WHEN LIFE CEASES—WHAT THEN?

Be Conscious Now

WHEN a murderer is sentenced to death, from the moment the sentence is pronounced, he is as good as dead. Whether his execution is to take place the very next day or weeks later, is of no consequence: life simply loses all meaning for him. All smiles are wiped from his face and it is with difficulty that he brings himself to speak. His hands, once raised so savagely to rain blows upon the weak and innocent, now hang limp and lifeless by his sides. He becomes a forlorn creature, a mere shadow of his former self.

The judgement in court has made plain the reality—a man’s sudden fall from power to powerlessness, from light to darkness, from material triumph to nothingness. Even before death, he finds himself in a world where his will is no longer his own. What then, will be his fate after death? After death, he will enter another world where he will be forced to bow to the will of the Creator.

Were man to remember this reality, his life would undergo the most sublime of transformations. It would then be brought home to him with tremendous force how inane it was to oppress the poor, unfortunate individuals who crossed his path and fell into his clutches. He would realize how senseless it was to ill-treat others, if he himself were to be subjected to divine retribution in the after-life. He would finally understand how mindless it was to entertain ideas of his own greatness, for greatness which cannot endure is of no intrinsic value.

In the end, having realized all this, he would hang his head in shame. Man drifts through life, an unthinking, pleasure-seeking, materially ambitious creature who enjoys making friends and accumulating riches. He revels in trivial distractions. Then something happens which stops him dead in his tracks. All of his faculties fail him. His eyes are sightless, his breathing stops. Death has come unannounced and unbidden. And in an instant he is bereft of all his worldly possessions, his friends, his pleasures, his riches, all that he holds dear—and he is carried away to the utter solitude of the grave.

Everyone alive today is under the sentence of death. But people are preoccupied with today and give no thought to tomorrow. In this world everyone is to a greater or lesser degree a culprit, but few pay heed to the fact that death is perpetually stalking us, and can catch us unawares—it can strike any moment.