Sharing reincarnation

Sharing reincarnation

August 2024

Sharing

Unveiling the Mystery  Of Reincarnation

Swami Mukundananda says that the belief in reincarnation motivates us to live a  righteous life in this incarnation as well as changes our perspective on life 

Since our childhood, we have heard many  legendary stories about reincarnation  or rebirth, like that of Mother Parvati  reincarnating as Sati and Jay-Vijay reincarnating  as Ravan and Kumbhkaran. Famous Western  thinkers such as Pythagoras, Plato, and  Socrates accepted reincarnation to be true, and  investigations by the scientific community have  also corroborated the same. Let us delve deeper  into this puzzling mystery of reincarnation. 

Rationale behind previous births 

If a person who is born blind asks, “What did  I do to be suffering like this?” what possible  answer can you give him? Clearly, it cannot be  the result of present-life actions. It cannot also  be the will of God, who is supremely benevolent.  Why would God want anyone to suffer? The  only logical explanation for being born blind  is negative karma created in previous lifetimes.  Without accepting the existence of past lives,  the above question has no plausible answer.  

A Western philosopher had a son who suffered  from progeria, causing premature ageing since  infancy. At age 14, he displayed the symptoms  of an 80-year-old, and then passed away. His  traumatised father could  not find any suitable  answer as to why his son had endured such suffering. After all, the  child had done nothing  evil as an infant to be  given such an affliction. 

Without accepting theidea of rebirth, the world  becomes an irrational place of existence.  Only the concept of  multiple births posits  that suffering could be a  consequence of past life  

why one is born in a rich family while another  is born poor. Someone receives a keen intellect  to excel in life, while another is born dull and is  unable to study. The difference is the result of  karma from past incarnations.  

Mozart, the great musician, wrote a sonata when  he was only four years old. Teresa Milanollo  was a violin-playing child prodigy who made  her stage debut at the age of nine. When we  study the characters and powers of geniuses and  prodigies also, we cannot deny the pre-existence  of the soul. Whatever the soul has mastered in  a previous life or lives manifests in the present.  This happens through the subconscious mind,  which is the storehouse of all the impressions  and experiences gathered over a continuum of  lifetimes. And these impressions remain latent  until favourable conditions rouse them and  bring them out on the conscious plane. 

Remembering past lives 

On accepting the idea of rebirth, the question  arises, Why do we not remember our past  lives? The answer is that death is very painful  for the soul. It erases most memories of the life gone by. Furthermore, birth is an even  more painful experience, which wipes out the  remaining recollections of the previous lives.  Nevertheless, this rule does have exceptions.  

Lugdi Devi was reborn as Shanti Devi in 1926 Shanti Devi is one such famous example. She  died as Lugdi Devi in 1925 in Mathura and was  reborn in Delhi in 1926. When she was four  years old, she had vivid recollections of her  previous life. She kept pressing her parents in  Delhi to let her get back to her previous family  in Mathura. Her claims were found accurate  when her current as well as previous family  members made detailed enquiries. An external  high-profile commission of eminent people  also teamed up to validate the case, and the  truth of reincarnation became self-evident.  

More fruitful than getting awed by people  who remember their previous lives, or trying  various methods to figure out our own past  lives, is to focus upon the significant lessons to  learn from the concept of reincarnation. 

How belief in reincarnation affects our lives What we term ‘death’ is merely the act of  discarding the old dysfunctional body. And  what is called ‘birth’ is the soul receiving  a new body to continue its journey. So, the  soul is eternal and imperishable. Under the  veil of ignorance, it falsely accepts bodily  relatives and gets attached to them in each life.  However, after the body dies, the relationships  are finished. Under these circumstances,  

jubilation and lamentation arise only from  misconceptions. Therefore, the Bhagavad Gita  states, “dehino‘sminyathā dehe kaumāraṁ yauvanaṁ jarā tathā dehāntaraprāptirdhÄ«rastatra na muhyati”  (2.13) 

“Just as the embodied soul continuously passes  from childhood to youth to old age, similarly, at  the time of death, the soul passes into another  body. The wise are not deluded by this.” 

Belief in reincarnation is the most important  belief that dictates our life. It becomes a game  changer with regard to the values we hold and,  consequently, the big and small choices we  make daily. For example, if we do not believe  in an afterlife, then we will also not believe  in the deep consequences of our actions in  our present life. We would naturally be self indulgent in eating, drinking, and making  merry. On the other hand, a believer will strive  for pure actions and intentions since they are  aware of the long-term consequences. When we  understand that our soul is eternal, it shifts our  perspective on life. We recognise ourselves as  the builders of our own destiny because, after  all, whatever we do stays with us.  

One can gain timeless Vedic wisdom in the  contemporary context as revealed by Swami  Mukundananda in his latest book, Spiritual  Secrets from Hinduism.

H H Swami Mukundananda —a yogi, a world-renowned spiritual teacher, an authori ty on mind managementt, an IIt and IIM alumnus, and a bhakti saint-is the founder of  JKYog. He is the author of several books: Science of Mind Management | Bhagavad Gita:  The Song of God.