Life after death stories. What is the afterlife - Paradise. The stories of people who have been to hell
As long as mankind has existed, so much it asks the question: is there life after death? And if it is, then what is the human soul? The answers to this question varied at different times. For example, the Greek philosopher Democritus believed that the soul is a lump of hot and soft-touching substance that can be touched. Plato, on the contrary, believed that the soul is incorporeal and lives wherever it wants.
In the twentieth century, in an age of total scientific domination, the soul was completely denied existence. They believed that the priests invented the soul in order to lure people into the temples, and there is no life after death. This was considered to be so until the time when Raymond Moody, a resuscitator from America, became interested in the stories of people who had experienced clinical death and wanted to somehow systematize them. Then incredible things came to light.
Instead of meeting the requirements of science and admitting that life stops after cardiac arrest, all patients, as if in conspiracy, talk about amazing events. Moreover, curiously, everyone tells about the same thing, as if in reality they have been somewhere in the same place.
So, then, something happens to the soul after death that official science has no idea about? It was after the sensational report of Dr. Moody that the scientific world became concerned with the problem of the human soul and set out in search of it. For example, from the achievements of a group of scientists from St. Petersburg, it was even possible to invent a special apparatus capable of photographing the soul, or rather the energy that lives in us together with the physical body ...
Alexander Shein, resuscitator:
“There was such a patient, I remember her very well. She, unfortunately, died - she had diabetes and many related complications. This woman experienced several massive heart attacks, she simply died before my eyes and she died literally with a smile on her face. And always, when she was still in full memory, in consciousness, she made it clear that everything that was happening to her, although it is sad and bitter, but for her it was not a final departure from life. This is a simple transition somewhere, into some other being, which happened to her during clinical death. "
Buddhists have a special instruction, Bardo Thodol, known in the West as the "Tibetan Book of the Dead." It describes in detail everything that awaits a person after the death of a physical body. An ancient manuscript written several thousand years ago contains detailed descriptions of what is now commonly called clinical death.
One of the key points is bright light. The Tibetan Book of the Dead is a set of guidelines describing what happens to consciousness after physical death. The first thing the soul sees is a tunnel of white light:
“Soon you will exhale with your last breath, and it will stop. Here you will see the eternal Pure Light. An incredible Expanse will open before you, boundless, like an Ocean without waves, under a cloudless sky. You will float like a feather, free, alone.
Do not be distracted, do not rejoice! Do not be afraid! This is the moment of your death! Use death, for this is a great opportunity. Keep your thoughts clear, not clouding them even with compassion. Let your love become passionless. After the exhalation stops completely, it will be good if someone reads these words clearly into the ear: "You are now in the Eternal Light, try to stay in this state that you are experiencing."
Modern science can explain the phenomena described in the ancient book. Clinical death is the first stage of dying biological organism... The beginning of the transition from life to death. During clinical death, the heart and breathing stop, all signs of vital activity disappear. During the first 10-15 minutes. a person can still be brought back to life, but this is not always the case. Only 5% of people who have been on the verge of death come back.
Andrey Yurkovskiy was lucky - he was able to survive clinical death. At the age of 12, Andrei was admitted to intensive care with anaphylactic shock. For several hours, doctors fought for the life of a teenager, but medicine was powerless. Doctors pronounced him dead.
Andrey Yurkovskiy, naval officer:
“The first thing I remembered was the doctors in white coats, the bustle around, then I began to seem to go somewhere ... I can't say what was happening further, but I remember, the scrolling of childhood memories began in my brain, I saw relatives ...”
While the boy's body was in the intensive care unit, his soul traveled in the Subtle World. Andrei recalls how he watched what was happening from the side. I saw doctors and relatives who could not find a place for themselves from excitement. I remembered how the doctors pronounced the fatal words: "Cardiac arrest" - and how the mother began to cry when she was told that her son had died. Andrey was considered dead for two days, but the doctors were wrong. The boy returned from the afterlife. He woke up unexpectedly, and the return was painful.
The doctors could not believe their eyes, they could not explain what had happened. Andrei was examined for a long time before he was discharged from the hospital. For the boy, the journey to the Subtle World was a real revelation. Thanks to clinical death, he realized that in addition to the physical body, there is some kind of substance that continues to live when the body dies.
Rushel Blavo, Dr. medical sciences, psychotherapist: "Man is not only a physical state, it is also the presence of mental, astral, etheric and other bodies and, of course, the soul itself."
Ancient people believed that after death the soul does not perish with the body, but passes into another world. There she continues to live. That is why they tried to provide the dead with everything they needed. In ancient burials, archaeologists find weapons and household items. The ancient Egyptians built majestic tombs for the pharaohs - pyramids. They believed that these gigantic structures would become a safe haven in the afterlife.
The famous athlete Eduard Serebryakov, champion of the USSR and Russia in Greco-Roman wrestling, experienced clinical death. He still considers this to be the most important event in his life.
E. Serebryakov, former athlete, champion of the USSR and the Russian Federation in Greco-Roman wrestling:
“What did clinical death give me? She changes life. I know that it is, and others do not know. When people find themselves in some kind of extreme situation, some kind of catastrophe happens to them, at this time certain forces intervene that change a person ... "
The tragedy took place on May 14, 1997. Eduard, as usual, went to work in his car. Approaching a railway crossing, he felt that the car had lost control. He hit the brake, and the pedal fell through, went into the floor. As they later found out, an attempt was made on the athlete, the brake hoses were cut, and he could not slow down. In the end, he still braked, but stopped right in the middle of the crossing.
And this moment his alarm went off, the doors were locked. Everything happened in a matter of seconds. The athlete's car was at the railway crossing, and he could not get out of it. In a moment, he saw that the electric train was rushing right at him. The man understood: a collision is inevitable and there is practically no chance of survival. For him, at that moment, time seemed to have stopped.
Eduard Serebryakov:
“Immediately a thought arose in my head: is this really my last day? How is this so, there must be some sign from above ?! It turns out that there is no sign, everything happens unexpectedly. These 2-3 sec. stretched out for hours or a whole day. Then there was such an unpleasant thought: I’ll be crippled all over ... I jumped into the back seat so that at least my face would remain intact, covered my head, turned my back to the window intuitively, hoping that I would be cured of the blow.
Then came a blow ... I see that I am lying in a coffin, I see my relatives. They mourn me. Some say that after the onset of death they climbed upward and saw the doctors. I didn't have that. I simply saw my funeral, felt myself lying in a coffin, saw that people were saying goodbye to me ... I can't say how long it lasted. "
Edward watched his own funeral, realizing that he continued to exist. He felt such peace and serenity that to this day he cannot find words to describe these feelings. Edward says that he understood why people who have the opportunity to return at the time of death prefer to stay there. The point is that there is bliss.
The return was sudden. He heard sharp, loud, unpleasant sounds, and then he made out the driver's voice: "Man, are you alive?" Edward replied, "I don't know." At first he was not clear where, then suddenly again a sharp transition, and then the driver with his question ...
Serebryakov was able to survive miraculously. During the collision, the train did not crush the car, but, hooking it onto the track cleaner, like a pitchfork, dragged it several tens of meters until the train came to a complete stop. The guy was seriously injured. There is a large scar on his head. His ribs and leg were broken, his whole body would have been cuts and bruises. For almost six months, the athlete was in the hospital. There he realized that after traveling to the next world something had changed in him.
Eduard Serebryakov:
“Why I came back here, I do not know. They know it higher power... It means you need it for something. I can only guess, guess. Perhaps I returned in order to take the old woman across the road tomorrow so that she would not die under the car. Perhaps in order to talk to you, so that someone would hear my story ... "
After returning from the afterlife, Eduard Serebryakov absolutely changed his life. He retired from sports and began to write poetry. But not just poetry, but rhymed prophecies.
The girl was holding the bell
The wind ruffled her hair
Only life was dying sadly
And sadness was her ending
I see reflections on the moon
In this mirror of bottomless emptiness
Seeks pleasure like a madman
In killing your own soul
The sound cuts, then jumps cheerfully
Sticky sweat does not confirm fear
The stone wears away the water in this tale
Because it is softer now
Eduard Serebryakov:
“I wrote these lines a few hours before Beslan. It was written somehow by itself. I understand that it was the higher powers that guided me. On the first of September, I suddenly find out on the news about the seizure of the school. Remember how the children suffered there? You see, a stone wears away water, and not vice versa, and sticky sweat ... "
It is noticed that, after clinical death, a person changes dramatically. He seems to be rethinking his life, and there is a scientific explanation for this. Psychologists, for example, compare posthumous experiences with shock therapy. They consider the realization of the unexpected finitude of being one of the most powerful stimuli for the disclosure of human potential.
Everything that does not kill us makes us stronger. The experience of dying helps a person to develop further. Another question: is he able to accept and use this negative experience for some kind of movement forward?
People who have experienced clinical death sometimes acquire the ability to telepathy and clairvoyance.
The famous neurophysiologist Natalya Bekhtereva believed that these phenomena actually exist. For a long time, she worked in intensive care, watching dozens of returns from the other world. The reanimated described a black tunnel, at the end of which a light is visible, talked about the sensation of flight and described the bright light that was at the end of the tunnel. Natalya Bekhtereva tried to understand what is happening at this time with the human brain, and to answer the question of whether the dying person's soul actually leaves the body during clinical death.
The result of almost half a century of scientific work of the neurophysiologist N. Bekhtereva was a sensational conclusion. The human brain is a kind of receiving and transmitting mechanism in which human consciousness is formed. But consciousness is not directly connected to the brain, it only uses the brain to receive signals. The brain receives information, processes it and only then makes logical decisions. But who is dictating these signals? After all, sometimes people get a ready-made formulation out of nowhere. According to Bekhtereva, this “someone” is our soul. It is she who, at clinical death, leaves the body and receives information, which, after returning to the body, is processed by the brain.
Moreover, during clinical death, a kind of "reboot" of the brain occurs. Our thinking machine starts working in a different mode. The most ancient sites that were not previously used are being activated. It is they who endow a person with unusual abilities. In the course of evolution, these capabilities of the human brain turned out to be blocked.
Leningrad region, 2008 House is on fire. The second floor is on fire. Thick clouds of smoke are pouring from the windows. A strange body rushes along the roof, and then merges with a column of smoke and rushes upward. People died in the fire, and the camera was able to capture their souls. Thin bodies often end up in the camera lens. These are translucent balls with an inhomogeneous structure. More often they appear in places where human emotions are manifested in excess, for example, in cemeteries.
1828, May 18, Crete. At the castle of Franco-Castello, a battle took place between the Greeks and the Turks. For 7 days, bloody battles took place under the walls of the fortress.
Tatiana Syrchenko, editor of the Anomaliya newspaper:
“The history of human lives leaves its mark. And what people call ghosts are, in fact, traces. This can be called phantoms or manifestations of some substances unknown to us so far. "
Since then, every year on May 18, the battle has been repeated over and over again. With the first rays of the sun, ghost warriors appear over the horizon. They head towards the coast. Accidental witnesses say that at the same time one can hear a horse stomp, the screams of soldiers and even the groans of the wounded. Researchers refer to these rare phenomena as chrono-mirage. They reproduce real historical events. You can often observe this kind of phenomenon in places where tragic events took place. Souls dead people, the ghosts of the past, can remain at the place of their death for an indefinite time.
It is generally accepted that a person has 7 bodies: physical, etheric, astral, karmic, and so on. Scientists call them projections of a person in a multidimensional universe. After all, it has been scientifically proven that before the big bang, the universe existed in 10 dimensions. In this way, physical body a person lives in a three-dimensional world, the etheric - in a four-dimensional, astral body - in the fifth dimension. And after the death of a person, these essences begin to decay rapidly. First, the physical body dies, on the 9th day - the etheric, on the 40th - the astral. And only then goes to freedom what the religions of the whole world call the soul.
A ghost is nothing more than an etheric body. The etheric body is the same as our physical body, but only having a four-dimensional nature; it is, as it were, a little slowed down in time. Such a ghost may be right here, but we will not see it, because it does not refract sunlight.
Often in the event of violent or unexpected death, the human consciousness cannot recognize the fact of its own death and tries to continue its usual existence. And sometimes it simply does not understand what happened to him.
According to people who call themselves mediums, most people simply did not realize that they had died. They do not know that they are already dead, just as many do not know that they are alive during their lifetime. People mechanically do something throughout their life, and when death occurs, they simply continue to do the same after death. Thus, a person can go to work even after death, meet someone there, dream about something. Especially if he died unexpectedly. Those who commit suicide and people who die suddenly become ghosts. Their etheric bodies are doomed to wander forever.
Eduard Gulyaev, Doctor of Energy and Information Sciences, Professor: “Ghosts and ghosts are real-life clots of energy. Most often these are etheric bodies thrown off at the moment of a strong shock. "
The ghost of Emperor Paul I, who was killed in the Engineering Castle, frightens tourists to this day. Witnesses describe a ghostly figure strolling through the castle, sometimes even playing the flute.
According to researchers, the Subtle World exists in parallel with the physical world. This is a world of energy and information. What is called the "subtle world", "other planes", " parallel worlds"- these are simply, perhaps, those aspects that our consciousness does not perceive until a certain moment. And then, at some point, switching, he begins to perceive.
It is believed that the Subtle World is inhabited by the souls of people and animals, the spirits of the elements and different kinds disembodied creatures. It is there that a person's life continues after death. This is where ghosts and ghosts come from. According to psychics, we can draw information from non-material sources. This extrasensory information can tell us about the future or the past.
Numerous evidences of encounters with ghosts and ghosts do not allow us to neglect this phenomenon. It is believed that these are the souls of the dead who want to convey to the living some messages or requests. For example, the ghost of the poet Dante Alighieri appeared to his son to indicate the place where the last songs of the "Divine Comedy" are hidden ...
St. Ignatius (Brianchaninov):
Perfect Christians, who have purified their senses, as if they saw the sky, and saw in the sky and in the air that which we do not see with our plump eyes. So, suddenly, through the action of the Holy Spirit, the Holy First Martyr Stephen saw the opening of heaven before his suffering death, standing in a large gathering of Jews hostile to Christ and Christianity. “Stephen,” says Holy Scripture, “this fill the Holy Spirit, looking up to heaven, he sees the glory of God and Jesus standing at the right hand of God, and speaking: behold, I see the heavens open and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God” (Acts 7:55, 56).
The heavenly saints saw heaven and the entrance of their teacher into the gates of heaven disciples of Macarius the Great of course, as did Stephen, through the mediation of the Holy Spirit.
Saw Monk Isidore of Skete, who was present at the death of the young ascetic Zechariah, the heavenly gates were opened for the dying man and exclaimed: "Rejoice, my son Zacharias: the heavenly gates have opened for you!"
I saw, as already mentioned above, Venerable John Kolov the radiant path from earth to heaven, along which the Angels lifted the soul of the deceased.
I saw, with the opening of the eyes of the soul, the sky opened and the lightning angel descended from there Elder Paisiy Nyametsky's mother, inconsolably grieving over the departure of her son to monasticism. When feelings, no longer bound by the fall, begin to act, their action is unusually refined, the very circle of action takes on vast dimensions - the space for them is reduced. The above visions of the saints are proof enough of this; but for the sake of clarity, we do not stop to present other spiritual experiences.
Saint Anthony the Great, who lived in one of the deserts of Egypt, not far from the Red Sea, saw the soul lifted up to heaven by the Angels Reverend Ammon, who labored at the other end of Egypt, in the Nitrian desert. The disciples of the Great noticed the day and hour of the vision, - then they learned from the brethren who came from Nitria that the Monk Ammon died on that very day and hour at which the Monk Anthony the Great saw the ascension of his soul. The distance between the deserts required thirty days of travel for a pedestrian. It is obvious that the vision of a Christian, renewed by the Holy Spirit and attained a high degree of perfection, extends far beyond the limits of human vision in its ordinary state; like renewed vision, renewed hearing also acts. It was not difficult for the spirit-bearing disciples of Macarius the Great to see the procession of his soul through the air and to hear the words spoken by her in the air and at the entrance to the heavenly gates.
Saint Athanasius the Great, patriarch of Alexandria, in biography Monk Anthony the Great narrates the following:
“Once, at the approach of the ninth hour, he (Anthony), starting to pray before eating food, was suddenly caught up by the Spirit and lifted up by the Angels to the heights. The air demons opposed his march; Angels, arguing with them, demanded an explanation of the reasons for their opposition, because Anthony had no sins. The demons tried to expose the sins he had committed from his very birth; but the Angels blocked the lips of the slanderers, telling them that they should not count his sins from birth, already blotted out by the grace of Christ, but let them present, if they have, the sins he committed after the time he dedicated himself to God by entering monasticism. When accused, the demons uttered many blatant lies; but as their slander was devoid of evidence, a free path was opened for Anthony. Immediately he came to himself and saw that he was standing in the very place where he had stood for prayer. Forgetting about food, he spent the whole night in tears and groans, thinking about the multitude of human enemies, about the struggle with such an army, about the difficulty of the way to heaven through the air and about the words of the Apostle, who said: “Our fight is against flesh and blood, but to the beginning "of the power of this air (Eph. 6:12), which, knowing that the air authorities are only looking for this, they take care of that with all their efforts, they strain and strive to deny us a free passage to heaven, exhorts:" take all the weapons of God, so that you can resist in the day of fierceness "(Eph. 6:13)," let the opposite be ashamed, having nothing to say about us "(Titus 2: 8).
Hermit Zadonsky Georgy tells an event that is almost contemporary to us: Archimandrite Barsanuphius (of the Zadonsk Monastery) froze for three days. At this time, he was in his soul in airy ordeals, undergoing torture for all the sins he had committed from his youth, but he heard the voice of God: "Prayers for the sake of the Most Holy Theotokos, the holy martyr Mokias and the stratilates Andrew, are forgiven his sins, and time is given to repentance."
- When I was dying, I saw some Ethiopians standing in front of me; their appearance was very terrible, and my soul was confused. Then I saw two very handsome young men; my soul rushed to them, and immediately, as if flying from the earth, we began to ascend to heaven, meeting the ordeal on the way 3), holding the soul of every person and everyone who tortures it about a special sin: one about lies, the other about envy, the third about pride; so every sin in the air has its testers, And so I saw in the ark held by the angels, all my good deeds, which the angels compared with my evil deeds. So we passed these ordeals. When we, approaching the heavenly gates, came to the ordeal of fornication, fears detained me there and began to show all my prodigal carnal deeds that I had done from my childhood to death, and the angels leading me told me: “All bodily sins that what you did while in the city, God forgave you, because you repented of them. " But the nasty spirits told me: "But when you left the city, you seduced your farmer with the wife of your farmer in the field." Hearing this, the angels did not find a good deed that could be opposed to this sin and, leaving me, they left. Then the evil spirits, taking me, began to beat me and then brought me down; the earth parted, and I, being led by narrow entrances through narrow and stinking wells, descended to the very depths of the dungeons of hell, where the souls of sinners are locked in eternal darkness, where there is no life for people, but only eternal torment, inconsolable crying and unspeakable gnashing of teeth. There is always a desperate cry: “Woe, woe to us! Alas, alas! " And it is impossible to convey all the sufferings there, it is impossible to retell all the torments and diseases that I saw. They moan from the depths of their souls, and no one is merciful about them; they cry, and there is no one who comforts; they pray, and there is no one who hears them and delivers them. And I was imprisoned in those gloomy places full of terrible sorrow, and I wept and wept bitterly ... "
- Oh, what glory you have won, Macarius!
The saint answered the demons:
“I’m afraid, for I don’t know anything good that I would do.
Then those of the demons who were even higher along the path of the soul of Macarius who followed, cried out:
- You really escaped our hands, Macarius!
But he said:
- No, but we must also avoid it.
And when the monk was already at the gates of paradise, the demons, with a strong cry, shouted:
- Escaped us, escaped.
- Yes! Shielded by the power of my Christ, I have escaped your wiles.
Such is the life, death and transition into eternal life of our venerable father Macarius.
The great saint of God, spectator of mysteries, Saint Niphon, Bishop of the Cypriot city of Constance, once standing in prayer, saw the heavens open and a multitude of Angels, some of whom descended to earth, others ascended mountain, lifting human souls into heavenly abodes ... He began to listen to this spectacle, and now - two Angels aspired to the height, carrying a soul. When they approached the prodigal ordeal, the demons came out and said with anger: “This is our soul! How dare you carry her past us when she's ours? " The angels answered: "On what basis do you call her yours?" - The demons said: "Until her death, she sinned, defiling not only natural, but also extraordinary sins, besides, she condemned her neighbor, and worst of all, she died without repentance: what do you say to that?" - The angels answered: "Truly we will not believe either you or your father, Satan, until we ask the Guardian Angel of this soul." The asked Guardian Angel said: “Surely, this man has sinned a lot; but just got sick, began to cry and confess his sins to God. Whether God forgave him, He knows. The power, the glory of the righteous judgment. " Then the Angels, despising the accusation of demons, entered with a soul into the gates of heaven. - Then the Blessed One saw another soul, lifted up by the Angels. Demons, running out to them, cried out: "Why carry souls without our knowledge, like this one, gold-loving, prodigal, quarrelsome, practicing robbery?" The Angels answered: "We probably know that although she fell into all this, she cried, sighed, confessing and giving alms, and therefore God granted her forgiveness." The demons said: “If this soul is worthy of God's mercy, then take the sinners of the whole world; we have nothing to work here. " The angels answered them: “All sinners who confess their sins with humility and tears will receive forgiveness by the grace of God; but those who die without repentance are judged by God. " Thus, having put the demons to shame, they passed. Again I saw the Saint ascending the soul of a man who loves God, pure, merciful, loving to all. The demons stood in the distance and gnashed their teeth at this soul; The angels of God came out to meet her from the gates of heaven and, greeting her, said: "Glory to Thee, Christ God, that Thou didst not deliver her into the hands of enemies and delivered her from hell!" - Blessed Niphon also saw that demons were drawing a certain soul to hell. It was the soul of one slave, whom the master tormented with hunger and beatings, and who, unable to bear the languor, strangled himself, being taught by the devil. The guardian angel walked in the distance and wept bitterly; demons rejoiced. And there came out a command from God to the crying Angel to go to Rome, there to take over the custody of the newborn baby, who was baptized at that time. - Again I saw the Holy Soul, which the Angels carried through the air, which the demons took from them in the fourth ordeal and plunged into the abyss. It was the soul of a man devoted to fornication, magic and robbery, who died suddenly without repentance.
- Well, the Kingdom of Heaven to him, eternal rest.
And as soon as she uttered these words, two Angels appeared beside me; in one of them, for some reason, I recognized my Guardian Angel, and the other was unknown to me.
Taking my arms, the Angels carried me straight through the wall from the chamber to the street.
... We began to climb up quickly. And as we rose, more and more space opened up to my gaze, and finally it took on such terrifying dimensions that I was seized by fear from the consciousness of my insignificance in front of this endless desert ....
I don’t know how long we still climbed up, when suddenly some vague noise was heard first, and then, floating out from somewhere, a crowd of some ugly creatures began to approach us with a shout and cackle.
"Demons!" - with extraordinary speed I realized and was numb from some kind of special, hitherto unknown to me horror.
Demons! Oh, how much irony, how much the most sincere laughter would have caused in me just a few days, even hours ago, someone's message not only that he saw demons with his own eyes, but that he admits their existence as creatures of a certain kind! As befits an educated person of the late nineteenth century, by this name I meant evil inclinations, passions in a person, which is why this word itself had for me the meaning not of a name, but of a term that defined a certain abstract concept. And suddenly this "well-known abstract concept" appeared to me as a living personification!
I can’t even say to this day how and why I then without the slightest bewilderment recognized demons in this ugly vision. There is no doubt only that such a definition has completely gone out of the order of things and logic, for if I had seen such a sight at another time, I would undoubtedly say that this is some kind of fiction in faces, an ugly whim of fantasy - in a word, anything , but, of course, I would never have called it by the name by which I understood something that cannot be seen. But then this definition poured out with such rapidity, as if there was no need to think, as if I saw something for a long time and well known to me, and since my mental faculties worked at the time, as I said, with some incomprehensible energy, then I almost as quickly realized that the ugly appearance of these creatures was not their real appearance, that it was some kind of disgusting masquerade, probably invented with the aim of frightening me more, and for a moment something like pride stirred inside of me. I felt ashamed of myself, of a person in general, that in order to frighten him, who thinks so much of himself, other creatures resort to such methods that we practice only in relation to small children.
Having surrounded us on all sides, the demons with shouts and shouts demanded that I be given to them, they tried to somehow grab me and snatch me out of the hands of the Angels, but, obviously, did not dare to do this. Among their unimaginable and just as disgusting to the ear as they themselves were to sight, howling and din, I sometimes caught words and whole phrases.
“He is ours, he has denied God,” they suddenly yelled almost in one voice, and at the same time they rushed at us with such impudence that every thought froze from fear for a moment.
"It's a lie! It is not true!" - Recovering myself, I wanted to shout, but an obliging memory tied my tongue. In some incomprehensible way, I suddenly remembered such a small, insignificant event, and, moreover, related to a long past era of my youth, which, it seems, I could not even remember.
I remembered how, back in the days of my studies, having once gathered at a friend's place, we, having talked about our school affairs, then moved on to talk about various abstract and tall subjects- conversations that we often conducted.
“I don’t like abstractions at all,” said one of my comrades, “but here it’s a complete impossibility. I can believe in some force of nature, even if it has not yet been investigated by science, that is, I can admit its existence without seeing its obvious, definite manifestations, because it can be very insignificant or merging in its actions with other forces and that is why it is difficult to grasp it, but to believe in God as a personal and omnipotent Being, to believe when I do not see any clear manifestations of this Personality anywhere is absurd. They say to me: believe. But why should I believe when I can equally believe that there is no God? Isn't it true? And maybe He is not? - already point-blank to me, the comrade reacted.
“Maybe not,” I said.
This phrase was in the full sense of the word "an idle verb": in me the stupid speech of my friend could not cause doubts about the existence of God, I did not even really follow the conversation, and now it turned out that this idle verb had not disappeared without a trace in the air, I should have to make excuses, to defend oneself against the accusation against me, and thus the Gospel legend was confirmed that, if not by the will of the leader secret heart human God, then out of the malice of the enemy of our salvation, we really have to give an answer in every idle word.
This accusation, apparently, was the strongest argument for my destruction for the demons, they seemed to have drawn from it new strength for the courage of their attacks on me and, with a frantic roar, spun around us, blocking our further path.
I remembered prayer and began to pray, calling for help from those saints whom I knew and whose names came to my mind.
But this did not frighten my enemies.
A pathetic ignoramus, a Christian only by name, I almost for the first time remembered the One who is called the Intercessor of the Christian family.
But, probably, my impulse to Her was ardent, probably, my soul was so filled with horror that as soon as I remembered, I pronounced Her name, when suddenly some white fog appeared around us, which began to quickly cover the ugly host of demons, hiding it from my eyes before it could separate from us. Their roar and cackle could be heard for a long time, but from the way it gradually weakened and became more muffled, I could understand that the terrible chase lagged behind us.
The feeling of fear I experienced so captured me in everything that I did not even realize whether we continued our flight during this terrible meeting or whether it stopped us for a while; I realized that we were moving, that we were continuing to climb upward, only when the endless air space spread out before me again.
Having passed some of its distance, I saw a bright light above me: it resembled, as it seemed to me, our sun, but was much stronger than it. There is probably some kind of kingdom of light.
“Yes, it is the Kingdom, the complete sovereignty of light,” I thought, anticipating with some special feeling what I had not yet seen, because there are no shadows in this light. "But how can there be light without a shadow?" - my earthly concepts.
And suddenly we quickly entered the sphere of this light, and it literally blinded me. I closed my eyes, brought my hands to my face, but it did not help, since my hands did not give a shadow. And what did such protection mean here ?!
“My God, what is this, what kind of light is this? For me, it’s the same darkness. I can’t look and, as in darkness, I don’t see anything, ”I prayed, comparing my earthly vision and forgetting, or perhaps even not realizing that now such a comparison was not good, that now I could see in the darkness ...
This impossibility to see, to look increased for me the fear of the unknown, natural when I was in a world unknown to me, and I thought with anxiety: “What will happen next? How soon will we pass this sphere of light and is there a limit to it, an end? " But something else happened. Majestically, without anger, but imperiously and unshakably from above, the words were heard:
- Not ready!
And then ... then an instant stop in our headlong flight upward - and we quickly began to descend.
… I did not understand the real meaning of the words that applied to me, that is, I did not understand that I must return to earth and live again the same way as before; I thought that I was being carried to some other country, and a feeling of timid protest stirred in me when, at first, vaguely, as in a morning fog, the outlines of the city appeared before me, and then the familiar streets clearly appeared.
Here is the hospital building that I remember. Just as before, through the walls of the building and the closed doors I was brought into a room completely unknown to me; in this room stood in a row several tables painted with dark paint, and on one of them, covered with something white, I saw myself lying or, rather, my dead, numb body.
Not far from my table, a gray-haired old man in a brown jacket was reading the Psalter with a bent wax candle along the lines of a large print, and on the other side, on a black bench that stood along the wall, sat, apparently already notified of my death and had time to arrive, my sister and beside her, bending down and saying something quietly to her, is her husband.
- Have you heard God's definition? - leading me to the table, my Guardian Angel, who had been silent until now, turned to me and, pointing then with his hand at my dead body, said:
- Come in and get ready.
And for this, both Angels became invisible to me ...
He heard all his sins, beginning from his youth, which he either did not confess, or forgot, or did not realize as sins, cry out against him, each with his own voice, and with sorrow accuse him ... Everything that he did for everything days of his life and refused to confess, and much that he did not consider a sin - they all now shouted terrible words against him. And in the same way, evil spirits, enumerating vices, accusing and bearing testimonies, even naming the time and place, brought evidence of his evil deeds ... And so, having heaped up and numbered all his sins, these ancient enemies declared him guilty and incontrovertible their power.
“On the other hand,” he said, “the small, pitiful virtues that I had unworthily and imperfectly spoke in my defense ... And these Angelic spirits in their boundless love protected and supported me, and slightly exaggerated virtues seemed beautiful to me and far more than I could ever have shown on my own. "
When the hour of my death came, I suddenly saw many evil spirits who appeared to me in the form of Ethiopians [Ethiopians (after the name of the people inhabiting the region of Africa southeast of Egypt, which is distinguished by black skin color) Christian writers often call dark spirits of malice] and, standing by my bed, they had outrageous conversations and gazed at me brutally ... Their eyes were bloodshot and seemed blacker than tar. Evil spirits did all sorts of things to frighten me: they were going to kidnap, and appropriate for themselves, and they brought big books, in which all my sins that I had just committed since the day of my youth were recorded; revised these books, as if expecting from minute to minute the arrival of some judge. Seeing all this, I was worried with fear. With trepidation and horror, I was completely exhausted and in such suffering I looked here and there, wanting to see someone and ask them to drive these outrageous Ethiopians away, but, alas, there was no one to help me get rid of them.
Being in such a painful state, I suddenly saw two Angels in the form of bright youths, very fine looking, dressed in golden robes; their hair was like snow. They approached my bed and stood on the right side. There was no limit to my joy when I saw them. The evil spirits, seeing the Angels appeared, immediately moved away with fear. Then one of the Angels turned to them with anger and asked: “Why do you, gloomy enemies of the human race, confuse and torment the soul of a dying woman? Do not rejoice, there is nothing of yours here. " After the Angel said this, the shameless spirits began to enumerate everything that I had done since my youth, whether by word, deed, or thought, - they all told the Angels and at the same time sarcastically asked them: “What? Isn't there anything? .. Didn't she do all this? .. ”And they added much, much more from themselves, wishing to slander me as much as possible.
Finally, death came. She poured something into a bowl, and what - I don't know, brought me a drink and then, taking a knife, cut off my head. Ah, my child, how bitter, bitter I felt then! And at that very moment, death plucked out my soul, which quickly separated from the body, just as a bird quickly bounces off the hand of a catcher if he sets it free.
Then the radiant Angels took me in their arms, and we began to ascend to heaven. Looking back, I saw my body lying motionless, soulless and insensitive, as clothes usually lie, when someone, having undressed, throws it and then, standing in front of it, looks at it. When the holy angels carried me, evil spirits came and said: "Here we have many of her sins: answer us for them." The holy angels responded by presenting all the good deeds that I had ever done: when I gave the poor bread, or gave drink to the thirsty, or visited the sick or prisoner in prison, or when I went to church with zeal, or gave a wanderer rest in the house. her own, or when she poured oil into a lamp in a church, or gave incense to the temple of God, or when she reconciled one of the enemies, or shed tears in prayer, or when she endured troubles with patience, or washed the feet of the strangers, or confirmed people in the faith low believers, or warned someone against sin, or grieved about other people's misfortunes and misfortunes, or suffered for others, or hurried to someone for a good deed, or made many bows; or when she fasted in order to conquer evil in herself and subdue the flesh to the spirit, or fasted at Forty, and for the Nativity of Christ, and for the holiday Holy apostles, and to the Dormition of the Most Holy Lady of our Mother of God, and on every Wednesday and heels; or when I tried not to see the useless, not to hear idle talk, slander and lies; Having collected all this, they opposed these good deeds to my sins, and the latter were redeemed first.
Opening one vessel after another, the young men poured aromas on me, I was filled with the fragrance of the spiritual and felt that I had changed and became very light. The monk said to the holy angels: “My Lord! When you have done everything necessary for her, then bring her to the abode prepared for me from the Lord and leave her there. " Having said this, he walked away.
The Holy Angels took me from the earth and headed up to heaven, as if going up through the air. And on the way, we suddenly met the first ordeal, which is called the ordeal. idle talk and foul language. The torturers appeared and demanded an answer in everything that I had ever said badly about anyone; I was accused of the bad songs that I sang, for indecent laughter and ridicule. All this was forgotten by me, since a lot of time has passed since then. But the Angels protected me from the torturers, and we went on.
Climbing higher to the sky, we reached the ordeal the second - the ordeal of lies... The evil spirits who were there were very vile, disgusting and ferocious. When they saw us, they came out to meet us and began to slander me, pointing out the time and place when and where I told a lie, even pointed out those persons about whom I told a lie. The angels, for their part, protected me and gave me to the evil torturers from the reliquary of St. Basil; and we passed them without trouble.
We have reached and third ordeal- ordeals condemnation and slander... There were many evil spirits here. One of them, the older one, came up and began to talk about when and with what bad words I had slandered whom throughout my life. It is true that they falsely showed a lot, but in any case it was surprising to me how they could remember everything that really happened with such detail and accuracy that I myself had forgotten. All this tormented and tormented me. The holy angels, for their part, told about my good deeds, separating them from the reliquary given by Saint Basil. We have passed this misfortune too.
We met further on the way of the ordeal fourth - gluttony and drunkenness... The servants of this ordeal stood like predatory wolves, ready to devour everyone who came to them. They pounced on me like dogs, expressing everything that I had done since my youth in regard to gluttony, recalled when I ate in the morning without praying to God, pointed out that I ate fast food on fast days, that I ate before dinner and during lunch, over the measure, that she ate without measure both before dinner and during supper; in all this they denounced me, trying to snatch me out of the hands of the Angels. Finally, one of them asked me: “Didn't you promise at holy baptism to your Lord your God to renounce Satan and all his works and all that belongs to Satan? Having made such a vow, how could you do what you did? " They even billed the cups that I had drunk throughout my life, telling me: “Didn't you drink so many cups on such and such a day, and on such and such a man drank with you, and on such a woman? Weren't you drunk, drinking beyond measure and so much? .. "In a word, these hated enemies of the human race slandered me a lot, trying to kidnap me from the hands of the Angels. Then I said that really all this was and that I remember all this ... The angels, having given a part of the reliquary of St. Basil, atoned for my sins of gluttony, and we went on.
One of the Angels told me: "You see, Theodora, what the soul of the deceased has to experience when it goes through all these ordeals and meets these evil spirits, these princes of darkness." I answered: “Yes, I saw and was terribly frightened; I think, do the people on earth know what awaits them here and what they will meet after their death? " “Yes, they know,” said the Angel, “but the pleasures and delights of life affect them so strongly, so absorb their attention that they involuntarily forget about what awaits them behind the grave. Good to those who remember the Holy Scriptures and do alms, or perform any other good deeds that can later redeem them from the eternal torment of hell. The same people who live carelessly, as if immortals, thinking only about the blessings of the womb and about pride - if they are suddenly overtaken by death, they will finally be destroyed, since they will not have any good deeds in defense of themselves. The souls of those people, the dark princes of these ordeals, having greatly tortured them, will take them to the dark places of hell and will keep them there until the coming of Christ - and you, Theodora, would have suffered so much if you had not received from the saint of God Basil the gifts that saved you here from everyone. these troubles ".
In such a conversation, we reached the fifth ordeal - the ordeal of laziness where sinners are tortured for all the days and hours spent in idleness. Immediately, the parasites, who lived by other people's labors, and did not want to work themselves, and the mercenaries who took pay, but did not fulfill the duties assumed, linger. Those who do not care about the glorification of God are immediately tortured, who are too lazy to go to church for morning services, Divine Liturgy and other sacred services on holidays and Sundays. Despondency and neglect of both worldly and spiritual people is immediately experienced, and everyone's carelessness for his soul is sorted out, and many of them are relegated to the abyss. And I was much tested there, and I could not have been freed from debts if the holy Angels had not made up for my shortcomings with the gifts of the Monk Basil.
Came to an ordeal sixth - theft... Here, too, the evil spirits were given a little and passed freely.
Ordeal seventh, love of money and avarice, we passed without delay, because, by the grace of God, I never in my life cared about many gains and was not avaricious, content with what God gave; And she was not stingy, but what she had, she diligently distributed to the needy.
We entered the ordeal eighth, covetousness... The representatives of this ordeal, torturing the sins of bribery and flattery, had nothing against me and therefore gnashed their teeth with anger as we left them comfortably.
Here is the ordeal ninth - falsehood and vanity... I was innocent of them, and soon we set off from there.
We have reached and the tenth ordeal, the ordeal of envy... By the grace of Christ, even here evil spirits had nothing against me: neither in their memory, nor in their books they found anything to condemn me. And we happily headed further.
Met ordeal eleventh where the sins of pride are tested, but we passed it completely free, since I turned out to be innocent of this sin.
Ascending further to the sky, we met an ordeal twelfth - the ordeal of anger. Happy is the man who, while living, did not feel anger. And so the oldest of the evil spirits, who was here and sitting on the throne, filled with rage and pride, with anger ordered his servants who were here to torment and torture me. The latter, like dogs licking their lips, began to inform me. They discovered not only what words I really uttered with rage and anger, or with what word I hurt someone, but also talked about how I once looked at my children with anger, and another time I punished them too harshly. ... They presented everything very vividly, indicating even the time when this or that sin was committed by me, and those people on whom I once poured out my anger, even repeated my true words, which I then uttered, and said who was present at this. To all this, the Angels responded with what they gave from the ark, and we went higher.
And we met an ordeal thirteenth - rancor... Like robbers, evil spirits jumped up to us and, testing me, they wanted to find something written in their charters, but since, through the prayer of Saint Basil, they did not find anything, they sobbed ... I was in many ways sinful, but love nourished everyone, both the great and the small, never insulted anyone, never remembered evil, never took revenge on others for evil ... And we went on without stopping.
I dared to ask one of the Angels accompanying me: "I beg you, tell me how do these evil spirits that we met in ordeals know, who and what did wrong in life?" The holy angel replied: “Every Christian at holy baptism receives a Guardian Angel, who invisibly protects him from everything evil and instructs him on everything good and records all the good deeds performed by this person ... On the other hand, the evil angel keeps an eye on everything throughout his life for the evil deeds of a person and writes them down in his book; he records all the sins that you have seen people who go through ordeals and go to heaven are tested. These sins can prevent the soul from entering paradise and throw it straight into the abyss, in which the evil spirits themselves live. These souls will live there until the second coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, if they do not have good deeds behind them that could snatch them out of the hands of the devil. People who believe in the Holy Trinity, who partake of the holy Mysteries of the Body and Blood of Christ the Savior as often as possible, have a direct ascent to heaven, without any obstacles, and the holy Angels are their protectors, and the holy saints of God pray for the salvation of the souls of such righteous people. But no one cares about the evil and evil heretics who do nothing useful in their lives, who live by unbelief and heresy, and the Angels cannot say anything in defense of them.
Have come to an ordeal fourteenth - robberies... It tests all those who pushed someone with anger, or beat on the cheeks, shoulders and neck with a rod, or a stick, or some other weapon. The holy angels, having given a little of the ark, led me through this ordeal without harm.
We suddenly found ourselves in ordeal fifteenth - sorcery, charm, poisoning with common herbs, calling demons. There were evil spirits, serpentine in appearance, for whom the only purpose of existence is to lead people into temptations and debauchery. None of them could even say a word against me, since I was innocent of these sins. By the grace of Christ, we soon passed this ordeal.
After that, I asked the Angels who accompanied me: “For every sin that a person commits in life, is he tortured in these ordeals, after death, or, perhaps, perhaps even in life, to atone for his sin in order to be cleansed of it here too no longer suffer for him. I'm just in awe of how detailed everything is understood. " The angels answered me that not everyone is tested like that in ordeals, but only those like me, who did not confess sincerely before death. If I confessed everything sinful to my spiritual father without any shame and fear, and if I received forgiveness from my spiritual father, then I would pass all these ordeals unhindered and I would not have to be tortured in any sin. But since I did not want to honestly confess my sins to my spiritual father, here they torture me for it.
Of course, I was helped a lot by the fact that throughout my life I wanted and tried to avoid sin. He who strives with zeal for repentance always receives forgiveness from God, and through this a free transition from this life to the blessed life after the grave. Evil spirits who are in ordeals along with their scriptures, having opened them, find nothing written, for the Holy Spirit makes everything written invisible. And they see this, and they know that everything they wrote down has been blotted out thanks to the confession, and then they grieve very much. If the person is still alive, then they try again to write in some other sins in this place. Truly, great is the salvation of a person in confession! .. It saves him from many troubles and misfortunes, makes it possible to go through all the ordeals without hindrance and draw closer to God. Others do not confess in the hope that there will still be time for salvation and for the remission of sins; some are simply ashamed to confess their sins to their spiritual father - such and such people will be severely tested in ordeals. There are those who are ashamed to say everything to one spiritual father, but choose several, and reveal some sins to one spiritual father, others to another, and so on; for such a confession they will be punished and will endure a lot, going through ordeals.
So we walked and talked; imperceptibly in front of us seemed an ordeal sixteenth - the ordeal of fornication. The torturers of this ordeal jumped up and, looking at us, were amazed that we had reached this ordeal without hindrance, and for some time stood as if in oblivion. Then they began to torture me, and they not only spoke the truth, but also gave a lot of false testimony, citing names and places in confirmation; we stayed here for a long time.
Here the seventeenth ordeal - adultery... The servants of this ordeal quickly jumped up to me and began to expound my sins: like I before, when I had not yet served with our holy father Vasily, I had a spouse whom my mistress gave me, and lived with him, and once sinned with others; and they slandered me a lot. The Holy Angels protected me here too, and we moved on.
Then we came to eighteenth ordeal - the ordeal of Sodom's sins, where all unnatural prodigal sins are tortured, and in general all the most abominable, secretly committed deeds, about which, according to the word of the Apostle, "it is shameful also to speak" (Eph. 5, 12). I was not guilty of the sins of this ordeal, and we soon passed it.
At the time when we were climbing higher, the holy Angels told me: “You have seen the terrible and disgusting prodigal ordeals; know that a rare soul will pass them freely: the whole world is in the evil of temptations and filth, almost all people are voluptuous; "The thought of the human heart is evil from his youth" (Genesis 8, 21), few who mortify the lusts of the flesh and few who would freely pass by these ordeals. Most of those who come here die. The authorities of prodigal ordeals boast that they alone, more than all other ordeals, replenish the fiery kinship in hell. Thank God, Theodore, that you have passed these prodigal torturers through the prayers of your father, the Monk Basil. You will no longer see fear. "
After that we came to nineteenth ordeal- which bears the name "Idolatry and all sorts of heresies"... Here I was not tested in anything, and we soon passed it.
Then we met the twentieth ordeal, which is called the ordeal of mercy and cruelty... In this ordeal, all the unmerciful, cruel, harsh and hating are recorded. When someone does not follow the commandments of God and is unmerciful, then the soul of such a person, having come into this ordeal, will be subjected to various tortures and thrown into hell, and there they will shut it up until the general Resurrection. God will not have mercy on such a soul, since it did not give a piece of bread to the poor, nor did it calm the beggar, nor did it visit the sick, did not pardon the weak and offended, if not by deed, then by a word of comfort, and in his grief did not grieve with him , but, on the contrary, did the opposite.
When we came here, the prince of this ordeal seemed to me very, very cruel, severe and even sad, as if from a long illness. He wept and wept; he seemed to be breathing the fire of unmercifulness. His servants flew up to me like bees and began to test me, but finding nothing, they walked away; we, merry and joyful, went on.
And so we approached the heavenly gates and entered them, rejoicing that we had safely passed the bitter trials in ordeals ...
I was born to the ringing of bells. My parental home is located a few dozen meters from the huge temple, which is now included in the Golden Ring of Yaroslavl. As a child, I woke up to the bells ringing from the bell tower. I remember that blessed state of mind with which we left the church to the ringing of bells after Sunday service. Each room, including the kitchen, of our large house had a red corner with large icons in gilded icon cases. In the evenings, grandmother always gathered us, five grandchildren, for home prayer... I left the village (parental) home at the age of 16 to study in Yaroslavl. Then my life with God was interrupted. After all, I studied to be a teacher, and this was the time when teachers were forbidden to believe in God. My childhood habits of prayer, going to church, repentance, and communion disappeared from my life.
For over 40 years I have been working at the school. But, unfortunately, far from God. I was devoted to the country, not to God. That is why I did not instruct my disciples and my own children in God's rules, I did not teach them to live like the Church. Then we had a different faith. Patristic literature came into my life when I had already retired. My youngest son, and then my grandson, often brought me books from churches. Now that my end is nearing, I increasingly wonder if I lived my life right. In church literature there are many indications of what awaits all of us after death. I thought this information would be useful for those working in the funeral business. I decided in a school-like manner, as I once did, to write an essay, which I propose below.
Following the Orthodox tradition, the burial and the first commemoration of the deceased takes place on the third day after death. The next commemoration occurs on the ninth and fortieth days. Why is this happening?
According to the doctrine Orthodox Church, in the first three days, the soul is allowed to fly around all the places on earth, what dear to it, where it felt good, where it did good deeds. Therefore, the funeral service and funeral only follow on the third day, and the soul passes into other spheres. On this day, the first commemoration takes place, because, starting from this day, she goes through ordeals - tests of the soul until her fate is decided at the Last Judgment. These tests consist in a meeting with demons, whose will a person fulfilled during his life on earth, when he committed his sins. The spatial zone of these meetings is located between the earth and the sky, where the soul moves, and where it is periodically stopped and interrogated about these or those sins "the spirits of evil in high places." It is curious that one of the meanings of the word "ordeal" is "places of collection of duties", in other words "customs". Thus, we can say that just as customs establish a barrier for smuggled goods across the border, ordeals also put a barrier for the entry of souls weighed down by sins into the Kingdom of Heaven. During ordeals, the duty is charged in full for earthly human sins. Christian sources speak of a different number of ordeals: from twenty to thirty or more. According to the teaching of the church, there are twenty of them. We will talk about them.
Mental ailments - sins - are imprinted on the soul, and it, being unhealthy as a result, is no longer able to really perceive the phenomena of the surrounding world. Just as a physically sick person cannot work normally, so a soul with an ailment cannot live properly and understand life processes. For this reason, a person commits a huge number of mistakes in his life and is not even able to see them. Committing sins, he seems to be in a "mental fever". And only getting to heaven after death, going through ordeals, the soul becomes "seeing." Here is a list of mental ailments that, during ordeals, are imputed to the soul as sins, including minor ones.
THE FIRST EXPERIENCE - FUNERAL SPEECH AND FEDERAL SPEECH
In this ordeal, there is an answer for foul language - speech filled with obscene words; blasphemy - an insulting attitude towards any shrine; desecration - desecration of something that is sacred to others; outrage - indecent, obscene, unceremonious behavior; listening to anecdotes, witticisms, stupid jokes in relation to God and the church; listening, watching, reading negative: literature, television, video, radio programs.
THE SECOND DISEASE - DEFINITION
In this ordeal, the spirits torture the soul for false promises; perjury - giving false or distorted testimony; hypocrisy - insincerity, ill will; flattery - obsequious praise, covering up insincerity; betrayal.
MASSAGE THREE - OFFENSES AND FALSE
Here the spirits of malice find out whether the soul has been seen in humiliation - oppression by resentment or belittling its abilities; condemnation - disapproving opinion, censure; rudeness - lack of culture, impoliteness; indelicacy.
THE FOURTH PROBLEM - ASSOCIATION
Here they torture for gluttony - pleasing one's stomach to the detriment of spirit and soul; drunkenness - constant and excessive consumption of alcoholic beverages; alcoholism - painful attraction, addiction to alcohol; smoking; drug addiction - an irresistible attraction to drugs; impurity - dirt, inaccuracy; intemperance - lack of desire or ability to limit oneself in something; long-suffering - lack of long-suffering, when you have to endure something for a long time; whim - whimsical desire, whim.
THE FIFTH PROBLEM - PRIDE
During it, sinners are tortured for not working on their spiritual development; inertia of thinking - immunity to the new, backwardness; negligence - careless attitude to one's duties; carelessness is a manifestation of carelessness; idleness is insignificant, giving nothing; laziness - lack of desire to act, work, love of inaction; killing time; killing an idea; life in vain.
MASSAGE SIXTH - THEFT
Here is the answer for the sins of theft - the criminal appropriation of someone else's; robbery - forcible theft of someone else's property.
PROBLEM SEVEN - SILVER LOVE
This is the ordeal of love of money - greed for money, wealth, avarice, love for gifts; speculation - buying and resale of values for profit.
EXTREME EIGHT - BRIBERY
It is responsible for covetousness - bribery, usury, flattery.
PROHIBITION NINTH - PROJECTION
Here is held accountable for the misuse of power or measure; commission of extortion, any injustice.
TREATMENT TEN - ENVY
Further, the soul reaches the tenth ordeal, where they torture for jealousy - a painful doubt about someone's loyalty or love; envy; unfriendliness.
PROBLEM ELEVEN - VANITY
The demons who have reached the eleventh stage are charged with vanity - arrogant arrogance, love of glory, veneration; megalomania - painful exaltation of one's abilities; stubbornness - extreme obstinacy, striving to achieve one's own; egoism - the preference of one's personal interests to the interests of others; stupidity - devoid of reasonable content in thoughts, words, actions; disrespect for traditions; oblivion - loss of memory of something, neglect of something; disrespect for parents.
The Twelfth Massacre - Angry
The souls of sinners are tortured for anger - a feeling of strong indignation, indignation; irritability; hatred - a feeling of strong disgust, unwillingness to see; enmity - actions imbued with hatred; anger - a feeling of angry irritation; gloat; ignorance; impudence.
THE THIRTEENTH PROBLEM - Malice
On it, the souls of the vindictive are subjected to interrogation - who have not forgiven the evil inflicted; touchy; vindictive - who wanted to avenge the wrongs inflicted; sowing strife and schism.
The following ordeals are the most difficult and difficult to pass, because here the most serious human sins are called to account.
MASSAGE FOURTEENTH - ROBBERY
So, the fourteenth stage is the ordeal of self-harm - mutilation of someone or oneself; beatings; intentional poisoning; attempts - attempts to take the life of another person or oneself; murder of love for God and neighbors; deliberate abortion.
PROBLEM FIFTEEN - MAGIC
This is the ordeal of spiritualism - the mystical belief in the possibility of communication with the souls of the dead; fortune-telling - recognition of the past or future using various techniques; gambling - strong excitement, enthusiasm, enthusiasm.
PROBLEM SIXTEENTH - LIFE
On it are tortured those souls who in earthly life were engaged in fornication, not being bound by the sacraments of marriage; committed the sin of incitement; temptation; shamelessness - the contradiction of public morality, obscene behavior; debauchery - sexual immorality, vicious lifestyle; vulgarity; passion. The prince of this ordeal is dressed in a stinking garment sprinkled with bloody foam, which was arranged for him by the shameful and bad deeds of those who on earth indulged in these sins.
SEVENTEENTH PROBLEM - ADULTERY
Those who did not maintain their marital fidelity, both in reality and in dreams, are tortured; committed prodigal violence and abductions; and also those who promised their purity to Christ, but broke their vows.
EIGHTEENTH PROBLEM - SODOM
Here the answer is held for the sin of sexual perversion.
NINETEENTH EXTREME - IDOLISM
Or the ordeal of heresy. Here they torture for selfhood - actions carried out without God's blessing; lack of understanding of their purpose on earth; blasphemy - reproach of the name of God, God's deeds and creations, insult to church relics; lack of faith; superstition is a prejudice, due to which much that happens is a manifestation of supernatural forces; fear; loss of will; suspiciousness; despair; weakness - insufficient consistency in one's movement towards God; delusion - false ideas, diverting from the true path, from God; blind trust; murmur; despondency; cowardice; discontent.
TURNING THE TWENTY - UNMORRY AND CRUELTY
The last, twentieth ordeal - mercy may turn out to be completely impassable. The list of sins here includes: heartlessness - a heartless attitude; a silent cry - a timid, not expressing his opinion, a call, as well as a refusal to help and attention to a person in need; cruelty; the transformation of commemoration for the dead into an ordinary drunken feast. The main spirit of this ordeal is dry and dull, as after a long illness, he cries, weeps and breathes the fire of mercy.
Until the ninth day, the soul visits the heavenly abodes and admires the beauties of paradise. On the ninth day, commemoration is again performed, because from this moment until the end of the forty-day period, the torment and horrors of hell are shown to the soul, which still does not know where it will go.
The souls of saints who are martyred are not subjected to ordeals. They immediately go to heaven. In the Orthodox lives of the saints, you can find many stories about how the soul after death goes through ordeals. The story about the warrior Taxiot tells how he came back to life after spending six hours in the grave, and told about his meetings with the spirits of evil: “When I was dying, I saw some Ethiopians (demons - author's note), their appearance was very terrible, and my soul was confused. Then I saw two young men, very handsome; my soul rushed to them. We began to ascend to heaven, meeting on the way the ordeals that hold the soul of every person. " Passing through ordeals becomes especially difficult not only because a person is sinful by nature, but also because demons try to add unconfirmed ones to the sins they have committed. After all, it is very important for them to get a human soul. But the soul is not alone in its encounters with demons. Angels accompany her. They weigh sins and good deeds on the scales, and if the latter outweigh, the soul goes through an ordeal. In addition, the angels take out gifts and give them to evil spirits as a ransom. These gifts are those good deeds that the soul performed while on earth, repentance for the sins committed, as well as the prayers of the Church and loved ones. Therefore, remembrance is very important, because only love and good memory of those who remain on earth will help the soul of the deceased to withstand the torture and go through all the ordeals. Only on the fortieth day will she be assigned a place where she will await the resurrection of the dead and the Last Judgment. Many souls are in fear and confusion while waiting. It is possible to change their condition thanks to prayers and commemoration, which takes place for forty days. Observing the Orthodox traditions of burial and commemoration, we help the souls of deceased relatives and friends on their difficult journey until they find their eternal dwelling.
Valentina YAKUSHINA
References
The ordeal of the Monk Theodora. Compiled by Hegumen Anthony, "Ladder".
Life, illness, death. Metropolitan Anthony of Sourozh, Sergiev Posad.
About death and the afterlife. "Diopter".
Afterlife. Danilovsky Blagovestnik.
Soul after death. Seraphim Rose. "The Tsar's Affair".
A word about death. "Rays of Sophia".
The afterlife or the last fate of a person. Tikhomirov E. "The Father's House".
How our dead live and how we will live after death. Monk Mitrofan. "Orthodox brotherhood of the holy Apostle John the Theologian."
Secrets of the underworld. Archimandrite Panteleimon. "Blagovest".
A word about death. Bryanchaninov. Lepta-press.
The secret life of the soul after bodily death. St. Gregory (Dyachenko). "Orthodox brotherhood in the name of the Exaltation of the Honest Of the Life-giving Cross Of the Lord. "
Afterlife in the light. Revealed teachings. St. George Orlov. "Pilgrim".
Read the full version of the material in the printed version of the magazine
MY DEAR! THIS TOPIC WRITTEN FOR US BY THE MODERATOR OF THE GROUP "LIGHT OF ORTHODOXY" About freedom Peace to all! My today's article is devoted to an acute, difficult and relevant topic for many people - freedom. What is freedom in relation to a human being? To answer this question, you must first "decipher" everything that is associated with this concept - life, death, independence, unfreedom, slavery, sin, the meaning of life, free will and some others. In turn, in order to understand these concepts related to freedom, we need to realize a number of essential details that contribute to "decryption" and thus we will come to other concepts and topics, as well as to the following important details, which in turn ... And so I will write until the second coming! Seriously now. The topic is really difficult, but despite this, I will try to reveal it as clearly and briefly as possible, as I imagine it all. So with the help of God, the Bible, the holy fathers, common sense and logic, let's start praying. The life that a person lives on earth is not Life at all, but just the threshold of Life! The death by which a person dies after living life on earth is not death at all, but just a door (transition, exodus) into Life or death (1). It is clear that here I mean the concept of death, as final and eternal death in hell. Thus, the concept of a door cannot be good for a person passing through it and discovering death behind it, which he himself quite rightly deserves with all his deeds and thoughts, willingly or not! And vice versa - the concept of a door (whatever it may be - violent, accidental, early, from illness, etc., etc.) cannot be evil for the human soul, which passes through it into Life! So we found two final "points" of good and evil, which are on the border of life and Life - death. Behind the door there is no longer any opportunity to get from death to Life (perhaps with very rare exceptions - through the prayers of holy people) and from Life to death (here I think without any exceptions). The initial "points" of good and evil are in Eden before the fall of Adam and Eve (good) and after the fall (evil). Between these four "points" is the life of absolutely every person. In such a life, a person cannot have any truth of freedom (except for freedom of choice over which neither God nor the devil has power), we can only hope for freedom in Life. To understand all this, we must consider the falsity of freedom (or rather freedom) in human life ... To do this, let's imagine an absolutely "free" person. Let's say this is a non-believing man who is absolutely independent of other people, law, finances, prejudices, information, someone's beliefs, etc. He tries to live according to his conscience and with all responsibility for his "freedom" goes through life. Whatever he does and whatever he thinks about on a global scale, he will always return to the same point - the door behind which there is absolute unknown! He is limited by the framework of life, which has a beginning, but does not have a clear, conscious and precise end. Resigning himself to the darkness and nothing outside the door, he thereby destroys his "freedom", which in fact he never had! Such humility will lead him to inevitable despondency and understanding that his children, grandchildren, friends and relatives have the same senseless and hopeless end. This person can say (and believe in it) that he is not afraid of death and that there is the infinity of the human race and the eternity of himself in his descendants. In fact, this is self-deception (because absolutely all people will die) that gives him at least some miserable hope for the meaning of his life. Also, this his humility before the last nothing gives him a subconscious feeling that his life is not correct, its aimlessness. For him, his parents, grandmothers, grandfathers were a life example of a conscientious life ... No one spoke to him about Christ, his thoughts belonged to the earthly world, he saw evil only outside, and not inside himself, and therefore came to the realization of the door, as to absolute harm to yourself! WHAT TO DO??? How to get rid of the despondency of the collapse of life and acquire hope for true freedom, that is, Life? Many religions talk about the possibility of eternal Life. It is only necessary to determine which of the religions is true! From my point of view, it is easy and simple to do this, it is enough just to study and analyze which of them is the most viable, all-conquering, strong and glorious for its saints, miracles, although I will not talk here about saints, miracles, as well as the inner content of religions ... I think the Christian religion will be beyond any competition here in all these parameters. So let us remember the cruel persecution at the very beginning of the creation of the Church of Christ! Despite this, Christianity in an amazing (if not supernatural, miraculous) way has only strengthened and expanded! Further, continuing to remember historical facts - the cult of Caesar, incredible in its cruelty and savagery! Caligula, Nero, Vespasian, Titus, Domitian, Trajan, Decius. The entire might of the Roman Empire fell upon Christians for a long time! I suppose that it was at that time that the common people of the Roman Empire began to see their light, when they saw that Christians preferred the door to denying their God the Savior. The first Christian martyrs incredibly strengthened the truth of their faith and made people think - what is stronger than the cessation of life? The emperors used the full power of the law, wild beasts, fire, poison, torture and all kinds of existing weapons to intimidate and destroy Christianity. You don't have to be an "archive worm" and a doctor historical sciences with access to secret documents to understand that all these seven emperors were on the side of true evil! And evil, as you know, cannot fight evil for so long and stubbornly, it is capable of fighting only with its opposite! How did this total persecution of the Christian faith and the Church end? Complete defeat of Roman paganism! What weapon did the Christians use for this victory? Patience, humility, love, hope and unshakable faith in your God - Savior! All these are weapons of defense, but as a weapon of "attack" and "capture" (salvation of human souls), Christians have successfully used the Gospel Word and their own example of life according to this Word. All this made it possible for the first Christians to receive an impenetrable shield and the all-conquering sword of Jesus Christ, which was the final predetermination of the defeat of the Roman authority of Caesar! By the way, the Jews were freed from the cult of Caesar, they were involved in the persecution of Christians, as they used their influence on officials, the administration and governors to fight the Christian "sect", as they then believed. After the separation of Catholicism from the united, holy, catholic and apostolic Church of Christ, the persecution continued! But the church itself, and by no means Orthodox, has acted as a persecutor. INQUISITION! CRUSADES! And again, one does not need to be seven spans in the forehead to determine whether the Catholic Church has created evil or good in the face of these phenomena. Of course I may be asked - what about the destruction of two-thirds of the pagan population at the time of the adoption of Christian Orthodoxy by Russia? I will answer this question as follows. Let's say you're right and the pagan faith of Russia was a true good and good for all people on Earth. But why then did it not strengthen and expand in spite of persecution, as Christianity did at the time of its foundation, despite the monstrous opposition of Judaism and the Roman "divine" power? No, my dear neo-pagans - native believers, true religion does not behave like that! The widespread disappearance from the face of the earth of the religion of the polytheists and human sacrifice says that she was dead from her birth (2). All this proves the weakness, falsity and delusion of the ancient - Slavic faith our pre-Christian ancestors! After the baptism of Russia, our ancestors almost did not know military defeats! Why? Because, unlike all other states and peoples surrounding Russia, our glorious ancestors went to battle to die, and not to win (killing enemies)! Die for Faith, Tsar and Fatherland! Christian Orthodox faith, eternal, glorious, true, sacred, and by no means pagan! Of course, here with me, many people can argue, as they say "foaming at the mouth", but the evidence is on the surface! And whoever does not see them, from my point of view, does not have a sound mind. It is enough to remember the territory of Russia under Prince Vladimir and compare it with the territory that exists now. Who achieved this? Who can name at least five famous and great people of the pagan faith who would develop and glorify Russia? And how many of them are there in the Orthodox faith? And of course, within the framework of determining the truth of religions, one cannot but mention the very recent events in relation to the persecution of the Russian Orthodox Church. Lenin, Stalin, Khrushchev. 1917 - 1964. For 47 years, evil tried to destroy good. Disguised as industrialization, collectivization, the fight against illiteracy, religious obscurantism, improving the lives of workers, using the frenzied propaganda of atheism, socialism, communist morality, using the slogans of freedom, equality, brotherhood, etc. etc. evil sought to destroy temples, monasteries, killing priests, faith, and with them the souls of people. This disguise was so cunning and plausible that even now very many people consider that time (before Brezhnev) to be good and good for all people of the USSR, without noticing the fall of the inner spiritual moral and moral essence of man, that is, his distance from Jesus Christ. The true freedom of the God-man was substituted for the surrogate freedom of the ideas of socialism and communism. And again, the opponents of Jesus Christ did not succeed - good again defeated the evil power of Caesar using the same weapon as in ancient times. Paradoxical as it may sound, but again the sheep prevailed over the wolves. "Behold, I send you like sheep among wolves: so be wise as serpents, and simple as doves" Matt. (10:16). Divine Love, the power and glory of the Savior of all people is all and everything conquering, well, finally, it's time for everyone to understand this and not from my words, but after studying historical facts from the creation of the universe to the present day. Thus, only the Christian Orthodox religion is the only truth. It is she who can give a person great hope for eternal Life and true freedom in it, the essence of which is the acquisition of an incorruptible body, and also: "And I heard a loud voice from heaven, saying: behold, the tabernacle of God with men, and He will dwell with them; they will be His people, and God Himself will be their God with them. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death will be no more; neither weeping, nor outcry, nor sickness will be anymore, for the former things are past. ”And he said He who sits on the throne: Behold, I create everything new. And he says to me: write, for these words are true and faithful. And he said to me: It is finished! I am the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end; to the one who is thirsty I will give a gift from the fountain of living water. and I will be his God, and he will be my son "(Rev. 21: 3 - 7). Modern (believers at heart) atheists and many others say - we do not need a church, we live according to our conscience and regret (repent) at home about our sins that we committed earlier. But what about the sacrament of Baptism (which is not possible without studying the faith for an adult) and the sacrament of the Communion (which is not possible without the sacrament of Confession and sacraments) - I ask such people? After all, the grace received during these sacraments is absolutely necessary for the salvation of the human soul, for the possibility of fighting against evil in oneself. And all this is not possible without the priests, who, although in quotation marks, are the "heirs" of the apostles - "He who receives you receives Me, but who receives Me receives him who sent Me" (Matthew 10:40). God must be sought in the study of the Bible, the teachings of the Holy Fathers, in union with Him through the sacraments of the Church, prayer, humility, patience ... in likening to Him, and not in our souls! And only after such a search for God, true repentance for forgiveness and changing yourself in the image of God, you will be able to find Him in your soul, which will mean your Love for Him and for all people. But such people do not pay attention to the sacraments of the church tested over millennia. They are ready to risk their souls, just not to feel ashamed before the priest in confession. They forget that in addition to shame and torment about their previously committed abominations in the face of God, they can receive the greatest hope for Life and perfect freedom! "and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free" (John 8:32). They do not understand a simple thing - eternal Life and the freedom granted in it outweigh absolutely everything that came to the door, and just for this, all atheists should understand, believe, accept and say that. .. Christ is risen!!! An amazing thing, we are afraid of the door, but we are not afraid of sin, although the door does not always lead to death, but only one mortal sin guarantees it! We do not want to fear God and be His slaves without realizing that this fear (in the sense of awe before God) and slavery (in the sense of slavery to good and war with evil in ourselves) free us from the fear of the door and give us hope for liberation. from death itself, which is the measure of the maximum freedom of human life on earth! Thus, even a person who is deprived of health, freedom of movement (prisoner), finances, etc., but having a tiny grain of hope for Life, is much freer than the person I presented in the example above! Such a person knows that only God is absolutely always completely free. He has no need to choose, He absolutely knows His goals and how to achieve them. God eternally does true (absolute, Divine) good, where he wants and how he wants, but not a single person is able to fully understand this good now! He has no internal or external obstacles to this. The Almighty is outside of time, which means that they do not act on Him causally - investigative connections ... God is eternally and infinitely Almighty, except for one thing - He cannot force a person to love Himself against his will, because Love, just like He is absolutely free! Many people associate the concept of "freedom" with the absence of any restrictions and prohibitions, like absolute independence. And again an amazing thing arises - the more we get such freedom, the more we, on the contrary, fall into dependence (slavery) of various passions, sins, bad habits and vices! "There are paths that seem straight to man, but their end is the path to death" (Prov. 14:12). My dear readers do not risk Life and freedom, for the sake of your (false, non-Orthodox) understanding of life, freedom, hell and paradise ... please don’t! Answer one question correctly - "So I find the law that when I want to do good, evil is present with me. For according to the inner man I find pleasure in the law of God; but in my members I see another law, opposing the law of my mind and making me a captive to the law. sinful in my limbs. Wretched man I am! who will deliver me from this body of death? " (Rom. 7:21 - 24). Our life gives us enough time and opportunities to sow correctly, we will reap outside the door. God gave all of us the awareness of good and evil, striving for Love, through His Word revealed moral and ethical limits and ways. He also provided a person with laws, rules of life and conscience, which is still a relative thing. The whole world before Moses lived according to the law of conscience, and what happened as a result? So it turns out that the law of conscience works well only in combination with the law of Jesus Christ! It is enough to remember how many holy righteous people were in the Old Testament history of mankind and how many of them became after He created his Church! The death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus Christ proved to all mankind the possibility of eternal Life, that evil and death must and can be conquered by any person who truly believes and receives grace! With all the strength of your soul, strive for good (which can be experienced by untruth, suffering and seeming injustice), reject evil (which can be disguised as justice and good), do not question the teaching of Christ, follow Him, and then we will be able to answer with joy and hope: Truly Risen !!! Always your ordinary person (with a gray soul) moderator of the "LIGHT OF ORTHODOX" group (1) For the convenience of narration, I will call the threshold of Life life with a small letter, and the true (eternal) Life after life (Kingdom of Heaven) with a capital letter. Also, for the sake of convenience, I will call human death after earthly life a door, and hell, death. (2) My third article on dead religion will be in exactly one week. p.s. Despite the fact that I often mention the word "truth" in this article, I ask all my readers not to take my thoughts as the ultimate truth. Everyone separates the grain from the chaff for himself. It should also be understood that everything written above is by and large not mine - it is a combination of my reflections from everything I read and thought out in my entire life, that is, in fact, these are the books that I read and how I understood them.
There was no such person born on the planet who can take death calmly. Such thoughts cause fear in more than half of humanity. What is the reason for the fear? Illness, poverty, stress, difficulties do not scare us, but why does death make us afraid, and the human stories of survivors make us shiver? Maybe the reason is that even about a serious illness there are a couple of lines, but about life in the afterlife we do not know at all who to ask.
The past upbringing proves once again: after all, almost all the inhabitants of the planet are sure that life after death does not exist. There will be no more sunrises or sunsets, as well as meetings with loved ones and warm hugs. All important senses will disappear: hearing, sight, touch, smell, etc. What happens after death and whether the stories of people who have experienced clinical death are true, this article will help to understand.
What is our body made of?
Everyone has a physical body and an incorporeal soul. Scientists and esotericists have discovered such a factor that a person has several bodies. In addition to the physical, there are subtle bodies, which, in turn, are divided into:
- Essential.
- Astral.
- Mental.
Any of these bodies has an energy field, which, when combined with subtle bodies, form an aura or, as it is also called, a biofield. As far as the physical body is concerned, it can be touched and seen. This is our main body, which is given to us at birth for a certain period of time.
Etheric, astral and mental body
The so-called double of the physical body has no color (invisible) and is called etheric. It exactly repeats the entire shape of the main body, moreover, it has the same energy field. After the death of a person, it is finally destroyed after 3 days. For this reason, the burial process does not begin earlier than 3 days after the death of the body.
"Body of emotions", it is also astral. Experiences and emotional condition a person is capable of changing personal radiation. During sleep, it is able to disconnect, which is why, waking up, we can remember a dream, which is only the journey of the soul at that moment while the physical body is resting in the bed.
The mental body is in charge of thoughts. Abstract thinking and contact with space distinguish this body. The soul leaves the main body and separates at the time of death, heading rapidly towards the higher world.
Return from that world
Almost everyone is shocked by the stories of people who have survived clinical death.
Someone believes in such luck, while others are skeptical about this kind of death in principle. And yet, what can happen in 5 minutes at the time of rescue by rescuers? Is there really an afterlife after life, or is it just a fantasy of the brain?
In the 70s of the last century, scientists began to carefully study this factor, on the basis of which the book "Life After Life" by Raymond Moody was published. He is an American psychologist who has made many discoveries over the decades. The psychologist believed that such stages are inherent in the sensation of out-of-body being as:
- Disabling the physiological processes of the body (the fact that the dying person hears the words of a doctor who states death has been established).
- Unpleasant noisy build-up sounds.
- The dying person leaves the body and moves with incredible speed along a long tunnel, where at the end a light is visible.
- His whole life flies by before him.
- There is a meeting with relatives and friends who have already left the living world.
The stories of people who have experienced clinical death notice an unusual split of consciousness: it seems that you understand everything and realize what is happening around during "death", but for some reason it is impossible to contact living people who are nearby. It is also surprising that even a blind person from birth sees a bright light in a fatal state.
Our brain remembers everything
Our brain remembers the whole process at the moment when clinical death occurs. Human stories and research by scientists have found explanations for unusual visions.
Fantastic explanation
Payell Watson is a psychologist who believes that in the last minutes of his life, a dying person sees his birth. Acquaintance with death, as Watson said, begins with a terrible path that must be overcome by everyone. This is the birth canal at 10 cm.
“It is not in our power to know exactly what is going on in the creation of a baby at the moment of birth, but, perhaps, all these sensations are similar to different phases of dying. After all, it may be that the deathbed pictures that emerge in front of the dying person are exactly the experiences in the process of birth, ”says psychologist Payell Watson.
Utilitarian explanation
Nikolai Gubin, an intensive care physician from Russia, is of the opinion that the appearance of a tunnel is a toxic psychosis.
This is a dream that looks like hallucinations (for example, when a person sees himself from the outside). In the process of dying, the visual lobes of the cerebral hemisphere have already undergone oxygen starvation. Vision narrows quickly, leaving a thin streak that provides central vision.
For what reason does the whole life flash before your eyes when clinical death occurs? The stories of survivors cannot give a clear answer, but Gubin has his own interpretation. The stage of dying begins with new brain particles, and ends with old ones. The restoration of important brain functions occurs the other way around: first, old areas come to life, and then new ones. That is why more imprinted fragments are reflected in the memories of people who have returned from the afterlife.
The secret of the dark and light world
"Another world exists!" - the medical specialists say, stunned. The revelations of people who have experienced clinical death have even detailed coincidences.
Priests and doctors, who had the opportunity to communicate with patients who returned from another world, recorded the fact that all these people have a common property of souls. Upon arrival from heaven, some returned more enlightened and calm, while others, returning from hell, for a long time could not calm down from the nightmare they saw.
After listening to the stories of those who survived clinical death, we can conclude that heaven is above, hell is below. This is exactly what the Bible says about the afterlife. Patients describe their feelings as follows: those who went down - met hell, and those who flew up - ended up in heaven.
Word of mouth
Many people were able to survive and understand what clinical death consists of. The stories of survivors belong to the inhabitants of the entire planet. For example, Thomas Welch was able to survive the disaster at the sawmill. Subsequently, he said that on the shore of the burning abyss he could see some people who had died earlier. He began to regret that he had worried so little about salvation. Knowing in advance all the horrors of hell, he would have lived differently. At that moment, the man saw a man walking in the distance. The unfamiliar appearance was bright and bright, radiated kindness and mighty strength. It became clear to Welch: this is the Lord. Only in his power is the salvation of people, only he can take the doomed soul to himself for torment. Suddenly he turned and looked at our hero. It was enough for Thomas to find himself back in the body and his mind revived.
When the heart stops
In April 1933, Pastor Kenneth Hagin of was engulfed in clinical death. The stories of survivors of clinical death are very similar, which is why scientists and doctors consider these to be real events. Hagin's heart stopped. He said that when the soul left the body and reached the abyss, he felt the presence of a spirit that was leading him somewhere. Suddenly a powerful voice sounded in the darkness. The man could not understand what was said, but it was the voice of God, in the latter he was sure. At that moment, the spirit released the pastor, and a strong whirlwind began to lift him back up. The light slowly began to emerge, and Kenneth Hagin found himself in his room, jumping into the body the way one usually crawls into trousers.
In heaven
Paradise is described as the opposite of hell. The stories of survivors of clinical death are never ignored.
One of the scientists, at the age of 5, fell into a pool filled with water. The child was found lifeless. The parents took the baby to the hospital, but the doctor had to say that the boy would no longer open his eyes. But the bigger surprise was that the child woke up and came to life.
The scientist said that when he was in the water, he felt a flight through a long tunnel, at the end of which he could see a light. This glow was incredibly bright. There, the Lord was on the throne, and below were people (perhaps they were angels). Getting closer to the Lord God, the boy heard that the time had not yet come. The child wanted to stay there for a moment, but in some incomprehensible way he ended up in his body.
About Light
Six-year-old Sveta Molotkova also saw reverse side life. After the doctors brought her out of the coma, a request came in with a pencil and paper. Svetlana painted everything that she could see at the moment the soul moved. The girl was in a coma for 3 days. Doctors fought to keep her alive, but her brain showed no signs of life. Her mother could not look at the lifeless and motionless body of her child. At the end of the third day, the girl seemed to be trying to grab onto something, her fists clenched strongly. The mother felt that her little girl was finally grasping the hair of life. Having come to her senses a little, Sveta asked the doctors to bring her a paper with a pencil to draw everything that she could see in another world ...
Soldier story
One military doctor treated a patient for a fever in various ways. The soldier was unconscious for some time, and when he woke up, he notified his doctor that he saw a very bright glow. For a moment it seemed to him that he was in the "Kingdom of the Blessed." The military man remembered the sensations and noted that it was the best moment of his life.
Thanks to medicine, which keeps pace with all technologies, it became possible to survive, despite circumstances such as clinical death. Eyewitness accounts of life after death frighten some, while others are interested.
Private from America George Ritchie was pronounced dead in 1943. The doctor who was on duty that day, an officer of the hospital, established death, which came because of the Soldier already prepared to be sent to the morgue. But suddenly a military orderly told the doctor how he saw the movement of a dead man. Then the doctor looked at Ritchie again, but could not confirm the orderly's words. In response, he resisted and insisted on his own.
The doctor realized that it was useless to argue and decided to inject adrenaline directly into the heart. Unexpectedly for everyone, the dead man began to show signs of life, and then doubts disappeared. It became clear that he would survive.
The story of a soldier who survived clinical death has spread all over the world. Private Ritchie was not only able to deceive death itself, but also became a medic, telling colleagues about his unforgettable journey.
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