Some people believe the pearly gates of heaven or the fiery pit of hell await souls after death, while others think their soul will be re-incarnated as some other being.
Every religion has its own teachings about death and the possibility of an afterlife, according to Angela Sumegi, a Carleton University professor who teaches a course on death and afterlife and is writing a book about the subject.
Within religions there may be differences in beliefs between different sects, she added.
For instance, there is no single belief system for aboriginal spirituality, said Naomi Sarazin, an aboriginal cultural liaison officer at Carleton’s Centre for Aboriginal Culture and Education.
“It’s different among all First Nations people and Inuit people and Métis people. Everyone has their own teachings and traditions,” she said.
Still, Sumegi said most religions have a few things in common.
All religions teach that there is an afterlife, with some aspect of the person continuing on in some form after death, Sumegi said.
Almost all religions link behaviour to the outcome of one’s life after death, she added.
Many also concentrate their teachings on how to have a good afterlife, including teaching believers living according to their religion’s beliefs is the way to have the best possible afterlife, she said.
Hinduism
In Hinduism, everything exists in a cycle of renewal with no beginning, according to the online edition of The Canadian Encyclopedia.
Since everything is continuous, actions taken and thoughts imagined today have consequences on the future, including the type of future lives experienced when one dies and is reborn into a future life, the encyclopedia explains.
This self-determining destiny is called karma, and the balance of good karma from good actions and thoughts against bad karma at death decides which level of the caste system, or type of person, one will be born into in their next life, according to the encyclopedia.
Release from the cycle, or moksha, is difficult, but can be achieved in one of three ways that clear bad karma from past lives, according to the encyclopedia.
A union of one’s spiritual self with God can happen through the yogas of knowledge, action or devotion.
Buddhism
Buddhism also believes in the continuing on of the mind into another body, said Rabjor, a Buddhist monk at the Joyful Land Buddhist Centre.
“The mind didn’t come into being with the body,” he said. “The mind is a different entity. It has no physical nature to it.”
The balance of good and bad karma determines where the mind will go upon the current body’s death, Rabjor said.
Keeping the mind peaceful and calm during death is also important.
Jainism
In Jainism, the soul and the body are also separate, and while the body dies, the soul is indestructible, said Jag Humar, the president of the Jain Association of Ottawa-Carleton.
“When a person dies, it means the soul leaves that body and migrates into another body, and it goes through an eternal cycle of birth and rebirth until liberated. When liberation happens, the soul, of course, never gets into another body and achieves what is called salvation,” he said.
To have the best possible future lives, one must do good deeds, be kind and compassionate, and practice universal love and non-violence, he said.
Judaism
As described by Rabbi Reuven Bulka, the leader of Orthodox shul Machzekei Hadas, Judaism has a very different take on the afterlife.
“The moment that you embrace the idea of a purposeful creation, and essentially creation being something out of nothing, automatically, it opens up the idea of this being not an exercise in futility that’s going to come to an end, but which has some lastingness to it,” he said.
It is important for followers to live a good life throughout their lives and keep in mind their mortality by placing importance on lasting values, he said.
Christianity
The Christian take on the afterlife comes from the story of Jesus dying on the cross for the sins of mankind and being resurrected into heaven three days later, opening up the possibility for the souls of his followers to do the same, confirmed Rick Hiemstra, director of research and media relations for the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada.
But Heaven is not believed to be a gated cloud in the sky, he said. Instead, it is a concept of being with God in a peaceful, happy place.
Islam
In Islam, angels question one after death, said Abdullah Aboukarr, a third-year student at the University of Ottawa who has practiced Islam all his life.
The dead give automated answers about what they truly believed throughout their lives.
The answers determine how comfortable they will be as they await the judgment day, he said.
On judgment day, two angels read 99 scrolls to Allah filled with each person’s good and bad deeds, Aboukarr explained.
Allah, in turn, knows the intentions behind each deed, but it is His mercy, not the person’s deeds, that determine if the end destination is heaven or hell.
Next, the person must cross a bridge “as thin as a hair and sharper than a sword,” said Aboukarr. Some cross straight to heaven, while others fall to hell.
The stay in hell may be permanent or a temporary atonement for sins, he explained.
Heaven is a place where anything is possible and one can finally see Allah, he added.
The key to getting into Heaven is to truly believe in and follow the five pillars of the religion, fast whenever possible, read the Qur’an, and recognize that humans sin, but honestly try to do good anyway.
Sikhism
Those who follow Sikhism, however, do not believe good deeds yield a trip to a sort of heaven and bad deeds send one to a type of hell, said Sikhism follower Kalvinder Brar.
“All your deeds, good or bad, are served to you sometime in your life by God,” she said, adding the dying must accept death and what God has served.
The religion does place importance on praying for the peace and rest of souls upon death, said Brar.
In the end, no one can be completely sure what happens when this life ends, said Sumegi, but death tends to come more peacefully for those who have a strong belief in some sort of afterlife, regardless of the religion they follow.
As Jainism follower Humar said, “You cannot claim to have the monopoly on truth.”
This story appeared in the January 2011 edition of the Charlatan magazine. For more stories from this issue, please see: