Theories about god

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Postby nuit09 » March 25th, 2006, 12:31 pm

SubmissMe wrote:
If God existed then I think he keeps his existence to himself (or herself) for a reason. I think God is very interested about who would perform the leap of faith and believe in him. If you took away the ambiguity surrounding God, there would be no criteria for seperating people who have good and moral basic instincts from those who have sinful instincts. We would all act the same because we would all KNOW God existed.



You are completely supported in this by the bible in case you did not know. There are several themes that run througout the bible that are lost for a number of reasons. firstly preachers teach the bible piecemeal. secondly, the bible was written in hebrew, aramaic and ancient vernacular (as opposed to classical formal ) greek and translating them was/is problematic. the translator's letter to king James says as much.
in addition the original authors often used euphemisms figures of speech and Hebraisms to talk around certain things that happened.

Well back to the hidden themes. you probably know there was a war in heaven. But during that war less than 1/3 of the population of "heaven" stayed blameless and loyal to God. God decided that a test in which we had absolute free will was in order. he incarnated us in Flesh with no certain knowledge that God existed for real. From the very beginning God knew we would fail this test. from the beginning he had planned on sending a savior. Satan from the beginning tried to courrupt and kill the savior's blood line.
here is one of those difficulties with euphemisms. satan seduced eve *physically* as well as mentally/spiritually. Cain's lineage is listed separately from Adam's for a reason. There is additional linguitstic evidence and additional biblical support for this but it is rather long winded. Cain was satan's own offspring. cain killed able to end the savior's bloodline. Fortunately, God had allowed for that and the savior's line continued through Seth.

The flood also arose due to Cain's bloodline corrupting Jesus's bloodline toi the point where only one family remained (mostly) pure.

During the history in the OT leading up to the birth of Christ the descendant's of Cain who survived via servants and wives of Noah's family first infiltrated the priesthood and by the time of Christ they moved to kill the savior. they failed to realize the plan of salvation was for him to die, thus paying the price for all humankind and be ressurected to glory.

Throughout the NT to and especially including especially the revalation of St John, the seed of Cain continue to cause trouble. They subverted the church itself so that the majority of churches actually decieve christians with teachings that will make them follow the antichrist and miss out on the first ressurection.

Fortunately God is not the psychotic, malevalent, bastard that he is made out to be not only by nonbelievers but by christians as well. You see, after Christ comes; there is a 1000 year remedial training at the hands of Christ and the angels and the saints. during this period the unsaved can be ministered to. what rational purpose is there for ministry if there is no hope for those that are ministered to?

At the end satan will be unloosed for a brief time ( this is 1000 years after he was running rampant in the end times of the present age.) Anyone who follows him after 1000 years of ministry, after the veil of forgetfulness is removed so that they have full knowledge of what has transpired from the very beginning will be destroyed in the lake of fire.

Further; hell is not eternal torment. God is not like that. The difficulty arises from translation of verses including a hebraism. Hell is absolute final and eternal nullification of existance.

What kind of heaven would it be with hell on the front porch for eternity as you hear and smell the writhing torment of sons, daughters, mother, fathers, brothers and complete strangers and friends. How sick are some christians that savor that idea? How sick that preachers use that to control their flock with fear of it?
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Postby nuit09 » March 25th, 2006, 1:12 pm

This, though it may look like it, is not an attempt by me to prostelytize. Far be it from me in my own state of sin to do so. I am attempting to explain obscured but central themes from the bible. There are biblical mysteries to explore even as i also explore occult mysteries elsewhere. in order to do so i must cover subjects as they are presented and sometimes obscured in the bible.

The purpose of the law in the bible is not to get into heaven. there is not one of us that can follow the law perfectly and even the slightest transgression of it is punisheable by the death of our immortal soul. The purpose of the law is not salvation. it is convict us and sentence us to death. The purpose of Christ was to pay that penalty for us. Salvation is by grace; not our merits. not our following the law. no man can do it. Not one. fortunate for us because if not everyone including every sanctimonious, smug, holier than thou, hypocritical christian would be "in the Barbie" along with the worst inhuman monster. A christian is not free from sin, he is only (conditionally) free of the consequences of that sin.
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Postby charon2187 » March 25th, 2006, 1:42 pm

I personally would not tell anyone that god existed. People who talk about god either get themselves killed, get other people killed, or both.
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Postby nuit09 » March 25th, 2006, 1:46 pm

with this theme i talked about earlier every seemingly barbaric genocidal command of an angry psychopathic God is explained as a result of the struggle to maintain the bloodline of Christ against the machinations of the descendants of Cain. Seems sort of important to know information, don't you think?

Also hidden in the bible is the concept of ages. That the creation in genesis describes two events. one at the beginning of time and one at the beginning of the present age. The bible does not support that the earth is just a few thousand years old. instead it supports that before those thousands of years the earth existed for an unspecified but vast period of time.

The bible also supports that Noah's flood was regional and not world wide. The original hebrew discriminates between world, kingdom, land, kingdom, region and so on but the english translation does not. also one word was mistranslated. It read "Was" instead of "became" and this puts together two verses that should be separated by geologic epochs of time. The bible also supports that there were people before adam was created.
There was a world wide flood. it did not occur in Noah's time but millions of years earlier.

Rapture doctrine is a satan spawned abombination that will kill millions of christians spiritually.

Finally, christmas should be in autumn. the exact date of christ's conception and birth is determinable from the bible in spite of not being given explicitly. This is so because it's exact relation to John the Baptist's conception and birth is mentioned and John's dates are given. Christ was not born on December 25. He was concieved on it. So it is still worthy of celebration for that reason.
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Postby goldragon_70 » March 25th, 2006, 9:25 pm

SubmissMe wrote:I would like to think I wouldn't tell anyone either, but for different reasons.

If God existed then I think he keeps his existence to himself (or herself) for a reason. I think God is very interested about who would perform the leap of faith and believe in him. If you took away the ambiguity surrounding God, there would be no criteria for seperating people who have good and moral basic instincts from those who have sinful instincts. We would all act the same because we would all KNOW God existed.

If God didn't exist I'd probably still keep quiet about it. I think that the idea of God has priceless qualities. I'm not talking about terrorists who die in the name of their God, I'm talking about the hope and reassurance God offers to the millions and millions of people who believe in God. And that is worth more than all the fame, glory and possesions in the whole world.


I since belief in this. This is not what I believe, but still there is a belief in god being conveyed in this message.
In my dreams I once said, "Ahh, Yes, but how many minds does my one mind hold?".
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Postby SubmissMe » March 26th, 2006, 5:43 am

Nobody knows what I truly think, I just play devils advocate in order to form an argument.

I'm surprised nobody has picked up on the fact that God gives blind hope, as we are not sure of his existence. It's not the same kind of hope as in "I hope the weather will improve" where we know that there is a chance of sunshine, even if it has not been forecast.

The hope God gives is slightly more ambiguous. It is blind hope, as technically we could never understand what exactly we are hoping for. Surely this kind of blind hope only leads to disappointment and dissaray?

And if we know there is no God, and subsequently no afterlife, then worldly possessions are all we have - thus making the temptation much greater to exploit our knowledge in order for personal gain.
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Postby goldragon_70 » March 26th, 2006, 8:38 am

SubmissMe wrote:Nobody knows what I truly think, I just play devils advocate in order to form an argument.


I was about to point that out in last post, but figure beter to make you say it. :P

SubmissMe wrote:I'm surprised nobody has picked up on the fact that God gives blind hope, as we are not sure of his existence. It's not the same kind of hope as in "I hope the weather will improve" where we know that there is a chance of sunshine, even if it has not been forecast.

The hope God gives is slightly more ambiguous. It is blind hope, as technically we could never understand what exactly we are hoping for. Surely this kind of blind hope only leads to disappointment and dissaray?


There are people who do believe that. Hope is hope, why deny that it's there, it's not like hope in god really losses you anything.


SubmissMe wrote:And if we know there is no God, and subsequently no afterlife, then worldly possessions are all we have - thus making the temptation much greater to exploit our knowledge in order for personal gain.


True. You didn't seem like that either, so I was getting suspicious.
In my dreams I once said, "Ahh, Yes, but how many minds does my one mind hold?".
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Postby SubmissMe » March 26th, 2006, 12:11 pm

I'm taking sides (sometimes on something I don't agree with) In order to keep a stable argument going.

I'd hate this forum to descend into a Monty Python 5-minute argument if you know what I mean.
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Postby goldragon_70 » March 26th, 2006, 1:09 pm

The only problem is it hard to make a rational argument in either way when it come to metaphysics. There have been test that have turn up measurements of hidden forces, but in all rationality it is labeled inconclusive, because there is no physics based answer. At the same timer there are other test, that have proven people shame artist. It makes it hard for one to really trust the other for true information.
In my dreams I once said, "Ahh, Yes, but how many minds does my one mind hold?".
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Postby tnot » January 28th, 2007, 4:12 pm

there is nothing even remotley spiritual about the human experience. we are mearley the result of a universe so infinetley vast that a one in a million occurence like life can happen. if you think about it when you flip a coin theres a very very very small chance it will land on its side, but there is still a chance. if you flip the coin enough times it will eventually land that way. given enough space and time life was bound to happen. god is mearley a product of our fear of death. we fear death so much because our purpose as a race is to continue on, this most basic instinct makes us feel a need to continue our own existance past our demise giving us a greater purpose then we really have
nothing in life worth doing is easy
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Postby 9hg7u » January 28th, 2007, 4:38 pm

i don't really know if i belvie in god or not, i'm sorta 50/50 about it right now, we are just on this ball of dirt and water (earth) just going for the ride
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Postby Axiom » February 3rd, 2007, 7:36 am

The Pains of Sleep

Ere on my bed my limbs I lay,
It hath not been my use to pray
With moving lips or bended knees;
But silently, by slow degrees,
My spirit I to Love compose,
In humble trust mine eye-lids close,
With reverential resignation
No wish conceived, no thought exprest,
Only a sense of supplication;
A sense o'er all my soul imprest
That I am weak, yet not unblest,
Since in me, round me, every where
Eternal strength and Wisdom are.

by Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834)

I came across this by accident and found it very moving although I am not religious. Then I noticed that this could be a hypnotic induction so now I am wondering if prayer is a way of accessing the power of hypnosis.

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Postby Jack » February 4th, 2007, 12:31 am

SubmissMe wrote:I'm taking sides (sometimes on something I don't agree with) In order to keep a stable argument going.

I'd hate this forum to descend into a Monty Python 5-minute argument if you know what I mean.


Here's a question for you: What're your actualthoughts/beliefs/whatever on this subject so far?
"The trouble with the world is that the stupid are cocksure and the intelligent are full of doubt." Bertrand Russell
"By doing certain things certain results follow." A. Crowley, Book of Lies
"Dum spiro, spero." - Cicero
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Postby Captain_Thunder » December 31st, 2007, 7:06 am

Didn't read all 28 pages, just replying to the OP here:

I'm a big fan of reincarnation. I believe that the point of our existence is to gain knowledge, and in order to do that, we have to experience life more than once, and not just on earth, but other places as well, and in other forms.

Call me crazy, but that's essentially the philosophy I subscribe to.

I'm officially Catholic, BTW.
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Postby Blink » December 31st, 2007, 10:45 am

Captain_Thunder wrote:I'm officially Catholic, BTW.
Wow. Just... wow.

If you ever hear a priest say "heresy" and "penance" in the same sentence, run like the wind.

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Postby yaar » January 4th, 2008, 1:15 am

Simply put, I'm an atheist. In the specific matter of death, I believe that you cease to exist, totally and completely. I also think that this idea played a big part in the adoption of religion: It's extremely difficult (if not impossible) to imagine not existing, and that the notion of an afterlife was created in a response to this idea.
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Postby Aestrius » August 3rd, 2008, 8:55 pm

Mallic wrote:I believe in god, but not in the same way that Christens do. I sort of agree with what makidus says about planes, but only in the very general sence. A sort of overruleling diety, but it is far from logic (even though this is the excuse to get out of explaining it). One diety is sort of logical, but one going under differant nams is even more. Souls are equal of how many people there are in the world (with new souls being created) but a soul can chose WHERE and WHEN he get incarnated INTO. A newly concived baby doesn't have a soul, but thoughout the course of pregnacy, he/she (The baby, as souls don't have genders) may be chosen by a soul as a body on this plane. There is no hevan/hell (though there may be purgatory for unruly souls) so souls go back and come from the same plane(s)

This is my theory, but in reality (or is it?) I think each person is judged by what they could have achived in life. Red Dwarf paraphrase: Just have to lead a worthwhile life.


I think your theory doesnt support the ocncept of new life, meaning new souls would need to be created to keep up with the amount of new humans and new life, the population hasnt always been the same, so it comes down to: your theory explains a lot, including the idea of ghosts, however it lacks some logic, I like to believe in heaven, even though I dont, because I really want to bargain with god for a body that I would be happy in, instead of this ugly old human body. damn humans.
My physical body is only limited by my imagination.
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Postby bigC » February 26th, 2009, 2:47 pm

Well, i have a theory. Let's take a look at God from a scientific stand point. We move in 4 dimensions, up/down, left/right, forward/back, and constantly forward through time. God would have to be a being that transcends the fourth dimension, therefore existing outside of time. He would therefore be able to have existed before time began. In this higher dimensional existence, this being has the power to manipulate space and time, so he creates a Universe. In that universe, he sets events in motion that lead to the birth of many diverse people, places, things and ideas. He loves all of these things that were created because they are in a sense, his offspring.

A common misunderstanding about God is that he hates non-christians, this is entirely untrue. He loves every last person, all he wants is that they acknowledge him.

Wouldn't it just suck if your children didn't believe you cared, or even existed?

Also, please people, do NOT use christians as your example for what God is like, Christians are just people, and they are flawed like everyone else. Many Christians (at least the ones who actually get attention) are very hypocritical and don't even understand what they are preaching about.

This is just my own personal feeling, but i think it would actually take more faith for me to be an atheist than to be a Christian. If I'm an Atheist, and it turns out i'm wrong... oh shit. If I'm Christian and it turns out i'm wrong... Oh well.
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Postby Follower » March 21st, 2009, 6:30 pm

If I'm an Atheist, and it turns out i'm wrong... oh shit. If I'm Christian and it turns out i'm wrong... Oh well.


Pascal's Wager, huh?

It makes sense, from a logical standpoint, but if you take into consideration what it really means, I don't think it serves the Christian faith all that well.

If one were only to believe in the divinity of Christ so he/she recieved a one-way ticket to Heaven, and they had no other reason for believing, is that truth faith?

I've come to believe over the years that Christianity is all about the concept of love. That God is love and that through him we can show love to others. Love is the binding force which allows people to define themselves by forming healthy relationships with others. By knowing other people, I can thus percieve myself through their eyes, and grow in my knowledge and understanding of not only myself, but their attitude and character as well. Relationships are the meaning of life, because without relationships, we have no substance and/or identity.

Sorry, I got on an existential rant there. But, as you can see, I'm a Christian. I believe that there's a Heaven and Hell, and that through Christ we are linked to God.
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Postby hypnointerest » March 22nd, 2009, 10:44 am

Pascal's Wager sickens me. If I'm Christian and it turns out i'm wrong..... This is not an oh well. This is an entire wasted life, holding back for something that doesn't exist. Denying yourself your most base urges and desires without any tangible reason whatsoever for all your years. Never trying anything new or dangerous or fun that may be considered a "sin" by a 2000 year old carpenter who was just trying to tell you "Don't be a dick. That is all." It takes a very slanted person to come up with such a ridiculous argument and a submissive, dependent person to believe it has actual merit.


The very nature of the wager is to designed to make you fear hell.
Christians are kept scared their entire life, not wanting to burn in their god's hell. This is the ONLY reason. Your all compassionate lord will throw you in the bbq if you are naughty. Hypothetically, if I believed in an omniscient, omnipresent godhead, they would be beyond such barbaric punishments. An all knowing being would not condemn you to an eternity of suffering because you enjoyed yourself while you were alive or did not pray enough. These are just the words of old men trying to scare you into religious servitude. Christianity teaches that even a good person can not get into heaven without becoming a Christian? REALLY?

Don't even try to tell me that Christianity is the only way to true morality. I know numerous people of different faiths that are so much closer to true morality that it makes the abuse of Christian dogma to keep the sheep subservient so much more sickening... if it weren't so sad they were wasting their life and shielding themselves from some of the most rewarding events they could experience.


Now that I've complained, I'll tell you my background.

Churchgoer until 18 when I was able to leave my house and make my own decisions. Christianity can be a decent guide to morality for some but more often than not is simply a tool to spread fear and demand obedience.
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Postby Follower » March 22nd, 2009, 11:49 am

hypnointerest wrote:Pascal's Wager sickens me. If I'm Christian and it turns out i'm wrong..... This is not an oh well. This is an entire wasted life, holding back for something that doesn't exist.


Of course, you'll be dead by this time, so you won't really care. :wink:

But I do agree with you. I dislike the notion of Pascal's Wager because it builds faith based on fear, and I don't think that qualifies as a reasonable reason for one's entire lifeview.

hypnointerest wrote:Churchgoer until 18 when I was able to leave my house and make my own decisions. Christianity can be a decent guide to morality for some but more often than not is simply a tool to spread fear and demand obedience.


I'm not going to deny that you're wrong. You're probably right in more cases than not. Christianity is a much abused religion. Not only through the believers themselves, but also through the outsiders looking in. Many people blame it for countless acts of geonicde throughout the years without taking the time to look at the core root of the problem. Men are going to corrupt any system of religion or values that one creates. They are capable of twisting a doctrine of love into one of hate and fear.

Don't even try to tell me that Christianity is the only way to true morality. I know numerous people of different faiths that are so much closer to true morality that it makes the abuse of Christian dogma to keep the sheep subservient so much more sickening... if it weren't so sad they were wasting their life and shielding themselves from some of the most rewarding events they could experience.


Do I believe this? Nope. I'm going to admit that there's a lot of people out there that are not Christians that embody the Christian lifestyle moreso than Christians do. And that's just sad.

It doesn't seem fair that these people should have to burn in Hell while Christians who hate and strike fear into people's hearts should get an eternity in paradise. Honest to God, I don't know how it works, but I don't think that a justifiable and good God would do this. Do I know the answers? No. Because people are the only way left to interpret the Bible, and the Bible was written by people in the beginning.

I know you might the idea of Blind Faith, but it's a bit redudant, don't you think? Faith is the ability to believe in something you have no tangible proof of, something you can't point to with a finger and say, "Look, this is why this is true." I'm not going to spend my life following a religion which I believe to be false, and if I come across something which directs me towards something else, then by all means, if that relgion or belief system makes more sense to me, then I'll choose that. I hate the concept of believing in a lie. Of following something you can't devote your whole soul to. I'm an existentialist; it comes with the territory.

Anyways, I'm glad that people here are able to hold mature discussions without breaking out in insults and flames. It's good to know that mature forums on the internet still exist.
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Postby hypnointerest » March 22nd, 2009, 5:00 pm

I'd also like to clarify that I was attacking those who would use religion for selfish reasons, not true followers of a faith, and I hope I didn't come across as to antagonistic.
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Postby 1love » June 16th, 2009, 7:46 am

Life as we know it, reality in our perception, is more or less like a tv channel that operates on a certain frequency. This is actually true as all matter in this universe oscillates in a certain range of frequencies. Who knows how many their are. Id say we are on channel three, due to the obvios limitations of our 3 dimensional life. Yes lets call these channels dimensions.
Now these dimensions operate on a frequency, Everything in our dimension operates on the same range. If the didn't well they just wouldn't exist in our dimension.
once you die you have no three dimensional body anymore so your free to go up a dimension or down one.
Now on to emotions. If you have measured the brain wave frequency of a positive emotion and a negative emotion, youll find the the more positive the emotion the higher the frequency. Obviosly the more negative an emotion the lower the frequency. Wich brings me back the the when you die part. When you die, everyone knows you see your life flash before you. now if you are content with the life you have led and have a POSITIVE emotional experiance about it, Then you will ascend to a higher dimention. If you are so so and want to try again. you reincarnate in the same dimension. If you were a horrible person and only experience pain and regret, You go down. Like a game of snakes and ladders.
With all of that out of the way i get to my final point. You may think yourself as unimportant, that there is an external god judging your actions. The only person that can truly judge you is your self, as you are god. YOU ARE GOD. you come from the matter of the universe. Therefore you are a part of the universe. You are the universe. And can you guess who you are In the very highest dimension?
You are god, you are the universe. you are everything that exists on any plane or dimention, every atom every being, every blade of grass.
That is who you truely are.
I experienced the higher dimension once. It was glorious and i lttle disorientating once i came back. Everything merged and became one. Everything. Its was like my consciousness had expanded to everything, and then when i came back i was left in the limitations of a 3rd dimention. Ive never felt quite the same since it happened.
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Postby stephiebaby » October 28th, 2009, 12:11 am

Theories abound, but they all begin at the wrong place, they all begin with the assumption of a god or gods. It is wrong to make this assumption since all ideas of gods do not come from facts, but from known errors in attempting to understand the world. The original gods were the sun and moon, but knowledge has shown us these celestial objects are not godly beings. But from this ignorance all gods have sprung, so know people indoctrinated as children do not ask whether god exists, or how people developed gods, they simply assume god(s) exists and attempt to interpret the nature of this assumption as though it is an actual entity.
The fact is all religions are formed from fear, ignorance and desire. Fear of death, fear of not knowing something and the fear that what you do not understand may hurt you, ignorance of the world (universe) and how it works, and the fear of being ignorant which makes many people prefer to make things up rather than admit their limitations, limitations which they share with everyone else but still cannot admit to themselves. And of course desire. Desire to never die, desire to know everything (or be the favoured pet of a being that knows everything), desire for foregiveness for everything one feels guilty of through ones life, and the desire to have all evil punished and all good rewarded (standards of good and evil decided by the individuals beliefs).


"What do you think happens after life"

Decomposition. It's not just a thought, it's a fact.


"But of course, if God is your belief, I can't judge, I can't tell you you're wrong."

Actually you can't go knocking on peoples doors to shove your ideas down their throat. In discussions such as this it is up to those with fragile beliefs to stay away. These are the times you can tell it like it is and it is their problem if they don't like it.


"God is there. He's quite real."

You believe but can never prove. Your claim is no different to a little kid and santa. And don't forget that if your god is real, then everyone else's gods must be real too. Since gods contradict themselves within their own religion, multiple gods from multiple religions would cause so much contradiction that the laws of physics would cease to apply and the universe would collapse in on itself. Our existence goes a long way to disprove the existence of our gods.


"Sure He helps out when it's needed"

Again, something you cannot prove, and something which is very easy to disprove. Observation shows us that no god, religion or ritual influences the indifferent universe (outside of the placebo effect of course). If you had gone with an indifferent god who created everything then played no part you would have the only theory of god which is at all possible. But it would also be a useless god, because people invented gods to pretend they could interfere. A non interferring god defeats the purpose of believing in a god in the first place.


"Why is it set that way? Damned if I know. But it is, and it's something I'm sure of for various reasons which I won't ever discuss "

You don't need to discuss them, they will be very typical of believers personal anecdotes, and completely useless to anyone but yourself and other hardcore believers. Just like magic and psychics, your "proof" is only good for your own mind, not reality.


" and fear inspired good conduct just as effectively as did faith"

That is the fantasy/theory, but it is a long way from reality. Fear inspires more fear, and corruption. Fear leads to the local religious leader being a dictator, absolute power corrupts absolutely. And any bad conduct that can be justified, immediately becomes good conduct. Read the christian bible, lots of murder, rape and slavery in there. Though modern christians tend to be very selective about what the word of god really is. Law and real life consequences does no less than religion, and usually a lot more. Look around the world at the societies ruled by law and those ruled by religious fear. People are not perfect, but I know where I'd rather be.
Religion gave the early shaman/witchdoctor power, plain and simple. The shaman could overrule the strongest warrior, the wisest elder, the most effective leader. Power through manipulation of the masses instead of accomplishments. That is what religion gave societies.


"Man needed a reward in return for behaving,"

Yes, and it was social living which gave those rewards, while we dragged religion into new eras. Social living gave us protection, from the elements, predators and other tribes. Social living also allowed population growth to reach a critical mass where knowledge could grow. These are the kinds of rewards we gained, religion was a ball and chained we progressed in spite of, not because of. social living also gave the opportunity for the parasite of religion.


"Think of neo-tech as evolving. All humans have already evolved from an ape-like mind, and neo-tech claims that there is another evolution. This new level, if you get there, will bring you power, money, and women. The most important part is the power"

This is a religion, and like all religions it is based on fear, ignorance and desire. The basic fears of death and ignorance, the ignorance of not understanding evolution and the desire for power, money and women. It's got a pseudo science, instant karma kind of feel to it.
Humans are evolving as a species, evolution is a constant process, not a steps and stages event based process. Also evolution happens to the species, not the individual. You cannot evolve, you are what you are and you will die that way, just the same as everyone else.


"My main thrust there was that even if there is a God, why is Man so arrogant as to assume that God cares about him at all? Maybe we as a species constitute the pimple on the ass of universe-wide progress. It may be only our self-awareness and self-absorption that have caused us to place ourselves so near the hypothetical center. LOL, a narcissist, I am not."

You are on the right track. It is our ignorance and desire which made us think we were the centre of the universe, and why we made up gods who favoured us and looked after us. You might like this poem "The Man and The Flea" by John Gay.


"As I said before, neo-tech claims that there is yet another evolution that we as humans are to go through. "

The fact is our species is doomed to extinction. Either we will die off, the planet will suffer an extinction level event, or we will evolve into another species. But this process is slow and ongoing. Also the next humanoid evolving from us will be remarkably like us. It will not be like Stargate's ascension. The massive change you are dreaming of would take a ver long time, and would be several species removed from us, not the next one. This neotech idea seem very similar to dying and becoming an angel, just using some pseudo science to convey the same concept.

"because I believe it is true, and I want to evolve ahead of the pack. This may sound weird"

Not at all, it sounds very normal. It is in fact still abnormal to be able to think beyond those desires typical of religious people such as yourself. That is actually the new evolution you are referring to, the ability to think instead of believe. But it will be centuries before we are in the majority. It's no magical leap forward, just an improvement on the ability to think. And it's not that new either.


"All thought takes on form whether here on the physical or astral or otherwise. An example would be for me, I wished I would die when I was in high school, I got cancer about 3 months later. "

Many teenagers have suicidal thoughts, very few get life threatening injuries or illnesses. This is another flaw of believers, the world is all about them. Personal anecdotes, beliefs and desires will have more weight in their "theories" than the rest of observable reality combined. That kind of bias just doesn't work, especially when one considers things like the ego and memory.


"I believed the cancer was going away, I told myself everyday, guess what happened "

It's called the placebo effect and it can be very powerful, especially on some individuals. Of course there are many more cases were belief and positive thinking had no impact on the disease. Also you may have gone into remission even if you were severly depressed, you do not know if your frame of mind had any effect (though it probably helped to some degree).


"The more people that believe in the same thing, the more powerful the entity becomes. That would likely make the Christian god most powerful"

Not even close. Many more people believe in reincarnation of one form or another than a christian style mythology.


"They're all real like I've said before. But they are real because we believe they are real. They are capable of incredible things because we made them capable of incredible things. When we worship them we give them power. When we give them power they empower us and that is how miracles are made."

Except they have no power. Throughout history people have been slaughtered while their gods did nothing. Strength of belief does not give the god power. Weapons and strategy will defeat faith in overwhelming numbers, as history has proven time and time again. While we cannot give gods power, the gods we create can take power from us, again as history has proven time and time again. Early christians used to destroy pagan god statues to prove their god was stronger, and to take power from the pagans. Alexander used religion and propaganda to defeat enemies without drawing a sword.
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Postby DrFier » March 13th, 2013, 12:13 am

I think similarly, but in the opposite direction; One mind, driven mad in solitude. In a sense, we are all God, and he is none of us.
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Postby d-cell-x » March 30th, 2013, 10:31 am

Why don't you try to study all the religions in this world, and then decide if one of them is true or none, and then make your decision.
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Postby Glasnerven » March 30th, 2013, 3:04 pm

You could also look for religions which have empirical evidence outside of their sacred texts to support them. :lol:
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Postby Chibi » June 17th, 2013, 9:23 am

My beliefs about God and the afterlife are complex and rooted firmly in deductive logic, mathematics and evidence.

And yes, I do think the Bible is probably true. For a period of time I liked the Bhagavad Gita too, but there's less information about it for me to check if it is a reliable source.

By definition, there is simply no difference between a monotheistic God and reality iself. Both are omnipresent, all powerful, self limiting, capable of reason, etc. So regardless of Religion I will always believe in atleast a God.

Because it is impossible for 0 + 0 to make 1, I conclude that peices of consciousness must exist in matter necesserily for us to have become conscious. Eg, an oxygen atome contains atleast a peice of consciousness. And when the "big crunch" occurs all consciousness will come back together and become God united again, aka the afterlife.

So yeah.
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Postby robindf1 » June 18th, 2013, 3:24 pm

I don't believe in an afterlife or a god, as an agnostic atheist, blah blah blah, not enough evidence to support blah blah blah.
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Postby Glasnerven » July 4th, 2013, 3:28 am

Because it is impossible for 0 + 0 to make 1, I conclude that peices of consciousness must exist in matter necesserily for us to have become conscious. Eg, an oxygen atome contains atleast a peice of consciousness.


By this logic, a single silicon atom must have at least "a piece" of the ability to run Skyrim, because my computer can do it.

Also, a single piston from your car (not down to the level of atoms) must have some ability to drive along the road, since your whole car can do it. You could try that; just put a naked piston on the road and see what top speed you can get out of it.

Basically, your conclusion does NOT follow from your premise. It's entirely possible for a system to have capabilities that none of the parts have individually. It's entirely possible for a brain to have the capability of thinking when none of the atoms or even individual neurons can think.
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Postby Chibi » July 9th, 2013, 5:14 pm

It does follow, but it is not easy to explain.

In the end, if it is not true then you are claiming that consciousness literally came from things completely devoid of consciousness. Which is literally the equivalent of saying 0 + 0 = 1. Do you believe that anything can come from that which does not exist (0)?

Can't a single silicon atom run skyrim? Do we understand enough about nature to say it doesn't already in a parallel universe kind of way? At best surely we don't know?

Either way, it is safe to say that the ability to pass all of the information for skyrim must exist in particles for them to pass through/by them to begin with. Even if not all at once.

I'm not saying they are always fully conscious, and I'm not saying they can always pass full amounts of information for a skyrim game, or always carry a human being a long distance. However the ability to do it is there, even if on varying scales at varying times.

And in the end, consciousness is just one of those things that are hard to judge by nature (We barely even know that each other are conscious), but mathematics however is meant to be absolute, and math does imply that it takes fragments of something to produce something.
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Postby Tangy » July 10th, 2013, 10:15 am

makidas wrote:Soon as the title of this thread is "Theories about god," here's my theory. All thought takes on form whether here on the physical or astral or otherwise. An example would be for me, I wished I would die when I was in high school, I got cancer about 3 months later. I believed the cancer was going away, I told myself everyday, guess what happened (which is sort of what drew me to hypnosis, but that's another story). In any case all thought takes on form somewhere. So with that in mind here goes, man created god. All gods from all religions exist. The more people that believe in the same thing, the more powerful the entity becomes. That would likely make the Christian god most powerful, not to say that makes other gods less relevant. I believe in the Christian god, but I do not worship him because I know he is man made, just like I believe in the Egyptian gods and godesses. As a matter of fact, I don't pay much tribute to any gods except myself. Now I'm not saying I'm a god persay, but I am saying that we are all our own gods and paying tribute to yourself (treating yourself for your accomplishments) is a good thing. Nothing pisses me off more than when someone accomplishes something great and then says "Thank god," or when I do something for someone, say I give them a gift and they say, "Thank god." How about being thankful to yourself? Or me for that matter. I'm not so arrogant to worship myself or to expect much of anything from anyone, but when people go to church or a sinagog or a temple etc. they are not worshipping the true god. They are worshipping a god that they created together collectively. Each god has it's own powers and methods etc. They're all real like I've said before. But they are real because we believe they are real. They are capable of incredible things because we made them capable of incredible things. When we worship them we give them power. When we give them power they empower us and that is how miracles are made. I'm probably forgetting something, but there is my ever changing theory. Great thread Mallic. :wink:



Heaven or hell there is no in-betweens if there are show me proof.

I will be more open minded about this Theory of reincarnation here is something interesting I found on the internet give you something to look at and make a decision for yourself. :o :o see below >>>>>
Reincarnation


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For other uses, see Reincarnation (disambiguation).

"Past lives" redirects here. For other uses, see Past Lives (disambiguation).





Reincarnation in Hindu art


It has been suggested that Pre-existence be merged into this article. (Discuss) Proposed since January 2013.

Reincarnation is the religious or philosophical concept that the soul or spirit, after biological death, begins a new life in a new body that may be human, animal or spiritual depending on the moral quality of the previous life's actions. This doctrine is a central tenet of the Indian religions.[1] It is also a common belief of other religions such as Druidism, Spiritism, Theosophy, and Eckankar and is found in many tribal societies around the world, in places such as Siberia, West Africa, North America, and Australia.[2]

Although the majority of sects within the Abrahamic religions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam do not believe that individuals reincarnate, particular groups within these religions do refer to reincarnation; these groups include the mainstream historical and contemporary followers of Kabbalah, the Cathars[citation needed], the Druze[3] and the Rosicrucians.[4] The historical relations between these sects and the beliefs about reincarnation that were characteristic of Neoplatonism, Orphism, Hermeticism, Manicheanism and Gnosticism of the Roman era, as well as the Indian religions has been the subject of recent scholarly research.[5]

In recent decades, many Europeans and North Americans have developed an interest in reincarnation.[6] Contemporary films, books, and popular songs frequently mention reincarnation. In the last decades, academic researchers have begun to explore reincarnation and published reports of children's memories of earlier lives in peer-reviewed journals and books.



Contents
[hide] 1 Conceptual definitions
2 History 2.1 Origins
2.2 Early Jainism, Hinduism and Buddhism
2.3 Early Greece
2.4 Classical Antiquity
2.5 The Celts
2.6 Judaism
2.7 Taoism
2.8 Middle Ages 2.8.1 Norse mythology

2.9 Renaissance and Early Modern period
2.10 19th to 20th centuries

3 Reincarnation research
4 Reincarnation in the West
5 Contemporary religious philosophies 5.1 Hinduism 5.1.1 Reasons for Reincarnation

5.2 Jainism
5.3 Buddhism
5.4 Sant mystics and Sikhism
5.5 African Vodun
5.6 Islam
5.7 Judaism
5.8 Native American nations
5.9 Christianity
5.10 New religious movements 5.10.1 Theosophy
5.10.2 Eckankar
5.10.3 Scientology
5.10.4 Meher Baba


6 In popular culture
7 See also
8 References
9 Further reading
10 External links


Conceptual definitions[edit]





Temple door depicting Dashavatar-the ten avatars, Sree Balaji Temple, Goa. (from leftmost upper corner, clock wise) Matsya, Narasimha, Parashurama, Rama, Krishna, Kalki, Vamana, Balarama, Varaha and Kurma.
The word "reincarnation" derives from Latin, literally meaning, "entering the flesh again". The Greek equivalent metempsychosis (????????????) roughly corresponds to the common English phrase "transmigration of the soul" and also usually connotes reincarnation after death,[7] as either human, animal, though emphasising the continuity of the soul, not the flesh. The term has been used by modern philosophers such as Kurt Gödel[8] and has entered the English language. Another Greek term sometimes used synonymously is palingenesis, "being born again".[9]

There is no word corresponding exactly to the English terms "rebirth", "metempsychosis", "transmigration" or "reincarnation" in the traditional languages of P?li and Sanskrit. The entire universal process that gives rise to the cycle of death and rebirth, governed by karma, is referred to as Samsara[10] while the state one is born into, the individual process of being born or coming into the world in any way, is referred to simply as "birth" (j?ti). Devas (gods) may also die and live again.[11] Here the term "reincarnation" is not strictly applicable, yet Hindu gods are said to have reincarnated (see Avatar): Lord Vishnu is known for his ten incarnations, the Dashavatars. Celtic religion seems to have had reincarnating gods also. Many Christians regard Jesus as a divine incarnation. Some Christians and Muslims believe he and some prophets may incarnate again. Most Christians, however, believe that Jesus will come again in the Second Coming at the end of the world, although this is not a reincarnation. Some ghulat Shi'a Muslim sects also regard their founders as in some special sense divine incarnations (hulul).

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. The Buddha lived at a time of great philosophical creativity in India when many conceptions of the nature of life and death were proposed. Some were materialist, holding that there was no existence and that the self is annihilated upon death. Others believed in a form of cyclic existence, where a being is born, lives, dies and then is reborn, but in the context of a type of determinism or fatalism in which karma played no role. Others were "eternalists", postulating an eternally existent self or soul comparable to that in Judaic monotheism: the ?tman survives death and reincarnates as another living being, based on its karmic inheritance. This is the idea that has become dominant (with certain modifications) in modern Hinduism.

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. The actual process of change from one life to the next is called punarbhava (Sanskrit) or punabbhava (P?li), literally "becoming again", or more briefly bhava, "becoming", and some English-speaking Buddhists prefer the term "rebirth" or "re-becoming" to render this term as they take "reincarnation" to imply a fixed entity that is reborn.[12] Popular Jain cosmology and Buddhist cosmology as well as a number of schools of Hinduism posit rebirth in many worlds and in varied forms. In Buddhist tradition the process occurs across five or six realms of existence,[13] including the human, any kind of animal and several types of supernatural being. It is said in Tibetan Buddhism that it is very rare for a person to be reborn in the immediate next life as a human.[14]

Gilgul, Gilgul neshamot or Gilgulei Ha Neshamot (Heb. ????? ??????) refers to the concept of reincarnation in Kabbalistic Judaism, found in much Yiddish literature among Ashkenazi Jews. Gilgul means "cycle" and neshamot is "souls". The equivalent Arabic term is tanasukh:[15] the belief is found among Shi'a ghulat Muslim sects.

History[edit]

Origins[edit]

The origins of the notion of reincarnation are obscure. They apparently date to the Iron Age (around 1200 BCE).[16] Discussion of the subject appears in the philosophical traditions of India (including the Indus Valley) and Greece (including the Asia Minor) from about the 6th century BCE. Also during the Iron Age, the Greek Pre-Socratics discussed reincarnation, and the Celtic Druids are also reported to have taught a doctrine of reincarnation.[17]

The ideas associated with reincarnation may have arisen independently in different regions, or they might have spread as a result of cultural contact. Proponents of cultural transmission have looked for links between Iron Age Celtic, Greek and Vedic philosophy and religion,[18] some[who?] even suggesting that belief in reincarnation was present in Proto-Indo-European religion.[dubious – discuss][19] In ancient European, Iranian and Indian agricultural cultures, the life cycles of birth, death, and rebirth were recoginized as a replica of natural agricultural cycles.[20]

Early Jainism, Hinduism and Buddhism[edit]

Patrick Olivelle asserts that the origin of the concept of the cycle of birth and death, the concept of samsara, and the concept of liberation in the Indian tradition, were in part the creation of the non-Vedic Shramana tradition.[21] Another possibility are the prehistoric Dravidian traditions of South India.[22] Some scholars suggest that the idea is original to the Buddha.[23]

In Jainism, the soul and matter are considered eternal, uncreated and perpetual. There is a constant interplay between the two, resulting in bewildering cosmic manifestations in material, psychic and emotional spheres around us. This led to the theories of transmigration and rebirth. Changes but not total annihilation of spirit and matter is the basic postulate of Jain philosophy. The life as we know now, after death therefore moves on to another form of life based on the merits and demerits it accumulated in its current life. The path to becoming a supreme soul is to practice non-violence and be truthful.[24]

In Hinduism, the holy book Rigveda, the oldest extant Indo-Aryan text, numerous references are made to rebirths,[25] although it portrays reincarnation as "redeaths" (punarmrtyu).[citation needed] One verse reads, "Each death repeats the death of the primordial man (purusa), which was also the first sacrifice" (RV 10:90).[26] Another excerpt from the Rig Veda states (Book 10 Part 02, Hymn XVI):
Burn him not up, nor quite consume him, Agni: let not his body or his skin be scattered. O Jatavedas, when thou hast matured him, then send him on his way unto the Fathers... let thy fierce flame, thy glowing splendour, burn him With thine auspicious forms, o Jatavedas, bear this man to the region of the pious... Again, O Agni, to the Fathers send him who, offered in thee, goes with our oblations. Wearing new life let him increase his offspring: let him rejoin a body, Jatavedas.[citation needed][27]
Indian discussion of reincarnation enters the historical record from about the 6th century BCE, with the development of the Advaita Vedanta tradition in the early Upanishads (around the middle of the first millennium BCE), Gautama Buddha (623-543 BCE)[28] as well as Mahavira, the 24th Tirthankara of Jainism.[29]

The systematic attempt to attain first-hand knowledge of past lives has been developed in various ways in different places. The early Buddhist texts discuss techniques for recalling previous births, predicated on the development of high levels of meditative concentration.[30] The later Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, which incorporated elements of Buddhist thought,[31] give similar instructions on how to attain the ability.[32] The Buddha reportedly warned that this experience can be misleading and should be interpreted with care.[33] Tibetan Buddhism has developed a unique "science" of death and rebirth, a good deal of which is set down in what is popularly known as The Tibetan Book of the Dead.

Early Greece[edit]

Early Greek discussion of the concept likewise dates to the 6th century BCE. An early Greek thinker known to have considered rebirth is Pherecydes of Syros (fl. 540 BCE).[34] His younger contemporary Pythagoras (c. 570–c. 495 BCE[35]), its first famous exponent, instituted societies for its diffusion. Plato (428/427–348/347 BCE) presented accounts of reincarnation in his works, particularly the Myth of Er.

Authorities have not agreed on how the notion arose in Greece: sometimes Pythagoras is said to have been Pherecydes' pupil, sometimes to have introduced it with the doctrine of Orphism, a Thracian religion that was to be important in the diffusion of reincarnation, or else to have brought the teaching from India. In Phaedo, Plato makes his teacher Socrates, prior to his death, state: "I am confident that there truly is such a thing as living again, and that the living spring from the dead." However Xenophon does not mention Socrates as believing in reincarnation and Plato may have systematised Socrates' thought with concepts he took directly from Pythagoreanism or Orphism.





A 2nd-century Roman sarcophagus shows the mythology and symbolism of the Orphic and Dionysiac Mystery schools. Orpheus plays his lyre to the left
Classical Antiquity[edit]

See also: metempsychosis

The Orphic religion, which taught reincarnation, first appeared in Thrace in north-eastern Greece and Bulgaria, about the 6th century BC, organized itself into mystery schools at Eleusis and elsewhere, and produced a copious literature.[36][37][38] 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.

An association between Pythagorean philosophy and reincarnation was routinely accepted throughout antiquity. In the Republic Plato makes Socrates tell 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. 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.

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.

In Greco-Roman thought, the concept of metempsychosis disappeared with the rise of Early Christianity, reincarnation being incompatible with the Christian core doctrine of salvation of the faithful after death. It has been suggested that some of the early Church Fathers, especially Origen still entertained a belief in the possibility of reincarnation, but evidence is tenuous, and the writings of Origen as they have come down to us speak explicitly against it.[45]

Some early Christian Gnostic sects professed reincarnation. The Sethians and followers of Valentinus believed in it.[46] 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)

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 AD. Noting Mani's early travels to the Kushan Empire and other Buddhist influences in Manichaeism, Richard Foltz[47] attributes Mani's teaching of reincarnation to Buddhist influence. However the inter-relation of Manicheanism, Orphism, Gnosticism and neo-Platonism is far from clear.

The Celts[edit]

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:[48]

“ 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. ”

Judaism[edit]

In Judaism, Rabbi Isaac Luria was said to know the past lives of each person through his semi-prophetic abilities. This was also true of the Baal Shem Tov, Rabbi Nachman of Breslov, the Seer of Lublin, and other Hasidic masters and Sefardic Kabbalists.[citation needed]

Taoism[edit]

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 BC) 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."[49]

Middle Ages[edit]

Around the 11–12th century several reincarnationist movements were persecuted as heresies, through the establishment of the Inquisition in the Latin west. These included the Cathar, Paterene or Albigensian church of western Europe, the Paulician movement, which arose in Armenia,[50] and the Bogomils in Bulgaria.[51]

Christian sects such as the Bogomils and the Cathars, who professed reincarnation and other gnostic beliefs, were referred to as "Manichean", and are today sometimes described by scholars as "Neo-Manichean".[52] 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.[53]

Norse mythology[edit]





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 poem 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 may have been commonplace among the Norse 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.[54]

Renaissance and Early Modern period[edit]

While reincarnation has been a matter of faith in some communities from an early date it has also frequently been argued for on principle, as Plato does when he argues that the number of souls must be finite because souls are indestructible,[55] Benjamin Franklin held a similar view.[56] Sometimes such convictions, as in Socrates' case, arise from a more general personal faith, at other times from anecdotal evidence such as Plato makes Socrates offer in the Myth of Er.

During the Renaissance translations of Plato, the Hermetica and other works fostered new European interest in reincarnation. Marsilio Ficino[57] argued that Plato's references to reincarnation were intended allegorically, Shakespeare made fun[58] but Giordano Bruno was burned at the stake by authorities after being found guilty of heresy by the Roman Inquisition for his teachings.[59] But the Greek philosophical works remained available and, particularly in north Europe, were discussed by groups such as the Cambridge Platonists.

19th to 20th centuries[edit]

See also: Reincarnation research





American psychologist and philosopher William James (1842 - 1910) was an early psychical researcher.[60]
By the 19th century the philosophers Schopenhauer[61] and Nietzsche[62] could access the Indian scriptures for discussion of the doctrine of reincarnation, which recommended itself to the American Transcendentalists Henry David Thoreau, Walt Whitman and Ralph Waldo Emerson and was adapted by Francis Bowen into Christian Metempsychosis.[63]

By the early 20th century, interest in reincarnation had been introduced into the nascent discipline of psychology, largely due to the influence of William James, who raised aspects of the philosophy of mind, comparative religion, the psychology of religious experience and the nature of empiricism.[64] James was influential in the founding of the American Society for Psychical Research (ASPR) in New York City in 1885, three years after the British Society for Psychical Research (SPR) was inaugurated in London,[60] leading to systematic, critical investigation of paranormal phenomena.

At this time popular awareness of the idea of reincarnation was boosted by the Theosophical Society's dissemination of systematised and universalised Indian concepts and also by the influence of magical societies like The Golden Dawn. Notable personalities like Annie Besant, W. B. Yeats and Dion Fortune made the subject almost as familiar an element of the popular culture of the west as of the east. By 1924 the subject could be satirised in popular children's books.[65]

Théodore Flournoy was among the first to study a claim of past-life recall in the course of his investigation of the medium Hélène Smith, published in 1900, in which he defined the possibility of cryptomnesia in such accounts.[66] Carl Gustav Jung, like Flournoy based in Switzerland, also emulated him in his thesis based on a study of cryptomnesia in psychism. Later Jung would emphasise the importance of the persistence of memory and ego in psychological study of reincarnation: "This concept of rebirth necessarily implies the continuity of personality... (that) one is able, at least potentially, to remember that one has lived through previous existences, and that these existences were one's own...."[63] Hypnosis, used in psychoanalysis for retrieving forgotten memories, was eventually tried as a means of studying the phenomenon of past life recall.

Reincarnation research[edit]

Main article: Reincarnation research

Psychiatrist Ian Stevenson, from the University of Virginia, investigated many reports of young children who claimed to remember a past life. He conducted more than 2,500 case studies over a period of 40 years and published twelve books, including Twenty Cases Suggestive of Reincarnation and Where Reincarnation and Biology Intersect. Stevenson methodically documented each child's statements and then identified the deceased person the child identified with, and verified the facts of the deceased person's life that matched the child's memory. He also matched birthmarks and birth defects to wounds and scars on the deceased, verified by medical records such as autopsy photographs, in Reincarnation and Biology.[67]

Stevenson searched for disconfirming evidence and alternative explanations for the reports, and believed that his strict methods ruled out all possible "normal" explanations for the child’s memories.[68] However, a significant majority of Stevenson's reported cases of reincarnation originated in Eastern societies, where dominant religions often permit the concept of reincarnation. Following this type of criticism, Stevenson published a book on European Cases of the Reincarnation Type. Other people who have undertaken reincarnation research include Jim B. Tucker, Satwant Pasricha, Godwin Samararatne, and Erlendur Haraldsson.

Skeptics such as Paul Edwards have analyzed many of these accounts, and called them anecdotal,[69] while also suggesting that claims of evidence for reincarnation originate from selective thinking and from the false memories that often result from one's own belief system and basic fears, and thus cannot be counted as empirical evidence. Carl Sagan referred to examples apparently from Stevenson's investigations in his book The Demon-Haunted World as an example of carefully collected empirical data, though he rejected reincarnation as a parsimonious explanation for the stories.[70]

Objections to claims of reincarnation include the facts that the vast majority of people do not remember previous lives and there is no mechanism known to modern science that would enable a personality to survive death and travel to another body, barring the idea of biocentrism. Researchers such as Stevenson have acknowledged these limitations.[71]

Reincarnation in the West[edit]

See also: Reincarnation in popular culture

During recent decades, many people in the West have developed an interest in reincarnation.[6] Feature films, such as The Reincarnation of Peter Proud, Dead Again, Kundun, Fluke, What Dreams May Come, The Mummy and Birth, contemporary books by authors such as Carol Bowman and Vicki Mackenzie, as well as popular songs, deal with reincarnation.

Recent studies have indicated that some Westerners accept the idea of reincarnation[6] including certain contemporary Christians,[72] 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. 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%.[73] 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.[73] Overall, 22% of respondents in Western Europe believe in reincarnation.[73] 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.[74]

Skeptic Carl Sagan asked the Dalai Lama what he would do if a fundamental tenet of his religion (reincarnation) were 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."[75]

Ian Stevenson reported that belief in reincarnation is held (with variations in details) by adherents of almost all major religions except Christianity and Islam. In addition, between 20 and 30 percent of persons in western countries who may be nominal Christians also believe in reincarnation.[76]

One 1999 study by Walter and Waterhouse reviewed the previous data on the level of reincarnation belief and performed a set of thirty in-depth interviews in Britain among people who did not belong to a religion advocating reincarnation.[77] The authors reported that surveys have found about one fifth to one quarter of Europeans have some level of belief in reincarnation, with similar results found in the USA. In the interviewed group, the belief in the existence of this phenomenon appeared independent of their age, or the type of religion that these people belonged to, with most being Christians. The beliefs of this group also did not appear to contain any more than usual of "new age" ideas (broadly defined) and the authors interpreted their ideas on reincarnation as "one way of tackling issues of suffering", but noted that this seemed to have little effect on their private lives.

Waterhouse also published a detailed discussion of beliefs expressed in the interviews.[78] She noted that although most people "hold their belief in reincarnation quite lightly" and were unclear on the details of their ideas, personal experiences such as past-life memories and near-death experiences had influenced most believers, although only a few had direct experience of these phenomena. Waterhouse analyzed the influences of second-hand accounts of reincarnation, writing that most of the people in the survey had heard other people's accounts of past-lives from regression hypnosis and dreams and found these fascinating, feeling that there "must be something in it" if other people were having such experiences.

Contemporary religious philosophies[edit]

Hinduism[edit]

Further information: Karma in Hinduism

Reincarnation – known as Punarjanma – it is one of the core beliefs of Hinduism that is generally accepted by many of its practitioners.[79]

Reincarnation is the natural process of birth, death and rebirth. Hindus believe that the Jiva or Atman (soul) is intrinsically pure. Howevever, because of the layers of I-ness and My-ness, the jiva goes through transmigration in the cycle of births and deaths. Death destroys the physical body, but not the jiva. The jiva is eternal. It takes on another body[80] with respect to its karmas. Every karma produces a result which must be experienced either in this or some future life. As long as the jiva is enveloped in ignorance, it remains attached to material desires and subject to the cycles of births and deaths (Samsara).

There is no permanent heaven or hell in Hinduism. After services in the afterlife, the jiva enters the karma and rebirth system, reborn as an animal, a human or a divinity. This reincarnation continues until mok?a, the final release, is gained.[81]

The Bhagavad Gita states;





Hindus believe 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 childhood 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)[82]

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 (the cycle of birth and death) 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, grounding 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. One is reborn through desire: a person desires to be born because he or she wants to enjoy a body,[83] which can never bring deep, lasting happiness or peace (?nanda). After many births every person becomes dissatisfied and begins to seek higher forms of happiness through spiritual experience. When, after spiritual practice (s?dhan?), 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 ?nanda. When all desire has vanished the person will not be born again.[84] When the cycle of rebirth thus comes to an end, a person is said to have attained liberation (moksha).[85] 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.[86]

Reasons for Reincarnation[edit]

Hindus provide several reasons why the jiva takes on various physical bodies:[87]
1.To experience the fruits of one's karmas: This is the main reason for rebirth. Sattvika (good or righteous) karmas reward one with the pleasures of Svarga. Rajas (pleasure-seeking) karmas reward one with mrutyuloka (mortal realm or earth). And Tamas karmas (actions related to inertia, laziness and evil) condemn one to patala-loka.
2.To satisfy one's desires: When a person indulges in material pleasures, he or she subsequently develops a stronger desire to enjoy more of it (V?san?). This unending craving to satisfy one's desires causes the jiva to assume new physical bodies.
3.To complete one's unfinished sadhana: When an aspirant making spiritual efforts for liberation from maya dies without attaining his or her goal, the jiva gets as a natural cause-effect another human body to complete its sadhana.
4.To fulfil a debt: When a jiva is indebted to another jiva, it gets a human birth to fulfil its debt and receive what is owed to it. The jiva comes in the form of a relative, friend or an enemy.
5.To undergo sufferings because of a great soul's curse: A person's grave error or sin may incur the wrath or displeasure of God or a Rishi. This results in the jiva of that person getting another birth, not necessarily into a human body.
6.To attain moksha: By the grace and compassion of God or a God-realized guru, a jiva gets a human body to purge itself of the layers of base instincts.[88]

Jainism[edit]

Further information: Karma in Jainism and Jain philosophy

Jainism is historically connected with the sramana tradition with which the earliest mentions of reincarnation are associated.[89]





The hand with a wheel on the palm symbolizes the Jain Vow of Ahi?s?. The word in the middle is "ahimsa". The wheel represents the dharmacakra which stands for the resolve to halt the cycle of reincarnation through relentless pursuit of truth and non-violence.
Karma forms a central and fundamental part of Jain faith, being intricately connected to other of its philosophical concepts like transmigration, reincarnation, liberation, non-violence (ahi?s?) and non-attachment, among others. Actions are seen to have consequences: some immediate, some delayed, even into future incarnations. So the doctrine of karma is not considered simply in relation to one life-time, but also in relation to both future incarnations and past lives.[90] Uttar?dhyayana-s?tra 3.3–4 states: "The j?va or the soul is sometimes born in the world of gods, sometimes in hell. Sometimes it acquires the body of a demon; all this happens on account of its karma. This j?va sometimes takes birth as a worm, as an insect or as an ant."[91] The text further states (32.7): "Karma is the root of birth and death. The souls bound by karma go round and round in the cycle of existence."[91]

Actions and emotions in the current lifetime affect future incarnations depending on the nature of the particular karma. For example, a good and virtuous life indicates a latent desire to experience good and virtuous themes of life. Therefore, such a person attracts karma that ensures that his future births will allow him to experience and manifest his virtues and good feelings unhindered.[92] In this case, he may take birth in heaven or in a prosperous and virtuous human family. On the other hand, a person who has indulged in immoral deeds, or with a cruel disposition, indicates a latent desire to experience cruel themes of life.[93] As a natural consequence, he will attract karma which will ensure that he is reincarnated in hell, or in lower life forms, to enable his soul to experience the cruel themes of life.[93]

There is no retribution, judgment or reward involved but a natural consequences of the choices in life made either knowingly or unknowingly. Hence, whatever suffering or pleasure that a soul may be experiencing in its present life is on account of choices that it has made in the past.[94] As a result of this doctrine, Jainism attributes supreme importance to pure thinking and moral behavior.[95]





The drawing illustrating how the soul travels to any one of the four states of existence after the death depending on its karmas, according to Jainism
The Jain texts postulate four gatis, that is states-of-existence or birth-categories, within which the soul transmigrates. The four gatis are: deva (demi-gods), manu?ya (humans), n?raki (hell beings) and tiryañca (animals, plants and micro-organisms).[96] The four gatis have four corresponding realms or habitation levels in the vertically tiered Jain universe: demi-gods occupy the higher levels where the heavens are situated; humans, plants and animals occupy the middle levels; and hellish beings occupy the lower levels where seven hells are situated.[96]

Single-sensed souls, however, called nigoda,[97] and element-bodied souls pervade all tiers of this universe. Nigodas are souls at the bottom end of the existential hierarchy. They are so tiny and undifferentiated, that they lack even individual bodies, living in colonies. According to Jain texts, this infinity of nigodas can also be found in plant tissues, root vegetables and animal bodies.[98] Depending on its karma, a soul transmigrates and reincarnates within the scope of this cosmology of destinies. The four main destinies are further divided into sub-categories and still smaller sub-sub-categories. In all, Jain texts speak of a cycle of 8.4 million birth destinies in which souls find themselves again and again as they cycle within samsara.[99]

In Jainism, God has no role to play in an individual's destiny; one's personal destiny is not seen as a consequence of any system of reward or punishment, but rather as a result of its own personal karma. A text from a volume of the ancient Jain canon, Bhagvati s?tra 8.9.9, links specific states of existence to specific karmas. Violent deeds, killing of creatures having five sense organs, eating fish, and so on, lead to rebirth in hell. Deception, fraud and falsehood lead to rebirth in the animal and vegetable world. Kindness, compassion and humble character result in human birth; while austerities and the making and keeping of vows lead to rebirth in heaven.[100]

Each soul is thus responsible for its own predicament, as well as its own salvation. Accumulated karma represent a sum total of all unfulfilled desires, attachments and aspirations of a soul.[101][102] It enables the soul to experience the various themes of the lives that it desires to experience.[101] Hence a soul may transmigrate from one life form to another for countless of years, taking with it the karma that it has earned, until it finds conditions that bring about the required fruits. In certain philosophies, heavens and hells are often viewed as places for eternal salvation or eternal damnation for good and bad deeds. But according to Jainism, such places, including the earth are simply the places which allow the soul to experience its unfulfilled karma.[103]

Buddhism[edit]

Main article: Rebirth (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.
The early Buddhist texts make it clear that there is no permanent consciousness that moves from life to life.[104] Gautama Buddha taught a distinct concept of rebirth constrained by the concepts of anatt?, that there is no irreducible ?tman or "self" tying these lives together (which serves as a contrast to Hinduism, where everything is connected, and in a sense, "everything is everything"),[105] and anicca, that all compounded things are subject to dissolution, including all the components of the human person and personality.

In Buddhist doctrine the evolving consciousness (Pali: samvattanika-viññana)[106][107] or stream of consciousness (Pali: viññana-sotam,[108] Sanskrit: vijñ?na-srot?m, vijñ?na-sant?na, or citta-sant?na) upon death (or "the dissolution of the aggregates" (P. khandhas, S. skandhas)), becomes one of the contributing causes for the arising of a new aggregation. 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.[109][110] The consciousness in the new person is neither identical to nor entirely different from that in the deceased but the two form a causal continuum or stream. Transmigration is the effect of karma (kamma)[111][112] or volitional action.[113] The basic cause is the abiding of consciousness in ignorance (Pali: avijja, Sanskrit: avidya): when ignorance is uprooted, rebirth ceases.[114]

The Buddha's detailed conception of the connections between action (karma), rebirth and causality is set out in the twelve links of dependent origination. The empirical, changing self does not only affect the world about it, it also generates, consciously and unconsciously, a subjective image of the world in which it lives as "reality". It "tunes in" to a particular level of consciousness which has a particular range of objects, selectively notices such objects and forms a partial model of reality in which the ego is the crucial reference point. Vipassana meditation uses "bare attention" to mind-states without interfering, owning or judging. Observation reveals each moment as an experience of an individual mind-state such as a thought, a memory, a feeling or a perception that arises, exists and ceases. This limits the power of desire, which, according to the second noble truth of Buddhism, is the cause of suffering (dukkha), and leads to Nirvana (nibbana, vanishing (of the self-idea)) in which self-oriented models are transcended and "the world stops".[115] Thus consciousness is a continuous birth and death of mind-states: rebirth is the persistence of this process.

Buddhist traditions vary in precise views on rebirth. The Tibetan schools hold to the notion of a bardo (intermediate state) that can last up to forty-nine days. An accomplished or realized practitioner (by maintaining conscious awareness during the death process) can choose to return to samsara. They believe many lamas choose to be born again and again as humans and are called tulkus or incarnate lamas.[citation needed] The Sarvastivada school believed that between death and rebirth there is a sort of limbo in which beings do not yet reap the consequences of their previous actions but may still influence their rebirth. The death process and this intermediate state were believed to offer a uniquely favourable opportunity for spiritual awakening. Theravada Buddhism generally denies there is an intermediate state--though some early Buddhist texts seem to support the idea--[116][117] but asserts that rebirth is immediate.

Within Japanese Zen, reincarnation is accepted by some, but wholly rejected by others. A distinction can be drawn between "folk Zen", as in the Zen practiced by devotional lay people, and "philosophical Zen". Folk Zen generally accepts the various supernatural elements of Buddhism such as rebirth. Philosophical Zen, however, places such emphasis on the present moment that rebirth may be considered irrelevant because even if it does exist, it can never be consciously experienced.[118] Specifically, in Zen the past and future are considered to be merely ideas which are held in the present. Because as living beings rebirth can only be viewed as something which may have happened in the past or that might happen in the future, we must essentially reject the present moment, or Dharma, in order to even consider it. For this reason, rebirth is often either rejected or considered unknowable in Zen and therefore a distraction.[119] D?gen Zenji, the founder of Japanese S?t? Zen, writes the following regarding reincarnation[119]:


According to that non-Buddhist view, there is one spiritual intelligence existing within our bodies. When this body dies, however, the spirit casts off the skin and is reborn. If we learn this view as the Buddha's Dharma we are even more foolish than a person who grasps a tile or pebble thinking it to be a golden treasure.

— D?gen Zenji, Sh?b?genz?

Some schools conclude that karma continues to exist and adhere to the person until it works out its consequences. For the Sautrantika school, each act "perfumes" the individual or "plants a seed" that later germinates. Tibetan Buddhism stresses the state of mind at the time of death. To die with a peaceful mind will stimulate a virtuous seed and a fortunate rebirth; a disturbed mind will stimulate a non-virtuous seed and an unfortunate rebirth.[120] The medieval Pali scholar Buddhaghosa labeled the consciousness that constitutes the condition for a new birth as described in the early texts "rebirth-linking consciousness" (patisandhi).

Still other Buddhists regard samsara as merely a metaphor of the human condition.[121]

Sant mystics and Sikhism[edit]

Reincarnation remained a tenet of the Sant Bhakti movement and of related mystics on the frontiers of Islam and 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.[122] 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.[123] 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".

African Vodun[edit]





An Egungun masquerade dance garment in the permanent collection of The Children’s Museum of Indianapolis
The Yoruba believe in reincarnation within the family. The names Babatunde (Father returns), Yetunde (Mother returns), Babatunji (Father wakes once again) and Sotunde (The wise man returns) all offer vivid evidence of the Ifa concept of familial or lineal rebirth. There is no simple guarantee that your grandfather or great uncle will "come back" in the birth of your child, however.

Whenever the time arrives for a spirit to return to Earth (otherwise known as The Marketplace) through the conception of a new life in the direct bloodline of the family, one of the component entities of a person's being returns, while the other remains in Heaven (Ikole Orun). The spirit that returns does so in the form of a Guardian Ori. One's Guardian Ori, which is represented and contained in the crown of the head, represents not only the spirit and energy of one's previous blood relative, but the accumulated wisdom he or she has acquired through a myriad of lifetimes. This is not to be confused with one’s spiritual Ori, which contains personal destiny, but instead refers to the coming back to The Marketplace of one's personal blood Ori through one's new life and experiences. The explanation in The Way of the Orisa[124] was really quite clear. The Primary Ancestor (which should be identified in your Itefa (Life Path Reading)) becomes – if you are aware and work with that specific energy – a “guide” for the individual throughout their lifetime. At the end of that life they return to their identical spirit self and merge into one, taking the additional knowledge gained from their experience with the individual as a form of payment.

Islam[edit]

The idea of reincarnation is accepted by a few Muslim sects, particularly of the Ghulat,[125] and by other sects in the Muslim world such as Druzes.[126] Historically, South Asian Isma'ilis performed chantas yearly, one of which is for sins committed in past lives.[127] (Aga Khan IV) Sinan ibn Salman ibn Muhammad, also known as Rashid al-Din Sinan, (r. 1162–1192) subscribed to the transmigration of souls as a tenet of the Alawi,[128] who are thought to have been influenced by Isma'ilism.

Reincarnation was also accepted by some streams of Sufism. Modern Sufis who embrace the idea include Bawa Muhaiyadeen.[129] However Hazrat Inayat Khan has criticized the idea as unhelpful to the spiritual seeker.[130]

Judaism[edit]

See also: Kabbalah#Human soul in Kabbalah

Reincarnation is not an essential tenet of traditional Judaism.[131] It is not mentioned in the Tanakh ("Hebrew Bible"), the classical rabbinical 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 Ashkenazi Orthodox Jewish communities. Medieval Jewish Rationalist philosophers discussed the issue, often in rejection. However, Jewish mystical texts (the Kabbalah), from their classic Medieval canon onwards, teach a belief in Gilgul Neshamot (Hebrew for metempsychosis of souls: literally "soul cycle", plural "gilgulim"). It is a common belief in contemporary Hasidic Judaism, which regards the Kabbalah as sacred and authoritative, though unstressed in favour of a more innate psychological mysticism. Kabbalah also teaches that "The soul of Moses is reincarnated in every generation."[132] Other, Non-Hasidic, Orthodox Jewish groups while not placing a heavy emphasis on reincarnation, do acknowledge it as a valid teaching.[133] Its popularisation entered modern secular Yiddish literature and folk motif.

The 16th century mystical renaissance in communal Safed replaced scholastic Rationalism as mainstream traditional Jewish theology, both in scholarly circles and in the popular imagination. References to gilgul in former Kabbalah became systemised as part of the metaphysical purpose of creation. Isaac Luria (the Ari) brought the issue to the centre of his new mystical articulation, for the first time, and advocated identification of the reincarnations of historic Jewish figures that were compiled by Haim Vital in his Shaar HaGilgulim.[134] Gilgul is contrasted with the other processes in Kabbalah of Ibbur ("pregnancy"), the attachment of a second soul to an individual for (or by) good means, and Dybuk ("possession"), the attachment of a spirit, demon, etc. to an individual for (or by) "bad" means.

In Lurianic Kabbalah, reincarnation is not retributive or fatalistic, but an expression of Divine compassion, the microcosm of the doctrine of cosmic rectification of creation. Gilgul is a heavenly agreement with the individual soul, conditional upon circumstances. Luria's radical system focused on rectification of the Divine soul, played out through Creation. The true essence of anything is the divine spark within that gives it existence. Even a stone or leaf possesses such a soul that "came into this world to receive a rectification". A human soul may occasionally be exiled into lower inanimate, vegetative or animal creations. The most basic component of the soul, the nefesh, must leave at the cessation of blood production. There are four other soul components and different nations of the world possess different forms of souls with different purposes. Each Jewish soul is reincarnated in order to fulfil each of the 613 Mosaic 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. Non-Jewish observance of the 7 Laws of Noah assists the Jewish people, though Biblical adversaries of Israel reincarnate to oppose.

Among the many rabbis who accepted reincarnation are Nahmanides (the Ramban) and Rabbenu Bahya ben Asher, Levi ibn Habib (the Ralbah), Shelomoh Alkabez, Moses Cordovero, Moses Chaim Luzzatto, the Baal Shem Tov and later Hasidic masters, DovBer Pinson and the Mitnagdic Vilna Gaon and Chaim Volozhin and their school, Ben Ish Chai of Baghdad and the Baba Sali. 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 in favour of gilgulim.

Native American nations[edit]

Reincarnation is an intrinsic part of many Native American and Inuit[135] 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][136]

The following is a story of human-to-human reincarnation as told by Thunder Cloud, a Winnebago (Ho-Chunk tribe) 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.[137] (Radin, 1923) ”

Christianity[edit]

Though the major Christian denominations reject the concept of reincarnation, a large number of Christians profess the belief. In a survey by the Pew Forum in 2009, 24% of American Christians expressed a belief in reincarnation.[138] In a 1981 Survey in Europe 31% of regular churchgoing Catholics expressed a belief in reincarnation.[139]

Geddes MacGregor, an Episcopalian priest and professor of Philosophy, makes a case for the compatibility of Christian doctrine and reincarnation.[140]

New religious movements[edit]

Theosophy[edit]

The Theosophical Society draws much of its inspiration from India. The idea is, according to a recent Theosophical writer, "the master-key to modern problems", including heredity.[141] In the Theosophical world-view reincarnation is the vast rhythmic process by which the soul, the part of a person 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.

Eckankar[edit]

Awareness of past lives, dreams, and soul travel are spiritual disciplines practiced by students of Eckankar. Eckankar teaches that each person is Soul, which transcends time and space. Soul travel is a term specific to Eckankar that refers to a shift in consciousness. Eckists believe the purpose of being aware of past lives is to help with understanding personal conditions in the present. Practicing students of Eckankar can become aware of past lives, through dreams, soul travel, and spiritual exercises called contemplations. This form of contemplation is the active, unconditional practice of going within to connect with the "Light and Sound of God" known as the divine life current or Holy Spirit.

Scientology[edit]

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."[142]

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.

Meher Baba[edit]

The Indian spiritual teacher Meher Baba stated that reincarnation occurs due to desires and once those desires are extinguished the ego-mind ceases to reincarnate:

“ The power that keeps the individual soul bound to the wheel of life and death is its thirst for separate existence, which is a condition for a host of cravings connected with objects and experiences of the world of duality. It is for the fulfillment of cravings that the ego-mind keeps on incarnating itself. When all forms of craving disappear, the impressions which create and enliven the ego-mind disappear. With the disappearance of these impressions, the ego-mind itself is shed with the result that there is only the realisation of the one eternal, unchanging Oversoul or God, Who is the only reality. God-realisation is the end of the incarnations of the ego-mind because it is the end of its very existence. As long as the ego-mind exists in some form, there is an inevitable and irresistible urge for incarnations. When there is cessation of the ego-mind, there is cessation of incarnations in the final fulfillment of Self-realisation.[143] (1967)
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Postby Glasnerven » July 11th, 2013, 3:47 am

[quote]It does follow, but it is not easy to explain.[quote]

No, you've explained your position quite well . . . it's just terribly unconvincing.

In the end, if it is not true then you are claiming that consciousness literally came from things completely devoid of consciousness.


Yep, just like the way that the ability to produce mechanical power by burning gasoline literally comes from a collection of parts which individually are completely devoid of the ability to do so. Read up on "emergent behavior" sometime; you might find it fascinating.

Which is literally the equivalent of saying 0 + 0 = 1.


Nope. It's not even similar.

Can't a single silicon atom run skyrim? Do we understand enough about nature to say it doesn't already in a parallel universe kind of way? At best surely we don't know?


There's absolutely no reason, theoretical or empirical, to even begin to suspect that any individual atom has any significant processing power. Unless and until such a reason is found, it would be ridiculous to think that.
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Postby Chibi » July 11th, 2013, 5:35 am

I know about emergence, but it is impossible for anything to emerge from something that doesn't already exist.

I think you are slightly mistaken, as I will explain:

Mechanical power is merely chemical reactions which cause physical movements, which all of the particles are capable of, if re-arranged.

The cars ability to move is a result of its particles abilities to move, if your cars particles couldn't move, neither could your car, it is a sum of its parts.

By your car example, our ability to be conscious must also come from our particles ability to be conscious. Just like the cars ability to move comes from its particles abilities to move.
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Postby Chibi » July 11th, 2013, 6:11 am

2. The main quality of a car is its ability to move and carry things.
And the main quality of a computer game is to carry information.

If their particles could not do these things also, then cars and computer games would not work. But particles do move, and particles do carry information in various forms.

Sure, cars and computer games as a whole can carry and move more (because they are a collection of particles), but I'm not claiming particles are fully conscious, just pieces of consciousness.
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Postby robindf1 » September 12th, 2013, 8:16 pm

...beliefs have changed somewhat of late. Christian now as of three days ago. It's far beyond me to know Him, but I'm willing to try.
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Postby WME3 » September 12th, 2013, 9:47 pm

I believe we all hold our own opinion, and that is alright.

No matter what you believe, we will all will have to take the same path to get there. And While that road has been worn, it will never stop seeing its use.

EDIT:
I believe in the saying that God is a force.
We are all just wavelengths of different variations, so would it be far fetched to say that the universe is one being? Omnipotence is really a physical matter, then. Physically waves are everywhere, and the universe is like a rock dropped in an ocean. Those ripples grow and grow, collide, and beat upon one another, but while individually we separate waves, together we can become in-sync, and experience something very few have ever felt:

Completeness.

That's my thoughts on it, my apologies for scaring away any other post with the original comment.
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Postby accursedCursive » December 17th, 2013, 5:00 am

I can disprove completely omnipotent/omniscient beings, but if you try and disprove finitely powerful deities through reason alone, you're gonna have a bad time.

As for the afterlife, I pretty much believe in [url=http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2503370/Quantum-physics-proves-IS-afterlife-claims-scientist.html]this,[/url] although I had the idea long before and so I'm with a slightly more advanced, but still far from complete version of the theory, which doesn't rely on quantum mechanics.
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waves to original poster

Postby nickythenick » October 8th, 2014, 11:55 am

-> return to source, drop payload, evaluate code, reload human image, re-iterate. Use senses, experience life, upon end session, goto line1.-
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