Is reincarnation possible in reality ?

[Tay]

Peace Tanveer,

Just to be clear, I am not convinced of the possibility of reincarnation, nor do I feel it is inconceivable - somewhere in the middle thus far...

You stated

Firstly, if reincarnation is true, the population of Earth should DECREASE and not increase with time !! think about it !!

This would be true only if there were a set number of people born from the beginning. I see no reason to believe this to be the case.

Secondly, If one says that population is increasing because of NEW souls then it is not fair, because the older souls had more chances and more cycles to achieve perfection; what is the fault of the newer souls for having fewer chances or cycles ?

Fewer cycles until what? I presume you're referencing the day of judgement. Perhaps the day of judgement does not occur until all souls have completed their cycle. Just a thought.

Thirdly, if reincarnation is true, then ALL of us should have a perfect memory of our past lives in order to be able to improve and correct our mistakes. How can one improve through blind trial and error, without knowledge of one's previous mistakes ? That makes it completely unfair and illogical.

The concept, as I understand it, is not to improve upon past performance, but to live through all levels of the human experience. It is not until one dies that he/she can evaluate the accumulated experiences thus far, at which point he/she chooses which experience is next. Accordingly, the individual chooses NOT to remember the previous lives so that the next experience will not be tainted.

Quite a neat concept if you ask me. But I again, I've not seen enough evidence for or against. Therefore, I'll keep the possibility open.

Peace,
Tay

[yfn123]

Peace Kyle,

The God has created the illusion that there are seperated "souls" for the sake of experience, which the created beings are His vessel.

Isn't He deceiving us by creating the illusion?

Anwar Azim

[unknownuser]

Thirdly, if reincarnation is true, then ALL of us should have a perfect memory of our past lives in order to be able to improve and correct our mistakes.

We are Souls having a human expience not Humans having a soulful experience. If is the Soul that remembers each human experience and learns from it not Humans who remember each previous human expience.

Humans learn from the earthly experience of the moment where as Souls Learn from all the human experiences..

How can one improve through blind trial and error, without knowledge of one's previous mistakes ?

Humans do learn from previous mistakes within its lifetime where as Souls learn from the mistakes over ALL human experiences

[unknownuser]

Peace all,

Thank you all brothers and sisters for thought provoking discussions, comments, and analysis.

THE LOGICAL PARADOX

The problem is that if reincarnation theory is true, it creates a logical paradox from which there is no way out. Let me elaborate.

There are two possibilities

1. There is a fixed number of souls and no new souls.

In that case the total population of Earth should decrease over time as souls reach nirvana/perfection and graduate out of the reincarnation cycle. However reality is that the total population is increasing with time. That can mean only two things

a. There is no reincarnation
b. There are new souls being manufactured/created.

The latter creates a problem. Souls are form of energy and have always existed, especially if one believes that all souls are part of The God. If there are new souls being created, where are they coming from? New soul means it did not exist before a point in time and space, so where and how did a NEW ENERGY come into existence, and if it did come into existence then it cannot be part of The God. The total sum energy has always beeen the same and does not increase or decrease. The total number of souls therefore is constant and does not increase or decrease, the only logical conclusion being that all souls have always existed and there are NO NEW SOULS, as that would imply creation of NEW ENERGY.

Now suppose for argument sake one assumes that new souls are being created. That brings us to the second possibility

2. New souls are being created, and that accounts for the increase in population.

If that is true that creates another problem. No matter how long or how many cycles it takes for a soul to achieve nirvana, the new soul that was created at a point in time and space AFTER the older soul will have lesser number of cycles or lesser time than the older soul to achieve nirvana. That gives the older soul an UNFAIR advantage over the newer soul of having greater TOTAL time/cycles. Both souls may have an infinite time forwards to achieve nirvana but still the older soul will have MORE TOTAL time/cycles and that is UNFAIR. The God is NOT UNFAIR.

In the Qur'aan, The God talks about everyone being gathered together on the Last Day, and that implies a fixed time in future marking the end point of time available to achieve nirvana. Again, that gives the older soul more time/cycles than the newer soul, which is UNFAIR.

All the following ayat imply a fixed point in time and space in future, marking the end point of available time/cycles to achieve nirvana

310 "Our Lord, You will gather the people for a Day in which there is no doubt; God does not break His appointment."
487 God, there is no god but He. He will gather you for the Day of Resurrection in which there is no doubt. Who is more truthful in saying than God?
4172 The Messiah is not too proud to be a servant to God, nor are the Angels who are close to Him. Whoever is too proud from His service, and is arrogant, then He will gather them all towards Him TOGETHER.
1046 And the Day We gather them, it will be as if they have slept for only an hour of a day.
6410 The Day when He will gather you, the Day of Gathering.

So as you can see, if reincarnation is true it creates a logical paradox and a logical trap/web from which there is no way out.

NO MEMORY OF PAST LIVES

This leads me to the next point, from which Tay invented a novel way to wiggle out, but logically that does not pan out.

The concept, as I understand it, is not to improve upon past performance, but to live through all levels of the human experience. It is not until one dies that he/she can evaluate the accumulated experiences thus far, at which point he/she chooses which experience is next. Accordingly, the individual chooses NOT to remember the previous lives so that the next experience will not be tainted.

Quite a neat concept if you ask me. But I again, I've not seen enough evidence for or against. Therefore, I'll keep the possibility open.

Let us create the scenario. A soul chooses a certain experience for the next cycle and starts the next life, choosing not to remember the previous life. This soul makes mistakes during that particular experience/situation and dies. Then the soul evaluates that experience and the mistakes and chooses the same or similar experience again so it can correct the mistakes in that particular form of experience and starts the next life, again choosing not to remember the previous life. The soul does not remember the previous life, and even though it chose a similar experience to correct its mistakes in the previous life, how can that soul correct its mistakes when it does not remember what mistakes it made previously in the similar experience/situation, while actually living that experience/situation in the new life ? That is completely illogical.

ALWAYS ANOTHER CHANCE ? !!

There is yet another problem reincarnation theory creates, which ends up recreating the problem it purports to resolve. It makes one complacent and lazy, by giving one a false sense of security that one can commit any mistake one wants and one will ALWAYS HAVE ANOTHER CHANCE to attain perfection/nirvana. There is not really any incentive to correct ones mistakes, because of the existence of ANOTHER CHANCE in future. So it is OK to mess up, you will ALWAYS HAVE ANOTHER CHANCE. Remarkable innovation by Satan, to lull us into false sense of security and complacence !!

Brother Saladin,

there is a verse in the koran that says something like "God gives you life ,death and recreates u in forms that u know not ." .
i cant remember the verse num,ber .
can this verse be refering to reincarnation ?

The ayaat are as follows

5664 We have predetermined death for you. Nothing can stop Us,
5665 From transforming your forms, and establishing you in what you do not know.
5666 You have come to know about the first creation. If only you would remember.

All these ayaat imply is that our forms will be transformed after death. This obviously is about resurrection on the Last Day and not reincarnation. The God also talks about the first creation, but that existence was not on Earth. Only one existence on Earth is indicated in Qur'aan.

First existence Jannah
Second existence Earth
Third existence Jannah/Jahannam.

Reincarnation theory on the other hand implies MULTIPLE/INFINITE existences on EARTH.

Sister Sytalls,

To explain the observation of the electron's behavior, a physicist named Feynman suggested the electron followed every possible available path from the source to the screen. The end result is the sum (or 'history') of all those paths. Which is how you get one electron doing something that makes it look as if it two electrons were present.

So...perhaps our souls or selves behave in a way similar to electrons?

Your analogy would be true only if a soul had multiple existences at the SAME TIME or PARALLEL existences. Reincarnation theory on the other hand implies existences of a soul in DIFFERENT TIMES, linearly following each other.

Brother Kyle,

The PARADIGM that has helped me the most is that this world is a MENTAL CREATION of the God. Lets say you thought of 10 characters in your mind, and wrote a life story for all of them in your mind, and envisioned these lives in your mind. Is there a point when your mind cannot stop creating "new characters"? Even if these characters increased in number in our minds, is there some form of unfairness going on?

A NEW SOUL can have a million MENTAL characters, still it has less TOTAL time to achieve nirvana than an OLDER SOUL which makes it UNFAIR.

I think an error in the idea of "increase" or "decrease" of what is being referred to as "souls"(nafs) is that there is really only ONE "soul"(NAFS) which is the God's "Soul".

The God has created the illusion that there are seperated "souls" for the sake of experience, which the created beings are His vessel.

Even if there is an illusion of separated souls, still the total sum number of souls is constant, and there are no NEW souls being created.

The God says that the next life will last as long as the skies and earth endure, what does that mean?

11109 As for those who are fortunate, they will be in Paradise; in it they will abide as long as the heavens and Earth exist, except for what your Lord wishes, a giving without end.

The words "without end" clearly imply eternal, non-ending.

Brother Ichephren,

Actually, the reincarnation theory that I am familar with states that the phenomenon happens unti all souls have reached nirvana. There is no set end point. The end point is when everyone has reached Nirvana, so it is not unfair.

It does not matter if there is no set end point. The future available time could be infinite, but the fact still remains that the older soul has more TOTAL time/cycles than the newer soul, which makes it unfair. The Qur'aan however indicates a fixed end point for all souls (please see discussion above).

But this does pose the question of where new souls come from. Is there a "new soul factory" that we are not aware of?

Agreed, please see my discussion at the beginning of this post.

Best regards,

Tanveer

[unknownuser]

We are Souls having a human expience not Humans having a soulful experience. If is the Soul that remembers each human experience and learns from it not Humans who remember each previous human expience.

Humans learn from the earthly experience of the moment where as Souls Learn from all the human experiences..

Souls and bodies do not have separate existence in the earthly life. At that time of coexistence, the soul does not remember previous mistakes, so your argument is wrong.

[savage_carrot]

Peace tanveermd,

Very interesting and indepth posts... I never got the impression from the reading that reincarnation in this temporal plane is possible, every soul even though they are born in different times/places has an equal opportunity...imo thats enough...

Nadia

[unknownuser]

Souls and bodies do not have separate existence in the earthly life.

The soul lives on, the body doesnt

At that time of coexistence, the soul does not remember previous mistakes

If you can't remember, how do you know this ?. Do you have complete recall of your subconscious mind ?..... The subconscious is where such imformation would be, not the conscious mind...

[unknownuser]

Peace Nadia,

every soul even though they are born in different times/places has an equal opportunity...imo thats enough...

Agreed.

Just to add to that, The God never burdens a soul more than it can bear. Different souls may have different strengths and breaking points. IMO The God knows all the souls, and carefully designs the tests and experiences/situations faced by each soul in such a manner as to give it a FAIR opportunity to prove and distinguish itself, without burdening it more than it can bear.

6154 .......We do not burden a soul except by what it can bear........

Regards,

Tanveer

[unknownuser]

Peace albion,

The soul lives on, the body doesn?t

Obviously you do not read my post carefully. I was talking about coexistence of soul and body in THE EARTHLY LIFE.

If you can't remember, how do you know this ?. Do you have complete recall of your subconscious mind ?..... The subconscious is where such imformation would be, not the conscious mind...

For reincarnation to be true requires perfect memory of past lives, and complete recall of subconscious AND conscious mind IN THE EARTHLY EXISTENCE, so that the soul can learn from it and correct its previous mistakes WHILE IN EARTHLY EXISTENCE, otherwise it is just an exercise in futility, like a blind person trying to find the way.

[savage_carrot]

Peace tanveermd,

Exactly, i would also like to add this verse that may make things clearer

2399
Until when death overtakes one of them, he says Send me back, my Lord, send me back;

23100
Haply I may do good in that which I have left. By no means! it is a (mere) word that he speaks; and before them is a barrier until the day they are raised.

Nadia

[unknownuser]

Peace Nadia,

Thank you for the signs. That demolishes reincarnation completely !!

[unknownuser]

"And you were dead, and He brought you back to life. And He shall
cause you to die, and shall bring you back to life,
and in the end shall gather you unto Himself." 228

[Tay]

Peace Tanveer,

I don't think you've grasped the concept of reincarnation. This, by no means, is derogatory, but simply an observation based on your following comments

Then the soul evaluates that experience and the mistakes and chooses the same or similar experience again so it can correct the mistakes in that particular form of experience and starts the next life

As I stated earlier, it is not about correcting mistakes or improving. It is about living the entire gamut of the human experience, not reliving the same life and trying to be better at it. Living in America in the middle class as a healthy male adult, I have no idea what it is like to be handicapped in a thrid world nation. I have no idea what it is like to grow up in poverty. I have no idea what it is like to grow up wealthy. I have no idea what it is like to be in a war. The list goes on and on. With each life, the soul develops - not improve. That's the key difference. And part of that development is living with the burdens of that particular life and striving to improve within that particular life, against that set of adversities.

So, you see, it's not that I invented a way to wiggle out of your hopeful explanation, just that I'm explaining to you what reincarnation theory is all about. There's plenty of info available all over the web.

It is what it is, and I neither endorse it nor deny it. The truth will come with patience, Inshallah.

Just to quickly address your comment that "the older soul has more time/cycles than the newer soul, which is UNFAIR."

How do you know that the population will not decrease as the day of judgement nears? Would this not explain away the "logical trap"? Perhaps the day of judgement is 10 million years down the road. Perhaps at that time there will only be a few million people left on Earth, finishing up their final cycles, while the rest of us wait in peace. Is this impossible?

Only God knows for sure.

Peace,
Tay

[yfn123]

Peace Kyle,

The PARADIGM that has helped me the most is that this world is a MENTAL CREATION of the God. Lets say you thought of 10 characters in your mind, and wrote a life story for all of them in your mind, and envisioned these lives in your mind. Is there a point when your mind cannot stop creating "new characters"? Even if these characters increased in number in our minds, is there some form of unfairness going on?

But this "PARADIGM" that "this world is a MENTAL CREATION of the God" has a very negative implication that the God is a psychopath, very sick mentally, I should say.

Anwar Azim

[unknownuser]

Peace be upon you all,

2399
Until when death overtakes one of them, he says Send me back, my Lord, send me back;

23100
Haply I may do good in that which I have left. By no means! it is a (mere) word that he speaks; and before them is a barrier until the day they are raised.

The person begging wishes to go back to thier very same life, but its too late, the game is reset at the beginning, when they are "raised". (just another possible look at the verses)

[salikahDC]

But this "PARADIGM" that "this world is a MENTAL CREATION of the God" has a very negative implication that the God is a psychopath, very sick mentally, I should say.

Anwar Azim

Peace Bro,

Why the judgement? The only basis you have for that comment are your perceptions...which, as a human, are limited to say the least.

[khalil]

Peace Tanveemd

Firstly, if reincarnation is true, the population of Earth should DECREASE and not increase with time !! think about it !!

That is logical if you hold that earth is the only plane of experience, those who are on earth now are experiencing life through the 3d.

Those who have progressed/regressed can be said to be on different planes, no?

Secondly, If one says that population is increasing because of NEW souls then it is not fair, because the older souls had more chances and more cycles to achieve perfection; what is the fault of the newer souls for having fewer chances or cycles ?

If you hold that earth is the only layer of experience then that is true , however if there are other planes of experience besides earth then the argument that all souls were created at once is plausible.

Thirdly, if reincarnation is true, then ALL of us should have a perfect memory of our past lives in order to be able to improve and correct our mistakes.

I disagree, I have trouble remebering perfectly an entire day as I'm sure most of us do, that is illogical to say that we must have a perfect memory of an existence before this. How are we benifited to know that we were a king or a peasent? I complete my greatest works of art when I am not weighed down by past expectations.

Also, I don't believe we should call it a past life, as we only have one life; our own. Its just different cloaks.

How can one improve through blind trial and error, without knowledge of one's previous mistakes ? That makes it completely unfair and illogical.

Look at your self right now, you are the sum total of what you were. Everything around you has meaning, it is your choice to read the 'signs.' Our physical is a reflection of our inner, all problems around us have their origins within us.

It is only blind to those who turn from their surroundings. It is only unfair to those who choose to point their finger at anyone but the source, their self.

I agree with this concept, and that demolishes the reincarnation theory also.

That does not demolish the reincarnation theory, it just hampers the notion that you can remeber a past life.

peace.

[unknownuser]

Peace Tay, all,

As I stated earlier, it is not about correcting mistakes or improving. It is about living the entire gamut of the human experience, not reliving the same life and trying to be better at it. Living in America in the middle class as a healthy male adult, I have no idea what it is like to be handicapped in a thrid world nation. I have no idea what it is like to grow up in poverty. I have no idea what it is like to grow up wealthy. I have no idea what it is like to be in a war. The list goes on and on. With each life, the soul develops - not improve. That's the key difference. And part of that development is living with the burdens of that particular life and striving to improve within that particular life, against that set of adversities.

So, you see, it's not that I invented a way to wiggle out of your hopeful explanation, just that I'm explaining to you what reincarnation theory is all about. There's plenty of info available all over the web.

It is what it is, and I neither endorse it nor deny it. The truth will come with patience, Inshallah.

The central theme of reincarnation is resolving KARMIC DEBT accumulated in previous lives, by being punished for evil deeds or bad karma from prior lives, or being rewarded for good deeds or good karma from prior lives. It is not just about living the entire gamut of human experiences. So reincarnation is primarily about learning from your previous deeds and improving by correcting your mistakes in past lives.

How do you know that the population will not decrease as the day of judgement nears? Would this not explain away the "logical trap"? Perhaps the day of judgement is 10 million years down the road. Perhaps at that time there will only be a few million people left on Earth, finishing up their final cycles, while the rest of us wait in peace. Is this impossible?

The fact is that the population is increasing, which implies NEW souls. Where did those new souls come from. The sum total of energy remains constant, and does not increase or decrease. Therefore the sum total number of souls is also constant and cannot increase or decrease. Creation of new souls contradicts that.

The second possibility is that the total number of souls is constant and fixed from the beginning, and some souls are being introduced into the reincarnation cycle at a point later than other souls, then that is UNFAIR. The souls starting their reincarnation journey earlier than other souls have MORE TOTAL TIME/CYCLES for progress or improvement or experience which is an UNFAIR advantage. What is the fault of the souls starting their journey later?

Regards,

Tanveer

[unknownuser]

Peace Khalil,

That is logical if you hold that earth is the only plane of experience, those who are on earth now are experiencing life through the 3d.

Those who have progressed/regressed can be said to be on different planes, no?

If those who have progressed/regressed are on different planes then still the population on this plane of existence should DECREASE, however we find it is increasing.

If you hold that earth is the only layer of experience then that is true , however if there are other planes of experience besides earth then the argument that all souls were created at once is plausible.

The sum total number of souls has to be constant as energy is neither created nor destroyed. The theory of reincarnation is about multiple existences in a linear fashion in the SAME PLANE OF EXISTENCE. Hence as souls achieve perfection or nirvana and get out of the reincarnation cycle, the total population in this plane of existence should DECREASE.

I disagree, I have trouble remebering perfectly an entire day as I'm sure most of us do, that is illogical to say that we must have a perfect memory of an existence before this. How are we benifited to know that we were a king or a peasent? I complete my greatest works of art when I am not weighed down by past expectations.

Ok, the memory does not have to be perfect, but there HAS TO BE THE MEMORY OF THE IMPORTANT EVIL OR GOOD DEEDS CONTRIBUTING TO THE KARMIC DEBT FROM THE PRIOR LIVES FOR ALL SOULS. However that is not the case.

Look at your self right now, you are the sum total of what you were. Everything around you has meaning, it is your choice to read the 'signs.' Our physical is a reflection of our inner, all problems around us have their origins within us.

The signs around me do not and CANNOT tell what evil deed I committed in my past life for which I am suffering. For that, one needs the memory of that evil deed. The signs around me can only tell that some evil deed must have been committed in past, but they do not tell WHAT that evil deed was, including its nature and magnitude. Exact knowledege of the nature and magnitude of the evil deed in previous life is NECESSARY to resolve its karmic debt by countering it with a good deed of the SAME NATURE AND MAGNITUDE.

Also, I don't believe we should call it a past life, as we only have one life; our own. Its just different cloaks.

This comments raises another interesting question in my mind. If the soul is one, and bodies are different in each existence then still it is not fair for a body in this life, which is completely genetically, metabolically, and physiologically different from the body in the previous life, to be responsible for the evil deeds committed by a different body in the previous life. If reincarnation is true, then the body in this life HAS TO BE PERFECTLY IDENTICAL to the body in the previous life, for karmic debt to be fair.

Regards,

Tanveer

[unknownuser]

Peace all,

Following is an interesting article I ran into on the internet, which raises some new points and objections to the theory of reincarnation that have not been brought forth yet on this forum

Reincarnation and cosmic justice
by Ernest Valea

The most important argument for reincarnation is of a moral nature. It says that karma and reincarnation provide the perfect way to realize justice in our world, by rewarding all one?s deeds and thoughts in further lives. They will manifest as good or bad happenings and circumstances, with mathematical exactitude, so that everything one does will be justly punished or rewarded, at both a quantitative and a qualitative level. This would explain all inequalities we see among people, comfort those who cannot understand their present bad situation and also give hope for a further better life. According to karma, there is no forgiveness for the "sins" of the past, but only accumulation of karmic debt, followed by paying the consequences in further lives. Swami Shivananda states

If the virtuous man who has not done any evil act in this birth suffers, this is due to some wrong act that he may have committed in his previous birth. He will have his compensation in his next birth. If the wicked man who daily does many evil actions apparently enjoys in this birth, this is due to some good Karma he must have done in his previous birth. he will have compensation in his next birth. He will suffer in the next birth. The law of compensation is inexorable and relentless.
(Swami Shivananda, Practice of Karma Yoga, Divine Life Society, 1985, p. 102)

As the karmic debt man recorded in his past is considerably large, a single life is not enough to consume it. Therefore, in order to attain liberation, many lives become a necessity. In pantheism, where a personal god as Ultimate Reality is absent, man is alone in his struggle with his past. Even the theistic branches of Eastern religions are incapable of solving man?s loneliness in this struggle, as karma and God?s grace cannot be properly reconciled without totally compromising one of them. Grace, granted by a god or a guru, contradicts the basic role of karma and would render useless its action. As a result, the claims of some gurus to be able to erase the karma of their disciples are absurd. Through asceticism and meditation, man has to work out his salvation alone, or rather to bear alone the dictates of karma.

Although it may seem that the mechanism of karma and reincarnation is the proper way to realize social justice, there are two main objections which contradict it

1. As long as suffering (or the reward for good deeds) can be experienced only at a personal level (physical and psychical), and man ceases to exist as person at physical death, it implies that another person, generated in another physical body, will actually bear the consequences dictated by the karma of the deceased person. The impersonal self (atman or purusha) which reincarnates has nothing to do with suffering; it is a simple observer of the ongoing psycho-mental life. If, at the moment of death, there is no more karmic debt left, the separation of the self from the illusory involvement with the physical and psycho-mental world is permanent, and this represents liberation. If not, the self is forced to enter a new illusory association with personhood until all fruits of past lives are consumed. In order to realize this, a new person is born each time the self enters a new human body. The new person will bear the karma produced by the previous persons inhabited by the same self. This mechanism, of one person accumulating karma and another bearing the consequences, is rather unfair, fundamentally contradicting the idea of realizing perfect justice. This is why natural disasters, plagues and accidents that affect innocent people cannot be explained away as being generated by karma.

For this reason, the saying "a man reaps what he sows" cannot be used as a way of expressing one?s reincarnationist ideas. (Actually this saying is taken from the New Testament, Galatians 6,7, but there it has a different meaning.) According to the reincarnation mechanism one person sows and another one reaps, since no personal characteristics can be preserved from one incarnation of the impersonal self to the next. In Buddhism, where the very idea of a self who transmigrates is rejected, the idea of sowing and reaping is even more absurd. See for instance the following text

If it be that good men and good women, who receive and retain this discourse, are downtrodden, their evil destiny is the inevitable retributive result of sins committed in their past mortal lives. By virtue of their present misfortunes the reacting effects of their past will be thereby worked out, and they will be in a position to attain the Consummation of Incomparable Enlightenment (Diamond Sutra 16).

Who will actually work out the effects of his past? A new distribution of the five aggregates? Or who will actually attain enlightenment? A certain configuration of those impersonal five aggregates? How could this process render perfect justice? Perfect justice for whom? For an illusory personhood that disappears at physical death?

2. A second objection concerns the actual possibility of attaining liberation from karma and reincarnation. Normally it is supposed that the person who is living out the consequences of his karma should do it in a spirit of resignation and submission. But this ideal is far from reality. Instead of adopting a passive attitude concerning the hardships that have to be endured, man almost always reacts with indignation, and so accumulates a constantly growing karmic debt. Common human experience proves that evil almost always generates evil and therefore a balance between good and evil cannot be reached. As a result, a vicious cycle is generated in which karmic debt is constantly growing. This happens with most people of our planet, as it is said that most of us live in ignorance (avidya). From one generation to the next, the sum of karmic debt is always growing and this situation can never be solved. What kind of a justice is that which starts more problems than it solves?

If it is most likely that one will always accumulate new karma instead of getting rid of it, probably the best solution to attain liberation from reincarnation would be the Jain fasting to death, as stated by Mahavira

If this thought occurs to a monk, "I am sick and not able, at this time, to regularly mortify the flesh," that monk should regularly reduce his food; regularly reducing his food and diminishing his sins, he should take proper care of his body, being immovable like a beam; exerting himself he dissolves his body....

This is the truth speaking truth, free from passion, crossing the samsara, abating irresoluteness, knowing all truth and not being known, leaving this frail body. Overcoming all sorts of pains and troubles through trust in this, he accomplishes this fearful religious death. Even thus he will in due time put an end to existence. This has been adopted by many who were free from delusion; it is good, wholesome, proper, beatifying, meritorious. Thus I say.
(Acaranga Sutra 1,7,6)

This should be the logical solution for anyone trying to escape his karma. However, this radical solution is far from being accepted by most adherents of reincarnation. But even if they would literally fast to death, it still could not guarantee the decrease of mankind?s karmic debt, as one accumulates more karma till the moment he adopts this kind of "holy" mortification than he could annihilate by using it.

Let?s take an example and see how the two objections actually work in the case of a real person. If we take the case of Adolf Hitler, the results are astounding. (For a detailed study of this case and other important aspects of reincarnation see Mark Albrecht?s book Reincarnation - InterVarsity Press, 1982.) There is no doubt that all adherents of reincarnation agree that many lives are needed for consuming his karmic debt. Hitler died in 1945 and had to reincarnate as a child in order to bear the harsh consequences of his monstrous deeds. The two objections can be stated as following

1. The person of Hitler ceased to exist at the moment of his physical death. Only the impersonal self will reincarnate, accompanied by its karmic deposit. However, there is no continuity between the person of Hitler and that of the individual who has to endure the hardships imposed by Hitler?s karma. The newborn person doesn?t know that he has to work out Hitler?s karma. After the cruel life and death of this person, other millions of reincarnations will succeed with the same tragic destiny. The most disgusting fact is that the person of Hitler, the only one who should have endured at physical and psychical level the results of his foolish deeds, was dissolved at his physical death, while other persons, totally unaware of this situation and innocent, have to work out his bad karma.

2. As a result of the hardships that have to be endured by the new incarnations of Hitler, it is almost certain that they will react with indignation instead of resignation to their situation, and thus will accumulate a growing karmic debt. Each new reincarnation of Hitler becomes a source of newly acquired karma, initiating a new chain of individuals who have to pay the consequences. The same happened in the case of Hitler himself. Whoever he was in a previous life, he made his karma a lot worse during the years of The Third Reich. Therefore, instead of solving the puzzle of global justice, the problem worsened. Starting with a single individual such as Hitler, we reach a huge number of persons who pay his karma and accumulate a new one. This is just one case of human history. Any attempt to imagine what happens at a larger human scale would reveal a catastrophe impossible to ever be solved.

As a result, karma and reincarnation cannot provide any kind of justice. Reincarnation cannot solve the problem of evil but only amplify it, leaving the original evil unpunished. If reincarnation were true, Hitler will never be punished for his deeds because he ceased to exist, right before any human person or circumstance of life could truly punish him.

Even if disagreement persists in accepting the growth of evil as an effect of karma and reincarnation, at least its conservation should be admitted in human history. This results from analyzing the links that exist between people and their karma from a global perspective. There are two points to be made here.

First, there is a moral issue involved. As suffering is the result of one?s bad deeds performed in previous lives, a possible way of reacting consistently with the law of karma might lead to a total lack of compassion toward people who suffer. One might think that the person who suffers deserves to be equitably punished, and anyone who dares to help him interferes with the unrolling of his karma and consequently is gathering bad karma for himself.

Second, the man who is the instrument of karma?s punishment records bad karma for himself and therefore will have to be punished at his turn, in a next life. Then the next person who acts as the instrument of karma will have to be punished in his turn, etc. A possible solution to this endless cycle would be that the one who acts as the instrument of karma in another one?s life should do it in a completely detached manner, without any interest in the results, according to the demand of Krishna in the Bhagavad Gita (2,47; 3,19; etc.). In this case it is considered that he doesn?t acquire new karma. However, such a solution would be limited, at best, to the few "detached" people that actually follow this rule, and thus has no significance on the larger scale of human society. Most people are far from considering themselves as detached executioners of karma in their neighbor?s life.

Let?s examine these two points in the case of the millions of Jews who were killed in gas chambers by the Nazis during World War II. First, it would seem absurd to have any feeling of compassion towards them, because they deserved to be killed like that, as a result of crimes done by them in previous lives. One could conclude that, after all, the Nazis did the right thing against the Jews, according to the dictates of karma. Using this reasoning any conceivable crime of the past or present could be justified, without bothering about moral values. This opens a horrifying perspective on the past and future of mankind, with implications difficult to grasp.

Second, the killing of millions of Jews requires that their executioners should be killed in their turn, in a similar way, in further lives. But this implies that the executioners of the reincarnated Nazis will be killed in their turn, etc., etc. The cycle would never end. The same reasoning could be used also back in time, which would require finding in each generation those millions of people executed and their executioners. An objection to this could be that killers may be punished (killed) in turn by other means, not necessarily by involving other new acquirers of karma. Natural calamities such as earthquakes could be the instrument of karma. However, this option doesn?t work because karma is generated not only by the actions themselves, but also by the desires that lead to the actions. The desire to kill has to be rewarded as well, not only the killing. Therefore, if reincarnation were a logical concept, it would imply that it has neither a beginning nor an end. This cannot be a solution for justice, but only a kind of eternal circus.

A further analysis of karmic justice proves that the basic principle of Hindu morality, that of non-killing (ahimsa), is absurd. According to this principle we should not participate in the killing of any living being, otherwise we will reincarnate in order to pay the consequences. (This is the basis of eastern religious vegetarianism.) For instance, the butcher who slaughters a pig will have to reincarnate as a pig in order to be slaughtered in his turn. However, the very principle of reincarnation contradicts the meaning of ahimsa and proves it to be futile. The pig had to be slaughtered, because he probably was the reincarnation of another butcher, who had to be punished that way. Neither in this case can the vicious cycle be stopped by natural means (i.e. the pig dying of a disease) because the butcher?s desire to kill the animal (for food or to earn his salary) also generates karma. Therefore the infringement of the non-violence principle becomes a necessity in order to fulfill karmic justice. The butcher was at the same time the instrument of working out one?s karmic debt and the generator of a new one for himself. In a strange and contradictory way, the fulfilling of karmic debt requires the punishment of its executioners. In other words, karma paradoxically acts through condemning the executioners of its "justice".

In conclusion, the concept of reincarnation stands in contradiction with logic, social justice, morality and even common sense. Looking beyond the apparent comfort it provides to this life by promising further lives in which perfection may be attained, belief in reincarnation cannot bring any beneficial result, but only resignation and despair in facing fate. Why then accept it as a major spiritual belief?

The various emphasis by underlining in the above article is mine.