Rebirth - Science and Philosophy

Notes by Shrikant Soman based on the book title 'Problem of Rebirth' by Sri Aurobindo.............. Pg 1 and 2
The theory of reincarnation is an age old theory from time immemorial. We may accept it or reject it as per our preoccupations. We may accept it as a result of ancient psychological experience. We can treat it as Truth because of the fact that this experience is always renewable and verifiable. On the other hand we may reject this theory as mere philosophical dogma. We may treat it as an ingenious speculation. Whether we accept it or not, this belief will always endure throughout the human existence. It has thus so far been endured ever since the thinking man appeared on earth.

Earlier, this doctrine used to pass in Europe under the grotesque name of ‘transmigration’. This name was associated with the humorous image of the soul of Pythagoras migrating, a haphazard bird of passage from the divine human form into the body of a guinea-pig or an ass.

The philosophical aspect of this theory was seen in the Greek word ‘metempsychosis’. It was an admirable but rather unmanageable work. It means the insouling of a new body by the same psychic individual. The Greek language is adept in its clever expression of thought in the word. We could not perhaps find a better expression to this word ‘metempsychosis’. However when we migrate this word into English language, it loses the subtle sense contained in the original Greek word. It then becomes more of a long and pedantic expression. It was therefore gone out of use in English language. The current popular word is ‘Reincarnation’. However this word is more superficial in its meaning and it raises many questions. I prefer the expression ‘rebirth’. This word goes more near to the Sanskrit word punarjanma, meaning ‘again birth’. This word has a very wide meaning though it is ‘colorless’. The word ‘rebirth’ is more ‘focused’ to the fundamental idea of the term which takes us to essence of this doctrine.

To our modern scientific mind, rebirth is only a speculation and a theory. It has never been really proved by the methods of modern science. It has not been accepted by the modern man with critical mind which is being groomed under the scientific culture. At the same time, it has also not been disproved. The modern science does not know anything for sure about the before-life or an after-life of the human soul. In fact it does not know anything at all about the human soul in the first place. It can also never know about it with its so called scientific methods. The province of the modern science stops at the border of human flesh, brain, nerve, the embryo and its formation and development. The modern critic does not have any instrument by which the truth or untruth of the rebirth can be established. Actually the modern criticism is not a very efficient truth finder at all. This is inspite of its pretensions to searching investigation and scrupulous certainty. It is impotent outside the sphere of the immediate physical world. Though it is good at discovering data, it has no means of being very sure of its theories derived from this data. The only exception is when the conclusions are very obvious from the data themselves. The theories of the modern science derived from the data in one generation of humanity get disproved in the next generation of humanity.

In the case of any historical assertion having any doubtful validity, the modern science can not verify the same with any surety. Take for example the case of Jesus Christ. Even after the century of debates, it has not even been able to tell us in clear affirmative or negative way the historical truth of the existence of Jesus Christ. If this be so, then how can we expect it to say with any surety about the validity of the doctrine of rebirth. We need to accept that this doctrine is a stuff of psychology. It must be decided more by psychological than physical evidence.

The arguments of both the supporters as well as opponents of this theory are often weak or futile. Even at their best, they are insufficient to either prove or disprove anything in the world. For example, the opponents of this theory very often put forward the argument that we have no memory of our past lives. This is their ‘sure shot’ case. As we have no memory of past lives, therefore we have no past lives – so the argument goes. These opponents consider themselves as something more than ‘intellectual children’. This is amusing. This argument proceeds on psychological grounds. Fine. Taking this reasoning further in the psychological domain, we have to consider the very nature of our ordinary or physical memory of a normal person. Forget about the past lives. Just consider the current life. How much do we remember of our current life ? We have clear memory of our very recent past. It becomes vaguer and less comprehensive as we go backwards in time. At distant past, we remember only landmark events. At the farthest end, when we go back to the period immediately after our birth and very early childhood, it becomes complete BLANK. Even if we leave aside the minute details of our infant life, do we remember the mere fact, the simple state of being an infant on the mother’s breast ? If we do not remember our infancy then do we conclude, applying the logic of the opponents of rebirth theory, that we did not have our infancy or the much part of our early childhood ? Certainly not. Then how can we expect that the brute brain of man will remember his past lives when he can not even remember early part of his own present life ? Therefore disproving the reincarnation theory on the ground of non-memory is illogical and not tenable. The ratiocination of our ordinary human sapient insipiency is restricted within this close circle of false reasoning. It is very obvious that if we want to remember our past lives, we need to make use of our psychical memory. This remembrance of our past lives can be as just a simple fact of the existence of past life or in their detailed events and images. The psychical memory needs to be awakened so that the limits of physical impressions can be overcome. It will also have to overcome the limitations of the resuscitate impressions other than those stamped on the physical being by physical cerebration.