Reply To: Hell and it’s punishment

[Ram Krishna Dasa]

Hare Krishna!
All glories to Srila Prabhupada!

First of all we must understand that Krsna does not give us remembrance of our past lives otherwise it will lead to lot of problems. For eg, a person may remember his murderer in past life and try to take revenge or would want to marry another girl whom he wanted to in past life but she may be already married to a third person in this life, and so on. This can get very complicated.

Now, when a person suffers in different hells for his karma, all these punishments are stored as impressions in his subtle body consisting of mind, intelligence and false ego. The person also gets nullified of his sinful actions only when he undergoes punishment in hell and is purified to some extent, so naturally because of above reasons, his tendency to commit sinful activities reduces.

Finally we must remember that going to hell or heaven both are only a trap to bind the soul to this cycle of repeated birth and death. Our actual benefit is in inquiring how to get out of this cycle of birth and death rather than inquiring why to stop sinful actions if we cant remember our past punishments. And the easiest quickest and surest solution to get out of this cycle of birth and death is only by the process of bhakti.

In your service,

Ram Krishna Dasa