![Gati or existences](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/5e/Gati_or_existences.jpg)
Reincarnation, also known as rebirth or transmigration, is the
philosophical
Philosophy (from , ) is the systematized study of general and fundamental questions, such as those about existence, reason, knowledge, values, mind, and language. Such questions are often posed as problems to be studied or resolved. Some ...
or
religious
Religion is usually defined as a social- cultural system of designated behaviors and practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics, or organizations, that generally relates humanity to supernatur ...
concept that the non-physical essence of a living
being begins a new
life
Life is a quality that distinguishes matter that has biological processes, such as signaling and self-sustaining processes, from that which does not, and is defined by the capacity for growth, reaction to stimuli, metabolism, energ ...
in a different physical form or
body
Body may refer to:
In science
* Physical body, an object in physics that represents a large amount, has mass or takes up space
* Body (biology), the physical material of an organism
* Body plan, the physical features shared by a group of anima ...
after biological
death
Death is the irreversible cessation of all biological functions that sustain an organism. For organisms with a brain, death can also be defined as the irreversible cessation of functioning of the whole brain, including brainstem, and brain ...
.
Resurrection
Resurrection or anastasis is the concept of coming back to life after death. In a number of religions, a dying-and-rising god is a deity which dies and is resurrected. Reincarnation is a similar process hypothesized by other religions, whic ...
is a similar process hypothesized by some religions, in which a
soul
In many religious and philosophical traditions, there is a belief that a soul is "the immaterial aspect or essence of a human being".
Etymology
The Modern English noun ''soul'' is derived from Old English ''sāwol, sāwel''. The earliest attes ...
comes back to life in the same body. In most beliefs involving reincarnation, the soul is seen as immortal and the only thing that becomes perishable is the body. Upon death, the soul becomes transmigrated into a new infant (or animal) to live again. The term transmigration means passing of soul from one body to another after death.
Reincarnation (''Punarjanma'') is a central tenet of the
Indian religions
Indian religions, sometimes also termed Dharmic religions or Indic religions, are the religions that originated in the Indian subcontinent. These religions, which include Hinduism, Jainism, Buddhism, and Sikhism,Adams, C. J."Classification of ...
such as
Buddhism
Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and gra ...
,
Hinduism
Hinduism () is an Indian religion or '' dharma'', a religious and universal order or way of life by which followers abide. As a religion, it is the world's third-largest, with over 1.2–1.35 billion followers, or 15–16% of the global p ...
,
Jainism
Jainism ( ), also known as Jain Dharma, is an Indian religions, Indian religion. Jainism traces its spiritual ideas and history through the succession of twenty-four tirthankaras (supreme preachers of ''Dharma''), with the first in the current ...
, and
Sikhism
Sikhism (), also known as Sikhi ( pa, ਸਿੱਖੀ ', , from pa, ਸਿੱਖ, lit=disciple', 'seeker', or 'learner, translit=Sikh, label=none),''Sikhism'' (commonly known as ''Sikhī'') originated from the word ''Sikh'', which comes fro ...
; as well as certain
Paganist religious groups, although there are Hindu and Buddhist groups who do not believe in reincarnation, instead believing in an
afterlife.
In various forms, it occurs as an esoteric belief in many streams of
Judaism
Judaism ( he, ''Yahăḏūṯ'') is an Abrahamic, monotheistic, and ethnic religion comprising the collective religious, cultural, and legal tradition and civilization of the Jewish people. It has its roots as an organized religion in the ...
in different aspects, in some beliefs of the
Indigenous peoples of the Americas
The Indigenous peoples of the Americas are the inhabitants of the Americas before the arrival of the European settlers in the 15th century, and the ethnic groups who now identify themselves with those peoples.
Many Indigenous peoples of the A ...
, and some
Indigenous Australians
Indigenous Australians or Australian First Nations are people with familial heritage from, and membership in, the ethnic groups that lived in Australia before British colonisation. They consist of two distinct groups: the Aboriginal peoples ...
(though most believe in an afterlife or
spirit world). A belief in rebirth/
metempsychosis
Metempsychosis ( grc-gre, μετεμψύχωσις), in philosophy, is the Reincarnation#Conceptual definitions, transmigration of the soul, especially its reincarnation after death. The term is derived from ancient Greek philosophy, and has be ...
was held by
Greek
Greek may refer to:
Greece
Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe:
*Greeks, an ethnic group.
*Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family.
**Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
historical figures, such as
Pythagoras
Pythagoras of Samos ( grc, Πυθαγόρας ὁ Σάμιος, Pythagóras ho Sámios, Pythagoras the Samos, Samian, or simply ; in Ionian Greek; ) was an ancient Ionians, Ionian Ancient Greek philosophy, Greek philosopher and the eponymou ...
,
Socrates
Socrates (; ; –399 BC) was a Greek philosopher from Athens who is credited as the founder of Western philosophy and among the first moral philosophers of the ethical tradition of thought. An enigmatic figure, Socrates authored no te ...
, and
Plato
Plato ( ; grc-gre, Πλάτων ; 428/427 or 424/423 – 348/347 BC) was a Greek philosopher born in Athens during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. He founded the Platonist school of thought and the Academy, the first institution ...
, as well as in various modern religions.
Although the majority of denominations within
Christianity
Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth. It is the world's largest and most widespread religion with roughly 2.38 billion followers representing one-third of the global pop ...
and
Islam
Islam (; ar, ۘالِإسلَام, , ) is an Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic Monotheism#Islam, monotheistic religion centred primarily around the Quran, a religious text considered by Muslims to be the direct word of God in Islam, God (or ...
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
Cathars
Catharism (; from the grc, καθαροί, katharoi, "the pure ones") was a Christian dualist or Gnostic movement between the 12th and 14th centuries which thrived in Southern Europe, particularly in northern Italy and southern France. F ...
,
Alawites
The Alawis, Alawites ( ar, علوية ''Alawīyah''), or pejoratively Nusayris ( ar, نصيرية ''Nuṣayrīyah'') are an ethnoreligious group that lives primarily in Levant and follows Alawism, a sect of Islam that originated from Shia Isl ...
, the
Druze
The Druze (; ar, دَرْزِيٌّ, ' or ', , ') are an Arabic-speaking esoteric ethnoreligious group from Western Asia who adhere to the Druze faith, an Abrahamic, monotheistic, syncretic, and ethnic religion based on the teachings of ...
, and the
Rosicrucians. The historical relations between these sects and the beliefs about reincarnation that were characteristic of
Neoplatonism
Neoplatonism is a strand of Platonic philosophy that emerged in the 3rd century AD against the background of Hellenistic philosophy and religion. The term does not encapsulate a set of ideas as much as a chain of thinkers. But there are some i ...
,
Orphism,
Hermeticism
Hermeticism, or Hermetism, is a philosophical system that is primarily based on the purported teachings of Hermes Trismegistus (a legendary Hellenistic combination of the Greek god Hermes and the Egyptian god Thoth). These teachings are containe ...
,
Manichaenism
Manichaeism (;
in New Persian ; ) is a former major religionR. van den Broek, Wouter J. Hanegraaff ''Gnosis and Hermeticism from Antiquity to Modern Times''SUNY Press, 1998 p. 37 founded in the 3rd century AD by the Parthian prophet Mani (AD ...
, and
Gnosticism
Gnosticism (from grc, γνωστικός, gnōstikós, , 'having knowledge') is a collection of religious ideas and systems which coalesced in the late 1st century AD among Jewish and early Christian sects. These various groups emphasized pe ...
of the
Roman era
In modern historiography, ancient Rome refers to Roman civilisation from the founding of the city of Rome in the 8th century BC to the collapse of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century AD. It encompasses the Roman Kingdom (753–509 BC ...
as well as the Indian religions have been the subject of recent scholarly research. In recent decades, many
Europeans and
North Americans
North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and the Ca ...
have developed an interest in reincarnation,
and
many contemporary works mention it.
Conceptual definitions
The word ''reincarnation'' derives from a
Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
term that literally means 'entering the flesh again'. Reincarnation refers to the belief that an aspect of every human being (or all living beings in some cultures) continues to exist after death. This aspect may be the soul or mind or consciousness or something transcendent which is reborn in an interconnected cycle of existence; the transmigration belief varies by culture, and is envisioned to be in the form of a newly born human being, or animal, or plant, or spirit, or as a being in some other non-human realm of existence.
An alternative term is ''transmigration'', implying migration from one life (body) to another. The term has been used by modern philosophers such as
Kurt Gödel and has entered the English language.
The Greek equivalent to reincarnation, ''
metempsychosis
Metempsychosis ( grc-gre, μετεμψύχωσις), in philosophy, is the Reincarnation#Conceptual definitions, transmigration of the soul, especially its reincarnation after death. The term is derived from ancient Greek philosophy, and has be ...
'' (), derives from ''meta'' ('change') and ('to put a soul into'), a term attributed to
Pythagoras
Pythagoras of Samos ( grc, Πυθαγόρας ὁ Σάμιος, Pythagóras ho Sámios, Pythagoras the Samos, Samian, or simply ; in Ionian Greek; ) was an ancient Ionians, Ionian Ancient Greek philosophy, Greek philosopher and the eponymou ...
. Another Greek term sometimes used synonymously is ''
palingenesis
Palingenesis (; also palingenesia) is a concept of rebirth or re-creation, used in various contexts in philosophy, theology, politics, and biology. Its meaning stems from Greek , meaning 'again', and , meaning 'birth'.
In biology, it is anothe ...
'', 'being born again'.
Rebirth is a key concept found in major Indian religions, and discussed using various terms. Reincarnation, or ''
Punarjanman
''Punarjanman'' ( sa, पुनर्जन्मन्) in Hinduism is a Sanskrit word that refers to "repeated birth", "transmigration", " re-birth" or "a principle of
diachronic ontogeny".Bodewitz, H. (2019). Table of Contents. In Heilijger ...
'' (, 'rebirth, transmigration'),
is discussed in the ancient Sanskrit texts of Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism, with many alternate terms such as ''punarāvṛtti'' (), ''punarājāti'' (), ''punarjīvātu'' (), ''punarbhava'' (), ''āgati-gati'' (, common in
Buddhist Pali text), ''nibbattin'' (), ''upapatti'' (), and ''uppajjana'' ().
These religions believe that this reincarnation is cyclic and an endless
Saṃsāra, unless one gains spiritual insights that ends this cycle leading to liberation. The reincarnation concept is considered in Indian religions as a step that starts each "cycle of aimless drifting, wandering or mundane existence," but one that is an opportunity to seek spiritual liberation through ethical living and a variety of meditative, yogic (''marga''), or other spiritual practices. They consider the release from the cycle of reincarnations as the ultimate spiritual goal, and call the liberation by terms such as
moksha
''Moksha'' (; sa, मोक्ष, '), also called ''vimoksha'', ''vimukti'' and ''mukti'', is a term in Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism and Sikhism for various forms of emancipation, enlightenment, liberation, and release. In its soteriology, ...
,
nirvana
( , , ; sa, निर्वाण} ''nirvāṇa'' ; Pali: ''nibbāna''; Prakrit: ''ṇivvāṇa''; literally, "blown out", as in an oil lampRichard Gombrich, ''Theravada Buddhism: A Social History from Ancient Benāres to Modern Colombo.' ...
, ''mukti'' and ''kaivalya''. However, the Buddhist, Hindu and Jain traditions have differed, since ancient times, in their assumptions and in their details on what reincarnates, how reincarnation occurs and what leads to liberation.
''
Gilgul
Gilgul (also Gilgul neshamot or Gilgulei HaNeshamot; Hebrew language, Heb. , Plural: ''Gilgulim'') is a concept of reincarnation or "transmigration of souls" in Kabbalah, Kabbalistic esoteric mysticism. In Hebrew language, Hebrew, the word ''gi ...
'', ''Gilgul neshamot'', or ''Gilgulei Ha Neshamot'' () is the concept of reincarnation in
Kabbalistic Judaism
Judaism ( he, ''Yahăḏūṯ'') is an Abrahamic, monotheistic, and ethnic religion comprising the collective religious, cultural, and legal tradition and civilization of the Jewish people. It has its roots as an organized religion in the ...
, found in much
Yiddish literature
Yiddish literature encompasses all those belles-lettres written in Yiddish, the language of Ashkenazic Jewry which is related to Middle High German. The history of Yiddish, with its roots in central Europe and locus for centuries in Eastern Euro ...
among
Ashkenazi Jews
Ashkenazi Jews ( ; he, יְהוּדֵי אַשְׁכְּנַז, translit=Yehudei Ashkenaz, ; yi, אַשכּנזישע ייִדן, Ashkenazishe Yidn), also known as Ashkenazic Jews or ''Ashkenazim'',, Ashkenazi Hebrew pronunciation: , singu ...
. ''Gilgul'' means 'cycle' and ''neshamot'' is 'souls'. Kabbalistic reincarnation says that humans reincarnate only to humans unless
YHWH
The Tetragrammaton (; ), or Tetragram, is the four-letter Hebrew theonym (transliterated as YHWH), the name of God in the Hebrew Bible. The four letters, written and read from right to left (in Hebrew), are ''yodh'', '' he'', '' waw'', and ...
/
Ein Sof
Ein Sof, or Eyn Sof (, he, '; meaning "infinite", ), in Kabbalah, is understood as God prior to any self-manifestation in the production of any spiritual realm, probably derived from Solomon ibn Gabirol's ( 1021 – 1070) term, "the Endless ...
/
God
In monotheistic thought, God is usually viewed as the supreme being, creator, and principal object of faith. Swinburne, R.G. "God" in Honderich, Ted. (ed)''The Oxford Companion to Philosophy'', Oxford University Press, 1995. God is typically ...
chooses.
History
Origins
The origins of the notion of reincarnation are obscure. Discussion of the subject appears in the philosophical traditions of
India
India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...
. The Greek
Pre-Socratics
Pre-Socratic philosophy, also known as early Greek philosophy, is ancient Greek philosophy before Socrates. Pre-Socratic philosophers were mostly interested in cosmology, the beginning and the substance of the universe, but the inquiries of thes ...
discussed reincarnation, and the Celtic
druids
A druid was a member of the high-ranking class in ancient Celtic cultures. Druids were religious leaders as well as legal authorities, adjudicators, lorekeepers, medical professionals and political advisors. Druids left no written accounts. Whi ...
are also reported to have taught a doctrine of reincarnation.
Early Jainism, Buddhism, and Hinduism
The concepts of the cycle of birth and death,
Saṁsāra, and liberation partly derive from
ascetic traditions that arose in India around the middle of the first millennium BCE. The first textual references to the idea of reincarnation appear in the
Upanishads
The Upanishads (; sa, उपनिषद् ) are late Vedic Sanskrit texts that supplied the basis of later Hindu philosophy.Wendy Doniger (1990), ''Textual Sources for the Study of Hinduism'', 1st Edition, University of Chicago Press, , ...
of the late
Vedic period
The Vedic period, or the Vedic age (), is the period in the late Bronze Age and early Iron Age of the history of India when the Vedic literature, including the Vedas (ca. 1300–900 BCE), was composed in the northern Indian subcontinent, betw ...
(c. 1100 – c. 500 BCE), predating the
Buddha
Siddhartha Gautama, most commonly referred to as the Buddha, was a wandering ascetic and religious teacher who lived in South Asia during the 6th or 5th century BCE and founded Buddhism.
According to Buddhist tradition, he was born in L ...
and the
Mahavira.
Though no direct evidence of this has been found, the tribes of the
Ganges
The Ganges ( ) (in India: Ganga ( ); in Bangladesh: Padma ( )). "The Ganges Basin, known in India as the Ganga and in Bangladesh as the Padma, is an international river to which India, Bangladesh, Nepal and China are the riparian states." is ...
valley or the
Dravidian traditions of
South India
South India, also known as Dakshina Bharata or Peninsular India, consists of the peninsular southern part of India. It encompasses the Indian states of Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, and Telangana, as well as the union territ ...
have been proposed as another early source of reincarnation beliefs.
The idea of reincarnation, ''Saṁsāra'', did not exist in the early
Vedic religions. The early Vedas do not mention the doctrine of
Karma
Karma (; sa, कर्म}, ; pi, kamma, italic=yes) in Sanskrit means an action, work, or deed, and its effect or consequences. In Indian religions, the term more specifically refers to a principle of cause and effect, often descriptivel ...
and rebirth but mention the belief in an
afterlife. It is in the early Upanishads, which are pre-
Buddha
Siddhartha Gautama, most commonly referred to as the Buddha, was a wandering ascetic and religious teacher who lived in South Asia during the 6th or 5th century BCE and founded Buddhism.
According to Buddhist tradition, he was born in L ...
and pre-
Mahavira, where these ideas are developed and described in a general way.
[A.M. Boyer (1901), "Etude sur l'origine de la doctrine du samsara", ''Journal Asiatique'', Volume 9, Issue 18, pp. 451–453, 459–468] Detailed descriptions first appear around the mid-1st millennium BCE in diverse traditions, including Buddhism, Jainism and various schools of
Hindu philosophy
Hindu philosophy encompasses the philosophies, world views and teachings of Hinduism that emerged in Ancient India which include six systems ('' shad-darśana'') – Samkhya, Yoga, Nyaya, Vaisheshika, Mimamsa and Vedanta.Andrew Nicholson ( ...
, each of which gave unique expression to the general principle.
The texts of ancient
Jainism
Jainism ( ), also known as Jain Dharma, is an Indian religions, Indian religion. Jainism traces its spiritual ideas and history through the succession of twenty-four tirthankaras (supreme preachers of ''Dharma''), with the first in the current ...
that have survived into the modern era are post-Mahavira, likely from the last centuries of the first millennium BCE, and extensively mention rebirth and karma doctrines.
The Jaina philosophy assumes that the soul (''
jiva
''Jiva'' ( sa, जीव, IAST: ) is a living being or any entity imbued with a life force in Hinduism and Jainism. The word itself originates from the Sanskrit verb-root ''jīv'', which translates as 'to breathe' or 'to live'. The ''jiva'', a ...
'' in Jainism; ''
atman Atman or Ātman may refer to:
Film
* ''Ātman'' (1975 film), a Japanese experimental short film directed by Toshio Matsumoto
* ''Atman'' (1997 film), a documentary film directed by Pirjo Honkasalo
People
* Pavel Atman (born 1987), Russian hand ...
'' in Hinduism) exists and is eternal, passing through cycles of transmigration and rebirth. After death, reincarnation into a new body is asserted to be instantaneous in early Jaina texts.
[ Depending upon the accumulated karma, rebirth occurs into a higher or lower bodily form, either in heaven or hell or earthly realm. No bodily form is permanent: everyone dies and reincarnates further. Liberation (''kevalya'') from reincarnation is possible, however, through removing and ending karmic accumulations to one's soul. From the early stages of Jainism on, a human being was considered the highest mortal being, with the potential to achieve liberation, particularly through asceticism.
The ]early Buddhist texts
Early Buddhist texts (EBTs), early Buddhist literature or early Buddhist discourses are parallel texts shared by the early Buddhist schools. The most widely studied EBT material are the first four Pali Nikayas, as well as the corresponding Chines ...
discuss rebirth as part of the doctrine of '' Saṃsāra''. This asserts that the nature of existence is a "suffering-laden cycle of life, death, and rebirth, without beginning or end."[; ''Quote:'' "Buddhist doctrine holds that until they realize nirvana, beings are bound to undergo rebirth and redeath due to their having acted out of ignorance and desire, thereby producing the seeds of karma".] Also referred to as the wheel of existence (''Bhavacakra
The bhavacakra (Sanskrit: भवचक्र; Pāli: ''bhavacakka''; Tibetan: སྲིད་པའི་འཁོར་ལོ, Wylie: ''srid pa'i 'khor lo'') is a symbolic representation of saṃsāra (or cyclic existence). It is found on the ...
''), it is often mentioned in Buddhist texts with the term ''punarbhava'' (rebirth, re-becoming). Liberation from this cycle of existence, ''Nirvana'', is the foundation and the most important purpose of Buddhism. Buddhist texts also assert that an enlightened person knows his previous births, a knowledge achieved through high levels of meditative concentration. Tibetan Buddhism discusses death, bardo
In some schools of Buddhism, ''bardo'' ( xct, བར་དོ་ Wylie: ''bar do'') or ''antarābhava'' (Sanskrit, Chinese and Japanese: 中有, romanized in Chinese as ''zhōng yǒu'' and in Japanese as ''chū'u'') is an intermediate, transitio ...
(an intermediate state), and rebirth in texts such as the ''Tibetan Book of the Dead
The ''Bardo Thodol'' (, "Liberation Through Hearing During the Intermediate State"), commonly known in the West as ''The Tibetan Book of the Dead'', is a terma text from a larger corpus of teachings, the ''Profound Dharma of Self-Liberation ...
''. While Nirvana is taught as the ultimate goal in the Theravadin Buddhism, and is essential to Mahayana Buddhism, the vast majority of contemporary lay Buddhists focus on accumulating good karma and acquiring merit to achieve a better reincarnation in the next life.
In early Buddhist traditions, '' Saṃsāra'' cosmology consisted of five realms through which the wheel of existence cycled.[ This included hells ('']niraya
Naraka ( sa, नरक; pi, 𑀦𑀺𑀭𑀬 Niraya) is a term in Buddhist cosmology usually referred to in English as " hell" (or "hell realm") or "purgatory". The Narakas of Buddhism are closely related to ''Diyu'', the hell in Chinese my ...
''), hungry ghosts
Hungry ghost is a concept in Buddhism, and Chinese traditional religion, representing beings who are driven by intense emotional needs in an animalistic way.
The terms ' literally "hungry ghost", are the Chinese translation of the term ''pret ...
(''pretas
Preta ( sa, प्रेत, bo, ཡི་དྭགས་ ''yi dags''), also known as hungry ghost, is the Sanskrit name for a type of supernatural being described in Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, and Chinese folk religion as undergoing suffer ...
''), animals ('' tiryak''), humans ('' manushya''), and gods (''deva
Deva may refer to:
Entertainment
* ''Deva'' (1989 film), a 1989 Kannada film
* ''Deva'' (1995 film), a 1995 Tamil film
* ''Deva'' (2002 film), a 2002 Bengali film
* Deva (2007 Telugu film)
* ''Deva'' (2017 film), a 2017 Marathi film
* Deva ...
s'', heavenly). In latter Buddhist traditions, this list grew to a list of six realms of rebirth, adding demigods ('' asuras'').[
]
Rationale
The earliest layers of Vedic text incorporate the concept of life, followed by an afterlife in heaven and hell based on cumulative virtues (merit) or vices (demerit). However, the ancient Vedic Rishis challenged this idea of afterlife as simplistic, because people do not live equally moral or immoral lives. Between generally virtuous lives, some are more virtuous; while evil too has degrees, and the texts assert that it would be unfair for people, with varying degrees of virtue or vices, to end up in heaven or hell, in "either or" and disproportionate manner irrespective of how virtuous or vicious their lives were. They introduced the idea of an afterlife in heaven or hell in proportion to one's merit.
Comparison
Early texts of Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism share the concepts and terminology related to reincarnation. They also emphasize similar virtuous practices and karma
Karma (; sa, कर्म}, ; pi, kamma, italic=yes) in Sanskrit means an action, work, or deed, and its effect or consequences. In Indian religions, the term more specifically refers to a principle of cause and effect, often descriptivel ...
as necessary for liberation and what influences future rebirths. For example, all three discuss various virtues—sometimes grouped as Yamas
The Yamas ( sa, यम, translit=Yama), and their complement, the Niyamas, represent a series of "right living" or ethical rules within Yoga philosophy. It means "reining in" or "control". These are restraints for proper conduct as given in the ...
and Niyama
The Niyamas ( sa, नियम, translit=Niyama) are positive duties or observances. In Indian traditions, particularly Yoga, niyamas and their complement, Yamas, are recommended activities and habits for healthy living, spiritual enlightenmen ...
s—such as non-violence, truthfulness, non-stealing, non-possessiveness, compassion for all living beings, charity
Charity may refer to:
Giving
* Charitable organization or charity, a non-profit organization whose primary objectives are philanthropy and social well-being of persons
* Charity (practice), the practice of being benevolent, giving and sharing
* C ...
and many others.
Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism disagree in their assumptions and theories about rebirth. Hinduism relies on its foundational assumption that 'soul, Self exists' ( ''atman'' or ''attā''), in contrast to Buddhist assumption that there is 'no soul, no Self' ( ''anatta'' or ''anatman'').[John C. Plott et al (2000), Global History of Philosophy: The Axial Age, Volume 1, Motilal Banarsidass, , p. 63, Quote: "The Buddhist schools reject any Ātman concept. As we have already observed, this is the basic and ineradicable distinction between Hinduism and Buddhism".] Hindu traditions consider soul to be the unchanging eternal essence of a living being, and what journeys across reincarnations until it attains self-knowledge. Buddhism, in contrast, asserts a rebirth theory without a Self, and considers realization of non-Self or Emptiness as Nirvana (''nibbana
Nirvana (Sanskrit: निर्वाण, '; Pali: ') is "blowing out" or "quenching" of the activities of the worldly mind and its related suffering. Nirvana is the goal of the Hinayana and Theravada Buddhist paths, and marks the soteriologica ...
''). Thus Buddhism and Hinduism have a very different view on whether a self or soul exists, which impacts the details of their respective rebirth theories.
The reincarnation doctrine in Jainism differs from those in Buddhism, even though both are non-theistic Sramana traditions.[ Jainism, in contrast to Buddhism, accepts the foundational assumption that soul exists ('']Jiva
''Jiva'' ( sa, जीव, IAST: ) is a living being or any entity imbued with a life force in Hinduism and Jainism. The word itself originates from the Sanskrit verb-root ''jīv'', which translates as 'to breathe' or 'to live'. The ''jiva'', a ...
'') and asserts this soul is involved in the rebirth mechanism. Further, Jainism considers asceticism as an important means to spiritual liberation that ends all reincarnation, while Buddhism does not.
Classical antiquity
Early Greek discussion of the concept dates to the sixth century BCE. An early Greek thinker known to have considered rebirth is Pherecydes of Syros
Pherecydes of Syros (; grc-gre, Φερεκύδης ὁ Σύριος; fl. 6th century BCE) was an Ancient Greek mythographer and proto- philosopher from the island of Syros. Little is known about his life and death. Some ancient testimonies cou ...
(fl. 540 BCE). His younger contemporary Pythagoras
Pythagoras of Samos ( grc, Πυθαγόρας ὁ Σάμιος, Pythagóras ho Sámios, Pythagoras the Samos, Samian, or simply ; in Ionian Greek; ) was an ancient Ionians, Ionian Ancient Greek philosophy, Greek philosopher and the eponymou ...
(c. 570–c. 495 BCE), its first famous exponent, instituted societies for its diffusion. Some authorities believe that Pythagoras was Pherecydes' pupil, others that Pythagoras took up the idea of reincarnation from the doctrine of Orphism, a Thracian
The Thracians (; grc, Θρᾷκες ''Thrāikes''; la, Thraci) were an Indo-European speaking people who inhabited large parts of Eastern and Southeastern Europe in ancient history.. "The Thracians were an Indo-European people who occupied ...
religion, or brought the teaching from India.
Plato
Plato ( ; grc-gre, Πλάτων ; 428/427 or 424/423 – 348/347 BC) was a Greek philosopher born in Athens during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. He founded the Platonist school of thought and the Academy, the first institution ...
(428/427–348/347 BCE) presented accounts of reincarnation in his works, particularly the ''Myth of Er
The Myth of Er is a legend that concludes Plato's ''Republic'' (10.614–10.621). The story includes an account of the cosmos and the afterlife that greatly influenced religious, philosophical, and scientific thought for many centuries.
The story ...
'', where 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 :''See also the chariot allegory in the Indian work Katha Upanishad, and another in the story of Vajira.''
Plato, in his dialogue '' Phaedrus'' (sections 246a–254e), uses the Chariot Allegory to explain his view of the human soul. He creates thi ...
of the '' Phaedrus'', in the ''Meno
''Meno'' (; grc-gre, Μένων, ''Ménōn'') is a Socratic dialogue by Plato. Meno begins the dialogue by asking Socrates whether virtue is taught, acquired by practice, or comes by nature. In order to determine whether virtue is teachabl ...
'', ''Timaeus Timaeus (or Timaios) is a Greek name. It may refer to:
* ''Timaeus'' (dialogue), a Socratic dialogue by Plato
*Timaeus of Locri, 5th-century BC Pythagorean philosopher, appearing in Plato's dialogue
*Timaeus (historian) (c. 345 BC-c. 250 BC), Greek ...
'' and ''Laws
Law is a set of rules that are created and are enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior,Robertson, ''Crimes against humanity'', 90. with its precise definition a matter of longstanding debate. It has been vari ...
''. The soul, once separated from the body, spends an indeterminate amount of time in the intelligible realm (see The Allegory of the Cave
The Allegory of the Cave, or Plato's Cave, is an allegory presented by the Greek philosopher Plato in his work ''Republic'' (514a–520a) to compare "the effect of education ( παιδεία) and the lack of it on our nature". It is written as ...
in '' The Republic'') and then assumes another body. In the ''Timaeus'', Plato believes that the soul moves from body to body without any distinct reward-or-punishment phase between lives, because the reincarnation is itself a punishment or reward for how a person has lived.
In ''Phaedo
''Phædo'' or ''Phaedo'' (; el, Φαίδων, ''Phaidōn'' ), also known to ancient readers as ''On The Soul'', is one of the best-known dialogues of Plato's middle period, along with the '' Republic'' and the '' Symposium.'' The philosophica ...
'', Plato has his teacher Socrates
Socrates (; ; –399 BC) was a Greek philosopher from Athens who is credited as the founder of Western philosophy and among the first moral philosophers of the ethical tradition of thought. An enigmatic figure, Socrates authored no te ...
, 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
Xenophon of Athens (; grc, wikt:Ξενοφῶν, Ξενοφῶν ; – probably 355 or 354 BC) was a Greek military leader, philosopher, and historian, born in Athens. At the age of 30, Xenophon was elected commander of one of the biggest Anci ...
does not mention Socrates as believing in reincarnation, and Plato may have systematized Socrates' thought with concepts he took directly from Pythagoreanism or Orphism. Recent scholars have come to see that Plato has multiple reasons for the belief in reincarnation. One argument concerns the theory of reincarnation's usefulness for explaining why non-human animals exist: they are former humans, being punished for their vices; Plato gives this argument at the end of the ''Timaeus''.
Mystery cults
The Orphic religion
Orphism (more rarely Orphicism; grc, Ὀρφικά, Orphiká) is the name given to a set of religious beliefs and practices originating in the ancient Greek and Hellenistic world, associated with literature ascribed to the mythical poet Orpheus ...
, which taught reincarnation, about the sixth century BCE, produced a copious literature. Orpheus
Orpheus (; Ancient Greek: Ὀρφεύς, classical pronunciation: ; french: Orphée) is a Thracian bard, legendary musician and prophet in ancient Greek religion. He was also a renowned poet and, according to the legend, travelled with J ...
, 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 ancient Greek religion and myth, Dionysus (; grc, Διόνυσος ) is the god of the grape-harvest, winemaking, orchards and fruit, vegetation, fertility, insanity, ritual madness, religious ecstasy, festivity, and theatre. The Romans ...
in particular, and of self-purification until the soul has completed the spiral ascent of destiny to live forever.
An association between Pythagorean philosophy
Pythagoreanism originated in the 6th century BC, based on and around the teachings and beliefs held by Pythagoras and his followers, the Pythagoreans. Pythagoras established the first Pythagorean community in the ancient Greek colony of Kroton, ...
and reincarnation was routinely accepted throughout antiquity, as Pythagoras also taught about reincarnation. However, unlike the Orphics, who considered metempsychosis a cycle of grief that could be escaped by attaining liberation from it, Pythagoras seems to postulate an eternal, neutral reincarnation where subsequent lives would not be conditioned by any action done in the previous.
Later authors
In later Greek literature the doctrine is mentioned in a fragment of Menander
Menander (; grc-gre, Μένανδρος ''Menandros''; c. 342/41 – c. 290 BC) was a Greek dramatist and the best-known representative of Athenian New Comedy. He wrote 108 comedies and took the prize at the Lenaia festival eight times. His rec ...
and satirized by Lucian. In Roman
Roman or Romans most often refers to:
*Rome, the capital city of Italy
*Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD
*Roman people, the people of ancient Rome
*''Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a letter ...
literature it is found as early as Ennius
Quintus Ennius (; c. 239 – c. 169 BC) was a writer and poet who lived during the Roman Republic. He is often considered the father of Roman poetry. He was born in the small town of Rudiae, located near modern Lecce, Apulia, (Ancient Calabria ...
, who, in a lost passage of his ''Annals'', told how he had seen Homer
Homer (; grc, Ὅμηρος , ''Hómēros'') (born ) was a Greek poet who is credited as the author of the ''Iliad'' and the ''Odyssey'', two epic poems that are foundational works of ancient Greek literature. Homer is considered one of the ...
in a dream, who had assured him that the same soul which had animated both the poets had once belonged to a peacock. Persius
Aulus Persius Flaccus (; 4 December 3424 November 62 AD) was a Roman poet and satirist of Etruscan origin. In his works, poems and satires, he shows a Stoic wisdom and a strong criticism for what he considered to be the stylistic abuses of his ...
in his satires (vi. 9) laughs at this; it is referred to also by Lucretius
Titus Lucretius Carus ( , ; – ) was a Roman poet and philosopher. His only known work is the philosophical poem ''De rerum natura'', a didactic work about the tenets and philosophy of Epicureanism, and which usually is translated into En ...
and Horace
Quintus Horatius Flaccus (; 8 December 65 – 27 November 8 BC), known in the English-speaking world as Horace (), was the leading Roman lyric poet during the time of Augustus (also known as Octavian). The rhetorician Quintilian regarded his ' ...
.
Virgil
Publius Vergilius Maro (; traditional dates 15 October 7021 September 19 BC), usually called Virgil or Vergil ( ) in English, was an ancient Roman poet of the Augustan period. He composed three of the most famous poems in Latin literature: t ...
works the idea into his account of the Underworld in the sixth book of the ''Aeneid
The ''Aeneid'' ( ; la, Aenē̆is or ) is a Latin Epic poetry, epic poem, written by Virgil between 29 and 19 BC, that tells the legendary story of Aeneas, a Troy, Trojan who fled the Trojan_War#Sack_of_Troy, fall of Troy and travelled to ...
''. It persists down to the late classic thinkers, Plotinus
Plotinus (; grc-gre, Πλωτῖνος, ''Plōtînos''; – 270 CE) was a philosopher in the Hellenistic tradition, born and raised in Roman Egypt. Plotinus is regarded by modern scholarship as the founder of Neoplatonism. His teacher wa ...
and the other Neoplatonist
Neoplatonism is a strand of Platonic philosophy that emerged in the 3rd century AD against the background of Hellenistic philosophy and religion. The term does not encapsulate a set of ideas as much as a chain of thinkers. But there are some id ...
s. In the Hermetica
The ''Hermetica'' are texts attributed to the legendary Hellenistic figure Hermes Trismegistus, a syncretic combination of the Greek god Hermes and the Egyptian god Thoth. These texts may vary widely in content and purpose, but are usually subd ...
, a Graeco-Egyptian series of writings on cosmology and spirituality attributed to Hermes Trismegistus
Hermes Trismegistus (from grc, Ἑρμῆς ὁ Τρισμέγιστος, "Hermes the Thrice-Greatest"; Classical Latin: la, label=none, Mercurius ter Maximus) is a legendary Hellenistic figure that originated as a syncretic combination of t ...
/Thoth
Thoth (; from grc-koi, Θώθ ''Thṓth'', borrowed from cop, Ⲑⲱⲟⲩⲧ ''Thōout'', Egyptian: ', the reflex of " eis like the Ibis") is an ancient Egyptian deity. In art, he was often depicted as a man with the head of an ibis or ...
, the doctrine of reincarnation is central.
Celtic paganism
In the first century BCE Alexander Cornelius Polyhistor wrote:
Julius Caesar
Gaius Julius Caesar (; ; 12 July 100 BC – 15 March 44 BC), was a Roman general and statesman. A member of the First Triumvirate, Caesar led the Roman armies in the Gallic Wars before defeating his political rival Pompey in a civil war, and ...
recorded that the druids
A druid was a member of the high-ranking class in ancient Celtic cultures. Druids were religious leaders as well as legal authorities, adjudicators, lorekeepers, medical professionals and political advisors. Druids left no written accounts. Whi ...
of Gaul, Britain and Ireland had metempsychosis as one of their core doctrines:
Diodorus
Diodorus Siculus, or Diodorus of Sicily ( grc-gre, Διόδωρος ; 1st century BC), was an ancient Greek historian. He is known for writing the monumental universal history ''Bibliotheca historica'', in forty books, fifteen of which su ...
also recorded the Gaul belief that human souls were immortal, and that after a prescribed number of years they would commence upon a new life in another body. He added that Gauls had the custom of casting letters to their deceased upon the funeral pyres, through which the dead would be able to read them. Valerius Maximus
Valerius Maximus () was a 1st-century Latin writer and author of a collection of historical anecdotes: ''Factorum ac dictorum memorabilium libri IX'' ("Nine books of memorable deeds and sayings", also known as ''De factis dictisque memorabilibus'' ...
also recounted they had the custom of lending sums of money to each other which would are repayable in the next world. This was mentioned by Pomponius Mela
Pomponius Mela, who wrote around AD 43, was the earliest Roman geographer. He was born in Tingentera (now Algeciras) and died AD 45.
His short work (''De situ orbis libri III.'') remained in use nearly to the year 1500. It occupies less ...
, who also recorded Gauls buried or burnt with them things they would need in a next life, to the point some would jump into the funeral piles of their relatives in order to cohabite in the new life with them.
Hippolytus of Rome
Hippolytus of Rome (, ; c. 170 – c. 235 AD) was one of the most important second-third century Christian theologians, whose provenance, identity and corpus remain elusive to scholars and historians. Suggested communities include Rome, Palestin ...
believed the Gauls had been taught the doctrine of reincarnation by a slave of Pythagoras
Pythagoras of Samos ( grc, Πυθαγόρας ὁ Σάμιος, Pythagóras ho Sámios, Pythagoras the Samos, Samian, or simply ; in Ionian Greek; ) was an ancient Ionians, Ionian Ancient Greek philosophy, Greek philosopher and the eponymou ...
named Zalmoxis
Zalmoxis ( grc-gre, Ζάλμοξις) also known as Salmoxis (Σάλμοξις), Zalmoxes (Ζάλμοξες), Zamolxis (Ζάμολξις), Samolxis (Σάμολξις), Zamolxes (Ζάμολξες), or Zamolxe (Ζάμολξε) is a divinity of the ...
. Conversely, Clement of Alexandria
Titus Flavius Clemens, also known as Clement of Alexandria ( grc , Κλήμης ὁ Ἀλεξανδρεύς; – ), was a Christian theologian and philosopher who taught at the Catechetical School of Alexandria. Among his pupils were Origen and ...
believed Pythagoras himself had learned it from the Celts and not the opposite, claiming he had been taught by Galatian Gauls, Hindu
Hindus (; ) are people who religiously adhere to Hinduism. Jeffery D. Long (2007), A Vision for Hinduism, IB Tauris, , pages 35–37 Historically, the term has also been used as a geographical, cultural, and later religious identifier for ...
priests and Zoroastrians. However, author T. D. Kendrick rejected a real connection between Pythagoras and the Celtic idea reincarnation, noting their beliefs to have substantial differences, and any contact to be historically unlikely. Nonetheless, he proposed the possibility of an ancient common source, also related to the Orphic religion
Orphism (more rarely Orphicism; grc, Ὀρφικά, Orphiká) is the name given to a set of religious beliefs and practices originating in the ancient Greek and Hellenistic world, associated with literature ascribed to the mythical poet Orpheus ...
and Thracian
The Thracians (; grc, Θρᾷκες ''Thrāikes''; la, Thraci) were an Indo-European speaking people who inhabited large parts of Eastern and Southeastern Europe in ancient history.. "The Thracians were an Indo-European people who occupied ...
systems of belief.
Germanic paganism
Surviving texts indicate that there was a belief in rebirth in Germanic paganism Surviving texts indicate that there was a belief in rebirth in Germanic paganism. Examples occur in eddic poetry and sagas, potentially associated with naming and/or through the family line. Scholars have discussed the implications of these attestat ...
. Examples include figures from eddic poetry
The ''Poetic Edda'' is the modern name for an untitled collection of Old Norse anonymous narrative poems, which is distinct from the ''Prose Edda'' written by Snorri Sturluson. Several versions exist, all primarily of text from the Icelandic med ...
and sagas, potentially by way of a process of naming and/or through the family line. Scholars have discussed the implications of these attestations and proposed theories regarding belief in reincarnation among the Germanic peoples
The Germanic peoples were historical groups of people that once occupied Central Europe and Scandinavia during antiquity and into the early Middle Ages. Since the 19th century, they have traditionally been defined by the use of ancient and e ...
prior to Christianization
Christianization ( or Christianisation) is to make Christian; to imbue with Christian principles; to become Christian. It can apply to the conversion of an individual, a practice, a place or a whole society. It began in the Roman Empire, conti ...
and potentially to some extent in folk belief
In folkloristics, folk belief or folk-belief is a broad genre of folklore that is often expressed in narratives, customs, rituals, foodways, proverbs, and rhymes. It also includes a wide variety of behaviors, expressions, and beliefs. Examples of ...
thereafter.
Judaism
The belief in reincarnation developed among Jewish mystics in the Medieval World, among whom differing explanations were given of the afterlife, although with a universal belief in an immortal soul. It was explicitly rejected by Saadiah Gaon
Saʻadiah ben Yosef Gaon ( ar, سعيد بن يوسف الفيومي ''Saʻīd bin Yūsuf al-Fayyūmi''; he, סַעֲדְיָה בֶּן יוֹסֵף אַלְפַיּוּמִי גָּאוֹן ''Saʿăḏyāh ben Yōsēf al-Fayyūmī Gāʾōn''; ...
. Today, reincarnation is an esoteric
Western esotericism, also known as esotericism, esoterism, and sometimes the Western mystery tradition, is a term scholars use to categorise a wide range of loosely related ideas and movements that developed within Western society. These ideas ...
belief within many streams of modern Judaism. Kabbalah
Kabbalah ( he, קַבָּלָה ''Qabbālā'', literally "reception, tradition") is an esoteric method, discipline and school of thought in Jewish mysticism. A traditional Kabbalist is called a Mekubbal ( ''Məqūbbāl'' "receiver"). The defin ...
teaches a belief in ''gilgul
Gilgul (also Gilgul neshamot or Gilgulei HaNeshamot; Hebrew language, Heb. , Plural: ''Gilgulim'') is a concept of reincarnation or "transmigration of souls" in Kabbalah, Kabbalistic esoteric mysticism. In Hebrew language, Hebrew, the word ''gi ...
'', transmigration of souls, and hence the belief in reincarnation is universal in Hasidic Judaism
Hasidism, sometimes spelled Chassidism, and also known as Hasidic Judaism (Ashkenazi Hebrew: חסידות ''Ḥăsīdus'', ; originally, "piety"), is a Judaism, Jewish religious group that arose as a spiritual revival movement in the territory ...
, which regards the Kabbalah as sacred and authoritative, and is also sometimes held as an esoteric belief within other strains of Orthodox Judaism
Orthodox Judaism is the collective term for the traditionalist and theologically conservative branches of contemporary Judaism. Theologically, it is chiefly defined by regarding the Torah, both Written and Oral, as revealed by God to Moses ...
. In Judaism
Judaism ( he, ''Yahăḏūṯ'') is an Abrahamic, monotheistic, and ethnic religion comprising the collective religious, cultural, and legal tradition and civilization of the Jewish people. It has its roots as an organized religion in the ...
, the Zohar, first published in the 13th century, discusses reincarnation at length, especially in the Torah
The Torah (; hbo, ''Tōrā'', "Instruction", "Teaching" or "Law") is the compilation of the first five books of the Hebrew Bible, namely the books of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. In that sense, Torah means the ...
portion "Balak." The most comprehensive kabbalistic work on reincarnation, ''Shaar HaGilgulim
''Sha'ar ha Gilgulim'' (''Gate of Reincarnations'', שער הגלגולים) is a kabbalistic work on ''Gilgul'', the concept of reincarnation put together by Rabbi Hayyim Vital who recorded the teachings of his master in the 16th century CE.
Au ...
'', was written by Chaim Vital
Hayyim ben Joseph Vital ( he, רָבִּי חַיִּים בֶּן יוֹסֵף וִיטָאל; Safed, October 23, 1542 (Julian calendar) and October 11, 1542 (Gregorian Calendar) – Damascus, 23 April 1620) was a rabbi in Safed and the foremo ...
, based on the teachings of his mentor, the 16th century kabbalist Isaac Luria
Isaac ben Solomon Luria Ashkenazi (1534 Fine 2003, p24/ref> – July 25, 1572) ( he, יִצְחָק בן שלמה לוּרְיָא אשכנזי ''Yitzhak Ben Sh'lomo Lurya Ashkenazi''), commonly known in Jewish religious circles as "Ha'ARI" (mea ...
, who was said to know the past lives of each person through his semi-prophetic abilities. The 18th century Lithuanian master scholar and kabbalist, Elijah of Vilna, known as the Vilna Gaon, authored a commentary on the biblical Book of Jonah
The Book of Jonah is collected as one of the twelve minor prophets of the Nevi'im ("Prophets") in the Hebrew Bible, and as a book in its own right in the Christian Old Testament. The book tells of a Hebrew prophet named Jonah, son of Amittai, wh ...
as an allegory of reincarnation.
The practice of conversion to Judaism is sometimes understood within Orthodox Judaism in terms of reincarnation. According to this school of thought in Judaism, when non-Jews are drawn to Judaism, it is because they had been Jews in a former life. Such souls may "wander among nations" through multiple lives, until they find their way back to Judaism, including through finding themselves born in a gentile family with a "lost" Jewish ancestor.
There is an extensive literature of Jewish folk and traditional stories that refer to reincarnation.
Christianity
In Greco-Roman thought, the concept of metempsychosis disappeared with the rise of Early Christianity
Early Christianity (up to the First Council of Nicaea in 325) spread from the Levant, across the Roman Empire, and beyond. Originally, this progression was closely connected to already established Jewish centers in the Holy Land and the Jewis ...
, reincarnation being incompatible with the Christian core doctrine of salvation
Salvation (from Latin: ''salvatio'', from ''salva'', 'safe, saved') is the state of being saved or protected from harm or a dire situation. In religion and theology, ''salvation'' generally refers to the deliverance of the soul from sin and its c ...
of the faithful after death. It has been suggested that some of the early Church Fathers, especially Origen
Origen of Alexandria, ''Ōrigénēs''; Origen's Greek name ''Ōrigénēs'' () probably means "child of Horus" (from , "Horus", and , "born"). ( 185 – 253), also known as Origen Adamantius, was an Early Christianity, early Christian scholar, ...
, 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.
states that men "die once, but after this the judgement".
Gnosticism
Several Gnostic
Gnosticism (from grc, γνωστικός, gnōstikós, , 'having knowledge') is a collection of religious ideas and systems which coalesced in the late 1st century AD among Jewish and early Christian sects. These various groups emphasized pe ...
sects professed reincarnation. The Sethians
The Sethians were one of the main currents of Gnosticism during the 2nd and 3rd century CE, along with Valentinianism and Basilideanism. According to John D. Turner, it originated in the 2nd century CE as a fusion of two distinct Hellenistic ...
and followers of Valentinus believed in it. The followers of Bardaisan
Bardaisan (11 July 154 – 222 AD; syr, ܒܪ ܕܝܨܢ, ''Bardaiṣān''), known in Arabic as Ibn Daisan (ابن ديصان) and in Latin as Bardesanes, was a Syriac-speaking Assyrian or ParthianProds Oktor Skjaervo. ''Bardesanes''. Encyclopædia ...
of Mesopotamia
Mesopotamia ''Mesopotamíā''; ar, بِلَاد ٱلرَّافِدَيْن or ; syc, ܐܪܡ ܢܗܪ̈ܝܢ, or , ) is a historical region of Western Asia situated within the Tigris–Euphrates river system, in the northern part of the F ...
, a sect of the second century deemed heretical by the Catholic Church, drew upon Chaldean astrology
Astrology is a range of divinatory practices, recognized as pseudoscientific since the 18th century, that claim to discern information about human affairs and terrestrial events by studying the apparent positions of celestial objects. Di ...
, 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
Irenaeus (; grc-gre, Εἰρηναῖος ''Eirēnaios''; c. 130 – c. 202 AD) was a Greek bishop noted for his role in guiding and expanding Christian communities in the southern regions of present-day France and, more widely, for the dev ...
and the work of Clement of Alexandria
Titus Flavius Clemens, also known as Clement of Alexandria ( grc , Κλήμης ὁ Ἀλεξανδρεύς; – ), was a Christian theologian and philosopher who taught at the Catechetical School of Alexandria. Among his pupils were Origen and ...
(see also Neoplatonism and Gnosticism
Gnosticism refers to a collection of religious groups originating in Jewish religiosity in Alexandria in the first few centuries CE. Filoramo, Giovanni (1990). ''A History of Gnosticism''. Blackwell. pp. 142-7 Neoplatonism is a school of Hellenis ...
and Buddhism and Gnosticism
Buddhologist Edward Conze (1966) has proposed that similarities existed between Buddhism and Gnosticism, a term deriving from the name Gnostics, which was given to a number of Christian sects. To the extent that Buddha taught the existence of evi ...
).
In the third Christian century Manichaeism
Manichaeism (;
in New Persian ; ) is a former major religionR. van den Broek, Wouter J. Hanegraaff ''Gnosis and Hermeticism from Antiquity to Modern Times''SUNY Press, 1998 p. 37 founded in the 3rd century AD by the Parthian Empire, Parthian ...
spread both east and west from Babylonia, then within the Sassanid Empire, where its founder Mani
Mani may refer to:
Geography
* Maní, Casanare, a town and municipality in Casanare Department, Colombia
* Mani, Chad, a town and sub-prefecture in Chad
* Mani, Evros, a village in northeastern Greece
* Mani, Karnataka, a village in Dakshi ...
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
Richard Foltz is a Canadian scholar of American origin. He is a specialist in the history of Iranian civilization—what is sometimes referred to as "Greater Iran". He has also been active in the areas of environmental ethics and animal rights.
...
attributes Mani's teaching of reincarnation to Buddhist influence. However the inter-relation of Manicheanism, Orphism, Gnosticism and neo-Platonism is far from clear.
Taoism
Taoist
Taoism (, ) or Daoism () refers to either a school of philosophical thought (道家; ''daojia'') or to a religion (道教; ''daojiao''), both of which share ideas and concepts of Chinese origin and emphasize living in harmony with the '' Tao ...
documents from as early as the Han Dynasty
The Han dynasty (, ; ) was an imperial dynasty of China (202 BC – 9 AD, 25–220 AD), established by Liu Bang (Emperor Gao) and ruled by the House of Liu. The dynasty was preceded by the short-lived Qin dynasty (221–207 BC) and a warr ...
claimed that Lao Tzu
Laozi (), also known by numerous other names, was a semilegendary ancient Chinese Taoist philosopher. Laozi ( zh, ) is a Chinese honorific, generally translated as "the Old Master". Traditional accounts say he was born as in the state of ...
appeared on earth as different persons in different times beginning in the legendary era of Three Sovereigns and Five Emperors. The (ca. third 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."
European Middle Ages
Around the 11–12th century in Europe, several reincarnationist movements were persecuted as heresies, through the establishment of the Inquisition
The Inquisition was a group of institutions within the Catholic Church whose aim was to combat heresy, conducting trials of suspected heretics. Studies of the records have found that the overwhelming majority of sentences consisted of penances, ...
in the Latin west. These included the Cathar
Catharism (; from the grc, καθαροί, katharoi, "the pure ones") was a Christian dualist or Gnostic movement between the 12th and 14th centuries which thrived in Southern Europe, particularly in northern Italy and southern France. Follo ...
, Paterene or Albigensian church of western Europe, the Paulician
Paulicianism ( Classical Armenian: Պաւղիկեաններ, ; grc, Παυλικιανοί, "The followers of Paul"; Arab sources: ''Baylakānī'', ''al Bayāliqa'' )Nersessian, Vrej (1998). The Tondrakian Movement: Religious Movements in the ...
movement, which arose in Armenia, and the Bogomils
Bogomilism ( Bulgarian and Macedonian: ; sh-Latn-Cyrl, separator=" / ", bogumilstvo, богумилство) was a Christian neo-Gnostic or dualist sect founded in the First Bulgarian Empire by the priest Bogomil during the reign of Tsar P ...
in Bulgaria
Bulgaria (; bg, България, Bǎlgariya), officially the Republic of Bulgaria,, ) is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the eastern flank of the Balkans, and is bordered by Romania to the north, Serbia and North Macedon ...
.
Christian sects such as the Bogomils and the Cathars, who professed reincarnation and other gnostic beliefs, were referred to as "Manichaean", and are today sometimes described by scholars as "Neo-Manichaean". 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.
Renaissance and Early Modern period
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, Benjamin Franklin
Benjamin Franklin ( April 17, 1790) was an American polymath who was active as a writer, scientist, inventor, statesman, diplomat, printer, publisher, and political philosopher. Encyclopædia Britannica, Wood, 2021 Among the leading inte ...
held a similar view. 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
The Myth of Er is a legend that concludes Plato's ''Republic'' (10.614–10.621). The story includes an account of the cosmos and the afterlife that greatly influenced religious, philosophical, and scientific thought for many centuries.
The story ...
''.
During the Renaissance
The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history marking the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and covering the 15th and 16th centuries, characterized by an effort to revive and surpass ideas ...
translations of Plato, the Hermetica
The ''Hermetica'' are texts attributed to the legendary Hellenistic figure Hermes Trismegistus, a syncretic combination of the Greek god Hermes and the Egyptian god Thoth. These texts may vary widely in content and purpose, but are usually subd ...
and other works fostered new European interest in reincarnation. Marsilio Ficino argued that Plato's references to reincarnation were intended allegorically, Shakespeare alluded to the doctrine of reincarnation but Giordano Bruno was burned at the stake by authorities after being found guilty of heresy by the Roman Inquisition
The Roman Inquisition, formally the Supreme Sacred Congregation of the Roman and Universal Inquisition, was a system of partisan tribunals developed by the Holy See of the Roman Catholic Church, during the second half of the 16th century, respons ...
for his teachings. But the Greek philosophical works remained available and, particularly in north Europe, were discussed by groups such as the Cambridge Platonists
The Cambridge Platonists were an influential group of Platonist philosophers and Christian theologians at the University of Cambridge that existed during the 17th century. The leading figures were Ralph Cudworth and Henry More.
Group and its na ...
. Emanuel Swedenborg
Emanuel Swedenborg (, ; born Emanuel Swedberg; 29 March 1772) was a Swedish pluralistic-Christian theologian, scientist, philosopher and mystic. He became best known for his book on the afterlife, ''Heaven and Hell'' (1758).
Swedenborg had a ...
believed that we leave the physical world once, but then go through several lives in the spiritual world—a kind of hybrid of Christian tradition and the popular view of reincarnation.
19th to 20th centuries
By the 19th century the philosophers Schopenhauer
Arthur Schopenhauer ( , ; 22 February 1788 – 21 September 1860) was a German philosopher. He is best known for his 1818 work '' The World as Will and Representation'' (expanded in 1844), which characterizes the phenomenal world as the pr ...
and Nietzsche
Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (; or ; 15 October 1844 – 25 August 1900) was a German philosopher, prose poet, cultural critic, philologist, and composer whose work has exerted a profound influence on contemporary philosophy. He began his car ...
could access the Indian scriptures for discussion of the doctrine of reincarnation, which recommended itself to the American Transcendentalists Henry David Thoreau, Walt Whitman
Walter Whitman (; May 31, 1819 – March 26, 1892) was an American poet, essayist and journalist. A humanist, he was a part of the transition between transcendentalism and realism, incorporating both views in his works. Whitman is among ...
and Ralph Waldo Emerson
Ralph Waldo Emerson (May 25, 1803April 27, 1882), who went by his middle name Waldo, was an American essayist, lecturer, philosopher, abolitionist, and poet who led the transcendentalist movement of the mid-19th century. He was seen as a champ ...
and was adapted by Francis Bowen
Francis Bowen (; September 8, 1811 – January 22, 1890) was an American philosopher, writer, and educationalist.
Biography
He was born in Charlestown, Massachusetts. He was educated at Mayhew School, Boston, Phillips Exeter Academy, and Harva ...
into ''Christian Metempsychosis''.
By the early 20th century, interest in reincarnation had been introduced into the nascent discipline of psychology
Psychology is the scientific study of mind and behavior. Psychology includes the study of conscious and unconscious phenomena, including feelings and thoughts. It is an academic discipline of immense scope, crossing the boundaries betwe ...
, largely due to the influence of William James
William James (January 11, 1842 – August 26, 1910) was an American philosopher, historian, and psychologist, and the first educator to offer a psychology course in the United States.
James is considered to be a leading thinker of the lat ...
, who raised aspects of the philosophy of mind
Philosophy of mind is a branch of philosophy that studies the ontology and nature of the mind and its relationship with the body. The mind–body problem is a paradigmatic issue in philosophy of mind, although a number of other issues are addre ...
, comparative religion
Comparative religion is the branch of the study of religions with the systematic comparison of the doctrines and practices, themes and impacts (including migration) of the world's religions. In general the comparative study of religion yie ...
, the psychology of religious experience and the nature of empiricism. James was influential in the founding of the American Society for Psychical Research
The American Society for Psychical Research (ASPR) is the oldest psychical research organization in the United States dedicated to parapsychology. It maintains offices and a library, in New York City, which are open to both members and the gener ...
(ASPR) in New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
in 1885, three years after the British Society for Psychical Research
The Society for Psychical Research (SPR) is a nonprofit organisation in the United Kingdom. Its stated purpose is to understand events and abilities commonly described as psychic or paranormal. It describes itself as the "first society to co ...
(SPR) was inaugurated in London, leading to systematic, critical investigation of paranormal phenomena. Famous World War II American General George Patton was a strong believer in reincarnation, believing, among other things, he was a reincarnation of the Carthaginian General Hannibal.
At this time popular awareness of the idea of reincarnation was boosted by the Theosophical Society
The Theosophical Society, founded in 1875, is a worldwide body with the aim to advance the ideas of Theosophy in continuation of previous Theosophists, especially the Greek and Alexandrian Neo-Platonic philosophers dating back to 3rd century CE ...
'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
William Butler Yeats (13 June 186528 January 1939) was an Irish poet, dramatist, writer and one of the foremost figures of 20th-century literature. He was a driving force behind the Irish Literary Revival and became a pillar of the Irish liter ...
and Dion Fortune
Dion Fortune (born Violet Mary Firth, 6 December 1890 – 6 January 1946) was a British occultist, ceremonial magician, novelist and author. She was a co-founder of the Fraternity of the Inner Light, an occult organisation that promoted ph ...
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. Humorist Don Marquis
Donald Robert Perry Marquis ( ; July 29, 1878 – December 29, 1937) was an American humorist, journalist, and author. He was variously a novelist, poet, newspaper columnist, and playwright. He is remembered best for creating the characters Ar ...
created a fictional cat named Mehitabel who claimed to be a reincarnation of Queen Cleopatra.
Théodore Flournoy
Théodore Flournoy (15 August 1854 – 5 November 1920) was a Swiss professor of psychology at the University of Geneva and author of books on parapsychology and spiritism. He studied a wide variety of subjects before he devoted his life to psych ...
was among the first to study a claim of past-life recall in the course of his investigation of the medium Hélène Smith
Hélène Smith (real name Catherine-Elise Müller, December 9, 1861, Martigny – June 10, 1929, Geneva) was a famous late-19th century French medium. She was known as "the Muse of Automatic Writing" by the Surrealists, who viewed Smith as evidenc ...
, published in 1900, in which he defined the possibility of cryptomnesia in such accounts.
Carl Gustav Jung
Carl Gustav Jung ( ; ; 26 July 1875 – 6 June 1961) was a Swiss psychiatrist and psychoanalyst who founded analytical psychology. Jung's work has been influential in the fields of psychiatry, anthropology, archaeology, literature, philo ...
, 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...." Hypnosis
Hypnosis is a human condition involving focused attention (the selective attention/selective inattention hypothesis, SASI), reduced peripheral awareness, and an enhanced capacity to respond to suggestion.In 2015, the American Psychologica ...
, used in psychoanalysis
PsychoanalysisFrom Greek: + . is a set of theories and therapeutic techniques"What is psychoanalysis? Of course, one is supposed to answer that it is many things — a theory, a research method, a therapy, a body of knowledge. In what might b ...
for retrieving forgotten memories, was eventually tried as a means of studying the phenomenon of past life recall.
More recently, many people in the West have developed an interest in and acceptance of reincarnation.[ Many new religious movements include reincarnation among their beliefs, e.g. modern Neopagans, ]Spiritism
Spiritism (French: ''spiritisme''; Portuguese: ''espiritismo'') is a spiritualist, religious, and philosophical doctrine established in France in the 1850s by the French teacher, educational writer, and translator Hippolyte Léon Denizard Riv ...
, Astara, Dianetics
Dianetics (from Greek ''dia'', meaning "through", and ''nous'', meaning " mind") is a set of pseudoscientific ideas and practices regarding the metaphysical relationship between the mind and body created by science fiction writer L. Ron Hub ...
, and Scientology
Scientology is a set of beliefs and practices invented by American author L. Ron Hubbard, and an associated movement. It has been variously defined as a cult, a Scientology as a business, business, or a new religious movement. The most recent ...
. Many esoteric
Western esotericism, also known as esotericism, esoterism, and sometimes the Western mystery tradition, is a term scholars use to categorise a wide range of loosely related ideas and movements that developed within Western society. These ideas ...
philosophies also include reincarnation, e.g. Theosophy
Theosophy is a religion established in the United States during the late 19th century. It was founded primarily by the Russian Helena Blavatsky and draws its teachings predominantly from Blavatsky's writings. Categorized by scholars of religion ...
, Anthroposophy
Anthroposophy is a spiritualist movement founded in the early 20th century by the esotericist Rudolf Steiner that postulates the existence of an objective, intellectually comprehensible spiritual world, accessible to human experience. Follower ...
, Kabbalah
Kabbalah ( he, קַבָּלָה ''Qabbālā'', literally "reception, tradition") is an esoteric method, discipline and school of thought in Jewish mysticism. A traditional Kabbalist is called a Mekubbal ( ''Məqūbbāl'' "receiver"). The defin ...
, and Gnostic
Gnosticism (from grc, γνωστικός, gnōstikós, , 'having knowledge') is a collection of religious ideas and systems which coalesced in the late 1st century AD among Jewish and early Christian sects. These various groups emphasized pe ...
and Esoteric Christianity
Esoteric Christianity is an approach to Christianity which features "secret traditions" that require an initiation to learn or understand.Guy G. Stroumsa (2005). Hidden Wisdom: Esoteric Traditions and the Roots of Christian Mysticism. Leiden: Br ...
such as the works of Martinus Thomsen
Martinus Thomsen, referred to as Martinus, (11 August 1890 – 8 March 1981) was a Danish author, philosopher and mystic. Born into a poor family and with a limited education, Martinus claimed to have had a profound spiritual experience in March ...
.
Demographic survey data from 1999 to 2002 shows a significant minority of people from Europe (22%) and America (20%) believe in the existence of life before birth and after death, leading to a physical rebirth.[ The belief in reincarnation is particularly high in the Baltic countries, with ]Lithuania
Lithuania (; lt, Lietuva ), officially the Republic of Lithuania ( lt, Lietuvos Respublika, links=no ), is a country in the Baltic region of Europe. It is one of three Baltic states and lies on the eastern shore of the Baltic Sea. Lithuania ...
having the highest figure for the whole of Europe, 44%, while the lowest figure is in East Germany, 12%.[ A quarter of U.S. Christians, including 10% of all born again Christians, embrace the idea.
Academic psychiatrist and believer in reincarnation, ]Ian Stevenson
Ian Pretyman Stevenson (October 31, 1918 – February 8, 2007) was a Canadian-born American psychiatrist, the founder and director of the Division of Perceptual Studies at the University of Virginia School of Medicine.
He was a professor at th ...
, reported that belief in reincarnation is held (with variations in details) by adherents of almost all major religions except Christianity
Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth. It is the world's largest and most widespread religion with roughly 2.38 billion followers representing one-third of the global pop ...
and Islam
Islam (; ar, ۘالِإسلَام, , ) is an Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic Monotheism#Islam, monotheistic religion centred primarily around the Quran, a religious text considered by Muslims to be the direct word of God in Islam, God (or ...
. In addition, between 20 and 30 percent of persons in western countries who may be nominal Christians also believe in reincarnation.[Jane Henry (2005)]
Parapsychology: research on exceptional experiences
Routledge, p. 224. 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. 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. 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 experience
A near-death experience (NDE) is a profound personal experience associated with death or impending death which researchers claim share similar characteristics. When positive, such experiences may encompass a variety of sensations including detac ...
s 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.
Other influential contemporary figures that have written on reincarnation include Alice Ann Bailey
Alice Ann Bailey (June 16, 1880 – December 15, 1949) was a writer of more than twenty-four books on theosophical subjects, and was one of the first writers to use the term New Age. Bailey was born as Alice La Trobe-Bateman, in Manchest ...
, one of the first writers to use the terms New Age
New Age is a range of spiritual or religious practices and beliefs which rapidly grew in Western society during the early 1970s. Its highly eclectic and unsystematic structure makes a precise definition difficult. Although many scholars consi ...
and age of Aquarius, Torkom Saraydarian
Torkom Saraydarian (1917–1997) was an Armenian author, poet, and musician. He was born in Sevas, Turkey to Armenian parents. He was trained iThe Ageless Wisdom Teachingsunder the guidance of his father, Monasteries, Arcane School.
He visited m ...
, an Armenian-American
Armenian Americans ( hy, ամերիկահայեր, ''amerikahayer'') are citizens or residents of the United States who have total or partial Armenians, Armenian ancestry. They form the second largest community of the Armenian diaspora after A ...
musician and religious author, Dolores Cannon, Atul Gawande
Atul Atmaram Gawande (born November 5, 1965) is an American surgeon, writer, and public health researcher. He practices general and endocrine surgery at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, Massachusetts. He is a professor in the Departme ...
, Michael Newton, Bruce Greyson
Charles Bruce Greyson (born October 1946) is Professor Emeritus of Psychiatry and Neurobehavioral Sciences at the University of Virginia. He is author of '' After: A Doctor Explores What Near-Death Experiences Reveal about Life and Beyond'' (2021), ...
, Raymond Moody
Raymond A. Moody Jr. (born June 30, 1944) is an American philosopher, psychiatrist, physician and author, most widely known for his books about afterlife and near-death experiences (NDE), a term that he coined in 1975 in his best-selling book '' ...
and Unity Church
Unity, known informally as Unity Church, is an organization founded by Charles and Myrtle Fillmore in 1889. It grew out of Transcendentalism and became part of the New Thought movement. Unity is known for its '' Daily Word'' devotional publi ...
founder Charles Fillmore. Neale Donald Walsch
Neale Donald Walsch (born September 10, 1943) is an American author of the series ''Conversations with God''. He is also an actor, screenwriter, and speaker.
Biography
Walsch was brought up as a Catholic by a family who encouraged his quest for ...
, an American author of the series ''Conversations with God
''Conversations with God'' (''CWG'') is a sequence of books written by Neale Donald Walsch. It was written as a dialogue in which Walsch asks questions and God answers. The first book of the ''Conversations with God'' series, ''Conversations ...
'' claims that he has reincarnated more than 600 times. The Indian spiritual teacher Meher Baba
Meher Baba (born Merwan Sheriar Irani; 25 February 1894 – 31 January 1969) was an Indian spiritual master who said he was the Avatar, or God in human form, of the age. A major spiritual figure of the 20th century, he had a following of ...
who had significant following in the West taught that reincarnation followed from human desire and ceased once a person was freed from desire.
Religions and philosophies
Buddhism
According to various Buddhist scriptures, Gautama Buddha
Siddhartha Gautama, most commonly referred to as the Buddha, was a wandering ascetic and religious teacher who lived in South Asia during the 6th or 5th century BCE and founded Buddhism.
According to Buddhist tradition, he was born in Lu ...
believed in the existence of an afterlife in another world and in reincarnation,
The Buddha also asserted that karma influences rebirth, and that the cycles of repeated births and deaths are endless. Before the birth of Buddha, ancient Indian scholars had developed competing theories of afterlife, including the materialistic school such as Charvaka, which posited that death is the end, there is no afterlife, no soul, no rebirth, no karma, and they described death to be a state where a living being is completely annihilated, dissolved. Buddha rejected this theory, adopted the alternate existing theories on rebirth, criticizing the materialistic schools that denied rebirth and karma, states Damien Keown.[ Such beliefs are inappropriate and dangerous, stated Buddha, because such annihilationism views encourage moral irresponsibility and material hedonism; he tied moral responsibility to rebirth.]
The Buddha introduced the concept that there is no permanent self (soul), and this central concept in Buddhism is called '' anattā''. Major contemporary Buddhist traditions such as Theravada, Mahayana and Vajrayana traditions accept the teachings of Buddha. These teachings assert there is rebirth, there is no permanent self and no irreducible ''ātman'' (soul) moving from life to another and tying these lives together, there is impermanence
Impermanence, also known as the philosophical problem of change, is a philosophical concept addressed in a variety of religions and philosophies. In Eastern philosophy it is notable for its role in the Buddhist three marks of existence. It ...
, that all compounded things such as living beings are aggregates dissolve at death, but every being reincarnates. The rebirth cycles continue endlessly, states Buddhism, and it is a source of '' duhkha'' (suffering, pain), but this reincarnation and ''duhkha'' cycle can be stopped through nirvana. The '' anattā'' doctrine of Buddhism is a contrast to Hinduism, the latter asserting that "soul exists, it is involved in rebirth, and it is through this soul that everything is connected."
Different traditions within Buddhism have offered different theories on what reincarnates and how reincarnation happens. One theory suggests that it occurs through consciousness (Sanskrit: ''vijñāna
''Vijñāna'' ( sa, विज्ञान) or ''viññāa'' ( pi, विञ्ञाण)As is standard in WP articles, the Pali term ''viññāa'' will be used when discussing the Pali literature, and the Sanskrit word ''vijñāna'' will be used ...
''; Pali: ''samvattanika-viññana'') or stream of consciousness (Sanskrit: '' citta-santāna'', ''vijñāna-srotām, or vijñāna-santāna''; Pali: ''viññana-sotam'') upon death, which reincarnates into a new aggregation. This process, states this theory, is similar to the flame of a dying candle lighting up another. The consciousness in the newly born being is neither identical to nor entirely different from that in the deceased but the two form a causal continuum or stream in this Buddhist theory. Transmigration is influenced by a being's past ''karma
Karma (; sa, कर्म}, ; pi, kamma, italic=yes) in Sanskrit means an action, work, or deed, and its effect or consequences. In Indian religions, the term more specifically refers to a principle of cause and effect, often descriptivel ...
'' (Pali: ''kamma''). The root cause of rebirth, states Buddhism, is the abiding of consciousness in ignorance (Sanskrit: '' avidya''; Pali: ''avijja'') about the nature of reality, and when this ignorance is uprooted, rebirth ceases.
Buddhist traditions also vary in their mechanistic details on rebirth. Most Theravada
''Theravāda'' () ( si, ථේරවාදය, my, ထေရဝါဒ, th, เถรวาท, km, ថេរវាទ, lo, ເຖຣະວາດ, pi, , ) is the most commonly accepted name of Buddhism's oldest existing school. The school' ...
Buddhists assert that rebirth is immediate while the Tibetan
Tibetan may mean:
* of, from, or related to Tibet
* Tibetan people, an ethnic group
* Tibetan language:
** Classical Tibetan, the classical language used also as a contemporary written standard
** Standard Tibetan, the most widely used spoken dial ...
and most Chinese and Japanese schools hold to the notion of a ''bardo
In some schools of Buddhism, ''bardo'' ( xct, བར་དོ་ Wylie: ''bar do'') or ''antarābhava'' (Sanskrit, Chinese and Japanese: 中有, romanized in Chinese as ''zhōng yǒu'' and in Japanese as ''chū'u'') is an intermediate, transitio ...
'' (intermediate state) that can last up to 49 days. The ''bardo'' rebirth concept of Tibetan Buddhism, originally developed in India but spread to Tibet and other Buddhist countries, and involves 42 peaceful deities, and 58 wrathful deities. These ideas led to maps on karma and what form of rebirth one takes after death, discussed in texts such as '' The Tibetan Book of the Dead''. The major Buddhist traditions accept that the reincarnation of a being depends on the past karma and merit (demerit) accumulated, and that there are six realms of existence in which the rebirth may occur after each death.
Within Japanese Zen
Zen ( zh, t=禪, p=Chán; ja, text= 禅, translit=zen; ko, text=선, translit=Seon; vi, text=Thiền) is a school of Mahayana Buddhism that originated in China during the Tang dynasty, known as the Chan School (''Chánzong'' 禪宗), and ...
, reincarnation is accepted by some, but 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 more emphasis on the present moment.
Some schools conclude that karma
Karma (; sa, कर्म}, ; pi, kamma, italic=yes) in Sanskrit means an action, work, or deed, and its effect or consequences. In Indian religions, the term more specifically refers to a principle of cause and effect, often descriptivel ...
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.
Christianity
In the major Christian denominations, the concept of reincarnation is not present and it is nowhere explicitly referred to in the Bible. However, the impossibility of a second earthly death is stated by , where it affirms that the messiah, Jesus of Nazareth, died once forever for the sins of all the human kind. mentions that king Herod Antipas took Jesus to be a risen John the Baptist
John the Baptist or , , or , ;Wetterau, Bruce. ''World history''. New York: Henry Holt and Company. 1994. syc, ܝܘܿܚܲܢܵܢ ܡܲܥܡܕ݂ܵܢܵܐ, Yoḥanān Maʿmḏānā; he, יוחנן המטביל, Yohanān HaMatbil; la, Ioannes Bapti ...
, when introducing the story of John's execution at Herod's orders.
In a survey by the Pew Forum in 2009, 22% of American Christians expressed a belief in reincarnation, and in a 1981 survey 31% of regular churchgoing European Catholics expressed a belief in reincarnation.
Some Christian theologians interpret certain Biblical passages as referring to reincarnation. These passages include the questioning of Jesus as to whether he is Elijah, John the Baptist, Jeremiah, or another prophet ( Matthew 16:13–15 and John 1
John 1 is the first chapter in the Gospel of John in the New Testament of the Holy Bible. The author of the book containing this chapter is anonymous, but early Christian tradition uniformly affirmed that John composed this gospel.Holman Illust ...
:21–22) and, less clearly (while Elijah was said not to have died, but to have been taken up to heaven), John the Baptist being asked if he is not Elijah (John 1:25). Geddes MacGregor
John Geddes MacGregor (13 Nov. 1909–9 Oct. 1998) was an author, scholar of philosophy, educator, and an ordained Episcopal priest.
Biography
MacGregor was born in Glasgow, Scotland in 1909, and his early life was spent in Edinburgh, Dundee, ...
, an Episcopalian priest and professor of philosophy, has made a case for the compatibility of Christian doctrine and reincarnation.
Early
There is evidence that Origen
Origen of Alexandria, ''Ōrigénēs''; Origen's Greek name ''Ōrigénēs'' () probably means "child of Horus" (from , "Horus", and , "born"). ( 185 – 253), also known as Origen Adamantius, was an Early Christianity, early Christian scholar, ...
, a Church father
The Church Fathers, Early Church Fathers, Christian Fathers, or Fathers of the Church were ancient and influential Christian theologians and writers who established the intellectual and doctrinal foundations of Christianity. The historical pe ...
in early Christian times, taught reincarnation in his lifetime but that when his works were translated into Latin these references were concealed. One of the epistles written by St. Jerome
Jerome (; la, Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus; grc-gre, Εὐσέβιος Σωφρόνιος Ἱερώνυμος; – 30 September 420), also known as Jerome of Stridon, was a Christian priest, confessor, theologian, and historian; he is com ...
, "To Avitus" (Letter 124; Ad Avitum. Epistula CXXIV), which asserts that Origen's ''On the First Principles
''On the First Principles'' (Greek: Περὶ Ἀρχῶν / ''Peri Archon''; Latin: ''De Principiis'') is a theological treatise by the Christian writer Origen. It was the first systematic exposition of Christian theology.
When Origen was aroun ...
'' (Latin: ''De Principiis''; Greek: Περὶ Ἀρχῶν)[Cross, F. L., and Elizabeth A. Livingstone. ''The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church'' (Second Edition). New York: Oxford University Press, 1984. p. 1009.] was mistranscribed:
Under the impression that Origen was a heretic like Arius, St. Jerome criticizes ideas described in ''On the First Principles''. Further in "To Avitus" (Letter 124), St. Jerome writes about "convincing proof" that Origen teaches reincarnation in the original version of the book:
The original text of ''On First Principles'' has almost completely disappeared. It remains extant as ''De Principiis'' in fragments faithfully translated into Latin by St. Jerome and in "the not very reliable Latin translation of Tyrannius Rufinus, Rufinus."
Belief in reincarnation was rejected by Augustine of Hippo in The City of God.
Druze
Reincarnation is a paramount tenet in the Druze
The Druze (; ar, دَرْزِيٌّ, ' or ', , ') are an Arabic-speaking esoteric ethnoreligious group from Western Asia who adhere to the Druze faith, an Abrahamic, monotheistic, syncretic, and ethnic religion based on the teachings of ...
faith. There is an eternal dualism (philosophy of mind), duality of the body and the soul and it is impossible for the soul to exist without the body. Therefore, reincarnations occur instantly at one's death. While in the Hindu and Buddhist belief system a soul can be transmitted to any living creature, in the Druze belief system this is not possible and a human soul will only transfer to a human body. Furthermore, souls cannot be divided into different or separate parts and the number of souls existing is finite.
Few Druzes are able to recall their past but, if they are able to they are called a ''Nateq''. Typically souls who have died violent deaths in their previous incarnation will be able to recall memories. Since death is seen as a quick transient state, mourning is discouraged.[ Unlike other Abrahamic faiths, heaven and hell are spiritual. Heaven is the ultimate happiness received when soul escapes the cycle of rebirths and reunites with the Creator, while hell is conceptualized as the bitterness of being unable to reunite with the Creator and escape from the cycle of rebirth.
]
Hinduism
The body dies, assert the Hindu traditions, but not the soul, which they assume to be the eternal reality, indestructible and bliss. Everything and all existence is believed to be connected and cyclical in many Hinduism-sects, all living beings composed of two things, the soul and the body or matter. Ātman (Hinduism), Ātman does not change and cannot change by its innate nature in the Hindu belief. Current Karma
Karma (; sa, कर्म}, ; pi, kamma, italic=yes) in Sanskrit means an action, work, or deed, and its effect or consequences. In Indian religions, the term more specifically refers to a principle of cause and effect, often descriptivel ...
impacts the future circumstances in this life, as well as the future forms and realms of lives. Good intent and actions lead to good future, bad intent and actions lead to bad future, impacting how one reincarnates, in the Hindu view of existence.
There is no permanent heaven or hell in most Hinduism-sects. In the afterlife, based on one's karma, the soul is reborn as another being in heaven, hell, or a living being on earth (human, animal). Gods, too, die once their past karmic merit runs out, as do those in hell, and they return getting another chance on earth. This reincarnation continues, endlessly in cycles, until one embarks on a spiritual pursuit, realizes self-knowledge, and thereby gains ''Moksha, mokṣa'', the final release out of the reincarnation cycles. This release is believed to be a state of utter bliss, which Hindu traditions believe is either related or identical to Brahman, the unchanging reality that existed before the creation of universe, continues to exist, and shall exist after the universe ends.
The Upanishads
The Upanishads (; sa, उपनिषद् ) are late Vedic Sanskrit texts that supplied the basis of later Hindu philosophy.Wendy Doniger (1990), ''Textual Sources for the Study of Hinduism'', 1st Edition, University of Chicago Press, , ...
, part of the scriptures of the Hindu traditions, primarily focus on the liberation from reincarnation. The Bhagavad Gita discusses various paths to liberation. The Upanishads, states Harold Coward, offer a "very optimistic view regarding the perfectibility of human nature," and the goal of human effort in these texts is a continuous journey to self-perfection and self-knowledge so as to end ''Saṃsāra''—the endless cycle of rebirth and redeath. The aim of spiritual quest in the Upanishadic traditions is find the true self within and to know one's soul, a state that they assert leads to blissful state of freedom, moksha.
The Bhagavad Gita states:
There are internal differences within Hindu traditions on reincarnation and the state of moksha
''Moksha'' (; sa, मोक्ष, '), also called ''vimoksha'', ''vimukti'' and ''mukti'', is a term in Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism and Sikhism for various forms of emancipation, enlightenment, liberation, and release. In its soteriology, ...
. For example, the dualistic devotional traditions such as Madhvacharya's Dvaita Vedanta tradition of Hinduism champion a theistic premise, assert that human soul and Brahman are different, loving devotion to Brahman (god Vishnu in Madhvacharya's theology) is the means to release from Samsara, it is the grace of God which leads to moksha, and spiritual liberation is achievable only in after-life (''videhamukti''). The non-dualistic traditions such as Adi Shankara's Advaita Vedanta tradition of Hinduism champion a monistic premise, asserting that the individual human soul and Brahman are identical, only ignorance, impulsiveness and inertia leads to suffering through Saṃsāra, in reality there are no dualities, meditation and self-knowledge is the path to liberation, the realization that one's soul is identical to Brahman is moksha, and spiritual liberation is achievable in this life (''Jivanmukta, jivanmukti'').
Islam
Most Islamic schools of thought reject any idea of reincarnation of living beings. It teaches a linear concept of life, wherein a human being has only one life and upon death he or she is judged by God in Islam, God, then rewarded in heaven or punished in hell. Islam teaches final resurrection and Judgement Day, but there is no prospect for the reincarnation of a human being into a different body or being. During the early history of Islam, some of the Caliphate, Caliphs persecuted all reincarnation-believing people, such as Manichaeism
Manichaeism (;
in New Persian ; ) is a former major religionR. van den Broek, Wouter J. Hanegraaff ''Gnosis and Hermeticism from Antiquity to Modern Times''SUNY Press, 1998 p. 37 founded in the 3rd century AD by the Parthian Empire, Parthian ...
, to the point of extinction in Mesopotamia and Persia (modern day Iraq and Iran). However, some Muslim minority sects such as those found among Sufism, Sufis, and some Muslims in South Asia and Indonesia have retained their pre-Islamic Hindu and Buddhist beliefs in reincarnation. For instance, historically, South Asian Isma'ilis performed chantas yearly, one of which is for seeking forgiveness of sins committed in past lives. However Inayat Khan has criticized the idea as unhelpful to the spiritual seeker.
From the teachings of Modern Sufi ''Sheikh'' M.R. Bawa Muhaiyadeen (Guru Bawa); a person's state continuously changes during his one lifetime (angry/violent at once and being gentle/nice in another). So when a person's state changes, his previous state dies. Even though it dies, the earlier state (of anger) will be reborn in another minute. According to Guru Bawa; the changing of a person's state is described as “rebirth” or reincarnation, this should not be confused with the physical death & rebirth. Although some scholars wrongly misquote that Guru Bawa accepts the common belief of reincarnation. For Guru Bawa, the reincarnation is spiritual, perhaps in kind, and with each rebirth a stage of consciousness is removed. The first birth consist of six consciousness and with each rebirth, a stage is removed until one is born with single stage of consciousness, such as a tree, shrub or a flower if he at least hold good principals in last stage of consciousness. If not, he will be born as a worm or something similar.
Ghulat sects
The idea of reincarnation is accepted by a few non-Sunni Muslim sects, particularly of the Ghulat. Alawites
The Alawis, Alawites ( ar, علوية ''Alawīyah''), or pejoratively Nusayris ( ar, نصيرية ''Nuṣayrīyah'') are an ethnoreligious group that lives primarily in Levant and follows Alawism, a sect of Islam that originated from Shia Isl ...
hold that they were originally stars or divine lights that were cast out of heaven through disobedience and must undergo repeated reincarnation (or metempsychosis
Metempsychosis ( grc-gre, μετεμψύχωσις), in philosophy, is the Reincarnation#Conceptual definitions, transmigration of the soul, especially its reincarnation after death. The term is derived from ancient Greek philosophy, and has be ...
) before returning to heaven. They can be reincarnated as Christians or others through sin and as animals if they become infidels.[Alawis]
, Countrystudies.us, U.S. Library of Congress.
Jainism
In Jainism
Jainism ( ), also known as Jain Dharma, is an Indian religions, Indian religion. Jainism traces its spiritual ideas and history through the succession of twenty-four tirthankaras (supreme preachers of ''Dharma''), with the first in the current ...
, the reincarnation doctrine, along with its theories of ''Saṃsāra'' and Karma, are central to its theological foundations, as evidenced by the extensive literature on it in the major sects of Jainism, and their pioneering ideas on these topics from the earliest times of the Jaina tradition.[ Reincarnation in contemporary Jainism traditions is the belief that the worldly life is characterized by continuous rebirths and suffering in various realms of existence.]
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 (''Ahimsa in Jainism, ahiṃsā'') 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. ''Uttarâdhyayana Sûtra, Uttarādhyayana Sūtra'' 3.3–4 states: "The ''jīva'' or the soul is sometimes born in devaloka, the world of gods, sometimes in Naraka (Jainism), hell. Sometimes it acquires the body of a asura, demon; all this happens on account of its karma. This ''jīva'' sometimes takes birth as a worm, as an insect or as an ant."[Krishan, Yuvraj (1997): p. 43.] 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."
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 their future births will allow them to experience and manifest their virtues and good feelings unhindered. In this case, they 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.[Kuhn, Hermann (2001) pp. 64–66] As a natural consequence, they will attract karma which will ensure that they are reincarnated in hell, or in lower life forms, to enable their soul to experience the cruel themes of life.[
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. As a result of this doctrine, Jainism attributes supreme importance to pure thinking and moral behavior.
The Jain texts postulate four ''gatis'', that is states-of-existence or birth-categories, within which the soul transmigrates. The four ''gatis'' are: ''Deva (Jainism), deva'' (demigods), ''Manusya-gati, manuṣya'' (humans), ''Naraka (Jainism), nāraki'' (hell beings), and ''tiryañca'' (animals, plants, and microorganisms).][Jaini, Padmanabh (1998) p. 108] The four ''gatis'' have four corresponding realms or habitation levels in the vertically tiered Jain cosmology#Jain geography, Jain universe: ''deva'' occupy the higher levels where the heavens are situated; ''manuṣya'' and ''tiryañca'' occupy the middle levels; and ''nāraki'' occupy the lower levels where seven hells are situated.[
Single-sensed souls, however, called ''nigoda'', 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. 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 (Jainism), samsara''.
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, ''Vyakhyaprajnapti, Bhagvati sūtra'' 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.
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.][Kuhn, Hermann (2001) p. 28] It enables the soul to experience the various themes of the lives that it desires to experience. 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.
Judaism
Jewish mystical texts (the Kabbalah
Kabbalah ( he, קַבָּלָה ''Qabbālā'', literally "reception, tradition") is an esoteric method, discipline and school of thought in Jewish mysticism. A traditional Kabbalist is called a Mekubbal ( ''Məqūbbāl'' "receiver"). The defin ...
), from their classic Medieval canon onward, teach a belief in ''Gilgul Neshamot'' (Hebrew language, Hebrew for metempsychosis
Metempsychosis ( grc-gre, μετεμψύχωσις), in philosophy, is the Reincarnation#Conceptual definitions, transmigration of the soul, especially its reincarnation after death. The term is derived from ancient Greek philosophy, and has be ...
; literally 'soul cycle'; plural ''gilgulim''). The Zohar and the Sefer HaBahir specifically discuss reincarnation. It is a common belief in contemporary Hasidic Judaism
Hasidism, sometimes spelled Chassidism, and also known as Hasidic Judaism (Ashkenazi Hebrew: חסידות ''Ḥăsīdus'', ; originally, "piety"), is a Judaism, Jewish religious group that arose as a spiritual revival movement in the territory ...
, which regards the Kabbalah as sacred and authoritative, though understood in light of a more Deveikut, innate psychological mysticism. Kabbalah also teaches that "The soul of Moses is reincarnated in every generation." Other, Non-Hasidic, Orthodox Jewish groups while not placing a heavy emphasis on reincarnation, do acknowledge it as a valid teaching. Its popularization entered modern secular Yiddish literature
Yiddish literature encompasses all those belles-lettres written in Yiddish, the language of Ashkenazic Jewry which is related to Middle High German. The history of Yiddish, with its roots in central Europe and locus for centuries in Eastern Euro ...
and folk motif.
The 16th century mystical renaissance in communal Safed replaced scholastic Jewish philosophy, Rationalism as mainstream traditional Jewish theology, both in scholarly circles and in the popular imagination. References to ''gilgul'' in former Kabbalah became systematized as part of the metaphysical purpose of creation. Isaac Luria
Isaac ben Solomon Luria Ashkenazi (1534 Fine 2003, p24/ref> – July 25, 1572) ( he, יִצְחָק בן שלמה לוּרְיָא אשכנזי ''Yitzhak Ben Sh'lomo Lurya Ashkenazi''), commonly known in Jewish religious circles as "Ha'ARI" (mea ...
(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
''Sha'ar ha Gilgulim'' (''Gate of Reincarnations'', שער הגלגולים) is a kabbalistic work on ''Gilgul'', the concept of reincarnation put together by Rabbi Hayyim Vital who recorded the teachings of his master in the 16th century CE.
Au ...
. ''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 Tohu and Tikkun, 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 fulfill each of the 613 Mitzvot, 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 Mashiach, 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; early Hasidic masters such as the Baal Shem Tov, Schneur Zalman of Liadi and Nachman of Breslov, as well as virtually all later Hasidic masters; contemporary Hasidic teachers such as DovBer Pinson, Moshe Weinberger and Joel Landau (rabbi), Joel Landau; and key Mitnagdic leaders, such as the Vilna Gaon and Chaim Volozhin and their school, as well as Rabbi Shalom Sharabi (known at the RaShaSH), the 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, Leon de Modena, Solomon ben Aderet, Maimonides and Asher ben Jehiel. Among the Geonim, Hai Gaon argued in favour of ''gilgulim''.
Ho-Chunk
Reincarnation is an intrinsic part of some northern Indigenous peoples of the Americas, Native American and Inuit traditions. In the now heavily Christianity, Christian Polar region, Polar North (now mainly parts of Greenland and Nunavut), the concept of reincarnation is enshrined in the Inuit language.
The following is a story of human-to-human reincarnation as told by Thunder Cloud, a Winnebago (Ho-Chunk tribe) Shamanism, 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:
Sikhism
Founded in the 15th century, Sikhism
Sikhism (), also known as Sikhi ( pa, ਸਿੱਖੀ ', , from pa, ਸਿੱਖ, lit=disciple', 'seeker', or 'learner, translit=Sikh, label=none),''Sikhism'' (commonly known as ''Sikhī'') originated from the word ''Sikh'', which comes fro ...
's founder Guru Nanak had a choice between the cyclical reincarnation concept of ancient Indian religions and the linear concept of Islam, he chose the cyclical concept of time. Sikhism teaches reincarnation theory similar to those in Hinduism, but with some differences from its traditional doctrines. Sikh rebirth theories about the nature of existence are similar to ideas that developed during the devotional Bhakti movement particularly within some Vaishnavism, Vaishnava traditions, which define liberation as a state of union with God attained through the grace of God.
The doctrines of Sikhism teach that the soul exists, and is passed from one body to another in endless cycles of Saṃsāra, until liberation from the death and rebirth cycle. Each birth begins with karma (''Karma#Sikhism, karam''), and these actions leave a karmic signature (''karni'') on one's soul which influences future rebirths, but it is God in Sikhism, God whose grace that liberates from the death and rebirth cycle. The way out of the reincarnation cycle, asserts Sikhism, is to live an ethical life, devote oneself to God and constantly remember God's name. The precepts of Sikhism encourage the bhakti of One Lord for ''mukti'' (liberation from the death and rebirth cycle).
New religious and spiritual movements
Spiritism
Spiritism
Spiritism (French: ''spiritisme''; Portuguese: ''espiritismo'') is a spiritualist, religious, and philosophical doctrine established in France in the 1850s by the French teacher, educational writer, and translator Hippolyte Léon Denizard Riv ...
, a Christian philosophy codified in the 19th century by the French educator Allan Kardec, teaches reincarnation or rebirth into human life after death. According to this doctrine, free will and cause and effect are the corollaries of reincarnation, and reincarnation provides a mechanism for a person's spiritual evolution in successive lives.
Theosophy
The Theosophical Society
The Theosophical Society, founded in 1875, is a worldwide body with the aim to advance the ideas of Theosophy in continuation of previous Theosophists, especially the Greek and Alexandrian Neo-Platonic philosophers dating back to 3rd century CE ...
draws much of its inspiration from India. 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.
Anthroposophy
Anthroposophy
Anthroposophy is a spiritualist movement founded in the early 20th century by the esotericist Rudolf Steiner that postulates the existence of an objective, intellectually comprehensible spiritual world, accessible to human experience. Follower ...
describes reincarnation from the point of view of Western philosophy and culture. The ego is believed to transmute transient soul experiences into universals that form the basis for an individuality that can endure after death. These universals include ideas, which are intersubjective and thus transcend the purely personal (spiritual consciousness), intentionally formed human character (spiritual life), and becoming a fully conscious human being (spiritual humanity). Rudolf Steiner described both the general principles he believed to be operative in reincarnation, such as that one's will activity in one life forms the basis for the thinking of the next, and a number of successive lives of various individualities.
Modern astrology
Inspired by Helena Blavatsky's major works, including ''Isis Unveiled'' and ''The Secret Doctrine'', astrology, astrologers in the early twentieth-century integrated the concepts of karma
Karma (; sa, कर्म}, ; pi, kamma, italic=yes) in Sanskrit means an action, work, or deed, and its effect or consequences. In Indian religions, the term more specifically refers to a principle of cause and effect, often descriptivel ...
and reincarnation into the practice of Western astrology. Notable astrologers who advanced this development included Alan Leo, Charles E. O. Carter, Marc Edmund Jones, and Dane Rudhyar. A new synthesis of East and West resulted as Hindu and Buddhist concepts of reincarnation were fused with Western astrology's deep roots in Hermeticism
Hermeticism, or Hermetism, is a philosophical system that is primarily based on the purported teachings of Hermes Trismegistus (a legendary Hellenistic combination of the Greek god Hermes and the Egyptian god Thoth). These teachings are containe ...
and Neoplatonism
Neoplatonism is a strand of Platonic philosophy that emerged in the 3rd century AD against the background of Hellenistic philosophy and religion. The term does not encapsulate a set of ideas as much as a chain of thinkers. But there are some i ...
. In the case of Rudhyar, this synthesis was enhanced with the addition of Carl Jung, Jungian depth psychology. This dynamic integration of astrology, reincarnation and depth psychology has continued into the modern era with the work of astrologers Steven Forrest (astrologer), Steven Forrest and Jeffrey Wolf Green. Their respective schools of Evolutionary Astrology are based on "an acceptance of the fact that human beings incarnate in a succession of lifetimes."
Scientology
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 a ''thetan'', an immortal spiritual entity, that has fallen into a degraded state as a result of past-life experiences. Scientology Auditing (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, Sea Org, whose motto is "''Revenimus''" ('We Come Back'), and whose members sign a "Billion year contract, 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."
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.
Wicca
Wicca is a neo-pagan religion focused on nature, guided by the philosophy of Wiccan Rede that advocates the tenets "Harm None, Do As Ye Will". Wiccans believe in a form of karmic return where one's deeds are returned, either in the current life or in another life, threefold or multiple times in order to teach one lessons (the Threefold law, Threefold Law). Reincarnation is therefore an accepted part of the Wiccan faith. Wiccans also believe that death and afterlife are important experiences for the soul to transform and prepare for future lifetimes.
Reincarnation and science
While there has been no scientific confirmation of the physical reality of reincarnation, where the subject has been discussed, there are questions of whether and how such beliefs may be justified within the discourse of science and religion. Some champions of academic parapsychology have argued that they have scientific evidence even while their detractors have accused them of practicing a form of pseudoscience. Scientific skepticism, Skeptic Carl Sagan asked the 14th Dalai Lama, 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." Sagan considered claims of memories of past lives to be worthy of research, although he considered reincarnation to be an unlikely explanation for these.
Claims of past lives
Over a period of 40 years, psychiatrist Ian Stevenson
Ian Pretyman Stevenson (October 31, 1918 – February 8, 2007) was a Canadian-born American psychiatrist, the founder and director of the Division of Perceptual Studies at the University of Virginia School of Medicine.
He was a professor at th ...
, from the University of Virginia, recorded case study, case studies of young children who claimed to remember past lives. He published twelve books, including ''Twenty Cases Suggestive of Reincarnation'', Reincarnation and Biology, Reincarnation and Biology: A Contribution to the Etiology of Birthmarks and Birth Defects (a two-part monograph), ''European Cases of the Reincarnation Type,'' and ''Where Reincarnation and Biology Intersect''. In his cases he reported the child's statements and testimony from family members and others, often along with what he considered to be correlates to a deceased person who in some ways seemed to match the child's memory. Stevenson also investigated cases where he thought that birthmarks and birth defects seemed to match wounds and scars on the deceased. Sometimes included in his documentation were medical records like autopsy photographs. As any claim of past life memory is subject to charges of false memory, false memories and the ease with which such claims can be hoax, hoaxed, Stevenson expected the controversy and skepticism of his beliefs that followed. He said that he looked for disconfirming evidence and alternative explanations for reports, but, as the ''Washington Post'' reported, he typically concluded that no normal explanation sufficed.
Other academic researchers who have undertaken similar pursuits include Jim B. Tucker, Antonia Mills, Satwant Pasricha, Godwin Samararatne, and Erlendur Haraldsson, but Stevenson's publications remain the most well known. Stevenson's work in this regard was impressive enough to Carl Sagan that he referred to what were apparently Stevenson's investigations in his book ''The Demon-Haunted World'' as an example of carefully collected empirical data, and though he rejected reincarnation as a parsimonious explanation for the stories, he wrote that the phenomenon of alleged past-life memories should be further researched. Sam Harris (author), Sam Harris cited Stevenson's works in his book ''The End of Faith'' as part of a body of data that seems to attest to the reality of psychic phenomena, but that only relies on subjective personal experience.
Stevenson's claims have been subject to criticism and debunking, for example by the philosopher Paul Edwards (philosopher), Paul Edwards, who contended that Ian Stevenson's accounts of reincarnation were purely anecdotal evidence, anecdotal and Cherry picking, cherry-picked.[Rockley, Richard. (2002)]
"Book Review: Children who Remember Previous Lives"
SkepticReport. Retrieved 11 October 2014. Edwards attributed the stories to selective thinking, suggestion, and false memory syndrome, false memories that result from the family's or researcher's belief systems and thus did not rise to the standard of fairly sampled empirical evidence. The philosopher Keith Augustine wrote in critique that the fact that "the vast majority of Stevenson's cases come from countries where a religious belief in reincarnation is strong, and rarely elsewhere, seems to indicate that cultural conditioning (rather than reincarnation) generates claims of spontaneous past-life memories." Further, Ian Wilson (author), Ian Wilson pointed out that a large number of Stevenson's cases consisted of poor children remembering wealthy lives or belonging to a Caste system in India, higher caste. In these societies, claims of reincarnation have been used as schemes to obtain money from the richer families of alleged former incarnations. Robert A. Baker, Robert Baker asserted that all the past-life experiences investigated by Stevenson and other parapsychologists are understandable in terms of known psychological factors including a mixture of cryptomnesia and confabulation. Edwards also objected that reincarnation invokes assumptions that are inconsistent with modern science. As the vast majority of people do not remember previous lives and there is no empirically documented mechanism known that allows personality to survive death and travel to another body, positing the existence of reincarnation is subject to the principle that "extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence". Researchers such as Stevenson acknowledged these limitations.[
Stevenson also claimed there were a handful of cases that suggested evidence of xenoglossy, including two where a subject under hypnosis allegedly conversed with people speaking the foreign language, instead of merely being able to recite foreign words. Sarah Thomason, a linguist (and skeptical researcher) at the University of Michigan, reanalyzed these cases, concluding that "the linguistic evidence is too weak to provide support for the claims of xenoglossy."
]
Past life regression
Some believers in reincarnation (Stevenson famously not among them) give much importance to supposed past-life memories retrieved under hypnosis during past life regressions. Popularized by psychiatrist Brian Weiss who claims he has regressed more than 4,000 patients since 1980,[Breakfast with Brian Weiss](_blank)
, ''Pittsburgh Post-Gazette'', 5 August 2002, Accessed 25 April 2009.[Weinstein-Moser, Edie]
"Interview with Brian Weiss"
. ''Wisdom'' magazine. ''Wisdom-Magazine.com''. 2008. Retrieved 18 June 2015. the technique is often identified as a kind of pseudoscience, pseudoscientific practice. Such supposed memories have been documented to contain historical inaccuracies originating from modern popular culture, common beliefs about history, or books that discuss historical events. Experiments with subjects undergoing past life regression indicate that a belief in reincarnation and suggestions by the hypnotist are the two most important factors regarding the contents of memories reported. The use of hypnosis and suggestive questions can tend to leave the subject particularly likely to hold distorted or False memory, false memories. Rather than recall of a previous existence, the source of the memories is more likely cryptomnesia and confabulations that combine experiences, knowledge, imagination and suggestion or guidance from the hypnotist. Once created, those memories are indistinguishable from memories based on events that occurred during the subject's life.
Past-life regression has been critiqued for being unethical on the grounds that it lacks any evidence to support its claims and that it increases one's susceptibility to false memories. Luis Cordón states that this can be problematic as it creates delusions under the guise of therapy. The memories are experienced as being as vivid as those based on events experienced in one's life and impossible to differentiate from true memories of actual events, and accordingly any damage can be difficult to undo.
APA accredited organizations have challenged the use of past-life regressions as a therapeutic method, calling it unethical. Additionally, the hypnotic methodology that underpins past-life regression has been criticized as placing the participant in a vulnerable position, susceptible to implantation of false memories. Because the implantation of false memories may be harmful, Gabriel Andrade argues that past-life regression violates the principle of ''Primum non nocere, first, do no harm'' (Medical ethics#Non-maleficence, non-maleficence), part of the Hippocratic Oath.
See also
* Ada F. Kay
* Arthur Flowerdew
* Arthur Guirdham
* Barbro Karlén
* Joan Grant
* Shanti Devi
* Incarnation
* Karmic astrology
* Plane (esotericism), Planes of existence
* Pre-existence
* Reincarnation in popular culture
* Soulmate
References
*
External links
The Columbia Encyclopedia: Transmigration of Souls or Metempsychosis
Jewish View of Reincarnation
{{DEFAULTSORT:Reincarnation
Reincarnation,
Afterlife
Buddhist philosophical concepts
Druze theology
Esoteric Christianity
Hindu philosophical concepts
Ismaili theology
Jain philosophical concepts
Kabbalah
Philosophy of religion