Posted by Stuart Gilman (65.93.89.93) on August 23, 2002 at 06:34:03:

In Reply to: Re: Scientific Theoogy - a Challenge to Brett & BK posted by Brett Zamir on August 23, 2002 at 05:46:38:

I read your reference at http://www.bahai-library.org/writings/abdulbaha/saq/81.html

I could have made a better case against reincarnation, finding the arguments therein quite mundane - but since I do not believe in reincarnation in any of the ways the article expounds, it is meaningless to criticize it. Suffice it that the article is a "straw dog" article, in which the presentation of reincarnation is assured its negation.

In particular: "Therefore, by returning, it is absolutely impossible to obtain existence; it is as if man, after being freed from the womb, should return to it a second time. Consider what a puerile imagination this is which is implied by the belief in reincarnation and transmigration. Believers in it consider the body as a vessel in which the spirit is contained, as water is contained in a cup; this water has been taken from one cup and poured into another. This is child's play. They do not realize that the spirit is an incorporeal being, and does not enter and come forth, but is only connected with the body as the sun is with the mirror. If it were thus, and the spirit by returning to this material world could pass through the degrees and attain to essential perfection, it would be better if God prolonged the life of the spirit in the material world until it had acquired perfections and graces; it then would not be necessary for it to taste of the cup of death, or to acquire a second life."

The part that amuses me most is - "... it wold be better if God prolonged the life of the spirit in the material world... "

This is another topic dear to my heart. I still, without anger, question God's stinginess when it comes to our longevity. The universe, space and time are infinite, a tree can live thousands of years, a turtle a few hundred, Jupiter is thousands of times greater than Earth and the Sun will go supernova in a few billion years. Yet, us, his beloved creatures, if we are fortunate, live healthy lives perhaps until seventy-six years of age. After that, tho we can live much longer, most of us are either dead or good for nothing much, with exceptions.

I believe that if God had not rested on the seventh day, and had he spent a little more time tinkering with reality, he might have found the generosity to allow us a few hundred years of life, which I consider minimal in order to learn anything of any importance. Longevity that lasts less than a hundred years guarantees our ignorance; it is barely time to learn how to intellectually and spiritually walk. What was He afraid of? The failed wish of Einstein to "know the mind of God"?

Your loving friend,

Stuart

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