Beyond Heaven and Earth

by Steven H. Propp

  I was completely humiliated and shamed—more than if I had been stripped naked and exposed to public humiliation before the entire world—yet Sophia continued relentlessly: “In terms of our sexuality, although there were certainly times when you used it as a means to share and express our mutual love, there were also times when your only thoughts were of your own needs, such as when you would wake me up early in order to satisfy your own physical desires. There were also other times when you deliberately withheld yourself from me physically—refusing to even embrace me—after we’d had an argument, since you hoped to ‘punish’ me by this means.”

  Since I was now manifested in a physical body, my tears could flow freely, and they did. I felt absolutely unworthy, and unredeemable. How could I even have thought that Sophia would ever want me? How could I ever have thought myself capable of truly “loving” someone as wonderful as Sophia?

  Then unexpectedly, Sophia manifested herself in a physical form again, and sat down next to me on my perch. She smiled gently, with true affection—in a beautiful smile that I loved and remembered so well—despite seeing my downcast look. She too spoke audibly, saying, “But don’t be too hard on yourself; that’s simply the way it is with earthly love, Mi Amore.” She laughed, with that delightful lilting laugh that I loved and treasured so much, then added, “And I can assure you, Jobran, that I engaged in similar reflections and calculations—in fact, if anything, my own calculations were even more selfish than yours. I rather coldly calculated your earnings potential as compared to other potential suitors I might have, and decided that you were at least as good as any others I was likely to get in the time I had allotted to find a suitable mate—you see, I had decided I had to be married as soon as I graduated from college. As we began dating, I would carefully give you enough physical contact—lots of kissing, light bodily caressing—to keep you ‘interested,’ yet I deliberately withheld closer pre-sexual contact until after you had made a commitment of marriage to me. Once we were engaged, I let you begin to touch me in a more erotic manner, yet I refused to have intercourse with you until we were married. Since you agreed to this, I didn’t have to implement my ‘Plan B,’ which was to give in to your sexual demands if it seemed clear I would otherwise lose you, but to press you to rushing through our engagement. I insisted that you agree to raise our child as a Catholic—even though that was not your own religion—in large measure because I was afraid of what my parents would say, otherwise.” She moved closer to me, and said softly, “So you are not the only ‘guilty’ one, my husband.”

  I laughed, for the first time. “Sounds like your love for me was as screwed up as my love for you was.”

  With great feeling, Sophia looked deeply into my eyes, and said, “Love itself is never ‘screwed up,’ Jobran—but the conditions under which love is expressed on Earth create forms of love that become twisted and perverted, and they lose their purity of spirit and emotion.”

  “But wasn’t there anything in my love for you that was of value? Genuine value? Eternal value?” I felt my hoarse voice trembling.

  She paused for a long time, until she was sure that she had my fullest attention. “Yes; indeed there was, my Jobran; my husband; Mi Amore.” The tenderness of these words brought tears of hope and joy to my eyes—but now I no longer had false hopes about what her words might mean.

  Sophia said, “There were many, many moments of true, selfless love that you showed towards me, my love: Times when you held my hand and kissed away my tears when I was sad; times when you waited on me hand and foot when I was ill, gently wiping the sweat from my brow, and whispering sweet words of comfort throughout the night to me. There were many times when you were so thoughtful, so considerate of me and my feelings, such as when you did little unrequested acts of simple love and affection—doing chores for me; calling me on the phone to cheer me up at just the right time; bringing me spontaneous little gifts; being willing to abandon your own plans in favor of mine; and countless other examples. Your love for me in turn inspired my own love for you; I had never known a love on Earth like that we shared together. There were so many, many occasions when your love truly was of a completely ‘giving’ nature, absolutely unmotivated by any thoughts of ‘self.’ And I never, ever, had any doubt but that you would instantly be willing to gladly give up your own life for mine, my love.” I could no longer see due to the flood of tears in my eyes, but her words burned like fire into the core of my being, as she continued, “All of these things are but signs, approximations of a deeper form of love, Jobran; but they are nevertheless genuine, in their own way. All earthly relationships are ultimately unsatisfactory, because they are seeking something that they can’t possibly deliver: unity, coupled with transcendence.”

  I looked at her directly, almost unable to see her visible form, and I whispered in a cracked voice, “Sophia, I loved you so much; our time together was so short.

  Isn’t there any way we can go back and recapture at least some of the time we lost?”

  And she fixed my eyes with hers, as her face began a remarkable series of transformations; every possible emotion, every turn of expression, every subtlety of glance, passed through her face. Every emotion I could ever remember sharing with her was reflected on her constantly-evolving face, and I relived so many of the tender and precious moments I had spent in her presence, basking in the warm glow of her love. And now, I saw her face changing, from that of an infant, to a small girl, to a gangly teenager, to that of the beautiful young woman I fell in love with—but it didn’t end there, as her face continued to age, gradually developing lines around her eyes, then on her forehead, her lovely hair becoming increasingly streaked with gray, until she finally appeared as an elderly woman— far from the youthful beauty I had met, but still containing fully the beautiful, infinitely precious face of the woman I had pledged my heart, soul, and entire being to—forever.

  And I realized that it isn’t the length of one’s love that is important, as the quality of it—even one single moment of true love was worth an eternity. Though short by earthly terms, the love that Sophia and I had so briefly shared was truly something eternal, in its essential nature.

  My eyes brimming over with emotion, I whispered, “My love, my Sophia; isn’t there any way in which I can find the true kind of love? I don’t mean the selfish, grasping kind of love I had for you, for so much of our earthly lives together, I mean true love: the giving, unselfish kind. I know that I’ve been blind to it during our entire conversation, but I know now that that is truly the kind of love that you have now—it has been staring me in the face, through your gentleness and patience with me, even as I raged on like a madman—and that is the kind of love that I myself genuinely aspire to, now; from this moment forward.” Unable to look at her, I continued, “I know that I am not worthy of sharing a life with you: you’re too far advanced spiritually, from where I am now. But in my heart, Sophia, I truly want to learn about the kind of love that you have been trying to show me, trying to tell me about. Is there…is there any sort of hope for me?” I looked at her, desperation in my eyes.

  Then, she manifested herself to me as she had appeared the first time I realized that I truly loved her; her face was such a vision of loveliness and purity, that it overwhelmed my heart with joy. Her thoughts probed deep into my own heart, as she said lovingly, “Yes, Jobran, my earthly love—you can move beyond your current conceptions of love, into the deeper realm of the love by and of the spirit. And I, as well as many others, will help you.”

  She stood up, and I felt her gently take my hand in hers. For a moment, it seemed almost as if were back on Earth, walking hand-in-hand—yet there was a transcendent feeling to this contact, which infinitely surpassed anything we had ever experienced on Earth. Now, there was no manipulation, there were no hidden thoughts or agendas; there was nothing but complete openness with each other, and complete love for each other, and for all of God’s creation.
r />   “This entire place is devoted to love,” her thoughts soared, lifting mine with them. “If you are open and receptive to it, there are no limits. The One whom we all follow has no limits, and neither do we—when we so aspire. You simply need to abandon all the previous notions—earthly notions—that you have had of love, and be willing to learn, based on what you see and hear here, and cast aside your previous conceptions.

  “In short, your love need only journey beyond Heaven and Earth…”

  EPILOGUE

  I can remember with perfect clarity having read books while I was on Earth about “What Heaven (or “the Afterlife”) Is Like”; such human notions about “glory” and grandeur pale before the true reality: the chance to know deeply and intuitively the true nature of things, and of God.

  There is no “supernatural” solution to our need for spiritual progress, whereby God miraculously waves his hand and transforms one into a perfected, perfectly spiritual being. No, instead one must develop into the kind of being that one is potentially capable of becoming. You have the ability to see yourself, with the utmost clarity, if you wish it. There is no longer any need for pretense, for putting up false fronts, for trying to be perceived by others as different or other than you really are.

  Here, in a very fundamental sense, one is always alone; yet in a wider sense, it is impossible to ever be alone. One is alone in the sense that the work to be done cannot be done by proxy; you must look unflinchingly into the deepest core of your being, and discover what must be done in order to progress spiritually. This process is an arduous, absolutely rigorous one, which requires the absolute commitment of one’s self. Only one who has truly looked into the deepest realms of silence—into the place where there is no distracting noise, no presence of others, and nothing to stand between you and the most rigid examination of your own being—can truly grasp what “being” is, and what the difference is between being and nonbeing. One must be able to stare directly into the abyss of nonexistence—understanding what personal existence is, what personal annihilation is, and what absorption into the infinite would mean—for only when one is willing to accept the possibility of one’s own nonexistence, can one truly understand the meaning of life, and be free to truly live.

  The thing that obsesses me now is not the afterlife, but God, who is the most awe-inspiring aspiration there could ever be; how could any of us have lowered our vision so that we ever looked at anything less than God? Before God, all other goals and attainments pale into insignificance. To be aware of God is to be aware of the very immanent nature of creativity; it is to inhabit every rock, every plant, every particle of air, every bit of physical extension and space. It is to understand how the universe is simply a process of unfolding, and barren rocky planets and empty space are as much a part of it as are oceans teeming with life. We are all a part of the whole, whether functioning as a simple microorganism, an insect whose life cycle is but one week, a human being living threescore and ten years, or a galaxy that has existed for all of eternity.

  To understand creativity is to see how life comes from life, how it takes place in a continuous process of evolutionary manifestation and exploitation of opportunities; how things come into existence simply because there was the possibility of them. It is to witness the primordial development of life, how particles can condense into matter, how matter can condense into galaxies, how galaxies can contain stars and planets. It is to understand how matter and chemicals can become the miracle of miracles, life. Just to begin to understand the actual components of physical nature is a truer revelation than any written book: to realize how irreducibly complex, yet how intuitively simple, is the construction that underlies the entire universe, from the smallest subatomic forces, to the largest galactic system.

  * * *

  There are times when Sophia’s path and mine interconnect, such as when her mother died; she and I greeted her mother together. Sophia and I take joy in seeing each other’s continual spiritual progress and development. Once, she again manifested herself to me in the physical form in which I had known her, but I communicated my preference for her to remain as the immaterial spiritual being that she was now—there was no need to try and recreate the past. The physical form of the Sophia I had known on Earth was but a pale imitation when compared to the beauty of the being she had become, and was still becoming.

  There is a sense of union of purpose, of ideal, between those of us who are engaged in the quest for spiritual development. There is no sense of envy, of jealousy, or of trying to achieve recognition for oneself, for we are all lost in the transcendent vision of the Divine. There is no sense of rush, or panic in this quest.

  After all, we now have all of eternity before us.

  BIBLIOGRAPHY

  Where there were some objectively “authoritative” websites, I tried to add these as well. (Yes, you might disagree with some of my choices, or question why I didn’t include URLs for diverse religions such as Christianity and Buddhism, whereas I did for Islam.)

  Some books dealing directly with the “Why does God allow…?” question include: When Bad Things Happen To Good People by Rabbi Harold Kushner, Where Is God When It Hurts? and Disappointed With God by Philip Yancey, When God Doesn’t Make Sense by James Dobson, C.S. Lewis’s A Grief Observed and The Problem of Pain, Why Does God Allow It? by A.E. Wilder-Smith, and Tough Faith by Mike Yaconelli (of Youth Specialties fame, and a fantastic speaker).

  As far as “general” surveys of the major world religions, perhaps the best single-volume book I found is World Faiths by S.A. Nigosian. Others are The Religions of Man and The Illustrated World Religions by Huston Smith, World Religions (ed. Geoffrey Parrinder), The World’s Religions by Charles Braden, Living Religions of the World by Carl Hermann Voss, Major Religions of the World by Marcus Bach, The Great Religions By Which Men Live by Floyd H. Ross and Tynette Hills, and A Comparison of World Religions by Henry J. Heydt, as well as Joseph Campbell’s Oriental Mythology and The Perennial Philosophy by Aldous Huxley. Useful reference works on “newer” religions are the Biographical Dictionary of American Cult and Sect Leaders and the New Age Encyclopedia by J. Gordon Melton; These Also Believe by Charles S. Braden; Religious and Spiritual Groups In Modern America by Robert S. Ellwood and Harry B. Partin; Strange Sects and Curious Cults by Marcus Bach; Cults of Unreason by Christopher Evans; and Cults In America by Will Appel. Christian books that consider many religious groups as “cults” include Walter Martin’s Kingdom of the Cults and The New Cults; Bob Larson’s Larson’s

  Book of Cults; The Religious Fringe by Richard Kyle, J.K. Van Baalen’s The Chaos of Cults, and A Guide to Cults & New Religions by Ronald Enroth (and others).

  Abortion: Books by opponents of abortion include Randy Alcorn’s Pro-Life Answers to Pro-Choice Arguments and Is Rescuing Right?; Joan Andrews’ I Will Never Forget You; Randall A. Terry’s Operation Rescue; Jean Staker Garton’s Who Broke the Baby?; Abortion by Paul B. Fowler, and the booklet Abortion: Is It Always Murder? by Walter Martin (who would permit it in cases of rape and incest). Blood Money by Carol Everett criticizes the motives of some abortion facilities. Deserving special mention is former abortion doctor (now staunch opponent and Catholic) Bernard Nathanson’s Aborting America and The Hand of God. A balanced book presenting both sides is The Ethics of Abortion by Robert M. Baird & Stuart E. Rosenbaum.

  Adi Da Samraj (aka Franklin Jones, Da Free John, etc.): (www.adidam.org) The Promised God-Man Is Here is a biography by Carolyln Lee. The Knee of Listening is his autobiography of his early years. Aham Da Asmi, Ruchira Avatara Gita, Da Love-Ananda Gita, Hridaya Rosary, and Eleutherios summarize his teaching. Earlier books include The Four Fundamental Questions (Da Free John), Garbage and the Goddess (Bubba Free John), and The Method of the Siddhas (Franklin Jones).

  Alternative/Natural Healing: A very few of the zillions of books in this area are The Best Alternative Medicine by Kenneth R. Pelletier, Nature’s Cure
s by Michael Castleman and Naturopathy by Stewart Mitchell.

  Anthroposophy: (www.anthroposophy.org) Rudolph Steiner’s own books include The Story of My Life (his autobiography), Theosophy, An Outline of Occult Science, and Knowledge of the Higher Worlds and Its Attainment. A survey work is The Way of Anthroposophy by Stewart Easton. A personal biography of Steiner is found in Rudolph Steiner Enters My Life by Friedrich Rittelmeyer.

  Ascended Masters (see also Church Universal and Triumphant and I AM Movement): (www.templeofthepresence.org) A superb critical history and survey is 400 Years of Imaginary Friends by Kenneth and Talita Paolini. “Pro” voices include the five volumes of the Life and Teaching of the Masters of the Far East by Baird T. Spalding; The Law of Life by A.D.K. Luk; The First Ray by Thomas Printz (Geraldine Innocente); Aum by Helena Roerich; and A Dweller On Two Planets by “Phylos the Thibetan” (Frederick S. Oliver).

  Astara: (www.astara.org) Remembering: The Autobiography of a Mystic by Earlyne Chaney, as well as her Beyond Tomorrow.

  Bahá’í: (www.bahai.org) Bahá’í does not have a single book of Scripture, but some important books are Selections From the Writings of the Bab, and Bahá’u’lláh’s Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh and The Hidden Words. ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s writings include Secret of Divine Civilization and Some Questions Answered. General books include Bahá’u’lláh and the New Era by J. E. Esslemont, Bahá’u’lláh (biography) by H. M. Balyuzi, The Dynamic New Religion: Bahá’í Faith by Jessyca Russell Gaver, and The Bahá’í Faith by Gloria Faizi. A conservative Christian critique is William McElwee Miller’s What Is the Baha’i Faith?