" Deathless” (amata) is another word for abundant life. If we think of Māra as death (the words amata and māra are both rooted in the Vedic m = death), then to no longer be constrained by his armies is to be freed to live fully. Gotama does not think of the deathless as immortality—as the term is understood in Brahmanism—but as the positive absence of reactivity. "

― Stephen Batchelor , After Buddhism: Rethinking the Dharma for a Secular Age