Could All Religions Be True?

Your soul is immortal. But it may not be what you think it is.

“Die happily and look forward to taking up a new and better form. Like the sun, only when you set in the west can you rise in the east.” — Rumi

Shopping in the Afterlife

A couple of years ago, I found myself in a conversation about the afterlife with a preacher from the local Assemblies of God church in our town. By “conversation,” I mean she talked while I listened. Her vision of the afterlife left me speechless.

“In Heaven, the sun will always shine! We’ll lounge on white sand beaches drinking fruit juice and laughing joyfully! Then we’ll go to golden shopping malls where the shelves are always filled with every kind of wonder, and everything is free!”

Wait, what? Golden shopping malls? Eternal consumerism?

For the record, you won’t find anything like her vision of Heaven in the Bible, the newest book of which, Revelation, was composed before the year 100. Shopping malls didn’t exist until 1956.

What my friend was describing (and projecting as universal for everyone) was a heavenly afterlife that would make her happy. That would delight her earthly personality, with its materialistic, shop-till-you-drop tastes.

And she fully expected to arrive there one day, in person, just as she was.

What About Us Survives Death?

Every Christian I’ve ever known (including me, growing up) at least appeared to believe their personality is immortal. That the person they experience themselves to be, on an everyday basis in this one life, is destined to live with God for eternity in Heaven. Their dead relatives will be there to meet them, recognizably the same people they were here on earth — happier, but still the same basic folks. This may not be a theologically sound belief, owing as much to Hollywood as it does to the Bible, but I do think it’s a common Christian view of the afterlife.

But is our personality, with all its foibles and failings, desires and dreads, wonders and woe, really what survives death? The part of us most shaped by the outside world? By growing up with our good or bad parents, by what we were or weren’t taught in school, by the jobs we’ve had, the opportunities life has offered or withheld, the people we’ve known, TV, the internet…?

Are we really destined (or doomed, as the case may be) to remain the person this single earthly lifetime has made of us, forever and ever, Amen?

Atman — Your Soul is not Your Personality

Not according to Hinduism, where the soul is known as Atman.

Here’s a definition, from Yogaopedia:

Atman is a Sanskrit word that can be translated as “self” or “breath.” It is a word that is used in Hinduism to describe the concept of the inner Self. Each person’s Atman is regarded as being a part of the universal Brahman [God], which is the eternal Truth or the absolute Universal Principle. … Atman is seen as being the true Self or Essence of a person.

Digging deeper into why our personalities can’t be our souls, here’s Mark Berkson, from his Great Courses lecture series Cultural Literacy for Religion: Everything the Well-Educated Person Should Know:

So what is the Atman? … What is the true, supreme self? … One way to describe the nature of Atman is pure consciousness. Pure subjectivity. Awareness itself.

… When you think of being conscious, you normally think of being conscious of something. Conscious of something you see, or taste, or hear. If your Atman is pure subject, then it cannot be an object. So anything that can be an object of your consciousness cannot be it. Since you can be conscious of your body, it can’t be your body. You can also be conscious of your thoughts, your emotions, your sensations. Thus none of these is your true self, the pure subject. Take away everything that can be an object of consciousness, and what is left? Consciousness itself… this is your true identity. And that is changeless, deathless, eternal.

Who Knows?

You can certainly be conscious of your personality. In fact, you probably know yourself pretty well. You’ve been living with you your whole life. No one knows you like you do.

But ask yourself: Who is it that knows?

When you know yourself, when you’re conscious of your own personality, your likes and dislikes, your memories of who you’ve been, your dreams for the future, your talents, your yearnings, your fears — Who is doing the knowing? Who is aware of the personality you usually think of as “I?”

Your Atman. Your soul. The pure consciousness, the awareness itself, that is your true Self or Essence — the witness to all the events of your life, inner and outer, from cradle to grave.

And that’s what reincarnates, according to Hinduism.

“As a person sheds worn-out garments and wears new ones, likewise, at the time of death, the soul casts off its worn-out body and enters a new one.” — Bhagavad Gita: Chapter 2, Verse 22

At death, your Atman returns to live another life with its own likes and dislikes, memories, dreams, talents, yearning, fears. To witness the travails, from cradle to grave, of a new personality.

But it’s still you.

Because you are not your personality. You are your Atman. You are your immortal soul.

Approximate Conceptions

Which remains true whether our souls reincarnate after death or go on to spend eternity with God.

In a 1944 letter, Swiss psychologist Carl Jung wrote:

“What happens after death is so unspeakably glorious that our imaginations and our feelings do not suffice to form even an approximate conception of it.”

Whatever comes next, don’t expect any golden shopping malls in the afterlife. The personality that cared about such “approximate conceptions” won’t be there.

You will.

From my book  Could All Religions Be True? The Short Answer is Yes. Essays from Outside the Spiritual Box: