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works. When they said that we will return back to this world, they could not have meant this planet, as they had no idea of planets and solar systems, as we do through the science of astronomy. The "world" was the physical realm, regardless of where it may be, this planet or another.
In the concept of reincarnation, life after death is a given. It is free and a part of nature. We don't have to earn life after death, it happens to everyone. There is a part of this concept that resonates within me. That is the concept of learning and bettering ourselves through living many lives. It sounds like a good plan. It's logical and I have a basis of understanding which stems from my real life experiences. The lessons that I have learned and am learning in this life are so profound, so meaningful, that I can imagine how much wisdom and knowledge I could gain from living many lives. However, the illogical thing about some concepts of reincarnation which makes me doubt their accuracy is that, how can one learn if one does not remember the past lives? For one to learn from one's experience, one has to remember it. To have one's memory wiped clean after each life is like going to school and then forgetting everything that is learned at the end of each grade. How can we be expected to lead life after life and learn from each one so that eventually we will reach a higher state of being if we cannot remember what we have learned from each life? If upon being born in this present life, I had memories of my past lives, I would be so much wiser, so much more intelligent and knowledgeable now. Many of the mistakes I made in this life would not have been made, as they would have already been made in past lives and lessons learned from them as a consequence. Much of the pain and suffering in this world would be unnecessary. Each life would have been like a grade at school, a learning process that could be built upon, layer by layer so that we could achieve a fruition, not a cessation of existence.
If you dig deep enough into reincarnation philosophy, you will find an answer to some of this, such as the "veil" that is purposefully drawn across our memories. But it seems like sophistry. However, the value in the theory of reincarnation is that we look to better ourselves progressively by living continuous lives of transformation.
Mainstream Christianity's concept of achieving eternal life is deterministic. Life after death is a given, but depending on your moral choices, one could end up eternally in hell or in heaven. But you only have this one lifetime to make the choice. It's unfortunate if one dies early in life and never gained the experience of making the right choices. Or if one's upbringing or circumstances twisted one's morality so that one chose wrongly. It's a crapshoot. One roll of the dice, one lifetime of getting it right, and you could lose or gain everything. I think a Creator with an infinity of time on his hands would be a lot more flexible.
The concept of life after death in most other major religions fall somewhere between the two above, or skirt around the edges. The fallacies in logic and lack of clarity within those philosophies and religions can be overlooked because the important thing is the similarities, which is that we all desire to improve, to grow spiritually, to make the right choices and evolve closer to the Creator, to become better beings. It is an innate need. Like the plant seeking the glimmer of light in a darkened room, we are drawn to spiritual light. This then, is our real destination in this life and in the now. Fulfillment of destiny may be our goal in the distant unforeseeable future but by fractal analogy, our immediate destination is to fulfill our potentials as human beings here and now. To create, co-create and re-create ourselves with leadings from our spirit so that we can choose the best values in our lives. When we do this now, this pattern becomes reflected in larger and larger spheres of reality so that it becomes the pattern of all reality, of all existence. The now, when realized and actualized in the deepest level, can become the fractal pattern for the eternal.
Spiritual Evolution Through Time And Space
Internally, within our consciousness, we can be one with the center of the universe through worshipful meditation even right now. Externally, we must go through the course of time and space via the process of life and death - the shedding of previous shells.
To where do we go when we die? Into what new shapes will we be transformed? Does anyone even have a clue? Who would even dare to hazard a guess?
The vision of a fiery hell and a cumulous cloud-studded landscape of winged angels may have worked for simple minded folk in the middle ages but for a more educated and technological world population, such as we are, a more sophisticated model of continued existence is necessary. I have found only one source worth mentioning (The Urantia Book). The only candidate worth considering that has any depth, logic and very importantly, details. Since it is impossible for me to verify its accuracy, I go by its elegance of thought, its logic and ring of truth. This is my understanding of it as I explored it further, sought and received new insights.
It seems that as we evolve from the material to the spiritual, it is not just our essence that is transformed. Our bodies and minds change also. As individuals, we must have a form, whether it is material, supermaterial or spiritual, otherwise we are as nothing. Here on this planet, we have a material body. As we progress, our bodies must reflect our higher minds and souls. We are not instantaneously made into a perfect entity merely by dying. The process takes many, many transformations and millions of years, traversing light years of space, with our bodies and minds becoming more and more spiritual in the process, the magnificent fruition of the results of our experiential adventures culminating in our presence by the side of the Creator.
The physical destination we arrive at, after a number of transformations in which we evolve to higher states of being is the place of supreme perfection, call it Paradise, which is metaphorically, and even geographically and logically, at the center of the universe. The fruition of our spiritual career is arri
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