The Stage of Death
The moment of death is more serious than any imaginable or unimaginable moment. All other difficulties that human beings encounter, pale into utter insignificance in the face of the enormous difficulty which assumes the form of death.
Death is the journey towards the most severe stage in life. It is to enter that stage where one has no control whatsoever, where one is entirely empty-handed and completely helpless. Every difficulty in this world has a limit, but death takes us into a world whose torments have no limits whatsoever.
In this world, too, human beings are actually in the same sort of condition. They are in themselves so weak that they are unable to tolerate even a minor unfavourable condition or situation. If you are poked by a needle or have to face hunger or thirst for a single day or do not get sleep for a few days, your anguish will know no bounds. But because in this world we have all that we need, we have forgotten how vulnerable we really are. We are unaware of our own reality.
Suppose this world were snatched away from us, this world where there is air and light and so on, and where, by using the bounties of Nature, human civilization is made possible, in such a situation, it will be impossible for human beings to create a similar world elsewhere in the cosmos.
When human beings face difficulties, they start making a big hue and cry about it. But if they knew about the impending Day of Judgment, they would cry out, ‘O God! What is going to happen then is much more severe than what is happening now, here in this world!’
Because in this world human beings revel in honour and comfort, they are overwhelmed by pride. But if they knew what is going to happen on the Day of Judgment, they would cry out, ‘O God! This honour and comfort have no value at all if they do not last after death!’
Death is not the end of our lives. Rather, it is the start of a new stage of Life. This stage will, for some, be a dungeon, where they will face the deadliest of all possible torments, while for others it will be the door leading to the highest of all possible comforts.
