DEATH - THE GATEWAY TO LIFE

The papers on matters concerning Near Death Experiences collected here are drawn from the 2016 conference in Winchester, 'Is Heaven for Real?' In his 'Afterword', David Lorimer offers a succinct summary, thus: 'The spiritual view implied by contributions in this volume suggest that our physical life is embedded in a deeper spiritual reality characterised by love and light, and we are microcosms of universal or nonlocal consciousness... The experiences you have read about cannot prove this contention but strongly suggest it.' (p 202)

NDEs are arguably near death in two ways. Firstly, they are near death because they involve people who are close to perishing, following a heart attack, for example. Former cardiologist turned NDE researcher, Pim van Lommel reports scientific studies that provide evidence of consciousness existing beyond/outside brain function. Subjects are utterly lifeless for periods lasting from about two to ten minutes: without pulse or heartbeat, not breathing, without reflexes or recordable brain activity. After that, through medical resuscitation, they come back. Life resumes, but often seeming better, more meaningful. People surviving coma, stroke, brain injury and near-drowning may also report NDEs.

Secondly, NDEs are near death because they are like death. Involving a special state of consciousness characterised by joyousness while somehow knowing you are dead. van Lommel, in Chapter One ('Nonlocal Consciousness'), also says about one-third of people remember being in a tunnel leading towards a bright light, observing a celestial landscape or meeting people who had died. About a quarter have 'Out of Body' experiences (OBEs) and some have a 'Life Review' and/or a 'Flash Forward'. These elements are said closely to resemble the actual experience of dying, thus suggesting the possibility of an afterlife. It is worth noting that all the cardiac arrest survivors began showing more interest in nature, the environment and social justice, displaying more love and becoming more emotionally involved in family life. The twenty per cent who had NDEs alone became less afraid of death and more convinced of an afterlife.

There is a brief 'Introduction', followed by seven chapters, plus five appendices each containing a personal account of an NDE. Peter Fenwick (Chapter Two) recalls a conversation that led him to take up research into NDEs in the late 1980s, describes some early findings, and refers to the acclaimed work of Monika Renz on the series of psychological transitions people go through approaching death.

David Lorimer's chapter, which brings to a close Part One ('The Nature of Consciousness'), summarises the 'New Thought' view of mind that originated with the likes of Ralph Waldo Emerson. David quotes freely from the American's near namesake, Ralph Waldo Trine's 1920 volume 'In Tune with the Infinite'; for example:

'If there is an individual life, there must of necessity be an infinite source of life from which it comes... The great and central fact in human life... Is the coming into conscious realisation of our oneness with this Infinite Life, and the opening of ourselves fully to this divine inflow.' (p 72)

The book's Part Two ('Spiritual and Religious Perspectives') begins with Marianne Rankin's chapter 'NDEs and Religious Experience', based on her role as Director of Communications with the Alister Hardy Trust. She describes how NDEs are among a range of universal spiritual or religious experiences including a sense of divine presence, voices, visions, healing, answers to prayer, meaningful coincidences, end-of-life and near-death experiences, also after-death communications. With multiple first-person quotes to illustrate this variety, Rankin concludes:

'These experiences seem to point the way to understanding what it means to be truly human, opening our eyes to a greater reality of which we are part. They are vivid, unforgettable and transformative.' (p 107)

Paul Badham, an Anglican priest and Professor of Theology, and Patrick Gaffney, a Buddhist scholar and co-editor of Sogyal Rinpoche's classic 2002 work, The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying, contribute consecutive chapters respectively on: the implications of NDEs for Christians; and, a comparison of NDEs with Tibetan Buddhist teachings. These are good chapters, and I wish there were space here to say more about them.

In the final chapter ('What Happens Next?'), Honorary Research Fellow in theology at Winchester, Shirley Firth, presents a commentary on earlier chapters using multiple quotes to expand and explore numerous themes. Importantly, to my mind, she (alone, and all too briefly) mentions unpleasant or negative NDEs that contain, 'Dark themes of guilt, remorse and punishment... Heaven and Hell' (p. 150). A more extensive and critical account of this less appealing aspect of NDEs would have been appreciated.

Firth suggests that, experienced throughout history, NDEs could be a major source for various different world religions' accounts of dying, death and beliefs in an afterlife. So, the question must be asked, 'What if they are simply baseless and biologically inexplicable hallucinations?' Many members of the materialistic and consumerist culture of today believe that humanity has been deluding itself on this basis for generations. But, we must also ask, 'Is it really reasonable to dismiss the consistent accounts of life-transforming NDEs presented in such an authoritative fashion?'

Is Death really the 'Gateway to Life'? This is a most vital conundrum, a sacred riddle, a kind of Zen koan that cannot indefinitely be avoided by anyone. Indeed, all wisdom literature recommends that we each tackle it sooner rather than later. After all, medically-speaking, from heartbeat to heartbeat, life is surely nothing less than a continuous near death experience. We could, of course, delay our investigations; simply wait and see what, if anything, does happen, when we expire; but this would be to miss the rich opportunity of investigating the proposition of Dag Hammarskjold, quoted in Chapter One: 'Our ideas about death define how we live our life' (p. 51-2).

Following the above quote from his Afterword, David adds, 'Readers will have to arrive at their own conclusion'. In clarifying matters, this commendable collection of essays will certainly help illuminate the mystery. The authors and editors clearly hope that everyone will, eventually, discover the big 'Truth' of an everlasting soul connecting us lovingly to each other, to nature and the Divine, as well as the little truth of attachment to one's all-too-impermanent flesh. Let me here add my Amen to that.