Mittwoch, 11. November 2009

Where did I come from? Where am I going?

Where did I come from?
Where am I going?


Life after Death,
The Journey of Your Soul


Third Edition 1996 Published by:
© Universal Life The Inner Religion
PO Box 3549 Woodbridge, CT 06525 USA

Licensed edition translated from the original German title:
"Ich kam – woher? Ich gehe – wohin?"

© Verlag DAS WORT GmbH im Universellen Leben
Max-Braun-Strasse 2, 97828 Marktheidenfeld/Altfeld, Germany
Order No. S 407en

The German edition is the work of reference for all
questions regarding the meaning of the contents.

All rights reserved
ISBN 3-89201-030

When I come,
nobody knows who I am
or where I came from.

When I go,
nobody knows who I was
or where I will go.



This book contains knowledge
from the highest spiritual spheres.
It gives answers to questions
which are as old as mankind.



Table of Contents

Preface

I. Where did I come from? Where am I going?

Introduction

Death is not destruction, but transformation

What happens in the process of dying? What does the soul experience
when it leaves its body?

The soul separates according to its level of development

Where will our souls be one day?

What does the mourning of the bereaved mean for the soul?

What is the meaning of our life on earth?



I I. Questions and Answers

Introduction

Help for the dying person

Medical help

When the soul leaves its body

Burial of the body – Contact with the deceased

Suicide

Karma and reincarnation

Planets and planes of purification



General questions



III. Quotations





Preface



People die everyday, yet most of us are afraid of death. We are afraid and ask ourselves, "What will happen to me afterwards?"

Many say, "We don’t know what will happen. No one has ever returned from the beyond." The Christian churches also do not have a satisfactory answer to this significant question of life.

The question of where we come from and where we are going is a mystery to the one who looks at existence between birth and death as the life.

What is explained in this book is no mystery, but the truth that many no longer know. Death is not a cutting off of our path through life, but the gate to its continuation on a different level of existence. It is the gate to a life that will be more light-filled, the more conscientiously a person has mastered the tasks of his life on earth.

Death is only another station on our soul’s journey to the perfect life.

Once we understand what life really is, then death will lose its horror. The reality of our life continues. We, ourselves, determine how.

The Christ-friends in Universelles Leben

Würzburg, Germany




I.
Where did I come from?
Where am I going?


Life after death. The journey of your soul


Introduction

What is life?

Is life – our life – only the span between the beginning and the end of our life on earth, between birth and death, those two inevitable events which are usually accompanied by difficulties and often with pain for those concerned? Is there really nothing more to say about life other than that a human being is begotten, develops in the womb until he is born, lives a few decades, dies, is buried and disintegrates into material components? Is the soul merely a product of the physical body that perishes together with the body? Is the organism determined solely by the hereditary factors of the parents and forefathers, a body that develops and builds up according to the laws of heredity?

Many people are convinced of this, others have more or less clear conceptions about the continuing existence of man or of a part of him, his soul. They believe that the deceased rests until his resurrection, and so they have carved on gravestones, "Rest in peace." They think that the material body can resurrect – despite its obvious disintegration.

Those who ask the Christian churches about life and death learn that the churches are unable to make conclusive statements about what comes after death, because the Bible does not contain well-founded statements concerning this subject. Many people who are tied to the church fear that after death they might suffer in hell or that they will be cast into eternal damnation after the Last Judgment.

The modern, informed person of the 20th century prefers to avoid the subject of "death." He believes that what he can experience with his five senses and grasp with his intellect is the real and what exists. He acknowledges his physical existence and experiences that he is interwoven in the processes of life which can be perceived externally. The questions as to where he came from, where he will go and the purpose and reason for his fate remain a mystery to him; but what he experiences externally seems to him concretely tangible as his life. Based on this awareness, which is characterized by a material point of view, he is, of course, frightened to face an end to life, his death, because he thinks that death will extinguish his existence.

So the person loves this life which indeed offers, apart from adversities, many pleasant and attractive things. He wants to live a long life and does not want to see others die either. Friends and relatives often want to hold on to someone already marked by death.

Fear and ignorance have placed a taboo on dying and death. It was only a few years ago that this attitude began to change, when several physicians began to stay with the dying instead of leaving them alone with their fate when further medical treatment seemed futile.

Experiences at the threshold of death have given cause for reflection and to revise one’s thinking. They have encouraged people to broaden a horizon of knowledge that has become narrow concerning life. A great number of people sense or already believe in the truth of those philosophies of life that are advocated by people in countries where the influence of materialism is less, where people see death as a station along the way in a natural order of life. These people believe that the "deceased" – that is, the soul – goes on living after the death of its physical body. It is also widely known that the soul can go through several lives on earth in different human bodies at different times.

Simple folk wisdom affirms a continuing existence. When researchers on death publish their scientific observations, we read some things which are not at all new to us. Although theories of natural science and ecclesiastical dogma could drive out very ancient knowledge from our consciousness, they could in no way refute, much less change, the reality of these facts by denying them.

This book augments the basic experiences of mankind; it corrects many things and, in some aspects, goes far beyond what has been known until now, delving into the world on the other side of material existence, into the world of the spirit. The knowledge which we pass on here originates from there, from the Spirit. The basic truths of life were revealed at all times, and again today they are being directly revealed by the Spirit of God through the mouth of a prophet. We have merely put this knowledge from the divine source into our words.




Death is not destruction,
but transformation



"Vita mutatur, non tollitur"
Life is not destroyed, but transformed
an old epitaph



Everything is energy and none of this energy is ever lost!

Life is a form of energy. Just as our scientists have not yet been able to clearly define where energy comes from and why and how it is generated, they cannot define life either. They can only describe it. This form of energy, life, is beyond the scope of scientific research, just as our soul is.

The soul is an essential part of the living being, "man." Where was it before the human being was born? Where does it go when the body disintegrates into its components?

As a living organism, the material body is formed by the transformation of matter. After death, when life leaves the body, it disintegrates into its material components through transformation. But what happens to the "life"; what happens to the soul?

Despite the greatest scientific efforts, research, which is oriented only towards matter, cannot explain what is evident to everyone, namely life, which surrounds us a million fold in the form of animals, plants and microbes. A caterpillar develops from the egg of a butterfly; later this caterpillar wraps itself in a cocoon; it pupates and a new butterfly slips out of the cocoon. Life changes, but it is not lost!

In His new revelations, the Spirit of God explains that everything is energy. Life is energy – it cannot be destroyed, eradicated. Only its form may change. Life in its original form is spiritual; yes, life is spirit. Our soul is spiritual existence, a spiritual form of life.

For many people outside our Western civilization, it is basic knowledge that the soul has existed before the conception of a person and that it will "outlive" his death. This means that we existed before our birth in the form of our soul, which lives as spirit body in the spiritual spheres.

Our soul has been journeying for a long time. It came once from the pure spiritual worlds and that is where it will return, back home to the eternal Father, into the heavenly spheres of light. Its journey leads through the realms of the souls, the spheres of purification. Under certain circumstances, it is allowed to "slip" into the body of a human being, in order to discard a part of its burdens in life on earth in space and time. If it succeeds in doing so, it can continue its way home to more light-filled worlds in the spheres of purification. It has then progressed another step on its path.

Therefore, life on earth is only an intermediate station on the pathway of the soul, a journey whose purpose is to reach its original pureness, its original light-power, its original high vibration, by developing spiritually higher.

The soul, the spiritual form with certain very specific – "personal," so to speak – characteristics approaches at the time of conception and enters completely into the physical human body during the birth of the child. It remains connected to the body until its physical death.

All life processes in man have their origin in his soul. The divine energy of life flows through the soul into the physical body and gives it life.

Everything is energy, even our sensations, thoughts, words and actions. The soul is the "book of life." Everything is recorded in it; what the person once felt, thought, spoke and did remains active in the soul after it has left its physical body. This means that we take with us into the spiritual spheres our identity, our consciousness or awareness, our faults and weaknesses, but also our inner joy and our devotion to God. Negative things burden our soul, shadow and darken it. Positive thoughts and actions relieve the soul and make it more light-filled.

It should be our most important task to be able to draw a positive balance at the end of our life on earth, that is, to have a soul which has been relieved of several burdens and shadows. What we take with us from this life is decisive in terms of how dark or how light-filled our soul is when we die, because this determines the further journey of our soul after our physical death.




What happens in the process of dying?
What does the soul experience
when it leaves its body?



For every human being, the separation of the soul from the body comes at the end of his life on earth. However, there is no rule for "dying"; every person dies in a different way.

Modern research on dying draws its knowledge from reports of people who were clinically dead and were brought back to life. These people often suffered a more or less violent death, which however proved to not be final.

The reports are similar:

The first experience is often a sense of floating outside and above the physical body. In this state, the soul perceives its environment and all occurrences in minute detail, for example, the operating room or the scene of the accident. Often the soul experiences gliding through a dark tunnel or towards a point of light. Many a one experiences being in bright light and perceives sounds, harmonies or a kind of celestial music. However, these souls are not yet completely separated from their bodies, and so attempts at resuscitation are successful.

But the natural process of dying happens in a totally different way: In this process, the withdrawal of life takes place over years; from time to time circulatory disturbances appear, one or the other organ may not work properly, the body becomes weaker and weaker.

During this time, many opportunities are offered to the soul to prepare for the separation from its body. For instance, while the body is in deep sleep, the soul can step out and practice "freedom of motion" together with its guardian spirit. Just as someone who has been bedridden for some time has to learn how to walk again, in the same way the soul must learn again how to move in the spiritual spheres.

Finally the person lies down to die. Just before his soul withdraws, his whole life passes before his eyes, like a fast-motion film. Fully conscious, the soul evaluates its past, its life on earth which has just rolled by, down to the most insignificant sensation. It evaluates it from a different point of view than the person did. The determining criterion used here is that of actualized, selfless love. In this way, the soul itself becomes the judge over the thoughts and actions of its own person.

If the person has prepared for death, his soul can separate from his body quite easily. Spiritual beings help the soul – its guardian spirit and the souls of former friends and relatives. They welcome the soul, which is parting from matter, and help it find its place in the beyond.

However, if the person did not prepare for death, if he lived solely on the material level, without spiritual aspirations, without a consistent alignment with God – then his thinking and striving, his whole consciousness, is so strongly fixed on the living conditions of life on earth that he holds on to them desperately. He cannot imagine a life other than material existence and so he struggles against death.

Spiritual beings also want to help this soul, so that it can separate more easily from its body. But as long as the person does not want to accept his death, nor admit it, their ability to help is limited, for the pure spirit beings respect the soul’s free will.

The soul, which is so strongly oriented to this life on earth, remains more or less connected with the physical body through energy streams even after it has left it. It clings to its physical "house," so to speak, because it thinks that life is possible solely in a material body. It still feels what happens to the lifeless body, no matter whether it is carried to the grave or taken to the crematory.




The soul separates according
to its level of development



Just as the human being has lived, as he has aligned his soul, in this same way the soul goes on feeling and living!

What happens to a soul, for example, during a fatal accident? If the soul is flung out of its body by a violent impact, it cannot separate from its body lawfully. This means that, even after disembodiment, it is still more or less strongly connected with its physical body, depending on the spiritual alignment of the person.

With such a violent separation, it is seldom possible for the soul to immediately find its way around, although spirit beings or other souls endeavor to help. Because of the shock that the soul has suffered, it believes it is still in the body, because it still feels the momentary terror and pain long after, not having developed the ability to discern the difference.

The physician may have already pronounced physical death, the dead body may already be buried, but the soul still believes that it is connected to its body. Because of this shock, the soul may possibly be under the impression, not only for days, but for weeks or months or even longer, that it is still a human being, maybe sick or injured, but not dead!

It goes on living in these impressions, which it feels as pictures. In these soul pictures, it believes it actually lives, feels, thinks, speaks and acts in the physical body. Perhaps it goes on working at its former job, because it thinks it is still a human being. It moves in traffic and uses our means of transportation, but after leaving the body it has no sense of feeling. It often wanders over the earth for a long time before it realizes that some things are different than what it was used to as a human being. It may go to its friends and say to itself, "Nobody takes notice of me anymore. Someone else is doing my job. I’m all alone. What’s the matter with me?"

Only after such a realization can the spiritual world begin to influence the soul. The soul can awaken due to the activities of its guardian spirit, but only when it has become aware that it is a fine-material being and that its body has long been buried; then it can begin its journey according to its level of consciousness. One soul takes the advice and lets itself be guided into the realms of the souls, another one may go to its grave and wait for the "resurrection of the flesh," as it was taught during its "lifetime."

As said in the beginning, the soul stores everything that the person experiences in the course of his life, including all religious instruction. If a person was raised according to the thinking of a certain denomination and has accepted it as the truth, his soul will remain with this denomination even after death. This is particularly the case if the church was able to convince him that it alone can give salvation and that the prerequisite for this is that he acknowledge all its teachings. When this soul has been freed from its body, it goes on living in the conception that it still belongs to its church. It still believes that it can find God only in a church building.

But God is not bound to any place; God is omnipresent as universal spirit, even in the soul itself! As long as a soul has not grasped this, as long as it holds on to what human teachers have imprinted upon it as truth, this influence will continue to be decisive for it. Then, it will shut itself off from what the messengers of light of eternal truth want to explain to it; and it will not be able to find its way around in the beyond and will strive for a new incarnation again and again.

How different it is when a person who is truly united with God passes away. Here you can speak of "going home." This person knows that his soul comes from God and that it receives its life force from Him. He knows that within his soul lies his eternal and immortal life. The soul, the child of God, is always linked with its Father and wants to go back to Him. The person knows that this material body can be compared to a garment that can be simply taken off when it is no longer needed. Years before he goes home, his soul receives impulses that tell it: Separate yourself gradually from your human body.

Certain vibrations of light stream into the soul. It withdraws its streams of life from the physical body very gradually and stores these powers. There are souls from higher spheres around this person who is united with God and, when he dies, former family members and his guardian spirit will be with him. The soul which is still in the human being feels happy because it knows that God, the Lord, is calling it back.

While he is waiting for his so-called death, the person is allowed to look back once more. He reviews his life and forgives where he needs to forgive. Perhaps he may even see beings from far away worlds and he feels the abundance that surrounds him. Then the physical body closes its eyes, breathes deeply a few times, and the human being once again sees spirit beings or more highly developed, light-filled souls. He breathes out one last time and the soul leaves its body. At the same time, this fine-material, flexible form unfolds. The soul is "stable" and lives consciously and joyfully in the spiritual sphere of vibration to which it has gone.

The soul is surrounded by light. Its guardian spirit or souls from higher worlds instruct it. The soul feels melodies, the vibrations of the planet towards which it tends.

Each soul is guided in a different way according to its condition. It sees perhaps a street, perhaps a tunnel or perhaps a beautiful meadow. The soul which is aligned with God looks back briefly, asks for support for the mourning relatives left behind, and goes on.

This soul has made progress during its life on earth which now lies behind it. It has moved a bit closer, some steps further on the way home, back into the light, back to the Father, whom it longs for.




Where will our souls be one day?



According to the spiritual law of gravitation – like attracts like – the soul will be drawn to the plane of purification that corresponds to it, its corresponding sphere of purification, to souls which correspond to it.

If a person was self-centered during his life, controlled by his drives and desires, if he wanted to have and possess, if he did not love selflessly, but hated and was envious and pursued only his pleasures – then these burdens were engraved in his soul. After it leaves the physical body, the soul takes along what the person could not recognize and eliminate during his life on earth.

The soul can also continue its further and higher evolution in the beyond, though not as quickly or as easily as in a human body on earth. However, if it is unable to grasp or accept its own task, it will associate with all those who have the same interests in the astral spheres, or will turn back towards earth and seek out those places where it once satisfied its passions.

Souls whose attraction to matter is particularly strong, above all those which are "addicted," seldom find their destination in the astral spheres. As so-called "earthbound" souls, they return to earth and try to influence those people who have the same vibration, because these people can still do what the souls can no longer commit.

Thus, there are millions of ignorant earthbound souls among us; they surround us everywhere because they want to share in our lives. They practically hang like clusters of grapes on those people who live solely in the material world, because they can influence them and tap into their life force.

And so, when we nurture negative thoughts and feelings, we give these earthbound souls the possibility to influence us. These souls, which correspond to our low, sunken state of vibration, draw strength from us and endeavor to keep us in this low vibration and, if possible, pull us down even lower.

If a person has already aligned his soul with higher regions, his soul will be attracted by higher worlds after its disembodiment. When the soul has turned to God, the eternal Being, it can also be guided by the high powers of the Being. It will receive the instruction it needs. The soul will gain the knowledge which allows it to advance. Its spiritual consciousness will expand gradually; the indwelling divine powers will unfold. The soul will accept schooling and instruction and it will continue its evolution in the realm of the souls.

From what has been explained, we can see that when the soul has separated from its body, it will find itself again in a world that is not strange to it, but corresponds to its level of consciousness. The one who wants to know what this world will be like for him needs only to strive for self–recognition. The soul will go to that world towards which it has already oriented itself.

And so, we just need to ask ourselves: "Are my thoughts positive or negative? Are they marked by envy, hatred, resentment, jealousy, greed, enmity, strife? Or are they loving and selfless thoughts towards my neighbor?" From our answer, we can deduce the present condition of our person and our soul. The sphere in the beyond towards which we now tend will be of the same kind.




What does the mourning of the
bereaved mean for the soul?



When someone dies, he leaves behind the bereaved who mourn. The death of a person quite often means a deep, painful turning-point in the life of his relatives, giving it an entirely new direction. However, the bereaved should overcome their pain and sorrow as soon as possible. For most people it is difficult to accept the death of a loved one without mourning him. For many, it is not yet possible to accept this event, that is, to believe that there is a reason for it, without first being able to fully comprehend it. And so, they mourn.

The understanding that the death of a loved one is good in any case – even if we do not see the reason at the moment – is usually possible only after a time of mourning.

The discarnate soul, too, feels this mourning and through it is detained on its further path of evolution. When mourning relatives cling to the deceased unreasonably, when they hold on to him and want him to come back, that is, consider him to be their property – they bind the soul to this earth. Actually, they think only of themselves and not about the well-being of the one whom they believe to love so dearly. Their love and mourning are in truth egotistical.

A soul’s capacity to feel is much more sensitive than that of a human being. It suffers from the pain which the person’s relatives feel on its account.

The relatives should therefore send loving thoughts to the soul on its way home and should ask God that the soul will be guided further on its path of purification. In no case should the soul be held back, whether through mourning and lamentation, or by wanting something from it.

If we could fully grasp God’s love and grace, we should actually be glad that a "dear" soul has preceded us into that strange land and that, when one day we set out on the same journey, it will receive us in the spiritual worlds.




What is the meaning of our life on earth?



As deep as the shock over the death of a relative may be at times, we tend to push the subject of death out of our consciousness, because it calls our attention to an aspect of life which we easily and often want to forget in our comfortable, thoughtless, daily routine.

Every decisive event in our lives, every blow of fate give us the chance to reflect, to go within. Grief leads us from a superficial "vegetating" on earth into a deep understanding and touches areas of our soul in which the powers for a higher life lie dormant. We then perceive the impulses from the Spirit which are otherwise drowned out by our loud human activities and drives.

We should not overlook the sign from God which points out to us that we should again recognize what is essential. We should become aware that the purpose of our life on earth is not to enjoy it to the fullest.

For our earthly life is a time of schooling and learning. We should make use of this time. If our soul does not reach the goal it is meant to learn during its life on earth, the person will be confronted again with the same tasks in another earthly life and will struggle with them until he has resolved and expiated everything.

It is therefore important that we orient ourselves to the everlasting. During our life it is our task to transform in our life everything negative into the positive, so that in the end our book of life will show only a positive balance. Through the purification process, the soul can then become a light-filled, pure spirit being again and return to the Father.

This is not possible through self-redemption, but only by acknowledging Christ who, through His sacrifice on Golgotha, placed into every soul an additional power that supports us, helps us and leads us home. We call this power the Christ-spark or Redeemer-spark. But when a person does not recognize his life’s task and is not willing to work on himself and purify himself and when he does not consciously accept Christ as his Redeemer, whose power brings about the transformation of the negative into the positive – then his soul will not progress. It will remain in the planes of purification among its own kind, according to the law "like attracts like."

We are living in the "end-time." Matter will be dissolved.

For almost 2000 years, the Spirit has admonished us again and again to align with the Christ-consciousness. We should realize that the Spirit of life is in us. Each one of us knows the commandments of life and no one can say, "I did not know anything about this!" Again and again our attention is drawn to the fact that we should pay attention to our soul, our spiritual immortal body, and that we should think, speak and act in a positive way.

It is the task of our life to live – that is, to fulfill and actualize – the commandment of commandments: "Love God your Father above all and your neighbor as yourself."

When we have lived in this spiritual alignment, then our soul can free itself after our physical death and can continue to develop and grow.

For this reason, the Spirit of God admonishes each one of us: Pay attention to your soul!



The soul leaves its garment, the physical body, which dies. This process of separation is different for each person, but one law is valid for all:

Just as a person has lived so will his soul continue to feel and live!

Let us strive, already now, to free our soul from burdens and shadows, so that it may become pure and light-filled. The divine powers in and around us will help us to gradually come closer to our goal, the eternal home of light, peace and love.





II.
Questions and Answers


Introduction



Universal Life held lectures on the subject of this book in many cities. During the discussions that followed the lectures, there was always a great interest in questions and answers that clarified and deepened the topic. Eventually it was found that many of the same questions were asked repeatedly.

Assuming that the readers of this book will have similar questions, Part II contains a selection of the more essential questions and answers.




Help for the dying person



1.


What should relatives and friends do when a soul prepares to leave its body, that is, when a loved one enters the phase of dying?

Think of what you would do if a loved one were to set out on a long journey. The pain of parting is present, because we will not have this person with us for a long time, but what would we do. We would arrange a loving farewell. Above all, we would not leave him alone, but stay with him until he has disappeared from our view. We would help him with everything he has to arrange, settle and still put in order before his departure. We would strengthen him with positive thoughts of confidence, we would accompany him with good wishes, and would not unnecessarily complicate the separation from his present station of life.



2.


What help can we give the dying person?

The dying person should not be left alone. A person who is dear to him should be with him, one who does not keep on talking to the soul and the person, but is simply there in quiet prayer and in loving thoughts. We can comfort a person who is on his deathbed. But we should not wait until the last moment to make amends for everything that was left undone throughout a lifetime. We should carefully impart the most important things to him.

Above all, our help should be for the soul which is preparing to continue its journey. During the hours of dying, that is, the death of the body, the soul is more alert than during its life on earth. Thus, it registers every sensation, every thought and every word. The help we can give consists mainly in enlightening and preparing the soul for its transition.

Here, prayer is important, because it helps to establish a contact with the spiritual form of existence into which the soul will now glide – that is, praying with the person concerned, as long as this is still possible, but also praying for him; that is, for his soul, so that it can still forgive, thus freeing itself from many a burden.



3.


What can we say and how long can we talk directly to the soul of the dying, then deceased, person?

When the person is already unconscious, just before and during his passing away and also shortly after, we can still talk with him. How much and what one says to him depends on the maturity of the soul of the dying person. If his consciousness is still apathetic and dulled, one may only briefly enlighten the soul about the process of dying, about the separation of the soul from the body, and then should draw its attention to its guardian angel or encourage the soul to go on. Anything else would just bind the soul to our sphere even more.

If the consciousness is more developed, one can tell the soul more. However, this soul should be lovingly let go as soon as possible.



4.


The subject "euthanasia" is now and then discussed in the media. What does it mean for the soul when its suffering is shortened by actively inducing an earlier death, as for instance, out of pity?

Not all the relief that we want to give the dying person is really a help for his soul. We may and should support the suffering and dying body, but should neither defer its so-called death with medicines, nor shorten its life on earth with medicines.

Truly positive help for the dying person does not mean to make it as pleasant as possible for the soul to leave its physical body, by making him unconscious with medicines. Illness and suffering have the function of purifying the soul. And so, illness and suffering, seen spiritually, have a good purpose. Their purpose is fulfilled all the more when they are recognized and accepted as a chance for expiation.



5.


So a person who has offered such active help in dying to another person burdens himself?

More or less, yes. The person who interferes with the course of life, no matter whether he shortens or prolongs it at any cost, burdens himself. When I know of a spiritual law and violate it, this weighs more heavily than when I act out of ignorance and in good faith.



6.


If I have actively "helped" a person to die and recognize afterwards that I have not acted correctly, how can the soul forgive me?

Do not make direct contact with the soul, because it is against the laws of God to contact the deceased. Instead pray to God that He may teach this soul. For Christ is in every soul; He is the connection for all people and souls. Through Him, we can ask the soul to forgive us.

We should therefore ask the soul for forgiveness by way of the redeeming power of Christ.




Medical help



7.


Is it in accordance with the Spirit to donate blood?

Every cell of the body bears the very specific vibration of the person to whom it belongs. It serves him as a part of the whole. It can fulfill this function only in the place where it belongs. When such cells – in this case, blood – are transferred from one person to another, vibrational dissonances are the result. When the interaction of the forces that are attuned to each other is disturbed, this will lead to difficulties. Accordingly, transfusions are not approved by the Spirit, and even less so organ transplants. This is why the same reservations exist against donating blood.

But whether a person can recognize these correlations and follow this knowledge in an acute emergency will depend on the level of his spiritual consciousness. No one has the right to condemn his fellow man or even to criticize him because of a decision he makes, because we should always respect the free will of another person.



8.


We all have the obligation to preserve life. When a child is not capable of living and is then kept alive through medical intervention, can you say that one has acted wrongly towards this child?

The possibility that the life of such a child could be preserved may be rooted in the karma of the child. Nevertheless, the physician did not act according to the spiritual laws. When a child is allowed to die at an early age, we should know that the soul of the child can develop faster.

Concerning your statement, "We all have the obligation to preserve life," we can ask in turn: Which life do you mean? Our true life is the spiritual life, not the momentary physical one.



9.


But nothing happens by chance. In this case, the physicians are instruments. Physicians have to respect life, don’t they?

Every being is informed before its incarnation about what awaits it during its life on earth. When a small child can take its leave after only one earthly day, this is a gift of grace for the soul. But when we hold back the soul artificially, we become guilty. The present line of development of medicine is not in accordance with the spiritual laws.

When the child can be kept alive, this is possible only because this possibility is rooted in the soul, in the karma of the child. Nevertheless, the physician is at fault, because physicians should know enough about the spiritual laws to not intervene except where it is justifiable according to these laws. In principle, we should always strive to follow the wise laws of our heavenly Father and to make them the guiding principle of our actions. The high powers that act according to the will of God always lead us towards our salvation, whether we recognize it at the moment or not.




When the soul leaves its body



10.


What happens when the soul leaves its body while the person is still alive?

The soul can leave its body mainly in deep sleep or in a state of unconsciousness, but it is still connected to the body by the so-called silver cord (like an endless, extendible umbilical cord).

According to its consciousness, the soul stays in corresponding spiritual spheres and may bring back spiritual teachings from the beyond – as we know from people who were revived, that is, who were called back to life.

The soul of a dying person may also leave the body from time to time. Letting go of the physical body can be much easier for a soul which is about to lay its body aside if it has had a glance into the heavenly spheres.



11.


What does the soul look like after it has left its body?

It resembles our physical body. It then refines and rejuvenates itself according to its spiritual development.



12.


Most people fear this transition, that is, they are afraid of dying. What can one do about this?

The process of dying is similar to that of birth. To be born into a material life is a very natural event. The soul changes spheres. To die is to be born into the spiritual worlds.

While on earth as a human being, the very best preparation for our transition into the fine-material form of existence is to align with the light-filled spiritual spheres. This happens by constantly turning to the Spirit within, to God, our Father, and by living a life according to His laws. The one who, so prepared, awaits the end of his present life on earth will no longer be afraid, but hopeful and confident.



13.


How can a person have hope and confidence when he learns about his path just before the death of his body, that is, when he recognizes only then which path he should have taken?

Every insight immediately opens a way on which we can follow this insight. We can always be sure of the guidance of the Spirit of God, of the power of Christ, if we are willing to accept it. We can, without hesitation, put our hope and confidence in this guidance.

When there is a correspondence in the soul, which can be removed only when the person lives "in the world" for some time, then this is necessary for the evolution of his soul and the prerequisite for his progress. Then he can be guided further. Often, he can then still cover a good distance on the way to God in this life on earth. But an awakened soul will continue its evolution in the worlds beyond, too. Enlightenment, advice and help from the Spirit are always at its disposal in this world as well as in the beyond.



14.


Someone has died and was declared clinically dead. He has actually experienced dying. He knows that he died; it was his last thought. But he is brought back to life. Does the same soul enter the body of this person again?

Certainly, because in this case the separation of the silver cord has not yet taken place; otherwise, the soul could not be brought back at all. If the soul separated quickly from the body, during an accident for example, then the silver cord is not yet severed, but still connects body and soul.



15.


In an accidental death, the soul is suddenly flung out of its body. Does the soul have difficulties adjusting after such a sudden discarnation?

Here too, we must differentiate: Are we talking about a person who had begun to align with God or about a spiritually unknowing person, perhaps a materialist or an atheist?

The decisive factor for the condition of the soul after its discarnation is always the consciousness that it has developed in this school of life on earth.

The shadowed soul takes with it to the other side the consciousness of its unknowing human garment. Its consciousness does not reach beyond what is earthly, that is, material. The spirit beings coming to help this soul are either not recognized or are rejected. It may take a long time for this soul to grasp and accept its new situation.

A spiritually oriented soul accepts gratefully the help offered by the spiritual world and can find its way into its corresponding spiritual world without too much difficulty.



16.


What about the souls of those who were murdered or died by the death penalty?

Here too, there are two different situations for the souls concerned. The person sentenced to death knows that he will die. He will prepare himself according to his consciousness and will experience what we have already explained.

It could very well be that the person who is suddenly murdered has a similar experience to that of the victim of an accident. If he has not lived in the constant awareness of God, he will not have prepared himself for this event. His soul will therefore be shocked.



17.


When the soul discards its body, does it see God then?

In this case, too, the state of consciousness of the soul is decisive. If the soul is fully purified already at that moment, it will not be long until it can behold God. But, in order to be able to bear His light at all, most of us still have to purify ourselves before we can stand before God as light-filled souls.




Burial of the body –
Contact with the deceased



18.


Does cremation damage the soul? May one burn the corpse?

This again depends on the level of spiritual development of each individual. Someone who is highly developed spiritually can release his soul from his body more quickly. As long as a person is still very earthbound, the soul will feel pain when the body is burned, because it is still more or less connected with its former body.



19.


May we think of the deceased, or do we pull them back to earth with this?

It depends on the thoughts we have. Thoughts are energies that can bind. The best we can do for those who have left this earth before us is to lovingly release them into their new lives. As soon as it is possible for us, we should stop thinking of them as still being a part of our life on earth.

Prayers for our departed loved ones are the best service of love that we can render to them.



20.


Isn’t it quite natural that I think of my departed child or husband? Should I not honor their memory?

Let us become aware of who "my husband" and "my child" are! Neither one of them is my possession. They are independent spirit beings, souls, which have walked a part of their path at my side during this earthly journey. We are linked by karmic ties; this is why we should act towards them, too, according to the commandment of love, which we are required to follow regarding all our fellow men.

When our journey together has ended and they part from their life on earth, we should not detain them. To let them go freely and not bind them by unreasonable possessiveness – this is true, selfless love! Our honoring their memory is not lessened by this.



21.


How do the bereaved that mourn detain the soul of a deceased person on earth?

On the one hand, by an utterly selfish request of the bereaved, such as, "Stay with us! Don’t leave us! Help us!" Usually, the soul cannot resist such requests.

And on the other hand, through karmic ties, which were not necessarily dissolved by death, at least not for all the bereaved. These karmic ties mean something like being joined to one another until these ties, these karmic threads, are dissolved.

Mourning can also become self-pity. We should examine whether this might be the case with ourselves.



22.


Should one keep on going to the cemetery for years, to visit the grave of a deceased person, or does this bind the soul to oneself?

If the soul has recognized the truth, and thus its spiritual path, it does not let itself be detained. This again depends upon the state of consciousness of the soul.

Visiting the grave may also be the result of a person’s self-pity and maintains a binding, which should have already been dissolved for the bereaved as well as for the soul that still tends towards the life on earth. And so, visiting the cemetery does not bring anything positive.



23.


Can one ask a deceased person for forgiveness?

Yes, but we should not address the deceased directly, because we then pull his soul back to earth. We should ask the deceased for forgiveness through Christ.



24.


It was said that we human beings will meet each other again as souls in the heavenly spheres.

Every soul can ascend only as far as it has developed. It is a question of similar vibrations. When every soul has fully developed, then all loved ones will be together again in the eternal home.



25.


What do you think about researching one’s genealogy?

Genealogical research is unlawful, because the researcher binds himself to the past by digging up the dead, so to speak, thus bringing them back and binding them to himself again. By so doing, he as well as the souls of his ancestors are delayed in their further evolution. And if there are still earthbound souls among them, we give them the opportunity to cling to us, in order to accomplish through us what they have not yet let go of.

The messengers of God try to help each and every soul unceasingly. All high powers of light are at their disposal for this. These spirit beings, which have been entrusted with the protection, teaching and guidance of the soul, will serve it out of the power of divine love and wisdom and will do everything possible to bring it to where it will be happier. Their activity is limited solely by the free will of the soul, which can accept or reject their help.

However, what we can do for the souls of our ancestors is to pray for them. Such souls can be helped by prayer; and this is lawful.



26.


What can one do when a soul, despite our prayers, contacts us again and again?

We should be patient in several respects. We should continue to pray – not to the soul, but to Christ, by asking Him to help the soul. There is a strong power contained in prayer. So, let us be patient and trust in the Lord!

It may also happen that, without our trying to do anything in this direction, we are freed from the importunities of a soul as a result of our own higher spiritual development.

Often, a soul that is bound will begin to reflect, when it experiences how a person evades its influence by developing more highly spiritually. The soul may perhaps then gain insight and pursue its way towards the light.



27.


How can we help a deceased person with prayer, if everything runs according to the law of cause and effect anyway?

Mercy acts through our prayer. This can alleviate the effect of the cause that has been sown. Only the Father knows to what extent an effect will be removed. It is certain that in everything He does our Father just wants to help us. He is the eternally giving One. He knows how He can help us in the best way.



28.


Isn’t it presumptuous to ask the Father for something?

We should even ask the Father to give the souls more strength to be able to repent. The Lord tells us again and again, "Pray for your fellow man!" By loving devotion in prayer, positive energy can be released.



29.


May we pray to our guardian spirit, too?

Pray to the Father or to Christ. In this way, you will reach your guardian spirit, too. If you want to, you may think lovingly of your guardian spirit. This will also have its effect; it will be glad about it. But always pray to the Highest, namely to the Father or to Christ.



30.


May we pray for a disembodied soul?

We should pray to the Lord, that He give the soul the strength for recognition, but should never pray directly to the soul, because there is a danger that we bind it to ourselves. So, we should always commend a soul into the blessing of the Lord.




Suicide



31.
What happens when someone commits suicide?

In a suicide, the separation of the soul from the body takes place as usual. It is also possible for such a soul, while reviewing its life after its disembodiment, to repent of its act and find forgiveness.

It should be said about suicide that in no case is escape from self-created karma possible. The soul takes its karma along to the spheres beyond and will have to expiate later. It is clear that suicide burdens us for a long time, often through several future incarnations.



32.


Is the time of death also predetermined for the person who commits suicide?

If a human life were to proceed entirely according to the will of the heavens, one could speak of predetermination. But if the person’s self-will is included, that is, a human will which does not comply with the divine will, then the planned time of death can of course change.

Suicide is an extreme form of a person’s unlawful self-will, which deliberately changes his preset time of death.



33.


What consequence does suicide have for the soul concerned?

For the time being, the soul cannot ascend to the pure worlds. It continues to live with all the problems which drove it to suicide, but it no longer has the possibilities, as it had before during its life on earth, to solve these problems.



34.


Everything should be better organized in the beyond. There should be angels which guide the souls and help them. Souls cannot wander about endlessly, can they?

There is no lack of organization or of angels, but souls which were stubborn and unteachable as human beings on earth act the same way in the beyond. This is why it is often so difficult to instruct them. Here on earth, too, we do many things which we know we should not do.

But these souls do not wander about eternally. They are constantly offered help and at some point in time this help will bear fruit. The homeward-leading and homeward-striving power, the Christ-spark, lies in each burdened soul. Through this spark, each and every soul will sooner or later find its liberation and salvation.



35.


Can people who commit suicide incarnate again?

Every soul which is still tied to the earth by threads of guilt will return to earth, that is, will incarnate again.



36.


I had to watch how a healthy mother became ill with cancer. She then killed herself with tablets, because she was in despair. She didn’t do anything wrong, did she?

This disease did not develop without reason. Illness always wants to tell a person something; it must be borne, because it is only in this way that karma can flow out.

If I try to block a rising karma, this will hold me back in my development.

If an illness begins to show itself in the body, this means that a soul burden wants to flow out through the material body. The soul is getting rid of a guilt-complex. We should therefore be thankful when a physical ailment takes hold of us. In this case, the woman could have taken pain-relieving medicines, for instance, and could have recognized her soul guilt by thinking things over. Such recognition will not be possible for her so quickly in the realm of the souls. Even healing may have been possible.



37.


You just said that the woman could have taken pain-relieving medicines. We know that the Spirit does not approve of the use of pain-killers. How can these two statements agree?

Through pain-relieving medication, one can make the pain more bearable for old and very ill people, so that they can still align with our heavenly Father during their last days.




Karma and reincarnation



38.


Is death already predetermined at the time of birth?

Yes, but we can shorten our life through wrong behavior, and can also prolong it, in certain cases, through correct behavior.



39.


How can one assess the faults one has committed out of ignorance?

Their consequences are not as serious as those of the faults committed by a knowing person. If one has come to recognize himself, one can ask that the faults previously committed may be forgiven. In other words, one asks the wronged person for forgiveness.

If the latter is no longer in his earthly garment, one asks the inner Christ for this forgiveness. In this way, this request will surely reach its goal.



40.


When karma has flowed out of an ill body and the soul enters the beyond, does the soul take along the remainder of the karma?

If there is anything remaining, the soul takes it along.



41.


What is the reason for a baby’s death?

Perhaps this soul had only a small burden left to expiate. But it may also be that this baby helps its mother to reflect about death.



42.


Isn’t it an unusual punishment to have to die as a child or even at birth, without seeing life?

We human beings are so used to regarding our physical life as the life, that it is often difficult for us to accept what the Spirit now wants to make us aware of once more: Our true, original, imperishable life is our spiritual existence. This spiritual existence was there before our incarnation and will continue to exist afterwards. And so, the child which is allowed to go again after a short stay in the temporal does not lose its life, but much more to the point goes back to its true life. We should feel happy for such a soul.

An incarnation as such is already the expiation of burdens. Since the child has no time to burden itself anew, a part of or even the rest of the guilt which the soul had previously borne is taken away in this short incarnation of the soul.

A spiritually developed person will therefore not mourn when a child dies, even if it is his own child, but will rejoice with the soul of the child over this great grace.



43.


Do our bodies resemble one another from one incarnation to the other?

Yes.



44.


With which souls do we come together again?

This is a question of similar vibration and burden.



45.


When does the soul lose its memory?

One should see this in the following way:

In the spiritual spheres, the soul remembers its previous lives. Only when it goes into a new incarnation is its memory covered up. If this were not the case, it would already be pre-programmed.

We should not strive to know about our past lives. During our lifetime we will most certainly become aware of what we should recognize in order to work our way into a higher consciousness.



46.


We know that we all have been on earth several times already. When my soul leaves my body, do I then know about my previous lives, everything I have done?

We are told that we see everything then.



47.


And what if I have not developed myself any further and have not gone higher?

If we have not used our life on earth to reach a higher spiritual development, we have not fulfilled the purpose, the task, of this incarnation. We have wasted divine energy and power. We return from our earthly journey with empty hands. When we do not pass a grade in school here on earth, we have to repeat that grade before we can go on to the next one.



48.


Can a soul see what happens with its former family?

Yes, but it should not do this, and a higher developed soul has no need for this.



49.


Isn’t it also an aspect of freedom that my soul have an overall view, so that I may recognize my faults?

As a soul you certainly get this view.

Before its sojourn on earth, the soul is shown the opportunities it has during the coming incarnation.

After it has left its body, the soul can again recognize everything it was able to fulfill during its past incarnation.

Before it steps out of its physical body, the soul can again experience its past life as in a fast-motion film. It can then recognize itself, to what extent it was able to realize its plan, whether it passed the grade, whether it has come a bit closer to the Absolute, to the Father.



50.


If, in a previous life, one experienced something which caused him much torment and is now stored in his soul, when he is born again, will he perceive a warning when something similar is about to happen, so that he may shy away from doing the same again?

We are always warned by inner impulses when we are in such danger. The question is whether we really listen to them and follow them.

The Spirit does not leave us in ignorance. We are now offered the chance to walk the Inner Path. The more we grow in knowledge about ourselves, the more will that which is stored in the layers of our soul rise to our consciousness. Then soul-pictures will slowly come up. In this way, we can gradually overcome the past. And so, we don’t have to stay ignorant about what burdens us.



51.


What happens, for instance, when civilians suddenly lose their life because of war, that is, without a recognizable guilt? I do know that the cause is karmic, but perhaps this can be explained again?

Here one must bear in mind that nothing happens by chance in the entire universe. If there were just one chance event, this would signal chaos. And so, no encounter between people is a coincidence. It is important how I meet a person, even if it is just someone on the street who asks for directions. Even this can be a karmic tie, which I had to meet in one way or another. He could be, for instance, someone to whom I had rudely refused to give information in a former life. This meeting gives me the chance to make amends.

When people who have no part in war actions die or even suffer from war, it is quite possible that, in a former life, their souls were responsible for the death of many of their fellow men during events of war. When they now die in a war, this part of the guilt is expiated. Through everything that breaks open in a person in times of unrest and jeopardized living conditions – before, during and after a war – karma can thus flow out of a person in many different ways. But a new karma can develop, because wherever negative, destructive forces are rampant, additional influences from corresponding vibrational spheres join increasingly with these forces. Fear, anxiety, panic and the like open the door to the radiation of dark powers.




Planets and planes of purification



52.


After the death of the body, time and space no longer exist for the soul. On the other hand, we supposedly continue to live on other planets. Isn’t this a contradiction?

There are seven realms of the fall, seven different levels of vibration. However, they are not arranged in levels, but they flow into one another. Each planet in the various galaxies is enveloped by all seven levels.

After the death of its body, the soul goes to one of the four planes of purification, to one of the many planets where it finds the vibration which corresponds to its level of vibration.



53.


Can we still see the planets where the deceased are, and can we still perceive the souls with our eyes?

Yes, we can see the planets. Souls live here on earth, too. But a soul living on a certain level can be seen and understood only by equally-vibrating and higher-vibrating souls.

We humans can perceive only material things with our material eyes.



54.


The earth is the only place where all levels of consciousness exist together and at the same time. Are there other planets where fully material beings live?

The earth is the only place where fully material beings live.



55.


The earth is supposed to be the lowest point in the universe; one cannot fall deeper. Are the souls that dwell on earth exclusively those which are the farthest from God, or can other souls also dwell here on earth, with or without a body?

The earth is the farthest point from God in the entire universe. Above the earth are the astral spheres, then the planes of purification, then the wall of light and, behind the wall of light, the pure heavens. The earth is the only place where beings from all levels of evolution and from all these planes can be found. It is inhabited by human beings whose souls have extremely distanced themselves from God, as well as by those whose souls have a higher degree of spiritual maturity. And so, all levels of spiritual development can be found on our planet, even pure beings of light who have incarnated on this earth to rescue and bring home the fallen, shadowed souls.

Of the disembodied souls, only the earthbound, strong-ly shadowed soul lives on the earth. Furthermore, many pure spirit beings carry out their duty on earth as guardian angels, as they do everywhere in the fall realms.



56.


I read in a revelation that the soul, after its physical death, goes to certain astral spheres, depending on its level of vibration, and there takes a rest and then is instructed. I cannot quite see how the earthbound souls fit into this.

We learned before that the situation of souls varies a great deal when they pass away. Christ said in a revelation, "Just as the tree falls, so it lies."

If someone regards life here on earth as the only life, he will not have enough strength in his soul to go beyond this at all. He will want to continue his activities on earth. He will not even look for the possibility to go somewhere else.

And so, based on the freedom of his will, he remains an earthbound soul on the earth sphere and does not go into the astral sphere until he gains insight and allows his guiding angel to lead him further on.



57.


What is the task or work of a soul after its physical death?

To fill with light and purify the soul particles that it burdened. To fill with light and purify means, for example, that the soul recognizes and repents its faults, makes amends for them and of course does not repeat them.

This is also possible when the soul is in its spiritual garment, through acts of love for other souls. This will be the main task. We will then no longer work for our daily bread, but to perfect ourselves each day.



58.


A soul can continue to develop as a soul, but can it also burden itself?

It is not possible to burden itself any further; however, it could stay in its present condition, this means, not progress.



59.


Is there a basic difference between astral souls and earthbound souls?

Yes.



60.


Where does the soul actually go when it enters a new life? Could it even go into an animal or something else?

Retrogression into the soul of an animal is not possible.



61.


If a soul in its earthly garment was a drinker and now, as an earthbound soul, it goes into pubs and clings to drinkers in order to drink with them – doesn’t it burden itself?

An earthbound soul cannot burden itself any further. It lives in a dream, so to speak, even when, for example, it clings to drinkers, imagining it is drinking with them. Every person, including the drinker, has a free will that he does not have to subject to an earthbound soul.

We, in the earthly garment, do not burden ourselves either when we dream, for instance, that we have murdered someone.



62.


Does an earthbound soul have the freedom to do whatever it pleases? Can it act unlawfully without bearing the consequences?

An earthbound soul cannot act; it can only influence people who let themselves be influenced.

We are exposed to many dangers on earth. We have to prove ourselves constantly. Only we human beings can burden ourselves, when we give in to these influences.



63.


Where will criminals be after they die – for example, murderers or people who violate nature.

A disembodied soul feels, thinks, wants and acts as if it were still in its body. It behaves according to its state of consciousness. It remains in its sphere of vibration.

According to the law of "like attracts like," it is surrounded by those who are like it: If it is on earth, by people who correspond to this sphere of vibration, and in the astral spheres, by corresponding souls. In the soul realms, a soul is surrounded almost exclusively by those who are like it. Similar souls act on it like reflections; the impulses from souls of a different kind are lacking. The soul is held there by a sort of group spirit. But such souls, too, are not without guardian spirits, that is, without further spiritual impulses which will ultimately bring them back to the Father step by step. However, for the reasons mentioned, it is much more difficult for such a soul to develop further and higher in the soul realms than here on earth.



64.


How is the debt of the soul paid off and how does a higher spiritual development take place in the astral spheres?

The maturing of a soul is much more difficult and takes more time in the astral spheres or in the planes of purification than on earth. Even though the term "time" exists only on the material level, one can nevertheless say that it takes longer to purify the soul-body and to fill it with light.

In principle, here as there, a higher spiritual development is based on the unfolding of selfless love. Here as there, the path back to God goes by way of self-recognition and actualization, that is, by discarding the negative, the faults. These processes take much longer and are sometimes much more painful in the soul realms than in a human garment on earth.



65.


Will the soul of a child arrive in the beyond as an adult or as a child?

A child which has died is also a child as a soul in the beyond, and there, too, it needs to develop like it would have here on earth. There, however, this takes place in the children’s sphere which corresponds to its consciousness.

The souls of children are still much more open for the teachings of the Spirit. They accept more easily the heavenly divine order and the possibilities of spiritual reality and thus develop quickly. Since they are not yet so strongly shaped and bound by an intellectual way of perceiving things, they grow and mature less hindered than a soul that was dispolarized through a long life on earth. Their evolution in the realm of the souls is characterized by the joy of discovering new spiritual possibilities. They still more or less grasp the totality and are still close to it. They expand their consciousness without much difficulty or effort, as at play. This is why we speak of the "children’s spheres."




General questions



66.


What is the particle structure of the soul?

The soul is made up of a structure of particles. The individual particles are cells of light and contain the elements of God.

The particles are arranged like the scales of a fish. Through an unlawful life, the radiation power in the structure of the particles decreases and one then speaks of "the shadowing of the soul."



67.


Can it be a protection when one’s knowledge is covered during an incarnation?

Yes, absolutely!

If we could see all our burdens from past lives, we would not have the courage and confidence for a new beginning.



68.


If one would make efforts to let go of his faults over-night, would it then be possible to gain the inner vision?

Yes, someone who strives and is willing to let go of his faults develops spiritually; and it will be possible for him to walk the mystical path. Through the constant connection with our Lord, he can be directly guided and inspired by Him.

However, the discarding of one’s faults happens step by step. Discarding all faults at one blow, from one day to the next, cannot succeed.



69.


Can I manage to pass all levels in one lifetime?

Yes.



70.


You see, I am 80 years old; I know that my life is coming to an end. Now I would like to know where I will go. I have heard only just now about the Inner Path.

You have heard a great deal today about life in other worlds. Certainly, you already knew some of it. If you become aware of all this during the last years of your life and align with our Lord Jesus Christ, and do not want to remain in the material spheres after leaving your body, but want to strive towards the light in the spiritual spheres – you need not fear anything.



71.


Everything that I process intellectually can help me a great deal in understanding their interconnections better and in behaving correctly. This day, too, brought me a lot of valuable and interesting information. How does this knowledge help me on my path?

All of our knowledge is just like reading a map. It can be of great help in finding our way around more quickly in a new country. Beyond this, intellectual knowledge is not essential for the Inner Path. It just increases our sense of ego and our self-esteem. In the final analysis, all knowledge is of value only when we actualize it on ourselves.



72.


When I do not feel well, is it because souls are influencing me?

To begin with, I put myself into a low vibration, because I do not fend off base sensations and thoughts. I let them grow in me; that is, I entered into this vibration. When I remain in this vibration without realizing it and saying, "Stop, dear friend, where are you heading in your thoughts and sensations?" then the souls which are on this vibration approach and influence me even more. For like attracts like; this is a divine law. Thus, I attract those souls which are bound to this level of vibration here on earth. They can then pull me down even further if I give in to them.



73.


Aren’t there also good spirits around?

Of course, our guardian angels are here; and there are millions and millions of pure spirit beings which endeavor to guide people.

How are people guided into a particular direction? Nothing happens by chance. And so, these numerous good spirit beings gently urge us humans, again and again, to where we have the opportunity to find our path. Of course, we have the freedom to accept this guidance or not.



74.


Does food have any influence on the development of the soul?

Certainly, the Spirit says very clearly that we should nourish ourselves from the fruit which the earth gives us willingly. Of course, with our present eating habits, this will not be one hundred percent possible right away.

The Spirit advises us to proceed step by step. When, for example, someone eats meat, he can try to reduce it slowly. One should not do this for external reasons of health, by saying, "This meat is not good for my body," but from the conviction that the animal is his second neighbor and that when he kills it for his nourishment, he has committed murder.



A harmonious spiritual development includes all spheres of life, also that of nourishment, because everything is vibration. Of course, this knowledge has been partly buried over the course of the centuries.

Thus, we should gradually find the kind of nourishment that benefits the development of our soul.



75.


Is it true that as long as someone eats meat, he is not pure enough for the Inner Path?

The person who wants to walk the Inner Path does not receive rules about eating. During the development of his spiritual consciousness, he himself will recognize what is right. Out of love for the Father and His creatures, he will be able, from within, to gradually let go of what does not correspond to the divine law.




III.
Quotations




"Today we can say with absolute certainty that death, as we have understood it until now, does not in reality exist . I have not the slightest doubt that our spirit – our soul or whatever you may want to call it – outlives our physical body."

Dr. Elisabeth Kübler-Ross



"If we could find out what actually happens to us after death, we could make the process of dying much easier for millions of people."

Dr. Elisabeth Kübler-Ross



"If death is actually so much different from what we always thought, then our life, too, will be different."

Johann Christoph Hampe



"When dying, a person with all his characteristics switches over from the physical to the spiritual world, where he has a spiritual form. Immediately after his physical death, the inner person, or the soul, continues to live in the worlds beyond. And so, life is not interrupted by death."

Emanuel Swedenborg



"I became a nurse and practiced this profession for twenty years. I witnessed many deaths, but always immediately afterwards I saw the spirit-form of an ethereal double of the human form take shape above the body, in which life had ceased, and then disappear."

Joè Snell



"Death is like sleep. One has no pain during the transition, except in the case of certain physical ailments and certain spiritual conditions. Just as an exhausted person is overcome by deep sleep, in the same way a person is overcome by the sleep of death. Death comes to many people so suddenly that it is difficult for them to understand that they have left the material world and have entered the world of the spirits. Bewildered by the many new and beautiful things which they see around themselves, they believe they are visiting an area or city of the physical world which they have never seen before. Only when they have been instructed in more detail and have realized that their spirit-body differs from their former material body do they recognize that they have actually been transferred from the material world into the realm of the spirits."

Sodhu Sundar Singh



An enlightened person
has overcome fear of death
with the power of knowledge and of love.
Only one who is bound to matter
sees death, the horror,
believing that his body is his true Self.

From: "The Spirit, the Source in Man"



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