How does reincarnation work? Life does not begin at birth and it does not end at death. So, what happens exactly with us, after leaving this present body? Will it continue to eternally reincarnate? What actually happens during reincarnation? Can we decide our future incarnations? In this article we will talk about the science and mechanisms behind life to understand how reincarnation works.
“I’m sure that we really get to live again, life emerges from death and the souls of the dead are alive.” – Socrates
“The soul enters the human body, as one enters a temporary life, and later it looks for another home, because the soul is immortal.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson
“Death does not exist. How could there be death, being that everything is part of God? The soul never dies, and the body is never really alive.” – Isaac Bashevis Singer, Nobel Prize.
“Do you have any idea how many lives we must have gone through before we even got the first idea that there is more to life than eating, or fighting, or power in the Flock? A thousand lives, Jon, ten thousand! We choose our next world though what we learn in this one… But you, Jon, learned so much at one time that you didn’t have to go through a thousand lives to reach this one.'” – Richard Bach (Jonathan Livingston Seagull)
Reincarnation in modern days
Hardly anyone thinks about death or what lies beyond it. Some say that death is the end of everything. Some believe in heaven and hell. Others argue that this life is just one among the many lives we have lived and will live. And more than a third of the global population, ie about 1,500 million people, admits that reincarnation is unquestionable. Reincarnation is not a creed, or a psychological evasion to escape the terrible fate of death, but a scientific and accurate explanation of our past and future lives.
Many books have been written on the subject, usually based on hypnotic regression, near-death experiences, stories of astral events (extracorporeal) and the experiences of the hereafter. But almost all the literature about reincarnation provides very poor information, full of fantastic, superficial and unreliable descriptions. But most important of all is that none of these popular reads explain the most fundamental of reincarnation: the process by which the soul eternally transmigration from one material to another body, the questions we are trying to answer: How does reincarnation work? Do we reincarnate instantaneously or slowly, over a long period of time? Can other beings, such as animals, reincarnate in human bodies? Let’s begin with the fundamentals and try to go deeper into detail as we proceed.
Read also: What Religions Believe In Reincarnation?
How Does Reincarnation Work?
Scientifically, the existence of the soul has not yet been proven. It is not even known where consciousness is located (which is the term scientists have chosen to avoid having to say “soul”), although among quantum physicists it is already being raised the possibility that this consciousness does not disappear after the death of the physical body. And phenomena such as near-death experiences or out of body experiences suggest that, in fact, consciousness is not a product of the brain, but it is something that does not depend on it and that is located elsewhere. This makes it very difficult to answer the question how does reincarnation work? But what scientists frequently ignore it is that there are too many people, not only children (although cases of children who remember past lives are quite convincing), who somehow have access to alleged memories of people who lived decades or centuries before… contrary to what many think, this has been verified many times, and today there are many more evidences of reincarnation. Those who remember past lives (and do not have any paranormal psychic ability) know that we can remember the lives of one or more, specific people, with experiences and emotions that still affect us today. If we could all access the collective unconscious (or even our genetic memory), it would be logical to think that we would remember many more lives that had nothing to do with us, with whom we shouldn’t feel identified.
What happens between reincarnations remains a matter of belief. Those who have been able to remember the period between lives through regressive hypnosis tell us how after death (without exception), sooner or later, they see a tunnel of light and cross it to reach another plane of existence where they are greeted by spiritual guides or deceased relatives. Interestingly this is the same story told by people who have suffered near-death experiences, only that in these cases the confusion seems to be much higher and often what they see is adapted to their own religious beliefs, which, in my opinion, undermines the credibility of them. Many of these people think that what they saw was “Heaven” or were with “God”, “Jesus” or “Muhammad”, and are not aware that what they saw was a tiny fraction of what it looks like on the other side, a place that these patients have accessed the period between lives described in more detail, but always within the limits imposed on us by human language. It seems that it’s a place to review our lives and plan our next incarnation. And then we are reborn.
Anyway, the only thing that we can be sure today is that there are people who remember their past lives. Some people know with 95% certainty (we always leave room for doubt) who they were in the past, with real names and convincing evidence. Even a certain resemblance. Any reader of this blog can be one of them.
People who are able to recall several past lives usually reach the following conclusions about how reincarnation works:
- Reincarnation is a natural phenomenon.
- Reincarnation is a universal phenomenon.
- No matter what religion you belong to, or how good or bad you’ve been, or where in the world you are born, you still reincarnate.
- The law of karma does not work as punishment or reward for our actions. But it is true that every action has a reaction.
- Most people remember past lives as those of ordinary people with nothing special to note, except their own experiences that always contain some meaning for the person who remembers.
- It is not uncommon to reincarnate within the same family. But it is also very common to reincarnate in totally different places, in individuals of any other race, language or culture, and in any social classes.
- We’ve all lived lives of men and women (recalling or not), sexual orientation can change from life to life, and in cases individuals may have a degree of gender dysphoria (ie, not feeling fully identified with the sex we have in the present life).
- Traumatic events (including traumatic deaths) leave deep footprints that can still affect our lives today.
- Some cases of physical trauma, for reasons still unknown, can cause birthmarks and can lead to birth defects in the new body in which the soul is reincarnated, but this is not always the case. Many diseases, affinities, phobias, skills, etc., originate in previous life traumas.
From the book Where Reincarnation and Biology Intersect (1999), by Ian Stevenson:
“Children who remember past lives exist in both Eastern and Western countries, what happens in the the West is that cases usually go unnoticed because we do not pay enough attention”.
- There is no rule governing the time between one incarnation to another. Possibly it only depends on us.
- Suicide is not punished in any way on the other side. It’s just a decision we can all take if we believe it is necessary.
- Will we ever get rid of the so-called “Wheel of Life” that makes us reincarnate again and again? We cannot still be sure. Some people say we have to fully develop our souls before leaving it.
Emotions are part of life, also suffering. We’re here to live, to feel, to thrill, to learn to manage our emotions, to learn to love, to be human, really. Humans are imperfect by nature. If they weren’t, we would not incarnate at all.
Read also: Transmigration Of Souls: Reincarnating Explained
Video: How and Why Reincarnation Works by John Van Auken
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yMRILc_dJuc
How does reincarnation work? The process of reincarnating
These simple questions and answers will help us understand how reincarnation works according to modern approaches. These answers are taken from the book Beyond Death by Samael Aun Weor.
1. What is understood by return?
Common and ordinary people understand by return the return to a new womb; this means that we as souls can reincorporate ourselves within a new human organism. It is not irrelevant to state that when we return we are born and continue to exist in the same manner, in the same way lived by us in our present existence.
2. Why is it that we do not remember anything of our previous lives?
People do not remember their previous lives because their Consciousness is asleep; it is clear that if their Consciousness were awakened then they would remember their previous lives.
3. Who returns?
The souls who still have the possibility of salvation can return to a new womb in order to re-attire themselves again with a new physical body; however when the case is lost, when we have become definitively evil, when already any punishment has no purpose for us, then it is clear that we no longer return, we do not return into a new body anymore, and instead we enter into the infernal worlds where only weeping and gnashing of teeth are heard.
4. How can we verify that we returned to this world anew?
For some people the return to this world after death is another theory, for others a dogma, a cause for laughter, a superstition, or a belief; but for those who remember our past lives, return is a fact; this means that only by remembering our previous existences will we be able to demonstrate the crude reality of the reincorporation or return to this valley of tears; however, we repeat, to remember our last lives is only possible by the awakening of the Consciousness.
5. Why do we come to this world again?
We return to this world with the purpose of becoming perfect, because unfortunately we are sinners and we need to end with our errors.
6. What returns to the world of human beings?
What returns to this world is the soul of the deceased.
7. Do animals and plants also return to this world?
The souls of plants, animals, and stones are the elementals of nature; they also return to this world in continuous manner. For example, if a plant dries up and dies, then the elemental of such a plant is reborn again in a new plant; if an animal dies, the elemental of that creature returns in a new animal organism again, etc.
8. Does predestination exist?
Each soul is the creator of its own destiny; if one performs good deeds, one then receives good luck, however if one performs evil deeds, then one is reborn in this world in order suffer and to pay everything; now we can understand why some are born on mattresses filled with white goose feathers and others in disgrace.
9. I would like to remember my past lives, but since I have my Consciousness asleep, how can I awaken it?
Follow the path of the sanctity; that is the way for the awakening of the Consciousness. Terminate with all of your errors, repent of all of your evil deeds, become pure in thought, word, and action; I guarantee you that your Consciousness will totally awaken when you have reached true sanctity.
10. Why do many of us not believe that we have had previous lives?
Some people do not believe that they had previous lives simply because they do not remember them, and indeed they do not remember them because their Consciousness is totally asleep.
11. Sir, do you remember your previous lives? Is it verifiable to you that reincorporation exists?
It is clear that if I did not remember my previous lives, I would not dare to defend the doctrine of return with so much passion; fortunately, I remember with entire exactitude all the lives that I have had on the planet Earth.
12. How many times can one return?
It is written with golden letters in the book of life that one returns to this world 108 times.
13. Why do some souls return as men and others as women?
Everything depends on the events of life; sometimes we must return in feminine body and others in masculine; this is according to the events of our previous lives.
14. Why do some say that if one treats animals badly one can return as a horse, dog, or cat, etc.?
The lost souls enter the infernal worlds; there, as it is stated in the sacred scriptures, they suffer the Second Death; it is after such a death that the condemned souls become free of any sin; then they can return to this world. However, they return according to the law of evolution, namely, they evolve, returning as mineral elementals; thereafter they ascend to the plant state, then later the souls reincorporate within animal organisms, and finally reconquer the human state that once they lost. When arriving at these heights, 108 lives are assigned to them again, so that they can become perfect; nevertheless, if they fail again, then the same process is repeated anew.
15. How is it that when one visits certain places one has the sensation of knowing the place so well that one can even give details and signs of the same place?
That phenomenon happens because in previous lives we were in that place.
16. How many opportunities does one have in order to return as a human being, how many as an animal, how many as a plant, and how many as a mineral?
The return in human organisms is already properly calculated as 108 times. But the return in plant or animals organisms, or simply as mineral elementals, does not have an exact number.
17. Is it possible to pass from the plant kingdom to the human kingdom or from the animal to the mineral?
From the plant kingdom one passes into the human kingdom—but through the animal kingdom; this means that we cannot skip a step, because “nature does not make leaps.” If animal elementals degenerate, then they devolve; they go back down to the mineral state but first by passing—naturally—through the plant state.
18. In what dimension are the elementals from plants and minerals located?
The elemental creatures of nature live in the fourth dimension.
19. Are we the same human souls from ancient times, those who return, or do some definitively disappear?
The present humanity is very old; it has been returning to this world for million of years.
20. How long does it take for a human soul—after physically dying—to receive a new body?
That depends upon the destiny of each one; some are reborn again immediately and others delay a long time in order to return.
21. As to students who have begun to awaken their Consciousness: when they die, can they be aware of the return process?
Whosoever awakens the Consciousness does not need to wait for the moment of the death in order to remember their previous lives; they can remember them in life, here and now.
22. Does Gnosis consider unfair the fact that millions of human beings live in the most complete ignorance about their evolution, return, the inner realization of their Being, and the awakening of their Consciousness?
We Gnostics consider unfair the fact that there are not enough instructors, or better said, a great quantity of missionaries to deliver the Gnostic teachings everywhere. Nevertheless, we are not guilty of this, since this humanity is only interested in amusing themselves, obtaining money, giving themselves to pleasures, etc. If people were more comprehensive, they would be more concerned with these studies and would spread them.
23. What is the Second Death and what does it have to do with return?
The Second Death is the termination of our animal passions in the infernal worlds; this means that through its fulfillment the condemned—the lost ones—arrive at the original purity, and when this happens they leave the infernal abysses, which exist within the interior of the Earth. Then, as we already stated, such souls evolve again from stone to man.
24. When will it be possible for humanity to understand “the why” of returning?
Humanity will only be able to understand “the why” of returning when they attain the awakening of their Consciousness.
25. Why is it that people are born, die, and return again just to repeat the same song?
Certainly, people—as you stated—are born and die and return again in order to repeat the same song because we are submitted to the Law of Recurrence. In each life, we return in order to repeat everything which we did in the previous life, but we suffer the consequences of the good and bad things we did in the last life; this is a vicious circle, a repetition of dramas, scenes, loves, encounters with the same people, etc.
26. What should we do in order to cease so many repetitions?
Only by means of sanctification is it possible for us to get rid of the Law of Recurrence.
27. Who send us to take a physical body again?
The Angels of Destiny send us to this world; they have written down in their books our good and bad actions.
28. If after the death of the physical body, the soul goes to heaven—as it is stated by many religions—why does it not stay there?
Heaven is a reward and a recompense for our good actions. However, when the recompense is exhausted, it is then clear that we must return to this world.
29. Is it true that hell exists?
That hell with flames—that pit with ignited coals and devils with forks—is a symbol that corresponds to a tremendous reality; in other worlds, the infernal worlds, the inferior worlds, are regions of bitterness within the interior of the planet Earth; the lost souls live in those infradimensional abysses.
30. If some souls go to hell, what can we do in order to avoid falling into those flames?
To teach the Gnostic doctrine to all souls is our duty, since it would be unjust—as we already stated in a previous answer—to not preach these teachings in all the regions of the world.
31. Is it true that the souls fall into that pit full of flames and yet are not burned?
Within the interior of the Earth exists the fire and the water; the failed souls become identified with these elements of nature and suffer. However, the fire cannot burn them nor the water drown them, because the souls are incorporeal, subtle. When seeing this subject-matter about the flames from another angle, I want tell you that such flames symbolize our animal passions.
32. Who saw those flames and became aware that the souls were there?
Any intelligent person knows that liquid fire exists within the interior of the Earth, since volcanoes show it; so, it is not necessary to be wise in order to see the flames; anyone can see those flames within volcanoes’ craters, mixed with lava and flammable gases.
33. What is the Purgatorial region?
Religions address us about Purgatory, about the Purgatorial region; in fact, there exist inferior and submerged molecular zones located beyond the fourth dimension. In such zones, many souls that aspire to the Light are purified by eliminating their sins.
34. Is it true that by believing in God one can escape hell?
Many people believe in God and, nevertheless, they do not escape hell; if you want to escape from falling into the region of the darkness, then you need to sanctify yourself.
35. Is it true that by learning by memory the chapters of the Bible one can be free of hell?
Many people who know the Bible by memory—with periods and commas—abide in hell.
36. Could somebody be saved just by believing what is written in the Bible?
Faith without works is dead faith; we need living faith, and this is based on good works. It is urgent to live in accordance with the teachings of our Lord Jesus Christ.
37. Is returning an obligation?
As long as we do not attain perfection, the Angels of Destiny will send us to this world.
38. Is returning favorable in order to pay for our bad deeds?
All the sufferings that we have in this world are due to the bad actions from our previous lives.
39. Do we always return in the same family?
The “I” continues in its own seed; this means that we continue in our descendants. In other words, we return to the same family.
40. What is the difference between return and reincarnation?
The egos “return incessantly” in order to repeat dramas, scenes, events, here and now. The ego returns in order to pay Karma and to satisfy its desires.
Read also: Life After Death True Stories
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