Reincarnation makes perfect sense from the standpoint of human learning. We need “do overs” to get it right. Most of us in the West (modern world), have a “one and done” view of life. We are born, grow up, grow old, and die. Then we (our souls) go either to heaven or hell, depending, or we just cease to exist. Throughout history, most people have rejected the concept of simply ceasing to exist. They want something more, so they establish religions and rituals that they think will give them a wonderful “afterlife” if they follow the right rules of behavior and worship the right deity in the right way.
The main problem with such beliefs (including mine and yours) is that they tend to establish an us versus them system. Several years ago a young woman told me that she felt sorry for people like me and Mother Theresa because, although we were good people, we couldn’t go to heaven because we didn’t belong to her church. Her church was a small, Christian church in rural Missouri. Such is often the nature of religion, which is by nature designed to separate the “lambs” from the “goats.” The “lambs” are those who worshiped in the right way, and the “goats” are those who didn’t follow the rules required for salvation. In that case, I would, at least, get to meet Mother Theresa.
In a letter to his brother, poet John Keats said that life is a “vale of soul-making,” the purpose of which is to educate an “intelligence” to the point it becomes a “soul.” The implication is that we need “do overs” to learn our lessons. That makes sense to me for a couple of reasons. In general, humanity is becoming more “civilized” the longer we have been around. Second, many people have “memories” of past lives. The memories typically consist of scenes from previous times that they associate with themselves. They remember those scenes basically the same way they remember earlier times in their current lives, in much the same way you might remember one of your early birthdays when you got the present you wanted—or didn’t get what you hoped for.
A number of books, including Old Souls: Compelling Evidence from Children Who Remember past Lives, present what seems to be evidence proving past lives. (Also see, for example, “Incredible Evidence” and “Best Evidence.“) The real question is why so many people would have such “memories” if there weren’t some kind of underlying truth to them. Most people are, of course, at least somewhat fearful of death, so it’s possible that such “memories” are wishful thinking in the same way many think of going to “Heaven” when they die. I have heard people say that a loved one has “gone to be with the Lord” and that he or she is walking on “streets paved with gold”—essentially a religious one-and-done rule.
It is only natural, of course, to wonder what happens when we die. It is certain that our bodies will die, and a lot of human activity is dedicated to postponing the inevitable—or hastening it for those we dislike. Medicine and witchcraft have the same underlying impulse, to change a “what is” to a “what could be.” I understand that impulse, and the older I get, the more I tend to think about it and belief systems in general. I have had experiences best categorized as “mystical” since I was a child, including looking at a tree in my yard and “seeing” its energy glowing and hearing the “click” of my dog’s nails walking on the hallway floor after the dog had died. As a teenager, my life was saved by a mysterious honk of a horn when I was about to ram the car in front of me because the traffic had stopped while I was daydreaming while driving.
More recently, while I was receiving bodywork (Healing Touch and Reiki) the practitioners for both sessions told me that I had killed them in a previous life. In both cases, I had what is often called cellular or body memory of the times and circumstances in which the events took place. The one event took place in a cave in very early human history, and the other was more medieval. There is, of course, no way to prove that either of these events actually took place. In both cases, however, the other person and I had the same basic “memory” of the event. The “memories” could simply be common hallucinations shared telepathically. Telepathic sharing would, of course, also require an explanation. A common expression of such circumstances is “too coincidental to be coincidental.”
A long time ago, St. Paul said that “we see through a glass darkly.” That is probably the best that can be said for human understanding. We can’t see the whole picture, and we don’t fully understand even that which we do see. As a result, we make up stories that help us make sense of our experiences, and we often become the heroes/heroines of our stories. I suspect everyone has the desire to be the hero of his or her own life, and the more we think we have achieved that status, the less we probably are. Pride is often considered the worst of the Seven Deadly Sins, probably because leads to the others. And no matter how “great” our achievements are in life, we all end up the same way: dead. That’s doubtless why we so desperately want an afterlife, including both a “heaven” and a “hell”: I and those who share my beliefs will go to “heaven,” and people I and those in my group consider bad will go to “hell.” Those we consider bad are, of course, thinking the same thing.
Whatever your belief, my question would be, “What do you consider evidence that supports it?” For some people, it is something they have read or something they heard someone or others say. Others, with a more skeptical bent (and I am one of them), have a difficult time finding something that provides anything that can be considered proof. Yes, I have had experiences that can only be called “mystical,” but mystical experiences aren’t “proof.”
If enough people have similar mystical experiences, what they believe might well become a religion. If we look to see what religions have in common, we see that what they have in common isn’t really all that common. The typical belief is, “my god is better than yours.” The part about the “after-life” is common, but the visions of that afterlife are very different. I suspect that would be true even if those asked all came from the same place of worship.
My sense is that we would do well to just do the best we can with our lives. Good card players, after all, are those who do the best they can with the cards they have been dealt. Doing well consistently hand after hand requires a lot of practice. The same is true with shooting pool or playing piano. Doing well requires a lot of practice, perhaps in addition to what we might consider “natural gift.” The Christian Bible says we are to “judge not” if we are to avoid being judged. That doesn’t mean we are to consider all behavior equally good, nor does it mean we shouldn’t put all those we consider criminals in jail. What it does mean is that we can’t know what led to another person’s behavior. We are, after all, only seeing through the glass darkly. Perhaps we just need more practice to get it right.
