Heaven, or the heavens, is a common religious, cosmological, or transcendent place where beings such as gods, angels, jinn, saints, or venerated ancestors are said to originate, be enthroned, or live. According to the beliefs of some religions, heavenly beings can descend to earth or incarnate, and earthly beings can ascend to Heaven in the afterlife, or in exceptional cases enter Heaven alive.

Heaven is often described as a "higher place", the holiest place, a Paradise, in contrast to Hell or the Underworld or the "low places", and universally or conditionally accessible by earthly beings according to various standards of divinity, goodness, piety, faith, or other virtues or right beliefs or simply the will of God. Some believe in the possibility of a Heaven on Earth in a World to Come.

Another belief is in an axis mundi or world tree which connects the heavens, the terrestrial world, and the underworld. In Indian religions, Heaven is considered as Svarga loka , and the soul is again subjected to rebirth in different living forms according to its karma . This cycle can be broken after a soul achieves Moksha or Nirvana . Any place of existence, either of humans, souls or deities, outside the tangible world (Heaven, Hell, or other) is referred to as otherworld.

The modern English word heaven is derived from the earlier (Middle English) heven (attested 1159); this in turn was developed from the previous Old English form heofon. By about 1000, heofon was being used in reference to the Christianized"place where God dwells", but originally, it had signified "sky, firmament" (e.g. in Beowulf , c. 725). The English term has cognates in the other Germanic languages : Old Saxon heƀan"sky, heaven", Middle Low German heven"sky", Old Icelandic himinn"sky, heaven", Gothic himins; and those with a variant final -l : Old Frisian himel, himul"sky, heaven", Old Saxon/ Old High German himil, Old Saxon / Middle Low German hemmel, Dutch hemel, and modern German Himmel. All of these have been derived from a reconstructed Proto-Germanic form ** Hemina-*.

The ancient Mesopotamians regarded the sky as a series of domes (usually three, but sometimes seven) covering the flat earth. : 180 Each dome was made of a different kind of precious stone. : 203 The lowest dome of heaven was made of jasper and was the home of the stars. The middle dome of heaven was made of saggilmut stone and was the abode of the Igigi. The highest and outermost dome of heaven was made of luludānītu stone and was personified as An, the god of the sky. ^[40] The celestial bodies were equated with specific deities as well. : 203 The planet Venus was believed to be Inanna, the goddess of love, sex, and war. : 108-109 : 203 The sun was her brother Utu, the god of justice, : 203 and the moon was their father Nanna. : 203

Ordinary mortals could not go to heaven because it was the abode of the gods alone.

Instead, after a person died, his or her soul went to Kur (later known as Irkalla), a dark shadowy underworld, located deep below the surface of the earth. All souls went to the same afterlife, and a person's actions during life had no impact on how he would be treated in the world to come. Nonetheless, funerary evidence indicates that some people believed that Inanna had the power to bestow special favors upon her devotees in the afterlife.

In Ancient Egyptian religion, belief in an afterlife is much more stressed than in ancient Judaism. Heaven was a physical place far above the Earth in a "dark area" of space where there were no stars, basically beyond the Universe. According to the Book of the Dead

Almost nothing is known of Bronze Age (pre-1200 BC) Canaanite views of Heaven, and the archeological findings at Ugarit (destroyed c. 1200 BC) have not provided information. The 1st century Greek author Philo of Byblos may preserve elements of Iron Age Phoenician religion in his Sanchuniathon

In the Middle Hittite myths, Heaven is the abode of the gods.

In the Song of Kumarbi, Alalu was king in Heaven for nine years before giving birth to his son, Anu. Anu was himself overthrown by his son, Kumarbi.

The Bahá'í Faith regards the conventional description of Heaven (and hell) as a specific place as symbolic. The Bahá'í writings describe Heaven as a "spiritual condition" where closeness to God is defined as Heaven; conversely Hell is seen as a state of remoteness from God. Bahá'u'lláh, the founder of the Bahá'í Faith, has stated that the nature of the life of the soul in the afterlife is beyond comprehension in the physical plane, but has stated that the soul will retain its consciousness and individuality and remember its physical life; the soul will be able to recognize other souls and communicate with them.

For Bahá'ís, entry into the next life has the potential to bring great joy.

Bahá'u'lláh likened death to the process of birth.

He explains: "The world beyond is as different from this world as this world is different from that of the child while still in the womb of its mother." The analogy to the womb in many ways summarizes the Bahá'í view of earthly existence: just as the womb constitutes an important place for a person's initial physical development, the physical world provides for the development of the individual soul. Accordingly, Bahá'ís view life as a preparatory stage, where one can develop and perfect those qualities which will be needed in the next life. The key to spiritual progress is to follow the path outlined by the current Manifestation of God, which Bahá'ís believe is currently Bahá'u'lláh. Bahá'u'lláh wrote, "Know thou, of a truth, that if the soul of man hath walked in the ways of God, it will, assuredly return and be gathered to the glory of the Beloved."

The Bahá'í teachings state that there exists a hierarchy of souls in the afterlife, where the merits of each soul determines their place in the hierarchy, and that souls lower in the hierarchy cannot completely understand the station of those above. Each soul can continue to progress in the afterlife, but the soul's development is not entirely dependent on its own conscious efforts, the nature of which we are not aware, but also augmented by the grace of God, the prayers of others, and good deeds performed by others on Earth in the name of that person.

In Buddhism there are several Heavens, all of which are still part of samsara (illusionary reality). Those who accumulate good karma may be reborn in one of them. However, their stay in Heaven is not eternal—eventually they will use up their good karma and will undergo rebirth into another realm, as a human, animal or other being. Because Heaven is temporary and part of samsara, Buddhists focus more on escaping the cycle of rebirth and reaching enlightenment (nirvana). Nirvana is not a heaven but a mental state.

According to Buddhist cosmology the universe is impermanent and beings transmigrate through a number of existential "planes" in which this human world is only one "realm" or "path". These are traditionally envisioned as a vertical continuum with the Heavens existing above the human realm, and the realms of the animals, hungry ghosts and hell beings existing beneath it. According to Jan Chozen Bays in her book, Jizo: Guardian of Children, Travelers, and Other Voyagers, the realm of the asura is a later refinement of the heavenly realm and was inserted between the human realm and the Heavens. One important Buddhist Heaven is the Trāyastriṃśa , which resembles Olympus of Greek mythology.

In the Mahayana world view, there are also pure lands which lie outside this continuum and are created by the Buddhas upon attaining enlightenment. Rebirth in the pure land of Amitabha is seen as an assurance of Buddhahood, for once reborn there, beings do not fall back into cyclical existence unless they choose to do so to save other beings, the goal of Buddhism being the obtainment of enlightenment and freeing oneself and others from the birth–death cycle.

One of the Buddhist sutras states that a hundred years of our existence is equal to one day and one night in the world of the thirty-three gods. Thirty such days add up to their one month. Twelve such months become their one-year, while they live for a thousand such years though existence in the heavens is ultimately finite and the beings who reside there will reappear in other realms based on their karma.

The Tibetan word Bardo means literally "intermediate state". In Sanskrit the concept has the name antarabhāva.

Brahmāloka

Here the denizens are Brahmās, and the ruler is Mahābrahmā

After developing the four Brahmavihāras, King Makhādeva rebirths here after death.

The monk Tissa and Brāhmana Jānussoni were also reborn here.

For a monk, the next best thing to Nirvana is to be reborn in this Brahmāloka.

The lifespan of a Brahmās is not stated but is not eternal.

Kāmāvacaraloka

The lifespan of a Kāmāvacara is not stated but is not eternal.

Cātummaharaja

Here some denizens are kings that came from human lives as being kings.

The Anguttara Nikaya says that on the 15th day, the Cātummaharaja gods look down to earth and see if the humans are still paying reverence to mother, father, samanas and brahmanas.

Bimbisāra (the king of Magadha), and Pāyāsi (the king of Kosāla) were reborn here.

The denizens here have a lifespan of 9,216,000,000 years.

Nimmānarati

The denizens here have a lifespan of 2,284,000,000 years.

Paranimmitavasavatti

The denizens here have a lifespan of 9,216,000,000 years.

Tāvatimsa

The ruler of this Heaven is Indra or Shakra, and the realm is also called Trayatrimia.

Each denizen addresses other denizens as the title "mārisa".

The governing hall of this Heaven is called Sudhamma Hall.

This Heaven has a garden Nandanavana with damsels, as its most magnificent sight.

Ajita the Licchavi army general was reborn here.

Gopika the Sākyan girl was reborn as a male god in this realm.

Any Buddhist reborn in this realm can outshine any of the previously dwelling denizens because of the extra merit acquired for following the Buddha's teachings.

The denizens here have a lifespan of 36,000,000 years.

Tusita

Anāthapindika, a Kosālan householder and benefactor to the Buddha's order was reborn here.

The denizens here have a lifespan of 576,000,000 years.

Yāma

The denizens here have a lifespan of 1,444,000,000 years.

There are 5 major types of Heavens.

In the native Chinese Confucian traditions, Heaven (Tian) is an important concept, where the ancestors reside and from which emperors drew their mandate to rule in their dynastic propaganda, for example.

Heaven is a key concept in Chinese mythology, philosophies and religions, and is on one end of the spectrum a synonym of Shangdi ("Supreme Deity") and on the other naturalistic end, a synonym for nature and the sky. The Chinese term for "Heaven", Tian (天), derives from the name of the supreme deity of the Zhou Dynasty. After their conquest of the Shang Dynasty in 1122 BC, the Zhou people considered their supreme deity Tian to be identical with the Shang supreme deity Shangdi. The Zhou people attributed Heaven with anthropomorphic attributes, evidenced in the etymology of the Chinese character for Heaven or sky, which originally depicted a person with a large cranium. Heaven is said to see, hear and watch over all men. Heaven is affected by man's doings, and having personality, is happy and angry with them. Heaven blesses those who please it and sends calamities upon those who offend it. Heaven was also believed to transcend all other spirits and gods, with Confucius asserting, "He who offends against Heaven has none to whom he can pray."

Other philosophers born around the time of Confucius such as Mozi took an even more theistic view of Heaven, believing that Heaven is the divine ruler, just as the Son of Heaven (the King of Zhou) is the earthly ruler. Mozi believed that spirits and minor gods exist, but their function is merely to carry out the will of Heaven, watching for evil-doers and punishing them. Thus they function as angels of Heaven and do not detract from its monotheistic government of the world. With such a high monotheism, it is not surprising that Mohism championed a concept called "universal love" (jian'ai, 兼愛), which taught that Heaven loves all people equally and that each person should similarly love all human beings without distinguishing between his own relatives and those of others. In Mozi's Will of Heaven (天志), he writes:

Mozi criticized the Confucians of his own time for not following the teachings of Confucius. By the time of the later Han Dynasty, however, under the influence of Xunzi, the Chinese concept of Heaven and Confucianism itself had become mostly naturalistic, though some Confucians argued that Heaven was where ancestors reside. Worship of Heaven in China continued with the erection of shrines, the last and greatest being the Temple of Heaven in Beijing, and the offering of prayers. The ruler of China in every Chinese dynasty would perform annual sacrificial rituals to Heaven, usually by slaughtering two healthy bulls as a sacrifice.

Traditionally, Christianity has taught that Heaven is the location of the throne of God as well as the holy angels, although this is in varying degrees considered metaphorical. In traditional Christianity, it is considered a state or condition of existence (rather than a particular place somewhere in the cosmos) of the supreme fulfillment of theosis in the beatific vision of the Godhead. In most forms of Christianity, heaven is also understood as the abode for the redeemed dead in the afterlife, usually a temporary stage before the resurrection of the dead and the saints' return to the New Earth.

The resurrected Jesus is said to have ascended to heaven where he now sits at the Right Hand of God and will return to earth in the Second Coming. Various people have been said to have entered heaven while still alive, including Enoch, Elijah and Jesus himself, after his resurrection. According to Roman Catholic teaching, Mary, mother of Jesus, is also said to have been assumed into heaven and is titled the Queen of Heaven.

The Gospel of Matthew frequently uses the phrase "Kingdom of Heaven", where the other Synoptic Gospels speak of the "kingdom of God", one of the key elements of the teachings of Jesus in the New Testament. speaks of a war in Heaven between Michael the Archangel and his angels against Satan and his angels, after which Satan and his angels are "thrown down to the earth".

In the 2nd century AD, Irenaeus of Lyons recorded a belief that, in accordance with, those who in the afterlife see the Saviour are in different mansions, some dwelling in the Heavens, others in paradise and others in "the city".

While the word used in all these writings, in particular the New Testament Greek word οὐρανός (ouranos), applies primarily to the sky, it is also used metaphorically of the dwelling place of God and the blessed. Similarly, though the English word "heaven" still keeps its original physical meaning when used, for instance, in allusions to the stars as "lights shining through from Heaven", and in phrases such as heavenly body to mean an astronomical object, the Heaven or happiness that Christianity looks forward to is, according to Pope John Paul II, "neither an abstraction nor a physical place in the clouds, but a living, personal relationship with the Holy Trinity. It is our meeting with the Father which takes place in the risen Christ through the communion of the Holy Spirit."

Attaining heaven is not the final pursuit in Hinduism as heaven itself is ephemeral and related to physical body.

Only being tied by the bhoot-tatvas, heaven cannot be perfect either and is just another name for pleasurable and mundane material life.

According to Hindu cosmology, above the earthly plane, are other planes: (1) Bhuva Loka, (2) Swarga Loka, meaning Good Kingdom, is the general name for heaven in Hinduism, a heavenly paradise of pleasure, where most of the Hindu Devatas (Deva) reside along with the king of Devas, Indra, and beatified mortals. Some other planes are Mahar Loka, Jana Loka, Tapa Loka and Satya Loka. Since heavenly abodes are also tied to the cycle of birth and death, any dweller of Heaven or Hell will again be recycled to a different plane and in a different form per the karma and "maya" i.e. the illusion of Samsara. This cycle is broken only by self-realization by the Jivatma. This self-realization is Moksha (Turiya, Kaivalya).

The concept of moksha is unique to Hinduism and is unparalleled.

Moksha stands for liberation from the cycle of birth and death and final communion with Brahman.

With moksha, a liberated soul attains the stature and oneness with Brahman or Paramatma. Different schools such as Vedanta, Mimansa, Sankhya, Nyaya, Vaisheshika, and Yoga offer subtle differences in the concept of Brahman, obvious Universe, its genesis and regular destruction, Jivatma, Nature (Prakriti) and also the right way in attaining perfect bliss or moksha.

In the Vaishnava traditions the highest Heaven is Vaikuntha, which exists above the six heavenly lokas and outside of the mahat-tattva or mundane world. It's where eternally liberated souls who have attained moksha reside in eternal sublime beauty with Lakshmi and Narayana (a manifestation of Vishnu).

In the Nasadiya Sukta, the heavens/sky Vyoman is mentioned as a place from which an overseeing entity surveys what has been created. However, the Nasadiya Sukta questions the omniscience of this overseer.

After Kalyug, there will be the heaven(created by Shiv) in Bharat, in which Lakshmi and Narayana are King and Queen.

The Qur'an contains many references to an afterlife in Eden for those who do good deeds. Regarding the concept of Heaven (Jannah) in the Qu'ran, verse 35 of Surah Al-Ra’d says, "The parable of the Garden which the righteous are promised! Beneath it flow rivers. Perpetual is the fruits thereof and the shade therein. Such is the End of the Righteous; and the end of the unbelievers is the Fire." [ Quran ] Islam rejects the concept of original sin, and Muslims believe that all human beings are born pure. Children automatically go to Heaven when they die, regardless of the religion of their parents.

The concept of Heaven in Islam differs in many respects to the concept in Judaism and Christianity. Heaven is described primarily in physical terms as a place where every wish is immediately fulfilled when asked. Islamic texts describe immortal life in Heaven as happy, without negative emotions. Those who dwell in Heaven are said to wear costly apparel, partake in exquisite banquets, and recline on couches inlaid with gold or precious stones. Inhabitants will rejoice in the company of their parents, spouses, and children. In Islam if one's good deeds outweigh one's sins then one may gain entrance to Heaven. Conversely, if one's sins outweigh their good deeds they are sent to hell. The more good deeds one has performed the higher the level of Heaven one is directed to. It has been said that the lowest level of Heaven, the first one, is already over one-hundred times better than the greatest life on Earth. The highest level is the seventh Heaven. Houses are built by angels for the occupants using solid gold.

Verses which describe Heaven include: Quran, Quran, Quran, Quran, Quran, Quran.

Islamic texts refer to several levels of Heaven: Firdaus or Paradise, 'Adn (Eden), Jannatun-Na'iim (heaven of delight), Ma'wa (refuge), Darussalaam (home of peace), Daarul-Muqaamah (home of permanence), Al-Muqqamul Amin (the secure place) & Jannattul-Khuld (heaven of immortality).

According to the Ahmadiyya view, much of the imagery presented in the Qur'an regarding Heaven, but also hell, is in fact metaphorical. They propound the verse which describes, according to them how the life to come after death is very different from the life here on earth. The Quran says: "From bringing in your place others like you, and from developing you into a form which at present you know not." [ Quran ] According to Mirza Ghulam Ahmad, the founder of Ahmadiyya sect in Islam, the soul will give birth to another rarer entity and will resemble the life on this earth in the sense that this entity will bear a similar relationship to the soul, as the soul bears relationship with the human existence on earth. On earth, if a person leads a righteous life and submits to the will of God, his or her tastes become attuned to enjoying spiritual pleasures as opposed to carnal desires. With this, an "embyonic soul" begins to take shape. Different tastes are said to be born which a person given to carnal passions finds no enjoyment. For example, sacrifice of one's own's rights over that of other's becomes enjoyable, or that forgiveness becomes second nature. In such a state a person finds contentment and Peace at heart and at this stage, according to Ahmadiyya beliefs, it can be said that a soul within the soul has begun to take shape.

The shape of the Universe as described in Jainism is shown alongside.

Unlike the current convention of using North direction as the top of map, this uses South as the top.

The shape is similar to a part of human form standing upright.

The Deva Loka (heavens) are at the symbolic "chest", where all souls enjoying the positive karmic effects reside. The heavenly beings are referred to as devas (masculine form) and devis (feminine form). According to Jainism, there is not one heavenly abode, but several layers to reward appropriately the souls of varying degree of karmic merits. Similarly, beneath the "waist" are the Narka Loka (Hell). Human, animal, insect, plant and microscopic life forms reside on the middle.

The pure souls (who reached Siddha status) reside at the very south end (top) of the Universe.

They are referred to in Tamil literature as தென்புலத்தார் (Kural 43).

The term for Heavens in the Tanakh is shamayim , located above the firmament (a solid, transparent dome which covered the earth and separated it from the "waters" above). Yahweh, the God of Israel, lived in Heaven or in the "Heaven of Heavens" (the exact difference between these two, if any, is unclear) in a heavenly palace. His dwelling on earth was Solomon's Temple in Jerusalem, which was a model of the cosmos and included a section which represented Heaven.

While the concept of Heaven (malkuth hashamaim מלכות השמים, the Kingdom of Heaven) is much discussed within the Christian and Islamic religions, the Jewish concept of the afterlife, sometimes known as olam haba, the World-to-come, is not discussed so often. The Torah has little to say on the subject of survival after death, but by the time of the rabbis two ideas had made inroads among the Jews: one, which is probably derived from Greek thought, is that of the immortal soul which returns to its creator after death; the other, which is thought to be of Persian origin, is that of resurrection of the dead.

Jewish writings refer to a "new earth" as the abode of mankind following the resurrection of the dead.

Originally, the two ideas of immortality and resurrection were different but in rabbinic thought they are combined: the soul departs from the body at death but is returned to it at the resurrection. This idea is linked to another rabbinic teaching, that men's good and bad actions are rewarded and punished not in this life but after death, whether immediately or at the subsequent resurrection. Around 1 CE, the Pharisees are said to have maintained belief in resurrection but the Sadducees are said to have denied it (Matt. 22:23).

The Mishnah has many sayings about the World to Come, for example, "Rabbi Yaakov said: This world is like a lobby before the World to Come; prepare yourself in the lobby so that you may enter the banquet hall."

Judaism holds that the righteous of all nations have a share in the World-to-come.

According to Nicholas de Lange, Judaism offers no clear teaching about the destiny which lies in wait for the individual after death and its attitude to life after death has been expressed as follows: "For the future is inscrutable, and the accepted sources of knowledge, whether experience, or reason, or revelation, offer no clear guidance about what is to come. The only certainty is that each man must die - beyond that we can only guess."

According to Tracey R. Rich of the website "Judaism 101", Judaism, unlike other world-religions, is not focused on the quest of getting into Heaven but on life and how to live it.

In order from lowest to highest, the seven Heavens, Shamayim (שָׁמַיִם), according to the Talmud, are listed alongside the angels who govern them:

The Nahua people such as the Aztecs, Chichimecs and the Toltecs believed that the heavens were constructed and separated into 13 levels. Each level had from one to many Lords living in and ruling these heavens. Most important of these heavens was Omeyocan (Place of Two). The Thirteen Heavens were ruled by Ometeotl, the dual Lord, creator of the Dual-Genesis who, as male, takes the name Ometecuhtli (Two Lord), and as female is named Omecihuatl (Two Lady).

In the creation myths of Polynesian mythology are found various concepts of the heavens and the underworld. These differ from one island to another. What they share is the view of the universe as an egg or coconut that is divided between the world of humans (earth), the upper world of heavenly gods, and the underworld. Each of these is subdivided in a manner reminiscent of Dante's Divine Comedy, but the number of divisions and their names differs from one Polynesian culture to another.

In Māori mythology, the heavens are divided into a number of realms. Different tribes number the heaven differently, with as few as two and as many as fourteen levels. One of the more common versions divides heaven thus:

The Māori believe these heavens are supported by pillars.

Other Polynesian peoples see them being supported by gods (as in Hawaii). In one Tahitian legend, heaven is supported by an octopus.

The Polynesian conception of the universe and its division is nicely illustrated by a famous drawing made by a Tuomotuan chief in 1869. Here, the nine heavens are further divided into left and right, and each stage is associated with a stage in the evolution of the earth that is portrayed below. The lowest division represents a period when the heavens hung low over the earth, which was inhabited by animals that were not known to the islanders. In the third division is shown the first murder, the first burials, and the first canoes, built by Rata. In the fourth division, the first coconut tree and other significant plants are born.

As per Sikh thought, Heaven and Hell are not places for living hereafter, they are part of spiritual topography of man and do not exist otherwise.

They refer to good and evil stages of life respectively and can be lived now and here during our earthly existence.

For example, Bhagat Kabir rejects the otherworldly Heaven in Guru Granth Sahib and says that one can experience Heaven on this Earth by doing company of holy people.

It is believed in Theosophy of Helena Blavatsky that each religion (including Theosophy) has its own individual heaven in various regions of the upper astral plane that fits the description of that heaven that is given in each religion, which a soul that has been good in their previous life on Earth will go to. The area of the upper astral plane of Earth in the upper atmosphere where the various heavens are located is called Summerland (Theosophists believe Hell is located in the lower astral plane of Earth which extends downward from the surface of the earth down to its center). However, Theosophists believe that the soul is recalled back to Earth after an average of about 1400 years by the Lords of Karma to incarnate again. The final heaven that souls go to billions of years in the future after they finish their cycle of incarnations is called Devachan.

Anarchist Emma Goldman expressed this view when she wrote, "Consciously or unconsciously, most theists see in gods and devils, heaven and hell; reward and punishment, a whip to lash the people into obedience, meekness and contentment."

Many people consider George Orwell's use of Sugarcandy Mountain in his novel Animal Farm to be a literary expression of this view. In the book, the animals were told that after their miserable lives were over they would go to a place in which "it was Sunday seven days a week, clover was in season all the year round, and lump sugar and linseed cake grew on the hedges".

Some have argued that a belief in a reward after death is poor motivation for moral behavior while alive.

Sam Harris wrote, "It is rather more noble to help people purely out of concern for their suffering than it is to help them because you think the Creator of the Universe wants you to do it, or will reward you for doing it, or will punish you for not doing it. The problem with this linkage between religion and morality is that it gives people bad reasons to help other human beings when good reasons are available."

In Inside the Neolithic Mind, Lewis-Williams and Pearce argue that a tiered structure of heaven, along with similarly structured circles of hell, is neurally perceived by members of many cultures around the world and through history. The reports are so similar across time and space that Lewis-Williams and Pearce argue for a neuroscientific explanation, accepting the percepts as real neural activations and subjective percepts during particular altered states of consciousness.

Many people who come close to death and have near death experiences report meeting relatives or entering "the Light" in an otherworldly dimension, which share similarities with the religious concept of heaven. Even though there are also reports of distressing experiences and negative life-reviews, which share some similarities with the concept of Hell, the positive experiences of meeting or entering "the Light" is reported as an immensely intense feeling state of love, peace and joy beyond human comprehension. Together with this intensely positive-feeling state, people who have near death experiences also report that consciousness or a heightened state of awareness seems as if it is at the heart of experiencing a taste of "heaven". ^[40]

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