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Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa, Hare Hare,
Hare Rāma, Hare Rāma, Rāma Rāma, Hare Hare
Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa,
Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa, Hare Hare
Krishna Productions presents, a narration of the book "A Second Chance: The Story of
a Near-Death Experience." It was written by His Divine Grace A. C. Bhaktivedanta Svāmī
Prabhupāda, the Founder Director for the International Society for Krishna Consciousness. In this
context, the word ācārya means "a person who is perfected in God-consciousness and who
also teaches others, both by precept and example, how to perfect themselves." The book was published
and copyrighted by the Bhaktivedanta Book Trust of Los Angeles, California in 1991 and
all rights are reserved by it.
Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa, Hare Hare,
Hare Rāma, Hare Rāma, Rāma Rāma, Hare Hare
And now I, Amala Bhakta dāsa, the narrator, offer my respectful obeisances to the lotus
feet of my spiritual master, Śrīla Prabhupāda, who is very dear to Lord Kṛṣṇa, having taken
shelter of His lotus feet. Śrīla Prahupada, through his numerous books, recordings and
disciples, is kindly preaching the message of Lord Caitanya Mahāprabhu and delivering
souls all over the world from the clutches of impersonalism, voidism, illusion and ignorance.
May he be pleased to inspire this humble narration with his spiritual potency, so that all who
listen to it may be helped to develop pure, ecstatic love of God and retun home, back
to Godhead, to engage in eternal, devotional service.
Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa, Hare Hare,
Hare Rāma, Hare Rāma, Rāma Rāma, Hare Hare
We now begin with the introduction of the book.
As the sinful Ajāmila lay on his deathbed, he was terrified to see three fierce humanlike
creatures coming to drag him out of his dying body and take him away to the abode of Yamarāja,
the lord of death, for punishment. Surprisingly, Ajāmila escaped this terrible
fate. How? You'll find out in the pages of A Second Chance: The Story of a Near-Death
Experience. You'll also learn many vital truths about
the fundamental nature of the self and reality, so you can better prepare yourself for your
own inevitable encounters with death and dying. Even today, people momentarily on the verge
of death report encounters like Ajāmila's, lending credibility to the idea that there
is life after death. In 1982, George Gallup, Jr., published a book
called Adventures in Immortality, which contained results of a survey on American beliefs about
the afterlife, including near-death and out-of-body experiences.
Sixty-seven percent of the people surveyed said they believe in life after death, and
fifteen percent said they themselves had had some kind of near-death experience.
The people who reported a near-death experience were then asked to describe it. Nine percent
reported an out-of-body sensation, and eight percent felt that "a special being or beings
were present during the near-death experience." The Gallup survey is intriguing, but it leaves
unanswered this basic question: Is there any scientific evidence for near-death experiences,
particularly of the out-of-body type? Apparently there is--from studies of people
on the verge of death who, while supposedly unconscious, accurately report events relating
to their physical body from a perspective outside it. Heart attack patients, accident
victims, and soldiers wounded in battle have all reported such experiences.
Dr. Michael Sabom, a cardiologist at the Emory University Medical School, undertook a scientific
study of such reports. He interviewed thirty-two cardiac-arrest patients who reported out-of-body
experiences. During a cardiac arrest the heart stops pumping blood to the brain, and so a
patient should be totally unconscious. Yet twenty-six of the thirty-two patients reporting
out-of-body experiences during cardiac arrest were able to give fairly accurate visual accounts
of their resuscitation. And the remaining six gave extremely accurate accounts of the
specific resuscitation techniques, matching confidential hospital records of their operations.
The results of Sabom's study, detailed in his book Recollections of Death: A Medical
Investigation (1982), convinced him of the reality of out-of-body experiences. He concluded
that the mind was an entity distinct from the brain and that the near-death crisis caused
the mind and brain to split apart for a brief time. Sabom wrote, "Could the mind which splits
apart from the physical brain be, in essence, the soul, which continues to exist after the
final bodily death, according to some religious doctrines? As I see it, this is the ultimate
question that has been raised by reports of the NDE [near-death experience]."
The true dimensions of that ultimate question are thoroughly explored in A Second Chance,
by His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupāda, the founding spiritual master
(ācārya) of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness.
Thousands of years ago in India, the history concerning Ajāmila and his near-death experience
was related by the great spiritual master Śukadeva Gosvāmī to his disciple King Parīkṣit.
Their conversation is recorded in the Sixth Canto of the Sanskrit classic Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam,
renowned as the ripened fruit of the tree of India's timeless Vedic literature.
In 1975-76, in the course of translating the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam into English, Śrīla Prabhupāda
translated the story of Ajāmila. And as with the rest of the work, in addition to the text
he provided an illuminating commentary on each verse.
But this wasn't the first time Śrīla Prabhupāda had explained the story of Ajāmila. During
the winter of 1970-71 Śrīla Prabhupāda was traveling with some of his Western disciples
in India. They had heard him speak about Ajāmila several times, and at their request he now
gave a systematic series of lectures on the Ajāmila story.
Thus A Second Chance consists of texts from the Sixth Canto of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam (reproduced
here in boldface type), selections from Śrīla Prabhupāda's commentary, and excerpts from
transcriptions of his lectures during the '70-71 India tour.
The history of Ajāmila is dramatic, powerful, and engaging. And the sharp philosophical
and metaphysical debates that punctuate the action as Ajāmila confronts the messengers
of death and finds deliverance are bound to excite the interest of those concerned with
life's deepest questions. The Publishers
Before beginning the actual narration of the book, we will first present a dramatization
of it, vividly showing the temptation, suffering, realization and final redemption of the main
character Ajāmila.
My name is Ajāmila and I once lived in the city of Kānyakubja, India, many thousands
of years ago. I was a young, upright Brāhmaṇa priest, but one day, I fell from the path
of spiritual life and lost all of my good qualities. Let me tell you about it.
In my youth, I studied all the Vedic literatures. I was a reservoir of good character and conduct.
I was very mild, and gentle, and I kept my mind and senses under control. I was always
truthful, knew how to chant the Vedic mantras, and was very pure. I always showed proper
respect to my spiritual master, guests and the elderly members of my household. Indeed,
I was free from false prestige. I was benevolent to all living beings and never envied anyone.
But one day, following the order of my father, I went to the forest to collect fruits and
flowers. On the way home, I came upon a very ***, low class man, shamelessly embracing
and kissing a ***. The man was smiling, and singing, and enjoying himself, as if this
were proper behavior. Both the man and the *** were drunk. The prostitutes eyes
were rolling in intoxication, and her dress, it had become loose, partially exposing her
body. When I saw this ***, the dormant *** desires in my heart awakened, and in
illusion, I fell under their control. I tried to remember the instructions of the scriptures,
and with the help of my knowledge and intellect, I tried to control my ***, but because of
the force of cupid within my heart, I was unable to control my mind. After that, I always
thought of the ***, and within a short time, I took her in as a servant in my house.
I then gave up all of my spiritual practices. I spent the money I had inherited from my
father, for presents, for the *** and even rejected my beautiful young wife, who
came from a respectable Brāhmaṇa family. Then I got money anyway I could, legally and illegally,
robbing and gambling, and used to maintain the prostitutes sons and daughters. By the
time I was eighty-eight years old, I had fathered ten sons by the ***. They youngest,
a baby, was named Nārāyaṇa: one of the names of the Supreme Lord Viṣṇu. I was very attached
to my young son, and derived great pleasure watching the child's early attempts to walk
and talk.
One day, without warning, the time of my death arrived. Terrified, I saw before me gruesome
figures with fierce, twisted faces. These subtle beings, with ropes in their hands,
had come to forcibly escort me to the court of Yamarāja, the lord of death. Seeing these
ghoulish creatures, I became bewildered, and out of affection for my beloved child, who
was playing just a short distance away, I began to cry loudly, "Nārāyaṇa! Nārāyaṇa!"
With tears in my eyes, weeping for my young son, I unconsciously chanted the Holy Name
of the Lord.
Hearing their master's name chanted with great feeling by me, the servants of Lord Viṣṇu,
the Viṣṇudūtas, arrived within a second. They appeared like, like Lord Viṣṇu Himself. Their
eyes were exactly like the petals of a lotus flower. They wore helmets of furnished gold,
glimmering silk silk garments the color of topaz, and their perfectly formed bodies were
decorated with garlands of saffron and milk white lotuses. They appeared fresh and youthful,
and their dazzling effulgence illuminated the darkest of the death chamber. In their
hands they held bows, arrows, swords, conchshells, clubs, discs and lotus flowers.
The Viṣṇudūtas saw the servants of Yamarāja, the Yamadūtas, snatching my soul from the
core of my heart, and with resounding voices they cried: "Stop! Stop!" The Yamadūtas, would
never before encountered any opposition, trembled upon hearing the Viṣṇudūtas harsh command
and asked: "Who are you? Why are you trying to stop us? We are the servants of Yamarāja,
the lord of death." The agents of Viṣṇu smiled and spoke in voices as deep as the rumbling
of rainclouds, "If you are truly the servants of Yamarāja, you must explain to us the meaning
of the cycle of birth and death. Tell us, who must enter this cycle and who must not?
The Yamadūtas replied, "The sun, fire, sky, air, demigods, moon, evening, day, night,
the directions, water, land, and the Supersoul, or the Lord within the heart, all witness
the activities of everyone."
The candidates for punishment in the cycle of birth and death are those who are confirmed
by these witnesses to have deviated from their religious duties. In proportion to the extent
of one's religious, or irreligious actions in this life, one must enjoy or suffer the
corresponding reactions of karma in the next. Originally, the living beings exist in the
spiritual world as eternal servants of God, but when they give up the service of the Lord,
they must enter the material universe, comprised of the three modes of material nature: goodness,
passion and ignorance. The living beings who desire to enjoy this material world come under
the control of the modes, and according to their specific relationship with these modes,
acquire suitable material bodies. A being in the mode of goodness obtains the body of
a demigod. One in the mode of passion, takes birth as a human, and one in the mode of ignorance
enters the lower species. All of these bodies are like the bodies we experience in dreams.
When a man goes to sleep, he forgets his real identity, and may dream that he has become
a king. He cannot remember what he was doing before he went to sleep, nor can he imagine
what he will do upon waking. In the same way, when a soul identifies with a temporary material
body, he forgets his real spiritual identity, as well as any previous lives in the material
world. Although most souls in the human body, have already transmigrated through all 8,400,000
species of life.
The living entity thus transmigrates from one material body to another: in human life,
animal life, life as a demigod. When the living entity gets the body of a demigod, he is very
happy. When he gets a human body, he is sometimes happy, sometimes sad, and when gets the body
of an animal, he is always fearful. In all conditions, however, he suffers terribly,
experiencing birth, death, disease, old age. His miserable condition is called saṁsāra,
or transmigration of the soul through different species of material life.
The foolish, embodied entity, unable to control his sense or his mind, is forced to act according
to the influence of the modes of material nature: even against his own desires. He is
like, like a silkworm that uses its own saliva to create a coocoon, and then, then becomes
trapped in it. The living entity traps himself in a network of his own fruitive activities,
and then can find no way to free himself. Thus, he is always bewildered and repeatedly
dies, and is reborn. Because of his intense material desires, a living entity takes birth
in a particular family and receives a family like that of either the mother or the father.
That body is an indication of his past and future bodies, just add one spring time, is
an indication of past and future spring times. The human form of life is especially valuable
because only a human can understand the transcendental knowledge that can free him from the cycle
of birth and death, but Ajāmila, he has wasted his human life, and before death, he did not
undergo atonement. Therefore, because of his sinful life, we must take him to the court
of Yamarāja. There, according to the extent of his sinful acts, he will be punished, and
then returned to the material world in a suitable body.
After hearing the statements of the Yamadūtas, the servants of Lord Viṣṇu, who are always
expert in logic and argument, replied, "How painful it is to see those in charge of upholding
religious principles are needlessly punishing an innocent person. Ajāmila has already atoned
for all of his sins. Indeed, he has intoned not only for sins he has perfomed in this
life, but for those performed in millions of previous lives as well, because he chanted
the Holy Name of Nārāyaṇa in a helpless state of mind at the time of death. Therefore, he
is now pure and eligible for liberation from the cycle of reincarnation.
The chanting of the Holy Name of Lord Viṣṇu is the best process for atonement for a thief
or a drunkard, or for one who betrays a friend or relative, or one who kills a priest, or
for one who indulges in sex with the wife of his guru, or another superior. It is also
the best method of atonement for one who murders women, the king, or his father, from one who
slaughters cows, and for all other sinful men. Simply by chanting the Holy Name of Lord
Viṣṇu, such sinful persons may attract the attention of the Supreme Lord, who therefore
considers, "Because this man has chanted my Holy Name, it is my duty to give him protection."
"One who chants the Holy Name of the Lord is immediately freed from the reactions of
unlimited sins, even if he chants jokingly, or for musical entertainment, this is accepted
in the scriptures and by all learned scholars. If one chants the Holy Name of Lord Kṛṣṇa,
and then dies in an accident, or is killed by a deadly animal, from disease, or by a
weapon, one is immediately freed from having to take birth again. As a fire burns dry grass
to ashes, the Holy Name of Kṛṣṇa burns to ashes all of one's karmic reactions. If a
person, unaware of the potency of the medicine, takes that medicine, or is forced to take
it, it will act, even without his knowlege, even if one does not know the value of chanting
the Holy Name of the Lord, the chanting will still be effective in liberating one from
reincation. At the time of death, Ajāmila, helplessly
and loudly, chanted the Holy Name of the Lord, Nārāyaṇa. That chanting alone has already
freed him from having to take birth again for his sinful life. Therefore, do not try
to take him to your master for punishment, by another term of imprisonment in a material
body."
The Viṣṇudūtas then released me from the ropes of the servants of the lord of death. I came
to my senses, and freed from fear, paid my heartfelt respects to the Viṣṇudūtas, by bowing
my head at their feet, but when the Viṣṇudūtas saw that I was about to say something to them,
they disappeared. Then I wondered, "Was this a dream I saw, or was it reality?" I saw fearsome
men with ropes in their hands coming to drag me away. Where have they gone? And where are
those four radiant persons who saved me?
I then began to reflect on my life. Being a servant of my senses, how degraded I became.
I fell down from my position as a saintly Brāhmaṇa, and begot children in the womb of
a ***. Indeed, I gave up my chaste and beautiful young wife. Once more, my father
and mother were old and have no other friend or son to look after them. Because I did not
take care of them, they lived with great pain and difficulty. It is now clear that sinful
person like myself should have been forced in his next life to suffer a hellish fate.
I am such an unfortunate person, but, but now that I have another chance, I must try
to become free from the vicious cycle of birth and death.
I immediately renounced my *** wife, and journied to Haridwar, a place of pilgrimage
in the Himalaya mountains. There I took shelter at a Viṣṇu temple where I practiced bhakti-yoga,
the yoga of devotional service to the Supreme Lord. When my mind and intelligence were fixed
in perfect meditation on the form of the Lord, I again saw before me four celestial beings,
recognizing them as the same Viṣṇudūtas who had saved me from the agents of death, I bowed
down before them in joy. There, at Haridwar, on the banks of the Ganges, I gave up my temporary
material body and regained my eternal spiritual form. Accompanied by the Viṣṇudūtas, I boarded
a golden aircraft and passing through the airways went directly to the abode of Lord
Viṣṇu, never again to reincarnate in this material world, and I hope and pray that all
of you, who have now heard my story, will do the same.
Hare Kṛṣṇa!