Are We Really Born Again...and Again?

Q: I'd like to suggest that ever since Socrates in the West and the various religions of the East, wise and contemplative men have agreed that the soul is immortal though the body is ephemeral. However, they also have suggested that to achieve the kind of virtue one would expect to be the ultimate goal of life would require more than one lifetime.

Apparently, in our desire for instant gratification, we Westerners imagine that the perfect state is attainable after only one lifetime. Looking at the world today, I can't help but see enormous numbers of people who are still incompletely "virtuous" (myself included), going through various stages of life in their search for perfection. What are your views on reincarnation? -- J., Jr., Gainesville, Fla., via godsquadquestion@aol.com

A: There is something both frustrating and exhilarating about speculating on mysteries we can never unravel. Hinduism is the strongest advocate of reincarnation--the belief that our souls are reborn to life in new forms after death until we attain release (moksha) from the cycle of death and rebirth. Jewish mysticism has dabbled with this idea, as well.

To my mind, the best arguments for reincarnation include your view that virtue is too difficult a goal for any of us to attain in one lifetime, and a loving God would most certainly give us another (and another) chance to get things right, or at least to get things better.

Dr. Brian Weiss in his book, "Many Lives, Many Masters," makes an even stronger claim. He believes that under hypnosis some of his patients have actually been able to describe past lives. He believes that their present phobias are the direct result of traumas they experienced in previous lives. I'm not so sure. My fear of snakes could be just a fear of snakes and not a remembrance of being bitten by a snake when I was a pharaoh in ancient Egypt (in most of my fantasies about possible past lives I'm always a king or potentate, or at least a Commissioner of Baseball).

Another problem with reincarnation is that we have more people now than in the past. Where did all those extra souls come from? Also, if you can't remember your past life, how can you learn from it? Believing that you can set things right in the next go around may also lead to a moral surrender in this life and keep you from setting things right now. I'm happy to have this life and am trying to do the best I can, as I'm sure you are. Beyond that, I follow the words of T.S. Elliot, "Trying is all that matters. Everything else is just not our business."

Q: In Genesis 1:26, my Bible says: "Then God said, 'Let us make man in Our image, in Our likeness.'" Notice the plural references. Is God one or is he plural? Or is my translation incorrect from the original?

I pray that you will be blessed today and continue to be a blessing to others. I often feel like we'd be great friends if we knew each other. -- K., via godsquadquestion@aol.com

A: The use of the plural in that verse is most often interpreted by Bible scholars as the Royal Plural. Like the Queen of England who might say, "We will be in residence at the palace this weekend." When she really means, "I will be in residence."

There's no doubt that God is believed to be unique and singular in all of Jewish, Christian, and Muslim theology. In fact, the monotheism of God is reaffirmed in Genesis in the very next verse, Genesis 1:27, which reads: "And God created man in His own image, in the image of God created He him; male and female created he them."

The Christian belief in the Trinity, to which I assume you're alluding, is not a belief in three gods. If Christians did believe in a plurality of gods, they would be polytheists and ultimately idolaters because they'd be worshiping something other than the one, single and true God.

In fact, as I understand it, the Trinity is a kind of elaboration, not an abrogation, of the oneness of God. It is a way of expressing the three principal manifestations of the one God. This is similar to the Muslim belief in the 70 names of Allah (The Good, The Merciful, etc.). It also is echoed in the Jewish beliefs in the several primary attributes of God, such as the God of Mercy and the God of Justice.

There is, however, a lovely Jewish legend that does take Genesis 1:26 as a plural usage but imagines it as a dialogue between God and the angels as to whether to create human beings at all. The angels were, according to this legend, opposed to the creation of people because of our propensity for evil. God agreed with them but settled the dispute by getting up from his throne of justice and sitting on his throne of mercy, and from that throne, the single God created us all in God's image.

Now, as far as our possible friendship is concerned, if you play golf, I could be your friend. If you don't play golf, I could have lunch with you but that's as far as it could go. God bless.

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