İnsanoğlu, hayatın son geçiş aşaması olan ölüme dair inanışlarını, korkularını, kaygılarını, merakını anlatma/paylaşma ihtiyacını hissetmiş ve bunları edebî türlere aktarmıştır. Fıkralar, iç dünyamızdaki duygu yoğunluğunu mizahla harmanlayarak hayatın çatışmalarını bütün gerçekliğiyle gözler önüne seren anlatmaya dayalı türlerdendir. Nasreddin Hoca fıkraları, her insanın yaşamış/yaşayacağı olayların, bilge Nasreddin Hoca’nın şahsında gerçekçi ve samimi bir şekilde canlandırıldığı anlatılardır. Bu yüzden çalışmamızda, fıkralarından hareketle Nasreddin Hoca’nın hayat felsefesi ve onun gözlemleriyle insanoğlunun kaygıları, merakı, ölüm ve öteki dünya algısı ele alınmıştır.

Mankind have felt the need to tell / share their beliefs, fears, anxieties, and curiosity about death, the final transitional phase of life, and transposed them to different types of literary works. Jokes are among types based on relating and clearly demonstrate the conflicts of life by blending intensive feelings in our inner world by humor. Nasreddin Hodja anecdotes depict events that every person has experienced / will experience in a realistic and sincere way in the person of Nasreddin Hodja. Our study, therefore, focused on mankind's concerns, curiosity, and the perception of death and the otherworld through Nasreddin Hodja's philosophy and his observa-tions.  “What is death in Nasreddin Hodja stories?”, “What kind of places are heaven, hell, and the otherworld”, “When will the doomsday occur?”, “How many ells is the world?”, “What does suffering in grave mean?”, “How could one cope with the fear of death?” We all seek answers to those questions. In that sense, Nasreddin Hodja endeavors to give a dimension of reality to those questions that we are trying to find answers to and to transform the unknown from ab-stract to concrete so that we can overcome our fears. The fact that pre-Islam Turkish culture and beliefs have been transferred to our generation through anecdotes also captures attention. Anec-dotes about pre-Islam Turkish beliefs include occasional references to mythic origins, including burial ceremonies involving burying a person upside down, wearing black clothing etc. and grieving. Such conscious preferences indicate that Nasreddin Hodja has been the carrier of our cultural values throughout history. Based on rules of logic, the anecdotes of Nasreddin Hodja depicts people who mock / over-come death by using strength derived from humor. The anecdotes also focuses on ideas about life after death. The belief that life in this world will continue without any change in the other-world is one of the most common topics. Conversations with Münkir-Nekir, angels who ques-tion people, and the hopes that they can be bribed into foregoing questioning, and humorous events such as the one where he says that "Someone else should give the cyme, because he is in a beef with me and he would not listen to me." may be cited as examples about the matter. These examples carry events witnessed / may be witnessed in terms of time, space, and corporeal aspects specific to this world to the "otherworld", drawing attention to contradictions between life in this world and in the otherworld. Nasreddin Hodja anecdotes draw attention to following subheadings centering around death and the otherworld:  1.Perception of world - otherworld 2.Anxiety and fear of death3. Ways of escaping fear of death This paper will analyze issues related to death and the otherworld in popular perceptions from the psychological and philosophical angle within the framework of humoristic narrative of anecdotes and based on Nasreddin Hodja anecdotes.