The above question...

The above question, which itself can be analysed into a number of other questions, is not limited to the properties and characteristics of any particular group of physical creatures, so that it may be answerable by some specific science through its own particular method.

It is, on the contrary, a philosophical question, which must be studied by reason through intellectual speculation and analysis, even though the starting point for such speculation is empirical knowledge in its widest sense, which includes inner and direct experience as well.

The answer to the above question, whether in the positive or the negative, constitutes a part of one's world-view, plays an important role in forming a basic aspect of a person's intellectual approach which may be called "ontology". Another basic question is whether the life of each individual human being is limited to the few years he lives in this world, or whether there is another life for him after he passes away, much longer and probably even an everlasting one.

And this question in turn raises another one: Does man, beside possessing a physical body, also possess a soul which can continue to live after the death of the body or not? Then, there is the last question, which is also related to the first ontological question, whether being is equivalent to material existence or is wider than that.

The solution to the above-mentioned problem also, whatever it may be, constitutes another aspect of an individual's world-view, which may be called here `anthropology'. And finally, the third fundamental issue to be settled before turning one's attention to the details and selecting a particular course for one's life is: What is the most certain way of knowing the best programme for individual and social life?

Is there any fool-proof way beside the usual ways commonly adopted by most people which so often lead to contradictory results, which would guarantee the certainty of results? The importance of the last question becomes more evident when the answer to the second question is in the affirmative; that is, when we conclude that man is immortal and that one must prepare beforehand for the felicity of afterlife through conscious effort during the limited period of this life.

When such a belief is accepted, the need for a sure way of determining the relationship between the two lives, and an elaborate plan that would guarantee everlasting felicity becomes clearer.