relegions which accept and refuse rebirth/reincarnation concept

[mradam83]

Namaste.

Druidism also has reincarnation in its belief system as well.

Ancient Druidism is a bit sketchy though as not enough information survived after the Christianisation of Ireland and Britain.

However, what little information that did survive has been incorporated into Neo-Druidism so much that Reincarnation is now a valid and quite believed concept in Druidism (I did look into it earlier on this year, so thankfully none of my info is guesswork).

With its love for nature, respect for wildlife and a pantheon of gods, I wonder if it is a distant cousin (very distant) to Hinduism (possibly due to the pre-historic Indo-European religion that spread when civilisation branched out from the Caucasus).

[ShivaIsLord]

Some Jews believe in reincarnation. Here is an FAQ written by a Jewish rabbi about reincarnation.

Christianity used to believe in reincarnation. There is a passage in the Gospel of John where Jesus sees a man blind from birth. His disciples ask him ""Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?" (John 9:2) Obviously he could not have sinned before he was born, so it seems that the Apostles believed in reincarnation, like some Jews today.

Jesus responded by saying that neither him nor his parents sinned. If Jesus didn't believe in Karma or reincarnation, he would have been like "you idiots, there's no such thing" but he didn't. He simply said that it did not apply in this one particular case.

[dhyandev]

I think these people believed in

यावज्जीवेत् सुखं जीवेत्, ऋणं कृत्वा घृतं पिबेत।

भस्मीभूतस्य देहस्य, पुनरागमनं कुत:।।

अर्थात् जब तक जीओ सुख से जीओ, उधार ले लेकर घी पीओ क्योंकि मरने के बाद देह भस्म हो जाएगी और वापस किसे आना है।

i.e. as long as u live ,live happily.Eat best foods even if u have to take a loan.after death this body will turn to ash who will return?:

[Vasa]

There is a passage in the New Trstament in which Jesus implies that both he and John the Baptist had a previous life as two of the characters in the Old Testament. I can't remember offhand but I'll try to locate it. Christianity believes in reincarnation until the 5th or 6th century AD when the church began to dispute it.

[Vasa]

Also, Asatru, which is the pagan beliefs of my people the Scandinavians, believed that people are reincarnated in their family. Asatru is basically the Swedish version of Hinduism, there are many striking similarities, and it is claimed that Odhinn himself was once a king in Asia. I don't find it too hard to believe that a group of Proto-Indos migrated there in the distant past and brought Vedic concepts of religion with them.

[Vasa]

So Jesus confirmed in the Bible that John the Baptist was Elijah in his past life, and words to the affect that John the Baptist was his guru in a past life would lend support to the argument that Jesus was the reincarnation of Elisha. More information can be found at this website: http://www.near-death.com/experiences/origen03.html

Personally I think the tale of Jesus coming to India and learning spirituality from masters there during the gap of undocumented years in the Bible makes the most sense. I struggled to understand a lot of Jesus' teachings until I saw them in the light of a Hindu (Yogananda) perspective.

[mradam83]

Namaste.

Also, re-visiting this thead I've since learned that the Yoruba religion of Africa believe in re-incarnation.

In fact, the name Babatunde translates to "father returns" referring to the belief in the re-incarnation specifically of one's ancestors.

Pranams.