The mediaeval text was most insistent: “Mors certa, hora incerta.” My Latin was definitely a bit scratchy, but even I could work this one out: “Death is certain, the hour uncertain.” The mediaeval philosopher who wrote this text also added, somewhat severely, that due to its uncertain nature, every man, woman and child should be prepared for death at all times.

For our ancestors, death was very much anchored in day-to-day life. For hundreds of years, Western European culture literally reverberated with the presence of death. Time and again, its influence on literature, religion, ritual life, mythology, art and, most certainly, philosophy was profound and immense. The great cathedrals scattered across the European landscape were not only active places of worship but served as ritual gateways to a safe passage through Purgatory for the souls of the dead.

Yet, with the dawn of the Industrial Revolution and the speed of technological progress, death suddenly became passé. Within a matter of years, mortality became a taboo subject that had no place in a progressive European society ... until now. Today, quantum physics has formed a somewhat unusual “marriage” with spiritual mysticism and the result has been a “resurrection” of interest in ancient teachings on death and dying from all over the world. Each of these revered texts states that the mystery of all life in the universe is said to lie in the knowledge of death. Death is far too important a subject to be ignored.