Spiritual death

The concept of spiritual death has varying meanings in various uses and contexts.

Although Buddhists occasionally use the term 'spiritual death,' there is no consensus about the meaning because the Buddha himself never used the term, hence the controversy. It has crept into use in recent decades. The closest he came to it, is in the term Parābhava, meaning 'spiritual ruination.' The various ways to spiritual ruination is expounded in the Parābhava Sutta. For example, the Sutta says: ‘If a man is fond of sleep, fond of society, and does not exert himself, but is idle and ill-tempered, that is the cause of spiritual ruination.’

The Sutta concludes:

'‘Having contemplated these ruined men in the world, the wise and noble man with perfect vision of things according to reality partakes of the world of the fortunate.'

For Buddhadasa spiritual death stems from attachment to good and evil, and means dukkha, i.e. 'suffering'. He says: "Once we know about good and evil, we attach to them ... This causes dukkha [suffering] and dukkha is death, spiritual death." (ibid, p.9)

Thus, for Buddhadasa spiritual death stems from attachment to good and evil, and equals suffering; whereas for Christianity, it stems from sin, and equals either separation from God, or the death of the soul. It is hard to see, from Buddhadasa's point of view, in spiritual death, what actually dies.

Sangharakshita uses the term "spiritual death" to describe insight meditation practice. In this case, spiritual death is something good, favourable.

He says: "The term 'spiritual death' may be slightly off-putting, but it isn’t meant to suggest physical death. What ‘dies’ are all our illusions and delusions about who we are and how things are. This is usually spoken of as ‘insight practice’ (vipassana)." (ibid).