Death: As viewed by a layman

The most basic belief about death in Hinduism is more or less similar to other religions. After death, a person either goes to Heaven or Hell. In Garuda Purana, there is a detailed description of how a departed soul progresses from this mortal Mrityuloka to the other world. The Puranas also talk about how a soul goes to hell or heaven, depending upon the karma or fruits of his or her actions. There is a gory description of what hell is, and everybody wants to go to heaven. Following a prescribed guideline of do’s and don’ts can take one to heaven. These injunctions of Smritis motivate people to do good things in life, which eventually leads to good thinking and further progress on the spiritual path.

Death: As viewed by the spiritually evolved

A person, who has spent some time on the spiritual path contemplating life evolves to understand the impermanence of worldly life. At this stage he knows that after death, the next birth is decided by agamikarma earned in the just ended life and sanchitakarma carried from lives previous to that. There is a clear understanding that there is no death to the soul, but only transmigration. As the Bhagavad Gita declares, nobody can kill the soul; it is eternal and there was never a time when it didn’t exist and there would never be a time when it would not exist.

The Chandogya Upanishad describes four paths that the deceased take depending upon how they have lived the life. The first called Devayana is a path taken by the spiritually advanced people, who though having led a pious life, serving others and meditating on God are unable to attain complete Self-realization before death. These people reach Brahmaloka, the highest heaven and from there in due course, attain final liberation.

The second path is called Pitriyana or way of the fathers. It is taken by people who have done a lot of charity or rituals with the desire of enjoying its results. These people reach Chandraloka, the lunar world and enjoy a very happy time in heaven before coming back to Mrityuloka to continue the cycle of life and death.

The third path is for people who have lead an impure life and do things forbidden by the scriptures. These people are born in sub-human species and after experiencing the fruits of their actions return back to human life, where they again have an opportunity to progress on the spiritual path.

The fourth path is for those who lead an extremely wicked life. These people again and again take birth as insects and other lower animal species. After suffering thus they too get an opportunity to be born again as a human being and tread the path of spiritual progress.

A very apt explanation of heaven is given by Sant Jnaneswar in his ‘Jnaneswari’. He compares heaven to a brothel where one is treated royally until one has money. Once money is over, the person is thrown out. In the same way when the sanchitapunya or accumulated merit is over, one is thrown out of heaven back to the cycle of birth and death in Mrityuloka.

The Brihadaranyaka Upanishad explains in detail how the soul moves to the next life and assumes a new body. According to it at the time of death the soul moves like a caterpillar. The caterpillar supported on a straw goes
to the end of it, takes hold of another support and contracts itself out of the old position. Similarly, the soul first connects with the new body before leaving the old one. While leaving the old body, it only takes the impressions of the life lived. These karmic impressions decide its further progress in the next life. All the associations, physical and social, are left behind as if they do not belong to it.