is our life the only life?

[atanu]

I was educated and raised in a Buddhist environment. I have a strong belief
for karma and rebirth (born again after death)
But I almost forgot, it's possibly only a ''belief''. It's a belief. We cannot prove it.
Someone suggested to me that - We will disappear forever after we die...
If we are going to disappear forever, where will be our soul?
Is it sad to know that we might only live once and only once?
If we disappear forever, we don't even have a soul to rest in somewhere?
No mind at all?
What do you think?

Samsara is a belief only.

 

[Twilight Hue]

I was educated and raised in a Buddhist environment. I have a strong belief
for karma and rebirth (born again after death)

But I almost forgot, it's possibly only a ''belief''. It's a belief. We cannot prove it.

Someone suggested to me that - We will disappear forever after we die...

If we are going to disappear forever, where will be our soul?
Is it sad to know that we might only live once and only once?
If we disappear forever, we don't even have a soul to rest in somewhere?
No mind at all?

What do you think?

I think there is a true and real death for ego. When we die, it's forever as it pertains to this unique phenomena called. "I". That personhood is finished.

I suspect however the "lights coming on" continues to occur, and will continue to do so, givin the direct fact as to our own initial birth.

That instance alone negates any impossibility in a permanent context that life itself remains a one time only deal in respect to mind and body giving rise under the right conditions. The impossibility imo is already negated. Otherwise, the experience of birth would have never happened had it been so.

Basically if it happened once, there is no reason it can't happen again.

 

[Ben Dhyan]

Is your belief in reincarnation compatible with your belief in what the Bible says? I didn't think that reincarnation is something that Christians accept?

I explained that in the post.....Christianity refers to the personality...the personality is unique and a one off, when the body dies...so does the personality....the essence that was responsible for the life remains after death.... However the soul who transfers identification from body to essence in a religious life may gain immortality.... So yes, to me they are compatible...the essence that was responsible for the life of a Christian will reincarnate if the self awareness of the soul is not 'born again' in the sense of transferring self identity from flesh to essence/spirit....

 

[That one dude...]

This is not my point. My point is: if you do not remember, how is that important? How is that different from irreversible termination?

I can understand the Christian who likes to think she will keep her identity in heaven. But I do not understand what kind of use we can have from reincarnation. It seems like a useless hypothesys that does not even provide comfort.

Ciao

- viole

The way I understand it is that karma and reincarnation go hand in hand. Karma is analogous to a credit score, with good deeds in life to earn points and bad deeds to deduct points. When this life ends, you trade up to a better model or down to a lower model in your next life depending on your credit score. I don't know if the cycle is eternal as a Christian's heaven or hell would be, but that's my understanding.

Also, I doubt very many people remember events before the age of 3 but those first years are very important for anyone.

 

[viole]

The way I understand it is that karma and reincarnation go hand in hand. Karma is analogous to a credit score, with good deeds in life to earn points and bad deeds to deduct points. When this life ends, you trade up to a better model or down to a lower model in your next life depending on your credit score. I don't know if the cycle is eternal as a Christian's heaven or hell would be, but that's my understanding.

Also, I doubt very many people remember events before the age of 3 but those first years are very important for anyone.

Well, my credit score on my previous life must have been huge. Shame I have no clue who that was. Let's call her X.

Now, suppose I do very bad things, kill all the credit accumulated by X, and build up a huge debt that will guarantee my next life (carrying X soul) to be in a much lower mode.

Do you think X will be pissed by that?

Ciao

- viole

 

[Rick O'Shez]

..the essence that was responsible for the life of a Christian will reincarnate if the self awareness of the soul is not 'born again' in the sense of transferring self identity from flesh to essence/spirit....

This sounds like a muddle, and I'm pretty sure that reincarnation isn't a part of Christian teaching.

 

[Ben Dhyan]

This sounds like a muddle, and I'm pretty sure that reincarnation isn't a part of Christian teaching.

Haha....of course it sounds like a muddle to a muddle headed atheist.. You will need to devote your life to theism to become unmuddled....

 

[Rick O'Shez]

Haha....of course it sounds like a muddle to a muddle headed atheist.. You will need to devote your life to theism to become unmuddled....

It's nothing to do with atheism. Are you saying that reincarnation is a Christian belief and teaching? Or have you converted to Hinduism now?

 

[LuisDantas]

If we are going to disappear forever, where will be our soul?

If there is such a thing as a soul, it most definitely is mortal.

Is it sad to know that we might only live once and only once?

Many people obviously think so. Not me.

If we disappear forever, we don't even have a soul to rest in somewhere?
No mind at all?

What do you think?

I think you are looking at the wrong place. Individual people can and must die "forever", but that is not at all a problem. We go on through the mark we leave on others.

 

[Ben Dhyan]

It's nothing to do with atheism. Are you saying that reincarnation is a Christian belief and teaching? Or have you converted to Hinduism now?

As an atheist....you have no idea what the reality of God is....until you experience God...there is no point in talking to you about it...may as well be discussing it with a puppy dog....

 

[outhouse]

You factually only get one life, the one you are living now.


Because once you die life is over.

Even if there was an afterlife, that is not life as you know it.

Anything else is imaginative based IMHO

 

[Geoff-Allen]

I was educated and raised in a Buddhist environment. I have a strong belief
for karma and rebirth (born again after death)

But I almost forgot, it's possibly only a ''belief''. It's a belief. We cannot prove it.

Someone suggested to me that - We will disappear forever after we die...

If we are going to disappear forever, where will be our soul?
Is it sad to know that we might only live once and only once?
If we disappear forever, we don't even have a soul to rest in somewhere?
No mind at all?

What do you think?

Does it REALLY matter how many lives you have/had?

The only reality is the present moment and the best use of that moment is 2 cultivate kindness & compassion for one's fellow beings.

I also am attracted 2 Buddhism - esp the metta meditation.

Best of luck in your search.

Have a good one!

 

[Rick O'Shez]

As an atheist....you have no idea what the reality of God is....until you experience God...there is no point in talking to you about it...may as well be discussing it with a puppy dog....

There is no need to patronise. I asked you a straightforward question: are you saying that reincarnation is a Christian belief and teaching?

 

[Ben Dhyan]

There is no need to patronise. I asked you a straightforward question: are you saying that reincarnation is a Christian belief and teaching?

There is no specific biblical teaching for or against reincarnation....same for Judaism...some Jews and Christians believe in reincarnation....there are some non-biblical Jewish teachings iirc re reincarnation...

 

[Deeje]

There is no specific biblical teaching for or against reincarnation....same for Judaism...some Jews and Christians believe in reincarnation....there are some non-biblical Jewish teachings iirc re reincarnation...

There is absolutely NO Biblical support for re-incarnation. That would be because the Bible dies not teach belief in an immortal soul that inhabits the body and leaves at death.

The Bible says that death is death...i.e. the opposite of life, and that there is no conscious part of man that lives on. That is Platonic Greek thinking, not Jewish or Christian in origin.

 

[Ben Dhyan]

There is absolutely NO Biblical support for re-incarnation. That would be because the Bible dies not teach belief in an immortal soul that inhabits the body and leaves at death.

The Bible says that death is death...i.e. the opposite of life, and that there is no conscious part of man that lives on. That is Platonic Greek thinking, not Jewish or Christian in origin.

No one said the soul is immortal...how could it be...it only exists due to the spirit of God vivifying the elemental/clay body... But that is not to say that the non-personal self awareness developed by the soul in life is not able to be impressed upon God's spirit when it leaves the body at death....only to be used again to vivify a new child clay body when the time is propitious ... How else do you account for the evolutionary progress since the days of Adam....if God breathed a completely new fresh breath into each new baby at birth...there would be no progress....

 

[Aupmanyav]

If rebirth is true then I am the rebirth of something else. Since I do not remember anything of my previous life, how is that different from my previous life being dead forever?

Yes, you are a rebirth of - not one thing but millions and billions of various things. From the nutrition provided by your mother when you were in the womb, the rice and wheat grain that you ate at various times, the apple that your father brought when you were in the sixth grade and so on. This exchange of atoms keep on happening all the time, with every one of your breath - as Buddha said 'we cannot step in the same river again'. Life is a dynamic process. Even after our deaths, what constitutes us will become a part of millions and billions of things. This has been happening for the last 13.8 billion years. Nothing remorseful, just the way things are.

But I do not understand what kind of use we can have from reincarnation. It seems like a useless hypothesys that does not even provide comfort.

Reincarnation or heaven and hell are social constructs, carrot and sword policies, to keep people in the line. They were there even before existing religions came up.

Do you think X will be pissed by that?

Forget about X, but would you like to be born as an ant? For a human birth again, you must increase the credits that X has already built up. You might be born as a king or Emperor (add female equivalents) or at least a President or Prime Minister some country during your next sojourn. Your stint as a human is precious, I am sure you are taking full benefit of that, do not waste it.

 

[That one dude...]

Well, my credit score on my previous life must have been huge. Shame I have no clue who that was. Let's call her X.

Now, suppose I do very bad things, kill all the credit accumulated by X, and build up a huge debt that will guarantee my next life (carrying X soul) to be in a much lower mode.

Do you think X will be pissed by that?

Ciao

- viole

X is dead and long gone. Are you pissed about the actions of a different person 100 years from now?

 

[RRex]

I was educated and raised in a Buddhist environment. I have a strong belief
for karma and rebirth (born again after death)

But I almost forgot, it's possibly only a ''belief''. It's a belief. We cannot prove it.

Someone suggested to me that - We will disappear forever after we die...

If we are going to disappear forever, where will be our soul?
Is it sad to know that we might only live once and only once?
If we disappear forever, we don't even have a soul to rest in somewhere?
No mind at all?

What do you think?

I was a staunch atheist for decades and firmly believed there was nothing after death.

In 2008 I became very ill and my perspective changed because I noticed and saw things I'd never noticed and seen before.

Now I believe there is something after we die. I couldn't say what it is. No one can.

Like everyone else here, I wait and wonder with anticipation.

 

[viole]

X is dead and long gone. Are you pissed about the actions of a different person 100 years from now?

If I was reborn as a lower being because of her misfits? Yeah. If I believed in what you said.

Wouldn't you?

Give me please a good reason why I should not do what I want during my life and turn the credits of my previous life into a huge debt for the next one to pay. Why should I care?

Ciao

- viole