The dimension, or plane, that is closest and just beyond the Earth Plane. It is also the next stage of life to earth and a replica with this world. This duplicity reduces the shock, after physical death, for the many who are uninstructed and ignorant, otherwise it would be more than they could stand. The astral world is essentially a world of thought, where thought is reality. It is peopled by men and women who are still very material in their outlook on life. While their expression of thought remains gross, their thinking continues to reflect physical things.
There are degrees of astral life, and as spiritual awakening gradually emerges, the grossness slowly disappears and becomes more refined. The experience in the astral world is like a dream world. It is not a dream for those who are living in it, it is a real world to them. It becomes a dream when they awaken from it and recall the experience.
Individuals do not lose their astral bodies in quite the same way that a material body is lost. It becomes more rarefied, and refined as the lower drops away. That is its death, for death really means transformation, resurrection, the rising of the higher out of the lower.
The higher ones' state of consciousness when someone is passing to the spirit world, the less the need for adjustment in the astral plane. With progress, the organs of these individuals become atrophied and disappear. If they enter the inner or higher planes they become androgynous shining figures, radiating light.
The Astral Plane is sometimes referred to as the fourth dimension, a lower range of which is a primitive material dimension with superstitious beliefs.