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- Hindus believe in God and the soul. Jainas
don't believe in God at all but only in the soul. And Buddhists
don't believe in the soul or God either. But about reincarnation all
three agree -- even Buddhists agree, who don't believe in the soul.
A very strange thing...then who reincarnates? Even THEY could not
deny the phenomenon of reincarnation, although they could deny the
existence of the soul; they say the soul does not exist but
reincarnation exists.
- If people become aware that they have
lived the same kind of life thousands of times ... and this was the
use that the theory of reincarnation was put to -- to create a great
boredom and a fed-upness, because all these things you have done
before. And you have not learned anything, you are again ... for
thousands of lives you have been running for power, for money, and
you are still doing that. It seems every life's experience is being
erased and you start from ABC again!
- My suggestion is, don't ask me whether the
theory of reincarnation is true or not. To me it is true, to you it
is not -- not yet. Don't take any position, negative or positive.
Just remain open to the hypothesis. Explore. If you can go into your
own past lives, that's enough proof that everybody has a long, long
past. And that gives another insight: if there are past lives, that
means there are going to be future lives; this life is only just in
the middle. Of course, to enter future lives is not possible because
the future has not happened yet. But to enter the past is absolutely
easy because it has already happened; the memory is there and the
record is there. It is just that you have forgotten the way to the
record room where it is recorded. Take it as a hypothesis.
- As far as I am concerned, reincarnation is
a reality. It is my own experience.
But what is truth to me becomes theory to you. That is the
difficulty.
And I don't want my truth to be your theory. I want it to be a truth
for you also.
- I know reincarnation is a truth. But I am
not saying that you should believe it because I say so. Never
believe anybody else's experience; that is a hindrance. I can only
say to you, just live this incarnation. That will open doors and you
will be able to see backwards, you will be able to see forwards. And
then it is up to you to believe in it or not. How can you disbelieve
it then? But before that.... Let it become an experience.
- Become more meditative. Reincarnation and
God, heaven and hell, do not matter. What matters is your becoming
alert. Meditation awakens you, gives you eyes -- and then whatever
you see, you cannot deny. As far as I am concerned, reincarnation is
a truth, because in existence nothing dies. Even the physicist will
say, about the objective world, that nothing dies. You can destroy
Hiroshima and Nagasaki -- so much power science has given to
chimpanzee politicians -- but you cannot destroy a single drop of
water.
- In India we have a special science for it
-- jaati smaran, remembrance of the past. A certain meditation,
certain preparations and you can enter into past lives. But remember
that you have to have the stamina and the guts not to get lost. Only
in the East has reincarnation been considered. And the three
religions which have born in India are the only religions which have
an absolute agreement on the point of reincarnation. They differ in
their philosophy, theology, on everything, but not on rebirth. It is
factual to all of them. They all have come in their meditations to
the same place. They cannot deny it. It is an existential fact that
you have been before and you will be after your death. The one that
was before birth, and the one that will be after death is the same
one. Its name is the buddha. Its name is the witness. It never dies
and it never is born.
- Remember this: Christianity, particularly
Jesus, knows well that there is incarnation, reincarnation, rebirth.
Life is a long continuity, this death is not going to be the
ultimate death. But once this is said, you relax. And the whole
method of Jesus depends on friction: you are not allowed to relax,
you have to fight, create friction, so that you can become
crystallized.
- This wheel of reincarnation is due to
unconsciousness. Once you become conscious, you see there is no
point: you have achieved success many times, but what is the point?
Death comes and erases everything. It is almost like making castles
in the sand -- a wind comes and the castle is gone. And you start
making another castle ... again and again the same thing will
happen.
- This is the whole doctrine of
reincarnation: that unless you learn it by yourself, the whole is
not satisfied with you. Unless you become a child in your own right
-- not because of your body but because of your being: if the
innocence is attained by you, and the innocence is attained in spite
of all distractions, in spite of all that was there to destroy it --
you will have to be thrown back again and again and again.
- The eastern concept of reincarnation is
beautiful. True or not true, that is not the point. Do you
understand me? It is not the point... but it gives you a very
relaxed attitude towards life. That is the real thing.
- In the East, all the three great religions
-- Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism -- have used the idea of
reincarnation; that you don't have only one life like in
Christianity and Judaism and Mohammedanism. Those three religions
born outside of India have only one life. They have not understood
the great psychological insight of the East: the East accepts that
you will have many, many lives. You had many before, and you will
have many in the future.
The idea was to create in you a sense of utter boredom. Just think,
you have lived many times, you have done the same stupid things many
times, you are still doing them, and you are bound to do them in the
future also. Many, many times, thousands of lives, and you will be
just sitting in a grocery store, tending the shop, fighting with
your wife, complaining to everybody about your misfortunes. The film
is the same, the story is the same, the dialogues are the same, the
actors are the same.
The idea was used by these three religions to give you a clear-cut
sense of utter boredom. If you want to change, change; otherwise you
will be moving like a wheel, and the same spokes will go on coming
on top and down, on top and down, and the same misery.... If you
want to change then don't postpone it for tomorrow, from this very
moment start exploring. And remember not to be repetitive. Always
look for something new, something fresh -- because there is really
no goal except the journey. So make the most of it. Make it as
beautiful as possible, as enchanting, as creative as you have the
capacity to make it. And you have infinite capacity, it is just
dormant.
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