Hazrat Inayat Khan here begins to speak about the experience of different souls after death, and what lies behind their condition. The previous post is here.
It is sometimes said that the soul is that which remains after the death of the physical body, and that it is then in heaven or in hell; but that is not so. The soul is something much greater. How can that be burned with fire which is itself light, Nur, the light of God? But owing to its delusion, it takes upon itself all the conditions that the mind has to go through after death. Therefore the experience after death of the soul that has not attained to liberation is very depressing. If the mind is not much attached to the earthly life and has gathered up the satisfaction of its deeds, it enjoys heaven. If the contrary is the case, then it experiences hell.
The mind that is more involved in earthly cares and attachments cannot let the soul be in the light. If you throw a balloon into the air it will go up and then it will come down again. It goes up because of the air that is in it. It comes down because of the earth substance in it. The tendency of the soul is to go to the highest spheres, to which it belongs. That is its nature. The earthly substance it has gathered around it weighs it down to earth. The kite goes up, but the string in a person’s hand brings it back to earth. The earthly attachments are the string that draws the soul downwards. We see that the smoke goes up, and on its way it leaves in the chimney its earth substance. All the rest of its earth substance it leaves in the air, and until it has left all behind, it cannot go up to the ether. By this simile we see how the soul cannot rise from the lower regions until it has left behind all earthly longings and attachments.
People have a great fear of death, and especially the simple, tender, and affectionate people, and those who are very much attached to their father and mother and brothers and sisters and friends, to their positions and possessions. But those who are unfortunate in life also fear death. A person would rather be very ill than dead. He would rather be in a hospital than in the grave with the dead people. When the thought comes to a man, ‘Some day I must leave all this and go down to the grave,’ a great sadness comes upon him. With some people this fear lasts part of their lives; with some it lasts the whole life. The proof of how great the fear of death is, is that death has been made out to be the worst punishment, although it is not nearly so bad as the pains, sorrows, and worries of life.
Death is the great examination to which one goes prepared, another unprepared; one with confidence, another with fear. However much anyone may pretend to be spiritual or virtuous in life, at the sight of death he is tested and all pretense falls away. It is said in the Quran, ‘Then, when the crushing calamity shall come, on that day shall man remember what he has striven after.’
There was on old man who was always crying and lamenting, saying, ‘I am so unhappy, my life is so hard – every day toil and labor? It would be better if I were dead.’ Every day he lamented in this way and called upon death to come and take him. One day Azrael, the angel of death, appeared and said to him, ‘You have called me so often, now I am come to take you with me.’ The old man said, ‘Not yet! I am an old man, pray grant me only a few days more of life!’ The angel of death said, ‘No. You have so often asked to die, and now you must come to Allah.’ The old man said, ‘Wait a little while. Let me stay here a little longer.’ But the angel of death said, ‘Not one moment more,’ and he carried him off.
To be continued…