[Lal]

This post was by Marina:

Related to my previous post,
How are Gandhabbas born and how do they deplete their karmic energy?
Why do only humans and animals have gandhabba? What happens to the gandhabba when the associated human generates a patisandi of an apāyā bhava for a hideous kamma?
The notion of antarābhava was not clear to me. Could you elaborate a bit more, or kindly indicate where can I find an answer in the site, on the difference between intermediate state and underworld or paraloka?
According to Mahāyāna, there is this intermediate state and it indicates 49 days as the maximum time that a being can be there, being born and dying seven times. However, Theravada rules it out. I have heard some Thero explaining that breathing does not stop, that every exhalation is immediately followed by an inspiration. Thus, when an ordinary being dies, he breathes out into that body and then breathes in into the next. I understand that this cannot be the case due to the obvious delay, at least, of the gestation of the new body, during which one does not breathe. Can the difference between bhāva and jāti fit here? If so, and the gandhabba spends time in disembodied paraloka, what is the difference between disembodied gandhabba and antarābhava? And what is the difference between paraloka and intermediate state? One last question: Do Gandhabbas breathe? Because if they breathe in smells, they do. If this is so, it would be true that all expiration follows from an inspiration. Would last human expiration be followed by first gandhabba inspiration?

May all beings liberate from suffering.

[Lal]

Yes. Those are complex questions. I cannot answer them in even a couple of posts.

Such details can be found in the following sections:
“Mental Body – Gandhabba”
“Gandhabba (Manomaya Kaya)”

I recently started a new section to discuss this in a systematic way:
“Buddha Dhamma – A Scientific Approach”

You may want to scan through the above sections to see which section would best for you. Each person is different.

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