Question
One of your answers to someone raises another
question for me. You said hell was more a matter of confronting the divine
when unprepared, and that these torments then lasted
eternity.
Truly eternity, with no redemption possible? This echoes
what happened to me and what I know of Christian mystics. The
phases of joy and peace are preceded by torment, doubt,
despair, and incomprehension. I believe we do not choose whether
awakening will be gradual or sudden, and that we are undeniably influenced
by the culture we grow up in, despite efforts to open ourselves to other
ways of thinking. The common point remains opening the heart. During the three
phases I experienced, each lasting nearly a week,
I stopped sleeping and ate almost nothing, and I cried
when alone, unable to stop the flow. I seemed to understand
something I have still not managed to internalize and live; I
repressed it. It remains within me as a kind of truth about myself and
the world that I reject. Words seem powerless to express it, and really
it is above all a matter of keeping what I may have understood deep inside.
Thank you for the attention you give us. We so greatly need
to be heard in our searches, which are surely mostly solitary.
Anonymous
Master Kosen’s answer
I am speaking of an absolute eternity, not a linear one.
Redemption is our true nature. Let our illusory ego go to hell and stay there. Hellish eternity is not even the size of a grain of sand from the Ganges; true nature is calm, unalterable, and indestructible.
Kosen