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Life After Death, Part 1 - Death At the Door

Deepak Chopra - October 18, 2006

While writing a new book on the afterlife, Life After Death: The Burden of Proof. I kept being drawn back to stories that I’d heard in India as a child. In these stories the abstract issues of death, immortality, and eternity acquire a human face as ordinary people confronted the mystery of death. I hoped that reader will be intrigued by a world where heroes battle darkness in order to emerge into the light.

In this case the hero is a woman named Savitri, and the enemy she must defeat is Yama, the lord of death. Yama shows up in her front yard one day, waiting to take away her husband the moment he returns from his work as a woodcutter. Will she succeed? What strategy can possibly turn Death away from his inexorable mission?
The following tale is a framing device for the main content of Life After Death, which concerns deep issues from the world's spiritual traditions as well as advanced science. These issues appear in parable form in the story of Savitri.


Part 1

Long ago, in the dense forests that once encircled the holy city of Benares, there was ample work for woodcutters. One such was the handsome Satyavan, who was all the more handsome because he had so much love for his wife, whose name was Savitri.

One day Savitri lay dreamily in bed contemplating her happiness, which seemed complete. Suddenly she noticed a figure sitting cross-legged in the dusty clearing that served for a front yard. A wandering monk, she thought to herself. She put rice and vegetables in a bowl and rushed out to offer them to the holy man, since hospitality is a sacred duty.

“I need no food,” the stranger said, pushing away the bowl that Savitri had placed on the shade-dappled ground before him. “I will wait here.”

Savitri drew back in horror, because suddenly she knew who her guest was. Not a wandering monk at all but Death himself, who is known in India as Lord Yama.

“Who are you waiting for?” she asked, her voice trembling.

“For one named Satyavan.” The lord of death spoke politely. He was used to having absolute authority over mortals, and he approached them simply, with just a touch of arrogance.

“Satyavan!” the loving Savitri cried. She could hardly keep from fainting when she heard her husband’s name.“ But he’s strong and healthy, and we love each other dearly. Why should he die?”

Yama shrugged. “Everything will be as it will be,” he said indifferently.

“But if you care so little,” Savitri said, her wits coming back to her, “then why not take someone else? There are sick and wretched people begging for the release of death. Visit them and leave my house in peace.”

“I will wait here,” Yama repeated, unmoved by her plea and the tears welling in Savitri’s eyes. In Yama’s face she saw a world where everything is nameless and without pity.

The young wife rushed back into the hut. She paced the floor, frantic in the knowledge that her husband would come home to meet his doom. Tigers feared the swing of brave Satyavan’s axe, but here was an enemy no blade could touch. Then she had an idea born of desperation. Throwing a cloak around her shoulders, she ran out the back door through the woods.

Savitri had heard that there was a sacred place, a space in the earth as large as a cave, somewhere on the mountain. It was formed by the roots of a huge banyan tree. A reputed holy man had lived in the hoe for years. Savitri would beg for his help. She didn’t know her way and soon found herself following deer paths and washed-out gullies. Fear drove her as hard as breath and strength would allow, and so she wandered, higher and higher, until she was totally exhausted. She collapsed on the ground and slept for a time, she couldn’t tell how long.

When a shaft of sunlight opened her eyes, Savitri found herself at the foot of a huge banyan tree. She spied the cavernous hole among the roots and peered into it anxiously. Before she found the courage to enter, a voice from inside said, “Go away!” It was so loud and sudden that she jumped.

“I can’t go away,” Savitri replied, her voice trembling. She explained her desperate plight, but the voice from the darkness said, “How are you different from everyone else? Death is always two steps behind us, from cradle to grave.”

Tears welled up in Savitri’s eyes. “If you are wiser than ordinary people, you must have something more for me.”

The voice said, “You wish to bargain with death? All who have tried that have failed.”

Savitri got to her feet with dignity, wiping away her tears. “Then let Yama take me in my husband’s place. What everyone says is true. Death is absolute. My only hope is that he will kill me and spare someone who doesn’t deserve to die.”

The voice was more gentle this time. “Be calm,” it said. “There is a way.” Savitri heard a stir in the darkness, and then the holy man emerged from his cave. He was an ascetic dressed in a loin cloth and a monk’s silk shawl thrown over his shoulders. He looked surprisingly young, however, and he told Savtiri that his name was Ramana.

“You know a way to defeat death? Tell me,” Savitri implored.

The monk Ramana squinted in the sunlight, ignoring her for the moment. He looked at Savitri with a gaze that she couldn’t read, then he stooped down to pick up a worn old reed flute lying on the ground.

“Come,” he said. “Perhaps you will be able to learn. I make no promises, but you are desperate enough.”

As if forgetting her, Ramana began to play to himself on his flute and wandered down a nearby deer path. Savitri stood for a moment, dismayed and confused, but as the notes of the flute faded into the forest, she had no choice but to run after them.

Part 2 - The Cure For Dying

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Posted by Deepak Chopra at October 18, 2006 10:53 AM

Comments

Is the moral of the story that there is no end?

There is no end to the story, so is that the moral?

More, please! :))) My book will not arrive before another few days...

Sorry, double post!

'As if forgetting her, Ramana began to play to himself on his flute and wandered down a nearby deer path. Savitri stood for a moment, dismayed and confused, but as the notes of the flute faded into the forest, she had no choice but to run after them.'

Yeah, you get this stuff, baby?

Something about, knights, in the end of the tale,
if you did, your..

Love, Passion

Lol Marek, King Arthur or.... Lancelot ?

;)

saskcarp

Part 1

huh?
mieke, Peter Pan or Alladin with a magic carpet,
after happy hour,

here's what constitute applepie in my, book,
of, 2006, I'm thinking of a Bruce Springsteen song..wich?

it's not..
but..

Love, Passion,

DEATH AT THE DOOR



Today on TV I heard a Hindu guru
Who claimed himself a doctor
And a researcher saving men from death,
Saying when we die only our body dies
But our soul goes eternal as Vedas say.

Our soul, a bundle-like something,
Wrapping within it our consciousness
That lives outside of our mind,
Our brain a mere instrument.

Our soul goes in cycles in births
Of many bodies from a tiny
Microbe to a huge elephant –
Depending on its Karma on earth.

And finally slips into a fetus’ tiny body
To be born again as a little baby
Or goes to heaven to live with God
Where terrorists meet their virgins.

A Jesus loving Christian told me:
His body will wait in the his grave
Till on the day of resurrection Jesus would
Come from heaven and make him alive once again.

The zen master Wu-chong Mu–tong
Told me we lived in the moment
Moment by moment and when the
Moment of death comes we die
What happens then he knew nothing.

Native Indians would let the dead
Body be eaten by eagles and birds
To carry their souls up high in the sky
To the grand daddy spirit of all.

Aborigines and some African tribes
Would roast the body of the dead on a
Pit of fires in a hut and the family would
Eat its meat to be a part of the dead body –
The soul of the dead spreading to all.

I came home and ask my dad I
Was dreadful of death and what he thought.
He quoted Pablo Neruda to me.
Listen my son, he calmly said:

“Buscate una moza robusta,
y dejate de tonterias.”
Get yourself a good woman
And give up this nonsense.


~White Wings

http://whitewings.sulekha.com/blogs/blogdisplay.aspx?cid=101750

Deepak: I can only assume that your logic is at fault for being "projected" into Larry King's mind now, thereby "transferring" all of Larry King's reasoning and sensibilities elsewhere--to be lost in some other unseen parallel dimension forevermore--never to be "channeled" directly through his personal genetic and neural mapping ("never say 'Never!'").

How could you do this to Larry King, after his been such a vehicle for your messages, "dear Deepak?"

I hear tell, now that Larry's clearly lost his marbles, that JZ Knight is to be on Larry King on Nov. 2nd--but then again, "What the Bleep Do I Know?!"

What I've particularly marveled at here, on the Intentblog of the last few days, especially with today's flood of new contributions from the Chopras, is that in the face of a few-who-claim-to-be-many, with all their ill-founded ridicule and disdain......

.....well, you, Mallika, Gotham, Arsenio and Zappy, Deepak Singh, Dave Sidhu, Suchitra, DK & Co., Saira, Maria Luisa, Shekhar and Rish--you all keep coming anyway, using your real names and personal backgrounds, and keep bringing us even more personal and anecdotal stories of the intimate side of your lives--instead of retreating away from the glare of the limelight.

Again then, for you, and all of your magnificent family of contributors the world over--from one of the members of your extended Intentblog family, for which I believe is 99.99% of both the "heard and unheard" voices of your 100% genetically-and-chemically related family--the human race, and those souls on the other side, who need the likes of Mary Occhino to give them voice from the higher vibrations:

Teddy Roosevelt, again, paraphrased by a New Zealander named Burt Munro, who set a world record as a sick and broke "old man": "It's not the critic that counts, or the man who points out where the strong man stumbles, or how the doer of deeds could have done them better; the credit belongs to the man who's actually in the arena!"

Again, and again and again, from the movie, "The Power of One:"

"Changes come the power of many, but only when the many come together do we know the 'Power of One.'"

Thank You, not only for listening, but for "Being Here, Now." Dave

Recently I had a patient die. This was by no fault of mine. In fact, I fought valiantly both in the operating room and by her bedside. But it was all in vain. I was shaken to my core. I came home and turned on TV to escape. City of Angels was on and the scene was exactly at the point that Meg Ryan had just lost a patient and she was explaining to her boyfriend that she is disturbed because we "fight for our patients lives, but do you ever wonder who we are fighting against."

Why did I go to school and train all those years, I am no match for Yama, after all. I too have been seeking caves to try and ward off Yama. I know western medicine's faults and inequities and have come to embrace eastern healing arts, for surely the wise yogis know the answer. I began sending many of my cancer patients to an energy healer with an excellent reputation in the community. Meeting him I could feel his peace but also his power. His hands could heal, I was sure of it. When I sent him a lady with cancer everywhere, whom I had no chance of helping, he laid hands and she felt better, but died anyway. I thought maybe I sent him someone too broke. But then my master, my hope, caught an infection and died himself!

So Deepak, I hear the flute, and I am going to follow into the forest, I am ready to deal with Yama.

Ahhhh,another inspiring read,,,,past the feel d
How dew you due it,,,
A warrior in perpetual motion
I'm looking forward
to the reed,,,,,
Blessings

Crystal Cave, last, riding off into the sunset,
remember? or am I the only one..again,

anyhow, the metaphore was, correct me if I'm wrong, about..,

right,
and now this tale,
totally logical,
just like my female fanclub,
but maybe I should stick to polish,
they wear skirts, and can bake,

Love, Passion,

Dear Deepak,

I'm very much looking forward to reading your book. My copy is "in the mail" from Amazon.

Thanks for sharing your journey.
Peace,
Scott.

LPB, I missed that bit LOL! DUH!! Peace out.

The New Eden

Love is a state of mind or existence. It is not a "thing" that we give or receive. In every moment of our lives, we are either experiencing some degree of love or of fear, and sometimes both virtually at once. We are either accepting and flowing with existence (love) or recoiling and repelling it (fear). This is the choice we make and remake continuously as our lives unfold. In this matter we each have absolute discretion and power of choice. What we say, goes. The resulting world of our experience is therefore entirely up to us. And the events are themselves affected by our choices.

This is the basis of Karma. In our dealings with each other, we are neither victims nor victimizers. I experience the love or fear that I am choosing, no matter what you are doing. And you are always experiencing the love or fear that you are choosing, no matter what I am doing. When we are both (or all) choosing love, we find ourselves in Paradise together. When we are all choosing fear, we find ourselves in hell--like war or other physical violence, for example.

Most of the time we find ourselves among people who are choosing a variety of shades of love and fear. We like some people and dislike others. We give to some, and withhold from others. We share with those who share our states of mind. All of the great avatars found ways to let go of their addiction to fear and chose instead to live in a loving and fearless state. Their names live on. Such is the great power of their path.

The new paradigm, even now opening among mankind worldwide, is the Path of Love. When it is complete, we will be a new species--homo noophericus, Telepathic Man. We will all share one Mind and the universe will be our New Eden.

donHeraldo

In the interest of clarity, I must edit the final sentence in my post above as follows:

"We will all CONSCIOUSLY share One Mind and the universe will be our New Eden.

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