ANSWERS: 11
  • Because Buddhists realize that people are not the only thing in the Universe that harbors life force energy. We are just one of an almost infinite number of manifestations of life. Nothing in the Universe is ever destroyed; everything just changes form. This is true of all things, whether or not you're looking at spirituality or physics. This means that just because we recognize ourselves to be alive and having Spirit, doesn't preclude that there was nothing before us or that nothing will come after us. Reincarnation is like spiritual evolution. We start off unaware of ourselves and our Spirit. We evolve into the beginnings of self-awareness and self-recognition. Then (eventually!) we progress into a full awareness and acceptance of ourselves as pure and whole beings, capable of far more than what we could achieve in the physical form of human beings. This evolution transcends what we currently are as people. Where we begin our Path, and whatever form we have at that time, is not the same as how we complete the trek. Being human is just a step along this Path. This is how "new" people come into being. They have simply evolved into this state. Just as we will someday evolve past this state into something else.
  • It's also helpful to remember that many Buddhists don't believe in reincarnation in a literal sense any more than many Christians believe in the Bible in a literal sense.
  • There is no core Buddhist belief is reincarnation. Some Buddhists, believe this, but then some Central American Catholics aren't opposed to sacrificing a chicken. Reincarnation is a Hindu idea, and since Buddhism arose in a Hindu region, it co-opted and used the language of Hinduism so that people would understand. Buddhism uses many Hindu words like: karma, rebirth, samadi etc... But, the meanings are changed in all of them. As a Buddhist I don't believe in reincarnation, and think that it is anti-antithetical to Buddhist teachings. In fact that Buddha never spoke of this. When translated from Pali, he spoke of "consciousness rebirth," which means the time from one thought or state of mind to another. In every moment you die and are reborn in another state. If you are driving and someone cuts you off, and you loose your mind in anger then you have died and been reborn in hell. If you lust after more and more material things, then you are in the realm of the hungery ghosts. Many Buddhists do believe in reincarnation, especially Tibetans I think, but this has more to do with the Buddha not answering these questions and people wanting answers, than anything else. In fact, since you are not any enduring thing moment to moment, how could there be anything to persist after physical death! The fear of death comes from the dilusion that you exist as some permanent thing now and won't after death. The Buddha said this: "Just as when a person's fear disapears when they think they've steped on a snake to find that it was only a rope, so my fear vanished when I realized my mistake."
  • Oh, and the answer given by teknimage is a common answer given by people with a very superficial reading of the Sutras. Buddhism is steeped in metaphor.
  • Think about how many people have ever died on this planet and not only that, how many sentient beings have the ever been... each one of them can potentially have rebirth/s at some point.
  • Well, Buddhists believe that one can be reincarnated to other forms. For example, one can come back as a dog, or even a bug to take it to the extreme. Also, if you've achieved enlightment ,then you won't be born again. It's almost like a self-organizing principle. Many years ago, a theorist/scientist believed that because of the way the population is growing, there would be no food to feed everyone. However, as long as humans keep inventing, everything will work out. Thus, the answer is that the universe always takes care of itself stangely enough.
  • He's more like the Martin Luther King of Buddhists.
  • One teaching, in regards to the doctrine of reincarnation, is that the spirit leaves the body in search of a mate. When they find a species that they are sexually attracted to, not being able to have physical contact with the corporeal, one becomes frustrated and takes the form of that species. Thus you may become a grasshopper, a tick, a flea, a rhino, or whatever. Sounds a bit fantastic, in my view, but I thought it an interesting teaching, nonetheless. The only place that I have, personally, incountered it was within the doctrines of Tibetan Buddhists. It is a belief held by the Dalai Lamma.
  • You all need to read the book called Good Questions, Good Answers. Don't worry. It's not a book with a dictionary-like mass. It's a thin pocket size containing Christian journalists interviewing an Australian Buddhist monk (who was originally a Christian). After you read that, you'll be going..."ahhhhh!"
  • Reincarnation is a Hindu teaching, not a Buddhist one. Buddhists talk about rebirth, which is not the same thing.
  • Most Buddhists do not believe in reincarnation in a literal sense. "Rebirth" means something very different to most. Actually, the Buddhist sense of 'rebirth' is not so different from that in Christian doctrine. It is the realization that you are now a new person. You have all your old memories and experiences, but you view life from a different perspective, now.

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