Dr. Maurice Rawlings id uniquely qualified to report on NDEs because he is a cardiologist routinely involved in resuscitation efforts. From his observations, he estimates that about 50% of NDEs are hellish. Most NDE researchers deem that estimate far too high, but Rawlings counters this rebuttal with 2 points:
(1) Unlike most NDE researchers, he is actually present at the NDEs he describes and he says the most NDErs suppress the memories of their hellish NDEs after experiencing and  reporting them to him. The trauma of finding oneself in Hell is just to great to survive in conscious memory for many.

(2) He also plausibly notes that being in Hell is too embarrassing or too unpleasant for many NDErs to share.  We don't want others to think we are Hell-worthy! 

I'm confident that Rawlings is at least correct in claiming that hellish NDEs are far more common than we realize.

Btw, Roger, ES does  recognize astral soul retrievals from Hell, just not in his major works.

Interestingly other researchers seem quite critical of Rawling's work. Past executive director of IANDS Nancy Bush has written a book about distressing NDEs called Dancing Past the Dark. From her website (http://www.dancingpastthedark.com/about/) :

'... a great many people object strenuously to that point of view and discount his work because of it. The real problem underlying the Rawlings material, however, is not theological. The problem is, as his fellow cardiologist (and fellow evangelical Christian) Michael Sabom pointed out repeatedly, a distortion of data.

A reading of any of Rawlings’ books will immediately give the impression that he resuscitated countless near-death experiencers—he himself said that his first book summarized “several hundred” cases—and heard their testimonies immediately, roughly half of them “hellish.” Sabom’s painstaking investigation of Rawlings’ data turned up quite a different picture.

Despite what was reported in Beyond Death’s Door, those “several hundred” cases “were represented by only 21 cases of ‘heavenly NDEs and 12 ‘hellish’ NDEs. Many of these were clearly not from Rawlings’ own practice, having been excerpted from other published sources. Others were simply left unidentified.”

The same situation presented with To Hell and Back, Rawlings’ second book. In a 1996 review in the Journal of Near-Death Studies, Sabom noted that of the 32 cases Rawlings claimed, twenty “were clearly lifted and referenced from other sources, and six were personally acquired examples used in his previous books. The remaining six NDEs appear to be new, previously unpublished accounts obtained from his own experience. However, two of these six cases were mentioned only in passing and never described.”

In other words, by reusing previous accounts and padding from other sources, Rawlings was able to give the impression of a greater number of distressing NDEs than he actually had. Further, his books leave one with the impression that many, many more distressing NDEs would be revealed if only people were interviewed immediately upon resuscitation. Sabom’s research indicated that conclusion also not to be supported by the data.'

On the face of it it seems Rawlings theological leanings encouraged him to maximise the number of 'hellish' experiences.From my perspective this unnecessarily increases fear about death and the dying process..

It would also be interesting to look at the near-death experiences of the two thirds of the world's population who don't come from a Christian tradition.

It would be equally interesting to know (if possible)  how many people who were clinically dead, then  resuscitated, but have no afterlife experience whatsoever, or at least none that they can recall.

We tend to only hear about those who have experiences, pleasant or otherwise.

Kind of reminds me of two medical procedures I had, one was with a mild twilight anesthesia and the other a stronger variety because of the length of the procedure. 

While under the first one, I had vivid dreams so real that when I awoke I was momentarily convinced they really occurred.  As far as the second, I had zero recollection of anything.

So maybe the afterlife experiences that are reported depend on how "dead" they really were before being revived.

R

Yes, isn't it said that some people believe that the dead "sleep" or don't "rise" until "judgement day" or stay in some state of unconsciousness that others must wake them from? A relative of mine who practices a form of buddhism has only recently come around to the scientific evidence of an afterlife after firmly telling me that she believed that a person stayed in a kind of sleep between lives. It is also said that some people want that kind of rest in the afterlife, and it is given to them. I can only suppose that our experiences in the afterlife vary considerably, depending on our motivations before, during and after, the helpers we acquire, and the "history" we may have in this life, other lives, or the places in the afterlife we may have already visited. Also, it seems that it takes "time" to learn how to navigate, how to find your way around.

seagull wrote on Jul 31^st, 2014 at 8:02am:


I agree with you Seagull. Bad or even evil actions are the result of a particular state of consciousness i.e spiritual ignorance. I balk at the idea that people may be considered to have an evil inner self- when the state of consciousness evolves, as if by magic, so do the actions.

rondele wrote on Jul 29^th, 2014 at 8:24pm:


This may not be helpful since I wasn't in a hospital when I died, but I apparently had convulsions, foamed at the mouth, turned blue, and stopped breathing. My friends used CPR to revive me. I have no recollection of any sort of NDE. I was just awake, then not, then awake again. It was a drug overdose. My heart rate was over 300 bpm when it was checked at the hospital after being taken in by ambulance.

I watched Howard Storm's NDE account, and what occurs to me is that Howard was in a hospital and he was yelling and swearing, putting out strong, negative energy. If there's any place that disturbed souls congregate to wait for people to die, it would obviously be a hospital. So that could be why he was attacked.

If you want to go the other route and suggest that our own thoughts and fears inform or create our NDE, we have to take into account that Storm was a Christian as a child. He had attended church for some time before rejecting it. So it's not as if he hadn't heard all the threats of hell and the stories of demons. As much as he wanted to deny all that and be an atheist, he knew, like we all do, that there's a possibility that the Christians have it right and that he may be punished in the afterlife. Regardless of what your conscious mind believes is true, your subconscious never forgets what you learned in church.

I do find this to be a fascinating account though. It's disturbing for me to hear these sorts of accounts because I operate a Wicca website. So if anyone is going to hell, it's probably me.

I apologize if I'm repeating anything that was already stated here. I didn't quite get a chance to read the entire thread.