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Reincarnation

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Reincarnation in Hindu art
For other uses, see Reincarnation (disambiguation).
See also: Reincarnation in popular culture

Reincarnation (literally, "to be made flesh again") is believed to occur when the soul or spirit, after the death of the body, comes back to Earth in a newborn body. This phenomenon is also known as transmigration of the soul. This doctrine is a central tenet within the majority of Indian religious traditions, such as Hinduism and Jainism. The idea was also fundamental to some Greek philosophers and religions as well as other religions, such as Druidism, that had Indo-European origins.

Recently a significant number of people in the West have been shown to accept the idea of reincarnation[1] including certain contemporary Christians,[2], modern Neopagans, followers of Spiritism, Theosophists and students of esoteric philosophies such as Kabbalah, and Gnostic and Esoteric Christianity as well as of Indian religions. A small number of parapsychologists have claimed evidence that they believe supports reincarnation.

The Buddhist concept of reincarnation differs from others in that there is no eternal "soul", "spirit' or self" but only a "stream of consciousness" that links life with life. Additionally, while reincarnation generally implies the taking of a human form on Earth, the Jain cosmology and Buddhist cosmology posits that people are reborn into many worlds, in which they take on varied forms.

Religions and philosophies

India

The concept of reincarnation (along with karma, samsara, and moksha) was likely first developed within the pre-Aryan non-Vedic culture, whose spiritual ideas greatly influenced later Indian religious thought. Buddhism and Jainism are continuations of this tradition, and the early Upanishadic movement was influenced by it. Reincarnation was adopted from this religious culture by Brahmin orthodoxy, and Brahmins first wrote down scriptures containing these ideas in the early Upanishads.[3][4][5][6][7][8] Philosophical and religious beliefs regarding the existence or non-existence of an unchanging 'self' have a direct bearing on how reincarnation is viewed within a given tradition.

Hinduism

Reincarnation is a core belief within Hinduism. The soul (atman) is immortal while the body is subject to birth and death. The Bhagavad Gita states;

Hindus believe in reincarnation, the process wherein the self or soul (atman) repeatedly takes on a physical body.
  • "Never was there a time when I did not exist, nor you, nor all these kings; nor in the future shall any of us cease to be. As the embodied soul continuously passes, in this body, from boyhood to youth to old age, the soul similarly passes into another body at death. A sober person is not bewildered by such a change". (2: 12-13)

and;

  • "Worn-out garments are shed by the body; Worn-out bodies are shed by the dweller within the body. New bodies are donned by the dweller, like garments". (2:22)[9]

According to the Hindu sage Adi Shankaracharya, the world - as we ordinarily understand it - is like a dream: fleeting and illusory. To be trapped in samsara is a result of ignorance of the true nature of our existence. It is ignorance (avidya) of one's true self that leads to ego-consciousness of the body and the phenomenal world that grounds one in desire and a perpetual chain of reincarnation. The idea is intricately linked to action (karma), a concept first recorded in the Upanishads. Every action has a reaction and the force determines one's next incarnation. The cycle of death and rebirth, governed by karma, is referred to as samsara. [10] One is reborn through desire: a person desires to be born because he or she wants to enjoy a body,[11] which can never bring deep, lasting happiness or peace (ānanda). After many births every person becomes dissatisfied and begins to seek higher forms of happiness through spiritual experience. When, after spiritual practice (sādhanā), a person realizes that the true "self" is the immortal soul rather than the body or the ego all desires for the pleasures of the world will vanish since they will seem insipid compared to spiritual ānanda. When all desire has vanished the person will not be born again.[12] When the cycle of rebirth thus comes to an end, a person is said to have attained liberation (moksha).[13] All schools agree this implies the cessation of worldly desires and freedom from the cycle of birth and death, though the exact definition differs. Followers of the Advaita Vedanta school believe they will spend eternity absorbed in the perfect peace and happiness of the realization that all existence is One Brahman of which the soul is part. Dvaita schools perform worship with the goal of spending eternity in a spiritual world or heaven (loka) in the blessed company of the Supreme Being.[14]

Hindu Gods are said to have incarnated in various forms under different circumstances. Lord Vishnu is known for His ten incarnations, the Dashavatars.

Jainism

Further information: Karma in Jainism and Jain philosophy

In Jainism, particular reference is given to how devas (gods) also reincarnate after they die. A Jain who accumulates enough good karma may become a deva but this is generally seen as undesirable since devas eventually die and one might then come back as a lesser being. This belief also exists in a number of schools of Hinduism.[15]

Buddhism

In this 8-meter (25-foot) tall Buddhist relief, made sometime between the years 1177 and 1249, Mara, Lord of Death and Desire, clutches a Wheel of Reincarnation which outlines the Buddhist cycle of reincarnation.
Main article: Rebirth (Buddhism)

Gautama Buddha taught a distinct concept of rebirth constrained by the concepts: anattā, that there is no irreducible ātman or "self" tying these lives together;[16] and anicca, that all compounded things are subject to dissolution, including all the components of the human person and personality. At the death of one personality, a new one comes into being, much as the flame of a dying candle can serve to light the flame of another.[17][18] Transmigration is the effect of karma (kamma) [19], volitional action[20]. Instead of a fixed entity, what is reborn is an "evolving consciousness" (M.1.256) or "stream of consciousness" (D.3.105), whose quality has been conditioned by karma.[21]

Buddhism suggests that samsara, the process of rebirth, occurs across five or six realms of existence.[22] It is actually said in Tibetan Buddhism that it is very rare for a person to be reborn in the immediate next life as a human.[23] This depends on the karmic potentialities (or "seeds") they have created with their actions and upon their state of mind at the time of death. If we die with a peaceful mind, this will stimulate a virtuous seed and we shall experience a fortunate rebirth; but if we die with a disturbed mind, in a state of anger, say, this will stimulate a non-virtuous seed and we shall experience an unfortunate rebirth. This is similar to the way in which nightmares are triggered by our being in an agitated state of mind just before falling asleep.[24]

Tibetan Buddhists believe that an accomplished or realized practitioner (by maintaining conscious awareness during the death process) can choose to return to samsara and exist within, but no longer uncontrollably bound to, the cycle of rebirth. In this way, many lamas choose to be born again and again as humans, and are called tulkus or incarnate lamas.[citation needed]

Skeptic Carl Sagan asked the Dalai Lama what would he do if a fundamental tenet of his religion (reincarnation) was definitively disproved by science. The Dalai Lama answered; "if science can disprove reincarnation, Tibetan Buddhism would abandon reincarnation... but it's going to be mighty hard to disprove reincarnation."[25]

Sant mystics and Sikhism

Reincarnation remained a tenet of the Sant Bhakti movement and of related mystics on the frontiers of Hinduism such as the Baul minstrels, the Kabir panth and the Sikh Brotherhood. Sikhs believe the soul is passed from one body to another until Liberation. If we perform good deeds and actions and remember the Creator, we attain a better life while, if we carry out evil actions and sinful deeds, we will be incarnated in “lower” life forms. God may pardon wrongs and release us.[26] Otherwise reincarnation is due to the law of cause and effect but does not create any caste or differences among people.

Eckankar is a Western presentation of Sant mysticism.[27] It teaches that the soul is eternal and either chooses an incarnation for growth or else an incarnation is imposed because of Karma. The soul is perfected through a series of incarnations until it arrives at "Personal Mastery".

Europe

The classical world

A 2nd century Roman sarcophagus shows the mythology and symbolism of the Orphic and Dionysiac Mystery schools. Orpheus plays his lyre to the left

Metempsychosis (Greek: μετεμψύχωσις) in the Greek language means "transmigration of the soul", especially its reincarnation after death,[28] wherein an individual incarnates from one body to another, either human, animal, or plant. The term has been used by modern philosophers such as Schopenhauer[29] and Kurt Gödel[30] and Nietzsche.[31]. Another term sometimes used synonymously is Palingenesia.[32]

The Orphic religion, which held the doctrine, first appeared in Thrace in north-eastern Greece and, about the 6th century BC, organized itself into mystery schools at Eleusis and elsewhere, and produced a copious literature.[33][34][35] Orpheus, its legendary founder, is said to have taught that the immortal soul aspires to freedom while the body holds it prisoner. The wheel of birth revolves, the soul alternates between freedom and captivity round the wide circle of necessity. Orpheus proclaimed the need of the grace of the gods, Dionysus in particular, and of self-purification until the soul has completed the spiral ascent of destiny to live for ever.

The earliest known Greek thinker with whom metempsychosis is connected is Pherecydes of Syros[36] but Pythagoras, said to have been his pupil, is its first famous exponent, who probably brought Orphic doctrine from North-Eastern Hellas to Magna Graecia and instituted societies for its diffusion. Several ancient sources affirm that Pythagoras claimed he could remember his past lives.[37] An association between Pythagorean philosophy and reincarnation was routinely accepted throughout antiquity.

Plato presented accounts of reincarnation in his works, particularly the Myth of Er. In Plato's Phaedo Socrates, prior to his death, states; "I am confident that there truly is such a thing as living again, and that the living spring from the dead." In the Republic he tells how Er, the son of Armenius, miraculously returned to life on the twelfth day after death and recounted the secrets of the other world. There are myths and theories to the same effect in other dialogues, in the Chariot allegory of the Phaedrus, in the Meno, Timaeus and Laws. However Xenophon does not mention Socrates as believing in reincarnation. Plato may have incorporated this concept from Pythagoreanism or Orphism.

The concept underpins Plato's ideas concerning innate knowledge. Plato taught that "all learning is but recollection" because we have innate knowledge of universal ideas. The soul, once separated from the body, spends an indeterminate amount of time in "formland" (see The Allegory of the Cave in The Republic) and then assumes another body. Therefore, according to Plato, we need only recall our buried memories to manifest innate knowledge. In Plato's view the number of souls was fixed; [38]

In later Greek literature the doctrine is mentioned in a fragment of Menander[39] and satirized by Lucian.[40] In Roman literature it is found as early as Ennius,[41] who, in a lost passage of his Annals, told how he had seen Homer in a dream, who had assured him that the same soul which had animated both the poets had once belonged to a peacock. Persius in his satires (vi. 9) laughs at this: it is referred to also by Lucretius[42] and Horace.[43]

Virgil works the idea into his account of the Underworld in the sixth book of the Aeneid.[44] It persists down to the late classic thinkers, Plotinus and the other Neoplatonists. In the Hermetica, a Graeco-Egyptian series of writings on cosmology and spirituality attributed to Hermes Trismegistus/Thoth, the doctrine of reincarnation is central.

Norse mythology

Sváfa holding the dying Helgi in their first incarnation of three.

Reincarnation also appears in Norse mythology, in the Poetic Edda. The editor of the Poetic Edda says that Helgi Hjörvarðsson and his mistress, the valkyrie Sváfa, whose love story is told in the Helgakviða Hjörvarðssonar, were reborn as Helgi Hundingsbane and the valkyrie Sigrún. Helgi and Sigrún's love story is the matter of a part of the Völsunga saga and the lays Helgakviða Hundingsbana I and II. They were reborn a second time as Helgi Haddingjaskati and the valkyrie Kára, but unfortunately their story, Káruljóð, only survives in a probably modified form in the Hrómundar saga Gripssonar.

The belief in reincarnation was probably commonplace among the Vikings since the annotator of the Poetic Edda wrote that people formerly used to believe in it;

Sigrun was early dead of sorrow and grief. It was believed in olden times that people were born again, but that is now called old wives' folly. Of Helgi and Sigrun it is said that they were born again; he became Helgi Haddingjaskati, and she Kara the daughter of Halfdan, as is told in the Lay of Kara, and she was a Valkyrie.[45]

The Druids

In the 1st century BC Alexander Cornelius Polyhistor wrote;

"The Pythagorean doctrine prevails among the Gauls' teaching that the souls of men are immortal, and that after a fixed number of years they will enter into another body."

Julius Caesar recorded that the druids of Gaul, Britain and Ireland had metempsychosis as one of their core doctrines;[46]

"The principal point of their doctrine is that the soul does not die and that after death it passes from one body into another..... the main object of all education is, in their opinion, to imbue their scholars with a firm belief in the indestructibility of the human soul, which, according to their belief, merely passes at death from one tenement to another; for by such doctrine alone, they say, which robs death of all its terrors, can the highest form of human courage be developed."

Many scholars accept this account as one of many links traceable between Druid, ancient Greek and Vedic religion and culture arising from a common Indo-European heritage.[47][48] Diodorus Siculus thought the druids might have been influenced by the teachings of Pythagoras[49] and one modern scholar has speculated that Buddhist missionaries had been sent by the Indian king Ashoka.[50]

Later religions

Christianity

Mainstream Christian denominations have rejected the notion of reincarnation but some Christians contend that reincarnation was taught by the early Christian church and that, due to bias and mistranslations, these teachings were lost or obscured. Geddes Macgregor argued that the Early Church Father Origen taught reincarnation.[51]

The New Testament has passages that have been taken to allude to reincarnation. In Matthew 11:10-14 and 17:10-13, John 1:21, the Jews ask John the Baptist if he is Elijah and John replies that he is not. However this is a special case as Elijah was taken bodily up to heaven in a whirlwind and a chariot of fire, and Malachi 4:5 [1] states that God would send Elijah back to Earth as a foreunner of the Messiah. Other passages seem to reject the possibility of any return or contact with this world for souls in Heaven or Hell.[52]

Some early Christian Gnostic sects professed reincarnation. The Sethians and followers of Valentinus believed in it.[53] The followers of Bardaisan of Mesopotamia, a sect of the 2nd century deemed heretical by the Catholic Church, drew upon Chaldean astrology, to which Bardaisan's son Harmonius, educated in Athens, added Greek ideas including a sort of metempsychosis. Another such teacher was Basilides (132–? CE/AD), known to us through the criticisms of Irenaeus and the work of Clement of Alexandria. (see also Neoplatonism and Gnosticism and Buddhism and Gnosticism)

Around the 11-12th century there emerged several reincarnationist movements collectively described as "Manichaean" (see below) and persecuted as heresies through the establishment of the Inquisition. They included the Cathar and Albigensian churches of Western Europe. Other such groups, sometimes referred to as "neo-Manichaean", were the Paulician movement, which arose in Armenia,[54] and the Bogomils in Bulgaria.[55]

During the Renaissance there was new interest in reincarnation. Marsilio Ficino (Platonic Theology 17.3-4) argued that Plato's references to reincarnation were intended allegorically but Giordano Bruno was burned at the stake by the Inquisition because of his teachings about reincarnation.[56]

Mani

In the third Christian century Manichaeism spread both east and west from Babylonia, then within the Sassanid Empire, where its founder Mani lived about 216–276. Manichaean monasteries existed in Rome in 312 A.D. Noting Mani's early travels to the Kushan Empire and other Buddhist influences in Manichaeism, Richard Foltz[57] attributes Mani's teaching of reincarnation to Buddhist influence. However the inter-relation of Manicheanism, Orphism, Gnosticism and neo-Platonism is far from clear.

Christian sects professing reincarnation and other gnostic beliefs were referred to as "Manichean", and are today sometimes described by scholars as "Neo-Manichean".[58] As there is no known Manichaean mythology or terminology in the writings of these groups there has been some dispute among historians as to whether these groups truly were descendants of Manichaeism.[59]

The Muslim world

The idea of reincarnation is accepted by several Muslim sects, particularly of the extreme Sh'ia, (Ghulat), and other sects in the Muslim world. In Nizari Ismailism the doctrine is seen in some devotional/gnostic verses (Ginans). Historically, South Asian Isma'ilis performed chantas yearly, one of which is for sins committed in past lives.[60] (Aga Khan IV) Sinan ibn Salman ibn Muhammad, also known as Rashid al-Din Sinan, (r. 1162-92) subscribed to the transmigration of souls as a tenet of the Alawi,[61] who are thought to have been influenced by Isma'ilism. Ya’furiyya Shia are also reincarnationists.

Some verses of the Quran are held to support the theory of reincarnation[62] Other verses seem to discount the idea[63] The principle is rejected by mainstream Sunni and twelver Shi'a denominations, but some Sunni Sufi mystics and poets have celebrated similar ideas:

I died as mineral and became a plant,
I died as plant and rose to animal,
I died as animal and I was man.
Why should I fear?
When was I less by dying? [64]

Modern Sufis who embrace the idea of reincarnation include Bawa Muhaiyadeen.[65] However Hazrat Inayat Khan has criticized the idea as unhelpful to the spiritual seeker.[66]

Reincarnation also exists in the Druze religion, which broke from Ismailism. The Druze believe that they will be reincarnated as Druze, their own future descendants. The five-colored Druze star, intelligence/reason (green), soul (red), word (yellow), precedent (blue), and immanence (white), stands for five different spirits that, until recently, have been continuously reincarnated on Earth as prophets and philosophers including Adam, Pythagoras and Akhenaten, personified in five people who came down together to Earth to teach humans the true path to God, though with them came five other individuals who would lead people away from the right path into darkness.

Ashkenazi Judaism

The Ark in the Ari (Isaac Luria) Ashkenazi Synagogue in Safed. Luria fully expounded the Kabbalistic doctrine of gilgul
See also: Kabbalah § Human soul in Kabbalah

Gilgul/Gilgul neshamot/Gilgulei Ha Neshamot (Heb. גלגול הנשמות, Plural: גלגולים Gilgulim) refers to the concept of reincarnation emanating from the Kabbalistic framework within Judaism. In Hebrew, the word gilgul means "cycle" and neshamot is the plural for "souls." Reincarnation is not an essential tenet of traditional Judaism. It is not mentioned in the Tanakh ("Hebrew Bible"), the classical rabbinic works (Mishnah and Talmud), or Maimonides' 13 Principles of Faith, though the tale of the Ten Martyrs in the Yom Kippur liturgy, who were killed by Romans to atone for the souls of the ten brothers of Joseph, is read in every Orthodox Jewish community. But books of Kabbalah — Jewish mysticism — teach a belief in gilgul and hence it is common in Hasidic Judaism, which regards the Kabbalah as sacred and authoritative.

The 16th-century systemisation of Cordoveran Kabbalah and the subsequent Lurianic Kabbalah replaced rationalistic medieval Jewish philosophy as the mainstream traditional Jewish theology both in scholarly circles and in the popular imagination. Esoteric explanations of gilgul were articulated as part of the metaphysical purpose of Creation. Luria taught new explanations of gilgul and advocated identification of the reincarnations of historic Jewish figures, compiled by Haim Vital in his Shaar HaGilgulim[67] The idea of gilgul became popular in Jewish folk belief and is found in much Yiddish literature among Ashkenazi Jews. The Hasidic tzadik was believed to know the past gilgulim of each person through their semi-prophetic abilities but would not directly reveal this information. Gilgul is contrasted with the other processes in Kabbalah of Ibbur, the attachment of a second soul to an individual, and Dybuk, the exile of a soul.

In Kabbalistic understanding reincarnation is not fatalistic, automatic, a punishment of sin or reward of virtue. Rather, it is concerned with the process of rectification of the soul, tied to the Lurianic doctrine of the rectification of creation. Gilgul is a heavenly agreement with the individual soul. The true essence of anything is the divine spark within that gives it existence. Even a stone or leaf possesses a soul that "came into this world to receive a rectification". A soul may occasionally be exiled into such lower creatures. Each Jewish soul is reincarnated in order to fulfil each of the commandments that elevate a particular spark of holiness associated with each commandment. Once all the Sparks are redeemed to their spiritual source, the Messianic Era begins.

The most basic component of the soul, the nefesh, is always part of the gilgul process, as it must leave at the cessation of blood production (a stage of death). It moves to another body, where life has begun. There are four other soul components and different nations of the world possess different forms of souls with different purposes.

Rabbis who accepted reincarnation include the mystical leaders Nahmanides (the Ramban) and Rabbenu Bahya ben Asher, Levi ibn Habib (the Ralbah), Shelomoh Alkabez, Yisrael Baal Shem Tov, later Hasidic masters and the Vilna Gaon. Chaim ibn Attar, in his commentary on the Torah identifies Moses as the reborn Abel and Rabbi Akiva as Cain. Moshe Teitelbaum of Ujhel (1759–1841) said he had been incarnated three times, first as a sheep in the flock of Jacob, second in the time of Moses and third in the time of the destruction of the First Temple in Jerusalem. The contemporary Kabbalist Yitzchak Ginsburgh identifies Isaac Newton as the modern reincarnation of Noah on his website.[68] Rabbis who have rejected the idea include Saadia Gaon, David Kimhi, Hasdai Crescas, Joseph Albo, Abraham ibn Daud and Leon de Modena. Among the Geonim, Hai Gaon argued with Saadia Gaon in favour of gilgulim.

Taoism and the Native American nations

Taoist documents from as early as the Han Dynasty claimed that Lao Tzu appeared on earth as different persons in different times beginning in the legendary era of Three Sovereigns and Five Emperors. The (ca. 3rd century BCE) Chuang Tzu states: "Birth is not a beginning; death is not an end. There is existence without limitation; there is continuity without a starting-point. Existence without limitation is Space. Continuity without a starting point is Time. There is birth, there is death, there is issuing forth, there is entering in."[69]

Reincarnation is an intrinsic part of many Native American and Inuit traditions.[citation needed] In the now heavily Christian Polar North (now mainly parts of Greenland and Nunavut), the concept of reincarnation is enshrined in the Inuit language.[citation needed]

The following is a story of human-to-human reincarnation as told by Thunder Cloud, a Winnebago shaman referred to as T. C. in the narrative. Here T. C. talks about his two previous lives and how he died and came back again to this his third lifetime. He describes his time between lives, when he was “blessed” by Earth Maker and all the abiding spirits and given special powers, including the ability to heal the sick.

T. C.’s Account of His Two Reincarnations

I (my ghost) was taken to the place where the sun sets (the west). ... While at that place, I thought I would come back to earth again, and the old man with whom I was staying said to me, “My son, did you not speak about wanting to go to the earth again?” I had, as a matter of fact, only thought of it, yet he knew what I wanted. Then he said to me, “You can go, but you must ask the chief first.” Then I went and told the chief of the village of my desire, and he said to me, “You may go and obtain your revenge upon the people who killed your relatives and you.” Then I was brought down to earth. ... There I lived until I died of old age. ... As I was lying [in my grave], someone said to me, “Come, let us go away.” So then we went toward the setting of the sun. There we came to a village where we met all the dead. ... From that place I came to this earth again for the third time, and here I am. (Radin, 1923)[70]

Later movements

Theosophy

The Theosophical Society, the first institution in the modern west to spread the concept of reincarnation, draws much of its inspiration from India. The idea is, according to a recent Theosophical writer, "the master-key to modern problems," including heredity.[71] In the Theosophical world-view reincarnation is the vast rhythmic process by which the soul, the part of man which belongs to the formless non-material and timeless worlds, unfolds its spiritual powers in the world and comes to know itself. It descends from sublime, free, spiritual realms and gathers experience through its effort to express itself in the world. Afterwards there is a withdrawal from the physical plane to successively higher levels of Reality, in death, a purification and assimilation of the past life. Having cast off all instruments of personal experience it stands again in its spiritual and formless nature, ready to begin its next rhythmic manifestation, every lifetime bringing it closer to complete self-knowledge and self-expression. However it may attract old mental, emotional, and energetic karma patterns to form the new personality.

Modern Christian teachings

A few modern churches indirectly address the subject through teachings about death (see Particular judgment) or consider the matter open to individual interpretation due to the few biblical references that survive. Among modern Christian-oriented teachings, the Anthroposophy of Rudolf Steiner describes the human soul as gaining new experiences in every epoch and in a variety of races or nations, searching for and even preparing a familial lineage supportive of its future life. Some events are determined by our past, others are ordained to prepare us for the future, and between these is space for human free will. Steiner wrote on the karma of historical individuals from Karl Marx to Julian the Apostate and developed exercises intended to develop a capacity to discern past lives.[72] The American mystic Edgar Cayce promoted reincarnation and karma as instruments of a loving God as well as natural laws - the purpose being to teach us certain spiritual lessons. Animals are said to have undifferentiated, "group" souls rather than individuality and consciousness.

Neopaganism

Today, most[weasel words] Wiccans, Witches, Occulists, and Modern Traditional Pagans seem to have the common belief that when one dies they do not always move on to a different plane of existence, but that they are reincarnated into another human, animal, or living creature. Some, Wiccans in particular, believe when they die they move onto a place called Summerland, temporarily, to rest and prepare for their next incarnation. Many Pagans believe that they will incarnate many lifetimes, until they have experienced all there is to experience, until they move on to a higher plane of existence. The ethnic neopagan Lithuanian faith, Romuva, accepts reincarnation as the most probable form of existence after death.

Scientology

See also: Scientology beliefs and practices.

Past reincarnation, usually termed "past lives", is a key part of the principles and practices of the Church of Scientology. Scientologists believe that the human individual is actually an immortal thetan, or spiritual entity, that has fallen into a degraded state as a result of past-life experiences. Scientology auditing is intended to free the person of these past-life traumas and recover past-life memory, leading to a higher state of spiritual awareness. This idea is echoed in their highest fraternal religious order, the Sea Organization, whose motto is "Revenimus" or "We Come Back", and whose members sign a "billion-year contract" as a sign of commitment to that ideal. L. Ron Hubbard, the founder of Scientology, does not use the word "reincarnation" to describe its beliefs, noting that: "The common definition of reincarnation has been altered from its original meaning. The word has come to mean 'to be born again in different life forms' whereas its actual definition is 'to be born again into the flesh of another body.' Scientology ascribes to this latter, original definition of reincarnation."[73]

The first writings in Scientology regarding past lives date from around 1951 and slightly earlier. In 1960, Hubbard published a book on past lives entitled Have You Lived Before This Life. In 1968 he wrote Mission Into Time, a report on a five-week sailing expedition to Sardinia, Sicily and Carthage to see if specific evidence could be found to substantiate L. Ron Hubbard's recall of incidents in his own past, centuries ago.

Parapsychological research

Main article: Reincarnation research

Ian Stevenson was best known for investigating reports of young children who had claimed to remember a past life with events that occurred during a previous life, ultimately publishing more than 2,500 case studies over the course of his lifetime. According to Stevenson, the memories normally occur between the ages of three and seven years then fade shortly afterwards; he compared the memories with reports of people known to the deceased, attempting to do so before any contact between the child and the deceased's family had occurred,[74] and searched for disconfirming evidence that could provide alternative explanations for the reports aside from reincarnation.[75] Stevenson believed that the best evidence for reincarnation was the existence of birth marks and deformities on children when they occurred at the location of fatal wounds in the deceased, but also claimed unusual behaviors such as phobias for the thing that killed the deceased, and in some cases the mother having a dream in which the deceased announces their intention to reincarnate in the child, were also evidence of reincarnation.[76][77] He conducted research on the subject throughout the world, including North and South America, Africa and Asia.[78] The vast majority of cases investigated by Stevenson's group involved people who had met some sort of violent or untimely death.[74][76] Stevenson's work tended to polarize opinion: While his supporters saw him as a misunderstood genius, others thought him gullible and superstitious.[79] Stevenson was noted for his scientific rigor,[80][81][82] but his conclusions regarding his research gained little or no support within the scientific community.[83]

Surveys in the West

Demographic survey data from 1999-2002 shows a significant minority of people from Europe and America, where there is reasonable freedom of thought and access to ideas but no outstanding recent reincarnationist tradition, believe we had a life before we were born, will survive death and be born again physically. The mean for the Nordic countries is 22%.[84] The belief in reincarnation is particularly high in the Baltic countries, with Lithuania having the highest figure for the whole of Europe, 44%. The lowest figure is in East Germany, 12%. In Russia about one-third believes in reincarnation. The effect of communist anti-religious ideas on the beliefs of the populations of Eastern Europe seems to have been rather slight, if any, except apparently in East Germany.[84] Overall 22% of respondents in Western Europe believe in reincarnation.[84]

According to a 2005 Gallup poll 20 percent of U.S. adults believe in reincarnation. Recent surveys by the Barna Group, a Christian research nonprofit organization, have found that a quarter of U.S. Christians, including 10 percent of all born-again Christians, embrace the idea.[85]

See also

Notes

  1. ^ Template:PDFlink
  2. ^ Tony Walter and Helen Waterhouse, "A Very Private Belief: Reincarnation in Contemporary England". Sociology of Religion, Vol. 60, 1999
  3. ^ “This confirms that the doctrine of transmigration is non-aryan and was accepted by non-vedics like Ajivikism, Jainism and Buddhism. The Indo-aryans have borrowed the theory of re-birth after coming in contact with the aboriginal inhabitants of India. Certainly Jainism and non-vedics [..] accepted the doctrine of rebirth as supreme postulate or article of faith.” Masih, page 37.
  4. ^ Karel Werner, The Longhaired Sage in The Yogi and the Mystic. Karel Werner, ed., Curzon Press, 1989, page 34. "Rahurkar speaks of them as belonging to two distinct 'cultural strands' ... Wayman also found evidence for two distinct approaches to the spiritual dimension in ancient India and calls them the traditions of 'truth and silence.' He traces them particularly in the older Upanishads, in early Buddhism, and in some later literature."
  5. ^ Gavin D. Flood (1996), An Introduction to Hinduism, Cambridge University - Press: UK ISBN 0521438780 - “The origin and doctrine of Karma and Samsara are obscure. These concepts were certainly circulating amongst sramanas, and Jainism and Buddhism developed specific and sophisticated ideas about the process of transmigration. It is very possible that the karmas and reincarnation entered the mainstream brahaminical thought from the sramana or the renouncer traditions.” Page 86.
  6. ^ Padmanabh S. Jaini 2001 “Collected Paper on Buddhist Studies” Motilal Banarsidass Publ 576 pages ISBN 8120817761: "Yajnavalkya’s reluctance and manner in expounding the doctrine of karma in the assembly of Janaka (a reluctance not shown on any other occasion) can perhaps be explained by the assumption that it was, like that of the transmigration of soul, of non-brahmanical origin. In view of the fact that this doctrine is emblazoned on almost every page of sramana scriptures, it is highly probable that it was derived from them." Page 51.
  7. ^ Govind Chandra Pande, (1994) Life and Thought of Sankaracarya, Motilal Banarsidass ISBN 8120811046: Early Upanishad thinkers like Yajnavalkya were acquainted with the sramanic thinking and tried to incorporate these ideals of Karma, Samsara and Moksa into the vedic thought implying a disparagement of the vedic ritualism and recognising the mendicancy as an ideal. Page 135.
  8. ^ "The sudden appearance of this theory [of karma] in a full-fledged form is likely to be due, as already pointed out, to an impact of the wandering muni-and-shramana-cult, coming down from the pre-Vedic non-Aryan time." Kashi Nath Upadhyaya, Early Buddhism and the Bhagavadgita. Motilal Banarsidass Publ., 1998, page 76.
  9. ^ Bhagavad Gita II.22, ISBN 1-56619-670-1
  10. ^ Brodd, Jefferey (2003). World Religions. Winona, MN: Saint Mary's Press. ISBN 9780884897255.
  11. ^ See Bhagavad Gita XVI.8-20
  12. ^ Rinehart, Robin, ed., Contemporary Hinduism19-21 (2004) ISBN 1-57607-905-8
  13. ^ Karel Werner, A Popular Dictionary of Hinduism 110 (Curzon Press 1994) ISBN 0-7007-0279-2
  14. ^ Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna, Translation by Swami Nikhilananda (8th Ed. 1992) ISBN 0-911206-01-9
  15. ^ Teachings of Queen Kunti by A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami, Chapter 18 "To become Brahma is not a very easy thing. Brahma is such a big post, and it is given to a very qualified living entity who is highly advanced in austerities and penance. But he is also a living entity like us."
  16. ^ Walpola Rahula, What the Buddha Taught (London: Gordon Fraser Limited, 1990), p. 51
  17. ^ Tucker, 2005, p.216
  18. ^ PTS: Miln 71-72; 82-83; 84 (Pali Canon)
  19. ^ His Holiness the Dalai Lama, How to Practice: The Way to a Meaningful Life (New York: Atria Books, 2002), p. 46
  20. ^ Rahula, p. 144
  21. ^ Bruce Matthews in Ronald Wesley Neufeldt, editor, Karma and Rebirth: Post Classical Developments. SUNY Press, 1986, page 125. Google.com
  22. ^ Transform Your Life: A Blissful Journey, pages 52-55), Tharpa Publications (2001, US ed. 2007) ISBN 978-0-9789067-4-0
  23. ^ The Five Precepts
  24. ^ Transform Your Life: A Blissful Journey, page 52), Tharpa Publications (2001, US ed. 2007) ISBN 978-0-9789067-4-0
  25. ^ Lynda Obst (2006). "Valentine to science - interview with Carl Sagan". Interview. p. 2. Retrieved 20 May 2008. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)
  26. ^ Reincarnation as understood by Sikh Religion
  27. ^ Edwards, L. (2001). A Brief Guide to Beliefs: Ideas, Theologies, Mysteries, and Movements. Westminster John Knox Press. ISBN 0664222595.
  28. ^ Encyclopedia Britannica
  29. ^ Schopenhauer, A: "Parerga und Paralipomena" (Eduard Grisebach edition), On Religion, Section 177
  30. ^ Gödel Exhibition: Gödel's Century
  31. ^ Nietzsche and the Doctrine of Metempsychosis, in J. Urpeth & J. Lippitt, Nietzsche and the Divine, Manchester: Clinamen, 2000
  32. ^ Heart of Hinduism: Reincarnation and Samsara
  33. ^ Linforth, Ivan M. (1941) The Arts of Orpheus Arno Press, New York, OCLC 514515
  34. ^ Long, Herbert S. (1948) A Study of the doctrine of metempsychosis in Greece, from Pythagoras to Plato (Long's 1942 Ph.D. dissertation) Princeton, New Jersey, OCLC 1472399
  35. ^ Long, Herbert S. (16 February 1948) "Plato's Doctrine of Metempsychosis and Its Source" The Classical Weekly 41(10): pp. 149—155
  36. ^ Schibli, S., Hermann, Pherekydes of Syros, p. 104, Oxford Univ. Press 2001
  37. ^ Reincarnation: Socrates to Salinger
  38. ^ "the souls must always be the same, for if none be destroyed they will not diminish in number." Republic X, 611. The Republic of Plato By Plato, Benjamin Jowett Edition: 3 Published by Clarendon press, 1888.
  39. ^ Menander, The Inspired Woman
  40. ^ Lucian, Gallus, 18 et seq.
  41. ^ Poesch, Jessie (1962) "Ennius and Basinio of Parma" Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 25(1/2): pp. 116—118, page 117, FN15
  42. ^ Lucretius, (i. 124)
  43. ^ Horace, Epistles, II. i. 52
  44. ^ Virgil, The Aeneid, vv. 724 et seq.
  45. ^ Bellow's translation of Helgakviða Hundingsbana II.
  46. ^ Julius Caesar, "De Bello Gallico", VI
  47. ^ M. Dillon and N. Chadwick, The Celtic Realms, Weidenfeld and Nicholson, London, passim
  48. ^ Isaac Bonewits, Bonewits's Essential Guide to Druidism, Citadel, 2006.
  49. ^ Diodorius Siculus v.28.6; Hippolytus Philosophumena i.25.
  50. ^ Donald A.Mackenzie, Buddhism in pre-Christian Britain (1928:21).
  51. ^ Reincarnation in Christianity: A New Vision of Rebirth in Christian Thought
  52. ^ see Hebrews 9:27 and Luke 16:20–31
  53. ^ Much of this is documented in R.E. Slater's book Paradise Reconsidered.
  54. ^ http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/11583b.htm
  55. ^ Steven Runciman, The Medieval Manichee: A Study of the Christian Dualist Heresy, 1982, isbn=0521289262, Cambridge University Press, The Bogomils, http://books.google.com/books?id=d1LGB7u5iD0C&printsec=frontcover&dq=mediaeval+manichee&cd=1
  56. ^ Boulting, 1914. pp. 163-64
  57. ^ Richard Foltz, Religions of the Silk Road
  58. ^ For example Dondaine, Antoine. O.P. Un traite neo-manicheen du XIIIe siecle: Le Liber de duobus principiis, suivi d'un fragment de rituel Cathare (Rome: Institutum Historicum Fratrum Praedicatorum, 1939)
  59. ^ http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/01267e.htm
  60. ^ CHAR JOOG NO CHANTO - Seeking forgiveness for sins from past lives
  61. ^ Wasserman, James (2001). The Templars and the Assassins - The Militia of Heaven. Inner Traditions International. pp. 133–137. ISBN 0-89281-859-X.
  62. ^ e.g. 3:27 "Thou [God] makest the night to pass into the day and Thou makest the day to pass into the night, and Thou bringest forth the living from the dead and Thou bringest forth the dead from the living, and Thou givest sustenance to whom Thou pleasest without measure."
  63. ^ e.g. 20:55 "From the (earth) did We Create you, and into it Shall We return you, And from it shall We Bring you out once again"
  64. ^ Mevlana Celaleddin-i Rumi - Nicholson, 1950, p. 103
  65. ^ see his To Die Before Death: The Sufi Way of Life
  66. ^ Gnostic liberation front The Sufi Message of Hazrat Inayat Khan
  67. ^ Sha'ar Ha'Gilgulim, The Gate of Reincarnations, Chaim Vital
  68. ^ From Noah's Rainbow to Isaac Newton's Prism at www.inner.org. Retrieved October 2009
  69. ^ tr. Giles 1889, p. 304
  70. ^ Jefferson, Warren (2008). Reincarnation beliefs of North American Indians : soul journeys, metamorphoses, and near-death experiences. Native Voices. ISBN 1570672121.
  71. ^ Theosophy and reincarnation
  72. ^ Steiner, various dates
  73. ^ Does Scientology believe in reincarnation or past lives?
  74. ^ a b Tucker, Jim (2005). Life before life: a scientific investigation of children's memories of previous lives. New York: St. Martin's Press. ISBN 0-312-32137-6.
  75. ^ Shroder, T (2007-02-11). "Ian Stevenson; Sought To Document Memories Of Past Lives in Children". The Washington Post.
  76. ^ a b Cadoret, R (2005). "Book Forum: Ethics, Values, and Religion - European Cases of the Reincarnation Type". The American Journal of Psychiatry. 162 (4): 823–4.
  77. ^ Rockley, R (2002-11-01). "Book Review: Children who remember previous lives, A question of reincarnation, Ian Stevenson". Skeptic Report. Retrieved 2010-03-01.
  78. ^ Carroll RT (2003). The Skeptic's Dictionary: a collection of strange beliefs, amusing deceptions, and dangerous delusions. New York: Wiley. pp. 276–7. ISBN 0-471-27242-6.
  79. ^ Fox, Margalit. Ian Stevenson Dies at 88; Studied Claims of Past Lives, The New York Times, February 18, 2007.
  80. ^ Brody, Eugene B. Research in Reincarnation and Editorial Responsibility: An Editorial, The Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease. September, 1977.
  81. ^ Lief, Harold. Commentary on Ian Stevenson’s "The Evidence of Man’s Survival After Death", The Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease.
  82. ^ Janice Hopkins Tanne. Obituaries: Ian Pretyman Stevenson, psychiatrist who researched reincarnation with scientific rigour, British Medical Journal. April 2, 2007.
  83. ^ Shroder, Tom. Ian Stevenson; Sought To Document Memories Of Past Lives in Children, The Washington Post, February 11, 2007.
  84. ^ a b c Popular psychology, belief in life after death and reincarnation in the Nordic countries, Western and Eastern Europe
  85. ^ China Regulates Buddhist Reincarnation

References

Scientific Publications

Other Publications

  • Abd-ru-shin, In the Light of Truth - The Grail Message. ISBN 1-57461-006-6
  • About Reincarnation: There are five ways to understand that we have lived before
  • Acharya, Pt. Shriram Sharma, Template:PDFlink, 1999.
  • Alegretti, Wagner, Retrocognitions: An Investigation into Memories of Past Lives and the Period Between Lives. ISBN 0-9702131-6-6, 2004.
  • Archiati, Pietro, Reincarnation in Modern Life: Toward a new Christian Awareness. ISBN 0-904693-88-0
  • Atkinson, William Walker, Reincarnation and the Law of Karma: A Study of the Old-new World-doctrine of Rebirth and Spiritual Cause and Effect, Kessinger Publishing, 1997. ISBN 0766100790.
  • Bache, Christopher M., Lifecycles, Reincarnation and the Web of Life, 1991, ISBN 1-55778-645-3
  • Besant, A.W., Reincarnation, Published by Theosophical Pub. Society, 1892.
  • Boulting, W. Giordano Bruno, His Life, Thought, and Martyrdom, London: Kegan Paul, 1914.
  • Bowman, Carol, Children's Past Lives, 1998, ISBN 0-553-57485-X
  • Bowman, Carol, Return from Heaven, 2003, ISBN 0-06-103044-9
  • Cerminara, Gina, Many Mansions: The Edgar Cayce Story on Reincarnation, 1990, ISBN 0-451-03307-8
  • Childs, Gilbert and Sylvia, Your Reincarnating Child: Welcoming a soul to the world. ISBN 1-85584-126-6
  • Doore, Gary, What Survives?, 1990, ISBN 0-87477-583-3
  • Gyatso, Geshe Kelsang Gyatso, Joyful Path of Good Fortune, pp 336–47, Tharpa Publications (2nd. ed., 1995) ISBN 978-0-948006-46-3
  • Gyatso, Geshe Kelsang Gyatso, Living Meaningfully, Dying Joyfully: The Profound Practice of Transference of Consciousness, Tharpa Publications (1999) ISBN 978-0-948006-63-0
  • Gyatso, Geshe Kelsang Gyatso, Transform Your Life Tharpa Publications pp 23–9, (2001, US ed. 2007) ISBN 978-0-9789067-4-0
  • Head, Joseph and Cranston, S.L., editors, Reincarnation: The Phoenix Fire Mystery, 1994, ISBN 0-517-56101-8
  • Jefferson, Warren. 2009. “Reincarnation Beliefs of North American Indians: Soul Journeys, Metamorphoses, and Near-Death Experiences.” Summertown, TN: Native Voices. ISBN 978-1-57067-212-5
  • Heindel, Max, The Rosicrucian Cosmo-Conception (Part I, Chapter IV: Rebirth and the Law of Consequence), 1909, ISBN 0-911274-34-0
  • Heindel, Max, The Rosicrucian Mysteries (Chapter II: The problem of Life and its solution), 1911, ISBN 0-911274-86-3
  • Heindel, Max, The Rosicrucian Fellowship, Template:PDFlink, 2001.
  • Josephus, Flavius (C.E. 66-73). George Lyons (ed.). "Book II, Chaper 8, Verse 14". wesley.nnu.edu. Retrieved 2009-11-14. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  • Leland, Kurt. Otherwhere: A Field Guide to Nonphysical Reality for the Out-of-Body Traveler. Hampton Roads Publishing (2001). ISBN 978-1571742414
  • Leland, Kurt. The Unanswered Question: Death, Near-Death, and the Afterlife. Hampton Roads Publishing (2002). ISBN 978-1571742995
  • Lönnerstrand, Sture, I Have Lived Before: The True Story of the Reincarnation of Shanti Devi, 1998, ISBN 1-886940-03-7
  • Newton, Michael, Life Between Lives: Hypnotherapy for Spiritual Regression, 2004, ISBN 0-73870-465-2
  • Newton, Michael, Destiny of Souls: New Case Studies of Life Between Lives, 2000, ISBN 1-56718-499-5
  • Nicholson, R.A. Rumi, Poet and Mystic. London: Allen & Unwin, 1950.
  • Nikhilananda, Swami. Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna, (8th Ed. 1992) ISBN 0-911206-01-9
  • Prophet, Elizabeth Clare, Erin L. Prophet, Reincarnation: The Missing Link in Christianity, 1997, ISBN 0-922729-27-1
  • Palamidessi Tommaso, The Memory of Past Lives and Its Technique, ed. Archeosofica, 1977
  • Palamidessi Tommaso, Reincarnation And Christianity
  • Ramster, Peter, In Search of Lives Past, ISBN 0-646-00021-7
  • Rinehart, Robin, ed., Contemporary Hinduism, (2004).
  • Roberts, Jane. Seth Speaks: The Eternal Validity of the Soul, (1972). ISBN 1-878424-07-6
  • Roberts, Jane. The Nature of Personal Reality. Prentice-Hall (1974). reprinted (1994) Amber-Allen Publishing. ISBN 1-878424-06-8
  • Roberts, Jane. The Oversoul Seven Trilogy. Amber-Allen Publishing (1995). ISBN 1878424173 Edition: Paperback; May 1, 1995 (originally published as three separate books: The Education of Oversoul 7 (1973). The Further Education of Oversoul Seven (1979). Oversoul Seven and the Museum of Time (1984).
  • Semkiw, Walter, Return of the Revolutionaries: The Case for Reincarnation and Soul Groups Reunited, 2003, ISBN 1-57174-342-1
  • Semkiw, Walter, Born Again: Reincarnation Cases Involving International Celebrities, India's Political Legends and Film Stars, 2006, ISBN 81-85250-37-5
  • Steiner, Rudolf, Karmic Relationships: Esoteric studies, 8 volumes, various dates, Rudolf Steiner Press. ISBN 0-85440-260-8 and others.
  • Steiner, Rudolf, Manifestations of Karma. ISBN 1-85584-058-8
  • Steiner, Rudolf, Reincarnation and Immortality. ISBN 0-8334-1706-1
  • Steiner, Rudolf, Reincarnation and Karma: Two fundamental truths of existence. ISBN 0-88010-501-1
  • Steiner, Rudolf, A Western Approach to Reincarnation and Karma: selected lectures and writings; ed. and intr. by René Querido. Hudson, NY: Anthroposophic Press, c1997, ISBN 0-88010-399-X
  • Steinpach, Richard, Hidden Connections Determine Our Earth-Life, 1988, ISBN 1-57461-013-9
  • Taylor, Michael, "Master of the Rose", Comstar Media LLC, 1997–2007, ISBN 1-933866-07-1
  • Weiss, Brian L., Only Love is real: the story of soulmates reunited, 1996, ISBN 0-446-51945-6
  • Weiss, Brian L., Many Lives, Many Masters, 1998, ISBN 0-671-65786-0
  • Werner, Karel, A Popular Dictionary of Hinduism (Curzon Press 1994) ISBN 0-7007-0279-2
  • Yarbro, Chelsea Quinn, Messages from Michael on the nature of the evolution of the human soul, 1979, ISBN 0-872235-26-2
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