Shortly before he was executed Socrates confided to one of his disciples that there was nothing to fear in death for the friends of knowledge. Indeed, if it is true that the body is merely a tomb for the soul, a form of unconsciousness that is lifted at death, what is there to fear for those who have dedicated their lives to seeking truth and justice?

This belief in a survival of the soul after death is characteristic of most spiritualities. Death is perceived as the separation of the soul from its earthly envelope—a transition, not an end. What other world then does this transition take us to?

For the great monotheistic religions, the world beyond is primarily characterized by a dichotomy between a place of well-being (heaven) and a place of suffering (hell), to be rejoined by those whose lives were spent pursuing good or evil actions, respectively. If, however, as Ostad Elahi suggests, our earthly life is above all an environment for the soul to pursue its perfection, such a binary division of the other world is hardly satisfactory. According to Ostad Elahi, the hereafter is not limited to these two destinations. Upon death, the soul reaches a temporary abode (the interworld) that reflects not only what the soul has done on earth in terms of good or evil, but also, and most importantly, what it has become through the transformation of its own substance. The interworld then designates the new conditions in which the soul will be able to continue its process of perfection.

The interworld

Let us pause for a moment to consider this notion. The term interworld is a translation from the Arabic word barzakh, the place where souls reside after death, awaiting the final judgment. Ostad Elahi addresses the issue of the hereafter in chapter 7 of Knowing the Spirit and describes the interworld as a place in which the soul temporarily resides after death: “(…) the spirit will be transferred and introduced, either immediately or after a delay, directly into the intermediate world.” (Ostad Elahi, Knowing the Spirit, p. 89.)

The interworld is described as an intermediate world, either between two earthly lives, or between earthly life and the spiritual worlds the souls go to after their allotted time to reach perfection has expired.

Either way, the interworld is a place the soul merely passes through—a temporary abode—no matter what living conditions (pleasant or unpleasant) it enjoys there. But it is also a transitory place for the soul, an environment where change is made possible, as the soul is given the opportunity to progress in its process of perfection in optimum conditions: “There, all the necessary means for the spirit that had stopped advancing in its (earthly) process of perfection are prepared and arranged in order to overcome its shortcomings, along with a sufficient period of time and in a way that greatly facilitates its task, without the obstacles and hindrances (of earthly life).” (Ostad Elahi, Knowing the Spirit, p. 89-90.)

The world the soul goes to after death has thus more to offer than heaven (place of pleasure) or hell (place of suffering). It provides an infinite number of possibilities and conditions adapted to the level of each soul. One could almost say that each soul gets its own interworld!

The question of merit

In keeping with the great monotheistic religions, Ostad Elahi recognises that our destiny after death (our living conditions in the interworld) depends in part on the quality of our deeds or, in other words, on the evaluation of our actions according to a divine criterion. This last point is essential, for what matters is not to have performed deeds that were appreciated by our fellow human beings, but rather to have performed deeds that, as B. Elahi puts it, “attracted the divine regard” (see Bahram Elahi, The Path of Perfection, p. 97). It may not be easy to always know which actions will “attract the divine regard”. We can however easily assume that the value of an action will depend on the extent to which it stands in conformity to what is Good—has it contributed to the well-being and joy of others, for example?—but also, and above all, on the intention that governs it. Certain actions have so much value that a single one of them, however unremarkable it may seem, could be enough to “save a soul”. This is what happens to a character in The Brothers Karamazov: the onion she once gave a person in need would have saved her from the flames of hell… if only her greed hadn’t eventually gotten the better of her.

“Once upon a time there was a peasant woman and a very wicked woman she was. And she died and did not leave a single good deed behind. The devils caught her and plunged her into the lake of fire. So her guardian angel stood and wondered what good deed of hers he could remember to tell to God; ‘She once pulled up an onion in her garden,’ said he, ‘and gave it to a beggar woman.’ And God answered: ‘You take that onion then, hold it out to her in the lake, and let her take hold and be pulled out. And if you can pull her out of the lake, let her come to Paradise, but if the onion breaks, then the woman must stay where she is.’ The angel ran to the woman and held out the onion to her. ‘Come,’ said he, ‘catch hold and I’ll pull you out.’ And he began cautiously pulling her out. He had just pulled her right out, when the other sinners in the lake, seeing how she was being drawn out, began catching hold of her so as to be pulled out with her. But she was a very wicked woman and she began kicking them. ‘I’m to be pulled out, not you. It’s my onion, not yours.’ As soon as she said that, the onion broke. And the woman fell into the lake and she is burning there to this day. So the angel wept and went away.”

Dostoyevsky, The Brothers Karamazov, Book 7, Ch.3

These actions “that save” contribute, according to Ostad Elahi, to building up some “savings” or “provisions” for the soul. This expression is quite telling with regard to the influence of our “good deeds” on our situation in the interworld. Taken literally, it would mean that our good deeds increase our “purchasing power” in a way. The idea may seem surprising, and yet it reflects the manner in which Ostad Elahi portrays this other world: a place of which our world is but a pale reflection, and where, consequently and just like here, “there is no such thing as a free lunch”. The currency, which can allow us to access a provisional paradise or to be taught certain truths, is constituted of our “good deeds”, those deeds we carried out selflessly here on Earth.

However, while these actions do increase our capital, and this is by no means insignificant, they are not sufficient in themselves to transform what we are. In other words, those who have accumulated positive actions will be able to acquire better living conditions in the interworld, but if they have not, at the same time, taken care of perfecting themselves, they will not be able to enjoy the deeper pleasures related, as we will see, to the understanding of Truths.

The interworld, a mirror of ourselves

In the system presented by Ostad Elahi (see Knowing the Spirit), our destiny after death does not depend solely on the actions we have carried out during our time on Earth. It is more profoundly who we are, that is, the virtues we have developed and the truths we have assimilated, that will determine our destination.

It is truly as if, at the moment of our death, our soul was released into the interworld like a hot air balloon into the atmosphere. Like a hot air balloon pushed upward by buoyancy until its density is equal to the density of the atmosphere, the soul rises in the interworld up to the level corresponding to its degree of assimilation of the truths. The more it assimilates truths and simultaneously develops virtues during the course of its earthly life, the greater its aptitude to attain higher levels in the interworld—higher in terms of knowledge of the Truths and thus higher in well-being, power and freedom.

Indeed, what good would it do for a soul to find itself in a level of the interworld, whose truths it could not comprehend? Very little. That soul would be like a young child taken to university to listen to an eminent specialist, a mathematician for instance, talk about his latest work. It wouldn’t understand a thing. What would be gratifying to some—those who have developed their aptitude to understand—would seem off-putting and uninteresting to that soul. If someone were to speak to it about one of these Truths it knows nothing about, it may not even grasp its veracity. This is because, when we arrive in the interworld, we are the same person we were in this world. If we have not acquired the aptitude to comprehend a particular Truth, when we are faced with this same Truth in the other world, we will be like a blind person faced with a source of light—we won’t see a thing.

Once again, what counts in our preparation of the afterlife is not only doing what is good, but also taking care of the “education of our thought”. Such an education, which is necessary for our soul to mature and thus progress towards its perfection, goes hand in hand with an understanding of the Truths. It enables human beings to move beyond the blind acceptance of dogma and to focus on a spiritual practice whose reasons and effects they are conscious of.

Thus, to the question “what interworld for my soul?” Ostad Elahi responds that the interworld is a mirror in which “everyone sees their own form”. Everyone will then have a tailor-made interworld, reflecting for them what they have capitalized and what they have become. Our level of well-being or suffering and whether or not we will be aware of specific Truths only depend on us: on the Truths we strive to assimilate and the virtues we try to cultivate here on Earth.

	Worlds and interworlds: revelation or rational hypothesis? This article is a follow-up on a comment related to the Worlds and interworlds section of the article Ostad Elahi’s thought in 7 points. The question went thus: if our approach to spirituality is to be rational, where should we stand on the issue of worlds and the interworld? [read more]
	Worlds, interworlds and successive lives It is a function of true understanding to bring back together the dispersed parts of a whole in a coherent context where they become meaningful. Our earthly life is a case in point. As a brief stage in the course of a long and complex journey, it should be carefully reassessed according to this pattern. [read more]

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