Key of Knowledge

SR No.: 006702
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Champat Rai Jain
Publisher: ZZZ Unknown
Publication Year: 1919
Total Pages: 1204
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 25 MB

Page 294

THE KINGDOM OF GOD.
individuals who might be able to perform tapas (austerities), i.e., to observe the vows or rules of conduct becoming pious or religious men, all those who have no idea of their true Self are necessarily debarred from the heavens, not to mention Nirvana-the Happy Home beyond the turbulent sea of samsara (transmigration).
Now, let us also observe the change of circumstances which a belief in the existence of the ego as a separate entity would effect in the life of the soul. It would, firstly, stand by, as it were, and see the body decline and disintegrate, without being affected by the sight. Secondly, it would enjoy self-consciousness, instead of the body-consciousness, with which it was formerly encumbered, though the form of its belief about its own nature would here also affect its status in its subsequent career as an incarnating ego. If it has perfected itself in belief, knowledge and conduct, it would reach nirvana on parting company from its physical body; otherwise it would wander about from life to life, till it qualify itself for liberation.
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It is, thus, evident that, so far as the soul is concerned, death is a mere delusion arising from the belief in its identity with its physical body. Hence, the terror of death loses its sting when the soul recognises itself as different and distinct from the body of matter in which it is ensouled.
So much for the idea of death; as regards death itself, it has been already stated that the true significance of decease consists in the separation of the soul from the body to be reborn elsewhere immediately. This is due to the fact that death does not also destroy
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