On Being Remembered.

I watched an episode of House tonight in which a terminal cancer patient declined all palliative treatment. The reason he gave was that if he passed away quietly he would pass unnoticed, but if he chose to suffer, people would remember him.

I never understood why some people are so desperate to be remembered after they’re dead. If there’s nothing but oblivion after death, then we’ll never know whether we were remembered or not. On the other hand, if we move into another state of being in a different version of reality, I see no reason why being remembered in a previous reality should matter. And if, as I suspect, we’re simply moving through a post-mortem stage en route to another life as another human, it should matter even less.

I suppose this comes down to the fact that the idea of beginning our existence only when we’re born into a human body and then continuing as the same person through eternity seems nonsensical to me. It’s one of many reasons why I cannot see exoteric Christianity as anything more than a delusion engendered by the need to follow a prescribed route however illogical it might be.

But even if I’m wrong and the Judaic tradition does have all the answers, then surely the focus of attention must be on the route onwards and upwards, not being concerned about whether the folks following behind remember us. And maybe this is just my loner gene seeking to express itself while it still has the means so to do.