What does your faith believe happens in the afterlife?

Answer:

by: Venerable Nicolas Thanissaro

When people die, Buddhists believe it is not the end of the story. What lives on of a person when their body dies is their 'mind'. As long as this mind is not free of greed, hatred and delusion, it must go to a new existence. It will go to a more fortunate existence if the mind is in a good mental state, and a worse one if it is in a bad mental state. Thus there are as many as 31 afterlife realms where a 'mind' can be reborn after death. The rebirth will go on - one lifetime after another endlessly until that person can manage to uproot all the greed, hatred and delusion in their mind and can thereafter enter permanently upon Nirvana.