Reincarnation, literally "to be made flesh again", is a doctrine or metaphysical belief that some essential part of a living being (in some variations only human beings) survives death to be reborn in a new body. This essential part is often referred to as the spirit or soul, the "higher" or "true" self, "divine spark", or "I". According to such beliefs, a new personality is developed during each life in the physical world, but some part of the self remains constant throughout the successive lives. Belief in reincarnation is an ancient phenomenon. This doctrine is a central tenet within the majority of Indian religious traditions, such as Hinduism (including Yoga, Vaishnavism, and Shaivism), Jainism, and Sikhism. The idea was also entertained by some ancient Greek philosophers. Many modern Pagans also believe in reincarnation as do some New Age movements, along with followers of Spiritism, practitioners of certain African traditions, and students of esoteric philosophies such as Kabbalah, Sufism and Gnostic and Esoteric Christianity. The Buddhist concept of Rebirth although often referred to as reincarnation differs significantly from the Hindu-based traditions and New Age movements in that there is no "self" (or eternal soul) to reincarnate. During recent decades, a significant minority of people in the West have developed a belief in reincarnation. Feature films, such as Kundun and Birth, contemporary books by authors such as Carol Bowman and Vicki Mackenzie, as well as popular songs, regularly mention reincarnation. Some researchers, such as Professor Ian Stevenson, have explored the issue of reincarnation and published suggestive evidence. Some skeptics are critical of this work and others say that more reincarnation research is needed. (more)
Genres: religious
-
Reincarnation research:
Reincarnation research is a field of inquiry that records and analyzes the discourse of people who claim to have had past lives. The field is roughly divided into two components: researchers and therapists. University of Virginia researchers Professo
-
Children's Past Lives:
Children's Past Lives: How Past Life Memories Affect Your Child is a 1997 book by Carol Bowman. It is the first non-academic book to explore the putative phenomenon of children’s spontaneous past life memories. Who is Carol Bowman? In the book, Bowma
-
Vicki Mackenzie:
Vicki Mackenzie (born 1947), an author and journalist, was born in England and spent much of her early life in Australia. The daughter of a naval officer, she graduated from Queensland University and became a reporter at the Sun newspaper in Sydney.
-
Buddhism:
Buddhism is a religion and philosophy with between 230 and 500 million adherents worldwide. The vast majority live in Asia. It consists of two major schools: Mahayana and Theravada. The Mahayana school is in turn divided into East Asian (including Pu
-
Hinduism:
Hinduism is a religious tradition that originated in the Indian subcontinent. Hinduism is often referred to as Sanātana Dharma (सनातन धर्म) by its practitioners, a Sanskrit phrase meaning "the eternal law" or "eternal way". Historically, Hinduism in
-
Childbirth:
Childbirth (also called labour, birth, partus or parturition) is the culmination of a human pregnancy or gestation period with the delivery of one or more newborn infants from a woman's uterus. The process of human childbirth is categorized in 3 stag
-
Sufism:
Sufism (تصوّف - taṣawwuf, Russian Суфи́зм, Persian: صوفیگری, sufigari, Turkish: tasavvuf), is the inner or mystical dimension of Islam. A practitioner of this tradition is generally known as a Sūfī (صُوفِيّ), though some senior members of the tradit
-
Death:
Death is the termination of the biological functions that define living organisms. It refers both to a specific event and, particularly in humans, to a condition, the true nature of which has for millennia been a central concern of the world's religi
-
Kabbalah:
Kabbalah (קַבָּלָה), which literally means "receiving", is the mystical aspect of Judaism. It is a set of esoteric teachings meant to define the inner meaning of both the Tanakh (Hebrew Bible) and traditional Rabbinic literature, as well as to explai
-
Theravada:
Theravada (Pāli: theravāda (cf Sanskrit: स्थविरवाद sthaviravāda); literally, "the Teaching of the Elders", or "the Ancient Teaching") is the oldest surviving Buddhist school, and for many centuries has been the predominant religion of Sri Lanka (abou
-
Gnosticism:
Gnosticism (γνώσις gnōsis, knowledge) refers to a diverse, syncretistic religious movement consisting of various belief systems generally united in the teaching that humans are divine souls trapped in a material world created by an imperfect god, the
-
Yoga:
Yoga (Sanskrit: योग, IAST: yóga, joːgə) is an Indian spiritual path aimed at achieving the union with the Supreme Consciousness. Some yogas go beyond it and aim at the spiritual transformation of the entire human nature and obtaining immortality even
-
Life:
Life is a condition that distinguishes organisms from non-living objects, such as non-life, and dead organisms, being manifested by growth through metabolism and reproduction. Some living things can communicate and many can adapt to their environment
-
Mahayana:
Mahayana (mahāyāna: महायान, "Great Vehicle") is a classification of Buddhism used in several different senses. # The most common, found in English dictionaries, is as one of two major branches of Buddhism existing today, the other being Theravada (स्
-
Afterlife:
The terms afterlife, life after death, and hereafter refer to the continued existence of the soul, spirit or mind of a human (or animal) after physical death. The major views on the afterlife derive from religion, esotericism and metaphysics. In man
-
Druze:
The Druze (Arabic: درزي, derzī or durzī, plural دروز, durūz; דרוזים, Druzim; also transliterated Druz or Druse) are a religious community found primarily in Lebanon, Israel and Syria whose traditional religion is said to have begun as an offshoot of
-
Theosophy:
Theosophy is a doctrine of religious philosophy and metaphysics originating with Helena Petrovna Blavatsky. In this context, theosophy holds that all religions are attempts by the "Spiritual Hierarchy" to help humanity in evolving to greater perfecti
-
Vajrayana:
{|style="float:right" Vajrayāna Buddhism is also known as Tantric Buddhism, Tantrayāna, Mantrayana, Mantranaya, Secret Mantra, Esoteric Buddhism and the Diamond Vehicle (Chinese: 金剛乘, jīngāngshèng, Japanese: 金剛乗, kongōjō) although these terms are not
-
Near-death experience:
A near-death experience (NDE) refers to a broad range of personal experiences associated with impending death, encompassing multiple possible sensations ranging from detachment from the body, feelings of levitation, extreme fear, total serenity, secu
-
Catharism:
Catharism was a name given to a radical Christian religious sect with dualistic and gnostic elements that appeared in the Languedoc region of France in the 11th century and flourished in the 12th and 13th centuries. Catharism had its roots in the Pau
-
Karma in Hinduism:
Karma is a concept in Hinduism which explains causality through a system where beneficial effects are derived from past beneficial actions and harmful effects from past harmful actions, creating a system of actions and reactions throughout a person's
-
Hindu philosophy:
In the history of the Indian subcontinent, following the establishment of Vedic culture, the development of philosophical and religious thought over a period of two millennia gave rise to what came to be called the six schools of aastika, or orthodox
-
Anthroposophy:
Anthroposophy is a spiritual philosophy based on the teachings of Rudolf Steiner (25 February 1861 – 30 March 1925) which postulates the existence of an objective, intellectually comprehensible spiritual world accessible to direct experience through
-
Spiritism:
Spiritism is a spiritualist philosophical doctrine, established in France in the mid-nineteenth century. Spiritism, or French spiritualism, is based on books written by French educator Hypolite Léon Denizard Rivail under the pseudonym Allan Kardec re
-
Tulku:
A tulku ( , also tülku, trulku) is a Tibetan Buddhist lama who has through phowa and siddhi consciously determined to be reborn, often many times, in order to continue their Bodhisattva vow. The most famous example is the lineage of Dalai Lamas, who
-
Anatta:
In Buddhist philosophy, anatta (Pāli) or anātman (Sanskrit) refers to the notion of "non-self" or "absence of separate self". One scholar describes it as "meaning non-selfhood, the absence of limiting self-identity in people and things." Its opposite
-
Edgar Cayce:
Edgar Cayce (March 18, 1877 - January 3, 1945) ( ) was an American reputed to have had psychic abilities. He is claimed to have demonstrated an ability to channel answers to questions on subjects such as health or Atlantis, while in a self-induced tr
-
Esoteric Christianity:
Esoteric Christianity is a term which refers to an ensemble of spiritual currents which regard Christianity as a mystery religion, and profess the existence and possession of certain esoteric doctrines or practices, hidden from the public but accessi
-
Subtle body:
According to various esoteric, occult, and mystical teachings, living beings are constituted of a series of psycho-spiritual subtle bodies, each corresponding to a subtle plane of existence, in a heirarchy or great chain of being that culminates in t
-
Metempsychosis:
Metempsychosis is a philosophical term in the Greek language referring to the belief of transmigration of the soul, especially its reincarnation after death. It is a doctrine popular among a number of Eastern religions such as Hinduism, Jainism and D
-
Past life regression:
Past Life Regression (PLR) is typically undertaken for one of two reasons. First, in a therapeutic setting it can be used in an attempt to resolve a whole range of emotional, psychological or psychosomatic problems. Second, it can be used by the curi
-
Richard James Allen:
Richard James Allen (born 1960) is a contemporary Australian poet, dancer and filmmaker. The former Artistic Director of the Poets Union Inc, and founding director of the Australian Poetry Festival, Richard was Co-Artistic Director with Karen Pearlma
-
Life review:
A life review is a phenomenon widely reported as occurring during near-death experiences, in which a person rapidly sees much or the totality of their life history in chronological sequence and in extreme detail. It is often referred to by people hav
-
Xenoglossy:
Xenoglossy (from Greek ξενογλωσσία - xenoglossia, from ξένος - xenos, "foreign" + γλώσσα - glossa, "tongue, language") is the putative paranormal phenomenon in which a person is able to speak a language that he or she could not have acquired by natur
-
Reincarnation and Hinduism:
Reincarnation is a core belief within Hinduism. In most Indian philosophical traditions, including the Hindu, Buddhist, Sikh and Jain systems, an ongoing cycle of birth, death, and rebirth is assumed as a fact of nature. These systems differ widely,
-
Edgar Cayce on Karma:
According to Edgar Cayce, a 20th century American mystic, Karma is the meeting of oneself in the present through thoughts and deeds from the past. Karma is tied to the concept of reincarnation and balance. Karma is neither a debt that must be paid ac
-
Reincarnation in popular western culture:
There is little detailed information on the prevalence of reincarnation beliefs in the contemporary western world. Nevertheless, the idea of reincarnation receives regular mention in feature films, popular books, and popular music. And there have bee
-
Preincarnation:
Preincarnation is the concept found in certain science fiction or fantasy works that a character is reborn backwards through time, being the opposite of reincarnation. Preincarnation features in the unfinished Tolkien story The Lost Road, is found in
-
Arthur Flowerdew:
Arthur Flowerdew was an Englishman who lived in the 20th century and whose unique recollections strongly suggest for some the existence of reincarnation.
-
New Age:
The term New Age (sometimes called the New Age Movement), refers to both a decentralized social phenomenon and a Western socio-religious movement that developed in the 1970-80s. It combines aspects of spirituality, esotericism, complementary and alte
-
Sikhism:
Sikhism ( : or ; ਸਿੱਖੀ, sikkhī, : ), founded on the teachings of Nanak and nine successive gurus in fifteenth century Northern India, is the fifth-largest organised religion in the world. This system of religious philosophy and expression has been tr
-
Esotericism:
Esotericism or, more neatly, Esoterism, the holding of esoteric opinions, derives from the Greek (esôterikos), a compund of (esô): "within", thus "pertaining to the more inward", mystic. Its antonym is exoteric. Esoteric knowledge is that which i
-
Vaishnavism:
Vaishnavism is one of the traditions of Hinduism, and is distinguished from other schools by its primary worship of one supreme God known in different perspectives under names of Narayana, Krishna, Vasudeva or more often Vishnu and their associated a
-
Rebirth (Buddhism):
Rebirth in Buddhism is the doctrine that the consciousness of a person (as conventionally regarded), upon the death or dissolution of the aggregates (skandhas) which make up that person, becomes one of the contributing causes for the arising of a new
-
Indian religions:
Indian religions are religions that originated in the Indian subcontinent. They are Hinduism, Jainism, Buddhism, Sikhism, and tribal religions. They form a subgroup of the larger class of "Eastern religions". Indian religions have similarities in cor
-
Kundun:
Kundun is a 1997 film directed by Martin Scorsese and written by Melissa Mathison. It is based on the life and writings of the Dalai Lama, the exiled political and spiritual leader of Tibet. Both Scorsese and Mathison (along with several other member
-
Ian Stevenson:
Ian Pretyman Stevenson, M.D., (born October 31, 1918, in Montreal, Canada, died February 8, 2007, in Charlottesville, Virginia), was a Canadian-American psychiatrist whose research interests included children who claim to remember previous lives, nea
-
Twenty Cases Suggestive of Reincarnation:
Twenty Cases Suggestive of Reincarnation is a book written by Ian Stevenson on the phenomena of spontaneous recall of information about previous lives by young children. The book contains twenty cases of children who begin to talk about specific memo
-
Samsara:
Samsara or saṃsāra (Sanskrit: संसार; Tibetan: khor wa; Mongolian: orchilong) refers to the cycle of reincarnation or rebirth in Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, Sikhism and other related religions. In modern Sanskrit-derived languages, it is primarily us
-
On a Clear Day You Can See Forever:
On a Clear Day You Can See Forever is a musical with music by Burton Lane and a book and lyrics by Alan Jay Lerner based loosely on Berkeley Square, written in 1929 by John L. Balderston. It concerns a woman who has ESP and has been reincarnated. The
-
Liberal Catholic Church:
The Liberal Catholic Church (LCC) is a form of Christianity open to Theosophical ideas and even reincarnation. It is not connected to the Roman Catholic Church. The title also is applied to various separate and independent denominations throughout th
-
Gilgul:
Gilgul, Gilgul neshamot or Gilgulei Ha Neshamot (Heb. גלגול הנשמות) refers to the concept of reincarnation, emanating from the Kabbalistic framework within Judaism. In Hebrew, the word gilgul means "cycle" and neshamot is the plural for "souls." Soul
-
Shaar HaGilgulim:
Sha'ar ha Gilgulim (Gate of Reincarnations) is a kabbalistic work on reincarnation. Based primarily on the Zohar (section Mishpatim), where gilgulim (reincarnations) are discussed, it also borrows heavily from the teachings of the prominent Kabbalist
-
Hell:
Hell, according to many religious beliefs, is a location in the afterlife, which may or may not be described as a place of suffering. Hell is usually depicted as underground. Within Christianity and Islam, Hell is traditionally depicted as fiery and
-
Karma:
Karma (Sanskrit: कर्म , kárman- "act, action, performance" ; Pali: kamma) is the concept of "action" or "deed" in Indian religions understood as that which causes the entire cycle of cause and effect (i.e., the cycle called saṃsāra) originating in an
-
Dalai Lama:
The Dalai Lama is the spiritual and political leader of the Tibetan people. Often referred to simply as "His Holiness" (HH), or "His Holiness The Dalai Lama", Tibetans usually call the Dalai Lama by the epithets Gyalwa Rinpoche, meaning "Precious Vic
-
Myth of Er:
The Myth of Er is an eschatological legend that concludes Plato's dialogue known as "The Republic" (10.614-10.621). The story begins as a man named Er dies in battle. When the bodies are collected, ten days after his death, Er remains undecomposed. T
-
Helgi Hundingsbane:
Helgi Hundingsbane was a hero in the Norse sagas, who appears in the Volsunga saga and in two lays in the Poetic Edda named Helgakviða Hundingsbana I and Helgakviða Hundingsbana II. The Poetic Edda relates that Helgi and his mistress Sigrún were Helg
-
Defending Your Life:
Defending Your Life is a 1991 romantic comedy/fantasy film about a man who must justify his life-long lack of assertiveness after he dies and arrives in the afterlife. The film was written, directed by, and stars Albert Brooks. It also stars Meryl St
-
Life Before Life:
Life Before Life is a book written by psychiatrist Dr. Jim Tucker, which is a very readable overview of more than 40 years of research at the University of Virginia Division of Personality Studies into past life recall by children. The foreword to th
-
Have You Lived Before This Life:
Have You Lived Before This Life is a Scientology / Dianetics book published by L. Ron Hubbard in 1960. It purports to be a collection of "forty-one actual case histories" of reincarnation and past-life experiences, gleaned from auditing with an e-met
 |
Have you tried vTap yet? See everything, miss nothing!
|
