Mukti is the final liberation of soul

Mukti mean liberation. There can be two types of mukti, one a mukti or liberation for the soul (a permanent liberation), and the other a mukti for the departed soul (a liberation at the end of each earth-life). The two are very different kinds of mukti. Soul, the God-self in a person, is an essence that is born again and again on earth. In each life it is born with different physical bodies, into different world-life circumstances, with different parents, religions, nationality, and with different destinies and capabilities (depending on karma or the laws of cause-effect).

Scriptures are written allegorically. We take the literal meanings and ignore the intended meanings. God is a mechanism for converting an idea into an action in seven stages, after ensuring that the ideas is compatible with all other ideas of life. The seven stages are: Day dreaming - Heaven. Illusion. Creativity. Stabilization. Determination. Status alteration. Compulsion - Hell. Usually ideas are converted into action in fourth or fifth stages. Ideas that are not converted into action because they are not compatible with most ideas get stagnated in the seventh stage, which is symbolized by Hell.

Reincarnation means transformation of an activity every time it is repeated. This indicates that the idea is not compatible with some ideas of life. Such ideas are recycled and thus return to stage 1, which is symbolized by Heaven. this recycling continues until the idea become compatible with all other ideas of life. Thus, it is an idea that attain Moksha. If all ideas of life attain Moksha then the soul of the individual too will attain moksha. However, this occurs during life time and not after death. The person would then become immune to the rules of the society.

The body and soul perish at death. As earth-life implies struggles and suffering, liberation for the soul happens only when it is able to escape from the cycle of death and rebirth for ever. Several terms like Moksha, Nirvana, Enlightenment and so on, are used for to describe this liberation. This is the ultimate and only mukti for the soul, after which the individual life or consciousness does not find itself as a “soul”, but something much more fundamental or spiritually far greater than soul.

The other type of mukti happens at the end of every earth-life. To understand this type of mukti, there is a need to know what happens at death and in the after-death period. There can be two sub-types of mukti of this type. Death is the end of earth-life, in which one looses one’s identity completely. The physical body is severed from the consciousness, sharply and permanently. However, the departed consciousness does not vanish but continues to live in an astral body, in the astral world. The astral world is a world of emotions, and all residual emotional tendencies of the dead person begin to trouble him, causing great suffering. The life lived in the astral world immediately after death is known as “hell”, because of this suffering. This continues to happen for quite a few years, the length depending on the nature and energy of emotional vibrations generated by the person during his recently concluded earth-life.

When the energy of all astral world vibrations have worked themselves out, one dies once again. This is known as the “second death”. In the second death, one discards the astral body in just the way one had discarded the physical body at first death. After the second death, one is born into the “glory of the mental world”. This is known as “heaven” in religions, and here there is no further suffering for the soul. Hence mukti for the departed soul happens when one undergoes the second death and rids itself from the astral influences.

The other subtype of after-death mukti is a little different. When a person dies, his thoughts are still attached to the physical world. In a way, he is somewhat “earth-bound”. This brings in added suffering because he can never return back to the physical world after his death. Mukti (of this subtype) happens when the soul is no longer earth-bound, but resigns to its after-life fate in the astral realms. Much of the after-death rituals, including all prayers for the dead and the shraddha rituals of the Hindus, help in bringing about this subtype of mukti.

Liberation for the soul means liberation from samsara - the endless cycle of birth and death. Shri Krishna says: "From the highest planet in the material world down to the lowest, all are places of misery wherein repeated birth and death take place. But one who attains to My abode, O son of Kunti, never takes birth again". —Shrimad Bhagwad Gita 8.16 Srila Prabhupada explains: All kinds of yogis-karma, jnana, hatha, etc. -- eventually have to attain devotional perfection in bhakti-yoga, or Krishna consciousness, before they can go to Krishna's transcendental abode and never return. Those who attain the highest material planets, the planets of the demigods, are again subjected to repeated birth and death. As persons on earth are elevated to higher planets, people on higher planets such as Brahmaloka, Chandra loka and Indra loka fall down to earth.

The practice of sacrifice called panchagni-vidya, recommended in the Chandogya Upanishad, enables one to achieve Brahmaloka, but if, on Brahmaloka, one does not cultivate Krishna consciousness, then he must return to earth. Those who progress in Krishna consciousness on the higher planets are gradually elevated to higher and higher planets and at the time of universal devastation are transferred to the eternal spiritual kingdom. Shrimad Bhagwad Gita, quotes this verse: "When there is devastation of this material universe, Brahma and his devotees, who are constantly engaged in Krishna consciousness, are all transferred to the spiritual universe and to specific spiritual planets according to their desires." Jay Shri Krishna