A Living Concept of Death

On 31st January 2010, my younger brother, Abdul Muhit Khan (b. 1932), died. He was 77. In my life I have seen many people dying or have heard news of their death. But the death of my brother was a completely new experience for me. It gave me, if I may call it, a living concept of death.

I reflected about why this new awareness regarding death came to me then. We were six siblings. After my younger brother’s death, it struck me that all my siblings had now died and that only I was left. This realization came as a shock. Till the other day, my brothers and sisters were in this world where I still am. But now, one by one, they have all died. I am the only one who remains here, the rest having gone out of this world and having entered another one. We can no longer meet. Death has separated me completely forever from my siblings.

What is death?

One way of viewing death is as compulsory expulsion from this world. In this present world, every person makes a world of his own for himself. House, property, business, children, relations, fame, public influence, position, and so on—on the basis of such things he builds his small or big world, in which he spends his days and nights. But suddenly, the moment of death arrives and takes him into a world where he has nothing at all but his own self!