The possibility of the return of the spirit to matter in another physical body is an ancient concept existing from the earliest antiquity. Most of the ancient peoples and the great wise man already had access to this knowledge, although without a scientific approach, which only Spiritism would bring in the second half of the 19th century, when the name "Reincarnation" was formalized.

 

The concept of soul rebirth can be found not only in the ancient Egyptian texts and in the millennial Eastern religions, such as Hinduism and Buddhism, but also in the West as the basis of the philosophy of the greatest Greek scholars:

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Pythagoras (570 - 495 BC), Greek philosopher, mathematician and religious leader, was called by his disciples as "The Great Teacher." It is attributed to him the invention of the word "philosophy". He was also the creator of the famous "Theorem of Pythagoras". For Pythagoras and his followers, Nature is constituted of a system of relations and mathematical proportions. He discovered the seven musical notes and argued that music obeyed laws of mathematical harmony and that the universe also submitted to these laws. He defended the existence of Reincarnation as a natural process that obeys a cyclical cosmic order for atonement (penance or punishment) for an original guilt

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Socrates (469 BC, 399 BC), another Greek philosopher, claimed that souls, after a passage through Hades, the realm of the dead, were again brought into the universe of living beings, in which they experienced innumerable existences. Like Jesus, Socrates left no written records of his ideas, and they were disseminated by his main disciple: Plato. Plato also argued that the soul is an autonomous essence pre-existing to the human body, in which it resides and is capable of perpetuating itself beyond its present existence, even without the existence of the physical body.

 

Within Judaism, we also find Reincarnation in the studies of Kabbalah. In early Judaism, the concept of rebirth was something very common and we can even see it in the Bible itself, as  we analyze  in the chapter "Reincarnation in the Bible". At that time there was no rejection or struggle against the concept of soul rebirth, as we see today on the part of traditional Christian religions.

 

The fact is that the idea of the return of the spirit to matter was, to the ancient people, something logical and natural, but at that time one still had a vague knowledge about how this return could occur. Actually, in Jesus' time, it would be quite impossible to explain more complex concepts that would depend on a greater development of humanity to be understood.

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At that time it was not even known that matter was composed of tiny particles called "atoms", nothing was known about electricity and magnetism and so many other knowledge that only science would bring. How could it then be possible to speak to that people in detail about a more subtle and invisible matter, that is, to speak about the Spirit and the capacity of it to bind itself to matter and to return to it, in successive lives, which even today, with all scientific resources, many still reject?

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 The Church's fight against reincarnation

 

Reincarnation began to be fought in the West in 553 AD, when it was banned by the Catholic Church at the Council of Constantinople, now Istanbul, Turkey. In this council, the ideas of Origen of Alexandria, an important philosopher and theologian from the Greek Church, who admitted the preexistence of human souls, were condemned: “God bases the difficulties that each soul faces in one life on the merits or blame accumulated in the prior existence as a spirit”

 

At that time, many Christians accepted reincarnation and followed Origen’s teachings, which obviously was not seen with good eyes by the Church leaders. Let us analyze: We have observed, from antiquity, the absolute control that the religions exercised over the believers through fear.

Those who did not strictly follow the precepts imposed could be considered "heretics", excommunicated or even burned at the stake! Also, the greatest fear of those who did not dare to confront the Church and, consequently, the Divine "Wrath", was to be condemned to the "hellfire."

 

But those who believe in Reincarnation cannot be controlled or manipulated by fear, because they do not believe in eternal punishments or a vindictive and tyrant God. In this way, this doctrine represented, as it represents until today, to the world's great religious institutions, which have become major financial empires, a threat of losing the control over their believers.

 

However, even with the prohibition of the Church, the concept of successive lives could not be suppressed, and resurged with full force in the West through Spiritism.

 

There are some differences between the Spiritist, Hindu and Buddhist views on Reincarnation. In this work, we will use the views of Spiritism which, in my conception, has a more scientific and more comprehensive view of all the questions that involve the trajectory of the Spirit, from the moment of its detachment from the material body through physical death, until his stay in the spiritual plane and its consequent return to the material plane in another physical body.

 

Spiritism, which is considered both a religion, a philosophy and a science, brings in its codification an astonishing amount of information about spirituality, as has never been seen before in any other philosophy or literature. "The Book of Spirits," the first book of Spiritist Codification, launched by Professor Hyppollite Léon Denizard Rivail (Allan Kardec) on April 18th, 1857, continues to be current and consistent to this day, and the most modern scientific discoveries have consolidated its teachings.

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As we have seen, all attempts throughout history to conceal and combat Reincarnation, for political and religious reasons, have not been sufficient, and its concept continues to grow stronger due to its rationality that brings the answers to the questions that traditional Religions, Based on the concept of the existence of a single life, are unable to answer.

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