Reincarnation

[Soul Kitchen]

There are many interesting stories of past lives out there but I wouldn't go fishing for them on this website... Too many people believe they can "feel" past lives because they're some sort of special old soul. People who have romantic delusions of being cooler characters than they are in their current life. This is BS...

But I know people who have interesting stories on this, and I've read some very compelling stuff on the topic. There's very convincing research that has been done as well.

[Frank Merton]

Everyone is an "old soul," since we've all been percolating since the beginning. Odds too that we are all the same soul.

Edited December 17, 2013 by Frank Merton

[docyabut2]

I`m still undecided if there is reincarnation or is it just memory cells that are passed on in the DNA.

http://www.unexplain...pic=258903&st=0

What if your child...remembered dying...in a past life? This special explores many parents most closely guarded secret: their child is a reincarnation of someone who died violently and came back to life. A young boy who remembers falling to his death on 9/11. A daughter haunted by recollections of dying in the Oklahoma City Bombing. A toddler terrified by nightmares of a gruesome end in World War II. These are just a few stories of parents struggling with the Ghost Inside My Child.

http://www.biography...hild/episodes/0

Apparently some find that person that the child has the memory of , but is it really reincarnation? Could it be in the long DNA of the child that some how they were related to that person and just remember the memories, I would not like to think my loves now will be reincarnated in people that are scatter all over the world and I would never know them again.There are cases of organ recipients that have the memories of their donors.Memory cells?

http://www.dailymail...human-soul.html

Edited December 17, 2013 by docyabut2

[tigersag]

I think a lot about the idea of a next life, not so much about past lives because I don't like looking back that much ;-)

If I had a past life I hope I was someone special to someone, coz that would really make me important rather then being any famous figure from history. It's every day people that make the world anyway.

About my next life I was thinking today that it's more about letting go of the things we THINK we are and moving on. I believe in 'the soul' as energy that is continued in some form or at least because even if we don't go to a next life, somewhere in space and time your life will begin again and maybe it's the same one with a different outcome. I think a lot of things are possible.

seeing death as the end may be realistic but it's boring and kind of negative. When you believe in an afterlife of anykind you have something to strive for, aside from making this life better for yourself and others on a daily, hour to hour basis.

[tigersag]

Care to share some?

Since I was a kid i've always felt that I was a male, a soldier during WW2. My feelings that overwhelm me whenever I think about it tell me that the last location I've visited was Ukraine. I must have died in war because I feel nothing towards the possibility that I've lived long and aged to become an old man. Before I searched into Reincarnation in the past, i've noticed how much I got emotional whenever I came across a WW2 documentaries, drove past a military base, came face to face with military men. Anything WW2 related will make me feel really uncomfortable and a feeling of Nostalgia overwhelms me. I'm still experiencing it all even now. The simple thought about the WW2 era brings back images of locations that I could have visited in the past and the same emotional discomfort follows. But again, it's hard for me to believe in Reincarnation. The Abrahamic religions oppose Reincarnation, but what if there were hidden secrets in the Torah, Bible and Korean concerning Reincarnations? Buddhism has a different point of view.

Reincarnation was banned by some jojo about 1600 years ago. I think religion and spirituality should be seen as seperate. Having been raised Lutheran, I think faith is a personal thing, a bond between you and your god whoever that may be. Your God or the universe will watch you anyway wether those pesky humans thing they are the only living thing and the best thing in creation ever, yes or no. I wouldn't want to believe in a God that is not love because I believe God is love. It's like that song Betty Middler sings so well; we are instruments in a marching band, singing songs of hope.. from a distance... etc etc..

So you just go and believe whatever you want!!

Also about those uniforms.. I have the same with police uniforms somehow although I'm not a criminal and I'm an honest man they always scare me somehow, police officers or anything in a uniform like that. Maybe I lived in a corrupt police state in a past life.

[Awake2Chaos]

I searched this forum for a reincarnation thread. Surprisingly, I never found it. So I just thought I'd make one up myself. So who here believes in reincarnation? You mind if we discuss it? For those who do believe, do you have any ideas of who you were in your past life?

I definitely believe in reincarnation.

My cousin, when he was a small boy, used to tell us that he was here before. He said he 'remembered being a bad man'. He was just 3 or 4 when he would talk about these things...and my aunt and uncle are in no way religious or spiritual people who would plant an idea of reincarnation in his mind.

I do not think reincarnation is as common as one would think. Something I have found in my own research of it is that most reincarnation stories share a couple common threads; 1. They died early/traumatically and were robbed of their intended experience. So they are sent back in order to have their rightful turn. And 2. They were 'bad' people....murderers, theives, criminals in general...and did not learn the lesson intended. They are then sent back to try and re-learn what they missed.

I think the majority of people move on, to where ever 'on' may be.

[Jatismara]

My memory extends back to my previous death, so I accept reincarnation as a fact, much as I accept the scar over my eyebrow was caused by a dogbite as fact, as I recall that incident from when I was three years old with equal clarity. Unfortunately, my memory goes no further, so I cannot say who I was before; only that I died by falling, and it was not a quick or painless exit.

[m1ssKarma]

I do. I did not used to believe in this because I was brought up Christian. I became ill, stopped associating with them, and decided to abandon the religion altogether after my experience of how they treated me after a series of very bad events. I'd known them since childhood and they talked down to me as if I had it coming somehow. I'd always believed in the supernatural, always felt connected to something ancient, something that survived beyond a humans lifespan. I felt 'old', and my aura felt bigger and bigger, wider, around people as if I was taller than them. At the time I just chalked it down to a newfound confidence since breaking off fellowship with my so-called 'friends'. I started to research reincarnation, and felt a resonance with what they were saying. I wrote things down, labeling each era of connection with a name, at the time I thought I had some sort of dissociative disorder, but I always felt like a part of me was living in the now, and a part was walking alongside in another reality, in a 'dream', a bubble.

Music would trigger very intense feelings of memories, I would picture the environment when I'd hear orchestra, no cars, the dust, horse hooves on gravel, the sound of the carriages as they creaked past, shop bells, and it wasn't like i'd seen it in a movie, it was as if i was standing in the middle of the street. I'd listen to even older music, and have very strong emotions from anything right back to the ancients. Then it got blurry, and I'd continue on with my day.

I now consider myself a cross between pagan/norse and buddhist. I'm still piecing 'me' together. I have memory fragments return as I'm falling asleep. I believe I'm here to fix what was broken last time, and if I fix it all, hope my future is more peaceful than the struggles I've had in this one!

 

[Marcus Aurelius]

On 6/2/2013 at 3:08 PM, Child of Toothless said:

I searched this forum for a reincarnation thread. Surprisingly, I never found it. So I just thought I'd make one up myself. So who here believes in reincarnation? You mind if we discuss it? For those who do believe, do you have any ideas of who you were in your past life?

Even as a Christian, I don't completely rule out the possibility of creation. In some ways I find the great Eastern Religions views on the subject to be quite appealing. In my understanding of Hinduism and Buddhism we enter into a state of becoming because of our attachment to being through sensory expression. This leads to the creation of an ego self, which in Hinduism the goal through many lives is to reach transcendence and realization of the true self or the Atman and our interbeing with all that is. In Buddhism we  cease to be a self, whether that means nonbeing... or some form of being that we cannot grasp...that depends on the particular path. Either way, even as a Christian these teachings resonate with me because I wholeheartedly believe that we are caught in the grips of a false, ego self that must be transcended. We differ as to how, but I appreciate the rich similarities as they are.

Could reincarnation occur? Perhaps. I don't believe in it personally, but I am, however at least open to it since we really cannot say what happens at the moment of death. To be honest though, I sort of hope that it isn't real. I should like to get this done and over with!

[Amica]

I believe it. For me personally, I do not see any conflict with my monotheistic faith. In fact, it reinforces the belief that God is Merciful. But, the way I am, I like to research and study. I had some experience with past life regression and was amazed by it. However, I feel like I need to further study. What is most frustrating about reincarnation is that it is extremely difficult to prove the farther away one's memories go for the simple fact that ancient people did not document much about themselves individually. There is some hope, though, considering that there are more people speaking up about past life memories and actually being able to show some proof for it.  Reincarnation helps me understand why sometimes humans experience certain events, how justice works and how we pay back for our deeds. I think that the Divine Mercy plays a role in that humans are given a chance to improve and get closer to God. But there is only so many chances one gets, and perhaps this is why there is still Hell in the Hereafter. One must be a real failure to end up there, I guess. 

Edited August 1, 2018 by Amica

[Amita]

No good reason to think one lifetime makes any sense, so I accept rebirth for nearly everyone.  The exceptions are the Sages who have liberated themselves from the automatic rebirth cycle.

Here is a site with much testimony & evidence:

https://www.reincarnation-research.com

[zenron]

idk if i can believe in this, I don't but i am skeptic and I have tried doing research n stuff

[Podo]

On 8/16/2018 at 12:28 PM, Amita said:

No good reason to think one lifetime makes any sense, so I accept rebirth for nearly everyone.  The exceptions are the Sages who have liberated themselves from the automatic rebirth cycle.

Here is a site with much testimony & evidence:

https://www.reincarnation-research.com

There is every reason to believe that one lifetime makes sense. Every piece of observable, circumstantial, physical, and scientific evidence shows that consciousness ceases when brain function stops. You have absolutely no reason to think that there is anything more than what you are currently experiencing.

[Will Due]

16 minutes ago, Podo said:

There is every reason to believe that one lifetime makes sense. Every piece of observable, circumstantial, physical, and scientific evidence shows that consciousness ceases when brain function stops. You have absolutely no reason to think that there is anything more than what you are currently experiencing.

 

Yeah but all indications point to the fact that all of us have been invited to experience more in the afterlife.

 

 

[Podo]

5 minutes ago, Will Due said:

 

Yeah but all indications point to the fact that all of us have been invited to experience more in the afterlife.

It's only "all indications" if you're completely divorced from reality. But as we all know, you are! You're gunna go off on a long rant about the Urantia Papers, I'm gunna refute you, you're gunna post more scripture, and it's going to continue until one of us dies of exhaustion, so let's just skip to the end where I shake my head and go do something more productive than argue with a particularly dense brick wall.

[Will Due]

5 minutes ago, Podo said:

It's only "all indications" if you're completely divorced from reality. But as we all know, you are! You're gunna go off on a long rant about the Urantia Papers, I'm gunna refute you, you're gunna post more scripture, and it's going to continue until one of us dies of exhaustion, so let's just skip to the end where I shake my head and go do something more productive than argue with a particularly dense brick wall.

 

I'll leave you alone. Lol. I don't want to stress you out. 

 

 

[Amita]

1 hour ago, Podo said:

There is every reason to believe that one lifetime makes sense. Every piece of observable, circumstantial, physical, and scientific evidence shows that consciousness ceases when brain function stops. You have absolutely no reason to think that there is anything more than what you are currently experiencing.

So the link I gave impresses you not at all (assuming you even read any of it)?  The fact that for thousands of years the majority of thinking humans accepted rebirth also leaves you cold?  

Your loss, so be it.

[Podo]

34 minutes ago, Amita said:

So the link I gave impresses you not at all (assuming you even read any of it)?  The fact that for thousands of years the majority of thinking humans accepted rebirth also leaves you cold?  

Your loss, so be it.

I did look through the link. The problem with it is the same problem with every piece of reincarnation evidence to date, and that is that the "knowledge" that these reincarnation cases have can be falsified. It doesn't matter how difficult or easy the knowledge would be, it can be explained in any large manner of rational ways. There has never once been a case of truly impossible knowledge, which would be defined by something that is 100% impossible to fabricate any other way. An example of this is language. Show me a child born to an amazonian tribe that can speak full sentences in, say, inuktitut. Show me a Chukchi Sea native child that can inexplicably speak Basque. Give me a sub-saharan African child from a nomadic tribe that remember the grammar and structure of an obscure indigenous language from South America. This, language, would be impossible to fabricate. But that has never happened. How convenient. I would love reincarnation to be true, but it just isn't.

Your second point is utterly meaningless, however. That thousands of years many people believed any particular thing is meaningless, and a textbook example of argumentum ad populum. If every single person on Earth believed that the sky was green, the sky woudln't be any less blue.

[Amita]

4 hours ago, Podo said:

I did look through the link. The problem with it is the same problem with every piece of reincarnation evidence to date, and that is that the "knowledge" that these reincarnation cases have can be falsified. It doesn't matter how difficult or easy the knowledge would be, it can be explained in any large manner of rational ways. There has never once been a case of truly impossible knowledge, which would be defined by something that is 100% impossible to fabricate any other way. An example of this is language. Show me a child born to an amazonian tribe that can speak full sentences in, say, inuktitut. Show me a Chukchi Sea native child that can inexplicably speak Basque. Give me a sub-saharan African child from a nomadic tribe that remember the grammar and structure of an obscure indigenous language from South America. This, language, would be impossible to fabricate. But that has never happened. How convenient. I would love reincarnation to be true, but it just isn't.

Your second point is utterly meaningless, however. That thousands of years many people believed any particular thing is meaningless, and a textbook example of argumentum ad populum. If every single person on Earth believed that the sky was green, the sky woudln't be any less blue.

There are other examples, but this is one of a child chanting in a form of Pali that no modern person does.  He was recorded doing this spontaneously up until about 10 years of age.

http://www.theravadin.org/2008/08/09/chanting-in-the-6th-century/

"Utterly meaningless" is hyperbole; your assumption is that popular beliefs are always wrong, based on modern science.  Yet is the latter always right, or does science have self-imposed limits?   If one is conditioned to believe that area X cannot exist, much less be investigated, then certainty is assured.   But if this premise re area X is mistaken, then a greater truth is lost.  So it is just safe, conventional thinking ruling over exploration.

[Podo]

On 8/24/2018 at 4:20 PM, Amita said:

There are other examples, but this is one of a child chanting in a form of Pali that no modern person does.  He was recorded doing this spontaneously up until about 10 years of age.

Pali is a well-known and well-attested historical language, because there are thousands (if not more) scholars and buddhists/hindus that study the Pali canon. Furthermore, the child in question was brought up in a place where he very realistically could have been exposed to Pali. Find me an Inuit (or some other child far removed from Hindu/Buddhist culture) child chanting Pali, and then you'll have a leg to stand on. Until then, this is just another unprovable and easily-explained example.

 

On 8/24/2018 at 4:20 PM, Amita said:

"Utterly meaningless" is hyperbole; your assumption is that popular beliefs are always wrong, based on modern science.  Yet is the latter always right, or does science have self-imposed limits?   If one is conditioned to believe that area X cannot exist, much less be investigated, then certainty is assured.   But if this premise re area X is mistaken, then a greater truth is lost.  So it is just safe, conventional thinking ruling over exploration.

It is not hyperbole. Argument ad populum is a classic and easily-defined fallacy. Also, you're strawmaning really hard right now. I never said that popular beliefs are always wrong, only that popularity is not a meaningful attestation of the validity of a point one way or another. The number of people who believe a thing should not and does not factor in to a claim's validity. Therefore, your argument that "lots of people believe this" is meaningless as to the veracity of your claim. It's just another tired theistic argument when you have nothing else to use. Yawn.

Edited August 27, 2018 by Podo

[Amita]

We sow the glebe, we reap the corn,

We build the house where we may rest,

And then, at moments, suddenly,

We look up to the great wide sky,

Enquiring- wherefore we were born,

For earnest, or for jest ?

 

The senses folding- thick and dark

About the stifled soul within,

We guess diviner things beyond,

And yearn to them with yearning fond ;

We strike out boldly to a mark

Believed in, but not seen.

 

And sometimes horror chills our blood

To be so near such mystic things,

And we wrap round us, for defence,

Our purple manners, moods of sense,

As angels, from the face of God,

Stand hidden in their wings.

 

Mrs. Elizabeth B. Browning

 

 

Edited August 28, 2018 by Amita