Never Die Alone

[Dharmavidya]

The book, Never Die Alone: Death as Birth in Pure Land Buddhism, published by Jodo Shu Reseasrch Institute is on the brink of publication and copies can be pre-ordered from Amazon. Authors include: Mark Blum author of The Origins and Development of Pure Land Buddhism; Carl Becker author of Breaking the Circle: Death and the Afterlife in Buddhism; myself, author of Who Loves Dies Well: On the Brink of Buddha’s Pure Land; Yoshiharu Tomatsu the Director of the Jodo Shu Research Institute’s Ojo and Death Project; and a group of Thai Buddhists offering a different view of Buddhist dying.

[Michael John Smith]

Are there possibilities for enlightenment or at least spiritual accomplishment in the period from dying to being reborn, as there is in the bardos of Tibeten Buddhism?

[Dharmavidya]

The teaching about the bardo is essentially the same in Pureland as in Tibetan teaching - so, yes. Purelanders aim for rebirth in Amitabha's Pure Land, but all other possibilities are open.