what is reinkarnation?

Answer 1

" Worn-out garments Are shed by the body:
Worn-out bodies Are shed by the dweller. "

- (Bhagavad-Gita, II:22)

Individual souls, or jivas, enter the world mysteriously; by God's power we may be sure, but how or for what reason we are unable fully to explain. They begin as the souls of the simplest forms of life, but they do not vanish with the death of their original bodies.

When we outgrow a suit or find our house too cramped, we exchange these for roomier ones that offer our bodies freer play. Souls do the same.

This process by which an individual jiva (soul) passes through a sequence of bodies is known as reincarnation or transmigration of the soul - in Sanskrit samsara, a word that signifies endless passage through cycles of life, death and rebirth.

Hinduism believes that God, who is all-loving and merciful, does not punish or reward anyone. He molds our destinies based upon our own thoughts and deeds. Every action of a person, in thought or deed, brings results, either good or bad, depending upon the moral quality of the action, in accordance with the adage, As you sow, so shall you reap. Moral consequences of all actions are conserved by Nature.

Until we reach the end of our journey we are subject to the law of Karma which makes out that our desires and acts determines the pace of our progress. Our present state is conditioned by our past and what we do now will determine our future. Death and rebirth do not interrupt this process. Four our present condition, we are ourselves responsible.

Mahabharata says that there is no external judge who punishes us; our inner self is the judge.

na yaman yamah ity ahuh atma vai yama ucyate
atma samyamito yena yamas tasya karoti kim?

If a person lives a good life on earth, he or she will be born into a better life in the next incarnation. For example, a sinner who leads an immoral life will be born as a poor human or as an animal in the next incarnation. A person born again and again to reap the fruits of his or her own actions. This cycle of birth and death continues until the person attains moksha or freedom from the cycle of birth and death. In all forms of Indian thought, time is symbolized by birth and death. The world is represented by wheel of time, of births and deaths.

Count Maurice Maeterlinck (1862-1949) was a Belgian writer of poetry and a wide variety of essays. He won the 1911 Nobel Prize for literature. In his book Mountain Paths, in the doctrine of Karma, he finds "the only satisfactory solution of life's injustices."



Reincarnation is interlinked with karma: successive lives afford the requisite scope in which the law of karma operates. It is the natural way the soul evolves from immaturity to spiritual illumination. When all the lessons are worked out and all the lessons of life are learnt, one attains enlightenment and moksha (liberation). This means you will exist, but will no longer be pulled back to be born in a physical body.

Nonetheless, one is not condemned to stay in this cycle of repeated birth and death forever. There is a way out. In the human form one can attain the knowledge of spiritual realization and attain release from Samsara. This is why every religious process in the world encourages people not to hanker for sensual enjoyments which bind them to this world but to look forwards what is spiritual and gives eternal freedom from Samsara.

Answer 2

It is a progression to a higher level of understanding and wisdom, the Maitreya has advanced to the highest level and now dwells amongst us. He is the Teacher of Teachers, the Master of Masters. His great mission is to usher mankind into the Golden Age, he will soon reveal to the world His plan for The New World Order.

Answer 3

Spirit recycling. The body dies, the spirit is reborn in a new body. Tribal cultures usually believe you can come back as either human or animal. Other cultures believe you can only come back as a human, as animal spirits are different.

Answer 4

Any person taking a re-birth after death and knowing every thing about his previous life and family circumstances and even the cause of his death, is known as reincarnation of that person.

Answer 5

To re-incarnate is to come back to life after one dies. To have another go at this thing called life. Buddists believe they will keep re-incarnating until they get it right,whatever right means, until one great and glorious day, they will arrive in Budda Paradise...Really thats one of the origins of this thing called re-incarination.

Answer 6

if u were asking about reincarnation then here is everything about it.
Why believe in Reincarnation?
What exchanges old for new, offers no special deals or closeouts, and keeps us coming back for more?

You were. You will be!
Know this while you are.
Reincarnation is the natural
process of recycling human energy through
birth, growth, decay and death.
Each rebirth is a link in one's eternal chain
of latent impressions, thoughts, desires and actions.
The soul in its new body is given the opportunity
to learn from the past, to live the present and to prepare for the future. Reincarnation: Why Believe?Once I have begun to base my sense of ‘who I am’ on perceiving myself as a soul rather than on perceiving only my temporary costume, the body, I deeply realize that, as a being of spiritual energy giving life to the body, I am immortal. I begin to understand that I change bodily costumes just as a snake sheds its skin, but I – the eternal soul – can never die.

Death and Rebirth
At the moment of physical death, the soul withdraws its energy from the organs of the body and vacates its seat in the middle of the forehead. It takes with it the impressions accumulated in that life and enters into the body of an unborn baby, while that new body is still being formed in its mother’s womb. This normally happens between the fourth and fifth month of pregnancy. A human soul only enters a human body. The type of body the soul enters and the conditions of birth are determined by the past actions of the soul in its previous life or lives, and the cumulative account of give and take that it has built up with other souls. Without proper understanding of this process, the leaving of one body and the taking of another is often an experience of great fear and anguish; but the details of the old life are soon obliterated by new experiences so that the soul is not overwhelmed and confused by past memories.

Reincarnation: What You Take With You
By the time the baby’s body and brain are developed, the soul has all but forgotten the past and become accustomed to its new conditions and to the parents of its new body. However, although the soul cannot usually remember details of its past life or lives, it carries with it—in the form of attitudes, tendencies and personality—the cumulative effect of all that it has experienced and learned. All that is genetically brought to the new life is the physical make-up of the body, the racial type, the colour of eyes, shape of nose and so on. And although the environment in which a child is raised – as well as the personalities of those around the child – definitely exert an influence on the child’s development, its tendencies and reactions to people and events are not biologically generated but are inherent in the soul from previous existences. Those predominant impressions recorded in the past life soon begin to manifest themselves and are expressed in the new surroundings.

Relationship in Other Lifetimes
Human life is based on inter–relationships between souls, which in turn are based on the different impressions present in each. These impressions determine the course of life, the nature of the soul’s activities and its physical placement in a particular environment. Thus there is typically a link or an ‘account’ between two souls who have formed a relationship in one lifetime; that link will bring them together again in other lifetimes. This explains why many people have the sense of having met or known a person before, even though they are apparently meeting for the first time. Or they experience meeting someone with the feeling of either attraction or repulsion even though they don’t know them well enough in the current life to have developed those feelings. What is taking place is that the soul is recognizing the other soul – even though they have different bodies – from the last time they met.

Reincarnation: Process of Rebirth
Reincarnation is a process of rebirth. With each death comes a new birth and the opening of a new chapter in the never ending story of life. With each new birth the soul carries on with its journey through eternity where it left off in terms of its ‘accounts’ in the previous birth. The soul is not the victim of an angry or vengeful God condemning it to a lifetime of deprivation or suffering for no apparent reason. The soul inherits a past created by its own self. The fact that the precise past causes for the circumstances of the new life are not apparent or visible does not mean that they don’t exist. In other words, a soul born in fortunate circumstances is not the recipient of God’s grace or blessings; rather it is reaping the reward of its own generous and beneficial actions done in the previous birth(s). Each soul is constantly experiencing the effect of some past action and also planting seeds to be reaped as some future fruit.

The understanding of reincarnation reinforces, in meditation, the experience of my own immortality, my eternal existence as a soul. This is excellent medicine for many types of fear, anxiety and limited thinking.

Answer 7

The proper word should be "reincarnation". I think it's more or less the same as resurrection. And they couldn't happen without being dead first.

Answer 8

some believe when we die we are reborn into a new life toward the future of a higher learning.some believe into animals.personally i believe in god.

Answer 9

it means people who are enlightened can choose be born again in the bodies they choose & also remember all the things of their past life

Answer 10

It's reincarnation.