"Uttarayana is the period when no dot of cloud or whiff of fog contaminates the vast dome and the sun shines in all His glory. This is the gross meaning; but there is a subtle one, too. The heart is the inner sky. There, the sun that shines is Buddhi or intelligence. When the clouds of ignorance, the fog of egoism and the smoke of attachment hover in that inner sky, the sun of intelligence is hidden and things look murky and are mistaken. Uttarayana of the heart is when the inner sky is clear of all these, and when the sun shines in full splendour. You must have heard the expression, 'Jnanabhaskara,' the sun of wisdom. The sun is always associated with wisdom and intelligence. When a person passes away with this equipment of the effulgent sun of wisdom in his clear heart, he can certainly escape rebirth. He takes the path of Agni, the Archiraadi path, as said already, and merges in Brahmam!"

"Those who pass away in the other half of the year, the Dakshinayana, have the opposite destiny; then the heart is beset with smoke and fog and cloud. The sun is hidden and His effulgence has no splendour. And in the dark half of the month the moon wanes, symbolising the waning of godward thoughts. The new moon night is enveloped in complete darkness, all spiritual impulses suffer defeat. The thick smoke of Ajnana lies heavily on the mind. This is the meaning of the expression, Krishna paksha. Those who die at such an inauspicious time reap an inauspicious result."