Expert: Edward Bode - 7/29/2008

Question
QUESTION: Back a ways Edward Bode (I think) was talking to someone ("Luke"?) and said there is no reference in the New Testament to any prevalent belief in reincarnation at year 33, nor were the people of the time interested.
In which case, would he please speak to the Gospel passages:
John 9:1, and Matthew 16:14?

As I understand it, reincarnation as an acceptable working premise went out of the Christian mindset when the writings of Origen were declared "anathema" at the Second Council of Constantinople, which the Roman Pontiff did not attend, since it was called by the emperor Justinian and his wife Theodora...who then threatened the Pope with open warfare if he didn't sign off on this Council's business matters...which the Pope did, and then tried to rescind his signature as having been made under coercion...553 AD.  At the very least, if "we" do not wholly die at death, but somehow emerge in another state and place and time...and if there is a resurrection of the body as we profess to in the Creed recited in each Mass, that in itself meets the definition of "new meat" with new life but the same ole us.

As for the benighted mucker hoping Buddhists aren't condemned to Hell for Eternity based on their zero theology "I know Buddhists don't believe in God", he says...has he heard of/looked into the Diamond Sutra (I believe it is, although I found reference also to the Heart Sutra), where the Buddha describes an "Unborn, Undying, Eternal"?  The point of Buddha's teachings was to steer away from the speculative.

Are we not aware that, after his mystical experience saying Mass, St. Thomas Aquinas abandoned dictation on the Summa Theologica, which he used to daily add to with the help of secretaries quill-penning down his dictation on parchment.  When asked "Father, aren't you going to dictate on the Summa today?" he reportedly replied:  "It's all straw."




ANSWER: In Jn 9;1, I see no reference to reincarnation but rather a belief that the sins of parents could produce bad effects on their offspring.  Mt 16:14 may reflect the idea that illustrious dead could reappear or that contemporaries could renew the spirit of the illustrious dead -- in the sense that a prophet like Moses would come.  I see no reference to the notion that people become reincarnated.
Concerning Origen: The fact of the rejection of him speaks somewhat in favor of his novelty and against any significant tradition of reincarnation.
If you wish more from me, please feel free to write again.
Best wishes.



---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: Unh-huh.  You neglected to speak to the other question to Jesus, in the passage in John where it is asked if the man blind from birth is so because of his sin...

Nor is there enough textual evidence in the Gospels for reincarnation as a belief or working theory in Judaism and the people of the time and the other religions or philosophies present.  It would take outside knowledge which I don't have...and you are silent on.  This is material to the question, whether Jesus knew about and/or heard about reincarnation, possibly explaining why he doesn't simply laugh Peter away, in the Matthew text, or laugh off the questions of the man blind from birth.

Since you suggest that Origen's ideas are of the "novelty" variety, you are implying that no one else from 33 AD to 535 AD, in the Christian tradition, has a credible comment supporting the doctrine, theory, or speculative question of reincarnation. Nor do you speak to the question of the resurrection of the body, to which we profess in the Creed, nor of entrance (somehow) to a state and/or place after death on earth...but I realize you already have settled this question in your own mind...and consequently have to search elsewhere for a response to the question of why God allows innocents to suffer, evildoers to prosper, and why there are manifest inequities on earth, in all beings, from birth, whether cats go to heaven, dogs, but maybe not reptiles...and so on...

So the question is:  Did you really answer the question or just give the reply you already knew.

Please note:  I am unable to "rate the expert" and find the concept unsettling, to say the least, so the numbers default to 10.  We are given no pick to zero them out and thus I can't evade that question.


ANSWER: In Jn 9;1, I see no reference to reincarnation but rather a belief that the sins of parents could produce bad effects on their offspring.
The core text against reincarnation is Heb 9:27 -- death and then judgement.  
So, I consider the doctrine of reincarnation to be alien to Christianity.  If that is what you mean by "settled this question in your own mind", that is correct.
I am not a church historian but am familiar with the trends. Origen's "apokatastasis" [my recollection of his word for continued purification toward perfection] was certainly a strange interjection and rejected by the main stream.  
I do not see how the fact that God allows evils to occur [rather than making creation a puppet on a string] necessitates or argues for reincarnation.
The doctrine of the resurrection of the body is firmly implanted in the New Testament. One could possibly argue from that doctrine:  The individual body awaits resurrection and does not depend on a reincarnation.
I tried to answer the question that you originally proposed.
I am sorry that you were unable to rate my answer as you desired.  I do know that you can skip the rating.  Most people do.
Again, best wishes, Jimmy.



---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: Reintarnation! (that’s being reborn as a hillbilly)…who’s Jimmy?
Are you Jimmy?  Am I Jimmy?  Did we jimmy up the window of the airless room of airtight theology and try to climb out?

If, as the Cathechism of the Catholic Church references, there is ONLY ONE scriptural passage, and that is just ONE SENTENCE from a letter of St. Paul which is rather pastel opaque, if we ask us…and here it us, served up nice and hot:   27And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment

Which if you look in context is regard the question of whether Christ suffers and suffered continuously for the sins of the world, or once done, then done…

Then we hopefully won’t be so ready to roll out the instruments of the inquisition against what might be one-third of the human race who do “believe in” reincarnation.

In fact, we’d look much more genially and possibly more closely, at our own Catholic/Christian doctrine and recognize that IF (as the Faith teaches and we recite in the Creed—please note this is not establish fact, but faith)…if there is a resurrection of the body, then we are (somehow) “back in the meat”…carne meaning “meat”…Carnival meaning “vale” meat (Latin) farewell to meat, i.e. Mardi Gras, i.e. Fat Tuesday, the day before Ash Wednesday.  Farewell to the meat is death.  The resurrection of the body is back in the meat…and if that don’t sound like re-in-carne-ation, I’ll eat Jeb’s hat!  And if we’re gonna not swat that fly, we still have to ponder what it means to say we live for Eternity in some other state…heaven or hell, assuming we have made parole from purgatory, those that gotta do time in the halfway house…what we and how?  How and in what are we alive for eternity?

OK.  I’m almost all petered out.  The point is, I know GOOD, strong in their faith Catholics who are utterly dismissive of other religions, other peoples, entire continents almost and of course billions down through time, for their beliefs, since it’s manifestly obvious to said Catholics that their argument, balanced on the head of a pin, pops the balloon of pagan heresy.  If we just took one step back from the brink, and let them be…we might actually be fulfilling Jesus’s commandments to us (how many? C’mon, how many?)  No, not two…please review the Last Supper texts, where Jesus closes the loophole.  (If I hate myself I’m free to hate my neighbor!)  no we are not free to hate our neighbor.  We are not free to brand them as heretics and burn them at the stake, for the sake of impounding all their worldly goods, ala the Spanish Inquisition (one of 11 inquisitions as I thought I read somewhere)…

No.  In fact, if we thought about it one matchhead further…what difference does it make if there is reincarnation or not?  I’m only alive in this one life NOW.  If my brother across the way wants to believe in reincarnation, does that really change anything, for him or for me?  Cannot have God set up the Cosmos as God wishes, and didn’t Jesus say:  “In my Father’s House there are many mansions.  If it had not been so, I would not have said it.”

Jesus does not laugh off the questions that tend toward revealing the possibility of reincarnation.  Neither does he endorse them.  It doesn’t matter to Jesus who someone was…but who he is now, and she is now…that’s why Jesus can sit down with prostitutes, tax collectors and sinners…while theologians are busy grabbing for the bug spray and the hand cleaner.  Amen.


Answer
Please excuse me for misspelling, Jiminy.
I am at a loss as to how to respond to your concerns.
I can only rest on two basic points of Catholic faith/teaching:
1 -- Reincarnation is not part of that faith.
2 -- God decides who goes to the eternal, supernatural happiness of heaven.  God wills that all people be saved and come to a knowledge of the truth -- 1 Timothy 2:4.
Best wishes.