past lives/reincarnation question

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Registered: 07-11-2005
past lives/reincarnation question
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Tue, 01-17-2006 - 4:43pm


Why do various religions have such a problem with past lives and reincarnation? They preach about resurrection and the bible says how angels and god come to visit certain writers of the bible. People though say that they're believers but have such a hard time with the idea of a past life or a spiritual visitation from a loved one?

My mother and others in my family think I'm an absolute kook or I've gone to the devil and developed evil tendencies because I talk about a past life or my spirit guide. I just wondered about a church who promotes spirituality and faith cannot accept people who have obviously have had a previous life and they have such strong memories of it.

My spirit guide has made several visitations to me in dreams, and I just can't believe a church would call me evil because of believing in his existance when he's made himself totally known to me. Knowing that he's there has really helped me along in the last few months.

I just wondered why the church is so deadset against it? Especially considering all the stuff that's actually in the bible.

Sarah

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Registered: 03-26-2003
Wed, 01-18-2006 - 6:04pm
Good thread, if I am dammed to hell, maybe I'll decide with the masters not to come back (:- ) I do like Unity, I am at home there. Love, leila
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Registered: 04-22-2003
Wed, 01-18-2006 - 6:42pm

Well, there's another whole Question of the Week!


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Registered: 01-17-2006
Thu, 01-19-2006 - 9:37am

Cool Beans, I love to hear others love to read this sort of stuff as much as me. I use to read novels all the time and once I got hooked on psychology, spirituality, metaphysics, etc., that is all I want to read. Anyway, I have to contact my friend who went to the lecture where we learned about these books and find out the name of the lecturer. I know he has a book out about it and I use to have it. It was several years ago that I attended this lecture, so the brain is fuzzy. The author's name is something like Gred Brandenton???? Have you heard of "A Course In Miracles"? Very, very interesting work, "given" by Jesus. As soon as I get the info, I will post it to you.

Rev.b

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Registered: 03-26-2003
Thu, 01-19-2006 - 10:03am
Thanks!
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Registered: 11-11-1999
Thu, 01-19-2006 - 1:26pm

As someone said, belief in reincarnation makes it harder to exert political control over people. Christianity is also easier to sell if faith is all that's needed during a one-shot liftime, reicarnation implies growth and accepting responsibility for one's actions, something most people don't want any part of.

An early Church Father who believed in and taught reincarnation was a man named Origen, his writings "On First Principles" explained his views.

This is a cut and paste explanation, these are not my words.

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Looking at the sequence of creation from its inception to its conclusion, one could summarize Origen's theological system as follows: Originally all beings existed as pure mind on an ideational or thought level. Humans, angels, and heavenly bodies lacked incarnate existence and had their being only as ideas. This is a very natural view for anyone like Origen who was trained in both Christian and Platonic thought. Since there is no account in the scriptures of what preceded creation, it seemed perfectly natural to Origen to appeal to Plato for his answers.

God, for the Platonist, is pure intelligence and all things were reconciled with God before creation - an assumption which scripture does not appear to contradict. Then as the process of the fall began, individual beings became weary of their union with God and chose to defect or grow cold in their divine ardor. As the mind became cool toward God, it made the first step down in its fall and became soul. The soul, now already once removed from its original state, continued with its defection to the point of taking on a body. This, as we know from Platonism, is indeed a degradation, for the highest type of manifestation is on the mental level and the lowest is on the physical.

Such an account of man's fall does not mean that Origen rejected Genesis. It only means that he was willing to allow for allegorical interpretation; thus Eden is not necessarily spatially located, but is a cosmic and metaphysical event wherein pure disincarnate idea became fettered to physical matter. What was essential for Christianity, as Origen perceived, is that the fall be voluntary and result in a degree of estrangement from God.

Where there is a fall, there must follow the drama of reconciliation. Love is one of God's qualities, as Origen himself acknowledged, and from this it follows that God will take an interest in the redemption of his creatures. For Origen, this means that after the drama of incarnation the soul assumes once again its identity as mind and recovers its ardor for God.

It was to hasten this evolution that in the fullness of time God sent the Christ. The Christ of Origen was the Incarnate Word (he was also the only being that did not grow cold toward God), and he came both as a mediator and as an incarnate image of God's goodness. By allowing the wisdom and light of God to shine in one's life through the inspiration of Christ, the individual soul could swiftly regain its ardor for God, leave behind the burden of the body, and regain complete reconciliation with God. In fact, said Origen, much to the outrage of his critics, the extent and power of God's love is so great that eventually all things will be restored to him, even Satan and his legions.

Since the soul's tenancy of any given body is but one of many episodes in its journey from God and back again, the doctrine of reincarnation is implicit. As for the resurrection of the body, Origen created a tempest of controversy by insisting that the physical body wastes away and returns to dust, while the resurrection takes on a spiritual or transformed body. This is of course handy for the reincarnationist, for it means that the resurrected body either can be the summation and climax of all the physical bodies that came before or indeed may bear no resemblance at all to the many physical bodies.

There will come a time when the great defection from God that initiated physical creation will come to an end. All things, both heavenly bodies and human souls, will be so pure and ardent in their love for God that physical existence will no longer be necessary. The entire cohesion of creation will come apart, for matter will be superfluous. Then, to cite one of Origen's favorite passages, all things will be made subject to God and God will be "all in all." ( 1 Cor. 15:28 ) This restoration of all things proposed by Origen gave offense in later centuries. It seemed quite sensible to Origen that anything that defects from God must eventually be brought back to him. As he triumphantly affirmed at the end of his "On First Principles", men are the "blood brothers" of God himself and cannot stay away forever.

dablacksox


Cynic: a blackguard whose faulty vision sees things as they are, not as they ought to be.---Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary.

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Registered: 03-26-2003
Thu, 01-19-2006 - 5:20pm
Great read!
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Registered: 03-26-2003
Thu, 01-19-2006 - 8:21pm
Who made up the word hell? leila
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Registered: 03-26-2003
Fri, 01-20-2006 - 1:10am
Not Bink obviously, but I believe it dates back to the old Norse mythology, where it was spelled 'Hel' and was cold.
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Registered: 01-17-2006
Fri, 01-20-2006 - 9:50am

WOW! Love what you posted to gingercookie regarding past lives/reincarnation, loved reading it. And funny I was just reading about Plato yesterday. THANK YOU for posting the writings!

Rev.b

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Registered: 11-11-1999
Fri, 01-20-2006 - 12:04pm

If you guys are interested, I wrote a VERY long, esoteric thesis and posted it when this web site was called women.com. It's so complex I don't think anyone has ever read it. I can post it if you like, I called it "On Creation, Jesus and the Nature of the Soul".

Be forwarned though it is very long and complex. It's based on the gnostic gospels, the bible, and the Cayce and Solomon readings.

dablacksox


Cynic: a blackguard whose faulty vision sees things as they are, not as they ought to be.---Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary.