Is there hell? What do the Vedas say about it?

In Western culture, people have, in general, an aversion to the idea of hell, perhaps due to Christianity having abused this idea for centuries. What do the Vedas say about it?

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In Western culture, people have, in general, an aversion to the idea of hell, perhaps due to Christianity having abused this idea for centuries. Even people who are religious usually prefer to believe that people just go to heaven, or that we immediately reincarnate, without passing through any form of judgment. Even one and a half centuries ago, when Śrila Bhaktivinoda was preaching in India, he encountered resistance to the idea of hell, which led him to minimize the idea and instead focus on more important issues.

However, the Puranas describe in detail the activities of Yamarāja and his servants, as well as the hellish words they use to punish the sinful. According to the Puranas, with the exception of devotees, who are escorted to their next body by the Viṣṇudutas (as described in the Bṛhad-Bhāgavatāmṛta), everyone has to pass through the judgment of Yamarāja before receiving their next body.

The best way to avoid that is, of course, by becoming a sincere devotee of Kṛṣṇa and chanting His Holy Names. As Śrila Haridāsa Thākura explains, even chanting on the stage of Nāmābhāsa is capable of destroying one’s sins and bringing a person to the liberated platform, where there is no question of meeting the Yamadūtas. The history of Ajāmila, narrated in the 6th canto of Śrīmad Bhāgavatam, is a graphical illustration of how one can be saved from hell even by chanting at the last moment.

Because Ajāmila was so sinful, the Yamadutas were prepared to bring him to hell, but at the moment they started snatching the soul from the body using their subtle ropes, the Viṣṇudutas appeared carrying weapons and ordered them to release Ajāmila, or else. It happened that Ajāmila destroyed all his karma by desperately chanting the name of Narāyana at the last moment. Even though he chanted to call his son, not directly addressing Lord Narāyana, because he chanted in full concentration, it was sufficient to free him from all his past sinful activities. By the time the Yamadūtas started taking the soul out of the body, he was indeed an innocent man, and thus the Viṣṇudutas immediately appeared to protect him.

What about the souls who are not so fortunate? How is the severity of the punishment one will receive in hell determined? The Śrīmad Bhāgavatam explains that it is determined according to one’s individual consciousness. The ones who commit sins due to madness receive the least punishment. The ones who know the difference between right and wrong, but still commit sins due to weakness, receive moderate punishment, but those who are stubborn atheists, consciously willing to commit sins and deluding themselves with the idea that there is no God, receive the most severe punishment.

This is explained in SB 5.26.3: “Just as by executing various pious activities one achieves different positions in heavenly life, by acting impiously one achieves different positions in hellish life. Those who are activated by the material mode of ignorance engage in impious activities, and according to the extent of their ignorance, they are placed in different grades of hellish life. If one acts in the mode of ignorance because of madness, his resulting misery is the least severe. One who acts impiously but knows the distinction between pious and impious activities is placed in a hell of intermediate severity. And for one who acts impiously and ignorantly because of atheism, the resultant hellish life is the worst.”

Just as a person is reintegrated into society after serving time in prison, a soul has the opportunity to receive a new body and continue his activities after going through hell. Chances are that all of us passed through hell at some point in the past, and thus, deep inside, we have the understanding that we shouldn’t do sinful things. However, due to the influence of material nature, we tend to forget and repeat the same mistakes.

Of course, in our case, there is hope because we are at least trying to serve Krsna, but people who are not so fortunate risk being again being captured by their material desires and gliding down back to hell. As mentioned in the same verse, “Because of ignorance, every living entity has been carried by various desires into thousands of different hellish planets since time immemorial.”

What kind of body does someone who is coming back from hell receive? This again depends on his mentality and activities, and especially their level of spiritual evolution. Some may receive human bodies, or bodies of evolved animals, such as cows or lions, from which they can quickly come back to the human platform. However, the ones who degraded their consciousness due to excessive sins and addictions and become thus completely devoid of pious merits risk going all the way down, receiving the forms of plants, insects, or even microorganisms and have to go through an extremely long evolutionary process until they can again receive another chance of getting a human body.

Souls who are coming from the animal species normally lack piety, and as a result, they receive human bodies in Kali-yuga, where they have to prove themselves in order to advance to higher realms. The problem is that, of course, there is little opportunity for spiritual advancement in Kali-yuga, and, therefore, chances are that these souls end up being captured into a practically eternal cycle of sinning, going to hell, going through the animal species, and eventually receiving another human body in Kali-yuga just to sin again and go back to hell.

The only realistic chance for such souls to be saved is to somehow or other meet devotees and start their practice of Krsna Consciousness. That’s the reason Chaitanya Mahāprabhu comes in Kali-Yuga, offering a chance for these souls who otherwise could just remain perpetually under such conditions.

Keeping this in mind, we should not underestimate our good fortune in coming in contact with the movement of Śrī Chaitanya Mahāprabhu. Not only should we strive to make good use of the opportunity, but we should also try to reach others, so they also have the same chance of changing their destiny.

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