Will I Meet My Dead Parents, Relatives and Friends After Death?

People often ask, "When I die, will I ever again be able to talk to my beloved parents (or at least have them recognize who I am, so I can communicate with them)? Will we ever meet dead friends and relatives again, in another form, but one which acknowledges who and what we are to each other?"

Just as mysterious life is, death holds its share of mystery too.

According to Swami Yukteswar Maharaj, the Guru of Paramahansa Yogananda, "The earth-liberated astral being meets a multitude of relatives, fathers, mothers, wives, husbands, and friends, acquired during different incarnations on earth, as they appear from time to time in various parts of the astral realms. He is therefore at a loss to understand whom to love especially; he learns in this way to give a divine and equal love to all, as children and individualized expressions of God. Though the outward appearance of loved ones may have changed, more or less according to the development of new qualities in the latest life of any particular soul, the astral being employs his unerring intuition to recognize all those once dear to him in other planes of existence, and to welcome them to their new astral home. Because every atom in creation is inextinguishably dowered with individuality, an astral friend will be recognized no matter what costume he may don, even as on earth an actor's identity is discoverable by close observation despite any disguise." (pg. 407 Autobiography of a Yogi by Paramahansa Yogananda).

The same has been affirmed in Srimad Bhagavatam 6:16  where Sage Narada resurrects a young son of a King, who, together with his family and relatives, has been grieving over his untimely death. Sage Narada tells the boy, "Because you died untimely, the balance of your lifetime still remains. Therefore you may reenter your body and enjoy the remainder of your life, surrounded by your friends and relatives. Accept the royal throne and all the opulences given by your father." (6:16:3). To which, the dead son, who re-enters his dead body, responds, "According to the results of my fruitive activities, I, the living being, transmigrate from one body to another, sometimes going to the species of the demigods, sometimes to the species of lower animals, sometimes among the vegetables, and sometimes to the human species. Therefore, in which birth were these my mother and father? No one is actually my mother and father. How can I accept these two people as my parents?".

He goes on explain to the grieving parents and loves ones, "In this material world,...all people become friends, relatives and enemies in due course of time. They also act neutrally, they mediate, they despise one another, and they act in many other relationships. Nonetheless, despite these various transactions, no one is permanently related.

".... so the living entity, as a result of his fruitive activities, wanders throughout the entire universe, being injected into various bodies in different species of life by one kind of father after another. A few living entities are born in the human species, and others are born as animals. Although both are living entities, their relationships are impermanent. Even though one living entity becomes connected with another because of a relationship based on bodies that are perishable, the living entity is eternal. Actually it is the body that is born or lost, not the living entity.

"One should not accept that the living entity takes birth or dies. The living being actually has no relationship with so-called fathers and mothers. As long as he appears as the son of a certain father and mother as a result of his past fruitive activities, he has a connection with the body given by that father and mother. Thus he falsely accepts himself as their son and acts affectionately. After he dies, however, the relationship is finished. Under these circumstances, one should not be falsely involved with jubilation and lamentation."