Good Life, Good Death: Tibetan Wisdom on Reincarnation [Hardcover]

Rimpoche Nawang Gehlek (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 27, 2001

It's what everyone wants to know-do I survive death? Where do I go? What do I become? Now, Rinpoche Gaelek, expert in the ancient teachings of reincarnation, helps us examine the four questions most of us ask ourselves: Who are we? Where did we come from? Where are we going? How do we get there?

Good Life, Good Death is organized around these four questions and their surprising answers. Rinpoche Gaelek lays out his own personal experience and techniques, tested over the course of twenty-five hundred years, that teach us how to take control over our lives and our fears, now and for the future. He writes about the physical reality of dying; the mental reality; when death actually occurs (it's not when the heart and brain stop); where we go after death; and how we can know ahead of time where we're going. He demonstrates how Einstein's theories can help us understand Buddhist mechanics of living and dying. For the first time in English, he also shares stories from great masters who have returned from death-not after a few minutes as in near-death experiences, but after days and even weeks. In fact, like other Buddhist teachers he believes that near-death experiences are just that-near death, but not actually crossing over.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Stories of reincarnation, of eerie recognitions and unexplainable knowledge, send a shiver up the spine. In Good Life, Good Death, Rinpoche Nawang Gehlek, himself a proclaimed reincarnation of a lama of high stature, passes on some of the accumulated wisdom regarding the Buddhist notion of reincarnation. Whereas many Western teachers of Buddhism shy away from the topic or even deny it, Nawang Gehlek tells us, in very simple language, how reincarnation happens. Even more importantly, he teaches how to prepare for a good death and a good next life. In fact, the largest portion of the book is a primer on eliminating anger and attachment while cultivating patience and awareness. Transforming bad karma to good is the key to a favorable rebirth. Also important is eliminating the role of the ego, and Nawang Gehlek offers nine pithy arguments to "prove the ego wrong." Those looking for a technically detailed account of Tibetan Buddhist reincarnation should look elsewhere, for instance to the various versions of The Tibetan Book of the Dead. Good Life, Good Death is a short, plainly spoken guide to the reality of dying and the possibility of a good reincarnation. And to this extent, it succeeds admirably. --Brian Bruya

From Publishers Weekly

Tibetan lama Gehlek says he doesn't want to persuade readers of reincarnation; rather, he wants them briefly to consider reincarnation and see how that consideration changes their attitude toward death. His insightful discussions of anger, love, compassion and ego will help readers not only reflect on death, but also as the title suggests to live a good life. Still, Gehlek's fundamental message is about dying: we all have to die eventually, and we should not fear it. He urges us to get to know our death, to imagine and accept it. And though death shouldn't be scary, he admits that it is often hard, even ugly. Gehlek acknowledges that one can have a "bad rebirth," and he cautions that "What I learned in the Buddhist tradition about hell would make your hair stand on end." But that occasional harshness only enriches the book, providing a useful corrective of the feel-good, pick-and-choose ethos of American religion. Gehlek is a felicitous writer, especially gifted with analogy ("Attachment is... like dipping paper in oil. When the paper touches the oil... a large amount of oil is quickly absorbed.") What might seem like needless name-dropping in another writer's hands to wit, Gehlek's many references to Allen Ginsberg here seem gentle and organic. Buddhist readers will cheer about this fresh voice, and even those who don't believe in reincarnation will find something valuable in this short meditation on death. (Oct.)Forecast: As if Gehlek's own merits aren't enough, the foreword by the Dalai Lama and the introduction by Robert Thurman are sure to help this book find an audience.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 288 pages
• Publisher: Riverhead Hardcover; 1st Printing edition (September 27, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1573221961
• ISBN-13: 978-0965317276
• Product Dimensions: 8.1 x 5 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,151,610 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

23 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Looking Ahead..., October 24, 2001

By 

Bill Butler "Bill Butler" (Tarzana, Ca. USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Good Life, Good Death: Tibetan Wisdom on Reincarnation (Hardcover)

This is a book about death and dying. And from a Tibetan viewpoint. Before buying the book, you will have to ask yourself if the Tibetan viewpoint of death is valid. Or
does it have any validity. Or could it have any validity.
If not, then don't buy the book. If you feel that it may
or you don't know, then this book could help determine how
you will experience the next million years. Not just after death,
mind you. But from the day that you read the first page.

The forward is by His Holiness the Dali Lama. I have the book with me right now. I have read it from cover to cover. So
allow me to describe it in a little more detail. In order
for you to make a decision about buying it.

The introduction is by the noted Tibetan scholar, Robert Thurman.
So along with the Dali Lama's contribution, we know that this
book may be a breakthrough in regards to what happens after
death. In the same lines as Sogyal Rinpoche's "The Tibetan
Book of Living and Dying," Paramahansa Yogananda's "The Autobiography of
a Yogi," and Betty J. Eadie's "Embraced By The Light."
If you have not read those books, I suggest that you do so in able to make a judgement call about where we go. Back to our book at hand.

In chapter two, we really get the full works. I would like to quote just one sentence from that chapter for you. "There are
eighteen volumes of return-from-death stories that give detailed
accounts of the bardo and of rebirth." So the author, a qualified lama, is telling us that the Tibetans have done numerous studies of what happens after death. And as he relates in this chapter, what can happen can be absolutely horrible.
Nightmarish. Worse than what we can imagine. The author
goes on to state that we move into a completely different "apartment" after we die. But the nature of that
"apartment" will be determined by our thoughts, words, and actions
in this life. The new "apartment" (body and environment) can be
a paradise or an absolute hell. Depending on what we do now.
Therefore, the remaining chapters, until the last one, tell us how we can be good in the Tibetan sense. Right now. I zoned
in on his emphasis of compassion, love, and patience. It seems,
from his writing, that we will have a heavenly experience if
we have these three characteristics! This would explain the heavenly near-death experiences by so many people. Murderers,
child molestors, rapists; these individuals will experience horrible hells for thousands of years. If not millions.
Nevertheless, they to can change.

This book is a must read for anybody concerned about death in any capacity. Which is about all of us, I would imagine. I
can't think of a logical person who would not read this book.
For you see, even if one is loving, what does one tell someone
who is not? If they want to know.

Please buy the book. Despite the content, it is a very easy read. The last chapter contains suggestions on how to die. If
you are dying. This could be a real Godsend for some of you out
there.

I wish you all the very best in every way possible.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Timeless wisdom in a contemporary presentation., February 7, 2002

By 

Albert J. Miller (Beverly Hills, MI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Good Life, Good Death: Tibetan Wisdom on Reincarnation (Hardcover)

This is a distinctive, accessible and very worthwhile book by an exquistely well-qualified (as emphasized by H.H. the Dalai Lama in the Foreward) Tibetan tulku. Rinpoche is a tremendously gifted individual, with insight into the Western perspective as well as an unsurpassed, encyclopedic understanding of the Tibetan Buddhist tradition. This book will inform readers new to Tibetan ways of viewing life and death, as well as reward long-time students of the topic. I am fortunate to be a student of this reincarnated lama, and recommend this book to anyone who has questions regarding death.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A must Read!!, April 21, 2002

By 

Folk Fan 27 "Folk Fan 27" (London) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Good Life, Good Death: Tibetan Wisdom on Reincarnation (Hardcover)

This is a life-changing book written by one of the finest living teachers of Tibetan Buddhism - written in a humorous and easy to read fashion it is an excellent introduction for anyone with or without an interest in Buddhism