an interview with Dr. Friedbert Karger
Subsequently, he took a position at the Max Planck Institute, where he began his work as a career scientist and concurrently finished his studies summa cum laude with a thesis on plasmaphysics in 1967. Dr. Karger is currently the Institute’s experimental director for the ASDEX Tokamak, a plasma machine for thermonuclear fusion research, and he serves as a consultant throughout Europe and in North and South America, Africa, and Asia. Since 1959, Dr. Karger has also been actively conducting research in the field of paraphysics. In addition to his extensive research, Dr. Karger has been invited by noted scientific organizations throughout the world to lecture, not only on purely scientific topics, but also on topics relating to the subject of human spirituality.
David: You’ve devoted over thirty years to the study of paranormal phenomena. How has your research convinced you that there is life after death? Friedbert: I found overwhelming evidence, some of which I could measure physically, that some type of consciousness continues after a person dies. David: Can you explain to us exactly what does happen at the time of physical death? Friedbert: There is a certain type of cord, or connection, between the soul and the body. It’s called the silver cord, because clairvoyants can see it as a shining "tether" between the soul and the body, and when this chord is severed, then it’s no longer possible for the soul to return into its body. Before death, of course, you are using your normal senses and you see or hear what is around you, but after a certain severing process, this is no longer possible. You see with the eyes of your next "inner" body, the so-called astral body, and you hear with your astral ears. This is also described by people who have had near-death experiences: they feel they are somewhere at the ceiling of the room and they can see their body lying on the floor, for instance, and hear people in the room saying things. And then the next step, actual death, is that they lose their astral body and really sever the silver cord, so that they cannot come back. When they have even more distance from their physical body, they can find other people, relatives or friends that are already dead, but whom they "see" again. A friend of mine, Dr. Richard Steinpach, who passed over about five years ago, has written a book in which the process of dying, this severing the soul from the body, is described in detail. When you read this book, you can directly picture what happens. It has the title Why We Live After Death, and it is a very important work. Its descriptions are also very logical and fully consistent with what we know in science. David: What about angels? How can you explain them? Friedbert: I think it’s a problem of semantics. In most cases, what people call angels are actually departed humans — friends, relatives, and so on — who appear like angels because they are connected with light, and because they are in another world. We should be aware of the fact that real angels are much higher than human beings, and what we usually call angels are spirits or souls of people who lived here on the earth but now have other tasks to perform, for instance, to help people. David: Is it good for us to contact our loved ones in the beyond? Friedbert: It can help us, but only when it happens in a spontaneous way. We shouldn’t force contact, nor should we train such abilities. Most people try to connect with the beyond simply to get assurances that the beyond actually exists. But somebody who is sure that life continues doesn’t need such continual proof, because he’s already convinced; contact is not necessary. David: Is it helpful for those in the beyond to be in contact with us? Friedbert: Again yes, but only when it happens in a natural, spontaneous way. In many cases it’s not good, especially when people try to hold their relatives or friends here on the earth. And it is very important to realize that clinging to a departed loved one is really selfishness, since it can really hinder them in their further evolution. David: How do the concepts of heaven or hell fit into the overall picture of life after death? Friedbert: These concepts are already a step further in our discussion, because they’re concerned directly with the fine material world, rather than our earth plane, which can be considered a dense, gross material world. In the fine material world, as here on Earth, there are natural laws, for example, the Law of Gravity, which states that the soul ascends — or descends — to that point that corresponds to the level of gravity of its spirit. This means that souls that have a higher inner level will also go to a higher level in the fine material world, and souls with a lower inner level will go to correspondingly lower level. The Law of Homogeneous Species states that higher souls will be attracted to other, similarly high souls, and the opposite will be true for lower souls. You can imagine that for the higher, lighter souls, the beyond will be something like heaven, but for lower, heavier souls, ones who will be together with the same kind of people as they are, for them it will be hell. David: What implications does this have for our life now? Friedbert: It means we have to go more in a direction that is upward rather than down; that is, to conduct our lives in a manner that ennobles our surroundings and those we come in contact with rather than weighting our surroundings down. There is also another basic law, the Law of Reciprocal Action; this means that whatever you do, whether it’s an action or merely a thought, it will come back to you. Together with the Law of Homogeneous Species, it means that if you send out good thoughts and do good deeds, good will return to you, but if you do bad things and have negative thoughts, then the same will come back. David: How does reincarnation fit into the whole picture? Friedbert: It’s connected with the Law of Reciprocal Action. It works everywhere, from here to the beyond, and also back, because we have to come back here to Earth when our work here isn’t finished, and I think this has many implications for our daily life. All the conflicts between races, religions, or nations are unnecessary, because you can be reincarnated in the nation of your enemy, or in another creed, or in another race. If people really understood this fact, bigotry would not exist. David: In Christianity, there is the concept, "As you sow, so shall you reap." This seems very closely linked with the Law of Karma, and yet Christianity does not embrace reincarnation. Friedbert: You are partially right. In antiquity, let’s say as long as 500 years after Christ, the idea of reincarnation was very common in Christianity. Dr. Steinpach formulates it very exactly. He writes in his book, "I would like to remind you that the so-decisively important doctrine of reincarnation, of rebirth as a human being through which the love and justice of God first became intelligible to human spirits, was only expunged from Christian creeds at the Council of Constantinople in the year 553, for purely political reasons in accordance with the wishes of Emperor Justinian I." This tells us that at its formation there was no discrepancy between Christian belief and reincarnation. Furthermore, we know that the circle of reincarnation is not eternal. The dynamic structure of our universe is one of development and disintegration, and we have to cope with the fact that we therefore do not have unlimited chances. David: I sense an urgency toward making the most out of our reincarnations, since our opportunities for rebirth are limited. Friedbert: Yes, you are right; it forces us to hurry up. The book referred to in this interview, Richard Steinpach’s Why We Live After Death, as well as Grail Foundation Press’ most popular title, Abd-ru-shin’s In the Light of Truth: The Grail Message, are available at your local bookstore or directly from the publisher at (800) 427-9217. |
As a young man, Dr. Friedbert Karger took an interest in parapsychological phenomena and their underlying laws. It was on the basis of this interest and his academic excellence that he received, in 1959, the National Scholarship for Talented Students Award in Munich, Germany, where he was born and educated. He was awarded this opportunity for the study and research of distinguishing the relationship between normal physical phenomena and paraphysical phenomena.