Death Is A Button For Continuity Of Life
Kamal Jain
Despite our fear of death, we have to confront it one day. Like change, death is inevitable. Life can’t move on without death. In fact death is the ‘off ’ button of life and life is the ‘on’ button of death. German philosopher Martin Heidegger said, “Man is being towards death.” It means that we start dying with our birth itself.
Animals and trees die, but they don’t know that they die. Since as human beings we are aware of death, we can outgrow fear of death. We have the potential to face death and overcome our fear of it. It is death which has inspired human beings to contemplate on life and this has given birth to metaphysics. After birth, death is the only guaranteed happening in the world, albeit with the uncertainty of when, where and how.
The body plays the important role of being the instrument of soul or consciousness in carrying life. Body tends to decay and perish over a period of time as per laws of nature. Once the body is unable to sustain itself beyond a point, the soul departs and starts afresh with a new body. This departure is termed as death and the starting of new life is birth.
The Gita terms it as change of cloth. Change of body is a necessity; that’s what makes death imminent. Though we can’t outgrow death at the physical level, change of body might facilitate continuity of the journey of the life of the same soul with the legacy of past impressions and conditionings. We may find some element of immortality in the natural process of reproduction by which we continue to live by passing on our biological traits to our offspring.
Death plays a positive role in the universe. On the one hand, life seems transient like a dewdrop; and on the other hand, it is permanent with the potential for eternal continuity. At the level of body, life is temporary and at that of soul, life is a continuum and permanent. Life in itself is immortal since it keeps assuming new shapes and forms even in the midst of destruction.
Growth, progress and evolution of the universe necessitate change which happens with death – destruction of old and creation of new to replace the former.
It is our desires which propel and bind us with the cycle of creationprotection-destruction. Our desires necessitate birth and we later meet death, all part of the circle of birth and death. As long as desires are there, we all are constrained to keep settling the account of karmas.
Since we can’t remain in body forever, why not seek immortality through our thoughts and actions? Mind is the faculty of soul, able to interact with the external universe through the body’s sense organs. Whatever we gather as knowledge, experiences and wisdom during our whole life must be shared and passed on as a legacy to the new generation for continuity of our ideology to further the progress and development of humanity and its prosperity.
This is the eternal aspect of life which outgrows individual death. This can be a way also to contribute a bit of ours in return for whatever we get abundantly from Mother Nature and society.
