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Proof of Heaven
A Neurosurgeon's Journey into the Afterlife
by Dr. Eben Alexander
A Neurosurgeon's Journey into the Afterlife
by Dr. Eben Alexander
The book, as the subtitle suggests, is about a fascinating
mysterious journey of a neurosurgeon when he was in comma for a week at General
Hospital in Virginia, USA. His discovery or the experience during the period talks
about a world beyond scientific knowledge and explanation. In Tibetan
society, we have 'des log, [pronounced as de-log] or shi-log,
meaning coming back from death. Dr. Eben Alexander was a neurosurgeon who had conducted
many surgeries on people with life-threatening brain damage. He was on faculty
of Harvard Medical School for fifteen years. His education and the profession
as neurosurgeon have left little room for him for God and spiritualism. He says
he was just a step ahead someone who darkens the door of a church at Christmas
and Easter.
His professional education has taught him that "When
your brain is absent, you are absent, too. This is because the brain is the
machine that produces consciousness in the first place. When the machine breaks
down, consciousness stops! Modern neuroscience dictates that the brain gives
rise to consciousness-to mind, to the soul, to the spirit, to whatever you
choose to call that invisible, intangible part of us that truly makes us who we
are." He confesses that his decades in the rigorous scientific world of
academic neurosurgery had profoundly called him to question the existence of
such thing as God. But all this changed when on November 10, 2008, at the age
of fifty-four, he was attacked by a rare brain disease and went into comma for
seven days.
His wife, children, parents, friends and relatives all stood
by his bedside praying and hoping that he would come back. The disease was diagnosed as E. Coli meningitis
that attacks the cortex of the brain, and chances of survival was very less.
While the family members and doctors were doing their best to bring him back
with dwindling hope, Eben found himself in a new strange world of bliss.
I began to move up. Fast. There was a whooshing sound, and
in a flash I went through the opening and found myself in a completely new
world. The strangest, most beautiful world I'd ever seen. Brilliant, vibrant,
ecstatic, stunning…..
There he was escorted and helped through the Gateway and
the Core by a young beautiful adorable girl on the Butterfly Wing. She was a
stranger, but she was not. There was a strong affinity and indescribable pure
love and sacred understanding. They talked but more through telepathy. She
conveyed that he was loved, and that there is nothing to fear. This girl, he later came to know, was one of his biological sisters who he has heard of but never met. He also felt the
power of love and prayers in him. An Orb followed him, through this Orb, the
God [Om] explained the essence of love and compassion. "How do we get
closer to this genuine spiritual self? By manifesting love and compassion! Why?
Because love and compassion are far more than the abstractions many of us
believe them to be. They are real. They are concrete. And they make up the very
fabric of the spiritual realm." The seven days in comma was a great
learning experience for Eben.
The book is a revealing testimony of a neurosurgeon that
there is a universe beyond this physical world. Modern science has paid good
attention to physical and material understanding, but it has ignored or has
little to say about the consciousness that lives even after death. Brain death
and physical death is not the end of consciousness, the journey continues. As a
neurosurgeon, Eben has heard many stories from people who have gone through
near-death-experience (NDE). Like many of his colleagues, he has brushed aside
these stories as pure hallucination. But this seven-day comma experience made
him realize that their experience are indeed true needing due attention from the
scientific world. The author says, "The ascendance of the scientific
method based solely in the physical realm over the past four hundred years
presents a major problem: we have lost touch with the deep mystery at the
center of existence-our consciousness."
His Holiness the Dalai Lama has on several occasions said that
science and religion are not contradictory, they are complimentary. Modern
science has made tremendous progress in development of physical world and in
understanding the matters; religion has equally played important role in
developing and understanding the non-physical - mental and spiritual aspect of
our existence. Basic goal of both science and religion is delivering happiness
to all through proper understanding of reality. Science sees the brain as
physical basis for consciousness, whereas for Buddhist science, consciousness
goes beyond brain. His Holiness the Dalai Lama has initiated number of dialogue
between science and religion under the platform of "Science and Mind"
across the world. This will go a long way in bringing the science and religion
together to play beneficial role in building a conscious world based on
principle of love and compassion.
The book is also about how family members come together in
the hours of crisis. How genuine prayers and faith helps. I thank Dr Eben
Alexander for sharing his story openly and espousing scientific attention in
these non-physical spiritual experiences. Because in his world of neuroscience,
and after the comma experience he has gone under, people may mistranslate the
wisdom he has gained. With his book, he has shared the experience of so many
people who may not have been taken seriously by other. The book is a living
testimony to the existence of greater world of consciousness beyond our earthly
existence.
"The physical side of the universe is as a speck of
dust compared to the visible and spiritual part. In my past view, spiritual
wasn’t a word that I would have employed during a scientific conversation. Now,
I believe it as a word that we cannot afford to leave out."
Note: This is the author's review of what he has read and
understood from the book to appreciate Dr. Eben Alexander and his family for
sharing the experience. Any misinterpretation or misunderstanding is regretted.
Serious readers who want to know more about the subject are advised to read the
book.
