Posted on 10/09/2012 8:08:49 PM PDT by grundle
Dr Eben Alexander, a Harvard-educated neurosurgeon, fell into a coma for seven days in 2008 after contracting meningitis.
During his illness Dr Alexander says that the part of his brain which controls human thought and emotion "shut down" and that he then experienced "something so profound that it gave me a scientific reason to believe in consciousness after death." In an essay for American magazine Newsweek, which he wrote to promote his book Proof of Heaven, Dr Alexander says he was met by a beautiful blue-eyed woman in a "place of clouds, big fluffy pink-white ones" and "shimmering beings".
He continues: "Birds? Angels? These words registered later, when I was writing down my recollections. But neither of these words do justice to the beings themselves, which were quite simply different from anything I have known on this planet. They were more advanced. Higher forms." The doctor adds that a "huge and booming like a glorious chant, came down from above, and I wondered if the winged beings were producing it. the sound was palpable and almost material, like a rain that you can feel on your skin but doesn't get you wet."
Dr Alexander says he had heard stories from patients who spoke of outer body experiences but had disregarded them as "wishful thinking" but has reconsidered his opinion following his own experience.
He added: "I know full well how extraordinary, how frankly unbelievable, all this sounds. Had someone even a doctor told me a story like this in the old days, I would have been quite certain that they were under the spell of some delusion.
(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...
I’ll take this as good news.
Just wondering, when you go into a coma, does God make a mistake and let you see Heaven early? I’m thinking no.
Sounds too much like the Koranic concept of heaven (Jannah) and the Houri beings (associated with the alleged 72 virgins).
In an essay for American magazine Newsweek, which he wrote to promote his book Proof of Heaven, Dr. Alexander says he was met by a beautiful blue-eyed woman in a place of clouds, big fluffy pink-white ones and shimmering beings
“Harvard-educated neurosurgeon”
Thanks, but my faith doesn’t need to be validated by a “Harvard-educated neurosurgeon.” I’m happy for him he realized that God is real. I’m getting a little sick of the elitist mentality. Just because I didn’t go to Harvard doesn’t mean I’m a knuckle dragger.
There better be young women there, beer, motorcycles and dogs as well - wouldn’t be much of a heaven without that stuff, would it?
Let's ask Paul.
I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago was caught up to the third heaven. Whether it was in the body or out of the body I do not know--God knows. II Corinthians 12:2
He saw heaven but had no idea if he was actually dead or not.
So it is apparently possible.
God does not make mistakes but sometimes He does allow us choices. Some choose to go on and die, some believe that they have things left undone and come back.
In Heaven there is no beer - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5CVQqOxAfdw
Could it be? One of the 72 virgins?
Thanks!
That’s a great point.
You can’t suicide-bomb yourself there, let’s put it that way.
Related.
Part 1: Earthfiles Viewer Letters About Angelic Light Encounters
http://www.earthfiles.com/news.php?ID=2021&category=Environment
Part 2: Earthfiles Viewer Letters About Angelic Light Encounters
http://www.earthfiles.com/news.php?ID=2022&category=environment
don’t forget kittens and cats for us cat lovers
Not really criticizing him, just making some observations based on the experiences of others.
In such a state of awareness, linear time cannot be trusted to be the same as it is in waking life. A (relative) moment can last weeks, or weeks might seem to fly by in a moment. Or something in between.
In some people, this creates an information compression/decompression problem, because your waking awareness can only deal with normal linear time with events, and not everyone can expand or contract dream or atypical information to fit their waking comprehension.
Information decay can be fierce, because you are unable to “refresh” what you saw. This happens as well in waking awareness, say when you briefly meet someone new for the first time. Without seeing them again, you can measure how quickly you forget them.
And there are all sorts of other oddities that can foul up perception and interpretation.
What set me thinking on a different tack and mystifying was one of Ben Breedlove's near-death experiences where he saw himself in a white suit looking in a mirror and was proud of the things he had done. Also Kid K somebody was there. I thought that rather odd and especially when I found out that Kid K didn't have any inkling about it. So it's a mystery.
Everybody reports something different. Jesus said "the Kingdom of Heaven is within you." Does that mean that we make our own heaven (or hell) in our own minds? I don't want it to be like that. This world our minds interpret a common reality; I would hope the next would be the same only better.
Shimmery. I think the Evil One has extraordinary power in these times and we are warned that devils can appear as angels of light. So pink and blue clouds and shimmery beings don't sound very heavenly to me. I was kinda hoping for streets paved with gold ;-)
It is given unto man once to die. But of those I guess Jesus said they were not dead but sleepeth.
Now I don't know if it's just me and I haven't been under general anesthesia too many times, but it seems like time stands still and it's like the mind quits altogether. You wake up (if you're lucky) and it seems that no time has passed at all.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.