How do I write a review of “Proof of Heaven: A Neurosurgeon’s Near-Death Experience and Journey into the Afterlife,” the narrative of Dr. Eben Alexander III’s journey into the afterlife? It deals with not only the scientific aspects of a near-death experience but also the spiritual realization that there is a loving God out there.
Stricken with a form of bacterial meningitis in 2008, Alexander fell into a coma and was hospitalized at Lynchburg General Hospital in Virginia, where he remained for seven days. He describes those days when he journeyed beyond this world and encountered an angelic being who led him through the darkness of the “Core, the Gateway,” riding on a butterfly’s wing. He witnessed the home of the “Divine,” inky darkness that was also full to brimming with light.
Adopted as a youth, Alexander had a deep-seated yearning to be loved, because he felt he had not been loved by his parents. As his biological sibling’s rally to sit with him and hold his hand constantly, he also has the support of his adoptive siblings as he pulls himself out of the morass that has him captured.
Alexander’s brain went from inactivity to awakening. He made a full recovery and was certain of a life beyond death. After his recovery, his son wisely advised him to write his experience down. Bit by bit, that part came back to him, and a lifetime of education and experience are at work again. He found there is really a loving God out there.