questions, no insecurities or fears. I almost can't wait to feel those weights lifted from my minds shoulders.

But these are simply my thoughts and beliefs. Take them as you will.

I don't think I could explain it again and get as clear and as concise of an answer as I did here. It has taken me a while to come to these conclusions and I am happy with them.

Goddess Bless.

[[moondance]]

Thanks everyone - lots of interesting viewpoints and food for thought .... does anyone else find it ironic that death is the ONLY thing we are certain of ... yet it is the thing that scares ppl the most and most ppl try to avoid thinking bout it ...

Wolfewitch - I like your concept - it makes sense. I agree, science states that energy can not jsut stop - it is transferred ... the human body is one of the biggest mass of energy ... so I can not accept that just dies / ceases to exist ... I mean .. the energy or wahtever it is in us has to be transferred somewhere ... bt where or what that is transferred to .. its a mystery ... the unknown ... do we stil hold fragments of our lives on earth ... do we move on to another "plane" as new "creations" ... who knows ...

I think its interesting ppl who have out of body experiences too ... but I often wonder (the scientist in me) that if these are just consequences of our brain dying ... perhaps as the brain begins to die it has effects on ppl to make them hallucinate or as has some other effect that then brings along these "visions" ... I dont know ...

Also curious what do ppl think about good / bad ... I mean heck even Karma comes into play here ... does "bad things" proceed with us to death ... ? Or is there no bad things in dying .. we get a new start to something new? A sudden "forgiveness" of all our negative actions ... I mean for instance, being brought up christian I was taught that if you are bad the consequences follow you to the afterlife ... I mean, I see so many ppl around that are bad ppl ... yes they continue to do well and have good / successful lives ... so if the laws of Karma is in place .. then sure what goes around comes around ... perhaps these ppl dont have their bad deeds reflect back on them in this life .. so it goes in the after life ... ? Also even suicides ... been drummed in that ppl who commit suicide will go to hell or never have peace whatever ... I find that hard to accept also that if a person commits suicide = then it means they were obviously in such a painful state they could see no other way out than to take their lives ... and then after that ... they shall be "condemned" to have even more pain / suffering ... ?!

[Elem]

I won't explain my theory about what happens when we die, as it's so remarkably close to WolfWitch's, there'd really be no point haha.

Also curious what do ppl think about good / bad ... I mean heck even Karma comes into play here ... does "bad things" proceed with us to death ... ?

As far as I'm concerned, the Universe doesn't have some grand ideas of 'right' and 'wrong', 'good' and 'bad'. These are the inventions of emotional, moral beings who perceive some actions as 'correct' and some as 'incorrect', in-tying with the society they live in / their own personal viewpoints. We make our own 'right' and 'wrong', the Universe couldn't care less .

It doesn't 'forgive us' or 'punish us' when we die, it does nothing. Besides which, even if it were a living, concious being capable of understanding the vague concepts of right and wrong.. What framework would it use to decide what's right and wrong? One society's crimes may be another society's every day life.

It's important to understand that, whilst positive experiences and knowledge are passed into the energy of the Universe when you die.. Negative ones are as well. Negative, that is, with relation to your life. Negative feelings and emotions in particular, that may end up making up a part of somebody else's energy in the future.. In this way, your negative actions in one life can create negative 'punishment' in the next, when your energy gets used again.

But, then again, the person / being that gets your 'negative' energy isn't really you at all.. So are you punishing others through your inactions in one life?

Either way, I'm rambling now . As I've said, I don't believe the Universe decides 'right' and 'wrong', and gives you punishments / rewards. When you die.. You die. All sense of self is gone. Whatever happens to your energy when it gets reused is a result of chance, and certainly hasn't been planned out by some grand 'Judge'.. At least, that's how I see it .

Elem

[Rein]

Since this is a discussion on views of death, I suppose I should contribute....

A little outline: I do believe in God, reincarntaion, and other strange things, so this post will reflect these beliefs. Here we go....

I believe death, or at least mortal death, is really only a form of transmigration of a person's being, or I guess "soul", as some call it, into another form. A certain person, or being, continues to be reincarnated over and over again, for reasons that only the higher-ups understand.

HOWEVER: I believe personally that there will come a time, i.e. the "apocolypse" or "armageddon" or whatever, when this circulation will come to an end, and the "souls" of humans, and animals, their lessons complete, will ascend into the "afterlife", whatever that may be.

In my personal opinion, the afterlife is just like our lives here, only lacking two things: 1) our human limitations and 2) death. Death, is in itself, not only a means of transmigration, but a way of making us as humans appreciate our time on earth, because we know that that time will end. Once the "apocolypse" or whatever it is happens, then beings will be free of their physical bodies and there will be no need for death. In a nutshell, I guess you could say that it would be a "world without danger".

And in case this is sort of confusing people, think about it this way: How could we ever appreciate life if we didn't know what it was like to be able to lose it???

There you go and sorry for my rambling.

Kayako

[Sercee]

I'm a Taoist Wiccan who was raised Christian and taught science, so this might only kind of make sense.

I believe that the world and universe are made of energy. All life is connected to this energy. Since energy and matter can not me made or destroyed, it makes sense to me that when you die your body goes into the earth and your spirit (energy) goes back into that energy web. Eventually your spirit can be 'reborn' into a new body.

Nature is built on patterns and cycles. In order for this to work energy needs to have a 'memory' of some kind. Therefore, when your spirit is reborn it may be able to remember a past incarnation if it is awakened.

However, there are ways for this to be altered. If you live your life so genuinely that you have mastered calmness and goodness then you can transcend that cycle and become a divine being. This does not mean you become 'God', it means that the divine essence of your spirit is seperate from the main web and can be used as inspiration to other spirits seeking enlightenment. Conversely, although I don't believe in hell, someone who willfully commits terrible acts in life might also be removed from the web. Here the spirit can reflect on its deeds, aka a personal hell. If the spirit chooses it can forgive itself and repent, gaining the chance to rejoin the web and try again. If it's angry and blameful instead them you get the bad spirits we know as demons.

[[Kris]]

I don't believe in hell. I believe that you are reincarnated until you are "pure"(depending on how you acted in you last life) and for the spirts that can't be reincarnated (because there might not be enough bodies to go around) they just stay around their family to protect or where they died until there is a body that they can go into. I know it sounds freaky but that is what I believe.

[Sercee]

Actually that also makes sense to me.

[Sobek]

i quite like that. its an interesting thought.

[Addalaide]

I remeber in a bible study i was at when i was like 13or 14 a boy say basicly the same thing, and the teacher said what a cute thought, but you know its wrong dont you? The kid never spoke about any thoughts he had about God and the bible ever agin, i whould have loved to of herd what else he thought up.

[Smolly]

aww
that makes ALOT of sense
i beleive in reincarnation, i always have i guess before i knew what it was called.

my uncle beleive we get reincarnated and each time we complete a 'phase' or 'lesson' we move up in the spiritual rainbow (pretty imagery is it not) until we reach the highest bow on the rainbow which is were we join our god/goddess/divine being etc etc
he told me this quite awhile ago and i dont think he explained it to me fully seeing as i was quite young. i will ask him again though ^^