What happens around a dead person, and how should we care for the body of a deceased individual?

Beloved Osho, a friend wrote to me that two days after her father died, sitting by the corpse she felt an incredible rise of energy in her. What is happening around a dead person, and how should we look after the body of a person who has died?

The moment a person dies he releases all his energy. If you are receptive, you will feel it. If you are available, open, you will feel your energy level rising up. It depends on many things -- what kind of man has died, what kind of energy he used to have. If he was a man of anger, violence, then it is better not to be close to him because all his repressed anger, all his repressed violence will be released and you can unnecessarily suffer from all that energy entering you. And it is very natural because when somebody is dying or dead, you automatically become silent by their side -- nobody makes any noise, nobody talks. Death is such a mysterious phenomenon that everybody is in shock. So the first thing to be aware of is, what kind of person is dying. If the person has been a…

Meditation and death happening together is the best that can happen to anybody, because he is dying yet he is aware that he will be dead for you all, but not for himself. He will simply be freed from this body. And because he has died with awareness, he will not be born again. He will be free, a white cloud in the vast universe. We have to make death beautiful: music, dance, silence, meditation. Up to now man has been born accidentally, dies accidentally, and between the two do you think you can live meaningfully? -- between two accidents? Your beginning is an accident, your end is an accident; do you think between these two you will be able to live meaningfully? Impossible. The beginning should be considered by the most intelligent people. You are creating a body for a soul.

At the death of a parishioner, master dogo, accompanied by his disciple zengen, visited the bereaved family.

WITHOUT TAKING TIME TO EXPRESS A WORD OF SYMPATHY, ZENGEN WENT UP TO THE COFFIN, RAPPED ON IT, AND ASKED DOGO:'IS HE REALLY DEAD?' 'I WON'T SAY,' SAID DOGO.'WELL?' INSISTED ZENGEN.'I'M NOT SAYING, AND THAT'S FINAL,' SAID DOGO. ON THEIR WAY BACK TO THE TEMPLE THE FURIOUS ZENGEN TURNED ON DOGO AND THREATENED: 'BY GOD, IF YOU DON'T ANSWER MY QUESTION, WHY I'LL BEAT YOU.' 'ALL RIGHT,' SAID DOGO, 'BEAT AWAY.' A MAN OF HIS WORD, ZENGEN SLAPPED HIS MASTER A GOOD ONE. SOME TIME LATER DOGO DIED, AND ZENGEN, STILL ANXIOUS TO HAVE HIS QUESTION ANSWERED, WENT TO THE MASTER SEKISO, AND, AFTER RELATING WHAT HAD HAPPENED, ASKED THE SAME QUESTION OF HIM. SEKISO, AS IF CONSPIRING WITH THE DEAD DOGO, WOULD NOT ANSWER.'BY GOD!' CRIED ZENGEN. 'YOU TOO?' 'I'M NOT SAYING,' SAID SEKISO, 'AND THAT'S FINAL.' AT THAT VERY INSTANT ZENGEN EXPERIENCED AN AWAKENING. Whenever a lover dies,…

Osho! On the passing of revered Daddaji you told your sannyasins to celebrate, to dance. Yet even in the midst of celebration and dance, again and again tears kept wetting our eyelids. Osho, after Daddaji’s going the heart still cannot believe that he has gone. It feels as if he is right here. The love he gave us is inexpressible.

Many sannyasins will depart—it is natural. To bid them farewell you must learn a new way—of joyous celebration. It is secondary what your joyful celebration will do for the one who has gone, though it will do something; but that is subtle—whether you understand it or not. When you weep and suffer… Suppose a husband dies: the wife weeps, beats her chest, is distraught. Then the one who has gone cannot move on either; he too cannot go, he too remains stuck. When his dear ones are suffering so, weeping so, his lifelong habit of owning them does not break in a day; it takes time. If his dear ones weep intensely, he too will wander here as a ghost. Thus it is that you create ghosts. You will be surprised to know that in the West—among Christians, Jews, Muslims—there are more ghosts. In England there are more ghosts than…

Question: BELOVED OSHO, A FEW MONTHS AGO MY FRIEND AND I WERE VISITING HIS DYING FATHER. LOTS OF PEOPLE WERE AROUND. HIS BODY WAS ABOUT FINISHED. TO MOST PEOPLE HE WAS INDIFFERENT, BUT WHEN EVERYONE LEFT HE SUDDENLY OPENED HIS EYES AND TOLD US,"I FEEL LIKE I HAVE TWO BODIES; ONE BODY IS SICK AND THE OTHER IS COMPLETELY HEALTHY. "WE TOLD HIM, "THAT'S RIGHT! THE HEALTHY BODY IS THE REAL YOU, SO STAY WITH THAT ONE. "HE SAID, "OKAY," AND CLOSED HIS EYES. AS WE SAT WITH HIM, THE SICK ENERGY AROUND THE HOSPITAL BED CHANGED. WE COULDN'T BELIEVE THIS NEW ENERGY; IT WAS AS IF WE WERE IN DARSHAN WITH YOU... SUCH BEAUTIFUL SILENCE. I FELT A BIT STRANGE SAYING THESE WORDS TO SOMEONE WHO WAS REALLY EXPERIENCING THIS. WHATEVER I SAID WASN'T REALLY MY EXPERIENCE, JUST SOMETHING I'D THOUGHT ABOUT.