Quotes About Death

While the realm of no materiality was a precious fruit of meditation, it did not help resolve the fundamental problem of birth and death, nor did it liberate one from all suffering and anxiety. It did not lead to total liberation.

I laugh when I think how I once sought paradise as a realm outside of the world of birth and death. It is right in the world of birth and death that the miraculous truth is revealed. -But this is not the laughter of someone who suddenly acquires a great fortune; neither is it the laughter of one who has won a victory. It is, rather, the laughter of one who; after having painfully searched for something for a long time, finds it one morning in the pocket of his coat. -Thich Nhat Hanh

Ich spreche nicht gern vom Tod, ich bin für Leben.

Very evil people cannot really be imagined dying.

The death house in this particular prison was one of those crass erections and maintenances of human insensitiveness and stupidity principally for which no one primarily was really responsible.

The leaf has the appearance of being born and dying, but it is not caught in either. The leaf falls to the earth without any idea of dying, and is born again by decomposing at the foot of the tree and nourishing the tree. The cloud has the appearance of dying in becoming rain, but it feels no sorrow or pain. [...] When we have awakened understanding, birth is a continuation and death is a continuation[.]

Death is essential to making life possible. Death is transformation. Death is continuation. When we die, something else is born, even if it takes time to reveal itself or for us to be able to recognize it.

There are many cells in your body that are dying as you read these words. Fifty to seventy billion cells die each day in the average human adult. You are too busy to organise funerals for all of them! At the very same time, new cells are being born, and you don't have the time to sing Happy Birthday to them. If old cells don't die, there's no chance for new cells to be born. So death is a very good thing. It's very crucial for birth. You are undergoing birth and death in this very moment.

All phenomena are impermanent. They are subject to birth and death. When the notions of birth and death are removed, this silence is called great joy.

When conditions are sufficient, we manifest in a particular way. When conditions are no longer sufficient, we no longer manifest in that way. This doesn't mean that we don't exist. If we're afraid of death, it's because we don't understand that things do not really die.

Now I see that if one doesn't know how to die, one can hardly know how to live - because death is a part of life.

We must look death in the face, recognize and accept it, just as we look at and accept life.

To live, we must die every instant. We must perish again and again in the storms that make life possible.

nature is truly the nature of no-birth, no-death. There is manifestation, and there is the cessation of manifestation in order to have another manifestation.

In this very moment all of us are dying. Some of us are dying more slowly and some of us more quickly. If we can be alive now, it is because we're dying at every moment. We might think that someone else is dying and we're not. But we shouldn't be fooled by appearances.

We do not have to die to get to the gates of Heaven.

With nonattachment, we see both being and nonbeing as creations of our mind, and we ride the wave of birth and death. We don't mind birth. We don't mind death. [...] Reality transcends both birth and death.

God is our true nature, the true nature of no birth, no death. That is why if you know how to trust God, to trust your true nature, you will lose your fear and sorrow.

When a leaf falls, we can sing Happy Continuation. When we have awakened understanding, birth is a continuation and death is a continuation, birth is an appearance and death is an appearance. People also appear to be born, grow old, and die.

We are life without limit. We are not caught in birth, we are not caught in death, we are not caught in being, and we are not caught in non-being. This is the truth of reality.

If we practice meditation, we can generate the energies of mindfulness and concentration. These energies will lead us to the insight that there is no birth and no death. We can truly remove our fear of death. When we understand that we cannot be destroyed, we are liberated from fear. It is a great relief. Non-fear is the ultimate joy.

THE WORD suchness describes reality as it is. Concepts and ideas are incapable of expressing reality as it is. Nirvana, the ultimate reality, cannot be described, because it is free of all concepts and ideas. Nirvana is the extinction of all concepts. Most of our suffering arises from our ideas and concepts. If you are able to free yourself from these concepts, anxiety and fear will disappear. Nirvana, the ultimate reality, or God, is of the nature of no-birth and no-death. It is total freedom.

True happiness does not reside in the ill-considered consumption of goods paid for by the suffering, famine, and death of others, but in a life enlightened by the feeling of a constant responsibility for one's neighbor.

Instead of saying that being leads to birth, we should say that being and nonbeing lead to birth and death. In our head, we have become used to the idea that when we are born we come into being out of nonbeing and when we die we go from being into nonbeing. If we remove the idea of being and nonbeing, there is no more idea of birth and death.