Recognition of Imam Part III - Key 4 Experience of Death
Key 4 Experience of Death
We have termed this topic the “experience of death.” But who has attained the experience of death, since with its occurrence all the experiences of the deceased vanish? However, it is true that among deaths there is also a special death, which is full of the observations and experiences of spirituality, certainty and recognition and abounds in the kernel of knowledge and wisdom. In order to know the reality of this kind of death you should carefully study the following explanation:
In verse (3:185) of the noble Qur'ān, the universal law of death is mentioned as follows: “And every soul has to taste death.” Two important questions arise regarding this universal law of death: One, when human existence is a composite of three things, namely, intellect, soul and body, why is the experience of death related only to the soul? The second question is: why is the experience of death compared to the tasting of a material thing?
The answer to the first question is that, although human existence is a composite of intellect, soul and body, in reality intellect transcends death because it does not die, as is the case with angels who are intellects and never die. Also death is not applicable to the body, such as stones. In contrast, the soul, which is animal, dies. This shows that the direct relation of death is with the soul. It does not occur to the body directly, it occurs only through the soul. That is, the living and dying of the body is through the soul. This is the reason that the wise Qur'ān has related death only to the soul in this universal law.
The answer to the second question is that death is compared to the tasting of a material thing for the reason that it is indeed a sort of spiritual taste, which is both extremely sweet and extremely bitter. Another aspect of this answer is that the wise Qur'ān has presented the concept of death as the tasting of a material thing because, for the people of ma`rifat, the special death consists of spiritual events and experiences of knowledge and recognition, which according to “Die before you die” is accepted before physical death through `ibadat and spiritual exercise. The purpose of this death is recognition (ma`rifat), in which are hidden the secrets of spiritual peace and eternal salvation. Thus, with respect to the realities and recognitions that are experienced under the title of spiritual death, it is a fact which can be compared to the experience of tasting a material thing.
That spiritual death which occurs due to the special `ibadat, spiritual exercise and mortification of the carnal self in the light of the guidance of the True Guide, is the introduction to spiritual events and experiences, in the sense that by it (such death), all the doors of the recognition of the self become unlocked. Thus, this voluntary death becomes the means of obtaining the realities and recognitions, spirit and spirituality and the secrets of God's recognition.
There are many wisdom-filled allusions in the noble Qur'ān about the occurrence of a special and voluntary death, or the experimental (tajribati) death before the usual and involuntary death. One of them is that human existence does not only have one soul, but rather innumerable souls. It is an extremely astonishing power of God, may He be exalted, that the abode of souls is not only the human heart and mind but every cell too and that the unity of these innumerable souls is the human “I (ana)”.
This Divine wisdom is also extremely astonishing that on different occasions, these souls of a human being are seized i.e., whereby on the one hand they come out one by one, and on the other hand they continue entering him. In other words, during his life, man constantly dies on the one hand and revives on the other simultaneously, until a day comes when he dies totally.
The above mentioned death should be called a partial death. It is due to this partial death that the reformation, revival and reconstruction of the human soul and body continue all the time, to the extent that after forty days not a single old particle of the human soul and body remains unchanged. As per this calculation, a human being transforms from his old body to the new one nine times every year.
Human life is like a river of souls, which comes from the mountains of the angelic world and the valleys of the human world and flows constantly. However, it is true that sometimes it decreases and sometimes it increases; sometimes it is clear and transparent and at other times it is murky.
At this point, I recall a couplet of Hazrat-i Pīr Nāsir-i Khusraw, may God sanctify his secret. He says in his Rawshana'i-namah:
zi dunya ta ba-`uqb nist bisyar
wali dar rah wujud-i tust diwar
There is not much distance between this world and the next;
Except that your existence is a wall between them.
This means that by special `ibadat and intense spiritual exercise, when the voluntary death occurs to a true mu'min, this wall of “being” will be removed and he will be able to experience the events of qiyamat and spirituality.
God be hallowed! How excellent is this wisdom-filled example of the exalted Pir, that your own carnal soul is the wall and veil between here and the hereafter! When you pass the exam of special `ibadat, spiritual exercise and the purification of the carnal soul, in the light of the sacred farman of the True Guide, the dense and murky wall of your existence and self will either be removed from in front of you, or be made of transparent glass, or a door will be made in it. Then you will gain not only the experience of the wonders of death, but also the doors of the treasures of the knowledge of qiyamat and spirituality and the recognition of God will be open to you forever.
Now as for the question: Is anyone exempt from this universal law of death? The answer is mentioned within the universal law itself that no soul, i.e., human being is above this law. Since no door to spirituality can open without the voluntary death, and since according to the holy Qur'ān (39:42), even sleep is a kind of death, and physical death is complete freedom for a mu'min, then reflect carefully how necessary death is for real mu'mins. Thus, it is clear that death is the door to the spiritual world, without entering through which neither is spiritual progress possible, nor eternal life.
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