Question: Dear Greg,

I was wondering about the theory of Reincarnation and your opinion on this topic. I have heard some good points on this issue and I would like your opinion on this subject!

Thanks!

Bob

Answer: Hello Bob,

Reincarnation's appeal is widespread – one in four Americans and one in three college-age people believe in reincarnation. Even more shocking -- among Christians the ratio is one in five! If surveys are to be believed, fully one fifth of people who identify themselves as Christians accept the idea of reincarnation -- a concept utterly alien to the Bible and historical Christianity -- but one that perfectly conforms to the human concept of justice, which is perhaps why it is so popular. We all like to believe that everyone else will get what is coming to him or her.

Reincarnation literally means "to come again, in the flesh." This belief is not to be confused with the historical fact and Christian belief of Christ’s incarnation (see John 1 and 1 John 4:1-2). Reincarnation means that after death the soul attaches itself to another body and returns to live another life. The most common kind of reincarnation teaching comes from Hinduism and Buddhism, and is based on the idea of karma. Karma is a vague but popular concept which has its origins in Hinduism and Buddhism. A roughly literal translation is "action" or "deed." On its most fundamental level, karma describes cause and effect. It says that every action in this life has a consequence. What goes around comes around. So far so good, from a physical perspective. Galatians 6:7 says that we reap what we sow – that is, we pay consequences in our physical lives and bodies for actions that we take during our physical lives (of course we can think of exceptions to this "rule" -- criminals and despots who live long and prosperous lives, while others who live virtuous lives suffer).

But beyond the physical, applied to the afterlife, karma says that what one sows in this life will be reaped in the next, or to put it another way, the moral quality of one's actions influences one's rebirth. In this sense, from a spiritual perspective, karma is the very antithesis of God's grace. Because of his grace, we do not get what we deserve. By his grace, we do not reap what we have sown -- in the life to come. In stead we reap what Jesus has sown in us.

Like karma, reincarnation is a vague but popular concept in the west, but present in many non-Christian religions -- even one form of Judaism. In the Indian traditions, the soul (or some form of consciousness) may be reborn thousands of times in thousands of human or animal bodies, slowly progressing toward "enlightenment," at which point the soul becomes free from the cycle of reincarnation and enters nirvana -- a state of eternal peace and freedom from suffering, but only if it has achieved "enlightenment." Further, in Buddhist and other traditions, this process is not directed by any supreme being -- but by the impersonal mechanisms and blind forces of the universe.

In this system, the soul is working (or failing to work) toward its own "enlightenment." Whether or not it finally reaches a state of rest is based purely on its own achievement, works, efforts and moral abilities. And think of it -- for thousands, perhaps tens of thousands of years, the soul endures struggling, suffering and repeated deaths, with no hope of rescue except for its own efforts. This is a hell of an existence -- "bad news religion" in every sense!

Compared to this grim outlook, the Bible is refreshingly clear – "...it is appointed for men to die once and after this comes judgment..." (Hebrews 9:27). And that judgment comes from a personal, merciful and loving God, who offers his grace based on the completed work of his Son. The kingdom of heaven is not gained on the basis of what we do, on the merits we gain, the works we amass (Ephesians 2:8-10). Salvation is a gift, given to us by and because of the riches of God’s grace – and it will not be enjoyed in someone else’s body, but in our own glorified, immortal body (see 1 Corinthians 15).

The Bible teaches that the spirit and soul of humans is disembodied after death, awaiting resurrection. Reincarnation teaches that the soul becomes embodied – in another body. Reincarnation is a process of perfection (works-based religion) while the Christian belief, based on biblical teaching, is that the resurrection is a perfected state, given and imparted by God’s grace. Reincarnation is an intermediate state, but resurrection is an ultimate state. Resurrection happens once into the same body; reincarnation claims to happen many, many times into different bodies.

Reincarnation is works-based, performance-based religion – and perhaps one of the reasons for its popularity is that humans do not naturally understand God’s grace, that he loves us without reservation, unconditionally – for the notion and practice or God's amazing grace is foreign to anything that we experience in our world.

In Christ,

Greg Albrecht