*...until they finally learn their lesson. (The poor)!...*

and the lesson is?

Your twisted!

Dear Dan,

The lesson is to use one's will to overcome passivity, darkness, sloth and other bad habits that dampen and dissipate one's energy. Lack of money/wealth is simply a sign of lack of energy.

(now I'm not saying that having lots of money and energy is the goal of life, but one needs to have it first before it can be given up)

Is Yuyustu correct? Are born again and again until we get it or use up all our time.?

The universe will self-destruct in less than 15 billion years and with it all elements of (time's up) physical life. There's often compelling evidence for life beyond the grave in various examples.

As chronicled in a book titled, life after life. The research of an ivy league university academic, who chose subjects to be hypnotised then asked to go back in time to their earliest memories.

Some of which appear to be recounting of earlier lives. And published with permission, if those memories could be validated by recalled topical events, newspaper headlines and facts only the individual and closest surviving relatives could have known.

Then there have been some interesting and widely reported events, that saw folk waking from long-term comas able to play the piano perfectly, even though never had lesson or piano in this lifetime. Or upon awakening able to speak fluent mandarin although never ever exposed to it or Mandarin speakers.

The question then is how and where did these memories come from? And if not from this life then where and when? This is eyewitness evidence for reincarnation?

Or in the teaching of the Master. Verily verily I say unto you, to reach unto the kingdom of heaven, ye must be born again.

Whereas none whatsoever for zip/zilch/NOTHING beyond this life.

And given reincarnation is true?

Makes absolute sense out of postcode poverty traps and the parlous state of our world, Death and suffering of innocents? Pain, suffering and infant mortality! Some years ago (1938) a young Jew returning from Paris to Berlin to get his Parents out and in Britain, before they could be interred in a Nazi death camp!

Needed to take a meal break and was afraid he'd be refused service in any German establishment. Then to his relief, spied a Chinese establishment.

Went in and asked the proprietor, do you serve Jews? The Proprietor said, yes sure, what kind of Jews you want? we got apple Jews, orange Jews or grape Jews!
Alan B.

*...Lack of money/wealth is simply a sign of lack of energy...*

That statement would rate the most stupid ever! Do you live on Earth?

.

Dear Peter,

.

Preparing for death as you describe it is a purely egotistical affair : recourse to religious belief (“faith”) in order to overcome one’s own, personal, existential anxiety.

For ordinary people, such as myself, preparing for death is something quite different. It means organising one’s departure so that loved ones, family, friends, business associates, employees, etc. do not have the worry, burden and responsibility of taking important decisions on complex matters of a very personal nature, affecting the lives of one’s survivors, dépendants and others.

Religious belief, and what you refer to as “faith” are, in my view, less unequivocal than love, for the simple reason that the former two are directed to a hypothetical god or gods, whereas there is nothing hypothetical about love.

Is there life after death ?

From a purely biological point of view, yes there is. Birth is not the beginning of life and death is not its end.

Life is a self-sustaining process that began a long time ago. It shows no signs of ceasing despite all the wars and destruction and irreversible damage caused by mankind to the eco-system. Birth is not the beginning of life. It is its continuance. Living cells are constantly renewed, some more frequently than others. Life is relayed by the individual members of each species, in exclusivity, to the next generation of the same species.

On the other side of the coin, death is the permanent cessation of the vital functions of a living organism or cell, due to either natural or accidental causes. It affects each and every member of the species individually or, in some exceptional circumstances, collectively. When all the members of a species are affected by death, the species is said to be extinct. But life is not extinct.

.

(Continued …)

.

.

(Continued …)

.

Our problem, our unease, or “existential anxiety”, is the insupportable thought that nothing eternal exists. Many of us cling desperately to the belief that there must be an afterlife for each individual and that “by faith alone we will be saved”. Faith may or may not get us to “heaven”, but, at least, it may, possibly, alleviate our “existential anxiety” - at least, to some extent.

Irrespective of whether we suffer from “existential anxiety” or not, the fact remains that as we can see neither a beginning nor an end to the cosmos and everything it contains, I, personally, consider that the eternal does, indeed, exist - until proof to the contrary.

I am less affirmative about life. But there is no doubt in my mind that, even if life is not eternal, love is.

I consider that either love is or it is not, and if it is not, then it never was. In my mind, there is no such thing as temporary or partial love. Either it is total, eternal and indestructible or it is not, and never was.

The biological anthropologist, Helen Fisher, suggested that " Love may be understood as part of the survival instinct, a function to keep human beings together against menaces and to facilitate the continuation of the species".

I, personally, like the definition of that well-known Australian biologist, Jeremy Griffith: "unconditional selflessness" – to which I should add Aristotle's definition : "to will the good of another". I also consider that there is necessarily an element of self-sacrifice in love.

Thus defined, love is a purely altruistic phenomenon, aimed at resulting in a concrete benefit to another individual rather than oneself. Nevertheless, the loss of a “loved one” can have a profound effect on some individuals – to such an extent that they do not survive the loss.

That, too, is, undeniably, a manifestation of love.

.