What Occurs After Death (1942)

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A VCopyrighted 1942 by

Supreme Grand Lodge, AMORCPrinted in U. S. A.

W ha t O ccuis Q.jte'L D ea th 1 B y H . S p e n c e r L e w i s , Ph. D., F. R. C.

M an is at al l t imes dual in nature, bu t not dual inconsciousness except when he is in a perfectly normalliving state, in his normal, physical body. Th e mom entthe brain consciousness or the physical consciousness ofthe physical body is inhibited, made dormant, or sus-pended by accident, injury, drugs or any other cause,man is then of one consciousness, a Divine, psychicconsciousness.

Now we have the question as to what occurs afterdeath. Some might say when reading this, “My, w hat acheerful subject,” and I say, “Yes, it is rather cheerful.”A fte r all, the more we un derstan d abo ut so called death,the more we know about wha t occurs at the great momenttransition takes place.

In twenty five years of talking with individuals whohave been in sorrow and grief over some transition thathas just occurred, or who are sick and anticipate thattransition may be close at hand, I have found that theirgreat anxiety, their great worry, their great depressionconcerning transition or so called death is due to theirfear of it. To the average individual, it is one of the twogrea t mysterious events in life. It is a fact tha t we knowlittle about wh at occurs before birth. Th ere is more of thegreatest chemical, physiological, magnetic, pathological,



scientific mystery connected with birth than there is withany other pathological process known to nature. W e havedelved into the mysteries of what happens after we leavethis plane, but science has been able to tell us little aboutwhat occurs before life comes to this plane.

The average person also seldom attempts to understandthe mysteries of so called transition and is greatly misledand misinformed. W e hear, for instance, in all of theChristian churches a constant repetition of the statementtha t there is no death. It would seem to be a slogan ofthe Christ ian Church and i t would seem to be the key-note to a hopeful message that these churches and religionswant to establish in the minds of the populace and individ-uals. It would seem to be the one silver or golden notethat makes man or woman here on earth accept the si tua-tions as they come, battle on against all obstacles and fight

for all that is worth wh ile— this one grand and gloriousstatement that “there is no death.”Yet while this very same slogan may be written in

gold letters and represented by a band of ribbon in thechurch, and may be recited in the rituals, there are songsthat are sung in the same churches that speak of deathand the fear of it, and your prepara tion for it. Th ere isa funeral ritual that paints a picture of death as the mosthorrifying condition. Th ere is everything around us andabout us in these churches to remind us of the terriblenessof death, and yet we are told there is no death.

To the mystic, neither of these statements, that death isterrible or there is no death, is true, nor does he speak ofthese things in such a manner. Th ere is no death to somethings and some parts o f man, but there is nothing terrible,nothing mysterious abou t it. W e speak of the immortality

of the soul, or hear it spoken of in rituals and doctrines asthough that were the only part of man that continued toexist after so called death—after transition; and yet Iwould like to make plain to you in a few words at thistime, and perhaps in more words at some other time in

another discourse, the fact that the body, the physical partof man is no more subject to death, annihilation, than isthe immortal soul and spirit of man.

All that man is composed of, physically, is of the dustof the earth, from the food he eats, the water he drinks,the air he breathes; and the physical part of man is trulythe chemical elements of the earth. A t transition theseelements return to e arth and whethe r the body is crematedand the ashes deposited in the soil, or whether the body,itself, is deposited in the soil, the physical elements of thephysical part of man continue to live, for every test and

every demonstration shows that the fundamental laws ofcohesion and adhesion do exist. Th ere is a retroactive ac-tion going on. Th ere is a chemical action going on. Th ereis every kind of action going on in that physical body thatthere was ever going on in it when alive. It may be areverse action. Thes e elements return to earth and theybecome once again the simplest elements from which theycame and they help to form new life—new vegetation onthe earth plane. Th ey begin again a new cycle and wecan easily and truthfully and beautifully think of thephysical elements of our body as contributing to some ofthe beautiful vegetation, the flowers and other forms oflife that nature evolves from the simplest elements in fill-ing the earth with life.

There is no death to the physical part of man’s body;but aside from this point, which is only incidental in my



talk tonight, I want to speak of what occurs at the mo-me nt of transition and therea fter. First of all, from thismoment on, let me say that I do not want to use theword “death.” I prefer to use the word “transit ion;" andhope the day will come when our newspapers and maga-zines will s top using the word, “death." W e pick up theSunday paper and read an editorial, perhaps a religiouseditorial; it may have the very subject, “There is nodeath,” and then we turn to the news columns and finda list of persons who died, or that death has taken thisone or tha t one. T o be consistent, this word should beeliminated.

The majori ty of the people belong to a church or or-ganization that holds to the principle that the real part ofman is immortal; therefore, the word “death” should beeliminated, and I will eliminate it now during the rest of

my discourse.A fte r all, wha t does occur at transition? It is merely a

change. I spoke in anothe r address of wh at you could ob-serve in the uncons cious body th at is still living. I saidif you ever looked upon a person who was in a faint,or unconscious from drugs or anesthetic, you would findthere is a normal body with all of the normal activities tomaintain life, and that all that was missing was a form ofbrain consciousness. I said that the D ivine or m ental con-sciousness, the mind consciousness of the real inner selfwas intact , uninjured, unchanged by the ou ter change thathad taken place. All the outer change had done, whetherby injury, accident or anesthetic, drugs, or temporary in-disposition by faint from weakness, was to close the eyesagainst seeing (although the eyelids may be open), shut

the ears against hearing, the nose against smelling, thetongue against tasting, and fingers against feeling.

W ith these five faculties shut off from m aking anyimpressions and conveying any intelligence and being ableto send forth any intelligence, the brain consciousness of

the individual was closed like a book, temporarily. In -wardly, however, the Divine consciousness, the conscious-ness of God, was maintaining its state of activity. It waskeeping the heart beating to the proper rhythm; i t waskeeping the lungs breathing; it was keeping the variousother organs of the body functioning with their rhythm;in fact, so keen is that consciousness that if that uncon-scious body were taken from a warm room into a coldroom, the temperature of the body would automaticallychange to meet the conditions in the new room, and anyothe r disturbance would be met. If the arms were vio-lently exercised by some apparatus or by someone doingit, the heart would beat faster to make up for the exer-cise. Th ere is a knowledge, mind control and conscious-ness guarding and protecting that unconscious body de-spite the fact that the outer consciousness sleeps.

Now, I pointed out that this so called unconscious stateof the person was only temporary. A t transition we havethe same situation, bu t it remains permanent. Transitionis nothing more or less, physically and pathologically, thanthe separation of the tw o forms of consciousness. Inthe case of transition, the Divine consciousness withdrawsitself from the body instead of remaining and this leavesthe brain consciousness incapable of any further activity.So we have the soul of man, the mind consciousness,the Divine, immortal consciousness in man, withdrawingat the time of transition. True , disease may have been



responsible and we find at transition an abnormal condition, an injured body; but we have found in many cases,and the physicians and coroners find every day, the bodiesof those where transition has occurred without the slightest injury, with no sign of disease, where the heart juststopped and the great separation has taken place. No wafter we look at this physical body that is left after thischange, we find it is a perfectly normal creation; that is,if disease or accident has not injured it. W e find it hasall of its parts; it has the necessary blood; it has all of theelements necessary for a living body, but there is no life.Th ere is no action. W e find the blood standing still and,because there is no combustion taking place in the system,no heat is being manufactured, and the temperature ofthe blood is lowered. Th e blood becomes cold and bystanding still it coagulates; the physical body simply be-comes inactive by degrees, mome nt by m oment because thegreat controlling intelligence has left.

This brings us to the point of the very wonderful andbeautiful statement in Genesis where it is said that manwas formed out of the dust of the earth; God broughttogether from all of the elements of the physical earththose things needed to make the physicaJ body. Th ebody was formed and there was breathed into it thebrea th of life, and man becam e a living soul. You see inthat brief statement the duali ty of m an—how the physicalpart may be formed perfectly, but no matter how per-fectly the body may be formed and how well propor-tioned, it is only a body of clay until the breath of life,soul, enters and makes it a living soul.

They say that for 66 cents, you can find in a pharmacyshop all the chemical elements tha t compose man’s body;

but that only makes the physical body. W e cannot makethe real part of m an out of the chemical elements. Youcould not take the physical body after transition no matterhow well preserved, even though the eyelashes were stillon the eyelids, and turn it into a living body by anychemical process. It takes more than e lectricity as somescientists have tried to figure out, and it takes more thanoxygen. Look at those cases wh ere transitio n is close athand and the person’s outer consciousness has alreadyclosed its pages. W he n a person is in a so called state ofcoma, he is brought oxygen; he has oxygen added to hissystem, but the most it has ever done is to encourage orstrengthen the weakened heart a l i t t le for one or twodays more, but transition has always been inevitable. Ma nhas found no substi tute for that Divine substance whenonce it begins to leave or once it has gone. O f thisdual man, the materialistic schools put all the emphasis onthe physical part of man, that part which is so largelywater. For instance, afte r cremation and extreme heat,when all moisture is drawn out, you have only a fewpounds—that which can chemically be bought for 66 cents— and w hich from every po int of view, is nothing morethan a gathering up of the elements you may have in thegarden of your homes. Th at, th e materialistic schoolspoint out, is the great man. Th ey study minutely everyone of these little cells, and get excited over the factthat they have found that one of the little cells of thenail in the finger is similar to the fibrous cell of a plantin the garden. Th ey get excited over such a discovery.A trusting child does not do that. He simply says, “Mama,Papa, if we must eat to live and eating keeps us alive,then my body must be formed by some of the meal and



mush and milk and things of that kind that I eat; and ifI go out in the oat field, I will find some of the things thatkeep me alive.” A nd it would be true. A little childdoesn’t get excited over that discovery, but science does.Its view'point instead of being broad is narrow.

Th at is the way to look at the material par t of man andsee nothing. Th e othe r side is reached by those schoolsof mystics, metaphysicians, and philosophers who say thatis no t the real pa rt of man. Th e inne r intelligence ofman, that which, according to the Bible, is called theliving soul is the real you. W e note in tha t s ta tementtha t man becomes a living soul in a living body. So attransition we find the two dualities being separated,broken down into two distinct entities—the physical bodyand the soul.

Note through all the years of time, with all the ancientmethods of burial and all the ancient methods of caringfor those at transition, all sacred rituals and writings saythat to dust man doth return. The y expect the return ofthe physical pa rt of m an to its original sources. Th ere isnothing horrifying or mysterious abou t it — tha t thephysical body of man should go back to the source fromwhence it came. W e should have n o difficulty in seeing,rationally, the wisdom of that principle, as well as thegreat fundamental law that the invisible part of man re'turns to its original source. So at transition we find thephysical part and the spiritual part separated, each goingto its original source from whence it came, separatingfrom each other moment by moment, hour by hour, untilthe whole universe is between them.

Now we are particularly interested in what occurs afterthis separation has taken place. W e have, in recent years,

comparatively speaking, a number of schools to explainthe possibility and probability of what occurs aftertransition. W e have foremost among the schools onewhich attemp ts to claim the greatest teachings — theSpiritualistic School. Th is system claims tha t the soul or

spirit of man, being immortal, ascends into a heavenly orDivine and spiritual world where it continues to live withits consciousness and personality, and that it is not onlyconscious of itself, but conscious of the attendance ofothers around it; conscious of the identity of those stillremaining here, and not only capable of communicatingand talking to those around it, but can talk and com'municate with those who are still on this earth plane.They go further and state that these disembodied or spiritual bodies are capable of returning here momentarily, tem-porarily, or upon call and request of those on the earth

plane. These are the claims set forth by that school. Thereare other schools which agree to the same fundamentalproposition that the soul or spirit of man ascends to aspiritual kingdom; but they claim that it waits in an un-conscious state for an ultimate Judgment Day when itwill be enlivened with other souls, and physical bodies willbe called from the graves. In this new day and new king-dom, the good and evildoers will be judged.

There are some schools which claim that after the soulascends to a heavenly or spiritual world it dwells in anunconscious or semi conscious state, and that it never re-turns again to the earth. Th ere are other schools ofthought in the Orient—with millions of followers—thathold that after the spirit ascends to Heaven, it remains ina suspended, conscious state until some other time when it



is absorbed into the consciousness of God, and loses itsidentity entirely by becoming a part of God again.

So we have these different thoughts, and you will notetha t most of these systems are highly speculative. Onething is certain— the average teacher or preach er who is

expounding any one of these systems or philosophies hasnever been there and is not talking from first handknowledge. Such doctrines are highly speculative. Agreat many of these systems are based on the statementsin Holy or sacred writings. Some from the Christian Bib le, so me fr om th e wri tin gs o f Buddha, and Confucius,some from Zoroaster, and some from writings goingfarth er back than an y of these. Even opposing schoolswill use the same Biblical quotations to prove their con-tentions, by giving a different translation or interpretationto the same statement.

You, as a seeker, you as a student, must form your ownconclusions when you come face to face with opposing,contending, and different statements of all these systems.Ve ry few agree on any one point. You find with any ofthese systems of thought their ideals are based on specula-tion, and your opinion and your conclusion is just as goodas anyone else’s. Th ere are, however, some things that areknown that occur after transit ion, or at the moment oftransition, by those who have been on the borderline andyet did not cross over it, and who have come back to tellus of their experiences. Those people have the most re-liable information we can have. It is to be noted that thestatements of those who have been temporarily on theborderline of transition, who have been walking, let ussay, the Grea t Path to the Gre at Gate, and then came backand did not pass through—the statements of these persons

from various parts of the world agree, whereas statementsfrom those who have never had such experiences are spec-ulative and do not agree.

Yes, we have a mass of information from those whohave claimed to go to the spirit world and are givingmessages through mediums, automatic writing, spirit pho-tography and inspirational talks, etc.; but from the thou-sands and thousands of books written under such in-fluence, it is interesting to note that the reports of whatis going on in the spirit world do no t agree. Sometimesthey are quite amusing. I remembe r reading one not longago, reported through a medium, who said he was stilllaying bricks in building houses. He ha d been a brick-layer here on this earth plane and therefore could thinkof no other im portant trade. Oth ers make reports on allsorts of things. Th ere are stateme nts from those stating

that in Heaven one passes the time leisurely away andthere is no work and no effort. O thers tell us that theyknow each other and speak to each other. Some say theyhave marriages and tha t even children are born. Some-times they say there a re big buildings up there. I couldgo on and repeat the many, many statements, the con-tradictory statements; they all disagree. From those thathave been on the borderline, the reports are all alike.

In one case an electrician was not expected to live formore than twenty eigh t hours. He had been shocked byhigh voltage. He was taken to the hospital in an uncon -scious state, believed to have passed through transition; hewas covered over with a sheet; the door was closed; thedoctor notified the undertaker to take his body to themorgue, and in every way he was considered to be lifeless.



Suddenly they began to feel a little warmth, showingindications of life that startled the nurses.

Then there is the statement of a woman, believed tohave passed through transition for twenty four hours.She was deeply religious in an orthodox, Methodist sense,

and was intolerant of any viewpoint other than thatwhich was prescribed by her church. H er report aftershe came back was like that of the electrician.

Then there is the little girl in the Montreal Hospital, ju st ab le to ta lk an d desc rib e in a ch ild ish w ay w hat sheexperienced. She had never heard of such an experiencebefore, had no idea of what Heaven was like, yet herreport was identical with all the others, even that of aphilosopher. A nd w hat do they report?

Th ere is first a great lightening of the body. Th atseems to be the first outstanding thing that impressesthem. Long before they are willing to let the nurse ordoctor know something peculiar is going on, they beginto sense they are not lying heavily. A t first they thinkit is imagination; then they begin to sense a warmth andthe lightness begins to feel as though they could springfrom bed and nothing could keep them from it. Th eroom that was only a few feet away, begins to look asthough it were many, m any feet away. It is not tha t theireyesight becomes blurred as they still recognize certainpersons, and witnesses show that to the last moment theywere able to recognize their presence. It is not a blurredeyesight, but a matter of Fourth Dimension. Th ey are be'ginning to sense themselves in a world that has anotherdimension that they have never sensed before. The y be'gin to feel that they are existing in the Fourth Dimension.

None of them, except the philosopher, knew anythingabout the Fou rth Dimension. The n the voices of thosethat were talking together, begin to get further away untilit sounds as though they were off at the end of the hall.This is a great moment with them because of the closing

out o f physical impressions. Eventually they can seenothing b ut themselves. Th ey see themselves lying on thebed. The y see their physical bodies, no t from their owneyes, but from ano ther sense of vision. Th ey say they seemto be six or seven feet away and above themselves, lookingdown on their own physical bodies, and between them andthe physical body there seems to extend a haze. On e described it as an aura, another like the silver thread spokenof in religious writing. A noth er described it as beingsimilar to the umbilical cord, only not so solid. T he fa ctis that they see something between themselves and the

physical body, and they feel the separation gradually taking place. I have seen about a hund red letters in the lasttwenty years from those who felt they did not desire to goback to the physical body to stop the separation. However, there is this one feeling, of sorrow for those whoare weeping, and they sense tha t sorrow. Th ey feelthey must go back to relieve the sorrow, but as for themselves, the lightness, the sense of great peace and the senseof music so intangible that they can hardly hear it, arepleasant sensations; while the freedom from all pain is arelief and is an impelling urge to let the separation continue. Bear in mind the man with a leg cut off, wholooked down upon himself and saw the mutilated body,but the part rising above had all of its parts, and no pain.There was absolute freedom from all suffering; and that iswhy there is no desire to go back into the physical body



again. The re seems to be a dual p ower — one trying tohold them to the physical body and one drawing themaway, and so they waver in that state.

Finally, in the case of those who made the reports, theyare draw n back into the physical body. Th ey feel them '

selves cramped, shut in and crushed, and immediately thephysical actions and powers begin to come back; they begin to feel warm instead of the cooling sensation; theybegin to feel heavy and weighted down as though therewas a load on their chests. It is hard for them to breathe.The eyelids are hard to open and yet they gradually do,and that is the first sign to the doctor that they are com'ing back; he sees the eyelids begin to quiver. He sees astruggle. Sometimes it is one, two, or three days beforethey are able to speak. Th ey kno w all that is going onabout them, but the body is heavy and cramped. The yknow something must be done to relieve the suffering andweeping of the beloved ones.

That is their picture of the borderline condition andthey not only all agree, but give us the most understand'able report. Here is a great story, a great picture. W ha ta wonderful thing life is, and yet how painless and howbeautiful transition can be.

Because my time is limited, I cannot go on and tell youwhat occurs after what their statements indicate, but Iwould have you think over these things again in the mean'

time, whenever you have a few moments. Th e lightnessof the body, the expanding space, and the beauty of thehaze surrounding them. Th e ability to see themselves,showing the dual consciousness, showing that the Divine

Consciousness can be independent of the physical body.Sometime you will understand m ore about it. I think inthe future it will be well to have a discourse on the sub

je ct , “ W h y A re So me E ar th bo un d? ” and ex pl ai n whysome persons feel that they cannot get away, and muststay here near the physical body. So w ith these few wordsto think about, I believe you will be able to build up anidea and picture of transition.



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What Occurs After Death (1942)

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