Where Is Heaven?

— In general, the word heaven designates the indefinite space surrounding the Earth, and more particularly the part that is above our horizon. It comes from the Latin coelum, formed from the Greek coilos, concave, because the sky appears to be an immense concavity. The ancients believed in the existence of many superimposed heavens, made of solid and transparent matter, forming concentric spheres and having the Earth as their center. As these spheres revolved around the Earth, they carried along with them the heavenly bodies that were within their circuit.

This idea, arising from the deficiency of astronomical knowledge, was that of all theogonies, which made of the heavens, thus graded, the various steps of bliss: the last of them was the abode of supreme happiness. According to the most common opinion, there were seven heavens, and hence the expression — to be in seventh heaven — to express perfect happiness. The Muslims admit nine heavens, in each of which the happiness of believers increases. The astronomer Ptolemy n counted eleven and named the last the Empyrean , n on account of the brilliant light that reigns within it. This is even today the poetic name given to the place of eternal beatitude. Christian theology recognizes three heavens: the first is that of the region of air and clouds; the second, the space in which the heavenly bodies lie; and the third, beyond this, is the dwelling of the Most High, the habitation of those who contemplate Him face to face. It is in accordance with this belief that it is said that St. Paul was raised to the third heaven.

— The different doctrines concerning paradise all rest upon the double error of considering the Earth the center of the Universe, and the region of the heavenly bodies as limited. It is beyond this imaginary limit that they have all placed the blessed residence and the dwelling of the Almighty. A singular anomaly, which places the Author of all things, He who governs them all, at the confines of Creation, instead of at the center, whence His thought, radiant, could embrace all things!

Science, with the inexorable logic of observation and of facts, has carried its torch into the depths of Space and shown the nullity of all these theories. The Earth is no longer the axis of the Universe, but one of the smallest of the heavenly bodies that roll in immensity; the Sun itself is no more than the center of a planetary whirlwind; the stars are so many innumerable suns, around which circle worlds beyond count, separated by distances accessible only to thought, although they appear to us to touch one another. In this grandiose whole, ruled by eternal laws — revealers of the wisdom and omnipotence of the Creator — the Earth is no more than an imperceptible point and one of the planets least favored as regards habitability. And, this being so, it is permissible to ask why God would make of the Earth the sole seat of life and degrade His favored creatures upon it? But, on the contrary, everything announces life everywhere, and Humanity is infinite like the Universe. Since Science reveals to us worlds similar to our own, God could not have created them without purpose; rather He must have peopled them with beings capable of governing them.

— The ideas of man are in proportion to what he knows; like all important discoveries, that of the constitution of the worlds was bound to impress upon them another course; under the influence of this new knowledge, beliefs were modified; Heaven was displaced, and the stellar region, being unlimited, can no longer serve it. Where, then, is it? And before this question all religions fall silent.

Spiritism comes to resolve them by demonstrating the true destiny of man. Taking as a basis the nature of the latter and the divine attributes, one arrives at a conclusion.

Man is composed of body and Spirit: the Spirit is the principal being, rational, intelligent; the body is the material envelope that clothes the Spirit temporarily, for the fulfillment of its mission on Earth and the execution of the work necessary to its advancement. The body, once worn out, is destroyed, and the Spirit survives its destruction. Deprived of the Spirit, the body is only inert matter, like an instrument deprived of the spring that makes it act; without the body, the Spirit is everything: life, intelligence. On leaving the body, it returns to the spiritual world, whence it had departed in order to reincarnate.

There exist, therefore, two worlds: the corporeal, composed of incarnate Spirits; and the spiritual, formed of disincarnate Spirits. The beings of the corporeal world, owing precisely to the materiality of their envelope, are bound to the Earth or to some globe; the spiritual world manifests itself everywhere, around us as in Space, without any designated limit. Owing precisely to the fluidic nature of their envelope, the beings that compose it, instead of moving about laboriously upon the soil, traverse distances with the rapidity of thought. The death of the body is the rupture of the bonds that held them captive.

— Spirits are created simple and ignorant, but endowed with the aptitude to know all things and to progress, by virtue of their free will. Through progress they acquire new knowledge, new faculties, new perceptions and, consequently, new joys unknown to inferior Spirits; they see, hear, feel and understand what backward Spirits cannot see, feel, hear or understand. Happiness is in direct proportion to the progress accomplished, so that, of two Spirits, one may not be as happy as the other, solely because it does not possess the same intellectual and moral advancement, without their needing for that reason to be, each one, in a distinct place. Even though together, one may be in darkness, while everything is resplendent for the other, just like a blind man and a seeing man who join hands: the latter perceives the light of which the former receives not the slightest impression. Since the happiness of Spirits is inherent in their qualities, they draw it everywhere they find themselves, whether on the surface of the Earth, amid the incarnate, or in Space. A common comparison will make this situation better understood. If two men were to find themselves at a concert, one a good musician, with a trained ear, and the other ignorant of music, with a sense of hearing little refined, the first would experience a sensation of happiness, while the second would remain insensible, because one understands and perceives what produces no impression in the other. So it is with all the joys of Spirits, which are in proportion to their sensibility. The spiritual world has splendors everywhere, harmonies and sensations that inferior Spirits, subjected to the influence of matter, do not even glimpse, and that are accessible only to purified Spirits.

— Progress in Spirits is the fruit of their own work; but, since they are free, they work toward their advancement with greater or lesser activity, with more or less negligence, according to their will, accelerating or retarding their progress and, consequently, their own happiness. While some advance rapidly, others remain stagnant, for long centuries, in the inferior ranks. They are, therefore, the very authors of their own situation, happy or wretched, according to these words of the Christ: To each one according to his works. Every Spirit that lags behind can complain of none but himself, just as the one who advances has the exclusive merit of his own effort; in his eyes, the happiness conquered holds greater worth. Supreme happiness is shared only by perfect Spirits, or, in other words, by pure Spirits, who attain it only after having progressed in intelligence and morality. Intellectual progress and moral progress rarely march together, but what the Spirit does not attain at one time, it reaches at another, so that the two kinds of progress end by reaching the same level. This is why one often sees men who are intelligent and learned yet little advanced morally, and vice versa.

— Incarnation is necessary to the double moral and intellectual progress of the Spirit: to intellectual progress through the obligatory activity of work; to moral progress through the reciprocal need of men for one another. Social life is the touchstone of good or bad qualities. Goodness, wickedness, gentleness, violence, benevolence, charity, egoism, avarice, pride, humility, sincerity, frankness, loyalty, bad faith, hypocrisy — in a word, all that constitutes the man of good or the perverse one — has for its motive, its aim and its stimulus the relations of man with his fellow men. For the man who lived in isolation there would be neither vices nor virtues; by preserving himself from evil through isolation, the good itself would be nullified. A single corporeal existence is manifestly insufficient for the Spirit to acquire all the good it lacks and to eliminate the evil it has in excess. How could the savage, for example, in a single incarnation, raise himself morally and intellectually to the level of the most advanced European? It is materially impossible. Must he, then, remain eternally in ignorance and barbarism, deprived of the joys that only the development of the faculties can afford him? Simple good sense rejects such a supposition, which would be not only the negation of divine justice and goodness, but of the very evolutionary and progressive laws of Nature. But God, who is supremely just and good, grants the Spirit as many incarnations as are necessary to attain its goal — perfection. In each new existence the Spirit brings what it acquired in the previous ones, in aptitudes, intuitive knowledge, intelligence and morality. Each existence is thus a step forward on the path of progress, unless, through laziness, negligence or obstinacy in evil, it fails to profit from it, in which case it must begin again. It depends, therefore, upon the Spirit itself to increase or diminish the number of its incarnations, always more or less painful and laborious.

— In the interval between corporeal existences the Spirit re-enters the spiritual world, where it is happy or wretched according to the good or evil it has done. Since the spiritual state is the definitive state of the Spirit and the spiritual body does not die, this must also be its normal state. The corporeal state is transitory and passing. It is above all in the spiritual state that the Spirit gathers the fruits of the progress accomplished through the work of incarnation; it is also in this state that it prepares itself for new struggles and takes the resolutions it is to put into practice on its return to Humanity.

Reincarnation may take place on the Earth or in other worlds. There are among the worlds some more advanced ones where existence is carried on under conditions less painful than on the Earth, physically and morally, but where also only Spirits that have reached a degree of perfection relative to the state of those worlds are admitted.

Life in the superior worlds is already a reward, seeing that there we find ourselves exempt from earthly evils and vicissitudes. There the bodies, less material, almost fluidic, are no longer subject to ailments, to infirmities, nor do they have the same needs. With evil Spirits excluded, men enjoy full peace, with no other concern than that of advancement through intellectual work. There reigns true fraternity, because there is no egoism; true equality, because there is no pride; and true liberty, because there are no disorders to repress, nor ambitious men seeking to oppress the weak. Compared to the Earth, these worlds are true paradises, like resting places along the path of progress leading to the definitive state. The Earth being an inferior world destined for the purification of imperfect Spirits, herein lies the reason for the evil that predominates there, until it please God to make of it the abode of more advanced Spirits.

— It is thus that the Spirit, progressing gradually as it develops, reaches the apogee of happiness; but, before having attained the summit of perfection, it enjoys a happiness relative to its progress. The child too enjoys the pleasures of childhood, later those of youth, and finally the more solid ones of maturity.

The happiness of blessed Spirits does not consist in contemplative idleness, which would be, as we have said many times, an eternal and tedious uselessness. Spiritual life, in all its degrees, is, on the contrary, a constant activity, but an activity free of fatigue. Supreme happiness consists in the enjoyment of all the splendors of Creation, which no human language could ever describe, which the most fertile imagination could not conceive. It consists also in the penetration of all things, in the absence of physical and moral sufferings, in an intimate satisfaction, in an imperturbable serenity of soul, in the love that envelops all beings, because of the absence of friction from contact with the wicked, and, above all, in the contemplation of God and in the understanding of His mysteries revealed to the most worthy. Happiness also exists in the tasks whose charge makes us happy. The pure Spirits are the Messiahs or messengers of God for the transmission and execution of His wishes. They fulfill the great missions, preside over the formation of worlds and over the general harmony of the Universe, a glorious task that is reached only through perfection. Those of the most elevated order are the only ones to possess the secrets of God, drawing inspiration from His thought, of which they are direct representatives.

— The attributions of Spirits are proportioned to their progress, to the enlightenment they possess, to their capacities, experience and degree of confidence inspired in the sovereign Lord. Neither favors nor privileges that are not the reward of merit; everything is measured and weighed in the balance of strict justice. The most important missions are entrusted only to those whom God judges capable of fulfilling them and incapable of faltering or of compromising themselves. And while the most worthy compose the supreme council, under the eyes of God, to superior chiefs is committed the direction of planetary whirlwinds, and to others is conferred that of particular worlds. Then come, by the order of advancement and hierarchical subordination, the more restricted attributions of those charged with the progress of peoples, with the protection of families and individuals, with the impulse of each branch of progress, with the various operations of Nature down to the most minute details of Creation. In this vast and harmonious whole there are occupations for all capacities, aptitudes and efforts; occupations accepted with joy, sought with ardor, because they are a means of advancement for the Spirits that aspire to progress. Incarnation is inherent in the inferiority of Spirits, ceasing to be necessary once these, transcending its limits, become fit to progress in the spiritual state, or in the corporeal existences of superior worlds, which have nothing of earthly materiality. On the part of these, incarnation is voluntary, having for its aim to exercise upon the incarnate a more direct action tending toward the fulfillment of the mission that pertains to them in respect of the same. In this way they accept with abnegation the vicissitudes and sufferings of incarnation.

Alongside the great missions entrusted to superior Spirits, there are others of relative importance in all degrees, granted to Spirits of all categories, and it may be affirmed that each incarnate being has its own, that is, duties to fulfill for the good of its fellows, from the head of the family, to whom falls the progress of the children, to the man of genius who casts new seeds of progress into societies. It is in these secondary missions that there occur the faltering, the prevarications and the renunciations that harm the individual without affecting the whole.

All intelligences contribute, therefore, to the general work, whatever the degree attained, and each one to the measure of its strength, whether in the state of incarnation or in the spiritual state. Everywhere activity, from the base to the apex of the scale, instructing themselves, aiding one another in mutual support, joining hands to reach the zenith.

Thus is established the solidarity between the spiritual world and the corporeal, or, in other terms, between men and Spirits, between freed Spirits and captive ones. Thus are perpetuated and consolidated, through purification and the continuity of relations, the true sympathies and noble affections.

— Everywhere, life and movement: no corner of the infinite unpeopled, no region that is not ceaselessly traversed by innumerable legions of radiant Spirits, invisible to the gross senses of the incarnate, but the sight of which dazzles with joy and admiration the souls freed from matter. Everywhere, in short, there is a happiness relative to all progress, to all duties fulfilled, each one bringing with it the elements of its happiness, arising from the category in which it places itself through its advancement.

Upon the qualities of the individual depends its happiness, and not upon the material state of the environment in which it finds itself; happiness can therefore exist anywhere there are Spirits capable of enjoying it. No place is circumscribed and assigned to it in the Universe. Wherever they find themselves, Spirits can contemplate the divine majesty, because God is everywhere.

Nevertheless, happiness is not personal: if we possessed it only within ourselves, without being able to share it with another, it would be sadly egoistic. We also find it in the communion of ideas that unites kindred beings. Happy Spirits, attracting one another by the similitude of their gestures and sentiments, form vast groupings or homogeneous families, within which each individuality radiates its own qualities and is saturated with the serene and beneficial effluvia emanated from the whole. The members of this whole sometimes disperse to give themselves to their mission, sometimes gather at a given point of Space in order to render an account of the work accomplished, sometimes congregate around a more elevated Spirit to receive instructions and counsel.

— Although Spirits are everywhere, the worlds are foci where they preferably gather, by virtue of the analogy existing between them and those who inhabit them. Around the advanced worlds superior Spirits abound, just as around the backward ones inferior Spirits swarm. Each globe has, in a manner of speaking, its own population of incarnate and disincarnate Spirits, replenished for the most part by the incarnation and disincarnation of these same Spirits. This population is more stable in the inferior worlds, owing to their attachment to matter, and more fluctuating in the superior ones. From these latter, however, true foci of light and happiness, Spirits set out for inferior worlds in order to sow in them the seeds of progress, to bring them consolation and hope, to raise up the spirits cast down by the trials of life. Sometimes they also incarnate in order to fulfill their mission more effectively.

— In that unlimited immensity, where is Heaven? Everywhere. No outline traces limits to it. The advanced worlds are the last stations of its path, which the virtues open and the vices forbid.

— Before this grandiose picture that peoples the Universe, that gives to all things of Creation an end and a reason for being, how small and paltry is the doctrine that circumscribes Humanity to an imperceptible point of space, that shows it to us beginning at a given instant only to end likewise with the world that contains it, encompassing no more than a minute in Eternity!

How sad, cold and glacial is that doctrine when it shows us the rest of the Universe, during and after earthly Humanity, without life or movement, like a vast desert immersed in profound silence! How despairing is the prospect of the elect devoted to perpetual contemplation, while the majority of creatures suffer endless torments! How it lacerates sensitive hearts, the idea of that barrier between the dead and the living! The blissful souls, they say, think only of their happiness, as the wretched ones think only of their sorrows. Is it any wonder that egoism reigns upon the Earth, when they show it to us in Heaven?

Oh! how paltry to us appears that idea of the grandeur, the power and the goodness of God! How sublime is the idea we form of Him through Spiritism! How its doctrine aggrandizes ideas and broadens thought! But who says that it is true? Reason first, Revelation afterward, and, finally, its concordance with the progress of Science. Between two doctrines, one of which belittles and the other exalts the attributes of God; one of which alone is in disagreement and the other in harmony with progress; one of which lags in the rear while the other advances, good sense tells on which side the truth lies. Let each one, comparing them, consult his conscience, and an intimate voice will speak to him through it. Well then, those intimate aspirations are the voice of God, who cannot deceive men.

— But, then, why did God not reveal to them the whole truth from the start? For the same reason that one does not teach to childhood what one teaches to those of mature age. The limited revelation was sufficient for a certain period of Humanity, and God proportions it gradually to the progress and the strength of the Spirit. Those who today receive a more complete revelation are the very same Spirits who had a particle of it in other times and who from then onward grew in intelligence.

Before Science had revealed to men the living forces of Nature, the constitution of the heavenly bodies, the true role of the Earth and its formation, could they have understood the immensity of Space and the plurality of worlds? Could they have identified themselves with spiritual life? could they have conceived after death of a happy or unhappy life except in a circumscribed place and under a material form? No; understanding more through the senses than through reasoning, the Universe was too vast for their brain; it was necessary to reduce it to smaller proportions in order to accommodate it to their point of view, at the risk of enlarging it later. A partial revelation had its usefulness; then it was reasonable, but today insufficient. The error belongs to those who, taking no account of the progress of ideas, believe they can govern mature men as though they were children. A. K. Note – This article, as well as that of the preceding number on the fear of death, are extracted from the new work that Mr. Allan Kardec will shortly publish. n The two facts that follow come to confirm this picture of heaven. [see Obituary — Mrs.

widow Foulon and Doctor Demeure.]

[1] Translator's note: See Heaven and Hell, Part One, Chapter III.

[2] Note by A. K.: Ptolemy lived in Alexandria, Egypt, in the second century of the Christian era.

[3] Note by A. K.: From the Greek, pur or pyr, fire.

[4] Translator's note: Heaven and Hell.