Questioner: Namaste Acharya Ji.
Acharya Prashant: Welcome.
Questioner: So since I belong to the Abrahamic religion background, we have been fed since childhood about the afterlife, heaven and hell concept. I understand that this concept is also fear-based and over the years you make sense of where you want to go in terms of the afterlife. But it is so deeply ingrained and fed that there's nothing else that can be the truth.
I mean even thinking about something different than this is so challenging because we are deeply conditioned. Now all of the people who really believe in this they're not bad human beings. They're really doing their best through this path, through this idea and they're compassionate. They are helping others. And most of the things that we read, and we understand from the Gita, they're pretty much even applying that in their day-to-day life. But then with the afterlife not being the ultimate truth, does it negate everything that they are doing in this life?
Acharya Prashant: Ultimately, you see it does. If people are on their road to destruction, should I facilitate their journey and be called a good nice human being? Should I set up relief camps along the way? Free medical aid, free food, obviously free water and such things. That's what the stupid kind of goodness means. No, I'm a good human being. I'm a nice human being. And what am I doing? I'm assisting people on their way to destruction. So on his way to destruction, somebody fell and bruised his knee. So I rushed to him with first aid. I'm a good human being, am I not?
I rushed to him with a bandage and I helped him get up and I also offered him food and I did all the goodies, all the niceties, all the virtues I display. But all the virtues that I display are ultimately assisting people on their road to destruction. So all that, in toto, is just very harmful towards oneself. You see when the fundamental itself is flawed, anything branching out from that just cannot be virtuous even if it appears to be virtuous.
I often say intentions don't matter, awareness does. I want the best for my kids, right? I am a father. I'm a mother. I want the best for my kids without knowing what goodness really is and I want my kids to have the best and what does that result in? We know the state of the world today. We also know that all the adults were once kids. We say the world is in such a despicable state. And people are monsters or a lot of people are monsters. But if people are monsters, they were all kids once and they were all raised by well-meaning parents. How did they turn into monsters?
It is because our intentions and our claims to beatification, they in reality, mean nothing. What is really of importance is the understanding or absence of it. Mostly there is just the absence, without doubt.
Questioner: What I also understand about the internalizing of heaven and hell, and the externalizing of heaven and hell, is that this concept also is very flawed and some people get it. They say, ‘Yes we are going to feel a little bit of the internal hell and internal heaven so that we are prepared for the external heaven and hell.’ So you know how they always give excuses and they have their reasoning.
Acharya Prashant: This is not even philosophy. This is not even a concept. This is simply theology and this theology is present in every single major religion of the world. Every single, even the message of the Buddha has not really been understood by most of the Buddhists. Right?
If you meet Buddhists, you'll be surprised by how many of them still do believe, especially in India, believe in personal rebirth. Whereas the Buddha makes it clear that there is nobody here to take rebirth. So all this is not even philosophy. This is just theology. And to debunk this theology, you don't need an alternate belief system. All you need is science. For somebody to go to heaven or hell, there must be somebody inside you, right?
There has to be somebody. The question that Vedanta would ask is for whom? For whom is heaven or for whom is hell? And science today is in a position to answer that. There is actually nobody inside your body. There is just the body. The consciousness that you identify with is actually a product of the body. It arises with the body and it's gone with the body. There is nothing that survives the body. So for whom is heaven and for whom is hell?
Questioner: That's true.
Acharya Prashant: So it's just a belief system and it's an extremely harmful belief system. I could have said it's just vapid but it's actually venomous.
Questioner: It took me so many years to really unlearn all of that. Being in the journey of, you know, being a student of religion from a very, very young age, it takes you lots and lots of unlearning, relearning to really, you know, change this whole concept.
Acharya Prashant: And you know what it does? It takes you away from the direct realities and facts of life as it is. Because you're all the time just dreaming of the afterlife. You say this duniya. This means nothing. Oh you are just a traveler. You have checked in, you will check out and this is just a sarai and in it, it means nothing.
Fine, to some extent that reduces your attachment with the worldly goodies. So as you said, ‘Ostensibly, there are some benefits that accrue from this line of thinking, but all in all, it's a loss making proposition simply because it stops you from attending to the present reality. You just don't see things as they are. You are enclosed in your belief and that just makes everything very nebulous.
Questioner: Yeah. You're just shuffling between these few options that you have. That's it. You cannot, you're not allowed to see beyond that.
Acharya Prashant: You cannot see beyond that and you cannot see even that which is in front of you. Beyondness comes much later. I will not be able to see. As J. Krishnamurti says, ‘Have you ever seen a tree? I'll never be able to see the real face of my spouse, my kid, my neighbor.’ To me everything is about that which will come after death. And that also makes some people get in a terrible hurry to reach death because they say you know real life begins only after death. So let me dispose of this life as soon as possible.
In fact that is another reason that is extended in favor of killings. They say, ‘You know if this fellow is allowed to live any longer then he will only accumulate actions that will further ruin his afterlife.’ So by killing him as soon as possible, we have actually redeemed his afterlife. Fantastic argument. And then you cannot see the face of the one you have killed. You don't see his tears, his blood, his agony. Instead, you console yourself. Not just console yourself, you actually glorify yourself by saying, ‘I am his savior. I have rescued him.’
Now he'll get a better afterlife. Had he continued to live, he would have accumulated sins. I have prevented him from accumulating sins. And you cannot see that the fellow is withering in pain. You cannot see that he is gasping for breath. You cannot see you have shot him and he still wanted to live. You cannot see that all his potential has gone wasted. All that cannot be seen because your eyes are covered with belief.
Questioner: Yeah. Yeah. We see all this every time and today we are seeing it mostly in the wars that are happening. It's all aimed at securing some space in the afterlife when you have not been able to secure today in the present.
Acharya Prashant: And when we talk of war, usually in wars we shoot at strangers. But what when you cannot even know the fact of how your wife is, your very relationship with your spouse is through a belief system and that's causing you to heap agonies after agonies on her. And you are wrapping her up in all kinds of rituals and clothing that makes no sense. You don't want her to get educated and you are talking about your son, your daughter. You are talking about your wife and you cannot see that you are pushing them deeper into misery and you still think that you are a virtuous person because you are acting as per a belief system. It blinds you to the immediate direct reality.
Questioner: Yeah. Absolutely true. The blinding part is I've experienced myself. So I know that you cannot really see even if the truth comes to you, you will not be able to see it. And actually the Quran actually warns you about this. It's very interesting because my learning of the Quran has become better after I joined your Vedanta sessions because now I can interpret the Quran in a much more internal, in a much more internalized manner rather than putting all the metaphors outside.
So when in the Quran, Allah says-
“Summum bukmun umyun fahum layarjiun” ~Surah Al-Baqarah, Ayat
That means, ‘You will become, they will become deaf and blind to the signs of god and these signs have been coming all the time to you but we think about the very different signs that we have made them as our belief.’
Acharya Prashant: Imaginary signs.
Questioner: Exactly.
Acharya Prashant: Imaginary signs. To us all this, these are not signs at all. Look at the face of the crying child. How is that not a very direct and potent and telling and living sign? No, no, that cannot be seen. Because that's the face, probably of a Muslim or a Jew. So I cannot see. My belief does not allow me to see anything.
Questioner: Hopefully we all can rise and bring the truth forward one day at a time, one moment at a time. We're doing our best that we can. But it's really a sad situation when you see people around you. How can we really like the pace that we are going? I know we are leading somewhere. But still I feel there is so much that we can do.
Acharya Prashant: One tries with intent and with the maximum application of intelligence. And beyond that as Lao Tzu was saying yesterday, beyond that is not your province to venture. If you want too much from your actions then the actions themselves will get compromised.
Questioner: Yeah. And you'll get trapped in those actions. Yeah.
Acharya Prashant: Yes. So one's job is to do as much as possible, as vigorously, as lovingly and then you leave it at that. Let the results come as they would.
Questioner: Yeah. Beautiful. Thank you so much, Acharya Ji. Thank you.
Acharya Prashant: Welcome.