Heaven, what a place, a concept an idea…. what is it? For me, its all those things and some more. From time to time I see things clearly, at other times I am filled with uncertainty.
Heaven is where the streets are made of gold, where lifes secrets unfold, where the secrets are told. Heaven, where flowers grow wilda and you are a child once more.
Hell is where strets are covered in blood, where secrets tare apart, where secrets are never told…
There are so many ideas, so many truths, so individual. The heaven, or the heavens, is a common religious, cosmological, or transcendent place where beings such as gods, angels, spirits, saints, or venerated ancestors are said to originate, be enthroned, or live.
According to the beliefs of some religions, heavenly beings can descend to earth or incarnate, and earthly beings can ascend to heaven in the afterlife, or in exceptional cases enter heaven alive.
Heaven is often described as a “higher place”, the holiest place, a paradise, in contrast to hell or the Underworld or the “low places”, and universally or conditionally accessible by earthly beings according to various standards of divinity, goodness, piety, faith, or other virtues.
In Indian religions, heaven is considered as Svarga Loka. Svarga Loka, is one ofthe seven higher lokas (in the esotericism plane) in Hindu cosmology.
The seven lokas consist of Bhuloka, Bhuvar loka, Svarloka (Indraloka), Maharloka, Janaloka, Taparloka, Satyaloka. On the other hand, the soul is again subjected to rebirth in different living forms according to its karma.
This cycle can be broken after a soul achieves Moksha or Nirvana. Nirvana is the supreme goal of certain meditation disciplines.
Any place of existence, either of humans, souls or deities, outside the tangible world (heaven, hell, or other) is referred to as otherworld.
Heaven or hell, one or the other, both? Here is a thought for the ages: the afterlife.
The view of an afterlife is what provokes people’s immense fear and concern about the concept of death in which they express that fear in different forms.
This has several reasons.
First of all, salvation means we receive eternal life if we have a personal relationship with God. In modern day society, most people go to church to show their faith to God in thinking they get “saved”.
This ancient literature goes into elaborate detail about the horrors Hell provides.
The Inferno of Dante (written by Dante Alligheri) goes into detail that there is a hell and the levels inside it are different tortures people have to endure for committing a specific crime.
The Inferno tells the journey of Dante through Hell. In the poem, Hell is depicted as nine concentric circles of torment located within the Earth. They are: limbo, lust, greed, gluttony, anger, heresy, violence, fraud and treachery.
Dante’s First Circle of Hell is resided by virtuous non-Christians and unbaptized pagans who are punished with eternity in a lesser form of Heaven.
Then comes lust, and in the third circle there are souls of gluttons who are overlooked by a worm-monster Cerberus. Sinners in this circle are punished by being forced to lie in a vile slush that is produced by an icy rain that goes on for ever.
In the Fourth Circle of Hell people souls are punished due to greed and on the fifth circle is where the wrathful and sullen are punished for their sins.
When reaching the sixth circle of Hell, Dante and Virgil see heretics who are condemned to eternity in flaming tombs. The seventh circle of Hell is divided into three rings. The Outer Ring houses murderers and others who were violent to other people and property. The Eight Circle of Hell is resided by the fraudulent.
The last, the 9th circle of hell, is divided into 4 Rounds according to the seriousness of the sin. Though all residents are frozen in an icy lake. Those who committed more severe sin are deeper within the ice. Each of the 4 Rounds is named after an individual who personifies the sin.
We can also see this concepts in other religions. As one of the oldest and most influential religions in existence, Judaism might be expected to be the source of our most profound notions of heaven.
The fact is that there is no clear indication of a heaven or afterlife in the Jewish scriptures.
Zoroastrianism (one of the world’s oldest monotheistic religions. Founded by the Prophet Zoroaster in ancient Iran) is also interesting because, unlike other religions, it claims that everyone will eventually get into heaven, though it might take a while.
The Islamic version of heaven is a paradise for those whose good works have outweighed the bad as determined by the straight path laid out in the Quran.
There are many ideas and concepts regarding the meaning of heaven and hell.
In my point of view, the idea of an afterlife is what provokes people’s immense fear and concern about the concept of death Heaven or Hell, a place, a concept, an idea…. what is it? There are so many theories, so many believes.
Time and space have taught me somethings, I don’t pretend to be an expert. They have taught me that Hell is other people who no matter what you do always find something to judge. Hell is when people drag you through the mud. People who only see flaws, all your mistakes, they don’t let you live because they refuse to forgive. Heaven is other people who choose to see the best. It’s people who don’t dwell on your sins and will search for unity.
