[dinoleif]

I think we agree, but I think you misinterpreted what I said. "Mystical experiences" isn't the problem. It's that the things commonly described in "near death experiences" are overtly contradictory with Judeo-Christian teaching about the afterlife.

[Mikeb85]

There isn't a lot of agreement on what the 'afterlife' is in Christianity, and Judaism has a different idea altogether.

To traditional Christians (Orthodox and Catholic), it involves the soul departing the body, experiencing a good, bad or in between afterlife, then the resurrection of the dead where they're reunited with their body at the end of the world to either live in paradise or be chucked into a fiery lake. Some mystics also describe a period where the soul wanders or is 'lost', and various traditional prayers support such theories. There's also the concepts of Hades/Sheol, Abraham's bosom, toll-houses or purgatory, and so on. Quite a bit of room for experiences roughly equivalent to some near-death experiences.

To most evangelicals, it's an instantaneous journey to heaven/hell. Protestants range from more traditional beliefs to soul-sleep to instant judgement.

For Jews, it's more of a nebulous existence in Sheol (roughly equivalent to the Greek Hades), which isn't particularly great nor horrible.

And then of course, the possibility that what every religion describes is allegorical and not literal.