People Who Don't Know They're Dead

The Bruce Willis character in the hit movie of a few years ago, The Sixth Sense, didn't know he was dead.  Most people probably assumed that this was just Hollywood science fiction.  A friend of mine enjoyed the movie but laughed at the idea a person (or soul) could not know he was dead.  Since the friend doesn't believe in survival of consciousness at death, I asked him if he thought he would know when he became "dead."  I also asked him if he knows that he is "alive" when he is dreaming at night?  That one stopped him cold.

There is a book titled People Who Don't Know They're Dead by Gary Leon Hill now on the market.  One of the reviewers at Amazon.com refers to it as "nutty chutzpah." Several other reviewers thought it was "crazy."  I thought it was consistent with the abundance of spiraling communication from the "Other Side" suggesting that many souls are slow to recognize that they have departed the material life.  That is, there seems to be a "sleep" or "dream" state that precedes the awareness that the consciousness has actually departed the physical life.

"The duration of the state of confusion that follows death varies greatly," explained Allan Kardec, the pioneering French psychical investigator of the 19^th Century, in The Spirits' Book.  "It may be only a few hours, and it may be several months, or even years.   Those with whom it lasts the least are they who, during the earthly life, have identified themselves most closely with their future state, because they are soonest able to understand their new situation."

A very similar message comes from the extensive writings of medium Alice Bailey and her teacher, the Tibetan master, Djwhal Khul.   "In the case of the [spiritually] undeveloped person, the etheric body can linger for a long time in the neighborhood of its outer disintegrating shell because the pull of the soul is not potent and the material aspect is," we read in Death: The Great Adventure. "Where the person is advanced, and therefore detached in his thinking from the physical plane, the dissolution of the vital body can be exceedingly rapid."

As set forth in God's Other Door, Edgar Cayce, the "sleeping prophet," said that "many an individual has remained in that [state] called death for what ye call years without realizing it was dead!"  Cayce further explained that the "entity" becomes conscious gradually and that this is contingent upon "how great are the appetites and desires of a physical body."

Silver Birch, the spirit entity who spoke through the entranced Maurice Barbanell, said the same thing.  "This [awakening] depends on the degree of awareness that the newcomer possesses," he explained.  "If completely ignorant of the fact that life continues after earthly death, or if so indoctrinated with false ideas that understanding will take a long time, then there is a process of rest equivalent to sleep."

Silver Birch went on to say that the time for realization is self-determined.  It can be short or long, as measured by our duration of time.  For the enlightened, at least those whose actions in the physical world were in accordance with their enlightenment, it is a speedy process.

The Spiritualist classic, Claude's Book, relates communication between Claude, a British pilot killed when shot down by the Germans in World War I, and his mother through the trance mediumship of Gladys Osborne Leonard.  Early on, Claude explains his passing.  He first felt a blow on his head, a sensation of dizziness and falling, and then nothing more.   "It may have been a fortnight or more later that I became conscious again," he told his mother through Leonard, further commenting that he had no account of time there, so he could not be sure.

After he became fully conscious on the other side, Claude received an orientation and was then put to work greeting other casualties of the war.  "We bring them away so that they may return to consciousness far from their mutilated physical bodies, and oh, Mum, I feel quite tired sometimes of explaining to men that they are dead.  They wake up feeling so much the same; some go about for days, and even months, believing they are dreaming."

One of the leading psychical investigators in the United States during the early part of the 20^th Century was Carl A. Wickland, M.D., whose wife was a medium.  Wickland recorded the information coming from the spirit world through his wife for some 40 years.  "This research has proven conclusively that death is only a sleep and an awakening, the process of awakening depending largely upon the individual's mental attitude, such as religious bias, unreasoning skepticism or the willful ignorance of and indifference to life's meaning, so prevalent among the multitude," Wickland wrote in The Gateway of Understanding. "In the case of the open-minded, unbiased individual there is no protracted death sleep, for as transition from the physical draws near he will often discern the presence of waiting friends from the Unseen, bidding him welcome into the new life..."  Wickland goes on to state that others may awaken from the death sleep entirely oblivious of their transition and remain in such oblivion for many years as "vagabond spirits."

On the other hand, some sources suggest that the "sleep" time does not extend beyond a few days.  According to The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying, a person becomes conscious on the Other Side with the dawning of the Ground Luminosity, or Clear Light.  "The vast majority of people do not recognize the Ground Luminosity at all," writes author Sogyal Rinpoche, "and instead they are plunged into a state of unconsciousness, which can last up to three and a half days.  It is then that the consciousness leaves the body."   This has led to the custom, Rinpoche adds, of making sure that the body is not touched or disturbed for three days after death.  

In Heaven and Hell, Emanuel Swedenborg, the brilliant 17^th Century scientist, inventor, and seer, stated:  "I have heard from heaven that some people who have died are thinking even while they are lying on the mortuary tables, before their awakening, still within their own cold bodies.  As far as they know, they are still alive, except that they are unable to move the smallest bit of matter that belongs to their bodies."

According to Swedenborg, the person's spirit often stays in the body for a while, but not beyond the complete stillness of the heart, which, Swedenborg explains, can continue for quite a long time in some and not so long in others.   The moment the heart motion stops, the person is "awakened."  This "awakening" means leading a person's spirit out of the physical body and into the spirit world.  This, the great seer went on, is what is known as "resurrection."

Although it is not clear from the writing, one might infer that the complete stillness of the heart is something even modern medical technology cannot detect.  Swedenborg goes on to explain that he was allowed to experience the dying process, at least as far as his physical senses were concerned.  His more inward life, including thought, remained unimpaired, so that he perceived and remembered the things that happen to people when they awaken from the dead.  "I noticed that physical breathing was almost taken away; the more inward breathing of the spirit kept on, joined to a slight and still breathing of the body," he wrote.  "Next, a communication was set up between my heartbeat and the celestial kingdom (since that kingdom corresponds to the heart in man).  I even saw angels from there, some at a distance; and two of them were sitting by my head.  This resulted in the removal of all my personal affections, although thought and perception continued.  I was in this condition for several hours."

It is somewhat difficult to reconcile the three-and-a-half days awakening mentioned by Rinpoche with the possibility of many years mentioned by others.  It may be that Rinpoche is referring to the severance of the "silver cord" or "giving up the ghost," which may also be what Swedenborg is alluding to in the "stillness of the heart."   It could also be that Rinpoche is referring to relatively enlightened souls. Both Wickland and Cayce mention spirits "awakening" and still being oblivious as to their condition, thereby suggesting that even though the "sleep" has ended and there is some consciousness the soul may be awakened and still not aware that he or she has passed from the physical world.  Is a crying infant "awake" to the fact that it is "alive" in the physical world?   Thus, it may be a matter of semantics.

Confusing, yes, but it still makes much more sense than the sleep and resurrection taught by orthodox religion.