Sri Sathya Sai Baba

He who is born cannot escape death, some time, somewhere. Every moment, many are born and many die. But man has to discover how to 'avoid' death. Now, the Atma which is the core of man, is not born; since it does not take birth, it does not meet death. Death happens to the body with which it is associated, with which it mixes. The delusion that the body is the core, that the body is real, that verily is the death. Affliction by that falsehood is the act of dying. To be free from that delusion is to attain Immortality. The body it is that disintegrates, not the Atma, the Soul, the Self. The body is undergoing change every moment and the final change is death, when the Self, changeless, remains. When one believes that the changing body is oneself and starts referring to it as 'I', that 'I' dies, but the real 'I' is deathless.

 As intense elevating activity and fearless inquiry into one's Truth are practised more and more, the consciousness that the 'body is oneself' can be overcome and negated. Consider the fruit of the tamarind tree. When unripe, it is not easy to separate the rind, the pulp and the seed. So too, those who have stuck to sensual desires and to fondling and feeding the body, cannot earn the awareness of the Atma. When the tamarind fruit becomes ripe, the rind can be broken off, the pulp gets detached from the seed and the seed can be isolated without effort. Inquiry and unselfish activity ripen the consciousness and the Atma can be isolated from the body, clear and pure.

(Sathya Sai Vahini, Ch 26)