Theos-Talk Archives (January 2005 Message tt00929)

Cass,

There is a growing mountain of information and evidence relating to near- 
and after-death states coming from a number of quarters today, and the 
notion of being greeted by loved ones has a huge amount of support, for 
instance by hospice workers who notice that a good proportion of people 
close to death see one or more loved ones there to greet them, in subtle 
form. The smiles of joy on the dying people's faces are very moving to see. 
These are clearly cases where the seeing and the greeting begins before 
physical death is completed.

Many Near Death Experience (NDE) cases also report being met by loved ones 
in their temporary journey into the worlds of light. Often these loved ones 
tell them they have to go back to earth life. I consider many NDEs to be a 
foray of our consciousness into some level of the inner worlds, that is 
projected into the brain when it resumes operation.

And, for yet another vector on it, the researches of Michael Newton, 
reported in his books "Journey of Souls" and "Destiny of Souls" draw on 
hundreds of cases where people, apparently operating from a level of soul 
consciousness in a carefully-induced deep hypnotic state, appear to be able 
to describe the events before and after their most recent death (and other 
states between lives). Being greeted by loved ones or helpers of some kind 
is virtually universal in these accounts from people of different 
backgrounds and cultures. These books are an amazing read, by the way, 
giving us a lot that agrees with Theosophical ideas, yet adds additional 
details.

So, even if we pick around this material - and it needs to be evaluated 
carefully, as does Theosophy itself - there are a lot of arrows pointing 
to the one thing; that we can be greeted by loved ones before or after the 
time of our physical death.

It helps in this, and other discussions on the boil on this list, to 
consider that all information flow from the inner or spiritual worlds 
through to the physical brain and thence into language, is subject to the 
colorations, condensations and distortions of the psyche of the observer, 
like a unique and complex lens. There is an inevitable crystallisation of 
subtle meaning-essence into the denser forms of human thought mediated in 
the brain, with its ready-made collection of images that leap to clothe the 
meaning in form. The search for a single, perfect source of occult 
information is fraught for those of us (the vast majority) who have to rely 
on the words of others for knowledge of these realms, especially when in 
HPB's day a whole lot of terms were being invented, ie new uses of old 
words, in the English language, that it had never been designed for.

I think it helps if we, as students, develop the often difficult art of 
holding all pronouncements lightly - and that includes from HPB herself - 
and aim to balance outer knowledge from books etc, with our own insights 
and intuitions. Authority from either of these sources alone is not as 
secure as combining them. HPB liked people who could think for themselves.

So here are some of the many interesting web sites on different aspects of 
death and dying that exist today. Some of them, I feel sure, will give you 
information on post- and pre- death greeting, and help to put into 
perspective the findings of the great pioneers of the world of spirit.

Happy browsing and my best wishes to you, Cass.
Murray

Some Death and Dying Web Sites:-
www.after-death.com
After Death Communication (ADC), books
www.chaliceofrepose.org/index.htm
Chalice of Repose Project - Music-Thanatology - beautiful
www.selfgrowth.com/death.html
Dying, and Grief - big resource, articles
www.hospicevalley.org/Outreach.htm
Outreach program, trained volunteers etc
www.iipc.org
Consciousness Research, OBEs, Vital Energy
www.victorzammit.com
A Lawyer Presents the Case for the Afterlife - a big resource
www.livingdying.org
Living-Dying Project - started by Ram Dass
www.near-death.com/experiences/evidence01.html
NDEs while brain dead - true stories
www.near-death.com/index.html
Near-Death Experiences and the Afterlife
http://www.mikepettigrew.com/afterlife/
NDEs, OBEs - map of afterlife states, how-to information << NB: this "map"
www.near-death.com/evidence.html
Scientific evidence for survival of consciousness after death
www.survivalafterdeath.org/
SurvivalAfterDeath.org - A Resource for Survival After Death


----- Original Message -----
> Date: Tue, 25 Jan 2005 18:05:27 -0800 (PST)
> From: Cass Silva <silva_cass@yahoo.com>
> Subject: Re: Re: Anand and Pedro Pt.1
>
> Dear Perry
> I like many were introduced to Theosophy through Leadbeater and Besant, 
> and for many years believed that when we die we are met by our loved ones 
> on the other side, and we communicate with them while in a state of 
> sleep. When I eventually read what HPB said about after death states, 
> "the Ego in Devachan cannot contact anyone- as there is no medium." I was 
> totally confused but being ignorant of what actually took place, somehow 
> found a middle ground, definite maybe belief, that we are greeted by our 
> loved ones and then when the etheric and prana disintegrate the entity is 
> uncontactable from a few hours to a few years. When awake on the Astral 
> the Ego has lost all of its remembrance of life on earth. After a while 
> the entity will fall into a sleep where the struggle with the Kamarupa begins.
> And then when I discovered, only a month or so ago CWL was a namedropper, 
> a liar, and a paedophile did I realise that not only was I hoodwinked by 
> him, but I passed on this erroneous belief to my children and friends. 
> Hence my opinion that it is a mistake to read any of his literature as it 
> is a false representation of what HPB said.
> One positive thing that has come out of it for me is that I had always 
> imagined my mother waiting for me, with arms folded, on the other side, 
> asking why did you waste all your inheritance on kalamati olives and fetta 
> cheese!
>
> Cass