The easiest answer is: Wait till death to find out!
The question that requires a response is: AFTER WHOSE DEATH AND WHOSE LIFE?
It is common knowledge that the physical body perishes after death.
What happens to the other entity…known as jiva or soul?
The jiva is the mind and intellect…the manifestation of CONSCIOUSNESS…that occupies the body and deals with the world.
On the journey of the soul after the death of the body, the Bhagavad Gita says
“…just as the breeze carries the fragrance from the flower, the jiva is carried from the body.”
A person with faith in the scriptures believes……the jiva will take up another body.
He sees life as a journey…………………which ends when the jiva discovers his true nature.
Others will need logic to convince them.
Logic is based on the laws of cause and effect, which conclusively conclude…there can be no effect without a cause.
So logically to explain birth and the differences we see around us
…some points arise…
- We have to accept the existence of something other than the physical body, which takes up different bodies.
- The karmas and last thought of the jiva determines…the future path and body.
As you think so you become.
But behind these ever-changing phenomena, there is something changeless and immutable……The Reality referred to as Brahman.
There is no more birth or death for the individual soul that has realized the true Self.
The jiva that remains ignorant, is then pushed by desire,
To be reborn in the appropriate field, in which to fulfill that desire.
Therefore…
purify the mind,
cultivate good karmas,
befriend Dharma
…and…GAIN THE KNOWLEDGE OF THE SELF.
Realise and abide in it. THEN everything is automatically taken care of.
In this journey, our best friend is the Lord alone.
In the Gita Sri Krishna says, “I am your friend and always with you!!!”
by Swami Tejomayananda