|
|
Remembering your Past Is The Key To The Future
For those who believe in past lives reincarnation, they believe that the soul goes through reincarnation and other births life after life. Among those who believe in this are those who practice the Hindu religion. The Hindu religion states that reincarnation happens because of the soul or athma, and because of karma, or the deeds one does during one's life. Hindu scriptures state that the soul doesn't die, and only can change from one form to the next; this is similar, for example, to the way one might simply shed old clothes for new.
This is very different than the Christian philosophy of reincarnation as it centers around Christ's resurrection. Hindus say that the soul can take any form, whether man, woman, or even animal. A human's deeds or karma in the present life determines what kind of life will happen next.
There are several Hindu scriptures that talk about past life reincarnations. Most notably is the Bhrigu Sanhita, a scripture that supposedly held an accounting of all future and past births for current souls living. Unfortunately, this scripture no longer exists, and has been lost to time.
In regard to modern-day reincarnation theory, Dr. Ian Stevenson has collected some compelling data. Even though modern science scoffs at the idea of past lives reincarnation, Dr. Stevenson believed in it. Therefore, although it can't be said that his data is the most respected scientific data on the theory, it's very famous and his cases are very well documented because Dr. Stevenson held a degree in medicine and was a psychiatrist.
Dr. Stevenson didn't put patients under trances or into hypnotic states, however, as many modern day past life regression therapists do. Instead, he simply interviewed children who spontaneously recalled things they had experienced in past lives.
Among the most well-known and puzzling cases was that of a child, a young boy, six years old, from a tiny village in Punjab. This child claimed that he had been Satnam Singh, a man from a village that the boy named as Chakkchela; the boy claimed to have lived there as Satnam Singh, even though he actually had not been there himself. Additionally, the boy could describe Chakkchela in minute detail.
The family tried to dissuade the boy from telling people about this, but he continued to claim that he was Satnam; he also gave the name of this man's father. He also said that he had been killed in his past life as he was coming home from school in a motorcycle accident. The boy's claims were investigated and were indeed found to be true, insofar that a man by that name had indeed been killed in a motorcycle accident on the way home from school. The boy was also able to give intimate family details, and these, too, proved to be accurate. What was most notable, though, was that when the man's and the boy's handwriting samples were compared, they were found to be identical.
Stevenson also interviewed a young girl named Swarnalata, another of his famous cases. This young girl was just three years old, but she remembered her past life as a young woman named Biya Pathak. The little girl could describe the house that she lived in, and even took her father there one day when they were coming back from the railway station in their town. She further said that she and her father could get a better cup of tea in Biya Pathak's house than they could on the road. Again, the final proof turned out to be when the child recognized the young woman's brother, and addressed him by a pet name the young woman had had for him, among a group of nine people.
Stevenson's files listed dozens of these types of cases. Further, Stevenson states that when injury happens in one life, it can manifest in the next as a birthmark in the same location as the injury. This was indeed borne out in one of his cases on a man from Thailand, who recalled that he was in fact his own deceased maternal uncle, reincarnated. This man had a scar on his head that matched the location where his maternal uncle had been wounded with a knife and had died as a result.
Another well-known case of Stevenson's was that of a boy who claimed to be a man called MahaRam in a past life. This man had been killed by close gunshots to the chest, and the boy carried similar scar-like birthmarks on his chest that looked like gunshot wounds.
Many psychiatrists and other eminent authorities in psychology and psychiatry believe in rebirth as a legitimate concept, including Dr. Brian Weiss, who is considered to be the father of past life regression. However, science continues to be very skeptical about it. Nonetheless, it's also worth noting that when many people undergo a few sessions of past life regression therapy, they experience the sudden disappearance of phobias and fears they've had their entire lives.
Are My Problems Really Caused By My Previous Life?
|
