Thursday 19 May 2016

Reincarnation

 It is important that when someone reads and learns something new, he has his mind open to unfamiliar possibilities and that he is also not bound from what he already knows. He should consider everything and examine them via the use of logic. This article, although it illustrates an idea that is foreign and distant, especially for my Christian readers, should be taken under serious consideration. One should always make himself available to new information because even though they could be wrong, they could also potentially be right, and if they are correct, then he has learned something he did not know before. Even further, one should at least consider a mentality that if not the majority, a great percentage of the populace accept, in their religions.
 First of all, a fair number of big religions like Buddhism or Hinduism accept reincarnation. For a more complete list of the official position of different religions you may visit the following web address at http://reincarnationafterdeath.com/what-religions-believe-in-reincarnation/. In Bhagavad Gita (Hinduism), Krishna dedicates the majority of the book teaching about elevating your character through your various reincarnations in this world. As I have stated in previous articles (specifically at https://theoryofhope.blogspot.ca/2016/05/realityis-unique-and-so-there-is-only.html) God ''exists'' in all religions and the only reason they are different from one another is due to humans because we are incapable of preserving the word of ''perfection'' (meaning that God's word is all about love and kindness and therefore human through the ages twisted that in order to get their way) and also due to the cultural and geopolitical differences of the eras. The sacred texts of the Hinduism religion, like Bhagavad Gita, illustrate this point since they only write about love and kindness, while mostly emphasizing on the salvation of one's soul and his liberation from the cycle of continuous reincarnations on this world, and therefore, his advancement on the next. Buddha's base of philosophy is also the elevation of one's character and his enlightenment that will also lead him to the salvation of his soul and therefore unbound him from the chains of reincarnation in this world of pain. Of course for my readers that already believe in this idea, due to accepting a religion that advocates this theory or not,  this article is redundant, but for example Christians and Western people that are not familiar with this notion, let's see what the Western culture had to say about it.
 The bases from which Western philosophy stems from are ancient Greek. Socrates in Plato's book Phaidon, discuses this idea. He supports via logical arguments (the theory of reminiscence) that souls existed before we were born and will continue to exist after we die, for they are eternal. Also, still using logical thoughts and arguments, he proves to his students that what we truly are is not our body but our soul that reincarnates in this world with different bodies over various eras! Sadly, I cannot explain Socrates's reasoning here because it would exceed by far the capacity of this article, but I strongly recommend you to read Phaidon for yourselves and pay close attention to his teachings. Moreover, all religious or spiritual organization in ancient Greece accepted reincarnation as a reality, For example the Orphics believed that our soul is perfect because it was made in the image of God, but all these imperfection (anger, hate, pain etc.) that we experience in life are due to our body, that is made out of matter and because of that they used to call the human body the tomb of the soul. Pythagoreans, the followers of Pythagoras, also believed in reincarnation and saw it as an necessity for the elevation of the human soul. The great Roman philosopher Cicero said on ''Treatise on Glory'' that, ''The counsels of the Divine Mind had some glimpse of truth when they said that men are born in order to suffer the penalty for some sins committed in a former life''.
 Sadly, the Quran remains silent towards the matter of reincarnation, but Sufism a spiritual section of Islam, accepts it as a reality.
 Moreover, according to my previous articles, the purpose of humans is to elevate themselves by bettering their characters and so, find their way back to God. But is that possible to be done in only one life? Most people do not improve their character during their lives, nor do they seek to find wisdom or enlightenment. So my whole philosophy should crumble upon that, for almost no one succeeds in his purpose in live. Plus, it is almost impossible for the majority of people to elevate themselves to near perfection, meaning in a state where they can abolish their negative emotions and embrace only the positive, and love all people without exception, in just one life. How much can one better himself in just a few years? What about the people who die young?Therefore, there must be more than one life that people live on this world so that we may elevate themselves through multiple lives, in order to reach perfection.
 In addition, in my previous article about Christ and the church, I state that church, being a man made organization has twisted the preachings of Jesus to some degree ( you may find the link here https://theoryofhope.blogspot.ca/2016/05/christ-and-church.html ) and that happened primarily during the first centuries after Christ during the contraction of the Church as we know it today, at the ecumenical counsels. Before them, though, the majority of Christians believed in reincarnation! More specifically, the order of Gnostics, one of the biggest sections of Christianity during the early centuries after Christ that later was branded as a harmful cult and their texts as apocryphal gospels due to our loving church, and whose beliefs certainly approached reality much more than the churches, rigorously accepted it as a valid truth. Their most notable example was Ouroboros, a snake eating its own tail, which represents reincarnation. Of course, there is a plethora of other teachings about reincarnation, which are not symbolic, and therefore, are much more clearer about it. Likewise, Saint Austine of Hippo was a firm believer of reincarnation that asked a very important question in his Confessions ''Say, Lord... did my infancy succeed another age of mine that died before it? Was it that which I spent within my mother's womb?... and what before that life again, O God... was I anywhere or in any body?''. The fact remains that before the church abolished a big portion of knowledge about the divine as heretic, reincarnation was an idea that the majority of Christians accepted!
 But what did Christ say about it? Sadly, in all 4 Gospels he remained silent about it, except in a few allegorical stories that He arguably might have referred to it through symbolism. But that is to be expected because the texts where Jesus spoke about it was deemed heretic and they are categorized as apocryphal gospels! One may find references of the texts that invoked the secret teachings of Christianity (mostly the Gnostics), at the following address http://reluctant-messenger.com/Lost-Doctrines-Christianity003.htm . As you may read, there are a lot of references that does not fit very well with the views of church, that is, we only live once. One should keep in mind, that the Christian who lived in the first centuries after Christ, before the church twisted the teachings of Jesus, believed that His preachings, although mostly allegorical, contained the theory of reincarnation and the knowledge that the soul is to be born many times in this world, with different bodies. Some of the most notable texts (that were a part of the Gnostic teachings of course) where Christ referred to reincarnation through symbolism are the ''hymn of the Perl'' (apocryphal gospel of Thomas) and the Shepherd of Hermas''. But I will deal with the allegorical meaning of some of them in another article.
 Finally, as I have previously stated, God ''appears'' in all religions and the differences between them are caused due to a human factor, so if all of them (their untwisted ''divine inspired'' teachings at least) claim the same thing, then that must be true, or at the very least should be taken under very serious consideration, no matter how unfamiliar or foreign it seems. Plus, the theory of reincarnation goes hand in hand with the idea of how our world works and how justice is served, for God must be just: Karma, or as ancient Greeks used to call it Heimarmene.

                                                                                        Andreas Sarchosis

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