Who am I?

Who am I? What am I doing here on earth? Why was I born? What is my purpose on earth? What is the meaning of my life? I know I will finally die. Then what happens to me? Is there a soul in me? If so, does it outlive me? Where does it go once my physical body dies and perishes? Is there a life after death? If so where? What is the proof? And what do I do in that life after death?  

Wow, questions and questions! All seem to be existentialist questions, arising from the very fact that I exist. And if I exist there has to be a meaning for that existence. Or is that not necessary? To answer these various questions related to our existence on earth, philosophy and religion have arisen. These two branches of science try and deal with these questions.

I do address philosophy and religion as science because there is a lot of thinking, analysis, presuppositions, hypothesis and conclusions arrived at in these philosophical and religious musings. It need not necessarily be laboratory experiments that qualify a branch of knowledge as science.

Coming back to the questions, death seems to play a decisive factor in these quests for answer. Witnessing old age and sickness leading to death, Siddharth as a young Prince, understood the futility of life. He went on to become a Buddha when he propounded that the cycle of births and deaths can be conquered once we cut off the source of attachment to life, which is desire.

Easier said than done! Desire to get rid of desire itself becomes a desire and a bondage! What do we do then?

India is the land of Hinduism, for 83% of Indian people are Hindus. The basic tenets of Hinduism believe that the material world and the lives as we see are all an illusion and to break the cycle of repeated births and deaths into which souls have descended due to ignorance, is to attain liberation from this world and this life. Once the accumulated good deeds (karma) become more than the bad deeds (karma), the soul is released from the cycle and attains freedom.

The individual soul (atman), which according to Advaita Philosophy of Hinduism, is only an extension of the universal soul (Paramatman), on liberation, merges with the universal soul and lives eternally in that effulgent state. Of course, the soul loses its identity and with it any meaning for its existence. 

  

Till that happens, the soul keeps returning to earth as a life, now as a human being, now as an animal or a lesser being, according to the merits it has earned in all its many births. The whole of caste system in Hindu society is built on this Karma theory.

But how surely do we know about the previous births and the karma accumulated during such births? Who has seen it or where is the proof? Was it only a theory propounded by the Kshatrya (warrior class) princes, who in ancient India, labored to find answers to existential questions on earth and arrived at these conclusions, which became embedded in Hinduism as Upanishads?  

Even if we take karma operating as a mechanical force in lives to determine the birth of a soul in such and such a body, then doesn’t it become a mechanical force just as the evolutionary force, blindly grinding on towards nothing excepting existence? What is the meaning of such an existence? Why do we exist?

Well, an atheist would simply say that all this life is an accident that happened due to some chance by which our planet was formed and life originated, developed from simple to complex organisms. The only drive that keeps the lives going, according to this philosophy, is the desire to exist, reproduce and survive. The fittest survived and flourished. On death one simply ceased to exist. Then what is the meaning of life, nothing at all! 

Death is a great leveler. I just lost my batch-mate to cancer. She struggled, fought and finally succumbed. Being an atheist herself, she was able to accept the inevitable as another aspect of life and go on peacefully having determined in her mind that there is nothing beyond death.

In case there is a life after death, then what? Wouldn’t she have lost something?  

Bible teaches differently. It affirms the material world and all lives as real and good, created by a Creator God. We are created for a purpose. The purpose is to be in close communion with our Creator and reflect His glory and also bring joy to Him. Much like a painter delights in the painting he has painted. God loves His creations, especially human beings, the crown of His creation.

Life just did not evolve in an accidental manner by some fluke and develop into higher living forms like human beings over billions of years by trial and error, either due to evolutionary theory of the survival of the fittest or the karma theory of soul finding its body according to its accumulated merits earned in the previous lives.

Every life has a meaning and a purpose for which it is created by God. The goal of life would be to find that purpose and align with it and live one’s life. When our lives are aligned with the Will and purpose of God, we have an easy and a happy, fulfilling life. It could be any calling in secular life or a life devoted to God and His ministry.

Such a life will give us significance and meaning. It is not a life due to an accident or chance happening. It has a purpose and a goal, giving us significance. It also ensures security. We are not tossed and turned by every wave and wind in the world, or be at the mercy of some mechanical force, but have an anchor, the Creator God, on whom we can depend and who is faithful to those who love Him.

Our body which decays and dies and the soul that leaves the body at death, both will be resurrected to a glorified body with a beautiful soul, after judgment in the next world. Bible categorically says that there is a life after death, a spiritual world and in that life we will be clothed with a glorified body, with resemblance to our earthly bodies.

The proof is the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who appeared to his disciples and followers, more than 150 people, for nearly 40 days after his death and resurrection. The eye-witness statements are recorded in the gospels and in the letters of His disciples, now called Apostles.

That was a foretaste of what is going to happen to us after our own deaths. But the souls will have to wait for the end of the world as we know it, which will end when Jesus Christ comes back once again, this time in power and glory and put an end to evil.

A new heaven and new earth will be formed by God and those who believed Jesus and God would inhabit it and live for eternity in the presence of God and Christ. Individuality will not be lost!

How do we even know that these are not speculations like the ones narrated before? How can we be sure of these? Where is the guarantee that these will happen as it is written in the Bible?

More of this I will deal with in the next blog.