This Will Change How You See Death

I want to start with a big question which is probably the biggest philosophical question and scientific question that remains at least in the secular world in the philosophical world and the scientific world that remains unresolved and that is what is the origin of consciousness? Where does consciousness as a phenomenon emerge from? The fact that we are sensient beings. We're aware of ourselves. We have thoughts. We have feelings. We have memories. We have a sense of identity. Where does that come from? So in the secular world, at least right now, at least currently, the popular worldview is materialism. Materialism is pretty much in various different iterations the prevailing secular worldview. And that means materialism not to be confused with conspicuous consumption which is a perhaps a behavioral outcome of values that are based on nothing more than materialism. Uh but materialism itself is is simply the assertion that everything that is real is material. If it exists, it is physical. It's a physical thing and there's nothing other than physical existence. So then the question that is posed to the materialists is where does consciousness come from? If we're to believe that consciousness is simply the result of chemical reactions in a bunch of cells or tissue called the brain. Then we have to ask, you know, how does that happen that a a a glob of cells produce this otherworldly, intangible, unobservable thing called called consciousness? And and when did it occur? Exactly when in the narrative did matter become conscious? At what point did a thing form some identity? the ability to to refer to itself, the ability to think of itself. Now, obviously from a Torah point of view, this is not a question at all because from a Torah point of view, we would say quite the opposite that consciousness is not a product of matter, but matter is a product of consciousness. There was divine consciousness. From divine consciousness from from the divine thought emerged creation including the physical plane as we know it which is uh at least in terms of answering this question the the Torah model is an easier model to accept. It brings up other questions. But uh it's easier to understand that matter emerged from consciousness than consciousness emerged from matter. And if we do understand that consciousness predated matter, that there was awareness before there were things and that the brain does not create consciousness but rather is let's say an antenna which is receptive to consciousness. Then uh it's also very easy to understand that the consciousness that makes me me and makes you you is not inextricably linked at all to our bodies. From a materialistic point of view, it is. Once brain function ceases, this dream or this myth called consciousness disappears. But from the Torah model, consciousness existed long before the formation of the body. Consciousness will continue to exist after the sessation of the functioning of the body. And that even during the time when the body was functioning, the body wasn't producing consciousness like uh as I mentioned earlier just so many chemical reactions popping off in a clump of cells. But uh the the the physical gear, the uh the hardware called the brain was just sort of tapping into something spiritual called the mind that uh exists beyond the physical brain. So when we understand things from that perspective, I think it's a little bit easier to start discussing the idea of afterlife and in fact I think to understand why afterlife is actually even a misnomer because afterlife implies that life has come to an end and now there's something that's after life. Actually the labavatur spoke to a group of college students in the 1960s and spoke to them in English and mentioned to them that the word afterlife is a misnomer and that the term that we use or one of the terms we use in Hebrew which is a very edifying term is hyalos. Histoalus sometimes we translate it as removal but uh you may translate it also as relocation or even as graduation. What it means is the person who was always here is sort of repositioning by shedding their body but their life continues and they're just sort of uh relocating. That's what histoalus means. actually that Eba mentioned to these college students there's a concept of the conservation of matter and energy that nothing is truly destroyed nothing is created nothing is destroyed everything is always there it just gets reiterated into new forms so the said if you could understand that you could understand very well that the consciousness of a person even after the sessation of the of the life of the body or the functioning of the body that the consciousness merely repositions and uh continues functioning. I heard this directly from a colleague, a friend, a mentor of mine, Rabbi Yeshua Binyam Gordon all over. I heard from him because I I I remember when he was sitting Shiva for his mother Allah shalom. So when I came to him when he was sitting Shiva in crown heights. So he told me that when his father Allah shalom his father Shalom bear garden was sitting Shiva for his mother the rebbit told their family you should know that when a loved one passes away they don't disappear. In fact, they're very close by that EB said powerful uh words. They just went up to the second floor. So, imagine that you're in a house and you're you're you're on the first floor and people are talking and they're going about their activities and everything's going on and then there's this person who you used to see. You know, if if the gathering would have been in an earlier time, that person would have been there. Now, they're not there. They passed away. So, you're looking around, that person's not there. Oh, they're not here. No, they are here. They're just on the second floor. They're just on the second floor. They're very nearby. Obviously, that's a spatial way of describing something. You know, first floor, second floor. It's a it's a metaphor because we're not talking about time space. We're not talking about physical location. But what we are saying is that just because somebody's physical body stopped functioning doesn't mean their consciousness ceased to function. It doesn't mean their conscious consciousness even went far away because as we were explaining consciousness was never locked to the body to begin with. Hey this is Shay Ta. You were just watching a clip from this class. If you want to get the full context, the full class that this clip that you just watched was from, you watch right here. Click right here. Here.