Reincarnation has not been entirely neglected in the philosophy of religion but it has not always been taken seriously or carefully discussed in relation to its role in believers’ lives. John Hick is exceptional insofar as he gave sustained attention to the belief, at least as it features in the philosophies of Vedānta and Buddhism. While acknowledging the value of Hick’s recognition of the variety of reincarnation beliefs, this article critically engages with certain aspects of his approach. It (...) argues that Hick’s search for a ‘criterion’ of reincarnation is misguided, and that his distinction between ‘factual’ and ‘mythic’ forms of the doctrine is over-simplifying. (shrink)

This article discusses critically the problems and significance of the concepts of reincarnation and the resurrection. It focuses on the contemporary debate on this topic between Robert Almeder and Stephen Hales. The Akan understanding of these concepts is invoked showing the contrast and,even comparison between the African and the Western understanding of the concepts. It is suggested in this article that the arguments for these concepts could still be ameliorated. This point is taken up by Ramose’s focus on the (...) issues that arise from the critical discussion. Ramose points out that the concept of immortality requires a special place in the discussion since it is the axis around which both reincarnation and resurrection revolve. He complements the discussion accordingly. He further argues that the topic is as relevant today as it was since the dawn of humankind. Any attempt to exclude or discard the topic from philosophy is both questionable and an arbitrary limitation of the scope and meaning of philosophy.2 Keywords: ‘God’, ‘the soul’, immortality, reincarnation, resurrection, the body. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Reincarnation/Rebirth Karma Causality Problem of Evil Determinism, Freedom, and Moral Responsibility Karma and Release Transfer of Merit Recent Developments Works cited.

This classic anthology offers ancient and modern perspectives on Job's question: 'If a man die, shall he live again?' Spanning over 5,000 years of world thought, the selections invite consideration of an idea that has found hospitality in the greatest minds of history.

In this paper, we defend universalism, which we understand to be the thesis that all individuals will eventually attain communion with God, in a Vedāntic context. We first outline the specific ontological commitments that our view requires, such as the doctrines of karman and reincarnation, and we note one Vedāntic tradition that holds to all these commitments. We then outline the conceptual merits of our view. We also argue that certain objections to universalism do not undermine our view, as (...) reincarnation and karman provide a means for all individuals to eventually freely choose to devote themselves to God, making it extremely likely that all individuals will attain salvation. (shrink)

In the first part of the paper, I argue that Christians should incorporate the theory of reincarnation into their belief system. The problem of the apparent disproportion between finite human sin and infinite punishment in Hell becomes far more tractable against the background of reincarnation. In the second part of the paper, I address and answer three objections that may be raised against a Christian theory of reincarnation. The first objection is based on the role of memory (...) in identity, the second points to the essential unity of body and soul, and the third revolves around the suggestion that living multiple lives may more easily lead to damnation than to salvation. (shrink)

The doctrine of reincarnation is usually associated with Buddhism, Hinduism and other Eastern religions. But it has also been developed in Druzism and Judaism. The doctrine has been used by these traditions to explain the existence of evil within a moral order. Traversing the boundaries between East and West, we explore how Jewish mysticism has employed the doctrine to help answer the problem of evil. We explore the doctrine particularly as we respond to objections against employing it in a (...) theodicy. We show how it supplements traditional punishment, free will and soul-building theodicies, and helps these theodicies avoid various objections. (shrink)

It has been observed, by D. Z. Phillips among others, that philosophy suffers from a “lack of imagination”. That is, philosophers often fail to see possibilities of sense in forms of life and discourse due to narrow habits of thinking. This is especially problematic in the philosophy of religion, not least when cross-cultural modes of inquiry are called for. This article examines the problem in relation to the philosophical investigation of reincarnation beliefs in particular. As a remedial strategy, I (...) argue for increased attention both to ethnographic sources and to the articulation of distinctively religious moral visions that reincarnation-talk facilitates. (shrink)

Contextualising the seemingly esoteric and exotic aspects of Tibetan Buddhist culture within the everyday, embodied and sensual sphere of religious praxis, this book centres on the social and religious lives of deceased Tibetan Buddhist lamas. It explores how posterior forms - corpses, relics, reincarnations and hagiographical representations - extend a lama's trajectory of lives and manipulate biological imperatives of birth, aging and death. The book looks closely at previously unexamined figures whose history is relevant to a better understanding of how (...) Tibetan culture navigates its own understanding of reincarnation, the veneration of relics, and different social roles of different types of practitioners. It analyses both the minutiae of everyday interrelations between lamas and their devotees, specifically noted in ritual performances and the enactment of lived tradition, as well as the sacred hagiographical conventions that underpin local knowledge. A phenomenology of Tibetan Buddhist life, the book provides an ethnography and insight of the embodiment of Tibetan Buddhism in everyday life. This unusual approach offers a valuable and a genuine new perspective on Tibetan Buddhist culture, and is of interest to researchers in the fields of social/cultural anthropology, religious, Buddhist and Tibetan studies. (shrink)

The present study focuses on research about reincarnation in order to formulate some preliminary conclusions concerning various philosophical theories. The overview extends over a considerable period range, from ancient Greek and up to the patristic tradition. The relevant issues include the problem of evil, the question of human decomposition and death as well as reincarnation in the Platonic thought. The problem of evil is a problem of reason that emerges from the philosophical background of ancient Greek thought but (...) also from the subsequent Christian patristic thought and transforms itself into diverse concepts. According to the original thought of Socrates, evil is associated with ignorance and good with knowledge. This point of view is given a brief review in the philosophical thought of several important representatives of the patristic tradition. On the other hand, the idea of immortality of the soul, which dates to the religious movement of the Orphic mysteries means that the persistence of the immortal soul at the moment of death needs the use of a new body. This essay will try to analyze the ancient character of the myth of reincarnation through the perspectives of philosophy and religion. (shrink)

Briefly summarized here are some reasons why the DNA/genetic model of life appears to be inadequate (for more details see previous OJPP paper). Given its foundational role with regards to our understanding of life and its challenges, this is significant. The traditional dualistic reincarnation model is introduced. That model is then considered, along with the DNA model, as potential explanations for our natural religious instincts. Next, the two models are considered as possible bases for the phenomenon of kin orientation (...) or bias. Together the case is made that a soul-based reincarnation model offers some explanatory advantages therein over the genetic-based (material-only) model. Finally, and of potential practical and philosophical significance, the corresponding imports for life and meaning are considered. (shrink)

Reincarnation and Biology:. Contribution to the Etiology of Birthmarks and Birth Defects. Ian Stevenson. Westport, CT, and London: Praeger, 1997. volumes. 1192 pp. $195.00 (cloth).

This article concerns the place of Plato’s eschatology in his philosophy. I argue that the theory of reincarnation appeals to Plato due to its power to explain how non-human animals came to be. Further, the outlines of this theory are entailed by other commitments, such as that embodiment disrupts psychic functioning, that virtue is always rewarded and vice punished, and that the soul is immortal. I conclude by arguing that Plato develops a view of reincarnation as the chief (...) tool that the gods have to ensure that virtue is victorious over vice throughout the whole cosmos. (shrink)

There are five main claims that may be made about life after death: We are reincarnated in the self-same body we had in life. We are reincarnated in another body. We are revived, or continue to live in a disembodied form.

This paper is a rejoinder to Robert Almeder's "On Reincarnation: A Reply to Hales". I argue that even if we stipulate the case studies of the reincarnationists to be good data, the explanatory hypothesis of reincarnation is a deus ex machina. Without a comprehensive scientific or philosophical theory of the mind that embeds the reincarnation hypothesis, the view should not be taken seriously. The fact that reincarnation is the first explanation of the case studies that comes (...) to mind says more about us and our culture than it does about which explanations are the most probable ones. (shrink)

The Russian philosopher Nikolai Onufrievich Lossky considered himself a Leibnizian of sorts. He accepted parts of Leibniz’s doctrine of monads, although he preferred to call them ‘substantival agents’ and rejected the thesis that they have neither doors nor windows. In Lossky’s own doctrine, monads have existed since the beginning of time, they are immortal, and can evolve or devolve depending on the goodness or badness of their behavior. Such evolution requires the possibility for monads to reincarnate into the bodies of (...) creatures of a higher level on the scala perfectionis. According to this theory, a monad can evolve by being progressively reincarnated multiple times through a sort of process of metamorphosis from the level of the most elementary particles all the way up to the level of human beings or even higher. Lossky argues that the works of Leibniz contain scattered elements of such a systematic doctrine of reincarnation. He attempts to reconstitute this doctrine in an article that appeared both in Russian and German in 1931. The Russian version, ‘Ученiе Лейбница о перевоплощенiи какъ метаморфозѣ’, was published in the Сборникъ Русскаго института въ Прагѣ, vol. 2, 1931, pp. 77–88. The German version appeared under the title ‘Leibniz’ Lehre von der Reinkarnation als Metamorphose,’ in Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie, vol. 40, n. 2, 1931, pp. 214–226. The content of the Russian and German versions is roughly the same, except for the omission, in the German version, of a mention of David Hume in the second sentence and of one paragraph and a half at the end of the article. The following is a translation of this article. I translated the text from the Russian version, which was in all appearances written first, but I also took the German version into account. The original pagination is added in angle brackets. Angle brackets are used wherever the additions are mine. — Frédéric Tremblay. (shrink)

The present study starts from the discovery that reincarnationist ideas have spread massively throughout European and Western thought in general, in a framework where the belief in one life was defining. However, the quandary between the two afterlife interpretations in contemporary Western culture is distinct from similar conflicts in other times or places because post-Christian critique of the Christian tradition shapes how reincarnation theory is understood in the West today. Therefore, the present study shifts the debate from the realm (...) of scientific and philosophical arguments to that of human needs and their cultural overtones. Contemporary reincarnationist theories circulating in the West are re-read through the grid of cultural criticism aimed at the shortcomings of one’s own tradition. As a next step, it is shown that only one of the forms that have developed within the Western tradition is the target of this criticism. The plurality of Christian eschatologies is yet unknown to most contemporary Westerners. This article is a plea for knowledge and contextualisation, which are prerequisites for navigating the ideational universe. Contribution: This article addresses the dilemma between reincarnation and one-life theories as perceived by the contemporary Western mind and deciphers it in the light of human needs and contextual cultural criticism, while also pointing to the internal plurality of the Christian tradition that remains largely unknown to those involved in the debate. (shrink)

This article argues that Laszlo's concept of the Akashic Field (A-field) does not render the concept of reincarnation either redundant or unnecessary, that reincarnation is a fact of nature, something the universe is doing at this stage of its evolution. Not only is Laszlo's theory compatible with the concept of rebirth, it actually strengthens that theory by clarifying some of the processes involved. This article presents a rationale for the belief that through reincarnation the universe is giving (...) birth to a transpersonal individuality that does endure outside space-time and is not dissolved back into the quantum vacuum. (shrink)

We argue that Indian speakers’ discourse about reincarnation represents a counterexample to the ordinary-language evidence for the Kripkean thesis of material-origin essentialism. Advocates of the essentiality of origins contend not only that persons have the property of coming from the two particular gametes they actually came from essentially, but also that competent ordinary-language speakers find this view intuitively compelling. We adduce evidence from Indian speakers’ discourse, both ordinary-language remarks and published literature about reincarnation, to disconfirm that contention. We (...) argue that the view that persons are mental entities is clearly coherent, intuitive, and not obviously necessarily false. We consider mental essentialism as an alternative, according to which persons are only accidentally embodied or biological. But we argue against it in favour of a modally relative anti-essentialism: what properties count as essential to an object and what properties count as accidental is not fixed but varies according to pragmatic utility. (shrink)

In Religious Studies xxvi Harold W. Noonan and Charles B. Daniels severally take issue with my ‘Reincarnation and Relativized Identity’. Both make valuable points but both, I think, have somewhat missed the point of my original article. In that paper I singled out five different views on the possibility of life after death: that we are reincarnated in the self-same body we had in our pre-mortem state; that we are reincarnated in another — in a different — body; that (...) we continue to exist in a disembodied form, which may or may not culminate in re-embodiment; that pre-mortem life is a dream from which postmortem life is the awakening; that none of the above holds: there is no life after death. (shrink)

A few years ago, a Yemenite patient came to Maimonides Hospital in Brooklyn. The friendly, diminutive gentleman apologized for visiting the clinic in the first place because, as he explained, he was a devotee of Maimonides and invariably used the medical treatments recommended by him rather than current Western medicine. But for this patient’s problem, Maimonides had prescribed garlic. The patient told his doctor that if he ingested garlic, his wife would refuse contact with him. So, having no alternative, he (...) came to our clinic for consultation and to see if there were any other appropriate treatments.Moses Maimonides was one the most important Jewish scholars of all times. A popular folk saying.. (shrink)

This essay analyzes the central role played by the concept of love in Feuerbach’s early pantheistic idealism as articulated principally in his first book, Thoughts on Death and Immortality. After contextualizing this work in relation to the pantheism controversy inaugurated by the publication in 1785 of Jacobi’s famous letters to Moses Mendelssohn On the Doctrine of Spinoza, the author goes on to argue 1) that the position developed by Feuerbach here is far more coherent than has been recognized by previous (...) commentators; 2) that the historical importance of this work consists in the effort undertaken in it to produce a philosophical account of the divinity as One and All, and thereby to provide an avenue for the religious aspirations of those members of Feuerbach’s generation who found themselves unable to “stomach” more orthodox conceptions of the divinity like the ones that Lessing was scandalously reported by Jacobi in his Spinoza-letters to have rejected in favor of pantheism; and 3) that appreciation of these circumstances is crucial for understanding Feuerbach’s role in the history of modern European thought, as well as a number of otherwise baffling claims he makes about the human species-essence in the opening chapters of The Essence of Christianity. (shrink)

The doctrine of reincarnation is endorsed by various philosophers in both the Western and Eastern traditions. This paper will explore the relationship between reincarnation and legal punishment. Three competing views of reincarnation will be analyzed on this issue: Plato's work on Socrates, the Bhagavad Gita, and Mahayana Buddhism. Each view presents interesting, but different perspectives on how our view of the person might affect how we punish. The paper will claim that there are practical implications on the (...) administration of justice linked witli each view of reincarnation. Rather than an area we should neglect, perhaps we miglit improve our understanding of punishment in our societj' when we better account for the beliefs held by members of the society. Key words: Buddhism, death, Hinduism, Mahayana, Plato, punishment, reincarnation, Socrates Then the Lord said, 'Now that the man has become as we are, knowing good from bad, what i f he eats the fruit of the Tree of Life and lives forever?' Genesis 4:22. (shrink)

In ‘Reincarnation and Relativized Identity’ 1 J. J. MacIntosh argues that reincarnation is impossible. I wish to make a slightly backhanded defence of reincarnation by showing that MacIntosh's argument does not succeed. I do not follow his recipe for defence of reincarnation exactly.

This essay is a detailed, critical overview of the evidence and arguments for and against belief in reincarnation.

Reincarnation has received substantial treatment in African philosophy. The dominant view of African scholars and researchers on the subject is that it is a belief that prevails in African culture. The task of this paper is to revisit Innocent Onyewuenyi’s “philosophical reappraisal” of this African belief. Onyewuenyi’s position is that the African communion with ancestors and their influence on their living descendant’s has been incorrectly labeled “reincarnation” by Western anthropologists. But whereas Onyewuenyi portrays the problem as being one (...) of semantics, I shall in this paper argue that the challenge of explaining African cultural phenomenon is one of hermeneutics. The question is a question of hermeneutics, because its focus is not on whether ancestors are metaphysical entities, but rather on what they mean within African existence. The paper adopts the conversational method of African philosophy endorsed by the Conversational School of Philosophy. It aims to show how conversationalism as a procedure of philosophical discourse plays out within the context of its specific canons. In the final analysis the paper promotes the thesis that there is not a belief in reincarnation in African culture strictly speaking, but a belief in the regeneration of life. For the African, life is not cyclical, it is rather eternal. Keywords: Innocent Onyewuenyi, reincarnation, conversationalism, hermeneutics, African metaphysics, living-dead, regeneration of life. (shrink)

James Matlock’s book, Signs of Reincarnation, is a recent addition to a seemingly endless stream of confused or superficial works on the topic of survival. Admittedly (and as one would expect), the case material is often of genuine interest. But when Matlock tries to make sense of that material, he demonstrates little grasp of the current state of the debate. Even worse, he seems unaware of the intellectually responsible strategies for challenging and criticizing positions opposed to his own. Since (...) Matlock criticizes what he says are my views throughout his book, and because this issue of the JSE features two comprehensive reviews of that book, I’ll focus only on the principal respects in which Matlock misdescribes my position and ignores the extended discussions I’ve provided, not only in Immortal Remains (Braude, 2003), but elsewhere (e.g., Braude, 2005a, 2005b, 2014a, 2014b, 2020), explaining the problems with the tired and flawed lines of reasoning he endorses. (shrink)

James Matlock’s Signs of Reincarnation discusses important issues related to the belief in reincarnation. These include the historical and social prominence of this belief in various cultures around the world, especially its place in spiritual and religious communities. Matlock also explores data seemly suggestive of reincarnation and attempts to develop a theory of reincarnation that can account for the data collected by parapsychological investigators and researchers. In this way, Matlock aims to show that belief in (...) class='Hi'>reincarnation is defensible as a conclusion drawn from what he calls “signs” of reincarnation. Matlock does a good job mapping out the wide range of beliefs about reincarnation across time and culture. His description of various case studies and their salient features is highly informative. And his effort to develop a theory of reincarnation—what he calls a “processual soul theory”—is a laudable attempt at trying to accommodate the various details of interesting case studies and a core idea of reincarnation in the spiritual traditions of the world. Unfortunately, this is where my praise ends. Like many other books on the topic, Matlock’s book suffers from a variety of serious defects. The cavalcade of poor scholarship, conceptual confusion, and impoverished argumentation is particularly egregious given that Signs is allegedly based on the lecture notes for Matlock’s course on reincarnation pitched at the advanced undergraduate or Masters-level graduate seminar. In what follows, I’ll explain why Matlock’s book is paradigmatic of nearly everything that’s wrong with survival research over the past thirty years. (shrink)

This book provides a systematic, inter-disciplinary examination of beliefs in as well as evidence for reincarnation that will appeal to students of anthropology, religious studies, philosophy, and the psychology of consciousness and memory, as well as parapsychology.

Mental health practitioners often come across a number of challenges in their clinical practice. One such challenge that posed a management dilemma presented with the history of reincarnation. This subject has been discussed in non-scientific literature at length but there is an absolute paucity in scientific literature. This paper describes a case where a boy presented with memories of previous life that started haunting him and caused significant anxiety. The subject of reincarnation needs extensive research in order to (...) understand and manage the resultant clinical challenges. (shrink)

A survey of the key arguments that have been developed for and against the rationality of belief in reincarnation shows that often the central dispute is not over what the ‘data’ are but how to assess the ‘data’ from specific metaphysical–hermeneutical horizons. By examining some of these arguments formulated by Hindu thinkers as well as their critiques – from the perspectives of metaphysical naturalism and Christian theology – we argue that one of the reasons why these debates remain intractable (...) is that the ‘theory’ is underdetermined by the ‘data’, so that more than one set of the latter can be regarded as adequate explanations of the former. (shrink)

prefaced throughout by editorial comment--on various facets of the idea of reincarnation. The first part quotes from world religions ; the second part focuses on particular writers--grouped by nationality. Even sceptical and opposing views are charitably, though briefly, cited.--A. B.