Today I am pleased to present and interview with Dr. Stafford Betty, one of the leading scholars on the subject of what life after death is like in the afterlife.
Dr. Betty is giving away one of his books to the reader who leaves the best comment. The lucky recipient will get to choose from Dr. Betty’s novel, “The Imprisoned Splendor,” or his non-fiction book, “The Afterlife Unveiled: What the Dead are Telling Us About Their World.”
I’m pleased to announce that the winner of the book giveaway is Erin W.!
1. Dr. Betty please give us some background on what drew you to study the afterlife in such depth?
I’ve always been impressed by how short our life on earth is, and how long by contrast what follows is. I didn’t just conclude this at a logical level; I felt it “in my bones.” Thus it seemed important to understand what we’ll meet on the other side of death.
2. Why do you believe that an afterlife exists?
Wow, where do I start?
There are eight major categories of evidence: spirit communication through mediums (mediumship), visions of the dying, near-death experiences (NDE), remembered past lives of little children, apparitions, poltergeists, spirit attachment or possession, and electronic voice phenomena (EVP).
Take the near-death experience: We now know that powerful NDEs occur when the brain is clinically dead. The Dutch researcher Van Lommel asks: “How could a clear consciousness outside one’s body be experienced at the moment that the brain no longer functions during a period of clinical death with flat EEG?”
Evidence is mounting that our brains don’t produce consciousness; rather they channel it. And, when it is no longer useful, as at death, it [the body/brain] is discarded. It [the body] is the soul’s instrument. It is not us.
Now let’s take an example of a life-changing apparition seen by “Hugh.” He’s an astrophysicist by profession, or was until he retired a few months ago. Here is his account:
Twenty-eight months ago I lost my wife to breast cancer. She wasn’t quite fifty, and I adored her. She was a devout Catholic with a special devotion to St. Francis. She was a member of a lay order of St. Francis, and her quiet dedication to Franciscan ideals was an inspiration to all who knew her. But my scientific education had emptied me of all spiritual convictions.
I was a materialist, an atheist. Why Carrie agreed to marry a confirmed old reprobate like me I will never know. That was eight years ago.
Anyway, a few days after she died I was alone in the house. Well, except for her little dog, a corgi.
Suddenly — it was late afternoon and the lighting was dim — I looked up and saw my wife standing in front of me. She was surrounded by a soft golden light. And behind her stood a monk in a brown habit. I took him to be St. Francis. They both looked at me and didn’t speak. The dog meanwhile started yipping and whining at them. He was tremendously agitated. Then they faded away.The whole thing didn’t last more than five seconds. But it completely changed my life. I went from a guy who scoffed at all talk of an afterlife to a guy who hadn’t the slightest doubt that his wife had survived death and was still alive. Oh, I know what some will say — that I hallucinated the whole thing. And I can’t prove to them I didn’t. But I know, I KNOW.
Examples like this are legion.
3. Can you describe the afterlife to readers? What is life like there?
This is what my two books are about. The novel describes in great detail the afterlife setting, and the non-fiction book summarizes the afterlife in forty-four generalizations–what the research tells us we are all headed for. And it isn’t what you find in the Bible!
Here are the first four generalizations of what awaits us after death:
A. Our present ideas about heaven and hell are illusory. Hell is hellish, yes, but it’s not a place of physical pain, nor is it everlasting, nor is it a place where there is not help. And heaven is not one place but a spectrum of worlds stretching from the lowly joys of souls newly arrived to spheres of unimaginable bliss and perfection for souls far more advanced.
The afterworld is not some fantastic vision of infinity where souls are locked in poses of permanent rapture gazing at the face of God. And no one floats on a cloud while playing a harp. Rather it is a place with landscapes and seas and houses and cities reminiscent of our own world. It is an objectively real material world, but made of matter vibrating much more rapidly than our senses can pick up.
There are gardens, universities, libraries, and hospices for the newly dead–but no factories, fire stations, sanitary landfills, or smokestacks.
There are no dirty jobs to do. “We have no traffic, and our roads are covered with the thickest and greenest grass, as soft to the feet as a bed of fresh moss. It is on these that we walk,” says the spirit of Msgr. Hugh Benson communicating through the English medium Anthony Borgia. He is describing a relatively low zone of the afterworld sometimes called Paradise or Summerland. It resembles a glorified earth.
B. The afterworld begins at the earth’s surface and extends outward. Earth is the nucleus of the entire world system that the spirits describe.
The spirit world begins very near the earth and extends millions of miles beyond,” writes the spirit of Leslie Stringfellow, a Texan who died at 20 and communicated through his parents. It “surrounds yours on all sides, like the atmosphere does the globe, and every nation has its counterpart in spirit, surrounding it, in connection with that part over or nearest its earthly place of residence.” Many spirit communicators tell us that their world “envelopes and interpenetrates the physical world.”
C. Spirit realms vary from culture to culture. Stringfellow described what he called “foreign trips”: “We went yesterday for the first time to a part of the Spirit World occupied by Turks and Hindus.”
We should not expect the Eskimo’s afterworld to look like the Maori’s.
The laws governing their worlds will be the same, but the appearances will vary. Nor should we expect Sunni and Shia Muslims to be living comfortably side by side in the same sector of the afterworld—or Han Chinese entrepreneurs and Tibetan peasants. Physical violence is not possible in the afterlife, but old habits of mutual suspicion and animosity don’t disappear just because we die. Progress takes time, both here and over there.
D. Earth’s slow “vibrations”—we don’t have a scientific understanding of what this word means, but it turns up everywhere in spirit communications–dumb down our ability to sense the presence of spirit, including the Divine.
A quickened “vibration,” such as we find in the afterworld, or what we shall call the astral, greatly increases one’s sensitivity to spirit. The Divine is no closer to the astral world than to our own, but spirits can discern or intuit the Divine more cleanly.
4. Does Hell and punishment exist in the afterlife?
Yes. All of us are accountable for our actions and for the habits we’ve developed over the course of a lifetime (or lifetimes). We will feel the suffering of our victims as it were our own. That is hell.
5. Can you tell us about Summerland and Shadowland?
Summerland is described under question number one above. Here’s what the spirits tell us about the Shadowlands:
There are hellish regions in the astral, and large populations that make their home there. The Shadowlands is a vast world of many conditions. The landscapes vary from sordid city neighborhoods to parched, gray scrubland to dark, lifeless deserts. The vivid clarity of higher realms is missing. Instead there is a dull overcast. Temporarily lost or confused or stubbornly unrepentant souls populate these regions. Disturbing noises and howls are sometimes mentioned.
The worst of these souls aggressively seek to harm vulnerable humans on earth. An advanced spirit calling himself Imperator, writing through the famous British medium Stainton Moses, tells us that these aggressors band together to “resist progress and truth, and fight against the dissemination of what advantages humanity.”
Other souls are enslaved to their addictions and become earthbound. For example, an earthbound spirit who was an alcoholic is still pestered by the craving for alcohol. So he hangs around bars on earth and “drinks through” other alcoholics he temporarily possesses, making it all the more difficult for his victim to conquer the habit.
Other earthbound spirits, Hatch tells us, are “thrilled by the poison of hatred. . . . for the purpose of gratifying their hostile passion they will attach themselves to you temporarily [if you lose your temper],” thus making it all the more likely you will storm and rage the next time you are provoked. Spirits surround us, and they are not all our friends.
“Missionary spirits” minister to souls in the Shadowlands. Residents can free themselves if they are willing to face up humbly to their errors and crimes and repent them. Some do; and most, perhaps all, will eventually. But many jeer at their would-be helpers and seem to prefer their dull or chaotic lives over the challenges of higher worlds they are frightened of.
No spirit is condemned forever to the dark regions. But God—whom spirits often refer to as supporting them or mystically present to them but never as visible in some anthropomorphic sense–will never interfere with our free will. Acting through higher spirits seeking to lead the “stumblers” out of their self-imposed exile, God will invite tirelessly, but will never force. One gets the impression that, at least for the moment, many spirits actually prefer their dimmed-down world to the higher Light-filled worlds they were created for, and that someday they will choose to enter.
6. What options exist in the afterlife? If they don’t reincarnate – what can spirits do to “grow spiritually” on the other side? Are there “jobs” they can take on?
The astral world, assuming you are not caught up in the Shadows, is limitlessly varied, with plenty of jobs to do. It’s not a place where you lean back and cruise, not if you want to progress.
The Creator places souls in the difficult environment of earth because He (She, It) loves them. He wants to see them grow in wisdom, love, and power. He knows that the only way to bring out the best in a soul is to challenge it, in the same way that a good teacher challenges her students.
Ultimately the Creator wants us to become as much like Himself/Herself as possible, to grow into near divine-like stature. Soul-building, or character development, is the whole point of our sojourn, both on earth and beyond, say the spirits. The use we make of our free will is absolutely crucial to our progress at all levels.
The astral world provides opportunities for every wholesome interest or avocation–from science to music to theology to astral architecture to homebuilding. It is a joyful, endlessly fascinating place, full of challenges, for those mature enough to value it.
Children of all ages are raised in the afterworld. They are not magically transformed into adults just because they died prematurely. One of the noblest professions in the astral is nurturing and educating spirit orphans. Great numbers of spirits are engaged in this satisfying form of work.
Human dilemmas turn up in the astral just as they do on earth. A former judge on earth, named Hatch, was constantly being called on to help fellow spirits out of their emotional predicaments. His skills as an arbiter, learned on earth, served him well on the Other Side.
7. Do people choose to reincarnate? If so, why?
There is no easy answer to this question.
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was a moderating voice. “Some believe in it [reincarnation],” he said, “many do not, and the general attitude may be taken to be that, as the doctrine cannot be proved, it had better to be omitted from the active politics of Spiritualism.”
He then goes on to say, “On the whole, it seems to the author that the balance of evidence shows that reincarnation is a fact, but not necessarily a universal one.” What seemed true to Doyle in 1924 seems even more true today. Most modern accounts reaching us from the Other World mention it.
Mattson, the Lutheran minister, says,
It’s an interesting fact that most persons grow faster spiritually while incarnate. The incarnate energy is denser. That makes it more possible for you, while embodied in flesh on earth, to take hold of a particular problem area and shape it into a more constructive pattern. Your period of incarnation on the physical plane is thus a very important period of education. It contributes to your own spiritual evolution and that of all humanity. You can elect not to return, and many do, after they have achieved a certain spiritual development. But the physical plane is a “school” for learning and development, and so most souls do desire to return for a series of incarnations.
A return to earth might resemble the experience of a teacher starting a new term after summer vacation—not always a prospect to be relished! In one of his more memorable passages, Hatch tells us,
What strange experiences one has out here [in the astral]. I rather dread to go back into the world [earth], where it will be so dull for me for a long time. Can I exchange this freedom and vivid life for a long period of somnolence [in the womb], afterwards to suck a bottle and learn the multiplication tables and Greek and Latin verbs? I suppose I must – but not yet.
8. Do Christians have a monopoly on heaven, and do atheists (or non-Christians) go to hell?
No to both questions:
No one is “saved” by faith in Jesus as Lord and Savior, as Protestant Christianity teaches, and deathbed conversions have no impact on the quality of life in the world to come. And no one is damned because he believes in the Trinity, in spite of Islam’s warning.
Character alone counts, not beliefs. Good atheists are not disadvantaged, though they are not likely to remain atheists once they come over! (Many spirits speak of God or use some equivalent term, though their references are almost always vague.) Correct beliefs are helpful insofar as they encourage good lives. And they often do. But they are not what determines one’s place in the afterlife. As far as I’ve been able to tell, spirits are unanimous on this point.
9. Where can readers get more information about you or contact you?
At my website: http://www.csub.edu/~sbetty/ . Or by searching “Stafford Betty” at Amazon.com. Or by email at sbetty@csub.edu
What questions do you have for Dr. Betty? Did you learn anything surprising about the afterlife? If you had an NDE what was your experience?
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P.S. Expand your awareness of the afterlife. Develop your intuition – click here.
Stafford Betty earned his Ph.D. in theology from Fordham University, where he concentrated on Asian religious thought and Sanskrit. Today he is a professor of religious studies at California State University, Bakersfield, and has evolved over the last twenty years as their death-and-afterlife specialist.
In 2011 he published two books on the afterlife. In the first, The Afterlife Unveiled, he brings together information about the world to come that has reached us from spirits who once lived on earth, and who utilize mediums to get their message across. The second, The Imprisoned Splendor, is a novel set in the afterlife. Betty’s earlier publications focused on the philosophy of religion. He has published seven books and dozens of article, some in top-tier philosophy journals. He has traveled to India four times, most recently in 2010 to deliver the keynote address at a convocation of Vedantins in Udupi.
Photo: Fotolia Leonid Tid#40792259
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I recently connected with my recently deceased mother, through a wonderful Medium. As Mom was bipolar and ultimately took her life, her adjustment on the other side is slow going. She is in a place where she is convalescing and has counselors helping her. She is slowly reviewing her life. When we first contacted her, she was embarrassed by some of her behavior in life- specifically regarding me. I was able to let her know that I have done a lot of healing work around some of the dysfunctional family dynamics we shared, and I believe it helped her.
Last spring, a few months after my father passed away, I had a reading with a different gal, who also acted as a Medium. Dad is doing great. His transition was pretty joyful; when I tuned into him myself, right after he died, I got a, “Woo hooo! I’m free!!” Anyway, the Medium said that Dad was doing research. When I asked what type, she said she saw a skeleton. I asked if that meant that he was doing medical research, and she said yes. Then I told her that in life, Dad had been a doctor.
I look forward to checking in with Mom in several months to see her progress.
Thank you for this informative interview!
Hi Susan,
I’m so happy you were able to contact both your mother and your father. I’m glad your healing work around your family issues has payed off for you.
I love it, “Woo hoo, I’m free.” Awesome. The second medium gave you a great piece of information with which to identify that this was your father.
That’s wonderful!
Thank you for visiting and sharing your story her.
It’s a pleasure to meet you.
Best,
Angela
Fascinating. If spirits are involved in work in the afterlife, how is it we can call upon them. How is it that my Mom can be present for me and still do her work in the afterlife. I believe she has attained an advanced state because she was such a wonderful mother. But she also promised she would always be here for me. Can you tell me more about this. Can spirits be in two or more places at once? Can she be attending to the children of Sandy Hook or be in the advanced state that you describe and still come to me?
HI Rosemarie,
From what I understand since we are pure conscious – energy inhabiting a frequency we can “bi-locate.” All we have to do is “think” of a place and we our consciousness is there so, we can be in more than one place at a time. So yes, she can be attending to the children of Sandy Hook and be with you at the same time.
Thank you for sharing the interview with Dr. Betty. When he talks about the afterlife it resonates with me – always has as far back as I can remember.
It started with my grandmother whom I adored and loved dearly. I was scared to death as a child when she related her personal “ghost” stories and even experienced some of the paranormal growing up around her.
She was psychic and clearly comfortable talking with her loved ones on the other side. She was an intelligent woman from the South and an avid Southern Baptist believer yet she had this side of her that drew you into the world beyond and I believed. Still do to this day though more intrigued than scared and would dearly love to visit with her from the other side to ask questions I didn’t know to ask as a child.
Shortly after she died she did present herself to me in a dream wanting to tell me something but my subconscious freaked out so much I lost the opportunity to my regret.
I love the mystery, magic and possibilities of ‘where we go when we die’ knowing we’ll all discover the answers and truths to our questions.
Thank you again for adding to that knowledge.
Hi Pat,
Your grandmother sounds like a remarkable woman! When we are exposed to the spirit world at a young age sometimes it does scare us, but on the other hand it helps us develop an open mind too.
Why not speak to your grandmother and ask her to come to you again? She can and does hear you. Write her a letter and ask her tell her that you want to see her again. Put the letter in your nightstand drawer and each night before you go to sleep affirm that you are going to get a visitation from her in a dream.
I’m so glad you enjoyed this article. Thanks so much for sharing your comment with us.
I’m trying to remember………so that I can forget! ?
Okay! lol
Very interesting post! Despite being quite a rational personality type, I myself am a firm believer in both reincarnation and the afterlife, because as an intuitive I’ve had communication in very specific terms with spirits, including names, appearance, and other details.
And as a human being in general, I actually have some memories of my most recent previous life (which was rather tragic and memorable), including someone who I believe is still close to me in spirit, and has done some fairly dramatic and visible things to demonstrate it.
I even have a physical anomaly that seems to relate to my memories of that past life, and several mediums and readers have described that incarnation as well.
So there isn’t much doubt in my mind that such things actually exist, and I find that to be an extremely comforting idea. It has all caused me to lose my fear of death completely, and in an odd sense I even look forward to it eventually, because my curiosity about that other world is enormous! I wonder how many people we’ll meet there from previous lives we’ve completely forgotten! 🙂
Thank you Jennifer! There are many documented cases of people born with physical anomalies related to their past lives!Your memories of your past life and the spirit who shares this life with you are all great evidence for the afterlife and reincarnation.
Thank you so much for sharing your comments and so much info about your life with us.
Dear Angela, Thank you for sharing Dr. Betty’s work and thought-provoking interview. Several things perked my attention. 1) I myself have not experienced an NDE but seem to connect profoundly with those who have. This suggests to me it is possible for people to access some sense of the experience without needing to die. 2) The concept of Earth’s slow “vibrations,” blocking us intrigues me. I find the more I spend time listening to the Earth itself and immerse in the natural world, the more I seem to access spiritual information. In fact, my greatest dilemma right now is how to live the life of my soul’s longing by reversing my current lifestyle and being outdoors 75% of the time, indoors 25%. 3) Especially coming from a man who studies and teaches religion, the idea that “Character alone counts, not beliefs,” reassures me. For some reason I cannot fathom, I have tried again and again to understand my hesitations toward Christianity despite reading scripture and attending various churches over a lifetime. It simply has not resonated with me the way other belief systems (such as Buddhism) have. Many outsiders to my family have commented about the nature of “good works” of my relatives, yet the one who has behaved most like a missionary personally saving lives is an atheist, and the rest of us have no specific religious compass as foundation. The constant tug I feel toward spiritual topics is probably the most “religious” expression among us. How we choose to behave must be more important than who we listen to. That reassures me for our existence outside this plane.
Hi Erin,
I’m glad you enjoyed this article and learned a lot from it.
You may have a memory of your previous time in the afterlife that is closer to your conscious awareness that most people. Perhaps this is why you resonate to NDEs to much?
Re: Earth’s slow vibrations. If you are in tune with the natural world you’re not as hooked into the hypnotic chatter of the man made world. This allows you to rise above the slow vibrations of the physical realm to access more of the Universal consciousness. The natural world is a portal to this expanded consciousness of life.
I agree that it is our character and act of goodness that count not our religion.
Thank you so much for sharing your insights and questions with us.
What a great gift to find today my comment was chosen! Thank you, Dr. Betty. I look forward to reading them both and understanding more of your lifelong work. Many Blessings for 2013 to both Angela and Dr. Betty.
Dear Erin,
Congratulations! I hope you enjoy the book from Dr. Betty.
Best wishes for a marvelous new year!
Angela
Dear Angela & Dr. Betty, thank you so much for sharing these insights on this site for everyone to read. After reading the above article I immediately went to Amazon to purchase the book “Afterlife..” I am so eager to read it! Thank you once again it’s great to be able to have access to such knowledge. Thank you Dr. Betty & Angela!
Belle,
That is fantastic! I’m sure you’ll learn a lot from the book.
Great having you as part of the community here.
Dear Angela,
It was nice to read about Stafford Betty’s views and his version of the Afterlife…..now don’t get me wrong…I do believe in the afterlife but I believe more in reincarnation as in energy flow…after death from one physical plane or body to another. There are perhaps some energies which retain the memory of their previous coding much like a computer program which is designed to do something and due to an external factor cannot finish the task and perhaps it is these “souls” which hover around to find a way to finish the job and are called Spirits…
I do sometimes wonder why we think so much about the after life and not enough about this life of ours 😉
Hi Manoj,
Thank you for sharing your opinions with us here.
I believe in reincarnation but, from what I have read we have free will even after death so, if we choose not to reincarnate or choose to wait for a period of time our consciousness exists in the place we call the “afterlife.” I too believe, as do many scientists, that we are energetic beings that live in a multiverse comprised of different levels of vibrating energy. I think it is this “energy” that contains our consciousness and is the part of us the survives the death of the body and eventually reincarnates.
I think we are interested in life after death because we realize our consciousness is eternal so, we are curious as to what it will be like to be conscious after the death of the physical body. I don’t think that thinking about this topic means we don’t think about the life we are leading. I think that knowing that our consciousness exists after the death of the physical body helps us to live a better life now. If you take the memories of this life with you then you will want to create the best life possible while you are in the body.
Thank you for commenting on this post.
It’s a pleasure to have you visit Powered by Intuition.
Angela
Thanks for your thoughts as well Angela….it is a pleasure for me as well..to visit your website.
Hi Manoj,
Welcome back. It’s a pleasure having you visit and comment.
This is fascinating. I’m wondering if the different “heaven worlds” are at all like what I was reading about the “multiverse,” the many dimensions that exist. It all sounds more complicated than I had imagined. And I’m wondering what it’s like for those souls who have reached the more advanced levels. So many questions!
Hi Galen,
Yes, to answer your questions I believe that the afterlife exists as part of the “mulitverse.”
I too would love to hear from more advanced souls as well. That would be fascinating.
Thank you for visiting and commenting.
Angela
Thank you, Angela and Dr Betty for the very interesting info on the afterlife.
What is new to me is to learn that heaven is a spectrum of worlds. It is comforting to know that no spirits stay in the dark forever and that there will be a day when the spirit decide to move towards the light. And yes, I found the part on the addictions interesting too! Great post!
Hi Evelyn,
I’m so glad you enjoyed the interview and learned some new things about the afterlife!
xoxo,
Angela
We are so curious about the afterlife, aren’t we? Dr. Betty’s information is fascinating. Of course I found this paragraph – “Other souls are enslaved to their addictions and become earthbound. For example, an earthbound spirit who was an alcoholic is still pestered by the craving for alcohol. So he hangs around bars on earth and “drinks through” other alcoholics he temporarily possesses, making it all the more difficult for his victim to conquer the habit.” – to be particularly interesting. Possibly that explains where some have such a difficult time letting go of their alcoholism for a period of time or forever, and others find it a bit more doable. Always interesting. Thanks for sharing Dr. Betty’s research.
Cathy,
This is the perfect section for you to have noticed!
This may also pertain to many other addictions as well such as drugs and food too. I have heard this before and I think it makes perfect sense. The discarnate will find someone that he/she can manipulate because of their addiction and use them to satisfy their own addiction.
I often think there is someone whispering to me to “eat that cookie.” lol
Glad you enjoyed this interview with Dr. Betty.