Why Do Humans Die When They See Gods?

In a recent blog, I posted about the comparison between Jesus and Krishna (in the Mahabharata) with regard to the divine power to procure their own deaths. I want to talk a little bit more about some theological/divine parallels that one can find when reading the gospels and the Ramayana.

Towards the end of the Aranya-kanda, a sadhu (ascetic) by the name of Shabari encounters Rama and his brother Lakshmana. It is revealed that Rama is an avatar to Narayana, and Shabari graciously gives him only the best fruit and nuts. After seeing him, she casts off her body and is spirited to a higher spiritual plane of existence.

Likewise, during Jesus’ presentation at the Temple as a young infant, a holy man named Simeon sees the child and proclaims:

Master, now you are dismissing your servant in peace,
according to your word; for my eyes have seen your salvation,
which you have prepared in the presence of all peoples,
a light for revelation to the Gentiles
and for glory to your people Israel.    – Luke 2:29-31

Or consider the words of John the Baptist when he first sees Jesus at the river Jordan.

He must increase, and I must decrease. – John 3:30

These words set the wheels in motion to a narrative that culminates in the Baptist’s death.

So far as there is a common theme of dying upon seeing the deity, there is no doubt that the New Testament removes much of the fear and trembling one experience upon seeing YHWH, which also resulted in death. The kinder, more gentler, Jesus does not scare people to death (literally) and while this feature has been diminished in the New Testament, I believe the tension is still there because the writer wants us to know that the implication of Jesus’ divine nature is just as important as that of YHWH who no man or woman can look upon. Certainly during the transfiguration nothing happens, but we should not be so quick to set about finding one-for-one correspondence parallels, especially since we do not demand that level of scrutiny even where the internal narrations of the gospels disagree on the details.

These divine appearance narratives are often termed darshana.

Darshan is a Sanskrit word used to convey a heavenly vision, one granted to those who see the true nature of the divinity in the avatar who often is not revealed except to those who are in his counsel.

We see this in the post-Resurrection appearances of Christ where Jesus tells Peter:

When you were younger, you dressed yourself and went where you wanted; but when you are old you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you  and lead you where you do not want to go. Jesus said this to indicate the kind of death by which Peter would glorify God. Then he said to him “Follow me.” (John 21:18,19)

When one says that there is nothing like the Resurrection in ancient Jewish history, or that the belief of bodily resurrection is firmly established as an original Christian thought, people forget that Christianity and its development could hardly be called a faithful conveyor of true-to-detail Jewish theological awareness. Rather, its reinterpretation, as well as a combination of elements from other cultures, for example, the concepts of logos and krasis in Stoicism, fit very nicely into the Jesus as Word-of-God concept and the hypostatic union of the God-man.

Certainly, at the close of the Ramayana, the khishkanda of the monkey god Hanuman and all his warriors are raised from the dead and brought with Rama to a heavenly abode.

So why do people die when they see the deity? One possibly answer is that such instances are suppose to reveal the transcendent difference between human virtue and divine virtue. Christians call it sin. Hindus call it dharma. Skeptics perhaps call it convenient.