The New Jerusalem/El-HEJERA Project .
Appendix E: The
Journey of the Soul - in the Kabbalah,
the Prophet's Ascent and the Tibetan Book of the Dead (Bardo Thodol).
In many traditions there are detailed descriptions of
"The Journey of the Soul" to heaven and/or to God. These descriptions
are important not just for the after life journey, but can act as guidance for
the spiritual ascent of living person as pilgrims to the City of God. The
following three sources are distinguished by supplying very rigorous plans and
methodologies that may be used for specific cyberspace applications.
In the Kabbalah, the traditional Jewish inner teachings such as the Book of the Zohar, there are detailed descriptions of the shrines/mansions of the earthly and heavenly paradises and the passages between them, along with a detailed "anatomy of the soul" and methodology of spiritual development. The Academy of Jerusalem is almost unique in the world for the ability of its associates to find and interpret the primary Hebrew material.
In the Zohar Hadash on Noah, there is a visualization of the soul’s journey based on the verse “Upon Thy Walls, Oh Jerusalem, I have appointed guards”. This is said to refer to the Heavenly Jerusalem as a city of seven concentric walls, with a gate in each of the walls, where an angel guards the gate. The entrant receives a notebook that contains the signs that should open that gate. In experiments conducted by the author and his associates, it was found that this visualization is extremely potent for a great majority of people. For each person, the forms of these walls are quite idiosyncratic, but it has also been found that the forms of the walls of Jerusalem, and of the gates in them, are highly evocative for many people.
In Islam, "The Night Journey" of the Prophet Mohamed (known by its two aspects of Al-Isra and Al-Mi'araj) has been elaborated by the Sufis (and by the "Ismaili Gnostics") into a "map" of the potential ascent of every adept in the wake of Mohammad's Ascent, to the status of "The Perfect/Whole Man" – El-Insan el-Kamil. We assert that the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem, which commemorates the Prophet Mohamed's Ascent to heaven via Jerusalem, was designed as a visual map of this process.
The Bardo Thodol – "The Tibetan Book of the Dead" – describes the 49 days in which the departing soul may shed its earthly fetters and delusions and ascend safely to the higher realms of enlightenment. It describes the kinds of visions the soul is likely to experience during the process, such as its sequential encounters with the archetypal "peaceful and wrathful deities", which are actually representations of aspects of one's soul. The detailed images and procedures of the Bardo Thodol may thus serve to equip a whole process of "Soul Journeys" in cyberspace.