The Wealth of Good Deeds

In the whole of human history, man’s greatest forgetfulness has been forgetfulness of death. In this regard, man’s heedlessness has been so extreme that down the centuries one can discover very few people who have not been a victim of this malaise.

This present world is a testing-ground. This means that in this world whatever a person has got—material possessions, social relations, status, and so on—he has received for the purpose of writing his test, the test of life. Death puts an end to this period of test. That is why with death’s arrival all the things that had been given to a person for the purpose of his test are snatched away from him.

After death, an individual suddenly enters a new world, where he will receive the results of his actions done in the pre-death phase of his life. Before death, a person lived in the midst of the things he had been given as part of the test that he had been put to. After death, he is separated forever from all of these. He will now live in the midst of the results of his actions in his pre-death phase. The things of the world that he had been so attached to and had so taken for granted will be completely separated from him. The only wealth he will now have will be the wealth of faith and good deeds.

          Given this stark reality, it is strange that so few of us take death seriously.