The Christian Heaven from a Buddhist Perspective (Christian Heaven witnessed by a Buddhist Yogi)

Abstract: Concepts such as heaven and hell exist in almost all religious traditions. Abrahamic traditions believe that, once you're liberated on this planet earth, you can go to heaven. Buddhist traditions mostly deny this claim and believe that we must reincarnate into this human world again from these celestial realms. Some believe that, these are merely mind-made concepts and in reality do not exist. Abrahamic traditions rely on the attainments such as ego-death, resurrection at their enlightenment while Buddhist traditions state, "Nirvana" is the highest goal leading to the final liberation. So there is a conceptual and a practical difference between the two. However a meditator who followed the bodhisattva path may have been exposed to both of these spiritual traditions and might have a different perspective, entirely based on his meditative experience. This post is about that.

Fig. 1: Depiction of heaven in an old painting (left), heaven as a meditative vision and as a mark of spiritual progression in the bodhisattva path (right).

Today is the boxing day, 26th of December in 2024. We just celebrated the Christmas day and I think, this is the best moment to write about the Celestial realms from both Abrahmic and Buddhist traditions, having the intention to clarify doubts about these realms and their existence. As a bodhisattva practitioner, you naturally come to know of these as meditative insights along your path, and they are revelations to question our general beliefs. 

Reincarnation

We need to clarify certain doubts first, one such thing is life after death. Abrahamic religious followers generally do not believe in reincarnation, despite the fact that genuine Christian/Catholic mystics have experienced it through meditation. Some claim that, the topic reincarnation has been removed from the original Bible. 

All Asian cultures believe in reincarnation. In Buddhist tradition, there are two contradictory ideas found around this topic, due to the misreading of Buddha's teaching: No-Self. These two ideas are the lacking of permanent, inherent self or soul and re-birth. Who is there to be re-born if the self/soul does not exist. First and foremost, Gautham Buddha had emphasized the importance of being free from Samsara or re-birth. This is a fundamental teaching and without that, without having the fear for samsara, we wouldn't even try to do something about it. So this fundamental understanding is a prerequisite and there is no question about re-birth! Secondly, in typical Buddhist Vipassana practice, we firmly base ourselves in the mind training of "no permanent self" or "lacking of inherent self" in daily life and also in the context of re-birth. This is essentially to eradicate our self identity, and to limit the attachment to our sensory pleasure. So we are free from the "self notion". Moreover we refrain from seeing ourselves as individuals in our past lives or in our next life, given the fact that, there is no permanent self. Otherwise this identification can corrupt our way of thinking that may even send us astray from the reality. i.e. You may look for your past life connections, places and try to bind yourself to these illusory things. Infact, this knowledge is a hindrance to the progression of the path. A good read about this topic can be found here.

Summary: So in nutshell, as far as the authentic spirituality is concerned, both traditions believe in re-birth and re-incarnation. Therefore both traditions expect spiritual liberation to be the end of suffering and the end of re-birth. Atleast, meditators from this spiritual lineage were able to recollect many such past life memories and therefore, in our opinion, we are bound to this samsara by the iron-chains of defilments.

Abrahamic Enlightenment (The State of Being Eternal) vs Buddhist Nirvana (Extinguishing the Self)

As was noted, Ego-death is common to both traditions. Practitioners from both spiritual paths go through a (one or several) dark night of the soul(s), till the individual surrenders their ego-self. In Abrahamic traditions, the final liberation is commonly referred to as "resurrection", in which, our ego-self is transcended by the death of our ego. This primarily removes the subtle bodies of the yogi from his physical body. One could also relate this to the annihilation of the conscious mind of the individual. Fully enlightened masters from the Abrahamic traditions are resurrected masters who, after their passing, are elevated to the highest energetical state of the universe. These states can be referred to as highest celestial realms from which, the resurrected masters never come into another form of life. i.e. Archangel Michael, Archangel Ariel. Hence the notion of eternal life. However I do not agree with this definition and terminology, as these so called "eternal states or realms" are bound to the cyclic existence of the universe. Which means, they too dissolve into the nothingness at the contraction of the universe. In addition, once the resurrected master is elevated to these realms, their self nature does not exist as their soul merges with that very state. So giving an eternal notion to this phenomenon is questionable in my opinion. An interesting article on this topic can be found here. In a nutshell, the enlightenment process of Abrahamic traditions is under the control of "existence", or one could say "within the godly system". Therefore the practitioners believe in an omnipresent, almighty god. 

These states or celestial realms are not as same as the Brahma, or Dheva realms in Buddhist tradition where beings most likely return from there to the human world or lower astral realms again. The Buddhist enlightenment, leading to Nirvana (extinguishing of self) is rather a different idea and yogis from this tradition, if become fully enlightened, do not end up in any form of a celestial realm or an energy state. However, the yogis who are at the 3rd stage of enlightenment or Anagamis (or non-returners) can end up in the realm called "Pure Abode" and attains Nirvana from there according to the scriptures. The Buddhist path to the liberation is entirely based on 8-fold Noble practice, in which, the yogi is trained to eradicate their mental fetters and thereby reach the purity of mind. However most people are unaware that, the transcending of death or a resurrection type of process also exists in Buddhist practice. For instance, Gautham Buddha is a divinely incarnated master who upon reaching the Arihanthood (Sainthood), uprooted all his subtle bodies and reached the final liberation as a Buddha. This is only possible for the capacity of a great bodhisattva. Purifying ourselves through the 8-fold Noble path is what is generally taught in Theravada tradition. Achieving the Buddhahood through the bodhisattva path is what is emphasized in Mahayana tradition. To summarize, the enlightenment through the Buddhist tradition is under the control of "non-existence", or one could say "outside the godly system" ! Buddha's trajectory was therefore different and independent, so it does not speak about an almighty god. Instead the dependent co-arising is highlighted. 

Christian Heaven as  a Mark of Spiritual Progression in the Bodhisattva Path

It does not matter which spiritual tradition you belong, if you are sincere and genuine to your practice, the geographical location does not matter. It might even help you to progress on your path. There is certainly a possibility for a Buddhist meditator to witness heaven as a sign of his progression. For instance if you follow the bodhisattva path, in a location within the European union, you might be exposed to the Angelic Realms and the true Heaven that Christians/Catholic often talk about. Usually this happens between the 8-10th Bhumis. This comes as a blessing and as a mark of the progression of your path. This Abrahamic heaven or this pure abode also has a hierarchy, in which, the lower regions are occupied/governed by the lower angels who mostly return to the human world to complete their enlightenment. However the higher regions (10D-12D) where all resurrected masters reside will never return to any lower realm or human world as their enlightenment is complete. However, the statement that "they reside in heaven" itself is wrong, as once they have merged to these higher dimension planes, there is no individuality to them. They are part of that very energy plane. So the state of being eternal is questionable for a non-existing individual in my opinion. It is just a matter of interpretation. 

Enlightened Buddhist Masters in a Special Universal Realm?

According to what I have written so far, this is not possible right? But there are things, dimensions that we are not really aware of. One such a higher plane of existence is called Sambhogakaya where all the supremely enlightened, Nirmanakaya masters reside. This is my own experience and personal encounter as a bodhisattva practitioner. You can read more about this encounter here: Many Masters, Zero Vessels.   

Some people in the West call it Shambala region. Depending on the maturity of the practitioner, his paramitas and his wisdom, universe might elevate such practitioners to this higher realm to re-appear once again into the human world to carry out a greater service. They are only available there as an energy form and looking for a human body to incarnate. Both Gautham Buddha and Jesus Christ are Nirmanakaya masters. This does not mean they have not attained supreme enlightenment or Nirvana. This means, only a handful of beings, despite their full enlightenment, are elevated to the Nirmanakaya state, so that they can return/embody in a human form to continue their service again when the time is ripe. Other beings who complete the enlightenment process and attain Nirvana within this lifetime have no plane of existence in any of the realms.

Fig. 1: Depiction of the higher planes of the existence (the highest is Sambhogakaya).

Conclusion

This article brings clarification to the general beliefs we have about heavenly abodes and spiritual enlightenment in two different traditions. In Abrahamic traditions, most people believe they reach heaven after death, and this is not true at all. Only by attaining enlightenment and resurrection in this human life, one comes to the state of purity and ends their samsaric cycle. They become the part of this existence and at the same time, they lose their individuality with it. One may call it an eternal state in the 3rd person perspective, but to the one whose individual self is exterminated, such eternity cannot be found. This is the case with all resurrected masters from the Abrahamic tradition. Buddhists already believe in reincarnation and their very effort to attain Nirvana within this human life makes them free from the samsara! As the saying goes, when the flame of the lamp has extinguished, can it be found elsewhere?