Is there life after death?
We are all eternal living beings who neither die nor cease to exist but keep changing bodies. The Bhagavad Gita reveal that all embodied beings pass through childhood, youth and old age in bodies and then go into new ones. They cast off the worn-outbodies and enter new ones just as we cast off worn-out garments and put on new ones.
The truth, as revealed in the Gita, is that the embodied being, which is God, does not die but leaves the bodywith the senses and mind and goes to a new body. Death is only a process of changing bodies by the eternal being who goes from a worn-out body to a new one.
The physical form of the being perishes due to a loss of intellect, as revealed in the following verses of the Gita:
A man contemplating the objects develops an attachment for them. From attachment arises desire and from desire arises anger. From anger arises delusion, from delusion confusion of memory, from confusionof memory the loss of intellect, from loss of intellect he perishes. Chapter 2:62-63
These verses show that the being perishes due to a loss of intellect that is caused by a chain reaction that starts when he performs actions with an attachment to the results. The physical form of a being, which ismade up of the five gross elements, mind, intellect and the ego, perishes with the loss of intellect. The being who is eternal and indestructible then leaves the body with the senses and mind and enters a new body. TheBhagavad Gita reveals a way by which the being can steady his intellect and thus save him from perishing. He will stop changing the bodies and dwell in the same body forever.
The questions regarding liberation and life after death have been best answered by Krishna in the Gita. Right at the beginning of his teachings, he says that certain indeedis death for the born and certain is birth for the one who has died. Subsequently, after explaining in detail the path that lead to God, he says that the dweller in the body who crosses over the three attributesarising from the body and attains thebhava of God is completely freed from sorrow, old age, death and birthand attains immortality.
The beings who are attached to the attributes of purity, passion and delusion are certain to die and also certain to take another birth in a new body. They are neither liberated while living nor are they liberated after death. They keep taking births in different bodies and remain subject to sorrow, old age and death in every birth. Certain is their death and certain is their rebirth.
As against these attached beings the person who crosses over the three attributes of purity, passion and delusion and attains the bhava of Godthat is who becomes same to all the beings he is completely freed from sorrow, old age and death and attains immortality. He is liberated while living.