Heaven & Hell

[Eagle Eye]

In many cultures, mythologies and ancient scriptures, it has been described the highest and lowest of creation (with different names), what most of us know them as Heaven and Hell. It has been described both physical and spiritual in each of them.
Why do all cultures, from ancient until today are aware of these "places" ?
So we can assume that they were guided even long ago, to let them be aware of it.
Since we call this reality a balance, I think also that this balance will have its own extreme sides (physical and spiritual).

[Bill Ryan]

From the beginning of human time, our ancestors fell upon good luck and bad luck in their lives. Their health, their hunting, the weather, their conflicts.

And that still happens now, to us all.

Seeking explanation for the often apparently unexplainable, our ancestors hypothesized invisible gods who would sometimes reward, and sometimes punish.

Roman Catholics (and others!) still believe that today, despite all our sophistication and greater understanding of the forces of the universe.

'Heaven' is the ultimate reward, and 'Hell' is the ultimate punishment. It'd be very nice for the human race to reach a point, some day, when these primitive concepts are all relegated to history.

[Eagle Eye]

It's a big difference between being aware of the existence of those realms and using that knowledge as a power to manipulate people. That's what religions do and have done it in history by manipulating (mixing truth with untruth), but denying its existence (of those extreme sides of creation ) it means also denying the existence of the balance.

[O Donna]

Life in transition is both true and not true.
Who can put a finger on it and hold it there?
Certainly not the transitory.

[snoman]

So, Iceberg.. if you believe those realms to exist, do you see them as distinct localities
or do heaven and hell inhabit the same space?

(don't be cut short by language.. if there are not too many, I will gladly proof read posts for you)

[Eagle Eye]

What I think is that all we can see and perceive, is but a tiny fraction of the creation.

[snoman]

do go on...

[O Donna]

Reason has it's limitation.

Nothing is impossible, only that which has yet to be observed and/ or experienced.

The mind tends to put up walls of perception similar to compartmentalizing, there are not permanent walls. Take a proverbial sledgehammer to one, then you will see. What you may see is another wall but with experience (and a sledgehammer ), you will know what to do.

[Sunny-side-up]

At death comes sauce, we all go back as souls that we are.

Heaven and hell is what you/we make of our time here in Samsara (the cycle of death and rebirth to which life in the material world is bound.).

We can be good and still suffer hell here, probably do suffer hell here if your good, when you see what goes on
We can be bad and experience heaven here and not worry about others and the bad you cause.

Maybe if your good here you can move on to better realms faster and or not linger in purgatory as some religions impose.

We can be walking an enlightened path and not let what goes on here (Pandora' s box, a process that once begun generates many complicated problems.)effect our path. Causing not good or bad directly only good by not being bad.

[O Donna]

Without conception there is no narrative but maybe that is a story for another time.

[Deux Corbeaux]

To me Heaven and Hell are a state of mind.

What kind of God would create Hell?

[Corfitz]

I've heard from a couple of sources that hell, in the biblical sense, is a reference to Gehenna; A place in Jerusalem for either sacrificing/burning people, or burning garbage and such ( or both? ) ,which then was used metaphorically to literally "scare the hell out of people".
First post here on Project Avalon, so I just thought I'd jump in, even with the limited knowledge I maybe can offer.

[greybeard]

We live in a world of duality--opposites--that applies to everything.
No heaven without hell.
However thats the illusion--Maya.

Non-duality states there is only one without a second---literally no subject no object
No separate individuals --so who is going to judge-who is going to hell?

Not saying im right but that's the essence of what mystics who are enlightened say--the open secret--only God is and you are That.

Chris
Ps Christ was clear--The Kingdom of Heaven is within and The Father and I are one.

[greybeard]

Their are many seeming paradoxes in spiiuality.

For the unenlightened--there is a heaven to go to on leaving the body.
The mystic--the enlightened have a different perception--they are One with the Father. (job done)

Its helpful to know that Jesus said that anything he could do we could do.
Seek ye first the kingdom of heaven and all things will be added unto you.

In India, on becoming enlightened the person was heard to exclaim-"-I am the totality, all of it."
Unlimited consciousness.

The kingdom is within--hence the emphasis on meditation by many teachers.

Chris

[Eagle Eye]

I think every culture is a representation of a collective spiritual perception that's why different cultures have different description of heaven, that doesn't mean someone got it right or wrong. Its just that all of them are aware of the highest state of creation and also the lowest one, but in different points of view.
I think all our life is a collection of experiences, learning and most of all choices. So in the end, we will choose our path with our own choices and those choices will lead us to the exact part of the creation we are looking for.

[O Donna]

Posted by deuxcorbeaux (here)
To me Heaven and Hell are a state of mind.

What kind of God would create Hell?

But, but, 'state of mind' is a creation as well. Assuming we are all in some state of mind right now, call it what you will, it's still a creation. Big bang is also a state of mind. On and on and on....

There is no place 'good' 'bad' 'neutral' or otherwise that isn't a creation.

Gaming is a great example.... mind and body can react just like being there and yet where are you? Its the often used " turtles all the way down". Where does the SIM end and reality begin?

[johnf]

These are my thoughts on heavens(s), and hell(s).

Thoughts have a tendency to repeat themselves,(much like those irritating .gifs people insist on posting on the internet).
All thoughts have a maximum duration, the length of which is determinined by the nature of the thought. While it exists it tends to attract similar thoughts to it, and these groups of thoughts can grow in size till they they create an entire "reality" or bubble of existence.

I think these things exist on various levels of density, and sometimes will loop back into the physical world. Robert Monroe called these things (certain ones anyway the looping back into physical existence ones) belief system realities in one of his books on his out of body experiences. They can be turned into an afterlife for people of similar belief systems. So there might be various places where Christians, even of specific denominations experience an afterlife, and that goes for other religions as well.

So these "heavens" are places that are created by relatively positive thoughts.
Likewise you can imagine how negative thoughts might create a negative afterlife, and these might be shaped by various behaviors and earth based belief systems and can be thought of as hells.
So I imagine there may be an immense number of such things as well as various middle type afterlife/between life realities.Purgatories if you will.

I agree largely with Greybeards ideas about the separate self,I think it is a temporary delusion/illusion, but it has a certain reality to it as long as the underlying thought is being "thinked". The idea of a permanent self is, I believe false, and in my case that includes the belief in an eternal self. Even what we think of as a spiritual being has I believe a duration to it (though the duration might be quite long), and when that duration runs out the individual dissolves into the pool of consciousness which it originally came out of.

One particular document I have read has had immense influence on my thinking on this matter, and that can be found here:

http://www.buddhanet.net/pdf_file/allexistence.pdf

The information purportedly came from lectures given by Gautama Buddha and there are several versions of it on the web.
I consider it to be the best general map of existences that has ever existed. And I have had direct experience with some of these areas myself,(At least I think I have).
The lowest plane, Niraya translates literally as hell. In this particular document's translation it seems to present it as one homogeneous place, but there are discussions I have run into that seem to suggest there are levels, and different places within it.

There are many more heavenly planes described further along in the discourse. I think in general this work tends towards oversimplification in order to concentrate on the importance of the consequences of thoughts and actions as far as what sort of existence we might seem to experience after the end of this one. I find the most interesting idea in Budhist thinking to be the idea that our very last thought in this life is what will determine the quality of the next existence. Our thoughts and actions in the present will influence that last thought though, so it really emphasizes the idea of helping others, as well as prayer and meditation practices as a way to upgrade our future existences.
Also there are a lot of practices that fall under the category of applied mindfullness that might work better for a western type person than meditation. The one I have gotten a lot out of has been the Natural Rest, and Living Inquiries practices that can be done by oneself , but the help of a facilitator can really be needed at certain points. By using these I have run into a lot of experiences that point to the reality described in Arupa-Loka, The Formless Realm. The highest point in this one is a state of being or not being, I find that one very fascinating because of the famous line Hamlet's Soliloquy,To be or not to be that is the question.
As far as heavens and hells go I find number 14 to be the most interesting.

Great Brahmas(Mahà brahma)

Two of this realm’s more famous inhabi-
tants are the Great Brahma, a deity whose
delusion leads him to regard himself as the
all-powerful, all-seeing creator of the universe
and Brahma Sahampati,who begs the Buddha to
teach the Dhamma to the world.

Elsewhere this particular Brahma is described as a threefold being, much like the God of Brahmanisn as well as the God of the Abrahamic religions. So people being influenced by this fellow, and what ever minions he has working for him might be responsible for a lot of the more coercive aspects of religion on this and other planets. This plane is part of a set of three planes that are just above the 11 planes that make up the physical (or sensual) plane.


As a fascinating side point here, there are 11 dimensions making up the multiverse, in the string theory model, and 11 planes making up the physical universe in the 31 planes model.
People will argue that they are not the same, and I'm sure that that is true in some ways , but what instrument will be able to see with a wider view, pure consciousness, or physical instruments and mathematics that are used to analyze those measurements.
Now the idea that the other famous being from this plane is concerned mainly with teaching beings how to be free from suffering,to me suggests a source of the more benevolent and philosophical aspects of religion, and culture as well. I suppose the advice here is to choose your friends wisely.


Have fun pondering,
John

[shaberon]

I disagree that people "invented the invisible" to explain natural phenomena.

Instead, I would say that the visible is only an effect of something that is, to most of us now, invisible.

Hell mostly refers to any unhappy state while on this earth: you could call it purgatory, torture, the grave, etc., all meaning about the same thing.

In Buddhism and in most Raja Yoga in general, we look towards a state of being that is not really the mind as we know it, but is found via the mind. This is said to be uncreated. Self-arising. Parentless. Swayambhu. This is seen as superior to Heaven, which is just a generally more pleasant phenomenon associated with the sky.

Brahma or creator worship is expressly forbidden by these schools, whereas, in western religion, it is the be-all-and-end-all, and hence we are separated by an impassable gulf. Biblical hell is based around Gehenna and seems to be a ploy based on fear for purposes of crowd control. They have many other contrivances, all engaged in the useless tasks of chasing effects to causes in a world that will never provide any answers, itself being a maya or creation, temporary, a collection of things that are born and die.

Transcendence is to seek That which is not born and does not die, which is clearly not the Creator.

We have far less understanding of natural forces as they relate to consciousness if we are still baffled by someone growing a plant in twenty minutes. For the most part we remain unevolved, seeking to become more attached to form and that mind that is chained to form. Wanting that kind of power for its own sake.

The real anchor point is the Heart, and until people sacrifice themselves to this--completely and utterly--they are not much different from dangerous animals. If you do, you will find it is made from the Sun in some invisible way; not really made, but actually identical. You will feel it much more than you will learn it like those big books of facts.

[greybeard]

Johnf thanks for the link
I have downloaded the content
Chris

http://www.buddhanet.net/pdf_file/allexistence.pdf

[Eagle Eye]

These verses are description of Heaven and Hell which many people know that exists, many of them are unsure and also many reject them. With this post I have completed my duty to warn this precious community of truth seekers.

[31 : 8] Indeed, those who believe and do righteous deeds - for them are the Gardens of Bliss.
[3 : 133] And hasten to forgiveness from your Lord and a Garden as wide as the heavens and earth, prepared for the righteous.
[50 : 31] And Paradise will be brought near to the righteous, not far. (I think that this verse proves the existence of the two greatest portals.)
[7 : 42] But those who believed and did righteous deeds - We charge no soul except its capacity. Those are the companions of Paradise; they will abide therein eternally.
[61 : 12] He will forgive for you your sins and admit you to gardens beneath which rivers flow and pleasant dwellings in gardens of perpetual residence. That is the great attainment.


[7 : 40] Indeed, those who reject Our Signs and are arrogant toward them - the gates of Heaven will not be opened for them, nor will they enter Paradise until a camel enters into the eye of a needle. And thus do We recompense the criminals.
[89 : 23] And brought, that Day, is Hell - that Day, man will remember, but what good to him will be the remembrance?
[7 : 179] And We have certainly created for Hell many of the jinn and mankind. They have hearts with which they do not understand, they have eyes with which they do not see, and they have ears with which they do not hear. Those are like livestock; rather, they are more astray. It is they who are the heedless.
[11 : 105] The Day it comes no soul will speak except by His permission. And among them will be the wretched and the prosperous.
[11 : 106] As for those who were wretched, they will be in the Fire. For them therein is exhaling and inhaling.