Beyond Life and Death
THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM
Beyond Life and Death
Unless one learns to overcome the fear of death, one cannot learn to live and enjoy life…
A seeker approached an enlightened Zen master and asked, 'Master, does an enlightened man speak?'
The master replied, 'A truly enlightened person can never speak. Enlightenment cannot be expressed in words. An enlightened person can never speak and if he speaks, you can be sure he is not enlightened.'
The man then asked, 'Oh! An enlightened person is always silent then?'
The master said, 'An enlightened man can never be silent. If he keeps mum, be very clear that he is not enlightened. If one possesses enlightenment, one cannot keep it under our pillow or put it in our treasure box. But when enlightenment, when God possesses us, we can never be silent. So if somebody is silent, you can be sure he is not enlightened.'
The disciple was naturally confused and asked, 'But, what is the truth? You say that an enlightened master never speaks; then you say he never keeps quiet. Then what is the truth? What does he do?'
The Master says beautifully, 'He sings.'
About this book
Death is the beginning, not the end. It is celebration, not mourning. It is liberation, not the finish line.
One who realizes this truth is enlightened.
Time and again, great masters have taught how to live life by understanding death. If one does not understand what death is, what the process entails, how one goes through the process and what lies at the end of the process, it is impossible to be aware of how to live one's life.
In a series of three discourses, THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM takes us through the journey of death, as he has experienced it. This journey is one of timeless truth.
It has been said that no one who has died comes back to tell the tale and no one who tells the tale has really died. On the contrary, every master who is enlightened has gone through the process of death, has traversed its path and has returned out of sheer compassion and love for fellow humans to tell them what he has experienced. We only need to listen to their song.
- THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM