God and the Afterlife

When trying to think of a person and place that seem to be completely intertwined, one of the first things that came to mind was God and Heaven. These two holy entities are of major importance to the entire world of religious people. The relationship between God and Heaven is as dependent a relationship as you will find, because one simply cannot work without the other.

First off, the existence of both God and Heaven cannot really be proven in any respectable manner, so I guess if one doesn’t believe in them at all, most of this doesn't even matter. However, being that no one can be sure of God’s existence, I say why not believe in God? At least it gives one the hope that if he lives a good life he can reach paradise in the afterlife. I would not call myself an overly religious person, but I believe that there is a God and Heaven, mostly because I don't see any good reason not too. If there is no God or Heaven, then why bother living a decent life, what purpose is there for my life? The answer would be none, and I can't live like that. So, I choose to believe that there is a God and heaven, and I strive to be a better person for that reason. Now, to most people, the fact that I believe in God and Heaven would mean I am a Christian, because that religion is known for the traditional God and Heaven relationship. However, in the Islam there is the belief of one almighty god, Allah, and a paradise that Muslims go to in afterlife with him, called jannah, so my argument here could apply to Islam just as easily. I, along with all Christians and Muslims, hold the belief that there is one almighty God and that if a person believes in God and is obedient to Him, they will go to heaven with Him when they die. Therefore, the idea of God pretty much embodies the idea of heaven with it. The two ideas are clearly intertwined.

The dependence of the two upon one another is clearly evidenced by the fact that there is no major religion or faith that has one without the other. Christianity has God and heaven and Islam has Allah and jannah. Followers of Judaism believe in god, but their views on the afterlife are a bit more complicated. They believe that when the physical body dies the soul lives on and does one of three things. Either it goes straight to Gan Eden, which is like paradise, or it goes to Gehinom, which is like purgatory. Then, in Gehinom the soul is cleansed for up to twelve months before makng it to Gan Eden, or if the soul is truly wicked it is destroyed entirely. Although it isn't exactly like heaven, there is a paradise to be reached eventually. In Buddhism, there is no belief of an almighty being at all or a place that Buddhists go to after they achieve nirvana. Buddhists believe that after they die they are reborn into another life that, depending on how they lived their previous life, will be of higher or lower quality. They can be reborn as an animal, a lowly ghost, a human, or, when one reaches enlightenment, a Buddha, which is the highest level where they are either some type of deity or a spirit. However, it is not told where they live and there is no mention of a place of paradise. In Hinduism, they don’t believe in one god but rather many gods, and they, like the Buddhists, believe in reincarnation on the earth rather than a paradise in the afterlife. No one almighty god means no heaven.

All of this makes perfect sense when analyzed logically, because God simply cannot exist without heaven. If one believes in God, then they need a motivation to obey Him. The answer to that is simple. It’s heaven. People wouldn’t bother to obey God if they weren’t going to be rewarded in some way for their service, so he gives them the promise of an afterlife in paradise as opposed to an eternity in hell. In Islam, much like in Christianity, there are sins that can condemn a person to hell, but should one avoid these acts and live in the way of Allah, they will go to jannah when they die. God would not be believed in without his reward of heaven. Otherwise God would have no purpose. He would provide a reason for why things happen, but none of it matters without some consequences to those events and actions.

On the flip side, heaven could not exist without God. No one would believe in a blissful afterlife awaiting us unless there was some set of rules to govern who gets in. Everybody can’t go there for their afterlife, because that just isn’t fair. Otherwise people would do whatever they want and the world would be enveloped with chaos. It wouldn’t make sense, and that’s where God comes in. His almighty judgment is the deciding factor that controls the gates of Heaven. Heaven seems entirely implausible without God to decide who is allowed to go there after death.

The relationship between God and heaven is absolutely dependent. If you believe in one almighty being, you must also believe in an afterlife in paradise, because there wouldn’t be a reason to believe in God otherwise, and vice versa. The two are undeniably intertwined.