This is the wonder! When the yaksha asked Yudhishthira, “What is the biggest wonder in this world?” he replied, “People are dying every day and yet each one wants to be deathless.” When no one has become immortal yet, how can you be the first one? People are afraid of death because they think it is the termination of the chapter, the end of the book. They do not believe that they will continue to live even after death. They see a body being burnt to ashes and think that everything has ended and that they will end up like that.
People believe in ghosts, vampires and spirits, but they do not believe in rebirth. They hesitate to believe in rebirth, but by believing in ghosts they infer the continuation of the atma, even after the death of the body. To become a ghost, the atma, the spirit, has to survive, even after the death of the body. When you see the complete destruction of the body after death, then who becomes the ghost? Surely not the body. Obviously that which is other than the body becomes the ghost. When man realizes that he continues to live in spirit, even after the death of the body, then there is no fear of death. When he sees death as a process of changing into a new role, a new life, a new opportunity, new karma, a new model of the body, which is free from its present afflictions, then he becomes free of fear.
Now my body is old, it is a 1923 model. So why should I have any difficulty in leaving it? In this body I can neither play golf, football, hockey, badminton, tennis or basketball. I can neither marry nor dance, nor can I enjoy good food or drink. In spite of this, man clings to his old model and is not willing to let it go. He thinks, “It doesn’t matter if the house is filthy and full of mosquitoes, if the roof is leaking and the windows are falling apart. Still I prefer to live in this same useless house. Where can I go if I leave it?” But that is wrong.
When your karma with that body is over, you should not regret it. I am not talking about untimely death or death at a young age. I am talking about death in old age. Everybody should book his ticket for the new world by the age of sixty-five or seventy. Even if God says to you, “My boy, your reservation is not yet made; all the seats are booked”, you should make an advance payment. Wherever there is a vacant seat, leave this world to take it. Birth is indefinite and uncertain but death is a definite certainty. There can be no two opinions about this, yet everyone is frightened of death. This is the biggest wonder of the world.
Rikhiapeeth, 24 December 1996, first published in Bhakti Yoga Sagar Vol. 4
Courtesy: Bihar School of Yoga