An Islamic woman who I'd known on IRC died of leukemia today, apparently.

It made me think...I'm unsure but I think I saw an Islamic heaven BST once on the way back from another retrieval.

It was a walled garden...granite walls.  It wasn't very wide, but was quite large length wise...it went back further than I could see.  There were a lot of ponds and the sounds of running water; in that sense it might have been similar to a Buddhist heaven except it was all done out of granite or onyx...black stone.

There was a lot of food of different kinds, arrayed around in different places, and the virgins were going from one person to the next, asking if there was anything they needed, or offering themselves physically as is described.  It was extremely corporeally oriented...if a person went in there and didn't know better, you could forget completely that you weren't in a physical place.

There was also a very large man on a throne or divan of some kind against the wall closest to me.  I'm unsure who this man was; I don't know if he was meant to be a representation of Allah, but I did get the feeling that he was the authority of the place.

I was standing outside the BST, looking in...but there were no doors, so I'm unsure how I was able to see inside...I think one of the walls simply became transparent to allow me to.

I'm unsure if this was an actual vision of a BST...but it was similar enough to what I've heard about Islamic heaven, anyway.  I certainly hope that if this Islamic girl did not get to F27, that she got there, anyway.  She could relax and wait for her parents there.  It was not an entirely unpleasant place; in fact, during the time when I saw it I wanted to explore further (altho only temporarily) but was told I was not allowed in; a Helper was apparently worried that if I went in I wouldn't come back out! *grin*

In all seriousness though, I couldn't imagine spending eternity there...I'd very much get bored, I think.

Hi Petrus,
I once want to have a look at that place, and I too saw a man on a throne there. To be exactly, for me it was a statue. It seemed to me, for some it was God or The Prophet and they worshiped him, and for others, those who felt anxious or unworthy to be face to face with the holy, they saw it as a statue but which was able to give messages from the holy with a voice sounding through it. This was the critical point for some who started doubting if they were at the right place. This statue and the messages became more and more unimportant and trivial to them who were about to go to another place.

Hi PA,
thanks for the infos about islamic religion. It's the same for many christians, this waiting in the grave and then raise at the "judgement day"- at least for the old styled.
Regarding the imagination of this "waiting time": The danger of this is, when the waiting time is imaginated as to be totally unconscious/dead, then it would be difficult to wake up again! If not unconscious, one might say "Now...I waited long enough, now is the time!" You know when you tell little children to wait some hours, they will ask you after half a minute "Now?!".

Spooky

[Petrus:] "It was a walled garden...granite walls.  It wasn't very wide, but was quite large length wise...it went back further than I could see. "
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You perceived a long and relatively narrow realm that reminded you of a Muslim Heaven.  So I thought you might be interested in the parallels with Emanuel Swedenborg's more in depth astral visits to this Muslim realm.  He warns that these planes remind one of Heaven, but are in fact merely a prelude to the heavenly realms:

"The people who are in these instructional sites live in different places.  As individuals, they are inwardly in touch with the communities of Heaven they are headed for... When you look at these sites from Heaven, they look like a Heaven in lesser form...The breadth seems to be less than the length ("Heaven and Hell," #514)."  

ES's astral contacts with Muslims draw fire an all sides.  Psychologist Wilson Van Dusen is an ES devotee, but nevertheless takes offence at the large number of Muslims ES encounters in the Hells.   On the other hand, ES's Christian contemporaries take exception to the hopeful state that ES discovers for highly moral devout Muslims:

"Behind these [realms for spiritual non-Christians] are people who were devoted to Islam and had led a moral life in this world, acknowledged one God, and recognized the Lord [Jesus] as the essential prophet.  When they let go of Muhammad because he can do nothing for them, they turn to the Lord and worship Him, recognizing His divine nature; and then they receive instruction in the Christian religion ("Heaven and Hell," #514)."

"Not everyone is taught in the same way or by the same communities of Heaven...Muslims are taught by angels [=discarnate humans] who once adhered to that religion, but have turned to Christianity....The others, like the Muslims and non-Christians, are taught on the basis of doctrines suited to their grasp (#515-516)."

ES's direct experience of the postmortem fate of devout Muslims finds independent support in atheist Howard Storm's NDE.  The orthodox Christianity of ES's day considered him far too liberal in his optimistic vision of the fate of righteous non-Christians.  Of course, if you've read my own posts, you know I believe the Bible teaches that God's love never permanently abandons anyone after death.  

Don  

wrote on Mar 26^th, 2006 at 12:15am:

When you look at these sites from Heaven, they look like a Heaven in lesser form...The breadth seems to be less than the length ("Heaven and Hell," #514)."

Yep...exactly.  It was a nice place, and on the surface I could understand why people would want to go there...but the more I looked, the more it looked and felt...small...and very limited.  If a person focused purely on the blissful vibe of the place and nothing else, they might want to stay there indefinitely...it's when they started thinking that they'd have problems...because that is when boredom would set in.  


wrote on Mar 26^th, 2006 at 12:15am:

ES devotee, but nevertheless takes offence at the large number of Muslims ES encounters in the Hells.

My own take on that would be that it wasn't a condemnation of Islam as a whole...but rather that those *individual* Muslims were in the Hells simply because that is where they expected to be, or because those places were consistent with their level of growth, as per the story about Max.  To me that doesn't say anything about Islam as an entire religion at all.


wrote on Mar 26^th, 2006 at 12:15am:

and then they receive instruction in the Christian religion ("Heaven and Hell," #514)."

Slight semantic quibble here...I tend to maintain that there's a difference between Jesus the individual and Christianity the religion...we see that in many instances in contemporary society at least.  I think where I possibly would have disagreed with Swedenborg there was his reference to a person "receiving instruction in the Christian religion," whereas I would have emphasised receiving information about Jesus the individual, and not about the various extraneous trappings (in my own perception, anywayz) of Christianity as an institution. (Most of Catholic theology/practice would be in this category in my own head, but that is a can of worms which I don't think is really relevant to open here)


wrote on Mar 26^th, 2006 at 12:15am:

Of course, if you've read my own posts, you know I believe the Bible teaches that God's love never permanently abandons anyone after death.

Yes, I do too.  That was interesting...thanks, Don. :)