Rebirth

Hinduism and Buddhism have strong beliefs in the concepts of rebirth. According to the ancient religious texts of Hinduism, the body is not the real man, but it is the soul, the body is just like a cloth that the soul changes and that the soul moves from one birth to another.

The concept of rebirth is closely related to the concept of Karma and Soul. Now Karma is any action that is done which produces a result. Every Karma has good and bad results, but basically there is good Karma and there is bad Karma. The examples of good karma are speaking truth, donating food and clothes to the poor, helping others etc. The examples of bad karma are lying, treachery, cheating, killing others etc.

However one must understand that no Karma is 100% good or 100% bad. For example, while donating food and clothes to the needy is an excellent act of kindness, when done too much may make people lazy or donating money to people who would misuse them becomes bad Karma.

Similarly some bad actions can have good results. For example, speaking a lie for a good purpose is better than a thousand truths. A real life example is I know about a kid who once stole money from his mother's wallet, to give it to his friend who actually used the money to pay his exam fees and was only then able to give the exam and pass it.

The boy who stole the money was badly beaten up and punished by his mother. After passing the exam the other boy got a job and he came to this boy's home with a box of sweets and returned the money that he borrowed.

The boy who stole the money actually had lied to his mother that he spent all the money. Had he not lied to his mother and stole the money, his friend won't have been able to give the exam and he would have never got the job. The lie that the boy told his mother changed his friend's life. Such a lie that is told for good purpose is worth more than a thousand truths.

So basically in Hindu and Buddhist philosophies it was believed that every man/woman had a rebirth depending on the Karma that he has done. The cycle of birth, death and rebirth continued till the person attained moksha or nirvana by the effect of his/her virtuous Karma.

We do observe in nature that each and every action produces a reaction. There are thousands of examples of people recalling their past lives like this news report News Of Rebirth
. There are many great spiritual giants like Swami Vivekananda, Sri Ramakrishna who have confirmed the theory of rebirth.

In our lives we see examples of kids 3 or 4 years old born with exceptional talents. Some are excellent painters, some can sing and play musical instruments wonderfully well. In fact so well that even adults cannot match their levels of excellence.

Here is example of six year old Niharika Nath, just listen to the song,  very few adults can match her (Niharika song ). 

So the question is from where do this kids get this talents? Talent really is a mere word or excuse to run away from an explanation of the phenomenon. Definitely it is their past life work or actions that they have done, that has resulted in their present talents.

All the monks and spiritual masters of India worked with one target in mind, liberation of the soul from the cycle of birth and death. They believed that their meditations, prayers etc. would ultimately result in them attaining the state of moksha(or nirvana), if not in this birth then in the next birth. Till today there are millions who follow this theory and carry out their spiritual practices.

According to Swami Vivekananda the memory of our previous birth is stored in our subconscious mind which the Yogi(a high end Rajyoga practitioner) can realize by constant practice and celibacy. Although knowledge of past birth may not always be that good.

One day surely science will discover the phenomenon and mechanism of rebirth. I just hope that day comes soon and it happens in my lifetime. 

Wonderful things done through Dreams

Srinivasa Ramanujan 

Srinivasa Ramanujan a great Indian mathematician was devout follower  Namagiri Thayar the deity of Namakkal temple. Ramanujan used to get the solutions of the mathematical problems in his dreams. When GH Hardy asked him to come to England, he being an orthodox Brahmin went to his mother to ask for permission. But the superstitious people of India in those time were religiously barred from crossing the sea. However Ramanujan's mother had a dream where the goddess of Namakkal temple asked her to let her son cross the sea.

Sensei who can make animals go to sleep 

     Below I have inserted a Youtube link of a video that shows how this Chi master from Japan can make animals go to sleep without touching them. He says that he got the knowledge of this power while he was asleep. 

The structure of Benzene

Benzene structure

        Fedrich Augustine Kekule' the scientist who discovered the structure of Benzene' , had a dream while working on the subject. In his own words :

"...I was sitting writing on my textbook, but the work did not progress; my thoughts were elsewhere. I turned my chair to the fire and dozed. Again the atoms were gamboling before my eyes. This time the smaller groups kept modestly in the background. My mental eye, rendered more acute by the repeated visions of the kind, could now distinguish larger structures of manifold conformation; long rows sometimes more closely fitted together all twining and twisting in snake-like motion. But look! What was that? One of the snakes had seized hold of its own tail, and the form whirled mockingly before my eyes. As if by a flash of lightning I awoke; and this time also I spent the rest of the night in working out the consequences of the hypothesis"

Dr Otto Lowei

Dr Otto Lowei

    Dr Otto Lowei won Noble prize for Physiology or Medicine for discovering the neurotransmitter acetylcholine. Earlier it was unknown whether nerve impulses are transmitted electrically or chemically. He dissected the beating hearts of two frogs one with vagus nerve(the vagus nerve controls the heart rate) another heart was on its own. Both the hearts were bathed in Ringer's solution and then the vagus nerve of the first heart was electrically simulated , the heart beat slower. Lowei took some of the liquid form the first heart and then applied it to the second heart. On applying the liquid the second heart beat slower . Thus it became clear that some chemical from the vagus nerve was controlling the rate of heart beats. The chemical was initially called Vagusstoff which was later found to acetylcholine.

       Now Lowei said the motivation for the experiment came to him in a dream in his own words :

"The night before Easter Sunday of that year I awoke, turned on the light, and jotted down a few notes on a tiny slip of paper. Then I fell asleep again. It occurred to me at 6 o'clock in the morning that during the night I had written down something most important, but I was unable to decipher the scrawl. The next night, at 3 o'clock, the idea returned. It was the design of an experiment to determine whether or not the hypothesis of chemical transmission that I had uttered 17 years ago was correct. I got up immediately, went to the laboratory, and performed a single experiment on a frog's heart according to the nocturnal design."

[I will include more wonderful things that happened being inspired by dreams on this post very soon.]

[Updating this post with more wonderful dreams]

 I live in a state of India called West Bengal and I am a great fan and follower of Swami Vivekananda. So when I think about great dreams how do I forget great dreams associated with this man. So I will put some dreams that are associated with Swami Vivekananda his guru Ramakrishna Paramhamsa. 

   Swami Vivekananda's guru Ramakrishna Paramhamsa was a priest of the Dakshineshwar Kali temple . Now there is a divine dream connection to the Dakshineswar Kali temple. Rani Rashmoni was preparing to leave for Kashi to express her devotions to the divine mother , the night before she had a dream in which the Divine Mother appeared in front for her and said 

"There is no need to go to Banaras. Install my statue in a beautiful temple on the banks of the Ganges river and arrange for my worship there. Then I shall manifest myself in the image and accept worship at that place."

Rani Rashmoni

Dakshineshwar Temple

    Rani Rashmoni followed the instructions bought 20 acres of land on the banks of the Ganga River and got a temple built there. Ramkumar Chattopadhay was the chief priest in time he brought in his younger brother Gadadhar Chattopadhay(Gadai) to assist him, Ramkumar died in some after that Gadai who later went on to become Ramakrishna Paramhamsa became the chief priest. Ramakrishna stayed there as a priest till his death. Dakshineshwar is the same temple when Swami Vivekanda(then Narendranath Dutta) and other boys were trained by Ramakrishna Paramhamsa who later on went ahead to build the Ramakrishna Mission. 

Swami Vivekananda

     Swami Vivekananda was adviced by many people including Maharaja Ajay Singh of Kehtri to visit US to attain the Parliament of Religions. While in an uncertain state of mind one night he had a dream:

(The following is an excerpt from Swami Nikhilananda's biography of Swami Vivekananda)

"The Swami one day had a symbolic dream, in which he saw Sri Ramakrishna walking into the water of the ocean and beckoning him to follow. He also heard the authoritative word 'Go!' In response to a letter that he had written to Sarada Devi, the Holy Mother, she gave him her blessings for the fulfilment of his desire, knowing that it was Ramakrishna's wish that he should undertake thejourney to America. And now, at last, he felt sure of his call."