any thoughts on reincarnation. yes, no, maybe?

Question

if you have read anything on this subject matter, pls mention if you like.

Answer 1

yes, I totally believe we have all been here before and some of us will be back , while some of us will not... I have read plenty on the subject... from various authors... though just because I read some books is not the reason I believe.... I believe because to me it makes perfect sense.... on why we feel an affinity with some people, why others make us uncomfortable why we feel a dejavu with certain places / times / people / things etc.... why some people have certain fears , why others have certain talents etc... why some are ill or disfigured, .all accumulation from from previous lives lived... and choices before entering this lifetime... I do not believe we were or come back as various animals... we remain humans.. and when we have finished learning whatever we need to learn we no longer come back...

Answer 2

Reincarnation.

Definition: The belief that one is reborn in one or more successive existences, which may be human or animal. Usually it is an intangible “soul” that is believed to be reborn in another body. Not a Bible teaching.

Does a strange feeling of being familiar with entirely new acquaintances and places prove reincarnation to be a fact?

Have you ever mistaken one man or woman who is alive for another who is also now living? Many have had that experience. Why? Because some people have similar mannerisms or may even look almost identical. So the feeling that you know a person even though you never met him before really does not prove that you were acquainted with him in a former life, does it?
Why might a house or a town seem familiar to you if you have never been there before? Is it because you lived there during a former life? Many houses are built according to similar designs. Furniture used in cities far apart may be produced from similar patterns. And is it not true that the scenery in some widely separated places looks very much alike? So, without resorting to reincarnation, your feeling of familiarity is quite understandable.

Do recollections of life at another time in another place, as drawn out under hypnosis, prove reincarnation?

Under hypnosis much information stored in the brain can be drawn out. Hypnotists tap the subconscious memory. But how did those memories get there? Perhaps you read a book, saw a motion picture, or learned about certain people on television. If you put yourself in the place of the people about whom you were learning, it might have made a vivid impression, almost as if the experience were your own. What you actually did may have been so long ago that you have forgotten it, but under hypnosis the experience may be recalled as if you were remembering “another life.” Yet, if that were true, would not everyone have such memories? But not everyone does. It is noteworthy that an increasing number of state supreme courts in the United States do not accept hypnotically induced testimony. In 1980 the Minnesota Supreme Court declared that “the best expert testimony indicates that no expert can determine whether memory retrieved by hypnosis, or any part of that memory, is truth, falsehood, or confabulation—a filling of gaps with fantasy. Such results are not scientifically reliable as accurate.” (State v. Mack, 292 N.W.2d 764) The influence of suggestions made by the hypnotist to the one hypnotized is a factor in this unreliability.

Does the Bible contain evidence of belief in reincarnation?

Eccl. 3:19: “There is an eventuality as respects the sons of mankind and an eventuality as respects the beast, and they have the same eventuality. As the one dies, so the other dies.” (As in the case of humans, nothing survives at the death of an animal. There is nothing that can experience rebirth in another body.)

Eccl. 9:10: “All that your hand finds to do, do with your very power, for there is no work nor devising nor knowledge nor wisdom in Sheol, the place to which you are going.” (It is not into another body but into Sheol, the common grave of mankind, that the dead go.)

How much of a difference is there between reincarnation and the hope held out in the Bible?

Reincarnation: According to this belief, when a person dies, the soul, the “real self,” passes on to a better existence if the individual has lived a good and proper life, but possibly to existence as an animal if his record has been more bad than good. Each rebirth, it is believed, brings the individual back into this same system of things, where he will face further suffering and eventual death. The cycles of rebirth are viewed as virtually endless. Is such a future really what awaits you? Some believe that the only way of escape is by extinguishing all desire for things pleasing to the senses. To what do they escape? To what some describe as unconscious life.

Bible: According to the Bible, the soul is the complete person. Even though a person may have done bad things in the past, if he repents and changes his ways, Jehovah God will forgive him. (Psalms 103:12, 13.) When a person dies, nothing survives. Death is like a deep, dreamless sleep. There will be a resurrection of the dead. This is not a reincarnation but a bringing back to life of the same personality. (Acts 24:15) For most people, the resurrection will be to life on earth. It will take place after God brings the present wicked system to its end. Sickness, suffering, even the necessity to die, will become things of the past. (Daniel 2:44; Revelation 21:3, 4) Does such a hope sound like something about which you would like to learn more, to examine the reasons for confidence in it?

If you would like further information or a free home Bible study, please contact Jehovah's Witnesses at the local Kingdom Hall. Or visit http://www.watchtower.org

Answer 3

Islam doesn't agree with the reincarnation theory. Let us look at what Allah Almighty said in the Noble Quran:

"From the (earth) did We Create you, and into it Shall We return you, And from it shall We Bring you out once again. (The Noble Quran, 20:55)"

" 'And Allah has produced you from the earth, Growing (gradually), And in the End He will return you Into the (earth), And raise you forth (Again at the Resurrection).' (The Noble Quran, 71:17-18)"

"Nor will they there Taste Death, except the first Death; and He will preserve Them from the Penalty Of the Blazing Fire. (The Noble Quran, 44:56)"

" 'Is it (the case) that We shall not die, except our first death, And that we Shall not be punished?' Verily this is The supreme achievement! For the like of this Let all strive, Who wish to strive. (The Noble Quran, 37:58-61)"

From the above Noble Verses, we clearly see that Allah Almighty created us to die only once. This clearly refutes the reincarnation theory from the Islamic perspective.

Answer 4

I'm going to say no, and I don't believe at all in the God thingy. I think when we die, we die, not become the next thing to live...be it insect, horse, tree, person, etc. If there is nothing to become, we don't remain in spirit status until there is. Were you thinking while inside your mother? Or were you just developing and the moment you were born you "were" whoever died before you? Why would everything just be a shell game? In here, out there, in here, out there? Why would you and other people be the only ones?

Answer 5

I have read Buddhist text and some other 'new age' text and I do believe in reincarnation. I believe I choose to come back for another lifetime on Earth after this one I am currently living.

Answer 6

It is appointed unto man to die once.
We don't come back as chickens, or fluffy dogs, or kings and queens. We have one life to live. And a choice to make where we will spend eternity,